Blue Mage: Best thread ever

[Sesshoumaru]

I lol at this lather rinse repeat cycle. Why are we continually talking about the same crap? Can we drop the whole lolclaws debate until something actually interesting comes up other then some one listing the instances where counter is useful.

[Akucaen]

hay guyz, y duz ths azurus clawwwz sux? jajaja.

:rocl:

[Dohorehn]

yuor all doin it wrong!!!11! figured it out.

gotta sub Morpher, and actually transform INTO a gnole... only works at night, but this makes asuran claw damage go through the roof, and lowers its timer to like negative 20, so essentially once you've executed the spell another one has already gone off in succession, putting you in berserker mode until you lose all your MP! Then you revert back and you die! *gasps for air*

[LD]

Ram Charge isn't a bad spell, it's just not the best. It's a one hit spell somewhat similar to Vertical Cleave, and it's capable to open and close Light in the oposite side of Cannonball. In the same way, Vertical Cleave is capable of closing and opening Darkness in the oposite side of Dissverement.

We already have something on that side of light, it's called savage blade.

Fucking. Laff.
Savage Blade is only useful because it allows us to self-SC Light. Damage for damage, it's hardly any better than Ram Charge, and being 2-hits, it doesn't have the same potential.

I think the point Shassira was trying to make was that Asuran Claw's main difference when compared to the big 3 is its damage, making its other, incidental aspects much less forgivable (if not unforgivable).

The only physical BLU spells I ever thought were totally useless were Grand Slam, Body Slam, Hydro Shot, and Spinal Cleave. The rest were either situational (to varying degrees) or were just spells that are pushed to the side and vanish from use, the same way tier 1 Black magic eventually goes unused.


Threads like this usually repeat the same topics often, but the reason I brought it up this time was actually because it was the only topic I felt like discussing while calling Charismatic out. That way, the chatter wouldn't be as mind-numbing or partisan while I developed my alibi, so to speak.

[Delekii]

Isn't it funny, all that argument about the use or uselessness of Blue tanking and the validity of Blue tanking, and instead of changing exuv hate, or limiting diffusion exuv, or any of the other things discussed, they give us a spell which serves no purpose whatsoever except to give us a defensive trait that is only useful when the mob is attacking you.

8)

[LD]

You really wanna take that tack? Ok.


Yes, I'm sure Counter will really help enough to sacrifice 7 points. I mean, we just have so many to throw around and the base 10% ptroc rate is more than enough to pose an effective defense.

Oh, I'm sure the devs meant it to encourage different playstyles as much as they meant Defense Bonus to, but you know damn well the Exuviation argument had little to nothing to do with BLU's tanking prowess. Don't act as if Counter is somehow any more an endorsement of Exuviation's grossly inordinate hate and its magnification with Diffusion than the much more effective defense Cocoon, which came roughly a year before the combination were possible.

...or are you so wounded for the last tiff that you're burning to start it again? I thought it interesting you to mentioned it on the previous page and it only seems to confirm my measure of you, now that you're being more aggressive about it.

[ronin sparthos]

The only physical BLU spells I ever thought were totally useless were Grand Slam, Body Slam, Hydro Shot, and Spinal Cleave. The rest were either situational (to varying degrees) or were just spells that are pushed to the side and vanish from use, the same way tier 1 Black magic eventually goes unused.

Add Terror Touch to this, that spell is completely useless. Ram Charge is completely useless as well, Savage Blade can do its only trick and that frees up valuable slots that most BLU are starving for.

Isn't it funny, all that argument about the use or uselessness of Blue tanking and the validity of Blue tanking, and instead of changing exuv hate, or limiting diffusion exuv, or any of the other things discussed, they give us a spell which serves no purpose whatsoever except to give us a defensive trait that is only useful when the mob is attacking you.

Im pretty sure SE knows exuviation gives a shitload of hate, they know that diffusion is on a long enough timer for it to completely useless beyond a huge hate jump every 12.5 mins. Counter is a novel ability (gnole lore and all) but even that is completely useless because Asuran Claws was rigged to be situationally 'decent' and Enervation is a crock of 10sec duration goodness.

[LD]

Terror Touch isn't good, but its unique enough to not be horrible, especially for its level. I admit I haven't used it since I was first able to, but those other abilities seem much worse in comparison (especially the last two, since the AOEs can at least be useful in Blitzkrieg and stuff like that Yagudo swarm missiony-quest thing). Just my opinion, of course.

I'm sure they know it too, I never doubted they did. The thing is, I really don't think their inaction comes from any approval (or even sloth). It seems like a 'no harm, no foul' situation to them, despite the fact that what they obviously intended with Diffusion isn't happening at all (or at least, so rarely that mentioning such situations is like mentioning a mage meleeing effectively).

