I'd love to do the duels but I'm not keen on the idea of spending an hour+ to maybe get the CE chain to spawn just for a 10% chance to even get chosen for the duel.
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turtleantGunpla Dadis the best.Registered Userregular
Roegadyn
And then you can't get in any practice and inevitably eat shit and weeeeeeeeelp.
They should pop way, WAY more frequently if nothing else.
Bozja is made up of a lot of little pieces that seem fine individually, that are then glued together in the stupidest way possible. I'm frankly baffled by a lot of the design decisions that define that place.
I'd like to see all of the story some day, but the amount of stupid grindy shit I'd have to do to reach that point, not even accounting for future additions in other patches, seems insurmountable. So in that sense, I guess it's they preserved the feel of Eureka perfectly despite the actual structural differences.
Desert Leviathan on
Realizing lately that I don't really trust or respect basically any of the moderators here. So, good luck with life, friends! Hit me up on Twitter @DesertLeviathan
it's also saddled with some of the awkwardness of blue mage in general, where it's this big solo content that you have to do after you talk people into taking you into multiplayer content as blu
What is funny to me about BLU is that I can sort of see how it may have played if it was a full job.
So, like, a really powerful spell you can pick up in the hard mode Library is Condensed Libra. It gives the target one of 3 elemental weakness suites: Umbral (Ice, Water, Earth), Astral (Fire, Lightning, Wind), and Physical. That lets you do much more damage with spells that have those elements. Also, some spells attempt to have a combo element to them. Northerlies freezes targets that have the Dropsy effect from Aqua Breath. Black Knight’s Tour hits extra hard if the enemy is suffering a status ailment from White Knight’s Tour. And a few others. One main issue is that the combos tend to not really be all that great in practice; the payoffs are too minor for requirements like moving around or removing a debuff.
If we had got a BLU that acts as a normal job, I think we could have leaned into those ideas. You could have spells that chain into each other in a particular elemental set (Aqua Breath into Northerlies into Plaincracker, for example. Flying Frenzy into Sharpened Knife for another.) that cause increasing amounts of damage if you do them in the right sequence. And you would use Consenses Libra to gain a random elemental buff (Weakness Perception: Umbral, doe instance), and pick your combo accordingly. Non-elemental stuff like Song of Torment would still be important. And I think even the Primal spells would still work. Say they can be used during your Libra buff, but they’re so powerful that they overload your elemental sensitivity and cancel the buff, so you’d need to use it right at the tail end of the buff.
But what about Self-Destruct and Final Sting? Well, maybe those could still exist, as they currently do. Big damage, but you die. Really neat when messing about and for cheesing Carnivale Targets, but not so good for actually running raids. Well, maybe there could be a way to gain a buff that allows you to perform those actions once without dying. Maybe you build up to it by successfully doing your elemental chains, and you get the buff after running through all 3 elemental sets successfully. This would make those skills a huge reward for doing the elemental loops correctly; one huge blast that you could augment with your other boosts. And this fits with the concept of BLU as a caster that is always analyzing monster techniques. By fighting and analyzing the target, they can find the right time and right way to deploy a highly dangerous spell without dying. Libra fits this as well; Blue Mage even had a Scan ability in FFV.
There’s a game plan for a unique caster that stands alongside the others in some of these Spell interactions. We’re never going to get that — BLU’s too far down its current rabbit hole — but I can see how it might’ve worked. And maybe we can get some better spell combos as we get level 70 BLU.
Bozja isn't quite as grindy as it appears when you first look at the numbers, since the mettle rewards you get scale with your rank. Going from rank 14 to 15 I was getting around 15k mettle per CE.
Running Bozja alone has been rather dreary to me. Running it with some friends on voice chat, running around doing fates and figuring out CEs as they pop has been a ton of fun.
Being able to go from 50 to 60 doing level 50 quests because of the Road to 70 buff, meant I had been level 60 for a lot of quests before I could enter Ishgard. Which is the point I needed to reach in the MSQ to unlock the Lily mechanic that White Mages get. Now I am looking at the next two quest givers for the MSQ and thinking I want to do something else for a bit. I kind of feel like I burned myself out on MSQ stuff.
