The Beast Within -- A Guide To Blue Mage

I see, thanks

Recently started throwing together a Magic Burst Damage toggle for fun.
Base Nuke Set:

(ignore the blue border hands.. will be done later this week)

Burst Set:


Feet +15, Legs +10, Ring +5, BunzisRob +10 = 40
Body +8 II, Hands +6 II, Ring +5 II = 19
+ 9% from job trait (Rail Cannon) = 28

Total of 68% Magic Burst Bonus


My question is; Is it worth giving up the +53 MAB, 5 INT, 33 Skill, 14 Macc on the +3 Empy Legs ALL for Burst Affinity +16?
If it's not, can easily sub out the Sibyl Scarf for Warders Charm +1 (r15) and keep the same magic burst damage without nerfing MAB as hard. Even better, has anyone tested it?

Side note: Pemphredo vs Ghastly +1, that big of a deal?

EDIT: I see a bit of discussion of this on the previous page, but the question about the legs didnt really seem to be answered

I personally don't see AF legs beating the 53 mab on empy with just the additional MBD in any situation

I have serious doubts Samnuha Coat outperforms Empy+3 body. 25 less intelligence, 26 less magic accuracy, 19 less MAB for 8MBB. That's not even factoring in set bonus.

Do the numbers support capped Samnuha Coat beating Hashishin +3?

Also think ghastly is better under BA with anything with an INT mod

How does one test it? I'm not really good with numbers like some of you scientists. I figure it'd be alot harder than just testing nuking sets since it hinges on BA and bursting in the field is so rare/fringe

I have both items, so I decided to do some quick testing today. Due to the fact that you have to pop BA/AL every time, the number of samples was very small, but the damage was pretty consistent. The two (Hashishin +3 vs. perfect Samnuha Coat) are pretty close to one another for bursting.

I tried testing Anvil Lightning bursts on Impaction/Light SCs, and experimented with the ambu meebles and Adoulin colonization reives. On the Meebles, my burst damage was in the ~36k range, with the Hashishin +3 body winning by 0.6%. On the reives, my average damage was ~67k, and had the Samnuha Coat winning by 0.1%. The advantages of the Hashishin body are the boost to base stats, while the advantage of the Samnuha Coat is a *percentage* boost to MB damage. My personal belief is that the Samnuha Coat will "win" by a negligible amount for bursts that do over ~60k+ damage due to the percentage increase, while the Hashishin body will win for anything below that.

I would also like to add that I only tested this with Anvil Lightning, which has a WSC of 80% DEX. The DEX and AGI of the Samnuha/Hashishin bodies are very close. I would expect my observations to be more or less accurate for Anvil Lightning, Silent Storm (80% AGI), or any spells with either no or negligibly low WSCs. For everything else, and especially for spells with high WSCs other than DEX/AGI, the base stats on the Hashishin are much higher (+25 for INT/MND, for example), and should perform much better. For these spells, the Hashishin +3 should easily win in all cases. Also, none of these tests factored in the boost of MAcc from Hashishin, the extra % of set bonus proc, or the survivability benefits of casting in a DT- set.

Basically, my overall conclusion regarding set advice would be that while the Samnuha Coat *can* win in very niche circumstances (by very small amounts), you're better off bursting in the Hashishin +3 body.

That's fair, I get that the MAB vs Burst Bonus is relatively equivalent Given the sum of all parts;
-20 mab, + 8 burst bonus, Other stats ignored.

That being said what are your thoughtrs on the pants? I think its most likely that the overwhelming MAB will win out, but otherwise stats are nearly identical, but you get the Burst Affinity WSC + 0.16. Essentially that's like frontloading a large amount of attributes for the spell, which would push it over Hashishin in attributes... but outperform?

It's kinda easy to napkin math this.

To make it easy lets assume some ridiculously biased scenario for AF+3 legs.

So 80% WSC. 500 stat for that WSC and 550MAB (this is probably possible in game with almost all the buffs). Even then going from x2.21 multiplier on BA to x2.37, would push damage by 6.5% and this is assuming dINT would be 0 and D value 100. 43 MAB in that scenario would be +6.6% damage.

So even in worst scenario for empy+3 legs they would be about even in damage, but empy+3 would still have superior macc, defensive stats and +1% chance for set bonus proc.

