But getting into a raid team as one is difficult, and it’s not hard to see why. Of course, group composition doesn’t matter at all to casual statics and duty finder, and for content you can queue for Samurai is a dream. Now people are starting to settle into the sorts of groups they want to play in, Samurai is starting to look a little like 3.0 monk, in that it has awesome personal DPS, but not enough utility to make them worth bringing along. It’s the most selfish job in the game by quite some margin - even Black Mage has something in manashift. High personal DPS doesn’t necessarily translate to higher DPS as a group, and that’s the problem with SAM. I don’t think we would’ve managed those kills if Samurai didn’t quite hit so hard (a 30k crit is not that impressive for a SAM), and statistically, it pulls higher DPS numbers than any other job. I’ve been in a couple of pug groups where there was a serious gap between me and the person in second place, and we finished as just enrage started or moments before.

If you’re in a group with some weak links that might otherwise struggle to hit enrage (as I’m sure we’ve all been in from time to time), a mediocre Samurai can be a good 1,000 DPS ahead of their peers without really trying. Couple that with excellent DPS output, and it can really pull its weight. Whether it’s expert dungeons, primals or raids, Samurai rarely feels like it’s not suited to the task at hand. The job doesn’t make people feel awful when they don’t nail positionals, you don’t need to drill maintenance buffs into muscle memory in order to be decent, and everything lines up really well. Given the job’s fundamentals, my feeling in that regard hasn’t changed at all, and I doubt it ever will. It was partly motivated by the fact that it’d give me a fresh perspective to write from, but, as I said at the time, it’s a fun and straightforward job that’s great for learning fights.

Just as the Heavensward jobs are as relevant as they’ve ever been, people will be playing both jobs long after Rhalgr’s reach gets mothballed.īeyond a few hours as a Machinist, I’ve spent the entirety of 4.0 maining Samurai. But Samurai and Red Mage feel like they’ll be the most enduring aspects of Stormblood. I always felt weird playing the ‘new’ class in an MMO whether it was Revenant in Guild Wars 2 or Death Knight in World of Warcraft, being the new guy never felt very natural to me, and I was always worried I’d just be playing an expansion-themed flavour of the month. The good news is that neither turned out to be a gimmick job.

Stormblood red mage drops