Ballista

[Thiefami]

I would personally say job balancing and lack of rewards is what stops me from playing. One job should be strong to another, and that other job should have a job they are strong against, but you have some jobs that are not strong against any jobs and that kind of sucks. On the other hand a bard will get his fanny whooped, but in a big team battle, which is the real reason for ballista ( to act as a team ) they are awesome with crowd control.

I dont know, maybe more variations of PvP, possibly capture the flag, or capture the fort I think would make a fun experience and excellent additions to this game.

[Marcicus]

Breath spells take too long to cast for anyone with half a brain to get hit by unless the enemy gets bound and stunned by other members on your team. Magical spells don't do enough damage unless you make a build SPECIFICALLY for magical blue magic; and honestly, who is either going to:

A) Come BLU/RDM to matches all the time just to nuke people (and magical spells are EASILY avoidable)

or B) Swap gear far away where no one can see you, then run back in with your new spell set and nuke people down

Big 3 is pretty much the best damaging spells a BLU has for them in most scenarios. Does that mean I won't set in a Radiant Breath in for some annoying pos RDM or WHM running around casting shit on people? No, but to insist that Big 3 people make you sick makes me lol hard.

edit: BRD/RDM has decent defense once stacked right. And I'm talking Terra's Staff / Jelly Ring / Umbra Cape with Minne, Protect IV, and taco on.

[Ultimagi]

Because Blue Mage doesn't have Stun, Bind, or Sleep? Vertical Cleave or Cannonball will deal way more damage used properly than any of those spells. If you pick up an HP drink, you go hide somewhere while you switch to a Heat Breath setup. You can wear all the damage reduction and defense you want, you're still going to fall to a good Blue Mage.

[Cream Soda]

Because a blu is going to have a body boost all the time? Also, like I said, I generally gear towards defense and resists. I use x2 arete del sol and with ballista's natural resistance, bind and stun last very little, if they stick at all in a very short amount of time. And you speak of sleep as if poison potions weren't the most common item dug up in a match. Going back to the body boost breath deal, situational situation is situational. That'd be the same as the number of times I've put on all mnd gear with faith h2h and virtue stone instead of kirin's pole, boosted to 12, dropped a 600-800 chi blast and then followed it up with a howling/asuran fists.

[Marcicus]

Sheep Song, Yawn, Soporfic are easily avoidable by simply running away. If you get bound with Regurgitation and you get slept, why do you not have Poison Potion on you? I already stated breaths take too long to cast to use them reliably as your main source of damage throughout the entire fight. Vertical Cleave? LOL, good luck doing decent damage with that. You'd have to sub THF and use Chain Affinity before you get good damage out of that, and no one is going to stand around and get hit by that (Although I will never understand for the life of me why it goes through Utsusemi but not blink. -.-) And BLUs have Cannonball set in their build, it's a finishing spell used when people think they can get away, but they really can't, so I don't see your point here at all.

[Cream Soda]

Well I'll go ahead and say it before he does. You're forgetting pinecone bomb, which does have a pretty large range and high success rate with sleep, but then again, poison pot. As for cannonball, with my defense build, its never hit me for very high in my personal experience

[Ultimagi]

Because a blu is going to have a body boost all the time?

If

My point is that if a Blue Mage doesn't suck, they can sneak up behind you and 1-shot you with a good Cannonball. Or, if they get a Body Boost or Giant's Drink, they can severely injure or kill multiple people with 1 Heat Breath. Relying on the "Big 3" is a shitty way to play Blue Mage.

[Marcicus]

I was walking over to class and thought, "Damn, I forgot to say Pinecone Bomb." lol.

Also wat, I have a pretty good build I use with Cannonball and I could never break over 700 with Chain Affinity unless I 2hred, but all spells are on cocaine when you use Azure Lore. You ain't going to one shot nobody with Cannonball, unless they're already low on HP beforehand.

I'm going to slightly derail this just cause I want to know Vegetto's view on MNK/PLD vs MNK/BLU cause that's probably gonna be the next job I take to 75 for ballista after DRK (got Ebody and Homam waiting for me :D); I'll reply after I finish owning this Engineering test and hopefully Ultimagi will give me a good argument by then.

[DragonCloud64]

Ballista being designed the way it is just doesn't make any sense.

Why would a FFXI player, a FFXI player since 2003, want to play Ballista, with all the equipment swaps causing penalties?

This seems to be the one of the more important beef's people have with ballista, but it's a curse and a blessing in disguise. While it keeps you from switching into your ws gear it keeps me from macroing in my -50% dmg taken gear.. or when i'm running away and see a nuke coming I can't change into a MDB/-magic dmg taken set.

About the hit&run strategy, BLU is the best defense agaisnt this, but then again, is also the master of this strategy.... If cannonball didn't exist it would be a different story

[DragonCloud64]

Magical spells don't do enough damage unless you make a build SPECIFICALLY for magical blue magic

Yeah, and most people don't know that Blue mage isn't completely unnerffed. Magic spells are nerfed heavily, even during AL. An 2hr EOM which would do around 1500+ on an IT mob wouldn't go over 1k on a player. Breath spells are pretty hard hit too, Heat Breath Damage does more like 1/3'rd the damage instead of 1/2, even with 4k HP i couldn't break 1.3k on a heat breath

[sleekmotorwurkz]

Magical spells don't do enough damage unless you make a build SPECIFICALLY for magical blue magic

You mean just like vegetto has a build SPECIFICALLY for dmg reduction?