[ronin sparthos]

BLU tier II merits are such a catostrophic failure that they might as well not exist. (in their current states)

...and yes i capped them even though they sucked.

[Sirrus]

Ram Charge is completely useless as well, Savage Blade can do its only trick and that frees up valuable slots that most BLU are starving for.

Genbu? Not that Genbu is important, but the spell is pretty good against him.

[LD]

BLU tier II merits are such a catostrophic failure that they might as well not exist. (in their current states)

...and yes i capped them even though they sucked.

I don't entirely agree, or at least, I believe they're as bad as most of the other group 2s ('cept for BLM & PUP's, paradoxically). Convergence is exactly what I expected to be, its failing point has more to do with the weakness of BLU nukes than the ability itself. Assimilation, while I'd rather it be stronger (2 each, at least), is still one of the most important things a BLU can merit. Other Group 2 sets are exactly like this; half good, half bad, and we all kinda got off better than Ninja. :/ However, I will say BLU's low points are a bit lower than most and that this still isn't much of an excuse. There's no reason Sange, Prot5, and Enchainment couldn't have been good, the Devs just don't feel as though they need to bother.

[Delekii]

You really wanna take that tack? Ok.


Yes, I'm sure Counter will really help enough to sacrifice 7 points. I mean, we just have so many to throw around and the base 10% ptroc rate is more than enough to pose an effective defense.

Oh, I'm sure the devs meant it to encourage different playstyles as much as they meant Defense Bonus to, but you know damn well the Exuviation argument had little to nothing to do with BLU's tanking prowess. Don't act as if Counter is somehow any more an endorsement of Exuviation's grossly inordinate hate and its magnification with Diffusion than the much more effective defense Cocoon, which came roughly a year before the combination were possible.

...or are you so wounded for the last tiff that you're burning to start it again? I thought it interesting you to mentioned it on the previous page and it only seems to confirm my measure of you, now that you're being more aggressive about it.

I assume you mean tact? I wouldn't want you to ruin your eloquent persona by making a spelling error that changes the meaning of your sentence

I know you don't have much experience tanking on BLU, but 7 points in a tanking setup are not that hard to come by. It would be at the expense of some HP or a couple of points of VIT, or perhaps one of the spells in the hate rotation or something like that.

I'm not sure how you would consider me to be "wounded" since it is fairly obvious that anyone with any actual experience tanking on BLU considers it a perfectly valid tank, and anyone such as yourself doesn't really matter, since they don't have any experience with it. Find me someone with appropriate gear who had appropriate support who actually tried to tank on BLU and failed or didn't perform as a fully functional tank in a scenario where a BLU tank actually makes sense, and perhaps I would concede that you MIGHT have had the beginning of an argument. Otherwise, that whole argument was basically you saying "I don't want to use BLU as a tank, so I will interpret what SE did as a mistake", and nothing more. You did say it eloquently though, I will give you that.

I said what I said just now tongue in cheek, knowing full well you would jump straight on it. The fact of the matter is that we are still not in a position to judge what SE thinks about BLU tanking, nor their expectations of what spells should do in terms of hate, all we can do is judge based on what we are able to achieve with the game as it is right now. Right now, BLU is a functional end game tank, who just got access to counter. That is the extent of what we can judge.

[Shassira]

First, about Savage Blade. Comparing a spell to a TP move is, well, not even. To use a move on the side of Ram Charge without it being Ram Charge you need TP, which puts the move into a very different cathegory. It's almost like arguing why use Zephyr Mantle if you can use /nin's utsusemi. The point was that Ram Charge ocupies a space in the logical spell chart and even if it's not a good damaging spell normaly, it does have a use due to its skillchaining properties. Rare? Yes, but it is there and it is unique. Would i want it to be better? Yup, I still think SE does things with a d20 when they make decisions, but whatever.

And yes, i compare this to Asuran because AC doesn't provide anything to level out even just a little the lack luster performance it gives... except... dun dun dun, base counter trait. This trait comes with a penalty of 7 points and i really doubt anyone will use Ennervation to offset the waste of points, so it's basicly that, since no one will use Asuran Claws either for damage unless they are trying to get low MP for some reason

Now, lets talk a bit about what counter does for tanking. I'm not gonna say i have much experience tanking as a BLU, because i don't, although i understand the basics and the times i've tried i've always found it very fun. All these times i've done it /nin, which minimizes the usefulness of a low proc ability like counter... but i digress, i do have tanked a lot as MNK.

