Traits needs a revampFollow

I been trying for the longest time to stay quiet about Blue Magic Points, but with the upcoming update looming over us. I can't be quiet anymore...

S.E. please make "Blue Magic Points" affects traits only, and let us have our magic PLEASE.

They're simply too many good spells we have to try to fit in a few more. There's not enough points,(I know with the level break there will be more points, but the ten extra points still isn't enough) the main reason we use a few of the spells in our inventory is for the sake of a trait. Not ever really using the spell in the to actually cast on mobs.

So, why can't it be the points we use on certain, "Blue Mage Spells" activate the traits only and we have open access to ALL of our spells?

I don't see it being too powerful! Half the time in Abyssea - you're there pop-in yellow !!. After that your stuck with 2~4 tops for dding/buffing/de-buffing/curing afterwards. Then to cool-down timer again because:

A)You forgot a yellow proc. spell
B)A buff or de-buff
C)A DD spells - to help out the situation. I'm all for balance but this is crazy.

I'll +1 that too.

Although I suspect SE's reasoning behind it has something to do with "overflowing power" or "bursting with so much power we turn into Soulflayers".

I don't see the other mages 'exploding with power' ... give us BLUs our full list! :)

Um, I am. I like that yellow procs give me an excuse to go BLM. I actually, God forbid, enjoy playing BLM.

Regardless of if you come to "proc yellow" or not, though, you still get access to your FULL line up of spells. Having to wait to Unleash Hell on the unsuspecting NM until after the procs are done goes for everyone fighting it, not just you. You at least get an "On" switch with no waiting.

If we come to "proc yellow", we either set all 8 spells (or some subset for how long we're going to be in there), wait until we hear the element and switch to it (with the corresponding 1 minute of down time waiting for spells to come online again), or we forgo switching around for the the spell and possibly missing yellow proc.

I don't know if they should necessarily give us access to everything completely out the door. Having our full allotment of magical spells, for instance, gives us a little too much. They do have a few options, though, that would give us more flexibility but also stop us from having full access to everything:

1) They could adjust recast and cast timers of spells not set. Doubling both of those would give a deterrent to wanting to use them when not set, particularly the DD. However, while being the easiest option, it still gives a lot more power to us.

2) They could decrease the potency of spells not set. If they ran off Blue Magic skill/2, for instance, that might adjust them a little bit and make them a bit harder to want to use. By decreasing the potency, we'll be harder pressed to want to use a spell, but the circumstances might make it nice. The upside, in particular here, is not having to set yellow procs. The downside is that they'd be much easier to resist, forcing BLU's to use M. Acc. gear to get them to land unless we're willing to set them.

3) They could remove or downgrade "additional effects" lines from spells not set. This is my least favorite option and doesn't even affect all spells, which means it's really the weakest option, as well.

In any case, only spells set with points would count towards job traits, as mentioned above.

The fluff also seems a little... draining. I guess I'll have to wait and see how powerful Meteor and Comet are, since in many FF's, those drain power from the person casting the spell and, theoretically, could (and in one case, did) kill the person casting it. If BLMs receive no drawback to these spells (short of casting time/mp cost), then, yeah, I'd say SE should at least consider giving us a new merit category at 99 that would allow us to use non-set spells, if not a job ability to do so.

I've said this before and I'll say it again (hopefully SEI is listing this time around with the new dev team) We should have access to all our spells and have your set points reduced by 1/3 or 1/2. Then the only way to get Traits would be to use spell points and also only spells that are "set" can be effected by CA and BA. We're still mages so no matter how awesome of spells we have, we are restricted by MP. I really don't see how if this was implemented that blu would be "broken".

I'm with the job ability crowd.

full list. no excuses. no abilities, no special circumstances. AND, like blm, we still wouldnt use like 70% of our spells. hysteric barrage still wouldnt get much use. foot kick probably would never be cast. id say the majority of the physical spells wouldnt be used. mostly likely, more buff spells would be used and more debuff spells. set spells affect traits and stat bonuses. would this make blu overpowered? ironically, i could see it hindering if we cast more buffs/debuffs/spells due to being restricted on mp. i dont honestly see a reason why they dont unlock it.

Good thinking there, in regards to the bolded bit. You can streamline the whole BLU yellow proc thing further tho.

