The Beast Within -- A Guide To Blue Mage

Would be strange for a drill to not be piercing.

Quad. Continuum
Delta Thrust
Barbed Crescent
Empty Thrash
Heavy Strike
Thrashing Assault
Sinker Drill
Sudden Lunge

Nat. Meditation
Erratic Flutter
Winds of Promy.
White Wind
Frightful Roar
Cocoon

Animating Wail
Blazing Bound
Mortal Ray
Fantod


Pros: DWIII, Triple attack, Store TP, Crit attack bonus. Retains utility and all offensive/defensive power.

Cons: Reduces accuracy by 12.


Alt:

Quad. Continuum
Delta Thrust
Barbed Crescent
Empty Thrash
Heavy Strike
Glutinous Dart
Sinker Drill
Sudden Lunge
Frenetic Rip
Disseverment

Nat. Meditation
Erratic Flutter
Winds of Promy.
White Wind
Frightful Roar
Cocoon

Animating Wail
Blazing Bound
Mortal Ray
Fantod

Lose TA instead, can additionally drop empty thrash for something else

It is worth your time if they don't constantly do AOE. How are 10 shadows not worth someones time? It's the ws that can slow you down, not the normal hits. Sitting in a DT set lowers DPS, as does casting utsusemi. The job comment is irrelevant, obviously people will play BLU for whatever they want, they aren't asking if its the best for content.

He was saying he doesn't have space in his spell set for a useful spell that does decent damage, chains with a popular WS, and gives crit attack bonus job trait. Occultation is the red herring in his set, it offers the least benefit under almost all practical situations. Occultation also requires a 500 skill set to be 10 shadows, so you have to aquire and carry gear specific to it, and it's very MP and time intensive to keep up. Let's say there IS a situation where it's worth using during a fight and not just something you cast while the BRD and COR buff, you'd be better protected by utsusemi or just take mages that can cure a DD. If damage taken is that big of an issue, you'd be better off on another job.

Edit: just to add, you talk about DPS loss of riding a hybrid set or casting shadows, think of the DPS loss of something that gets through blink or losing a tier of DW or DA/TA job traits in order to facilitate setting Occ. It's just not worth it MOST of the time.

cocoon and harden shell are so underrated for damage protection, it makes me sad ):

occultation and sinker drill interchangeability is easily one of the better choices, but occultation is such a rare part of my spell sets to begin with simply because it's almost never necessary.

In that case you don't need to be setting any cures, I don't really anymore unless its a PUG or I'm solo. Not arguing its the best spell in all scenarios but its very useful. It's only three set points and you act like its such a huge cost to set it and use, and suggest job or sub job changing instead lol. I can think of a lot of fights where its useful instead of going /nin. One fight that springs to mind is Tenzen. Some other mentions are Mandy in Delve, Boar in Delve, Gnole in Delve, etc. You can put it up and keep meleeing without having to swap to DT set. Some of those mobs can one shot with some WS.

You have a tendency to think that you should come BLU to everything or that your way is the right way. I'd sooner set a cure spell than occultation for a lot of reasons. 3 set points can mean the difference between losing more important job traits or other, more useful, utility spells. The question was, "what do I lose from this set", the answer is Occultation.

Funny, you have a tendency to think you are always right as well. I wasn't arguing about his set, I was commenting on your suggestion that Occultation is not worth the effort for a large majority of situations, and that is untrue.

"Even with Tizona you can't justify the set points and lack of use."

Completely false, there are plenty of situations where it does better than most defensive options. Also, in regards to his set, theres no reason to set white wind if you have a competent WHM after recently added spells. You need the set points more and you can afford other changes without having to have that in there.

I actually have to agree with Draylo, that Occulatation is Heavily undervalued, and in certain instances, is a very good option (occultation and using /war on tenzen is a massive DPS boost over /nin)

On Tenzen, you're better off taking a SAM than a BLU, that's a situation where a different job configuration is your answer. If you're deadset on taking BLU and find a use for Occultation, have at it. But, don't pretend that Tenzen is the bulk of content or that BLU with Occultation is the best way to complete it.

they aren't really arguing that. anyway, resuming testing on sinker drill. first physical spell that has made me excited in a while

Seems so, it did 90 dmg on Wopket.

