7.0 BLM Changes will kill the job

[Galvuu]

I feel like this game is allergic to any manner of skill ceiling or skill expression in its job design. It's really tragic...

[wezzco]

I really hope they make it so any spell under Umbral Ice phase regens MP.

If they leave it as is, it would change NOTHING for standard, just killing the fun part of BLM optimization which is non-standard gameplay.

[Daralii]

I feel like this game is allergic to any manner of skill ceiling or skill expression in its job design. It's really tragic...

Players that don't want to do research, practice, or read their tooltips and job gauge descriptions are plentiful, vocal, and spend a lot of money on microtransactions.

[Envinyon]

I haven't posted here before, but I play black mage quite a bit. I wanted to explain the issues the job MIGHT have, just based on the information we have now. I understand we might be lacking information that will make these concerns unwarranted, but I'd rather get the feedback out now, and if I'm wrong in these concerns, then I'm wrong and I'll have fun with the job.

-Making it so MP regenerates when using ice spells potentially kills using transpose to go into Umbral Ice and go back to Astral Fire without ever using ice spells. This is both a stronger rotation and is fantastic for movement, as you don't have to hardcast blizzard 3 or 4 and instead are using instant casts like Xenoglossy and Thunder 3 proc to fill time while your MP ticks up

-New gauge might force you to do 6 Fire 4s in each astral fire. This is highly dependent on how much potency the new cast is, and whether or not you lose this gauge when going to umbral ice. If you lose it, it means you can't have shorter astral fire phases in order to align yourself with mechanics better otherwise you lose potentially a lot of damage.

-How does black mage handle in lower level fights? What if you're going into P6 of TOP, you just used Despair and then the cutscene happens? Are you just standing there with your enochian dropped and no MP? What about phase transitions in general? Are we going to have to make sure to end phases with using ice spells? Umbral Soul might give you MP. What about the two level 70 ultimates? Black Mage already has it pretty rough in these, the idea of starting phases with very little or no MP, or not being able to just immediately go into astral fire would feel bad.

Overall, it feels like these two things would make black mage significantly more rigid and restrictive, and making its functionality just a lot worse in any fight that might have downtime or cutscenes. It makes the job potentially less interesting to optimize but also much harder for newer players. While I think wanting the rotation to not be subjected to MP ticks is good, the implementation as described creates other problems. I do have some suggestions for fixing this. Regenerating MP in umbral ice should be done by using ANY cast while in ice. This would make it so standard and non-standard rotations are possible. For the new fire gauge, since we don't know how it fully works right now, I'll suggest that we should keep the charges when we go to umbral ice. That way we could do a short astral fire phase, go into umbral ice, and then pick things back up when we transition back to astral fire. Also, umbral soul should be an ability you get much earlier. It's something I honestly have wanted anyways, and doing this would solve any issues of not having MP in lower level fights in between phases or downtime.

I'm not incredibly worried about things because this does create legitimate functionality issues, its not just "simplification". If it launches like this, it will not take long for complaints to pile up. Hopefully between media tour feedback and feedback now, they can ensure the job is still as fun as it is now.

[Galvuu]

snip

I've been giving this some thought, and there are so many issues. For example, I'd usually end p1 and p3 in TOP with a Despair, Tpose and just Umbral Soul once, and let my mana regenerate while blasting Xenos/Paradox and do a Transpose line. Situations like these (short downtimes between phases where you want to end on a burst) are horrible now, because if you don't have enough time spam enough Umbral Souls (and I'm being charitable and assuming that Umbral Soul regenerates MP) you open a phase spamming your very weak ice gcds to get your mana back.
Another thing that will be bothersome is stuff like Lost Flare Star in Delubrum Reginae Savage (yes, very niche content, I know), since using it will force you to spam Ice spells (that, again, are very un-impactful).

I'm not even gonna bother with how much I (and, I assume, most BLMs) relied on some non-standard lines to generate free movement through instant casts (proc/xeno > transpose > paradox > proc/xeno > transpose > proc) in movement-heavy 100% uptime phases like p6 top, superchain (first and II-A) in Athena, and so forth.

It really feels like a knee-jerk, short-sighted change to me, and after the Abyssos 8S door boss fiasco (and, if you wanna pull further back, 4.0 BLM where the timers were so tight and potencies so low that Blizzard IV was a trap), I have no faith this won't be horrible in some capacity until they do 1837 adjustments that never recover the old feel of the job and also never fully fix this new issue they created.

[4clubbedace]

Why are they wanting to change it? I thought it was yoshida's favorite ? BLM is my 3rd favorite class so this is a bit lame.
Unless they are upping ice potency, it feels like a nerf to the class.

its because non standard is not standard for a reason, its both dependent on your internet and keeping track of ticks (and more often than not, that later one uses less than wanted means)

if the mana gained in ice is 2 spells than it barely affects anything.

[OgruMogru]

Forget nonstandard lines and if they should or shouldn't exist. How is any player of any skill level supposed to contend with no mana regen during any downtime?

[Myrany]

Forget nonstandard lines and if they should or shouldn't exist. How is any player of any skill level supposed to contend with no mana regen during any downtime?

This is what I am giving a wait and see, and also what I am concerned about. It depends quite a bit on exactly how it plays out.

[4clubbedace]

Forget nonstandard lines and if they should or shouldn't exist. How is any player of any skill level supposed to contend with no mana regen during any downtime?

Umbral soul is a spell

[Sjol]

Currently Ice Spells have a mana cost which prevents them from being used when you have 0 mana unless you're in Astral. But if they cost 0 always and give mana instead, then you just pick up your rotation where you left off after a cutscene or interruption.

I'm sure there are things they've missed in the job changes, but what's described and the fact that Yoshi plays it himself makes me think that they haven't missed really obvious stuff with BLM. Other jobs, sure, but BLM seems less likely.

Honestly, this was something I was expecting given where their job design was going. MP seems to be a legacy system they're trying to design around since it's hard to incorporate that kind of meter into every design.