With the talk of multiple classes planning to get buffs or QoL changes, I decided to put some ideas out for Archmages and Bishops. These classes are widely known for their full map damage potential, being the best mobbers in the game and for that reason, absolutely awful at bossing. The changes I propose are not meant to bring mages up to par with some of the better bossing classes out there like BM, DRK, or even MM. They are just small buffs to make training more enjoyable. I myself am not a very big fan of the long cast time and delay for mage ultimates. As an I/L I really enjoy using Chain Lightning, opting to use it over blizzard even though I know the leveling speed takes a drastic hit. My proposition is to increase the damage of the 4th job mage non ult skills by about 1.6x-1.7x. For example, the base damage of Chain Lightning is 210 and Blizzard is 570. I think increasing the base damage of Chain Lightning to something like 350 would be a fine change since it would still be much weaker than Blizzard in terms of damage and range, therefore making it an inferior grinding option but still semi viable if you enjoy the skill. This increase will bring them no where close to good bossers(even current state buccs will probably still beat us) but it will make it that much more enjoyable and appealing to actually use the non ult skills. I understand perfectly that if mages were brought close to dealing as much damage as tier 2/3 bossers then they would be the perfect all in one class and this would make more people gear and fund mages to take bossing. I think with the damage buff on the subskills this will not happen purely due to the speed at which mages cast and the fact that our damage will still be nowhere up to par. This way people who really like those skills can use them knowing that, while training efficiency does go down, it's not as bad as it used to be as compared to spamming ultimates. Buffing things like chain lightning, paralyze, big bang, and even fire/ice demons would make mages a much more varied and enjoyable class to use in 4th job where right now we are limited to *press ultimate key*. For bishops, I propose an equal damage buff on angel ray as well as making it able to hit up to 6 mobs(not sure how hard this would be to code). The only problem with this is that bishops might become secondary attackers at bosses but between spamming heals/dispels and HS I don't think they'd have the time to. This is purely a suggestion based on my experiences with my beloved Ice/Lightning Archmage and me actually really enjoying using the 4th job non ult skills as opposed to just ultimate. The changes are intended to allow players that enjoy using those skills to keep using those skills without being punished as much as currently for not using their ultimates superior damage and range. Edit: I think many people are missing my point. I said nothing about ultimates being buffed. In fact, I think they are perfect as they are currently. Nothing about making mages effective bossers. Mages SHOULD NOT be effective bossers. I was talking about getting our subskills such as Chain Lightning, Paralyze, Angel Ray, Big Bang, and Fire/Ice Demons buffed so that users who like using and want to use those skills don't have to train with such a heavy penalty for not purely using ult. 4th job mages have no variance in that regard and it would be nice if they did.
Hello eeveethefox, Mages class imo is already very , very powerful even in bossing if actually controlled well. Gears for mages are indeed very rare, and to fund one takes not just money but alot time and effort to even see one. With an unwelled geared lvl200 mage 1400~ magic, giving Echo + Sswis Cheese + SE buff as an Bishop/Archmage will already allow you to be one of the better DPS inconsideration even to a bucc/Shad or even xBM/BM in mapleroyals final attraction, HT! where you are able to white arms easily, dealing a stable ~90k~150k to each target and especially hitting 5~6 targets at one go, using bliz/meteor/Genesis respectively. Gear them well and abuse these skills together with telecasting to not have knockback delay to the fullest, you will figure, that these classes do not need a buff at all, bossing wise. Its just very unpopular and not properly played/observed in the community
The buffs are not(and should not) be aimed at bossing. Most people won't consider taking a mage anyways. And as you said, yes we can deal loads of damage with our ultimates, but most people are afraid of us casting them due to DC issues in royals bossing. If you happen to be a mage in a boss and start spamming ult, people will blame you if they DC due to you spamming said ult. Which means you need to resort to your subskills, all of which are MUCH weaker. As I said, mages are amazing grinders/mob clearers and that is what they should be. I did not ask for any ultimate buffs, only subskills so that people that want more variation aside from press ult can actually go ahead and use those without suffering so much penalty for doing so.
I don't think it's fair to say mages are fine how they are just because they do ok during certain parts at 1-2 bosses. This is probably the hardest class to buff since they're the best grinders, but end game grinding isn't exactly versatile or challenging compared to what bosses have to offer so most people don't really want to main mages, but instead use them as a means to fund bossing classes. As for Bishop's they don't need a buff.
