Black Mage DPS Rotation, Openers, and Abilities — Dawntrail 7.2

This page covers the endgame rotation for Black Mage. The base rotation for Black Mage is fairly simple, structured around using MP in Astral Fire on strong spells like Fire IV and Despair, then refreshing MP in Umbral Ice. The rotation has some flexibility which can be utilized in order to keep the High Thunder DoT up, use Xenoglossy as needed, and overall provide some level of leniency. As a Black Mage, your goal is to take advantage of this flexibility as well as other personal utility and resources to keep casting as much as possible amidst mechanics, making as few concessions to your rotation as possible.

Below is an overview of various high-level concepts and resources utilized by Black Mage throughout the rotation.

Astral Fire provides increased damage to all fire-aspected spells while doubling their MP cost. Ice-aspected spells have lowered potency and are free in Astral Fire. At three stacks of Astral Fire, ice-aspected spell cast times are reduced by half. Astral Fire halts regular MP recovery other than Manafont and Ethers. Below is a table displaying the effects of Astral Fire:

	Fire Spells		Ice Spells
	MP cost	Damage	MP cost	Damage	Cast time
1 stack	2x	1.4x	0x	0.9x	1x
2 stacks	2x	1.6x	0x	0.8x	1x
3 stacks	2x	1.8x	0x	0.7x	0.5x

Umbral Ice allows for MP recovery via casting ice-aspected spells, while lowering the damage of fire-aspected spells. Ice-aspected spells are free in Umbral ice, and at three stacks of Umbral Ice, fire-aspected spell cast times are reduced by half. Below is a table detailing the effects of Umbral Ice:

	MP Recovery	Fire Spells
		MP cost	Damage	Cast time
1 stack	2500 MP/ice spell	0x	0.9x	1x
2 stacks	5000 MP/ice spell	0x	0.8x	1x
3 stacks	10000 MP/ice spell	0x	0.7x	0.5x

Enochian grants a passive damage bonus while Astral Fire or Umbral Ice is active. Enochian remains active while switching between phases, and in most cases will only be lost following a death. Maintaining Enochian for 30 seconds provides a charge of Polyglot, allowing for the use of Xenoglossy and Foul. Due to this, it is a high priority to maintain Enochian throughout your rotation, as well as during downtime.

Umbral Hearts are obtained in single-target by using Blizzard IV, during AoE via Freeze, and built up during downtime via Umbral Soul. Umbral Hearts negate the increased MP cost of fire-aspected spells (other than Flare/ Despair) in Astral Fire, using up one Umbral Heart per spell. Casting Flare with Umbral Hearts will use up all remaining hearts and lower the cost of Flare by a third.

Paradox replaces Fire and Blizzard on your hotbars when conditions are met. It should be used in both Astral Fire and Umbral Ice. You can generate a charge of Paradox by swapping from Umbral Ice III with three Umbral Hearts back to Astral Fire, as well as swapping from Astral Fire III to Umbral Ice.

Casting Fire IV generates one Astral Soul stack, and Flare generates three Astral Soul stacks. Upon reaching the maximum of six Astral Soul stacks, Flare Star can be casted, consuming all stacks in the process. Stacks end upon leaving Astral Fire.

The overall flow of the single-target rotation for Black Mage revolves around spending your MP in Astral Fire on six Fire IV casts and one Paradox cast, ending in Flare Star and Despair before switching over to Umbral Ice to recover MP. While there is some flexibility in the precise ordering of spells, this is how your base rotation should look:

1. Blizzard III
2. Blizzard IV
3. Paradox
4. Fire III
5. Fire IV x3
6. Paradox
7. Fire IV x3
8. Flare Star
9. Despair

Note that if starting a fight with Blizzard III instad of a traditional opener, you will not generate the initial Paradox as listed, and should just skip it.

Instead of having a set place in the rotation, High Thunder should be used when the DoT is about to fall off on the target. One Thunderhead buff is generated each time you enter Astral Fire or Umbral Ice, including switching between the two, but since the DoT does not need to be refreshed this frequently, the extra Thunderhead buffs should be ignored.

