Blue Mage: Best thread ever

[ronin sparthos]

Odd, i fought the ones in Battalia Downs and it was a full moon and they never stood up on 2 legs.

Do they spawn on 2legs or mode-shift in the middle of combat?

I know lobisons are always walking around on 2legs or on 4 when i passed through that area for the Jugner Maw.

[Tonko]

It will be slashing, I can't see them not making it goddamnmotherfuckignslashing so I can stop using Death Scissors and Vertical Cleave on Temperance.

[ronin sparthos]

Asuran Claws.... sounds like piercing to me! >.>

[Charismatic]

watch that shit be blunt...

[Alixana]

Please forgive the newb post. I just need to ask some questions and what not...I know this is "advanced" discussion so if it's unwelcome here I'll delete this. I just need some solid advice, as I'm starting to feel lost.

I just finished reading about a fifth of this thread. I'm at work so I'll try to read more later at home.

I'm not sure I have ever felt this overwhelmed with a class in an MMO, heh. I am still relatively noob in this game, but have years of experience in others, and the hard work and dedication, not to mention knowledge, often required to be a top performer in one's class. Well, I am convinced that BLU was just not meant to be a first-to-75 job for anyone, which is maybe why I feel this way. My highest level job is my 54 RDM followed by my 49 BLU, I know absolutely nothing about end-game or merits or "the best" this or that other than what I read or ask other people about.

I don't want to be one of those gimp BLU's that everyone says gives the class it's bad name. However, reading through this thread I feel like I'm doing so many things wrong. Especially with gear, I'm just fucking LOST. I'm Elvaan, I need SOME MP gear to even dream of casting spells in a party, especially since I have been in more parties with neither a RDM nor a BRD. >.> I use all of my MP and hMP+ gear to heal in ebwteen pulls as best as I can, and I have the Clear Mind trait. However, after that I basically stack ACC, ATK, STR and DEX as much as I can. I think I might be focusing too much on ATK though and not enough on STR, or since I am having to conserve MP so much is this okay so that my sword DoT is better?

I always try to play both DD and support in EXP parties. Usually this means use of Wild Carrot/Blank Gaze/Head Butt, which is fine. Jet Stream seems to be my highest base-DD spell still, but it's so expensive that I only use it when I SC with myself, other than that it's Sickle Slash, Mandibular Bite, or Bludgeon. Is this good/bad? I need to start parsing but other than the occasional decked out SAM, DRK, WAR or MNK I definitely seem to be out-doing most of the other melee DD's. I watch the combat log like a hawk and adjust accordingly. I ate rice dumplings until 35 or so and then switched to sole sushi for food for exp parties.

I know it's "just mid-levels" but honestly I'd rather not wait until I'm 75 to learn the nuances of my class. Also, if I have gotten into some bad gear choices/ habits I would rather do away with them now. Any help or advice is appreciated.

[ronin sparthos]

Ok, i probably understand the feeling that you -need- MP in certain slots and because your around level 50 i would suggest antivenom/insomina earrings for you because your elvaan and lack of mp could warrant putting MP gear on but -dont- gear up for just mp because a bluemage is primarily a DD with an mp bar (for the most part.) Focus on the melee stats and sprinkle yourself with MP gear (usually the mp slots work best.)

Parties without a RDM, BRD, COR or DNC are one of those situations where the PT is gonna by nature be slow or going to be a pain in the ass for a blu, and usually a PT is gonna want a refresher. If you party in a WotG or ToAU zone you will get sigil/sanction refresh and that will help alot in terms of managing mp - coupled with a PT that supplies refresh even if that means bugging the hell outta the rdm if they slack on you or run into the aoe ranges of the corsairs/bards and lastly if the mob has mp dont be afraid to ask the dancer to drop aspir samba if they dont, you shouldnt really have a problem with mp running out -too- much.