Is the new skirmish sword anygood?

no


----------

SA High: 710 (225)
SACA High: 1013 (321)

321 - 225 = 96

225 - 96 = 129

129/125 = 1.032
fTP ~= 1.0~1.035

96/1 = 96
WSC ~= 95~100


so far

I proposed a situation where blu uses occultation. I never said it was optimal.

Unless BA really boosts it, I'm not very impressed by Crashing Thunder. It's nearly the same damage as Thunderbolt, without the long duration stun, and significantly more expensive. I haven't tried with BA though, so maybe it gets a huge boost?

Thought you didn't get it =(

I believe his argument is that this proposed situation isn't really a justification for occulation, because people don't bring Blu to Tenzen.

Moles are usually creatures that live underground, so they probably don't need raincoats, in the situation that a mole was outdoors, and it was raining, you could put a raincoat on a mole but this doesn't justify making a raincoat for your mole.

But it wouldn't wear one, cuz it's an animal, so this isn't a real justifcation for mole raincoats.

Animals don't wear raincoats and Blus don't go to Tenzen.

This is similar to the Thaumas/Qaaxo argument. There's a time and place for everything and BLU is a versatile job. For example, Prothescar likes the utility of white wind in his set, and I just toss in magic fruit if I think a healing spell might be needed. Its not "wrong" either way (or having no healing spell if you are totally DD focused and you are confident in support members).
Its only wrong if it doesnt make sense for your situation. For example you set autorefresh and battery charge, but you are simply meleeing and CDC.

The only problem with that is that if you're hitting more than a couple people, white wind is superior to magic fruit in terms of HP/MP, whereas if you're only hitting a single person, magic fruit is superior. In either situation, one or the other is the superior spell.

That's not to say you will know before setting your spells which will be better, though, as situations can change very quickly.

if a fight needs a lot of AoE healing (wopket) and I know the WHM is subpar or will be stuck casting status removal a lot (wopket), I set white wind. otherwise, magic fruit or no heal. that said, you could set anything and the difference should be minimal enough that it won't matter

Yeah, it sucks, but that's the nature of MMO's, what the playerbase decides is good gets invites, even if they're wrong.

Its the Sam Mnk only mentality, has nothing to do with anything about Blu, pick XYZ non Sam or MNK job and its the same. I have seen people turn up Apoc/Lib/Rag pimped Drk because Mnk Sam only... Yeah sometimes the elitism just goes the way of idiocy.

On That note, Never set a single utility / support Spell go all out DD in spell set You will do nice damage parse higher then most but in the end be told "Wtf why weren't you (insert support role action)"

Blu Should not have to set occulaiton white wind magic fruit or any of those spells but unless you run with Friends/ Perm 99% of the time healers/ support see Blu and think "Oh one less person for me to have to heal erase paralyna etc."

And for wopket I spam sanguine blade (5.5k), requiring an extremely limited amount of healing during the fight. Go with 2 other blues who can play their job and the WHM falls asleep from boredom.

Diffusion: Erratic Flutter will win plenty of friends. Just tell the whm or brd he needs not worry about haste for the next 7-ish minutes and you need only one march to cap.

Same, I also don't get the opposite though. Why are you telling people they should go a different job? As if anything in this game is hard that you NEED a certain DD, its not like they will shave off 20 minutes or something on a different job lol. That was "cool" in 2005, it isn't 2005 anymore.

What is cool (or at least fun imo), is to throw parse out at the end of a delve run where a couple ppl (who don't know you're a good BLU) moan and groan that a BLU is DD'ing. Besting relic (not mythic) SAM or MNKs shuts ppl up pretty quick.

PS - and actually delve sam likely better than relic but its the mystique/aura some ppl give it to

Obi by a very significant margin