Like High Thunder, Xenoglossy does not have a set place in the rotation. Xenoglossy costs one Polyglot charge to cast and is your strongest spell, so it is vital to not miss uses in a fight. However, being able to hold onto three Polyglot stacks without overcapping allows flexibility in its use - since it is instant cast, it is useful for helping with movement, weaving abilities, and dumping excess charges under buffs. If not needed for anything specific, it should just be used before overcapping on Polyglot stacks, and all charges used up before the end of a fight.

Each Paradox cast in Astral Fire generates a guaranteed Firestarter proc, which should almost always be used. The most valuable usage is to hold your Firestarter until Umbral Ice, using it to re-enter Astral Fire after a Transpose. Upgrading the weakened Fire III normally used in Umbral Ice III to one used in Astral Fire I is more of a gain than using it in Astral Fire III. Example of execution below:

1. Blizzard III
2. Blizzard IV
3. Paradox
4. Transpose
5. Fire III

If you do not have a Firestarter proc from the previous Astral Fire cycle, you should instead opt to use Paradox just after the Transpose to generate a proc.

The off-global cooldown abilities for Black Mage do not directly deal damage or increase damage dealt. However, they increase the rate at which you can cast spells, as well as enable uptime while dealing with movement and mechanics. As a result, utilizing these abilities properly can have a large effect on your damage output.

Standing within your Ley Lines grants a buff that decreases both cast and recast time of all of your spells. Therefore, even instant-cast spells still gain benefit when used within Ley Lines, and there is no specific need to line it up with Astral Fire. Since you need to stay within your Ley Lines to benefit from them, timing and placement are important to consider to maximize your Ley Lines uptime in a given fight.

If you need to temporarily leave your Ley Lines, you can consider using Between the Lines to return to them. If you need to abandon them for longer, you can now relocate them using Retrace once per Ley Lines usage.

With the reduced casting time of most BLM spells in Patch 7.2, Triplecast and Swiftcast no longer save time on casting spells. As a result, both of these abilities should mostly be used to keep casting uptime while moving. It is no longer a loss to potentially miss out on uses of these two abilities.

Manafont can be used at the end of an Astral Fire cycle for a full additional Astral Fire phase without having to enter Umbral Ice for MP and Umbral Hearts, for both single-target and for AoE.

Amplifier should be used approximately on cooldown to allow for maximum charges of Polyglot in a fight.

Aetherial Manipulation can be used to quickly move to a party member, which can be very useful when a longer-distance movement is required for a mechanic where a party member may already be in a good position.

Transpose can be used when ending uptime phases in Astral Fire in order to use Umbral Soul during downtime, or for small optimizations especially regarding Firestarter proc usage.

Manaward provides a personal shield to help live through some damage, either planned for proactively for big hits or reactively used in the case of mistakes.

The general purpose opener for Black Mage, generally referred to as the Standard "5+7" Opener, is listed below. You may choose to alter the opener slightly based on fight-specific requirements/alignment, especially with regards to Swiftcast and Triplecast usage.

The alternative opener below, referred to as the Alternative Single Target Flare Opener, is slightly weaker but provides more flexibility with Paradox usage, which in some situations may be more valuable than the minor loss in damage.

The multi-target rotation is somewhat similar to the single-target rotation, with some filler spells cut out in favor of an additional Flare, and Transpose leveraged to skip both High Fire II and High Blizzard II.

The standard AoE loop will look something like below.

1. Freeze (or otherwise generating Umbral Hearts and MP before the pull by use of Umbral Soul)
2. Foul/ High Thunder II
3. Transpose
4. Flare x2
5. Flare Star
6. Foul/ High Thunder II
7. Transpose

Manafont has high value when used for an additional two Flare casts then another Flare Star. Aim to use High Thunder II as filler when the DoT is falling off, otherwise prioritizing Foul. When running low on these filler spells, consider using Paradox during Umbral Ice, or even clipping the Transpose without a filler spell.

For two targets, use the AoE rotation above, replacing Freeze with Blizzard IV. If you cannot hit both targets with your AoE spells, use the single-target rotation, maintaining High Thunder on both targets.