Blue Mage Tanking

[Meian]

If you replace the usual White Mage in the tank party with a Scholar, the Scholar can give your Blue Mage tank 380 Stoneskin, which is only 30 short of a Red Mage.

It is still a bit early for me but where are you getting this 380 Stoneskin?

If I remember correctly, Scholar's aoe Stoneskin is based off the receipient's Enhancing and MND, not the Scholar's.

[Ultimagi]

They changed Accession in an update, the area effects are now based on the Scholar's stats. The extra 30 comes from Stone Gorget. Scholar can't wear the Stone Mufflers.

[Meian]

They changed Accession in an update, the area effects are now based on the Scholar's stats. The extra 30 comes from Stone Gorget. Scholar can't wear the Stone Mufflers.

Seriously? Man, I wasn't sure if it was true when I had checked Wiki under " Stoneskin", guess it wasn't updated at the time. I feel pretty dumb now XD

[Ultimagi]

Oh my mistake, the Blue Mage needs to be wearing the Stone Gorget and Mufflers, meaning they can get 410 Stoneskin if the Scholar's Mind and Enhancing Magic are high enough.

[Tsuko_Asura]

Gonna' have to ask for proof of that.

[Yugl]

If you replace the usual White Mage in the tank party with a Scholar, the Scholar can give your Blue Mage tank 380 Stoneskin, which is only 30 short of a Red Mage.

If I remember Kaeko's journal correctly, I remember him saying that AoE SS gives a ton of hate unless you wear -50 Enmity (And by doing that you gimp the SS)

[Massimo]

Oh my mistake, the Blue Mage needs to be wearing the Stone Gorget and Mufflers, meaning they can get 410 Stoneskin if the Scholar's Mind and Enhancing Magic are high enough.

This is correct, Tsuko. Scholar's Stoneskin is based on his own stats (as you know), and the items do work if you wear them while recieving Stoneskin. Some tests were done a while ago.

[rath]

If I remember Kaeko's journal correctly, I remember him saying that AoE SS gives a ton of hate unless you wear -50 Enmity (And by doing that you gimp the SS)

We had this problem with sch buffing.We ended up forcing the sch to only hit the desired tank and himself with his buffs, otherwise they ended up tanking.

[Ultimagi]

Most of Scholar's Mind equipment has -Enmity on it already, such as Mahatma and Goliard.

[Tsuko_Asura]

This is correct, Tsuko. Scholar's Stoneskin is based on his own stats (as you know), and the items do work if you wear them while recieving Stoneskin. Some tests were done a while ago.

You'll have to excuse my pessimism, but it wasn't too long ago that we established that this wasn't true. I'm not in a state of disbelief, but it seems like a very random thing for Square to just up and patch.

If it is true, cool, it should have been that way from the beginning.

[Kaeko]

I have stone gorget and it only works on me when I AoE it. If the person getting my AoE skin has gorget on he'll get the +30 bonus though. The same is true for something like Hollow Earring and Enspell.

[Ultimagi]

Since Blue Mage can wear both, I'll have to work extra hard to get them. I should have them already for my Red Mage, but I don't really like that job. This works out quite nicely being able to give 410 Stoneskin to any job that can wear both items.

[Massimo]

I have stone gorget and it only works on me when I AoE it. If the person getting my AoE skin has gorget on he'll get the +30 bonus though. The same is true for something like Hollow Earring and Enspell.

Yeah, this is what I meant. Guess I worded it kinda silly.

[AoshiZ]

Since Blue Mage can wear both, I'll have to work extra hard to get them. I should have them already for my Red Mage, but I don't really like that job. This works out quite nicely being able to give 410 Stoneskin to any job that can wear both items.

If the blu has to wear the items at the time of stoneskin casting, I fear the coordination required to have the items on during an AE stoneskin cast to be more detrimental then productive.

However, if the blu is casting the stoneskin himself (via diamondhide or metallic body), then I feel its worth it because they can macro it in. The stats on the stoneskin boosting neck and hands are very poor to keep them on all the time.

I'm also confused as to why there is so much talk over stoneskin in the first place. In essence stoneskin is but a heal which can be applied beforehand in a buffered state. However, once the spell is down reapplication could have diminishing return because of the time involved in casting it versus actually just healing the damage.