Part of being a blue mage is knowing the prey your exping on and preparing accordingly, such as knowing if a mob has mp or not (determines if you set MP drainkiss) knowing if a mob has annoying buffs (determines if you set blank gaze) and if a mob has damage resistance against your spells (crabs are resistant to bludgeon for example.). Things like this come with personal expierience or researching what things can do to you or the PT. Around your level the best spells are going to be sickle slash and jet stream along with your trusty conserve mp spells - mandy bite and head butt - everything else can come into the spellfold on a case by case basis and skillchaining depends on what your fighting as well (if your fighting something weak to fire go for a fusion skillchain)

Id also invest in fulltiming /thf (at least till you rearch around level 65+) to make your spells have a bit more punch (if you dont already) and await the better traits like auto-fresh that come along around level 60. Worry about your damage and always keep a backup cure set (something alot of blus think isnt important.... ha.) and overall just enjoy the job.

[Delekii]

Please forgive the newb post. I just need to ask some questions and what not...I know this is "advanced" discussion so if it's unwelcome here I'll delete this. I just need some solid advice, as I'm starting to feel lost.

I just finished reading about a fifth of this thread. I'm at work so I'll try to read more later at home.

I'm not sure I have ever felt this overwhelmed with a class in an MMO, heh. I am still relatively noob in this game, but have years of experience in others, and the hard work and dedication, not to mention knowledge, often required to be a top performer in one's class. Well, I am convinced that BLU was just not meant to be a first-to-75 job for anyone, which is maybe why I feel this way. My highest level job is my 54 RDM followed by my 49 BLU, I know absolutely nothing about end-game or merits or "the best" this or that other than what I read or ask other people about.

I don't want to be one of those gimp BLU's that everyone says gives the class it's bad name. However, reading through this thread I feel like I'm doing so many things wrong. Especially with gear, I'm just fucking LOST. I'm Elvaan, I need SOME MP gear to even dream of casting spells in a party, especially since I have been in more parties with neither a RDM nor a BRD. >.> I use all of my MP and hMP+ gear to heal in ebwteen pulls as best as I can, and I have the Clear Mind trait. However, after that I basically stack ACC, ATK, STR and DEX as much as I can. I think I might be focusing too much on ATK though and not enough on STR, or since I am having to conserve MP so much is this okay so that my sword DoT is better?

I always try to play both DD and support in EXP parties. Usually this means use of Wild Carrot/Blank Gaze/Head Butt, which is fine. Jet Stream seems to be my highest base-DD spell still, but it's so expensive that I only use it when I SC with myself, other than that it's Sickle Slash, Mandibular Bite, or Bludgeon. Is this good/bad? I need to start parsing but other than the occasional decked out SAM, DRK, WAR or MNK I definitely seem to be out-doing most of the other melee DD's. I watch the combat log like a hawk and adjust accordingly. I ate rice dumplings until 35 or so and then switched to sole sushi for food for exp parties.

I know it's "just mid-levels" but honestly I'd rather not wait until I'm 75 to learn the nuances of my class. Also, if I have gotten into some bad gear choices/ habits I would rather do away with them now. Any help or advice is appreciated.

You sound like you are doing just fine. BLU damage output is seriously limited by its access to enough refresh, and your race means nothing when it comes to that. A taru and an elvaan might start 2-300 MP different but once we are both down at 400MP, one is as good as the other, unless we both have time to rest to full again. You sound like you are already making liberal use of equipment changes which is the most important thing. Stick with the sushi for a long time to come, I still use it at 75 most of the time.

For melee: at lower level, concentrate on accuracy and attack first, str is much less important for your melee dot. For weaponskills (if you use them), str becomes more important, but accuracy and attack are still important.

For spells: 95% of physical spells will gain the most damage benefit from str. BUT, make sure that you don't ignore your accuracy, since over time you lose a lot more damage by giving up accuracy you cant afford to give up for str that you can afford to lose. Make sure your accuracy isn't lacking, then concentrate on str. There are very few exceptions to this; a notable one is sickle slash, which gains more from dex than it does from str (but only marginally, so don't feel you need to change your whole gearset). I assume you know that attack has no bearing on your blue magic, so don't bother with that.

For magical spells: Magical spells fit into lots of categories, have a look at http://wiki.bluegarterls.com/Calculatin ... gic_Damage to check it out for yourself. INT, MND, CHR are all used for various blue magic spells, as well as AF Body (blue skill) and any m.acc gear.