If you happen to be a mage in a boss and start spamming ult, people will blame you if they DC due to you spamming said ult. imo this varies from bosses, example Zakum, even HT, during arms the clients are very stable, and in HT, personally as a hardcore bishop player, i spam it all the way throughout and there isn’t any issue. An good adjustment is Horntail’s weakness to element, example middle head who does fire skill to be weak to ice. This will make an proper buff to not just our elemental based arch mages but paladin as well.
Mages other then bossing wise as we know its the biggest money earning classes, and even with the cheap skillbooks available. I think the class is overall at a very perfect point I/L level easily 30-70 and F/P is the 2nd fastest Leveling class for lvl70-120 1st being shadower. Maybe buff bishop’s holy shield to give stance!?
4NL 1SE 1 DPS Bishop and her Sed mule! Go A>B>C Bishop Dispel defense buff, deal stable dps that won’t cause inbalancing where arms won’t start showing 40% notifications too quickly. Its beautiful
-Cleric's level nearly as fast as both classes and they have both the aoe and utility They're excluded from bosses which makes them miss a huge chunk of end game content. If they could be more capable at bosses or at least resource efficient at grinding it would help them a lot since I doubt any versatile grinding maps will be released. Giving Stance to Holy Shield would make Bishop's even stronger and undermine classes with their own skill.
Definitely would be nice for mages to actually have skills other than their ultimates to effectively dish out damage at bosses. Given the amount of hate mages get when they use ultis at bosses (causing DC), a stronger chain lightning/paralyze would be a nice alternative.
You say you want to buff the non ultimate skills of mages. However, you don't actually provide any DATA that shows they need buffing. I'll provide some data for the bishop class. 1v1 DPS for bishops is reliant on angel ray. Angel ray at lv 30 has 240 basic attack, and 60% mastery. The delay for angel ray is 720 ms. A late game (not end game!) bishop will be able to 1hit skeles. So this means that they will have ~1300 magic, and ~1000 int. Using this mage damage calculator, each angel ray hits on average 21716 damage against horntail. With 720 ms delay, thats about 30k dps or 1.8m DPM. Adding in bahamut would put you over 2m DPM. And note that this is single target damage for a SUPPORT class. Using genesis instead (2.7 second delay, 670 basic attack), your average hit is ~62k damage, or ~23k dps on a single target. When you have 5 targets your damage goes up to ~115k DPS, or 6.88m DPM without SE. That's pretty dam respectable considering that against horntail, multiple body parts are within range of genesis for a long portion of the fight. If you plug in the numbers for i/l arch mages and f/p arch mages, I think you will find that their "non ultimate skills" are no where near as bad as you believe. They are significantly stronger than bishops due to elemental amplification and their elemental wand boosts. I know you are talking about buffing them in a non bossing sense, but as long as you have a skill that can hit 15 targets, its always going to be a poor choice to use a skill that can hit less than 15 when 15 mobs are available. Even if you buff your non ultimate skills, you would still be playing extremely inefficiently compared to a mage who uses the ultimate skills, even if you could 1hit the mobs with the non ultimate skill. **Also, to the point that mage ultimates dc people at bosses, i personally feel like its caused by something else (maybe their graphics settings, video card, etc), and people are just blaming the mage ultimates. I don't have any data to support this, but i think the people who get dc'd by ultimates would dc regardless. Nonetheless, I've never actually seen anything concrete that actually supports the statement that mage ultimates dc people at bosses**
That is EXACTLY why I am asking for a buff to the non ultimate skills. I know that it would be inefficient in comparison to using ult skills. I just would like for it to be NOT AS BAD as it is currently. I don't mind that it's not as efficient because I enjoy using the non ult skills to fight anyways.
In my opinion it just seems kind of pointless then. If you want to play inefficiently for FUN, I don't see how it is any less fun to play with unbuffed non mage ultimates vs buffed non mage ultimates. Anyways, I think that buffing the non-mage ultimate could potentially bring out some imbalance bossing wise for the mage classes. I've already shown you that bishops can be a somewhat decent attacker in a bossing situation, and arch mages are certainly much more powerful than bishops.
I don't want to play inefficiently. I'm ok with doing so. All I'm saying is it would be nice to not have to be AS inefficient anyways. No one will take an archmage bossing anyways when other classes outshine their damage and they have literally no useful party skills.
Imo, no one actually built a archmage for bossing before. But if an archmage that has 1600~ magic willing to cheese, get echo and skilled/experienced in the HT scene, the class will actually be very comparable to DK or Hero. Clearing wyvern wave very efficiently, doing a stable dps and if you wash it, it will he a actual very strong seduce unit. Overall its an great class if you learn and play around it.