I can try testing some stuff later today when I get time, but I'm pretty sure Hashishin is your best choice again. I'll try testing with Entomb, which has a WSC of 80% VIT, which is the "best case scenario" for the Assimilator's Shalwar given their respective base stats.

The potential benefit for the Assimilator's lies in the BA bonus. The MB bonus stat can be capped at 40% by using the Bunzi's Rod, Warder's Charm +1, Hashishin Basmak +3, and Locus Ring, which is overall a smaller trade in MAtk bonus than swapping any of those pieces for the Assimilator's Shalwar to cap MB bonus.

So, the real question is whether or not the BA bonus can overcome the severe lack of MAtk. I doubt it in general, but it might be possible by a small margin for Entomb.

How disappointing, but can't really argue here. Thanks

I tried some bursting with Entomb (80% VIT WSC) and the Assimilator's Shalwar +3, which should be the best case scenario for that piece, due to the high WSC and the relatively high VIT on the gear. I was originally going to test it against the Hashishin Tayt +3, but I realized that the Luhlaza Shalar +3 would be better for Entomb (the real question is whether or not the Assimilator's Shalwar has a use in a MB set). The Luhlaza Shalwar beat the Assimilator's in every test I tried. Looking at other high WSC spells and the stats on other gear, I'm not sure there's a case where the Assimilator's Shalwar will beat the Luhlaza Shalwar, the Hashishin Tayt, and the Amalric Slops. One of those pieces will probably always be better. At least the Assimilator's Shalwar is a good SIRD piece.

Yeah it'll always excel at that given the ludicrous amount on it. Just seems like an oversight giving it the "Burst Affinity" role with 0 MAB, what a shame. Appreciate you putting in the word to look into it.

Whats everyone using their blu for these days? Last I played I was using it for refilling merits and tp drain in odyssey and cruel joke B for gil. I see you can do triple dmg with empy gear and am just curious what you guys use the job for?

Sortie solo/trio.
Odyssey solo triple 5% V25
Some V25 clears (not me personally for now, since I need to use other jobs that teammates dont have)
Einherjar
HTBF to catch up on upgrade mats
Vagary triobox setup to farm codex
Planning to use it for lots of Aeonic farm soon in triobox setup.

I’m hoping to use it more in Sortie I’m perma RUN but I think BLU can tank just as well with more DPS potential and cleave opportunities.

It’s also my go to in any older content similar to Simons list.

I've never really tried it; What does BLU main tank look like? Enmity spells, support job, cycle of tanking etc? Just curious. Obviously Sudden Lunge, self heals, damage mitigation stuff. Could be something fun to try. I can throw stuff together for sets, but it's easier to ask since you're on the topic.

Also, is there a master list somewhere of every single ability/spell in the game with it's CE/VE listed somewhere? I imagine most stuff hasn't been tested for exact numbers, and many others are just based on damage or have a low static value. Just wondering if there's a JP reference somewhere that people know of.

What does your Triobox setup look like? I have been thinking of starting to look more into Aeonic farming myself as well.

are you guys using blu to farm exemplar in Crawlers nest with mambo? I'm curious on the damage and how many spells it takes to cleave a pack down. With maybe a cor only for buffs?

Setup will probably change for some NMs, but generally just Cor BRD and Blu. Honor, 2x minuets and possibly carols or mambos and Sam/Cor. Sudden lunge works on a lot of things, so most NMs won't even make a move before it's dead. I haven't been doing Aeonics for few years, so I bet with recent powercreep you can do much more.

Have done triplebox aeonics before, you won't be able to do a lot of the HELMs with BLU

you'll also have to adjust that strategy for WoC and Kirin

They removed cleaving... maybe not entirely, but effectively it's dead. You can't joke crawlers nest anymore, and they added 50% Locus mobs in the Apex mobs, which take 0 Aoe Damage.

That being said, YES you can still get a PLD or RUN to pull 40 mobs, cleave all the Apex out of them, then single target/skillchain the remaining locus while the tank re-pulls. That being said, in my experience you'd never want to do with with BLU's. Why pull massive amounts of hate on 20+ mobs and get flatlined when Aeolian and the like of magic weaponskills pull nearly 0 hate and can be just as effective.

I use Epam / Sroda for SB + Epam/ Metamorph+1 for Exp, but you can easily Augment a Beithir + either of them and bypass using Karieyh. It's hard these days to not opt for Schneddick.