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turtleantGunpla Dadis the best.Registered Userregular
Roegadyn
The worst part about BLU is that they knecapped the class so hard to "preserve the style and flavor" and then it doesn't even do what makes Blue Mage fun in the old FF games anyway.
Like, the whole reason Blue Magic is such a fan favorite is because it had so many weird spells that were kind of clunky but maybe broken in certain circumstances.
In 14 like half of BLU's spells are just the same line or cone or orb AOEs with different elements or maybe a status effect. And the weird shit that is in there doesn't work half the time or is just bad.
Like, Bad Breath should be cool, but then you realize that half the status effects dont even actually do anything to monsters, poison is so low damage it might as well not exist, and there are much better ways to get paralysis onto enemies. So back in the book it goes, never to be seen again and you just use mindblast to paralyze things.
The worst part about BLU is that they knecapped the class so hard to "preserve the style and flavor" and then it doesn't even do what makes Blue Mage fun in the old FF games anyway.
Like, the whole reason Blue Magic is such a fan favorite is because it had so many weird spells that were kind of clunky but maybe broken in certain circumstances.
In 14 like half of BLU's spells are just the same line or cone or orb AOEs with different elements or maybe a status effect. And the weird shit that is in there doesn't work half the time or is just bad.
Like, Bad Breath should be cool, but then you realize that half the status effects dont even actually do anything to monsters, poison is so low damage it might as well not exist, and there are much better ways to get paralysis onto enemies. So back in the book it goes, never to be seen again and you just use mindblast to paralyze things.
Bad Breath, I've come to understand, is something you take as a tank BLU. True, you generally don't need it for normal dungeon mobs, because Ram's Voice exists and completely incapacitates almost all groups. But the Malodorous debuff, which reduces damage output, seems to work on everything, has no diminishing returns, and is just generically useful for a tank to apply to the target.
But yeah, a lot of the spells are variants on the same thing, just with a different element and/or a different status ailment. Heck, I have 2 Primal skills (Eruption and Feather Rain), and they ultimately do the same amount of damage in the same AOE. I think, for most non-carnivale stuff, you really just need Water Cannon, Electrogenisis, and Drill Cannons, to make use of Condensed Libra's effects for damage. Then, Sonic Boom and Sharpened Knife, to weave the few things that aren't GCD spells. Song of Torment + Bristle for an actually good DOT. Any one Primal spell for extra damage. And finally, Ram's Voice, if you're up against any sort of group situation and want to stop them in place. Any other damage spells are mostly personal preference or if a particular status is useful.
I would use stuff like White Knight's Tour and Black Knight's Tour, but space is tight, and their combo quickly falls prey to diminishing returns on statuses, if they work at all on the target.
That's why I think a normal-job version of BLU would have elements go in a specific combo pattern, to make them useful at different times, or in conjunction with each other.
And yeah, I get it, BLU ain't balanced for shit, but that seems like a weird choice. When I played Blue Mage in Final Fantasy V, it was never a good thing when I got a new spell and it turned out to be useless when compared to spamming Aero spells. I loved spells like Dark Spark, Aqua Breath, Death Claw, or Aera. Not so much stuff like Moon Flute or Flamethrower. And in this game, I don't enjoy getting Alpine Draft only to find that I have better spells that hit its weakness or its AOE shape.
Moon Flute was hilarious in that game, though, but for the wrong reasons. When you first encounter it, the enemy uses it, and it drives your entire team berserk. So then you learn it. And when you cast it, it drives your entire team berserk. It's not a spell that targets; it's a spell that effects your team, no matter who casts it.
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admanbunionize your workplaceSeattle, WARegistered Userregular
The worst part about BLU is that they knecapped the class so hard to "preserve the style and flavor" and then it doesn't even do what makes Blue Mage fun in the old FF games anyway.
Like, the whole reason Blue Magic is such a fan favorite is because it had so many weird spells that were kind of clunky but maybe broken in certain circumstances.
In 14 like half of BLU's spells are just the same line or cone or orb AOEs with different elements or maybe a status effect. And the weird shit that is in there doesn't work half the time or is just bad.