Advantages being (with disadvantage in parenthesis next to it):
1. If stoneskin remains up while being hit spell casting remains uninterrupted (however on hard hitting enemies this likely will go down quickly and the majority of the time... Stoneskin will be down)
2. Stoneskin effectively increases your maximum HP (but is arguable if the tanks HP is not full)
3. Stoneskin is MP efficient (but Accession increases cost and the casting time is slow)

[Ultimagi]

This applies more to battles like Ouryu or Tiamat, where you only need Stoneskin to be casted on you once every approximately 4 minutes, in a controlled and safe manner. Other situations like tanking Jailer of Love would also work, but would be harder to time efficiently. Has anyone tested if these items work with Diamondhide?

[fantasticdan]

If the blu has to wear the items at the time of stoneskin casting, I fear the coordination required to have the items on during an AE stoneskin cast to be more detrimental then productive.

However, if the blu is casting the stoneskin himself (via diamondhide or metallic body), then I feel its worth it because they can macro it in. The stats on the stoneskin boosting neck and hands are very poor to keep them on all the time.

The "enhances stoneskin" items don't work for metallic body or diamondhide.

[Ultimagi]

Good to know, thanks.

[Belgaer]

I could see BLU being a useful tank in some situations, or like for when you don't have a PLD around (I've tanked Chigoe on BLU/RDM and RDM/WAR before), but I think RDM is probably better. It can use all the same gear you'd use for tanking, and is a lot more MP efficient with convert. Though, despite popular belief (or so it seems), a RDM tank can't still support, so it needs another RDM or what-have-you.

If you're looking for something that can DD as well as tank, again, BLU isn't really a good bet, since you'll want to conserve MP as a BLU tank (head butt, actinic burst, etc. etc. spamming adds up).

I still support BLU tanking. I support any job trying to think outside the walls and make something work that isn't supposed to. Just not when there's something more efficient around.

[Tsuko_Asura]

Though, despite popular belief (or so it seems), a RDM tank can't still support, so it needs another RDM or what-have-you.

Oh dear god, this. People always like to make me the only RDM in the tank party.. And then start bitching when I'm not Refreshing and Hasting my co-tank..

[Dimmauk]

As blu I have tanked Tia and Cerb, and used no - dmg gear other than earth staff. I dont bother with Macuahuitl at all. Actinic burst is max hasted and treated like i treat my flash on PLD same with blank gaze (good hate tool, and dispel lands on tia), I spam jettatura whenever its up (it very occasionally terrorizes Cerb), temporal shift whenever on cerb but saved for touchdown on tia (always stuns), and i toss exhuviation out occasionally but rarely need to diffusion exhuviation as I wouldn't be able to get the mob off me defeating the purpose of sharing hate with a cotank. I have a macro that does CA BA Convergence one after another for a little Enmity boost. As long as nothing in the area to catch with AoE blu is much like a pld but with the rdm spamming of the spells (but can do HP - + sets with magic fruit much like a pld also).

http://i44.tinypic.com/2s67cw0.png
Tiamat aerial shot. Pretty standard dmg reduction from fire resist this shot was before I had some fire gear that I have now. Saline Coat and Cocoon in the shot are not necessary at all ever this was an early test and the spells really have no use except for saline on ultima.

You honestly can generate as much enmity as you could possibly want, I don't really run out of MP and would do so less now with AF2 body. (I could care less about the -2 enmity on it as I was initially tanking with hardly any enmity gear). There are some advantageous job traits that you get with blu over PLD including mdb, conserve mp, auto-regen and I love the fact that temporal shift stuns and blank gaze dispels, you also get some additional haste that PLD doesnt have access to in Nashira body.

I have 75 PLD and would much rather tank something on blu because I feel I can generate significantly more hate, I imagine this is what a player with a nin/drk and pld/nin feels like as well. Just as long as nothing is in the way blu should be able to tank whatever.

Edit: To add, some of the people in this post have suggested head butt, other blu stun spells, and even other phys blu spells. I would strongly and I mean very strongly advocate not doing phys spells ever for obvious TP reasons.

That was /NIN?