Blue Mage the All rounder?

[chrismercenary]

Could blue mage work similar to the crystal exarch's role?

[Cled-cat]

I’d like that, maybe only let a caster version be used for high end content but in most other stuff it could have set abilities to use for each role. Would need more healing spells and defensive cooldowns but would be a hell of a lot better than the mess it is now.

[AnimaAnimus]

I made a three role system suggestion for blue mage long before it was released. Dancer too.

These two jobs could have easily fit any role and could have switched between them with little effort. Blue mage having a spell set for tanking, healing, dpsing and dancer having stances and dances for the different roles. Whatever role they are fulfilling being locked as soon as they get the entering instance notification. It would make things super easy as they would only have to design one job essentially.

Let's face it tho, SE isn't really...imaginative or ground breaking in class design. They rely on already existing classes for the most part and a whole lot of cliches. Red Mage could have been absolutely amazing as a battle mage, using en-spells to enhance dps and rotating between casting and melee. But instead we got basically a black mage in a fancy hat. Sure it has a (lackluster) melee rotation and a raise, but those are mostly afterthoughts. Even the red mage's sword becomes....a staff. They couldn't have made the job more unimaginative.

So a three role job would be quite a stretch albeit exciting.

[nalol]

Let's face it tho, SE isn't really...imaginative or ground breaking in class design.

because of class balance.

plus already when it's so easy to change classes ... u don't give different roles to a class. In a game like WoW .. it makes sense, since 1 toon has only 1 class. in here it makes no sense at all to give multiple roles to a class ... then u struggle with balance adding the risk of having only 1 viable role.

but class balance is a big limitation to creativity

[AnimaAnimus]

because of class balance.

plus already when it's so easy to change classes ... u don't give different roles to a class. In a game like WoW .. it makes sense, since 1 toon has only 1 class. in here it makes no sense at all to give multiple roles to a class ... then u struggle with balance adding the risk of having only 1 viable role.

but class balance is a big limitation to creativity

Not really tho. I mean you can do something different on a superficial basis. Look at ast, how many games have healers running around with star globes and cards? I am not talking about the function of a job but the way it is presented. You can still have a dps but does it need to be just like every other dps? MMOs in general are horrible when it comes to class design. Mostly the devs check boxes more than doing something fun. You can have the old standards, but throw at least a little something different in there now and then.

Was there a reason to make Red Mage into a budget black mage? You can still have balance and have rdm be a caster without falling back on the old "is casting magic, must give staff" trope. Esp for a job like rdm which has such a rich and varied background. Not all casters need books and staffs.

[dinnertime]

Right now I think the closest we can get from that is if ever Blue Mage gets reworked into full-pledged job, it's still classified as a DPS but has the ability to (somewhat) both tank or heal if they wish, but get penalized in the effectiveness of the other two roles they didn't choose. It will probably just cause chaos though.

Was there a reason to make Red Mage into a budget black mage? You can still have balance and have rdm be a caster without falling back on the old "is casting magic, must give staff" trope. Esp for a job like rdm which has such a rich and varied background. Not all casters need books and staffs.

I mean...Red Mage is technically a budget Black Mage (and White Mage) so it's not like it's wrong, but I love how they presented it in FFXIV even if it can't really fulfill the healer/support role that much. I just wish they expanded on it more than just add one new skill on their rotation.

[Silver-Strider]

because of class balance.

plus already when it's so easy to change classes ... u don't give different roles to a class. In a game like WoW .. it makes sense, since 1 toon has only 1 class. in here it makes no sense at all to give multiple roles to a class ... then u struggle with balance adding the risk of having only 1 viable role.

but class balance is a big limitation to creativity

This would matter if BLU wasn't already trampling on the Trinity System with a Tank Stance/Emnity Skill, AoE heal and a blend of Physical and Magical Damage littered throughout its toolkit. SE could rework the majority of BLU current spells and change them to better suit an all around job that can function as a Tank/Healer/DPS as need be with a quick swap out of its spells. It's not as though BLU doesn't have 6 different versions of the same skill with only the minimalist of differences between them anyways so why not adjust them to fit into the all around role and make BLU actually something useful, even if only for the lower level stuff?

[Jandor]

This would matter if BLU wasn't already trampling on the Trinity System with a Tank Stance/Emnity Skill, AoE heal and a blend of Physical and Magical Damage littered throughout its toolkit.

It's hardly trampling the trinity though, it can't take aggro from a tank, it can't tank as well as a tank and it can't replace a healer with just one expensive AoE heal.