Resting: you're on the right track - like I said earlier, BLU without refresh is like thief without a dagger. Your damage output division will change drastically depending on how much refresh you have, and without any you will be lucky to make 15-20% damage from blue magic at low level, but this might go up to 60-70% with refresh. Just concentrate on a full hMP set as you lvl, that will be the biggest boon to your mp stakes that you can do without a source of refresh - the max mp isn't as important, it's just a stop gap.

You are almost at a level where you can consider going /thf, and in cases where you don't have refresh, this is probably a good idea. /thf increases your damage quite a lot around the 40s and up, because melee damage is not that considerable at that stage, and you dont have access to a lot of haste and so fourth, nor dual wield 2, etc. But /thf will greatly increase your mp:damage ratio, which is one of the biggest problems of BLU without refresh - dealing damage with your magic as mp-economically as you can. People get very heated about /thf /nin arguments, but speaking as someone who frequently used both while leveling, they both have great use, depending on the situation. If you can afford to spam spells, go with /nin, if you cant and have good healing support or good tanks, go with /thf.

[Villian]

I say SE needs to make Lowing what it was when blu just came out. >______________>;;;

[Alixana]

First, thanks for the help/advice.

I definitely do not wear MP gear full-time, unless you consider my RSE. I wear my Elvaan RSE gloves and pants pretty much full-time, and I haven't found much that is better. The RSE has DEX in addition to MP which is a modifer for some of our spells...but I probably need to get some STR items for those slots. I wear "my" (on loan from a friend) Leaping Boots on the feet, but wear my RSE boots whenever I am /WHM and healing. Is it okay to still keep wearing my Leaping Boots? I mean, I have looked and unless I am missing something, not even our AF seems to be better than those.. O_o Everywhere else I have quite a bit of ACC or ATK- I was recently able to equip a Life Belt, for instance. Weapons: I cannot find anything better than Combat Casters+1 x2 ....well, except maybe the +2 version, but I found our AF weapon is okay... but for the sake of EXP parties I like having the extra ACC. Is there perhaps an item I have overlooked?

I probably need to look more into it, but one of my gripes with this game is simply awful hybrid itemization at the mid-levels, As I said, my other job is RDM and I can't even see my AF replacing my RSE on that job (except the hat and body, which are awesome). In the case of BLU, there's definitely some nice melee gear coming up that I could see upgrading to. Thanks for the bit of direction on what to get, though. RDM itemization for parties is way more straightforward than BLU, which is not exactly something I thought I'd say!

Thankfully at this level we fight a lot of beetles, and so yes, I use MP Drainkiss pretty much every time I can. However, sometimes, as you all know, you get less than 20 MP back, and it's not really a substitute for Refresh/Ballad. Also, beetles with no RDM or BRD means...guess who is the dispeller? Not a big deal but OMG I have wasted so much mana on times when so-and-so loses/gets hate just as I am casting and my entire efforts are ruined on Blank Gaze. I found standing behind the tank to work best but anyway- I started announcing in /p every time I'd dispel in the hopes that someone could hold off their lolWS for just a moment while I remove the buff that could potentially lower their damage anyway. -.-

And I have indeed mastered the art of "oh crap the BRD is casting ballad! Run to the back and get it NOW!" Sometimes I wonder if BRDs even know at all how much we want that...I try to stand the closest I can to the mages relative to the enemy to make it easy for the BRD to Ballad me- but this is only successful in a party with a PLD, who also needs Ballad. I admit I was ignorant of Refreshing BLU's at first on my RDM, but after I had one excellent BLU in my party and I saw what a BLU with less mana concerns can do well...needless to say they got bumped up on my cycle. I ask for Aspir Samba when it's feasible to, however sometimes the other melees resist that if I am the only front-line MP-user. >.> Anyway, I think many think BLU's are like DRK's who are sorta-but-not-really dependent on MP to do damage. Oh well, I suppose all I can do for now is equip the hMP gear when resting, as I stated before.

So, here's an idea. Once I hit 51, is it feasible on Aspirable mobs to self-SC Gravitation, quickly switch to Dark Staff, and MB Drain Kiss, or should I only use it when the timer is up?