I leveled MNK in a way many others never do, which was in a duo as /bst and /nin, depending on the camp and level gap, with a pup partner. Yup, odd combo and you can guess who was tanking most of the time (and yes, from 30 to 75). Even as /bst, mnk ends up riping hate from the pet easily unless you deliberately gimp yourself, which wasn't the point, and ofcourse /nin the mnk would have hate. The times were i could say "omg, thank god i have counter" can be counted with one hand through the whole levels except when... yes, you guessed it, i had counterstance up. So basicly the mnk base trait of counter is mostly useless and just a little gimmick unless you boost it up with the relevant ability, not to mention later on it can be boosted a bit more with AF2 and merits. This is all to say that a 10% counter base is not a good JA and doesn't give SE any reason to do the slopy job they did with this spell.

Is counter worth in a blu tanking setup because it's "only 7 points"? Maybe, i can imagine you can fit it in and it is a small chance of reflecting a hit that would've landed other wise. But is this JA worth the introduction of a rather hard to farm (although for me it was easier than most spells) spell, specialy for the level? Not under my view.

You can argue all you want that the intention of Asuran Claws is giving BLU a crapy counter rate and i'll probably agree, but I guess the main point is SE's design is yet again not fitting well. You can say there's a ton of other spells that are bad and even though this is true and should be remedied (which won't at the rate they change things), the thing is these spells are new and although it's relatively acceptable to make mistakes when the job came out and they tried to fill the list without knowing how BLU would perform exactly, there is no excusse to make new spells that have no point.

And yes, i know what some are thinking: "Check most of the new gear...". Yup. I guess that's SE!

[Delekii]

BLU is already strong enough. Adding another spell comparable in effect/mp viability to disseverment and frenetic rip would have drastically improved our ability for short term burst damage (increase by ~50%, or ~33% if you use Hysteric during burst as well). It is not realistic to expect this to occur.

The spell is 2 set points, and serves a niche purpose, which is a description that can be attributed to the majority of the spells on a BLU spell list.

SE is between a rock and a hard place. There is no way to make Asuran Fists viable as a spell worth casting without drastically increasing the capability of BLU in an area that it is already extremely strong in - it fits the exact same niche that BLU already has covered best out of all it's varied uses. The only option would be to choose another spell, or to not add any spells at all.

Incidentaly, Counter even in it's base form is not "crappy" when you are tanking HNMs, and the only reason you would think as such is because there is no feasible way to use it on tanking jobs before now - Monks have drastically higher chance at countering so it's not a fair comparison, and plds, nins and rdms are hardly going to sub monk to gain access to counter. That doesn't make it useless as a tanking ability. Avoiding 1 out of 20 physical attacks that aren't otherwise mitigated is a small deal perhaps, but it's just another layer of defense, which the BLU gives up minimal attributes to access, and only in cases where it is useful (on mobs where you can tank while engaged).

[karril]

You really wanna take that tack? Ok.


Yes, I'm sure Counter will really help enough to sacrifice 7 points. I mean, we just have so many to throw around and the base 10% ptroc rate is more than enough to pose an effective defense.

Oh, I'm sure the devs meant it to encourage different playstyles as much as they meant Defense Bonus to, but you know damn well the Exuviation argument had little to nothing to do with BLU's tanking prowess. Don't act as if Counter is somehow any more an endorsement of Exuviation's grossly inordinate hate and its magnification with Diffusion than the much more effective defense Cocoon, which came roughly a year before the combination were possible.

...or are you so wounded for the last tiff that you're burning to start it again? I thought it interesting you to mentioned it on the previous page and it only seems to confirm my measure of you, now that you're being more aggressive about it.

I assume you mean tact? I wouldn't want you to ruin your eloquent persona by making a spelling error that changes the meaning of your sentence

Tack... Its a sailing term. Basically he just said 'well if you want to move in that direction'. Its funny that you go after him saying he made a mistake. Especially when you start with 'I assume". Well, thats basically what you did. Made an ass out of yourself >.>

[Shassira]

SE is between a rock and a hard place. There is no way to make Asuran Fists viable as a spell worth casting without drastically increasing the capability of BLU in an area that it is already extremely strong in - it fits the exact same niche that BLU already has covered best out of all it's varied uses. The only option would be to choose another spell, or to not add any spells at all.

Then don't add it. This is the mentality that their designers need to stop using. Adding things is good, but those things need to have a use. Wasting time and effort on adding things that have no use is ridiculous. They wanted to give blu counter? Then make the trait available from current spells. Or even better, if they want to give counter to BLU and it be obtained from Gnoles, add a SPELL that gives a buff which grants the counter effect and make it cheap! There is so many ways of doing this if their intention was to give counter that the one they chose is pathetic. Basicly defending a spell that should be a damaging spell only for a trait it gives and has no use whatsoever makes no sense. It's like Self-Destruct, an annoyance that can only be explained by the desginers' sadistic love that plagues the game.