SE could rework the majority of BLU current spells and change them to better suit an all around job that can function as a Tank/Healer/DPS as need be with a quick swap out of its spells. It's not as though BLU doesn't have 6 different versions of the same skill with only the minimalist of differences between them anyways so why not adjust them to fit into the all around role and make BLU actually something useful, even if only for the lower level stuff?

It's not going to happen though, this is a dev team that thinks hitting monsters to gain skills is such a incredibly radical departure from the norm that the job has to be restricted from all current content and remain at least 20 levels below level cap for the foreseeable future.

[Silver-Strider]

It's hardly trampling the trinity though, it can't take aggro from a tank, it can't tank as well as a tank and it can't replace a healer with just one expensive AoE heal.

I wouldn't expect a Jack of All Trades to do better than a specialty role. With how SE adjusted Aggro to be tied into Tank Stances more, it only makes sense that a Tank would hold aggro better than a BLU due to the fact that BLU has 1 skill that builds Emnity (I think its only 1) vs Tanks that build it passively thru their rotation. As for Healing, yes White Wind is an expensive AoE heal and could never replace a true healer either but again, it shouldn't have the complete capabilities of a Healer as a Jack of All Trades so I can live with that.

What I want for SE to do though is to make it so BLU can somewhat fill these roles by adjusting their current toolkit. They could easily adjust Transfer to be a non-lethal Single Target Heal, make Wonder Guard build Emnity with all skills, and adjust the Stats of BLU gear to be all purpose gear, being a blend of VIT, INT, and MND just to give BLU a starting basis to work with. As for the whole Learning from Monster aspect, its not as though some enemies don't heal/buff each other that we couldn't learn these skills from them either to keep that part of BLU true to the source material as possible and then there's always the possibility of introducing more Whalaqee Totem skills as well.

The idea of making BLU a Jack of All Trades is very much possible, SE just needs to be willing to make the adjustments is all.

[Duelle]

These two jobs could have easily fit any role and could have switched between them with little effort. Blue mage having a spell set for tanking, healing, dpsing and dancer having stances and dances for the different roles. Whatever role they are fulfilling being locked as soon as they get the entering instance notification. It would make things super easy as they would only have to design one job essentially.

In the context of BLU, you'd need a solid set of mechanics for that to work. Either that or a framework that plays the same regardless of role, which I admit is untried and iffy at best.

Off the top of my head, you could probably bunch certain spells into a rotation using monster affinity as a determining factor. As you suggested, creating spell sets for each role, with the Masked Carnivale allowing you access to every spell at the same time. The trick then becomes which role to make the default BLU role (I'd go for caster DPS), then decide on how this multi-role thing would be implemented (assuming regular gameplay with no detours builds caster DPS BLU, the tank and healer options wouldn't show up unless you've collected requisite spells for it; maybe use a hunting log-type system for it that updates itself per expansion).

Let's face it tho, SE isn't really...imaginative or ground breaking in class design. They rely on already existing classes for the most part and a whole lot of cliches. Red Mage could have been absolutely amazing as a battle mage, using en-spells to enhance dps and rotating between casting and melee. But instead we got basically a black mage in a fancy hat. Sure it has a (lackluster) melee rotation and a raise, but those are mostly afterthoughts. Even the red mage's sword becomes....a staff. They couldn't have made the job more unimaginative.

I'd say it's more that classes are built within a certain framework, which can work for or against a job. It's sort of like writing 5 stories that have the same pacing and conflicts, but involve completely different characters; the outline will work for certain characters but not for others (leading to stories that drag on or feel forced).

but class balance is a big limitation to creativity

Class balance has nothing to do with limits in design. If you want a class to do something, you figure out how to make that happen within the framework you set, not shrug your shoulders and say "it can't be done". There's ways BLU could have been implemented within the design approach for the other jobs, with a couple of twists to allow the job to come into its own.

And because I couldn't resist:

I mean...Red Mage is technically a budget Black Mage (and White Mage) so it's not like it's wrong, but I love how they presented it in FFXIV even if it can't really fulfill the healer/support role that much. I just wish they expanded on it more than just add one new skill on their rotation.

On a triangular graph where WAR, BLM, and WHM stand on each tip of the triangle, RDM would be smack in the middle. I'd argue they leaned too much on the magical side of the job, especially since the job is supposed to be several tiers behind BLM and WHM, not have their own versions of each school's most powerful spells (Flare and Holy). To compensate for lacking that mastery of magic, they have some melee prowess and are hardier than your average mage (the former horribly underrepresented in this game, the latter non-existent since RDM was put on "of Casting" gear).