The Beast Within -- A Guide To Blue Mage

If inventory be damned, then Aqua Sachet still belongs in the Req set and Jukukik feather in the CDC set.

working around inventory issues with the new equipment section format. stay tuned

Massive Guide Overhaul Notes

Several sections have been reformatted for ease of use and to provide a further breadth of content. Some sections have been removed.



Introduction to Blue Mage section - Job abilities and merits taken out of spoilers. Reformatted and refined information.


What can I do as a Blue Mage section - Rewritten.


Spells section - Spell sets rewritten.


Traits section - Unchanged.


Equipment section - Several sets have been removed and replaced. Equipment sets are now split up into four sets per category, including three power tiers for each slot as well as a fourth set (when applicable) listing all of the accuracy gear for that particular category. Some categories may have special sets included.


Sub Jobs section - Unchanged.


Various in-game content sections - Removed. They were poorly made and not very useful.


Damage calculation section - Removed. Likely unused and does not fit the theme of the guide. If I feel like it, I'll make a separate FFXI math guide some day.


Conclusion section - Unchanged.









Let me know what you all think. Further tweaks and revisions may ensue, however I like where it's at right now.

i don't even know how to deal with inventory any more it's at critical mass

Will need ACC in some ws sets against the highest content atm. Might want to keep that in mind for a set, would have optimal choices instead of picking and choosing. Like replacing an ammo in CDC set with the +15 acc one. Depends on buffs obviously (some don't roll with 4 song bards etc.)

uh, that's what the accuracy sets are for. they list the ideal accuracy pieces for each slot and which slots to swap out before others

Maybe I misread it, I did at first with the CDC sets and the "2nd best" set at the bottom of the others. It said "everything else" for a lot of them unless you mean swap everything else if it gets to that point.

At that point it doesn't matter what you swap, it's going to be the same relative sacrifice, reworded for clarity

Hey so I picked up a Eminent Want. Nice mage stats

combined with tamaxchi you get

210 Magic Damage
11 INT/MND
26 MAB

Dual Wield nuking with both clubs anyone?! Sub SCH for dark Arts to raise ele skill and you're good to go!

with my whole nuking set along with both clubs was doing 533 stone 1 on marjami ravine lair reive nests

Hm. You know, since the Eminent weapons are basically just Perdu MK.II (model, latent, general premise all the same), it's likely that the latent is active during weaponskills as well as under 100TP, just like old Perdu weapons. That would make Eminent Scimitar better than Xiutlaeto, which means I'll need to do a bit of revising.

@Proth
If you aren't already sick and tired of editing the guide, there's only one thing I thought would be nice to see on there:

For physical spells, it would be nice to know what type of physical damage they're doing - blunt/slashing/piercing. At least for the commonly-used physical spells:

Goblin Rush - Blunt
Benthic Typhoon - Piercing
Whirl of Rage - Slashing
Quad. Continuum - Piercing
Empty Thrash - Slashing
Delta Thrust - Slashing
Heavy Strike - Blunt
Sudden Lunge - Slashing
Quadrastrike - Slashing
Amorphic Spikes - Piercing
Barbed Crescent - Slashing
Glutinous Dart - Piercing

Good to know stuff for someone reading a guide if they know their target is weak/strong to certain physical types. Plus it's good for someone like me who continually keeps thinking Delta Thrust is Piercing =(

*Edit*
One other sorta nitpicky thing. You mention under the physical spell sets to swap in Spiral Ring for STR/VIT or STR/INT spells. While there are a few good spells that would benefit from the VIT portion, I don't think there are any *good* spells that would utilize the INT portion of Spiral Ring. At a glance, the only spells I saw that would benefit from both STR and INT are:
Queesyshroom, Terror Touch, Mandibular Bite, Headbutt, Leafstorm, and Blazing Bound. I'm not an expert but I don't ever cast any of these.

Amorphic Spikes is a good, commonly used physical with a DEX/INT mod, for which Spiral is a good choice.

That's such a boring way of doing reive on BLU, do you even get any bayld?

