Blue Mage - Mixed Responses

[Galaxia]

Hi everyone

After doing abit of research on my server I was curious about BLU.
Now I keep getting told many things for it's sub, People have said ya need nin, others said to do whm and even some said I'd need rdm....

So can you go from 1-75 with just one SJ?
cause I get told many diffrent thinks ppl with /whm said they only use that and ppl who do /nin said they never use /whm

mega comfuseing.....

any ideas?

[bikkebakke]

I'd probably keep /nin and /whm available to allow for your party leader's preference.

[Galaxia]

Ninja is pretty pricey to lvl isnt it?

[bikkebakke]

Depends... if you're just going to level it to 37 it's not too bad. If you have a semi decent way of making gil you'll be just fine.

[Dopeoddy]

The initial cost of Utsusemi at level 12 is quite a bit, but Ninja's have fairly cheap gear and weapons, and the powders arn't too expensive if you farm once and a while. And if it is only a sub it shouldn't be terribly expensive.

I have also heard that Thf is a viable sub for Blu, because sneak attack stacks with the majority of the physical spells. Something else to keep in mind I guess.

[Malacite]

/WAR sub for early tanking. It's my opinion that BLU out tanks even PLD by leaps and bounds until the 30's with cocoon and defense food (or cookies if you need fast MP recovery)

/WHM is great if you want to do any kind of healing. It's been tested and found that healing magic skill boosts all your healing blue magic (except pollen it apparently) quite nicely. The extra MP is great too ^-^

/BLM is for those who dare to use the magical blue spells. It seems that most shun these spells in favor of the generally more potent physical ones, but I don't think you should disregard this combo entirely.

/THF gets you Sneak Attack at 30 which works with all your physical attack spells and boosts damage quite nicely, berserk/double attack sadly don't have any influence on physical spells. You can also plant a lot of hate on someone with SATA Deathscissors. @ . @;

/NIN is for those BLU who absolutely love to spam spells (and thus gain loads of hate) and for end game TP burns.


/THF /NIN and /WHM are the 3 subs you should focus on having ready if you're serious about BLU. For the most part, you can get away with any of them to 75, but you're only limiting your options by doing so.

[Armando]

/WAR sub for early tanking. It's my opinion that BLU out tanks even PLD by leaps and bounds until the 30's with cocoon and defense food (or cookies if you need fast MP recovery)

Cocoon + Defense food is a waste if you ask me. Cocoon alone should already give you all the defense you need, and we all know defense has diminishing returns. May as well take advantage of the fact that your defense is covered and eat meat if you ask me.

Also, I prefer /WAR at 30 over /THF. Berserk may not affect spells but I find it better than just SA + Spell before you get any of the impressive one-shots.

/BLM is for those who dare to use the magical blue spells. It seems that most shun these spells in favor of the generally more potent physical ones, but I don't think you should disregard this combo entirely.

I wouldn't count it out entirely, but even if I went /BLM I still wouldn't fall back on magic spells early on. Don't know if it changes later on but yeah, Head Butt/Feather Storm/Bludgeon beat magic spells by a mile early on no matter how you look at it.

[Sabaron]

WHM: The Healing Skill bonus to BLU Healing Magic is excellent--Healing Breeze, Wild Carrot, and Magic Fruit are all affected by it, but Pollen has a soft cap making it roughly equivalent to a self-target only Cure I spell and therefore of limited usefulness. The White Magic curatives will be generally less effective and you will probably not favor them over BLU cures. Add -na, Erase, and WHMs other nifty features and you have quite a main healer. BLU/WHM is only used for main-healing so if you never main heal as BLU, you never need /WHM but it maximizes your invite rate.

/NIN: The speed bonus from Dual-wield is very nice pre-Berserk. Shadows allow you some leeway in terms of damage. Used only defensively after 30th level.

/WAR: This sub allows you to tank as BLU and gives you very good DoT increase through Berserk at 30 and later on Warcry. This is a staple sub of the Blue Mage and probably #1 on your list of sub-jobs to level. If I were to pick a single sub for Blue Mage to level to 37, it would be this one.

/THF: This sub is great for the massive damage CASA and CASATA attacks that you get later on. The first one that's worthwhile is Jet Stream at level 38. I don't know for certain the DPS differences between it and having Berserk on, so I can't speak to that at this time, but level 40 (Chain Affinity) would seem to me to be the earliest opportunity you'd have to use this sub provided CASA >> Jet Stream works out. The CASA procedure goes like this: #1 Use CA. #2 Use WS. #3 Use SA. #4 Cast spell [Jet Stream]. For Jet Stream CASA it's Red Lotus Blade to open and it makes Fusion. I'm not there yet, but you could try this as well:

#1 Chain Affinity
#2 Burst Affinity
#3 Red Lotus Blade
#4 Sneak Attack
#5 Jet Stream
#6 Bomb Toss

THF is a worthy sub and probably looks super cool if the second procedure works. I've never seen CABASA's or CABASATA's used, but since Blue Mage burst is "late" compared to normal bursts, it's entirely possible that it would work with well-timed macros.