This seems to be the one of the more important beef's people have with ballista, but it's a curse and a blessing in disguise. While it keeps you from switching into your ws gear it keeps me from macroing in my -50% dmg taken gear.. or when i'm running away and see a nuke coming I can't change into a MDB/-magic dmg taken set.

Well see there... that looks like it would take some strategy. Id rather be able to swap to my ws gear and see if you can time it fast enough to equip -50% dmg taken in time. Good luck.

[Cream Soda]

My point is that if a Blue Mage doesn't suck, they can sneak up behind you and 1-shot you with a good Cannonball. Or, if they get a Body Boost or Giant's Drink, they can severely injure or kill multiple people with 1 Heat Breath. Relying on the "Big 3" is a shitty way to play Blue Mage.

No, they can't. Even with SA, A cannonball has never hit my build for over 500 dmg. I have 1.7k hp. You do the math. Not only that, but the chance of them sneaking up on me with how often I'm holding my target button to see invis and anywhere near me is very slim to none. It has nothing to do with the skill of the blu mage, it has to do with the skill of the person they are trying to sneak up on. Let's say they do get a body boost, which is rare. That is one free kill (if it even does that) they get. After that, the body boost is as good as useless cause I got a lethe water with your name on it.

Like I said, I'm not saying blu is a shitty job. It's just not plain broken like everyone is trying to make it seem.

You mean just like vegetto has a build SPECIFICALLY for dmg reduction?

That's actually my standard build. Works well against all DD, not just blu. If there is ever any variation in my build, it is to deal with a specific job, which then would be going for specifically (Like if a rdm is doing nothing but bind duty on me, I'll toss on my Fire Belt) or toss on a bunch of acc+ for a thf, ect.

[Ultimagi]

Just making sure you're not judging the job based on what 90% of the population does with it. There are good Blue Mages out there who actually know how to play the job.

[Cream Soda]

Like I said, I know the job's potential and it is a good job. I just wouldn't put it on the broken jobs list. (and like I said earlier, I wouldn't put pld there either). I think rdm and sch are 2 of the only jobs I'd call broken and MAYBE blm, but that's mainly due to the genie (idk the name of the nq) set where the curse will rly slow u down (especially when paired with gravity)

[Ultimagi]

It's Igqira. Anyway, I've never seen a Scholar in Ballista, how is it broken? Just curious. Also I haven't done any Ballista since Nyzul Weapon Skills came out, does Atonement work?

[DragonCloud64]

Well see there... that looks like it would take some strategy. Id rather be able to swap to my ws gear and see if you can time it fast enough to equip -50% dmg taken in time. Good luck.

Well I usually see things like berserk, boost, Sekkanoki, and warcry as a giveaway that a WS is coming, lol

[Cream Soda]

It's Igqira. Anyway, I've never seen a Scholar in Ballista, how is it broken? Just curious. Also I haven't done any Ballista since Nyzul Weapon Skills came out, does Atonement work?

Deadly job when you have nabs on your team(like usually when there are aoe jobs on the other team, I won't stand with the huge crowd). Things like grav-ga or bindga gives the other team easily enough time to target a single member and take him out before people can reach their team or use their catlicons. Helixes, while nerfed, can still get a more potent dot than disseverment easily. Enspell-ga, situational depending on what you have on your team, but for example, put a couple faith baghs mnk with a sch and you will rly see the utility there. And w/o a lethe water, gl 1shotting them so they're not exactly all that easy to target either.

As for atonement, I'm not sure exactly how it works, but it seems to deal more damage the longer the target has been alive. (And for jobs like blu rdm mnk or jobs that are often avoided, will hurt bad) I've seen it do 600-700 on ppl that have lived longer.

[Marcicus]

Deadly job when you have nabs on your team(like usually when there are aoe jobs on the other team, I won't stand with the huge crowd). Things like grav-ga or bindga gives the other team easily enough time to target a single member and take him out before people can reach their team or use their catlicons. Helixes, while nerfed, can still get a more potent dot than disseverment easily. Enspell-ga, situational depending on what you have on your team, but for example, put a couple faith baghs mnk with a sch and you will rly see the utility there. And w/o a lethe water, gl 1shotting them so they're not exactly all that easy to target either.

As for atonement, I'm not sure exactly how it works, but it seems to deal more damage the longer the target has been alive. (And for jobs like blu rdm mnk or jobs that are often avoided, will hurt bad) I've seen it do 600-700 on ppl that have lived longer.

This. I run -33%physical damage taken on Scholar. That, Pro4, taco, and stoneskin/phalanx(which I -ga onto my team often) makes SCH hard to take down. I'm rarely silenced thanks to a ~90ish(95 I think) Baraero. Bindga and Graviga are extremely fucking annoying to deal with especially in crowds. Lol I remember one time in uncapped Jugner there was this JP whm who loves to stand in the middle of his team's crowd and he usually has the entire team allianced. My team was defending the rook and I saw him run towards his team. I popped Tabula Rasa and proceeded to Gravity, Bind, Sleep II, Aspir, and Dispel spam his entire team, literally crippling them within a minute's time because a SMN ran up and Astral Flowed the fuck out of them, followed by a -ga3. Never seen so many people die at one time. Best time I had on SCH ever.

About Atonement, it definately does more damage the longer your target is alive. This PLD was following me back in a Pashhow match and did like 200dmg to start, then the second one did 600 and I had no idea what the fuck hit me.

[Ultimagi]

Someone wants to fight me, I'll look forward to disco balling his face in.

[SamanosukeShiva]

it'll be worth going to official ballista matches if we can buy gears with ballista points, good gears although wont surpass the top endgame pieces etc.

ie.

better than haubergeon+1, but not better than adaberk etc