1) Set you spells like you would anywhere in the game, leave 5 points unused.

2) By this point in Abyssea's life-span you will be trying to proc with at least 1 person with the discernment abyssite if you dont have it yourself; wait til they get hint message.

3) Load spell and attempt to proc.

4) Unload spell after NM death.

Repeat 2-4 ad nauseum.

That's why, when the day changes you say "hold up guys, I need to switch out a spell, give me 60 seconds before popping the next NM".

Everyone waits a minute, and then continues on as normal.

That's why I usually leave at least 12 points reserved just to get 3 proc spells for previous, current, and next day elements. Even then, I still need to change the triplet once the day change.

Sorry. I still don't see the justification for gutting a BLUs spell list just to get off one proc. And if your group can not do without you for 60 sec while you add one spell after hint has been found, i just don't know what to say.

Is the BLM(s) going to try all his spells, cleanly, in one min? The WHM who is also juggling keeping ppl up while trying to proc on Lightsday? The poor bastard who drew the duty to /BRD?

There's being prepared and then there's being over prepared. Though i will concede that everyone may not have access to the abyssite of discernment itself of players with it. But when i see one of the worst RDMs on my server mt in /say that the hint for yellow is Ice as i pass by; it means ANYONE that tries can get it.





@1-See my reply to VZX.

@2-Bad analogy. The slot is going to be filled with one of three spells and you have zero way of knowing which until each NM fight starts. Why wouldn't i clear the space after NM death to be ready to start the process anew?

Now again, i'll concede maybe my thinking is different from joe-blow-BLU in that i have the aforementioned abyssite. Here is a jumbled quick run-thru of your typical NM fight with my group from my POV.

I run in after pop and depending on mob and what we are after i'm usually doing something at the beginning of the fight. After the initial Delta strike and a few Headbutts, i usually get hint for yellow and i shout it out. After i set BLU proc spell, i usually try NIN proc during the reset(yes, i carry tools for all the ninjitsu procs when /nin) and depending on mob, it can easily take over a min to get a clean attempt. When NIN is done and if it didn't proc i go ahead and start on BLU.

And that process is just if we are going after yellow. Throw in someone needing a KI or wanting a rare item drop and Red!! and Blue!! get thrown in the mix.

So no, i do see it as being "selfish". I see it as me being able to contribute during the proc'ing phase on big NM asap so i can then get back to w/e else i was asked to be doing, you know? Like building and maintaining lights as ppl come to and leave the alli, solo farming TE, teaming up with a few alli members to do a few lesser NMs while the main group goes to tackle bigger stuff.

I read in a post here on Alla a few days back that there was a disconnect between players here and the larger group of players ingame. I didn't think too much on it when i read it, but i see it here. And like i owned up before, i may be part of this disconnect as well. But really guys, i'll say-again-if you group is floundering because you took a min to reset your spell list, your group has much bigger problems it nedds to address.

I'm glad you included the anecdote near the end, because it shed light on how your group dynamics are influencing your playstyle, so I'm prepared to concede it might work better for you. You seem to be talking about a large-ish shell that isn't exclusively focusing on any particular AF3 drops but has enough people to justify Yellow stagger for them.

For my part: I usually run with a small group (4-8 people) that by this point is mostly focused on upgrading Emp weapons. Most of the time I'm on BLU, I don't bother equipping any Proc spells or leaving room for them because no one really needs the drop. If someone does want something, it means we're staying at that particular NM repeatedly until we're done with it, so in those cases I keep all 3 set because speeding up each kill means speeding up the total time bothering with it.

There's also always either a THF or NIN with me, so I don't waste my personal time with that proc; if you're without one, then covering that in the minute before you're ready makes sense. I do think your method wouldn't be ideal for something like a generic 4-man pickup seal run; I'd be frustrated with a BLU who made us wait so he could fit in Double Attack or something. And since you asked, I do usually get off all 4 spells clean in under a minute on BLM (assuming the party is smart enough not to feed it TP the whole time). WHM obviously can take a bit more time, but that's 1/8 and not to base a whole procedure on.



