FFXIV Mage Comparison! Easy/Hard? Strong/Weak? Utility?

let's compare the three Mages of Final Fantasy 14. if you already know you want to main a mage then this might serve to help you choose or alternatively teach you what you don't want or maybe you just want to hear about the pros and cons of each Mage combined with a bit of comedy in which case you have also come to the right place please keep in mind that this video may be slightly opinionated especially in the ratings shown for each job so if you feel that I missed something or that you disagree I would love to hear about it or your favorite Mage in the comments now then let's start with the black mage which serves as the classic Fireball slinging fantasy wizard The Black Mage alternates between ice calm recovery and fire aggressive attack as modes while sprinkling in Thunder as a damage over time component the job relies on cooldowns and so-called procs to have access to non-casted attacks for keeping up the pressure while on the move which as your level grows becomes less and less of a hassle due to the sheer amount of instant attacks you will have readily available at lower levels though the blackmage feels obscenely slow to play and relies on randomly generated procs for some of their highest damaging attacks via 3 fire starter and Thundercloud these random procs are much less important for the overall play of the job at higher levels and you even get sharp cast to ensure a proc that you really want or need black Mages are known to have some of the highest personal damage output with their area of effect standing out especially because of how flashy it looks and how explosive the damage is there just isn't quite anything like four flares back to back to back to back followed up with multiple files however even with the vast amount of instant attacks at the black Mages disposal It Is by and large the poster job for being terrible with movement yes black Mages have ethereal manipulation to zip around the battlefield but Ley lines forcing you to stand somewhere specific for 25 of an encounter combined with the vares but limited amounts of instant attacks available to you still means you're less mobile than most other jobs when it comes to extended periods of movement additionally aside from the universal Mutual actions Addle and sleep not that you would use it much the Black Mage brings quite literally nothing to the table in terms of utility so it's particularly High DPS is the one utility it has which puts a lot of pressure on the player to perform which can be tough when the job has a very steep learning curve this also includes the fact that black mage uniquely amongst the Mages can supplement its damage ever so slightly with clever use of ethers as well as the fact that black mage is played to the highest level at least theoretically have a whole network of cast sequences to optimize the use of procs like Firestarter to incorporate abilities like transpose that the m bridge player tends to forget about as they reach higher levels and finally most roles use somewhat similar stat priorities at least to the point that any two jobs in a specific role can play almost as well in a gear set optimized for a different job as they could in their own optimized gear but for Mages there's a huge difference in the stat priorities between two in particular one of which is the Black Mage you see black mage is the single job in the game that has a high speed build as the most commonly utilized due to how the vast majority of the damage output of a black mage is centered on their gcd and that having higher spell speed allows you to get fancier and fancier with your astral fire sequences making more out of the 15 second timer by virtue of everything you can do taking less time it's incredibly handy the shorter cast times also mean that you dedicate less times or cast and indirectly make you more mobile while blackmage also access to lower speed builds these are recommended mainly for advanced players what I'm saying is that black Mages really love speed in fact you might think the euthama searches Guild has a big knob fall statue because of that whole life and death and balance thing but you'd be wrong if you look really really closely you can see that in one hand they have a spell speed material and in the other a gear piece that primarily has spill speed on it next up is Red Mage the job that originally got me into the game years ago while rhythmage does not fill any particular classic fantasy archetype it is the closest you will get to the spelled blade or battle mage Styles a mage that also deals in close quarters sword combat the Red Mage combines this with the Final Fantasy redmage staple known as dual cast allowing them to skip the cast of Every second spell they cast in a funny twist red Mages and not black Mages are the ones that deal with balance the red mage's gauge involves alternating between white and black magic to keep a balance between the Mana generated from their spells the Red Mage also has a small amount of Randomness in the stone and the fire procs however the damage gained from these procs are small enough that a lot of bad luck isn't devastating and is also offset by how many