Scared to try black mage

[monk-dps]

Just as the title says, extremely scared/worried about trying another role. I leveled monk to 80 and while I'm loving the job, I want to try different things. I got THM to 12 and unlocked Arc but I'm worried about stepping into these roles. Dnc has been fun but I feel like I suck because I do such tiny damage. Only time I didn't feel like I was bad was when I was grouped up with an ungeared sam and he was always number 4 on the hate list. And dead most of the time.

My question is I know blackmage is top deeps, but is it fun to play/easy to learn for a new player?

[Elladie]

In my experience BLM Is the hardest DPS to play well by a long way. It requires you to know every fight extremely well so that you can minimise the amount you need to move in an effective way. There are amazing BLMs out there and it's awesome if you get one in a run. But awesome BLMs are few and far between

It's also not fun to play - for me - for the same reason. I am not in any way an awesome BLM, I don't have a script in my head for every fight in every dungeon, and so I constantly mess up my rotation and nerf my damage. Which I find not enjoyable at all

[dinnertime]

BLM in my opinion isn't that hard. It has a steady learning curve if you level it up naturally. It's incredibly simple at lower levels and starts to have depth at around 60...but not that much. At level 80, one of BLM's weakness which is mobility doesn't become much of a problem anymore, to a point it's the most mobile caster (dethroning SMN) in optimal play.

If you want to try out an easier caster, play RDM. SMN is said to be the most difficult out of the three so you might want so sit that out until you feel more comfortable with the caster role.

[Zyneste]

Black Mage is the easiest it has ever been. The worst part about the job is the leveling experience, it turns your optimal rotation on its side every 5-10 levels. It has a couple dead skills like Fire II, Blizzard II and Blizzard.

Once you hit 80 it all fits together nicely and its performs really well. HW Blackmage level difficulty is dead.

The biggest part about BLM is the biggest part about all classes! If you understand how to keep your GCD rolling [Also known as ABC, Always be casting!] youll be successful on any class, magical or physical.

[Zerathor]

blm can be difficult, but in a different way to other jobs imo. Depending on the type of player you are, you may find it very difficult, or possibly even easier. Its the only dps in this game that plays like a caster imo. Something with longer cast times that just wants to anchor to the ground and become a turret.

The core rotation? Likely the easiest in the game. The difficulty comes from knowing how to move, and where to weave ogcds as there aren't many opportunities for blm to weave their ogcds, as well as times to modify your rotation to get more damage if a boss is about to jump (but i think every job deals with this in some way).

Its also hard to gauge how much you'll enjoy blm while leveling it up, as its play style changes a good bit through the levels.

Also, don't be afraid of the notion that blm has to know a fight very well to do well in it. Knowing a fight helps anyone, but to be able to adapt on blm in a fight while you're learning it you just keep your mobility options available and do mild tweaks on the second run to optimize a little more damage if you can identify spots to. General rule while you're at level 80 learning a fight is to just keep at least one polygot ready, and that can give you a gcd's worth of movement on demand without any clipping. Keeping a triple cast open can weave that xeno into a triple, into a swift, to a sharp fire off the swift to get an ensured fire 3 proc. That's 6 gcd's of movement, 7 if you have another polygot open, so it can be very mobile if you set yourself up for it. Theres a lot of fine tuning you can do on a fight, but playing it safe the first time through wont really hurt your damage much.

[Miminming]

Blm is only hard if you try to maximize is up too 100% and even so its not the hardest as some people say (just need difference adjustment for every fight) but atm even if you perform badly it'll probably on oar with an okay smn/rdm, so... just fire iv things

[monk-dps]

Thanks for the replies. I'll look into all of that and if possible keep you guys updated. So far at 12 I'm getting the hang of it but I'll keep note that it changes in higher levels. So far now it's kindof relaxing compared to my monk. Tho the cast times is something I'm getting used too.

[Zerathor]

Thanks for the replies. I'll look into all of that and if possible keep you guys updated. So far at 12 I'm getting the hang of it but I'll keep note that it changes in higher levels. So far now it's kindof relaxing compared to my monk. Tho the cast times is something I'm getting used too.

It'll feel really clunky until you get fire 3 and blizzard 3. After that it at least flows well enough.

[Samsta]

The difficulty of black mage doesn't come from the rotation, which I find really easy, but from the requirement of fight knowledge, and even that is not so set in stone now that you have more free movement utilities than ever, I wouldn't be scared, it's not that hard, it's just that it's difficulty comes from entirely different place than most dps.

[Seku]

If it's fun to play and easy to learn is subjective to the person.

My suggestion is to stop being afraid, pick up the job and learn it and decide for yourself. Just make sure to read your skill descriptions to know your AoE rotation and single target rotation. When you get to about 60 go and look up a video or seek guidance on optimizing the rotation. No one picks up a class and instantly knows how to play it and everyone makes mistakes while trying to optimize the class in different situations. If anyone else tells you other wise, their lying.