Like, Bad Breath should be cool, but then you realize that half the status effects dont even actually do anything to monsters, poison is so low damage it might as well not exist, and there are much better ways to get paralysis onto enemies. So back in the book it goes, never to be seen again and you just use mindblast to paralyze things.
Honestly that sounds exactly the same as Blue Mage in any other Final Fantasy game.
The Blue Mage design in FF11 was a lot of fun, aside from the initial hassle of acquiring spells, which is something they're never going to get to feel right for 100% of players no matter how they implement it. But any kind of Blue Mage runs directly counter to the bedrock principle of current FF14 class balance - that every single member of a class is identical. My Dragoon has the exact same powers as every other Dragoon in existence. My Red Mage uses his tool kit the same way every other Red Mage ever uses theirs. The only build variance, aside from players hamstringing themselves by failing to do their job quests and unlock powers, is via Materia. And that only comes into play at the bleeding edge of top-tier content. And even then, optimization becomes standardized pretty much immediately, so there's only really variance in the couple of days while people are figuring out the new plan whenever the item level cap gets raised.
A build-your-own-class kit like Blue Mage can never fit into that framework, unless they did something drastic like making all the enemies with necessary spells conveniently appear in your Job Quests so that it was fundamentally just like the ability unlocks of all other classes, and then locking the core stuff that would make 80-90% of your kit permanently into your spellbook, leaving any optional choices as mainly cosmetic changes. Your level 45 slot can be a Wind attack, a Lightning attack, or a Fire attack, all of which are a power 180 cone with a 3 second stun attached. And one of them is in the 45 job quest, with the others being found from enemies in the field, or instanced fights. That kind of crap. Which would be such a major departure from the traditional Blue Mage style, I think people would hate it even more than the current half-assed implementation. But without changes that sweeping, balancing Blue Mage to be a regular job would probably be as much of a hassle for the powers team as balancing all other DPS jobs combined.
Desert Leviathan on
Realizing lately that I don't really trust or respect basically any of the moderators here. So, good luck with life, friends! Hit me up on Twitter @DesertLeviathan
The Blue Mage design in FF11 was a lot of fun, aside from the initial hassle of acquiring spells, which is something they're never going to get to feel right for 100% of players no matter how they implement it. But any kind of Blue Mage runs directly counter to the bedrock principle of current FF14 class balance - that every single member of a class is identical. My Dragoon has the exact same powers as every other Dragoon in existence. My Red Mage uses his tool kit the same way every other Red Mage ever uses theirs. The only build variance, aside from players hamstringing themselves by failing to do their job quests and unlock powers, is via Materia. And that only comes into play at the bleeding edge of top-tier content. And even then, optimization becomes standardized pretty much immediately, so there's only really variance in the couple of days while people are figuring out the new plan whenever the item level cap gets raised.
A build-your-own-class kit like Blue Mage can never fit into that framework, unless they did something drastic like making all the enemies with necessary spells conveniently appear in your Job Quests so that it was fundamentally just like the ability unlocks of all other classes, and then locking the core stuff that would make 80-90% of your kit permanently into your spellbook, leaving any optional choices as mainly cosmetic changes. Your level 45 slot can be a Wind attack, a Lightning attack, or a Fire attack, all of which are a power 180 cone with a 3 second stun attached. And one of them is in the 45 job quest, with the others being found from enemies in the field, or instanced fights. That kind of crap. Which would be such a major departure from the traditional Blue Mage style, I think people would hate it even more than the current half-assed implementation. But without changes that sweeping, balancing Blue Mage to be a regular job would probably be as much of a hassle for the powers team as balancing all other DPS jobs combined.
The bolded points are ones I never fully agreed with when people have been discussing Blue Mage. The idea of slotting in spells to make your own build hasn't been a thing for Blue Mage in any game but FFXI, as far as I understand. Sure, back in FFV, you would equip abilities to make your own job combos, but that was a feature of every job in that game. And your Blue Magic spellbook was a single ability slot that every Blue Mage had; you had access to all your learned spells. It's the same with Strago, Quistis, Quina, or even a Bravely Default Vampire; you have all your spells, once you learn them. You just get them in a novel way and they often have interesting effects.