If anything, at top end I'd say theres an argument to be made for diminishing returns on raw WSD vs actual Attributes, and Sroda may outperform Karieyh depending on your sum of all parts.

TL;DR yes

Sroda is better for capped attack on Expiacion and it's worse for uncapped attack, unless you have 3 or more Trusts, then it should be break even or slightly better.

Beithir R30 beats Karieyh Ring +1 for uncapped attack too (R25 is break even).

Metamorph+1 loses to Beithir too in both capped and uncapped attack (significantly with uncapped attack assuming Beithri R25~30)

How would Sroda be better for Expiacion, its -20 Dex on a 20% Dex mod WS... basically offsets the 15 STR.

You're basically saying "who cares it has 3 PDL"

Which technically is true, because even assuming a perfect scenario for Karieyh, which is having Gleti body R30, but not having Nyame R30, then your Expiacion capped attack set has 62%wsd and 12%pdl without the ring slot.

1.66/1.62=1.02469
1.15/1.12=1.02678

So like you see 3%pdl alone beats 3%wsd in this case and keep in mind that's for main hit only, which does majority of damage, but there is still some damage coming from 2nd and sub hit and potentially even more from multi attack or AM3 proc and WSD doesn't work for any of that, while pdl does, so pdl has even bigger advantage than above math suggest.

-20 dex is only -4 base damage for Expiacion. +15 STR is +4.5 base damage, so it indeed evens out, but if you fight something stronger you might also not be capping fSTR, which means additional ~3-4 base damage from 15 STR.

Realistically, when do you even bother to toggle a PDL set in for non DRK/WAR/DRG type jobs? I'm always under the impression is you'd only ever be atk capped with a cor and brd super buffing you, in which most content you'd be doing under that scenario as a blu is either A) Odyssey/Sortie type stuff where you wouldnt be atk capped anyway, or B) too low level for it to even matter and this merely makes your Big Number slightly bigger.

I'd love to be wrong, it just seems completely impractical for non heavy DDs. Maybe you can change my mind on it.

That being said; in the hypothetical where your atk capped and want to push the envelope, why chop off the ring for 3 PDL and virtually nothing else? I figure you'd sub out nyame hands/feet for Gleti hands/feet which get the most bonus raw stats from R30, as well as solid chunks of PDL particularly from the hands. This would keep you on both the Nyame Legs/Body which have the strongest values of WSD, as well as empy+3 head. You'd also swap coiste bodhar for crep pebble, so we're looking at 15ish % PDL? Just seems like a more balanced approach. You seem like a math guy so i'm sure you'll have some spreadsheets on those kind of marginal changes

BLU is the job that caps attack pretty fast.
You have only PDL +0.1 from /DRG and you have 0%PDL in JSE neck and earring. That means your pdif cap is only at 3.35
DRG and especially DRK has much more attack, but also much higher pdif caps to reach and they also have a lot of PDL in neck and earring already, so they have harder time with PDL toggle than BLU, especially DRK that might even need to include LR up and down.

Now on BLU you have +25% attack buff and usually tier III+ of attack bonus trait. With Trusts you usually have Dia III and Fury/Frailty(-12%) and you can def down mobs with Tenebral Crush, so you might be capped even with Trusts on a lot of things.

That being said I usually don't use attack toggle anyway, but my base set has Sroda ring (because if Im not with brd and cor, im with 5 trusts) and Crepuscular Pebble for PDL. So my attack toggle would just add Gleti's body on top of this


This is terrible approach.
Hands: You trade 10% WSD and 2 base damage for 7%PDL
It's still a gain in the vacuum, but worse than Sroda ring, Crepuscular Pebble and Gleti's Body.
Feet: You trade 10%WSD and 4 base damage for 5%PDL. That's actually a loss even in the vacuum.

You have the biggest gain by switching Crepuscular, Sroda Ring and Gleti's body and after that its almost break even if you try toswitch hands and/or legs and requires more attack to work, so its really bad. That's Gleti's R30 vs Nyame R25. It would be even worse if we get Nyame R30 finally.

With new Platinum Moogle Belt as Taru with ML45 Tizona/Thibron



I like it :O

EDIT: Probably easy to break 2k as Galka now :)