I'm a Mage I\L Main , I DON'T want to play other classes wich are called "attackers". The problem that Mages are facing is spamming Magic Guard skill when they are bossing, the DPS isn't a factor because the skills are not allowing them to be very useful when doing bosses(like HornTail , Vergamot and so on) . The major issue is that we don't get to do many bosses and when we do , its with friends and even there we cant help with nothing (again , DPS is not a factor) because we have to spam the Skill Magic Guard just to stay alive. I wish we could help and try to enjoy the full game with any class , not only "attackers' who got hp washed and spent billions on leeching + int gear + apr to stay alive . We are mages need to be able to actually attack without getting anxiety every 0.1 seconds and click Magic Guard . What I suggest is to let the Magic Guard skill stay active like the Ifrit skill when bosses are doing debuff. I'm level181 and currently maining a Mage. I can't help to friends with any boss and just by that , I'm considering to actually quit... Thank you for reading this and may you all understand the Mages Mains point of view .
A Mage is more like a supporter. You can't be both an attacker and a supporter. It wouldn't be fair, and won't balance out the game. The thing about classes - every class has it's benefits, and it's weaknesses. Pros: +Low budget & usefull +Easy way to make money +90% of the times he Is needed for bosses +High survivability due to magic guard Cons: -Can't do much but spam MG & HS -Will be boring eventually while bossing since you don't do much and just "hop along" - You need a pretty high amount of TMA to be able to leech everything in-game (1300-ish for mobs up to skeles)
You can hp wash a mage if that is what you would like, a lot of dedicated bishops hp wash to survive bosses. Most bosses have a dispell animation so you have plenty of time to react and MG up. Learn the boss animations and patterns so you don't feel the need to spam MG. As for the ones that don't give any or much warning, you will have to HP wash like everyone else to tank hits.
the cost of that can reach 100B ... not everyone could afford such hp\mp wash. When you say plenty of time I'm guessing you don't really have a Mage and clearly didn't do any boss like Horntail or Vergamot and those a just two exapmples. Their pattern is to debuff every attack so there is no secret that I have to just stand still and spam Magic Guard , again , the cost of HP\MP wash Mage can reach numbers like 100B . Like I said , I don't need to have DPS but atleast not to just stand still and spam Magic Guard so what I suggests is when the Boss is debuffing (wich is happening to much to the point we can't play , I can't support while standing still). Am not a Bishop so you might think that i'm asking too much to make Bishops overpowered wich is true , but for Mage I\L main and probabley speaking for Mage F\P , we want to be somehow usefull while doing bosses with friends .
Some classes were just not meant for bossing, they serve a different purpose. It's fine if you decide to play them that way, but you have to understand that you have chosen a niche path and it will never be as effective. That's just how the game is designed, and in my opinion it's fine. Your best bet is waiting for PB, where mages are actually useful and are considered attackers, but even then you will have to be washed and decently geared.
I can't be effective at any boss that's true . The point i'm tring to make is , if you keep the Magic Guard spell active when the bosses use debuff(wich happens too much) we could enjoy bossing with friends for the reason that they will deal most of the damage(that's why they are called "attackers") and we the Mages could just keep the our attacking skills(chain lightning) active too , I don't find that change to actually change the meta for the reason that Mages don't have good DPS wich still encourage other players to use NL, Bucc , BM and so on but it will make the Mages Class actually fun when joining my friends bossing run(wich you all know , we will not be effective too much because of the DPS) but atleast that class will be more enjoyable .