The things that have made Blue Mage Blue Mage, to me, has been the broad concepts of learning enemies' techniques as spells, and being able to cast those spells myself. That concept, more than specific things like how many you can equip, how overpowered they are, or even the specific method of learning spells (seeing them cast, being hit, eating monsters, using items), is all secondary, in my mind. If I get to use Bad Breath, Self-Destruct, or Flying Sardine, then it doesn't matter to me if my spellbook is ultimately the same as any other Blue Mage's. I didn't care so much for freedom of build expression with Strago in FFVI; I liked that he could shoot a tidal wave at enemies or drop comets on their heads. I would absolutely be fine with a BLU that's even more restrictive than what you said; if the level 45 spell was specifically Glower, I'd be fine. Heck, I think I'd prefer it to having 3 or 4 spells that do almost identical things, just one of them is superior outside of the Carnivale.
And some people say that the idea of using monster abilities is inherently unbalanced, and that they couldn't give you enemy abilities in this game without having them be crazy. But we already have stuff like enemies that are resistant to our gravity/death spells. And plenty of BLU spells are significantly different from the spell as used by the monster. Condensed Libra is a generic Vulnerability Up debuff when used by Mechanoscribes; but we get it as a randomly-assigned elemental vulnerability.
Which would be such a major departure from the traditional Blue Mage style, I think people would hate it even more than the current half-assed implementation.
I think people, including the devs, get far too hung up on the 'traditional Blue Mage style'. The traditional Summoner style is 2-minute-long cutscene attacks. The traditional Black mage style is identical spells for fire, blizzard and thunder so they can hit elemental weaknesses. The traditional Dragoon style is being spending half the fight invincible and untargetable. Somehow they were able to reimagine those classes to play well in a themepark MMO, and they should have done the same for Blue Mage.
I wouldn't be super surprised with any of
A. they do not add a beastmaster job
B. they add a beastmaster job and it's a weirdo limited job like blue mage
C. they add a beastmaster job and it's a real job somehow
My aerial-view idea for Beastmaster is to have a whip as a weapon type (make it a ranger job), and a magic gourd from which monsters are released to fight. A released monster either fights on its own, or you use certain GCDs to command it to attack. Then, between whip-strikes, you use skills like Treat or Scold or Withdraw to alter the beast's behavior as it attacks. Probably you'd have a tiger or something else with claws to attack in melee, and a giant bird to do big wind blasts for ranged and AOE.
You could also have other beasts than the one you have attacking that do other things. Release a Babyhemoth to defend an ally with a Comet Counterstance, or bring out a Magic Pot to heal someone.
their Final Smash Limit Break would probably be a Behemoth dropping a cluster of burning meteors.
What's neat is that I do see some ideas like that show up in Bozja. The Beastmaster dude does throw treats to his beast, and do stuff like command it to go all out.
In a surprise twist, Beastmaster takes up both the tank and healer spots. Their beast functions as a tank and the Beastmaster heals it while doing damage in melee, but unlike other healers they are unable to heal the rest of the party. DPS are encouraged to "git gud."
* Beastmaster: Ranger
* Cannoneer: Healer (uses Chemist mixes in their shells)
* Magitek Elite: Caster (uses magic to fuel magitek weaponry, and can enter a powerful Aether Trance to instead fire off empowered spells until it ends)
Which would be such a major departure from the traditional Blue Mage style, I think people would hate it even more than the current half-assed implementation.
I think people, including the devs, get far too hung up on the 'traditional Blue Mage style'. The traditional Summoner style is 2-minute-long cutscene attacks. The traditional Black mage style is identical spells for fire, blizzard and thunder so they can hit elemental weaknesses. The traditional Dragoon style is being spending half the fight invincible and untargetable. Somehow they were able to reimagine those classes to play well in a themepark MMO, and they should have done the same for Blue Mage.
Is something going on with the forums because I definitely don’t remember making this post and clicking on it sends me to a completely different one.