BLM: How does BLM sub affect magical BLU? Is it just the +INT or does Elemental skill affect it in a similar way Ninjutsu is boosted? I vaguely remember seeing something like this on this forum but I don't remember where or in what context...

RDM: RDM sub is generally used for a very small number of reasons: 1) Fast Cast, 2) Dispel, 3) Gravity. A good percentage of BLU spells have a 1.5 second casting time. Fast Cast really isn't going to help too much--BLMs use it because their high level nukes take so long to get off. If you're relying on long-cast spells, RDM could benefit you. As for Dispel, BLU already gets Dispel in the form of Chaotic Eye, Blank Gaze, and Geist Wall. Mysterious Light covers Gravity, so there's nothing left here but Fast Cast and a boost to healing magics similar to WHM but slightly less potent. You sacrifice Curagas, -nas and Erase for Fast Cast, so it's not as good for Main Heal BLU as WHM.

My picks: WAR, THF, WHM, NIN in that order.

[Armando]

BLM: How does BLM sub affect magical BLU? Is it just the +INT or does Elemental skill affect it in a similar way Ninjutsu is boosted? I vaguely remember seeing something like this on this forum but I don't remember where or in what context...

It gives you 1 or 2 points of INT over other subs (not worth mentioning) and gives you Magic Attack Bonus (which you can get with Cursed Sphere and Sound Blast post-32 without having to sub /BLM.)

By the way, most physical blue spells are 0.5 sec casting times, not 1.5. I see /RDM more as a way to get more MP while getting +5 Attack/Accuracy out of your belt in the 30-39 range (Rapier Belt.)

[Sabaron]

I see... with a bonus like that, I would be inclined to suggest RDM as a sub (for the Rapier Belt) only if you had levelled it previously for a different reason. I would never recommend anyone to level a sub-job exclusively for a single piece of gear. BLM seems rather pointless as well as anything it's giving a bonus to has a horrible mp/damage ratio unless you're fighting groups of mobs instead of individuals which I have done before as BLU and it's actually kind of exciting.

[Karinya]

The other thing /BLM gives you, Conserve MP, you can't get from a spell combo until level 66. (Any two of Chaotic Eye, Frost Breath and Firespit, according to Mysterytour.) BLU is one of the most MP-hungry jobs in the game and unlike BLM itself, doesn't usually rest in the middle of fights as well as in between them. So from 40-65 you may want to consider the benefits of having Conserve MP (and more max MP than any other sub besides SMN). It's also possible that Elemental Seal may affect the resist rate of magical blue magics, allowing you to ES+Sheep Song links or ES+Chaotic Eye that Goblin Shaman that's giving you trouble. (Disclaimer: I haven't personally tested this.)

Of course this has to be balanced against the benefits of a backup provoke and Berserk, SA+Screwdriver (or at 40, Jet Stream or Uppercut), DS+Healing Breeze, and Utsusemi:Ichi. BLU is a versatile job and several different subjobs can improve it in different ways.


I found that while leveling BLU up to 37, one of my most effective spells was Poison Breath. Even without counting the poison damage its damage/MP was right up there with anything else, and it didn't give a bunch of TP. It also bursts on Distortion, if you're in one of those rare parties that actually does a skillchain. The rest of the magical damage spells seemed pretty pathetic, although Sandstorm might be worth it for the acc down if you have a ninja tank. Blood Drain/Digest do sort of unimpressive damage, but when you count in the free healing, they're not bad if you're injured.

That was without /BLM though, I never tried it although I have it leveled. (I might give it a shot post-40 when Conserve MP is in play, if I go back to leveling BLU at some point.)

Choice of monsters plays a role too: if you're fighting high def (crabs, crawlers, beetles) or high eva (flies, colibri, puks) monsters, the physical spells are going to suffer. But then, anyone who's ever bludgeoned a crab probably knows that already. Magic spells will go right through physical def and eva.

[Armando]

I'm almost sure Elemental Seal works on magical Blue Magic. I could test it next weekend in any case.

By the way, MAB doesn't affect Breath spells so it won't make Poison Breath stronger.

[Malacite]

Now, almost every BLU I've come across uses the CASATA self SC method. However, wouldn't it be more practical to use that TP to power up your WS (you need 150 or 300 in the case of blue magic, unlike WS apparently) for a skill chain?

I've seen CA-SATA Deathscissors close some nasty chains >.>b

[Sabaron]

I'm more curious about the CABASATA attacks and if you've ever seen one of those (Chain Affinity, Burst Affinity, WS, SATA, Physical Spell, Magical spell).

[bikkebakke]

So I could pretty much go to 75 as BLU with just WAR and WHM subs?