I don't think anyone's stating that a group is having actual safety problems from this. They wouldn't 'flounder' if I went afk unannounced either, but it's still mildly rude. I just don't like wasting anyone's time if I don't have to. From what you describe, you aren't, so my only remaining confusion is this:



Even with your playstyle, this doesn't make sense. You don't get some sort of no-claims bonus for having empty slots, and it doesn't take you noticeably longer to swap a spell than to set one. I'm still not seeing why you'd give up the possibility of being ready with the correct spell for the certainty that you won't be. Maybe someone else can explain the misunderstanding here.

At the first bold, well i guess we're even here because i personally think its rude to say that the way i set my spell list is selfish w/o knowing the full why as to why i do it that way.

At the second bold, for w/e reason we usually don't have a NIN on hand to tank. And when we do the sob is usually afk or w/e and i don't find him reliable(don't get me started here, i'd kick him personally but he's a sack as well....). So possibly if it didn't fall to the /nin ppl to be able to proc i might feel differently. But we do and since i'm already saddled with at least 60 sec worth of another jobs duties, might as well add the proc spell, after i get my hint, then.

And sorry, i play with some damn good BLMs that are always on point with their spells, and they are not always hittng yellow when its BLM in a min. On some mobs they can don't get me wrong, but every NM? Nope. And TP spam isnt even an issue as its usually designated tank on the mob and a THF running in when when SA and TA are up to attempt a TH boost.

Anyways, i'm not telling anyone to do it my way. I was seriously just surprised to see ppl here on the BLU forum still setting all three spell. And more over being happy doing it that way. Though now as i type this it occurs to me, if you were setting all six spells before they adjusted BLU procs, 3 spells aint so bad. I didn't. Once i got abyssite, i rolled with ten points open til hint then.

More power to you guys i guess and continued success with your way that works for you and i'll keep trucking with mine that works for me and my group that incidentally i've never heard a complaint from. I will asked them though, just to see what they say. I honestly dont think they give a damn as long as BLU spell gets tried on mob, but i'll see and will edit this post.

Which you can easily knock down to 60 seconds every 2 hours if set one additional proc spell. Yesterday, today, tomrorow, next day. Wait until it becomes day after next, sub two out and add two in, wait another 2 hours.

Not needing to set 1/tic refresh freed up so many points that we can do stuff like this easily.

Don't get me wrong. I would have still given BLU a JA that lets them access any spell on their list. Say 10 min cooldown, 1 min duration. You save it until you want to whip out some extra DD spells or an obscure debuff that you didn't set. That'd be nice. But not having it isn't the end of the world.

BLU is definitely my favorite job but I'm not sure if this idea would be ideal, because each spell still carries additional stats aside from the job traits, and I would think even with a full arsenal of magic we would still miss those extra buffs. Not saying it couldn't work but the way they have it now isn't as bad as you'd think. Personally if they'd let us change something, I would say lower the "downtime" of setting spells a bit, or give us something similar to macro book pages-

Say you're fighting an NM and a mage/tank/DD goes down and you need to switch to an alternative role while they are weakened. Instead of going through each additional spell (and sometimes completely passing it while trying to rush) we could just hit the macro and it would remove the current spells and switch to what we need with a click of a button.

Example:

[Charged Whisker Book]

/equip spell "Charged Whisker"
/equip spell "Memento Mori"
/equip spell "Sound Blast"
/equip spell "Actinic Burst"
/equip spell "Enervation"
/equip spell "Whirl of Rage"
/equip spell "Fantod"

etc

and for Melee, something similar.




Edited, Aug 7th 2011 11:25am by mmmBiscuits

Edited, Aug 7th 2011 11:27am by mmmBiscuits

Blu is already overpowered. It is a full-fledged DD that also has a huge arsenal of healing, crowd control, buffs, debuffs, and different damage types. Giving us unfettered access to every spell would be a slap in the face to all the "pure DD" jobs whose damage is more or less equal to ours.

All I want from SE is for them to stop de-sorting my spell list. Every $%@&ing update.

We can be anything, but not everything. It's not only limited by spell set, but also our gear.

We can't evade as good as NIN, DNC, or THF in Abyssea. If we're /NIN, we almost pushed to casting utsusemi everytime. For blood tanking, we need dedicated -PDT and -MDT setup, and defensive spell casting will become more busy when you blood tank.

We can CW burn almost everything but that's the only job we'll be doing when you already set the CW atmas and spell set.

Again, we're versatile as in we can be anything, but not everything at the same time. Giving access to all spells with weakened effects doesn't change much of the fact.