Which would be such a major departure from the traditional Blue Mage style, I think people would hate it even more than the current half-assed implementation.
I think people, including the devs, get far too hung up on the 'traditional Blue Mage style'. The traditional Summoner style is 2-minute-long cutscene attacks. The traditional Black mage style is identical spells for fire, blizzard and thunder so they can hit elemental weaknesses. The traditional Dragoon style is being spending half the fight invincible and untargetable. Somehow they were able to reimagine those classes to play well in a themepark MMO, and they should have done the same for Blue Mage.
Is something going on with the forums because I definitely don’t remember making this post and clicking on it sends me to a completely different one.
Which would be such a major departure from the traditional Blue Mage style, I think people would hate it even more than the current half-assed implementation.
I think people, including the devs, get far too hung up on the 'traditional Blue Mage style'. The traditional Summoner style is 2-minute-long cutscene attacks. The traditional Black mage style is identical spells for fire, blizzard and thunder so they can hit elemental weaknesses. The traditional Dragoon style is being spending half the fight invincible and untargetable. Somehow they were able to reimagine those classes to play well in a themepark MMO, and they should have done the same for Blue Mage.
Is something going on with the forums because I definitely don’t remember making this post and clicking on it sends me to a completely different one.
I think a quote tree got trimmed wrong
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turtleantGunpla Dadis the best.Registered Userregular
Roegadyn
The big thing that makes me skeptical of Beast Master is how much trouble SMN egis have been/continue to be
Course I also kind of think egi will be gone next xpac and egi assault/enkindle/devotion will be normal spells with animations that show an egi for a second so maybe they'll just slot beastmaster into the pet class slot.
I’m sort of envisioning that Beastmaster’s beasts could function like Living Shadow or Automaton Queen, but as the job’s entire focus. You summon the beast, and it goes through a series of automatic attacks, possibly with a cast bar visible to you. And as they do that, you’d be able to use abilities to effect them as they go though their attacks. You could buff their damage, extend their active time, repeat a move they just did, make them return early so you can bring out something else, or maybe even force a berserk mode at the cost of needing extra downtime.
And in the meantime, you’re attacking the enemy with your whip and using your beast commands as OGCD skills.
That’s how I imagine you could do that without needing to deal with how messy pet AI seems to be in this game.
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They should pop way, WAY more frequently if nothing else.
I'd like to see all of the story some day, but the amount of stupid grindy shit I'd have to do to reach that point, not even accounting for future additions in other patches, seems insurmountable. So in that sense, I guess it's they preserved the feel of Eureka perfectly despite the actual structural differences.
Let's be honest. That bird's patterns are brutal even for an ex trial.
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That's kind of what the Masked Carnivale is.
It's also why I like the Masked Carnivale.
Steam: pazython
So, like, a really powerful spell you can pick up in the hard mode Library is Condensed Libra. It gives the target one of 3 elemental weakness suites: Umbral (Ice, Water, Earth), Astral (Fire, Lightning, Wind), and Physical. That lets you do much more damage with spells that have those elements. Also, some spells attempt to have a combo element to them. Northerlies freezes targets that have the Dropsy effect from Aqua Breath. Black Knight’s Tour hits extra hard if the enemy is suffering a status ailment from White Knight’s Tour. And a few others. One main issue is that the combos tend to not really be all that great in practice; the payoffs are too minor for requirements like moving around or removing a debuff.
If we had got a BLU that acts as a normal job, I think we could have leaned into those ideas. You could have spells that chain into each other in a particular elemental set (Aqua Breath into Northerlies into Plaincracker, for example. Flying Frenzy into Sharpened Knife for another.) that cause increasing amounts of damage if you do them in the right sequence. And you would use Consenses Libra to gain a random elemental buff (Weakness Perception: Umbral, doe instance), and pick your combo accordingly. Non-elemental stuff like Song of Torment would still be important. And I think even the Primal spells would still work. Say they can be used during your Libra buff, but they’re so powerful that they overload your elemental sensitivity and cancel the buff, so you’d need to use it right at the tail end of the buff.