Avenues the Red Mage has to either Dodge the cast with acceleration and swiftcast as well as guaranteed procs again through acceleration but also through their melee combos the damage gained from using these tools for that purpose is so small however that the best red Mages tend to save acceleration and swiftcast for displacing the gcd timings as their ogcd tools Flash and contrast sixth coming out late is a far bigger damage loss in comparison the Red Mage stands out among all jobs as one that tends to plan their moves 5 Seconds at a time and in pairs whereas most other jobs deal with things one gcd at a time Flash and Contra 6 being on cooldowns that are multiples of 5 also reinforces this now you may think based on how much I praised the black Mages area damage that there is no competition but you would be wrong red Mages have both access to more consistent area damage in impact and can choose to use their mini combos for even bigger area bursts just be aware that the air area of effect spells cost more MP so be sure to use that lucid dreaming in terms of utility red Mages of course also have the rule actions but in addition to that has access both two rate white damage cooldown in embolden and a raid white defensive cooldown in Magic barrier they can also even cast heals in a pinch and most importantly they can as the only job in the game instant cast raises back to back with dual casted voices which has resulted in the nickname res mage all this dual casting and melee combos also allows red Mages to move around the battlefield a lot more freely than a black mage however all this utility and convenience comes at a cost as their Red Mage tends to do significantly less DPS than a Black Mage and relies more on teamwork than its own merits alone this results in a job that is very welcoming to newer Players Once you understand the basics of the job a little steep to learn at the very start but somewhat easy to play after that yet with a lot of room to grow unfortunately the job is only available at level 50 and Beyond now you might still be wondering what that other job is that stands against the black Mages spell speed heavy style but that would of course be the Red Mage due to how the Red Mage specifically plays around the 5 second timer between sets of casts anything beyond small amounts of spell speed can really mess with your rotation and you would need an obscene amount of spill speed for two months or anything a Red Mage would actually care about such as an extra melee cover within a two minute time frame or however many extra melee combos they could get in a fight overall for this reason even the low spell speed builds black Mages can function with may feel like too much fun optimized Red Mage player you could say that red and black Mages are almost Polar Opposites in multiple ways high speed versus low speed low utility high damage versus high utility low damage low Mobility versus high mobility in fact you can even see how red Mages mimic that not fault balancing act with the CV in one hand and the gear piece in the other just to spite the black Mages which finally leads us to the old new kid on the Block Summoner again not exactly the most common fantasy archetype however we can probably agree that summoning mythical creatures out of a book and having a family Amelia is one of the most typical fantasy magic things you can imagine Summoner stands Out Among the Mages as the weird one that has no Randomness and also because its toolkit somewhat mimics mechanics in a lot of other jobs the gameplay revolves around empowering the Summoner for a while which at higher levels includes alternating between summoning Bahamut and Phoenix followed by going through the three primals ifriid Titan and Garuda in any order you like the Summoner also has a simple set of ogcd attacks in energy train and fester and their area of effect equivalence but these play a minor role in the rotation in fact nearly every single target attack the Summoner has is accompanied by an identical area of effect version of the same attack during the Bahamut and Phoenix trans periods you can freely move an attack As You Wish somewhat comparable to a ranged physical job the E3 section combines the long and fixed cast times of the Black Mage with a one-tool melee combo akin to most melee job although they normally do one two three combos the Titan section while also arranged copies the gun Breakers continuation combo in how it is performed the Garuda section combines the fast 1.5 gsds of the machinist's hypercharged combo with an incredibly long single cast that is best performed with swiftcast almost referencing how the old style of Summoner would use swiftcast in the rotation it also results in a damage over time area of effect Circle similar to ninjas doton what I'm saying here is that the Summoner touches on a lot of somewhat unique features of jobs and roles and makes a unique job from this amalgamation assuming you cast a router's slipstream with swiftcast the Summoner at high level will need to stand still for a grand total of about 7.5 seconds every minute which with slide casting gets closer to 5.6 seconds due to how specific yet open the summoner's rotation is it is