Trying Out Blue Mage

Tuesday is the launch of Final Fantasy XIV's patch 7.21 and the introduction of Cosmic Explorations. But before I dove headlong into crafting and gathering I wanted to level up my chocobo companion. I didn't want to do a boring FATE grind so I went ahead and started up another job: blue mage.

A blue mage in FFXIV is a limited job that learns abilities by mimicking enemy attacks instead of leveling up traditionally. Unlike other jobs, blue mages gain spells by observing monsters use them and then defeating those monsters. Considered a limited job, blue mages can't queue for regular duties but can participate in special Blue Mage-exclusive content. The job features extreme burst damage, meaning the blue mage can do some content otherwise inaccessible. Perhaps more importantly for my purposes, the grind should help level up my companion, as I could get two week's worth of challenge log experience for my chocobo.

When I started the quest to unlock the job, Out of the Blue, I received a pleasant surprise. Blue magic comes from the Whalaqee people of the New World. So perhaps for all the people interested in the story looking into blue mage at the end of Dawntrail is a logical next step? Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Blue mage does have a semi-traditional series of job quests every 10 levels. However, the reminder to do the next quest in the series doesn't pop up automatically like for the other jobs. Also, one can purchase a new spell every 10 levels, at least in the first 50 levels. The quests and spells are obtained in Ul'dah.

I know that guides are out there suggest the best way to level is obtain a certain spell that throws fish and abuse a mechanic. But as part of my reason for playing blue mage is to level my companion, I just took the sortable spell list and started working my way up the levels. The method seems to work as I now have 24 blue mage spells in a week.

I have to admit I'm actually looking forward to running dungeons solo using the blue mage job. One of the spells needed to advance the blue mage quest line required defeating Galvanth the Dominator, the final boss of The Tam-Tara Deepcroft. While I failed to even reach Galvanth the first time I tried at level 26, defeating the creature from a Lovecraftian nightmare was very satisfying at level 32.

My goal for now is to reach level 50 by the end of the weekend so I qualify to participate in the Masked Carnivale. One of my weekly tasks is collecting Allied seals in order to purchase aetheryte tickets. Usually I just go out, hunt down the elite mark from the hunting board, and collect 100 Allied seals, which brings in 20 tickets. If I can just teleport over to Ul'dah and grab a couple hundred seals in 10 minutes every week I'll consider the effort leveling blue mage a win.