But what about Self-Destruct and Final Sting? Well, maybe those could still exist, as they currently do. Big damage, but you die. Really neat when messing about and for cheesing Carnivale Targets, but not so good for actually running raids. Well, maybe there could be a way to gain a buff that allows you to perform those actions once without dying. Maybe you build up to it by successfully doing your elemental chains, and you get the buff after running through all 3 elemental sets successfully. This would make those skills a huge reward for doing the elemental loops correctly; one huge blast that you could augment with your other boosts. And this fits with the concept of BLU as a caster that is always analyzing monster techniques. By fighting and analyzing the target, they can find the right time and right way to deploy a highly dangerous spell without dying. Libra fits this as well; Blue Mage even had a Scan ability in FFV.
There’s a game plan for a unique caster that stands alongside the others in some of these Spell interactions. We’re never going to get that — BLU’s too far down its current rabbit hole — but I can see how it might’ve worked. And maybe we can get some better spell combos as we get level 70 BLU.
Like, the whole reason Blue Magic is such a fan favorite is because it had so many weird spells that were kind of clunky but maybe broken in certain circumstances.
In 14 like half of BLU's spells are just the same line or cone or orb AOEs with different elements or maybe a status effect. And the weird shit that is in there doesn't work half the time or is just bad.
Like, Bad Breath should be cool, but then you realize that half the status effects dont even actually do anything to monsters, poison is so low damage it might as well not exist, and there are much better ways to get paralysis onto enemies. So back in the book it goes, never to be seen again and you just use mindblast to paralyze things.
BLU wave
Bad Breath, I've come to understand, is something you take as a tank BLU. True, you generally don't need it for normal dungeon mobs, because Ram's Voice exists and completely incapacitates almost all groups. But the Malodorous debuff, which reduces damage output, seems to work on everything, has no diminishing returns, and is just generically useful for a tank to apply to the target.
But yeah, a lot of the spells are variants on the same thing, just with a different element and/or a different status ailment. Heck, I have 2 Primal skills (Eruption and Feather Rain), and they ultimately do the same amount of damage in the same AOE. I think, for most non-carnivale stuff, you really just need Water Cannon, Electrogenisis, and Drill Cannons, to make use of Condensed Libra's effects for damage. Then, Sonic Boom and Sharpened Knife, to weave the few things that aren't GCD spells. Song of Torment + Bristle for an actually good DOT. Any one Primal spell for extra damage. And finally, Ram's Voice, if you're up against any sort of group situation and want to stop them in place. Any other damage spells are mostly personal preference or if a particular status is useful.
I would use stuff like White Knight's Tour and Black Knight's Tour, but space is tight, and their combo quickly falls prey to diminishing returns on statuses, if they work at all on the target.
That's why I think a normal-job version of BLU would have elements go in a specific combo pattern, to make them useful at different times, or in conjunction with each other.
And yeah, I get it, BLU ain't balanced for shit, but that seems like a weird choice. When I played Blue Mage in Final Fantasy V, it was never a good thing when I got a new spell and it turned out to be useless when compared to spamming Aero spells. I loved spells like Dark Spark, Aqua Breath, Death Claw, or Aera. Not so much stuff like Moon Flute or Flamethrower. And in this game, I don't enjoy getting Alpine Draft only to find that I have better spells that hit its weakness or its AOE shape.
Moon Flute was hilarious in that game, though, but for the wrong reasons. When you first encounter it, the enemy uses it, and it drives your entire team berserk. So then you learn it. And when you cast it, it drives your entire team berserk. It's not a spell that targets; it's a spell that effects your team, no matter who casts it.
Honestly that sounds exactly the same as Blue Mage in any other Final Fantasy game.
A build-your-own-class kit like Blue Mage can never fit into that framework, unless they did something drastic like making all the enemies with necessary spells conveniently appear in your Job Quests so that it was fundamentally just like the ability unlocks of all other classes, and then locking the core stuff that would make 80-90% of your kit permanently into your spellbook, leaving any optional choices as mainly cosmetic changes. Your level 45 slot can be a Wind attack, a Lightning attack, or a Fire attack, all of which are a power 180 cone with a 3 second stun attached. And one of them is in the 45 job quest, with the others being found from enemies in the field, or instanced fights. That kind of crap. Which would be such a major departure from the traditional Blue Mage style, I think people would hate it even more than the current half-assed implementation. But without changes that sweeping, balancing Blue Mage to be a regular job would probably be as much of a hassle for the powers team as balancing all other DPS jobs combined.