very easy to get into and the biggest learning curve relate to planning when to use the E3 section due to out both as a standstill section and a melee section both the Black Mage and Red Mage have some difficult and very tight and specific optimized openers while the Summoners optimized opener is mostly related to adjusting searing light and energy drains slightly and with a Titan ARCA ruler goes first depending on team composition in any case the intuitive opener the average Summoner might choose is actually very close to what the optimal opener might be as soon as you know to not start with ifreed of course in terms of utility Summoner also has the role actions of course and while Summoners have access to Resurrection due to how swiftcast is used very often in the rotation they have to go out of their way to have it available to use similarly while Summoners technically have a heel in physic it heals for yeah it is pretty decent at very low levels though as it scales with mind instead of intelligence main utilities of a Summoner are its very long damage boosting rate cooldown and its radiant Aegis which is almost always available and active for every raid white attack if the Summoner plans around it while the Summoner can weave it at any time they wish every sermon locks you out of the cast for a good five to six seconds and Bahama than Phoenix locks you out completely for their duration this can be circumvented by radiant ages having an extremely long duration so you can simply cast it way in advance another utility that someone brings is of course Phoenix's Everlasting flight as well as the targeted heel rekindle remember that you can use it on other players and finally of course Summoners nearly as mobile as a ranged physical job as the Summoner in contrast to Black Mage as the plan when they want to stand still instead of when to move for stat priorities the Summoners the Midway Street between black and red Mages some nuns can swing either way it is mostly up to you speaking from experience trying both the slower builds matching Red Mage is easier to play simply because energy drain and Searing light and won't drift away from your Bahamut and Phoenix casts additionally unless a specific spell speed amount leads to some specific interaction like being able to sneak in an extra Bahamut of Phoenix be finding submission with no attack targets then this slower build will do slightly more damage ultimately the damage potential of the two build styles are close enough that if you decide to optimize your Mage equipment for either black or Red Mage that does not lock you out of playing Summoner just fine the ruin 4 pose with your arms stretched out perfectly reflects this how red and black mage are both pooling at the Summoner to join their side with the poor Summoner in the middle wanting to make their own choice to round up this comparison each of the three Mages have their own places of Mastery for a new player wanting to play a mage I would highly recommend the Summoner not only to the Spells but it flashy quite early but you get a familiar to follow you around on your adventure and the rotation is not too complicated if Summoner turns out to not be your style you can even pivot to Healing as a scholar once you reach level 30 if you like in contrast I would not recommend the new players who start with black mage due to how involved its rotation gets very early on however if you're set on playing it just be aware that it might be more difficult at first redmage lands somewhere in the middle however due to requiring level 50 you will probably have a much better ability to make that choice Yourself by then for a more General comparison the Black Mage is among one of the best at delivering personal DPS and is the perfect job if you love spell speed Red Mage is the ultimate DPS at dragging people through content making it both excellent at learning new content for the first time and teaching friends and other players content you already know and Summoner replaces some of the team utility options with more personal utility in even more Mobility a completely predictable rotation not to mention the freedom to use whichever stat build you like without it really impacting the enjoyment of your rotation thank you for watching if you enjoyed this comparison or found it funny please consider leaving a like you can also subscribe and tap the Bell to get notified when next I post a video and remember to let me know in the comments which Mage is your favorite fun fact Summoner used to be one of the hardest jobs in the game before its rework meaning that both of the starter Majors were incredibly complex to play resulting in a weird world where they're easy to play Mage was available only once you reach level 50. I have a video specifically on how this old style of Summoner played if you're interested [Music]

Channel: Caetsu Chaiji Ch.

Views: 26,524

Keywords: ff14, ffxiv, final, fantasy, ARR, Realm, Reborn, HW, Heavensward, SB, Stormblood, ShB, Shadowbringers, EW, Endwalker, Guide, Blackmage, Redmage, Summoner, Thaumaturge, Arcanist, Scholar, Magic, Flare

Id: LUo7ho7OOko

Length: 15min 51sec (951 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 15 2022