Hmm, /THF. I had initially resisted the idea (mostly because I hate the idea of leveling THF to 37) but I really do not want to limit myself subjob-wise, so the THF leveling is going to commence soon. From what I read, /NIN and /THF are extremely viable subs for different situations, and it makes perfect sense to try to get more bang for your buck, so to speak, by using many of your spells with SA.

[Tonko]

/THF isn't worth it in my opinion, and is certainly not worth leveling to 37 if you don't already have the sub. You'll be just fine BLU/NIN all the way to 75.

As for +MP gear, only time it's worthwhile is to macro into a healing MP setup, and then use it on a couple spells real quick before switching to dd gear. It's more hassle than it's worth generally, because as it's been said, BLU is about how much refresh you have. That is what determines your damage output and the flow of MP usage. If you're meleeing in +MP gear that doesn't also have beneficial melee stats, you're doing it wrong.

Do more with less, macro in as much +str for damage spells as you can for every physical spell you cast. It's like a weaponskill that costs MP. Get a mnd setup for your heals. And get +hMP gear to help you get your MP back faster between pulls

As for self SC+MB with pluto's, it's a very good idea. You'll get more from the Pluto's + MB Bonus every 2 minutes than you would if you just spammed drainkess.

[LD]

Are we any closer to figuring out what Physical Potency merits do? If it weren't for the fact that I don't believe -20 seconds is a worthwhile investment for 150k exp, I'd feel stupid meriting them.

[VZX]

Are we any closer to figuring out what Physical Potency merits do? If it weren't for the fact that I don't believe -20 seconds is a worthwhile investment for 150k exp, I'd feel stupid meriting them.

As far as I keep track the discussion in this thread, no one post some additional data after my and delekii's test.

I was really expecting damage up in any way, but... who knows.... Remember when Arching Arrow/Blast Shot was bugged for the longest time (can't crit at all, regardless the WS desc say crit hit rate varies on TP). Let's just hope this is another similar case.

[ronin sparthos]

/THF isn't worth it in my opinion, and is certainly not worth leveling to 37 if you don't already have the sub. You'll be just fine BLU/NIN all the way to 75.

I always favored /thf for the levels before Frenetic Barrage due to the fact that you get the spike damage all the time with the spells like Sickle Slash / Death Scissors and the ability to do some hate management post-60 with trick attack. I always found /nin to be only useful after the multi-hit spells, missions/events and other places where you might be sharing hate with a tank.

Opinions i guess, both subs have valid uses for said events.

[LD]

Are we any closer to figuring out what Physical Potency merits do? If it weren't for the fact that I don't believe -20 seconds is a worthwhile investment for 150k exp, I'd feel stupid meriting them.

As far as I keep track the discussion in this thread, no one post some additional data after my and delekii's test.

I was really expecting damage up in any way, but... who knows.... Remember when Arching Arrow/Blast Shot was bugged for the longest time (can't crit at all, regardless the WS desc say crit hit rate varies on TP). Let's just hope this is another similar case.

Damn, I was really hoping you or someone else had figured someone out on your own. Guess I'll just keep meriting it in the hopes that it is actually helping or it will at some point.

Gotta remember to ask SE wtf next chance we get.

[Araius]

/THF isn't worth it in my opinion, and is certainly not worth leveling to 37 if you don't already have the sub. You'll be just fine BLU/NIN all the way to 75.

Seriously? :rocl:

Granted it depends what you're fighting but...if you don't even have /THF available, that in and of itself is pretty gimped. THF is really not all that much of a pain to level unless you're using a dagger from level 1 on...which...god help you if you are.

[Judai]

/THF is a must for Endgame BLU. Don't need for exp, I prefered /NIN but you will be severaly gimping yourself endgamewise witout it as a sub.

[Arkanna]

/THF is a must for Endgame BLU. Don't need for exp, I prefered /NIN but you will be severaly gimping yourself endgamewise witout it as a sub.

[ronin sparthos]

/whm /nin /thf and you'll be set for most things that can be thrown at you on BLU.

[Maxxthepenguin]

/thf was great from the levels bludgeon starts kinda sucking until you get your good multihits. Doing 1k+ death scissors > utsusemi

You can cocoon and head butt, you don't need the protection from uts:ichi.

[ronin sparthos]

Zephyr Mantle when you get it can make the /thf expierience easier as well.