I'm awful at keeping track of time but it felt like 2 hour, maaaybe 3 hour sessions of doing stuff
The bolded points are ones I never fully agreed with when people have been discussing Blue Mage. The idea of slotting in spells to make your own build hasn't been a thing for Blue Mage in any game but FFXI, as far as I understand. Sure, back in FFV, you would equip abilities to make your own job combos, but that was a feature of every job in that game. And your Blue Magic spellbook was a single ability slot that every Blue Mage had; you had access to all your learned spells. It's the same with Strago, Quistis, Quina, or even a Bravely Default Vampire; you have all your spells, once you learn them. You just get them in a novel way and they often have interesting effects.
The things that have made Blue Mage Blue Mage, to me, has been the broad concepts of learning enemies' techniques as spells, and being able to cast those spells myself. That concept, more than specific things like how many you can equip, how overpowered they are, or even the specific method of learning spells (seeing them cast, being hit, eating monsters, using items), is all secondary, in my mind. If I get to use Bad Breath, Self-Destruct, or Flying Sardine, then it doesn't matter to me if my spellbook is ultimately the same as any other Blue Mage's. I didn't care so much for freedom of build expression with Strago in FFVI; I liked that he could shoot a tidal wave at enemies or drop comets on their heads. I would absolutely be fine with a BLU that's even more restrictive than what you said; if the level 45 spell was specifically Glower, I'd be fine. Heck, I think I'd prefer it to having 3 or 4 spells that do almost identical things, just one of them is superior outside of the Carnivale.
And some people say that the idea of using monster abilities is inherently unbalanced, and that they couldn't give you enemy abilities in this game without having them be crazy. But we already have stuff like enemies that are resistant to our gravity/death spells. And plenty of BLU spells are significantly different from the spell as used by the monster. Condensed Libra is a generic Vulnerability Up debuff when used by Mechanoscribes; but we get it as a randomly-assigned elemental vulnerability.
I think people, including the devs, get far too hung up on the 'traditional Blue Mage style'. The traditional Summoner style is 2-minute-long cutscene attacks. The traditional Black mage style is identical spells for fire, blizzard and thunder so they can hit elemental weaknesses. The traditional Dragoon style is being spending half the fight invincible and untargetable. Somehow they were able to reimagine those classes to play well in a themepark MMO, and they should have done the same for Blue Mage.
A. they do not add a beastmaster job
B. they add a beastmaster job and it's a weirdo limited job like blue mage
C. they add a beastmaster job and it's a real job somehow
2020 has made monsters of us all
well then i'll be able to beastmaster you all
You could also have other beasts than the one you have attacking that do other things. Release a Babyhemoth to defend an ally with a Comet Counterstance, or bring out a Magic Pot to heal someone.
their Final Smash Limit Break would probably be a Behemoth dropping a cluster of burning meteors.
What's neat is that I do see some ideas like that show up in Bozja. The Beastmaster dude does throw treats to his beast, and do stuff like command it to go all out.
* Beastmaster: Ranger
* Cannoneer: Healer (uses Chemist mixes in their shells)
* Magitek Elite: Caster (uses magic to fuel magitek weaponry, and can enter a powerful Aether Trance to instead fire off empowered spells until it ends)
Is something going on with the forums because I definitely don’t remember making this post and clicking on it sends me to a completely different one.
it was the javen of darkness
I immediately imagined the bird sounding like Iago. Help.
I think a quote tree got trimmed wrong
Course I also kind of think egi will be gone next xpac and egi assault/enkindle/devotion will be normal spells with animations that show an egi for a second so maybe they'll just slot beastmaster into the pet class slot.
And in the meantime, you’re attacking the enemy with your whip and using your beast commands as OGCD skills.
That’s how I imagine you could do that without needing to deal with how messy pet AI seems to be in this game.