From the point of view of someone who has attempted every pre-Auf NT boss with a pure mage team (I/L + F/P + Bishop), have brought arch mages to Auf (eternal thanks to those who brought me), and also did some limited HT and Zakum bishoping (I have not been to VL though): - The damage buffs may never happen... many mage mains push for CL/Paralyze to be buffed but I'd say the better angle is to work on the support skills, be it debuffs or party buffs. There were some ideas thrown around like the demons or 3rd job Composition changing boss elements. Reworking or replacing seal, etc. - A major strength of mages that could have been relevant in bosses is their ability to clear nuisance monsters. This is why Pink Bean was brought up above: arch mages are used to clear the summons there. However, the main boss in Royals where minions are a legitimate threat, VL, has miniboss coding on the minions so we can't help melt golems with our DOT skills or seal gargoyles (Allegedly. I've not been to VL but I've been told sairs/pallys cannot freeze them and Doom doesn't work.) - Vergamot is a terribly designed boss but most people do not see it because they have a bucc or thief class who can just avoid the McDonald's lasers completely. They only complain about Dunas V2 since that dispel is not tied to an attack and cannot be cheesed with avoidability or iframes. (Technically Vergamot is doable with less pain if you position yourself to tele into it whenever the laser comes out. However body 2 gains lightning RESISTANCE... so it just annoys me) - To most players on this server, mages do not exist past leech/farming mules. I've had people ask me why the hell I'm improving my magic attack or leveling past 160, call my quest-medal wearing character a mule, and quit on Bearwolves parties when my F/P joins. - Mage HP is a sore spot with this server, a lot of people keep saying oh, mages wash so easily/don't need washing at all with MG but as you've discovered, that is straight up wrong and not the point. Many veterans are remaking their bishops to tank Auf (19k+ hp). There's actually no real argument against the repeatable mage MP quest at least, don't tell people they can just remake or drop 90B to fix their unwashed mages . Which brings me to the next point: -If you want to know how much hate mage mains get in this server open the Rose Garden Feedback thread and read the first few pages. Half of the arguments there are straight up nonsense. Oh yes we'd definitely duo client RG and risk losing bees during multispawns. These haters literally think the best strategy against the RG boss is to spam ulti. Personally if you want to play this class be prepared to play solo a lot and tolerate 50 minute NMM/Nibergen solos, and accept that some bosses like Vergamot and Dunas V2 are just not worth it. Those solos are surely not optimal but they feel so damn good. Unfortunately you may have to remake if you want a washed mage, or you could sacrifice some MP for a maybe 10k HP/20k MP mage? Honestly, I almost feel obliged to make attacker characters (particularly bucc or shadower) to support my own mages to farm bosses. Actually, not almost because I'm making a fucking pally soon to farm krex. The tradeoff is mage farming (and doing those fetch/kill quests) feels less of a chore to me since I genuinely like playing the farming characters. Your friends might think you're unhinged (endearingly) . Keep those friends close and give the haters the big finger.
Washing should only cost ~10b for a decent HP, not 100b. My 30/30 wash cost around 30b, and optimally can be done in around 25b. While mages can be expensive to wash, it's nowhere near what you're claiming. HornTail only debuffs every few minutes, with an obvious animation. The summoned dark wyverns also spam dispel but they should be easy to kill for an archmage. Vergamot only debuffs with the laser attack, which is quite easy to see, and you'll have time to recast before the next attack. The dispel laser is also only in body 1&2, which deal lower damage meaning you can ignore mg with ~8k HP. Alternatively, you could instead just stand inside the boss and use the iframes from touch damage to avoid dispel, which is what I do on my paladin when fighting it. v2 dispels without an animation every 30 seconds, so that one would kind of suck. Auf also spams her ranged dispel, but besides that most bosses should be reasonable to survive on mage if you pay attention and learn the boss mechanics.
All i'm saying is , the bosses are doing it too much to the point mages cannot enter and enjoy too (you are saying patterns but you gave an example of Vergamoth.... His main attack is the laser that cause debuff so all I can do is stand and spam Magic Guard). I'm talking from a Mage Main perspective and probably the rest of the Mages out there who want to live other things beside using blizzard\meteor shower at skeles map.... You are saying 25B like that's super easy to earn lol , while most of the community have no clue on how to get 100m on a weekly basis , After understanding that so why to even bother create Mage I\L or Mage F\P if Bishops can do the same thing but only sell Leech, Heal, HS, Dispell , Shield , Res and Genesis... We should be able to help besides spamming Magic Guard and spectate the party team slay the boss...
Oh boy this brings back memories... Imo if they could just make Magic Guard undispel-able and add elemental decrease to second (or third? Forgot which job it was) job, that would help out a lot already. No more random dying and spamming MG, and Paralyze's/Chain Lightning's shitty damage won't be cut down further more on poison/lightning strong bosses. Those are QOL changes instead of an actual buff/change to the class.
You can give class/skill related feedback here. Yes its already an old thread and i wish we would be much further into the skill balance already but any feedback is still very welcomed. Specifically about Magic Guard being undispellable, i don't think we will do that. As others have pointed out washing a mage is also possible and does not cost 100b. You can even gain some HP via Rosegarden nowadays. Furthermore some bosses dispels can be tracked or avoided.