Incidentaly, Counter even in it's base form is not "crappy" when you are tanking HNMs, and the only reason you would think as such is because there is no feasible way to use it on tanking jobs before now - Monks have drastically higher chance at countering so it's not a fair comparison, and plds, nins and rdms are hardly going to sub monk to gain access to counter. That doesn't make it useless as a tanking ability. Avoiding 1 out of 20 physical attacks that aren't otherwise mitigated is a small deal perhaps, but it's just another layer of defense, which the BLU gives up minimal attributes to access, and only in cases where it is useful (on mobs where you can tank while engaged).

I guess the analogy i made with having leveled mnk from 30 to 75 by blood tanking and blink tanking is nothing compared to tanking "HNMs" with the same counter rate. Let me point this out, from bgwiki:

If the enemy evades the counter attack, the attack on the player goes through normally.

As far as i'm concerned, i'm pretty sure my mnk had quite decent accuracy since i fought Tough (although sometimes Very Tough) monsters and i think i'm not very far off if i say that you should normaly have lesser accuracy on an "HNM" than you'd have on a Tough mob. I'm not sure why you'd like to point HNMs as being a huge difference, but in my opion counting on counter 10% to evade an attack from an "HNM", specialy if you factor in the possible lack of accuracy, is almost like hoping the monster will miss due to that 5% chance.
Btw, and hoping this doesn't derail, you mention mnk as if it was not an indicator of the usefulness of counter in tanking (maybe you are refering to salvage?) due to its "drastically higher chance at countering". Such higher chance is only effective when under Counterstance (+the addition of AF2 feet, which need counterstance too). If you were refering to the personal experience i gave you, i'll tell you that i only used Counterstanc when /nin (because it's brutal to keep shadows up) and when fighting goblin pets, simply because taking 180 or 220 dmg per hit difference was worth the way higher chance.
But in general, mnk has presumably the same counter rate with the base trait as BLU has so my personal experience is as reliable as your personal experience where counter is worth in "HNM".

So in closing and to drop the topic because it's obviously circular anyway, i just hope SE's team took a minute to actualy think what they do instead of rolling a d20 and checking an action table. I swear, one day they'll read a table from the star wars table top rpg and BLU's will get a light saber because they rolled an 18.

[Genosync]

Holy shit. You guys finally made me realize why I was able to countertank (SJ locked) a Long-Bowed one time (from 100->23% before dying, unlucky atk+WS). I had like in the 70%ish counter range, and the time I owned the shit out of it I was still on my 'omg gonna use sushi 3F+' kick. The next time I had to try it I was on meat.

Wow. Thanks.

[Delekii]

Shassira I never said that counter as a trait was great, fantastic, or whatever. In fact I specifically said a "small" chance to counter.

You are pulling an LD and trying to second guess the development team's thought processes. The facts in front of us that they gave us a useless 2 point spell that activates counter. Perhaps it will be buffed, more than likely it wont, and it certainly wont be changed for another Gnole spell (especially one that Gnoles don't have themselves, like +counter..).

The reason I singled HNMs out as different from exp mobs is that a counter during a HNM can mean a shadow up rather than interrupted against a mob that hits for ~300 damage, or double attacks, or whatever else, and is designed to destroy you asap. I doubt it would even happen on 5% of attacks that get past your shadows, but if it did, stopping 5% of attacks that you would have otherwise been hit by on a HNM is a big deal.

[LD]

Is there some reason we shouldn't second guess the development team?
Also, though I could be mistaken, I believe the point Shassira was attempting to force into your skull was that without an at least passable hit rate in conjustion with Counterstance, Counter is not an especially potent defensive skill, and thus isn't as important as you seem to be making it. You'll notice the only situation Counter is especially good in is Salvage.

..and yes, curse my use of big words and...small, difficult words. :bagel:

[Havok]

Has anyone tested the enmity properties of Regurgitation?

I just duo'd JoFortitude, I've done it several times, and I was finding it very hard to pull hate off of my rdm partner tonight. Normally when doing this, enmity levels stay fairly even, so it's very easy to trade hate back and forth. Tonight though, she would pull hate off of me with something like casting refresh...showing that our enmity is pretty even. Then I'd cast regurgitation for ~400 dmg, and not pull hate at all. I used to just use mind blast as my only nuke, and even ~350 dmg from that would usually pull hate, so I'm not understanding this. The whole fight I was having trouble getting hate back off of her.

Possibly regurgitation has very little enmity gain? Or resets enmity somehow? The ONLY thing I did differently this time fighting it was adding regurgitation into my spell list, so that's what it feels like to me.