Ah. Yeah I forgot spiral ring is good for that spell. How valuable is strength compared to dex and int for amorphic spikes being only 20% dex/int? Do you know/remember a ratio value for that? Like every 1.5 str will net you the same damage as 1 dex or int?

Agreed. And terribly inefficient. I thought trusty old melee with a couple dream flowers was the way to go for Marjami Reives. You can set Occultation/Metallic Body to help with interrupts. Set whirl of rage as well. Will go something like this:
Before fight, prebuff battery charge/animating wail/occultation/metallic body/cocoon/nature's mediation (in that order).
Run in to mound and start beating on it till all mobs are aggro'd on you.
Actinic Burst -> Whirl of Rage -> Dream Flower
Re-apply Metallic Body and Occultation. Re-apply nature's meditation when it falls off.
Sudden Lunge anything that comes out of sleep early.
If you can't finish the mound before sleep wears off, or if more than one comes out of sleep early, just re-cast burst -> rage -> flower.

I think that's the gist of it anyway. Admittedly, it's been a while, lol.

I would definitely try to melee now that we can bring a small NPC army.



Physical spells follow more or less the same formula as player WS. If that doesn't explain it then I can elaborate further.

Keep in mind you're probably using it to close darkness with CDC, meaning it's under chain affinity. That makes the primary mods twice as effective for each point. Generally under chain affinity, you stack the mods in the highest amounts you can get, unless you need to substitute for accuracy or skill tiers.

Set MP Drainkiss when soloing reives as all the mounds/obstacles have MP. Can Magic Burst it with Burst Affinity off a Darkness SC for 250-300(actually better off setting Magic Hammer and midcasting Hagondes gear; can get 400-500 dmg off a BA+Magic Hammer.)

99% of spells have the same STR, DEX, VIT, INT, etc. modifier; i.e., QC is 32% 32%. Therefor, from a base damage standpoint, each modifier of a spell has the same impact on your base damage when added in equal amounts. However, STR has a couple of minor advantages:

1) It contributes to fSTR, assuming you are not capped, giving you a few extra points of bonus D

2) Every 2 STR = 1 blue magic attack


The second modifier of a spell should still be put on whenever possible. For example, if you're gearing for Delta Thrust and have two theoretical pairs of pants: one has 50STR, the other has 39STR 29VIT, you want to wear the second pair of pants. If the spell does not have a STR modifier, like Amorphics Spikes as you mentioned, it would not really be worth focusing on STR at all, but getting some in there along with WSC for the extra attack when possible doesn't hurt.

With the way that gear works these days, it's pretty difficult not to have STR and all of your WSC modifiers covered anyway.

If a spell has low (<30%) non-STR mods and your fSTR is likely uncapped, then its almost always better to choose STR over an equal amount of INT/MND/whatever outside of CA.

Thats actually exactly the way I do them, except I don't usually wait for sleep to wear off, I wake then with whirl and re-sleep before they have a chance to hit me, admittedly sometimes you do get hit but it`s rare it' enough to drop you. Sometimes I even throw in the odd thunderbolt for the fun of it and spam MP drainkiss to keep MP up.

Cure Received and Cure Potency are separate terms that both cap at 50% individually.

"Magic Damage +" applies to magic spells and magical WS that incorporate a D term.

Just got a Dothis Tathlum, should be best in slot for most things for BLU requiring magic dmg i.e Nukes, Sanguine, M.Hammer, right?

not sure about magic hammer, but for sanguine you're probably better off with mab in any slot you can get it.

Dual wielded Eminent Wand / Tamaxchi and in MAB gear Magic Hammer did well over 1000 just about refilled all of my MP back. Just be sure you know what mobs have MP for it to be worth using.

isn't magic hammer damage to mp conversion? i didn't think mobs had to have mp.

Unlike Spirit Taker where you can just gain MP from damage dealt from any mob, Magic Hammer actually steals MP equal to Damage Dealt if the mob has any and sadly will not steal MP from undead :(

ah, ok, i knew it worked different than drainkiss or aspir.