your thoughts on the soon to be blue mage class.

will this further imbalance the classes... or will it... erm.... unbalance the classes.

SE has been doing pretty well trying to balance the classes. Nerfing RNG and NIN was necessary, and while DRG wasn't really that bad off before the patch, changing call wyvern to a 20 minute ability helped them a bunch. The only job that's really been hit hard lately was BST, but they'll probably find a way to fix the problems caused by the latest anti-MPK patch.

As far as blue mage unbalancing the classes... how the heck should we know? We don't have much to go on. As far as I know, no spells or abilities for the blue mage have been announced. We don't even know how the mage will acquire the enemy's attacks. Will they have to be hit by them and survive or will they have an FFX lancet-style ability? Since they use melee weapons, I can assume that they'll be a lot like RDM in that aspect. Blue mages (or blue mage type abilities such as enemy skill in FFVII) have always been offered a wide array of different kinds of spells.

I've heard rumors that blue mage may be the new solo class.

Honestly, I think it's too early to ask your question. We don't know enough right now.

We need to know about the other new jobs being released alongside BLU before we can even begin contemplating any sort of imbalance in the job structure. But honestly, I'm not too afraid of any major upset being caused by the introduction of new classes. The only problem I can foresee is a bunch of people trying to immediately jump on the new job quests and innundating the dunes with these new jobs.

so far... on playonline I have read, the only new class is Blue Mage.

On the official Website there seems to be more slots..so its not only BLU...well not likely to be only it anyway. I just know that there will be alot of bugs, and tweaks til its balanced.

It's been confirmed in recent interviews that BLU will not be the only new job released in the new expansion pack.

wow, neat... now lets make rumours and guess what the new classes will be.

well... they need a Lady Luck styled class, that would be fun to use and exploit.

Anyone got pics on how this new Blue Mage job looks like?

http://ffxi.allakhazam.com/news/sdet...tml?story=6324

Arabian nights, like Arabian days! More often than not, are hotter than hot, in a lot of good ways! :D

yeah...not exactly the most sexiest equipment ive seen.

Mithra panties and belly ;o

I thought it was fairly noticable that on PlayOnline's section on the new expansion it has a section titled "New Jobs" as in plural. I thought anyone would be able to figure that one out with or without an interview.

You want speculation? I'll give you speculation.

My bet is geomancer is most likely to appear. Mage class with an axe? Hell yes!

Chemist may work as a support job as well. Throw in a knife, a gun, and potion-making skills and you've got a nice combination.

I suppose oracle is possible, but seeing as NIN and RDM have enfeebling spells down, SE would have to come up with some crazy new enfeebles. It could be done, but I'm not holding my breath.

In case you didn't notice, those are jobs that have appeared in Final Fantasy Tactics that haven't been used yet. Calculator was too broken to be put in FFXI, dancer is the same as BRD, battles have too much going on for mime to work, and squire and knight are already covered by WAR and PLD. I'm not even going to bother with FFTA jobs because some of those were the same thing only with different names for different races. I don't think we'll ever see race-specific jobs in FFXI.

I've had conversations with my linkshell members, and we've decided that it's highly unlikely that they'll introduce jobs to FFXI that have never before been seen in a Final Fantasy title. If they didn't decide to do that though, I've got two possibilities.

Necromancer. Necromancers are commented on in the story. Pirates that attack the Selbina-Mhaura boat are necromancers. Seeing as, from my understand anyway, the new expansion will have a good deal to do with pirates, it's a possibility, however slim, that necromancer could pop up in there. The biggest thing that kills necromancer is the fact that throughout FF history, the undead have always been the bad guys. To suddenly be able to control undead minions would be kind of funky. Kudos to Armando for pointing that one out.

Alchemist. Alchemy is already a crafting skill, but other kinds of alchemy have been referenced. The philosopher's stone and red water seem to be a direct reference to Fullmetal Alchemist. Also, in the description of the lamiae in POL's section of Treasures, it explains that the lamiae are not beastmen but rather chimeras. It describes chimeras as biological weapons created by alchemists. Obviously this is a different kind of alchemist than the people who study the alchemy craft. Biggest thing against alchemists is transmutation circles. Those take some time to draw, and it would either mean really long casting times, or requiring equipment with circles on them. Also, one would need the supplies to create something from the transmutation, so I suppose it would become a lot like NIN (as they require powders) in that respect.

There. Speculation. Happy? I am.

okay, my complete list of classes I reckon would be good to add in.

Illusionist: Devouted 100% to elemental crowd control or just crowd control in general.
though does very little damage, its constant dishing out of mob attacks slowly wither down the crowds while (if it has any at the time) his/her team members take a more thorough approach and focus on the enemies 1 by 1.
it does have some other specialties that occur when it is hit with certain attributes from foes (in other words these are his job traits).
when he/she suffers from petrify, the Illusionist's petrified soul continues to inspire her/his team members by upping there resistence and significantly raising there DEF stat while the illusionist is petrified.
when hit with an elemental attack from a foe it does a severe magical attack focused on that certain offender, the illusionist summons a non-elemental magical spike from another dimension called: Astral Punch, once it has been used once it needs 10 minutes to recharge until the effect can enter battle once again.


Lady Luck: Inheritors of the Cardians Magical feats.
this job learns how to channel there cardian ancestors ... ugh, i will do the rest later.

It says on the playonline page:
Employing the legendary arts of Aht Urhgan, these formidable fighter-mages employ elegantly curved blades for close combat, while decimating their enemies from afar with fell magic mastered from their opponents.

which would suggest that the BLU does infact use skills from the monsters ingame.

Should be good :D

Illusionist has many flaws...Sleepga and Lullaby are the ultimage crowd control. I know you havent been to end-levels yet, but if its only damge over time that matters for Illusionist, its way behind everyone else. With one skillchain the monster around this level will lose almost all its life it not fall within the skillchain itself along with Magic burst. Usually its only wearing down one monster, then the next is instant kill. If Illusionist cannot do enough damage like that, then its considered quite useless. Around mid-lvls a skillchain can take out half a mob's life too.

Also if he is petrified..then he is the tank right? But Defense up? Why would anyone else need Defense up besides tank? Also the fact that you need to be under status aliments to get stuff out makes it very flawed and more of a liability than anything...and the effects have to be VERY VERY noticable to be accepted into the party.

While Astral Punch sounds good, it only seems that they have to get hit to use it...and so in other words..its only good (the job) every 10 minutes? >_>; What if it was AerogaIV and you take over 900 damage?

Doesnt seem feasible, what type of job would it be as well? Healer? Melee? Tank? Support? Would this work vs certain HNMs too(as in does it have a role even)? What about Ballista?