FFXIV Random Complaint Thread III: Zenos was the best part of SB

[Gokulo]

Yeah, it seems that's how it was designed. Other skills don't matter until you start Carnival, where elemental weaknesses play major role - spells hits a couple of times harder

[Fiye]

For BLU, I don't know if it's the lack of having a weapon above lvl1 to increase your WD with, but after 40 levels, every skill that doesn't KO me or isn't 1K Needles still hits like a wet noodle, even with Bristle and the best gear I can get for my level.

I've been trying to avoid being carried to get my levels/skills with a lvl70 as much as possible here, but the job's logical skill progression (CC/utility/gimmicks, but heck all for usable damage) feels rather non-existing, especially with nearly half of it being from lvl50 content. 95% of everyone playing BLU will just be doing Mighty Guard + 1K Needles spam when they get them, because there is nothing better for dealing damage with while leveling.

Or you could one shot mobs and then swap to BLU before the kill credit hits and you get 14-19k exp. Went home during lunch and got 32-40 in Urth's Fount (N. Than was crowded).

[Fondue]

Or you could one shot mobs and then swap to BLU before the kill credit hits and you get 14-19k exp. Went home during lunch and got 32-40 in Urth's Fount (N. Than was crowded).

wait wut

[Gokulo]

Basically, go as a 70 job with a ranged attack that has a 'shooting' animation (e.g. broil) and attack the mob and switch to blu as it dies. You will get exp on blu.

[Fiye]

[Dotsudoku]

wonder if any action is going to be taken over this. On the one hand, soloing to 50 legitimately takes less than a day, so you're saving hours at best. On the other, this is a pretty blatant exploit

[Gokulo]

Something similar was being done in Eureka with FATEs and they did nothing

[Dotsudoku]

how so? Just curious

[Gokulo]

You would pull normal mobs in the FATE area and kill them when higher level than them, then quickly sync down to FATE level to get full exp

[Raldo]

Yeah, I doubt they'll do anything about it. It's not hurting anyone. The exploit like that in Eureka is so commonplace in Pagos that sometimes there's so many people doing it, it can be hard to find enough mobs to kill. It's also been heavily abused since before Pyros was added and they haven't done anything about it, so I take that as tacit approval that it's fine.

Also if you're going to take advantage of it for BLU, I'll emphasize the "one-shot" thing. It needs to go from unclaimed to dead in one hit, otherwise the system won't let you change jobs right away, so it's not helpful for getting spells, it's strictly for leveling up. (This doesn't apply to the Eureka thing, since you're not changing jobs there)

I haven't touched BLU yet though -- is there a level difference that's ideal? Or can I just go straight to lv50 mobs as a Lv1 BLU and get tons of exp?

[Kaisha]

Or you could one shot mobs and then swap to BLU before the kill credit hits and you get 14-19k exp. Went home during lunch and got 32-40 in Urth's Fount (N. Than was crowded).

I put that trick under "avoid being carried". The problem is it's so prevalent now to the point where I think I'll have found myself a spot with 3-4 mobs I can solo w/ 1k needles spam, but then someone comes around and one-shots my camp on me using that trick and then moves on. If I could solo queue dungeons for guaranteed uninterrupted mob farming and get XP that'd be dandy, but no, you can't since undersize is the only way to enter with less people, and that removes all XP. It'll be less of a prob as time goes on, but it's aggravating while this is still new.

I don't even know. With the ludicrously tiny MP costs on everything I'm more inclined to believe the potency/cost scaling of the skills is actually broken.

[Alkar]

Everyone is basically doing it so you're forced to do it yourself if you wanna get any EXP at higher levels. Camps are crowded atm.

[Silenka]

Having lived through the salvage bans, my thoughts on using any type of exploit are a solid "nope", even if "everyone else is doing it". There one precedent that proves SE can absolutely pull that trigger if they want to, and one is enough for me. Choosing not to use exploits is a personal choice though, and one I'm completely comfortable making.

I ended up just zoning out and chaining mobs solo since I have no frienz to powerlevel me. There are actually several underutilized overworld camps at various level ranges. It's a chore, but at least it's over pretty quickly. My overall thoughts on BLU are gonna wait until I gather the rest of the spells, gear up and do some Carnivale.

[Scythiroth]

Yeah, there is no way I'm risking my account over a side job lol. I doubt anything bad will happen, but I still wouldn't risk it.

[Prothescar]

Now that I've put in a couple days and effectively finished everything you can do with the job I'm going to lay down a review:



Everything Yoshida claimed is fucking bullshit. There's nothing preventing this job from having been a real job outside of not having one forced standard spell set for duties and dungeons. The spells are overall quite weak outside of a few standout exceptions (Diamondback, Mighty Guard, Ram's Voice, 1000 Needles). Most of these issues can be solved by putting a level requirement on spells. Damage-wise, BLU is pretty pitiful. The strongest spells you get cap out around 310 potency and have 30-90s cooldowns, self sacrifice spells notwithstanding. There is a sort of DPS rotation once your spellbook is complete too, albeit very basic, though that can be easily expanded upon with future spell additions for 60/70/etc. It boils down to always feeling like I'm hitting things with a limp ass pool noodle, even with an enormous +50% dmg dealt debuff on the mob. Buffs are parlor tricks for the most part, and the debuffs and status effects are cute, but overall worthless outside of Bad Breath's damage reduction debuff and the few times where Stun and Silence are actually useful for something (which will be never once we get to Heavensward content). I haven't even cast Doom yet, because I already know it will be complete and utter garbage based on my experience with Level 5 Petrify and Tailscrew, not to mention when the fuck am I going to need a 15 second doom? Missile is probably the most compelling of all of these "unbalanced, unbelievably overpowered raidkiller" spells, and even that is lukewarm at best after you realize that all of the trivial sub-bosses that it works on were already a joke to begin with. This was totally worth cutting BLU out of the entire game for. Yes.

Learning spells was a headache at worst and okay at best. Doing things like casting Missile on Cuca Fera when learning Diamondback only to find that it fucking worked was cool as fuck, but then learning the primal spells and 4-tonze Weight came down to being nothing more than an absolute bore where I had to repeat fights dozens of times, fights that I've probably already done hundreds of times, mind you, just to learn a spell that I probably won't use ever outside of a couple of them. This isn't a major negative for me, after all, XI BLU was worse for this. But still, this wasn't a be-all-end-all experience that made me shit my pants in excitement, it was a glorified sightseeing log that I feel I will never use at least half of the "rewards" I got from completing it.

The Carnivale itself feels uninspired. They tried to do something interesting and gave up half way through. Some of the fights have interesting mechanics but, barring one or two extremely rare exceptions in all 25 of the available stages, these things could be done by a myriad of jobs just as well as BLU can do them. The elemental weakness system is completely phoned in and banal, even Eureka does this better. The things that pigeon hole BLU into being the only job capable of clearing some of the stages are just forced in to make you use spells that you otherwise would never have on your bar, which to me is not a compelling argument for segregating an entire class from the rest of the game in favor of a couple of hours worth of solo battles that reward you with some of the most plentiful, and worthless, currencies in the game. Again, this piece of content needs either a lot more work or a much more compelling reason to do it again. It does not, as some people said before BLU came out, give BLU even anywhere near a minute fraction of the longevity that other jobs enjoy by being... well, usable to play the fucking game.

Overall, if you were to ask if I would be willing to give up being able to Jihad in the middle of Ul'dah, blow up a trash pack in dungeons somewhat faster than a real party can do it, or freeze trash mobs for 30 seconds in exchange for a job that I can use for more than 2 days worth of content and maybe 15-20 minutes of weeklies that consist of repeating the fights I've already done ad nauseum, my short answer would be yes. My long answer would be fuck yes. And if you think that's wrong my answer would be fuck you.

[Twilight Sky]

I was feeling that to do respectable damage, you had to blow yourself up, or use 1000 needles. I liked that it basically made exping in the world viable again(while also disallowing it become an event as it were in FFXI prime), and the game seem to "come to life", but like all novelties, this unfortunately will come to pass.

[Gokulo]

Read somewhere that Doom works on Fate bosses. That'd be fun

[Silenka]

This was totally worth cutting BLU out of the entire game for. Yes.

I agree with everything you said.

Now, my optimistic and entirely unrealistic prediction, like all my predictions (they never ever come true):

We already know 5.0 is retooling the battle system at least somewhat, if not a major overhaul. Maybe they were unwilling to give a proper reason for BLU being a limited job because the real reason is that 5.0's battle system is being overhauled in such a way that BLU will fit in as a real job! Perhaps they wanted to add BLU early to get the playerbase used to hitting mob elemental weaknesses and actually using debuffs, because without those things in the battle system bringing differentiation to new jobs has become too restrictive! YES! LET'S FUCKING DO IT


(or maybe BLU is just a glorified sightseeing log fanservice job and that is all it will ever be)

[Gokulo]

I'm sorry but such optimism with S-E is a sign of deeply rooted issues

[Silenka]

I'm sorry but such optimism with S-E is a sign of deeply rooted issues

I know At least deep down I don't believe my own hype.