[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

OK, kids, if you want to play COR on the cheap, I can't stop you. If you want to skip /RNG and /NIN as subs (among others), you're only cheating yourself of reaching a higher potential with the job, but even those who play it /mage seem to do it pretty poorly from my observations. Lots of mistakes are made. I'll admit my COR/Mage setup is not perfect as of yet, there's a few pieces I should have that I'm working out.

Anyway, here's the major mistakes I've been seeing, particularly since I moved to a more populated server where these mistakes are more common:

Mistake #1 - Guns and Bullets

This is a big one I've observed.

I have seen numerous COR/Mages at 75 with AF1 guns or hexaguns and the level 22 Bullets. OK, if you're not shooting the gun at all and only doing Quick Draw, then a Corsair's Gun and a stack of Steel Bullets you never plan to shoot probably will not hurt you and, as a result, you'll have higher damage potential for Quick Draw. Quick Draw is calculated by the base damage of you bullet and gun - the higher, the better.

If you're too cheap to even Quick Draw as often as possible, you have no business being a Corsair at all.

Mistake #2 - AGI and MAB, where art thou? I'm drowning in MP here.

AGI is still important to the job. If you're going the /mage route, there's really no reason to be wearing full AF. The Earring and Ring slots in particular have a lot of potential to give you a big boost to AGI and should be favored slotsfor AGI as opposed to MP.

Yeah, yeah. More MP means more ability to cure. Its cute people still think that's all a mage sub is for. Even BRD (well, a good one) has to consider Stats vs. MP and where they want to put that at no loss in performance on both ends. You should make an effort to balance it out. Going with a pure MP setup is taking the easy way out.

RSE sometimes has options for MP and AGI unless you're a Tarutaru or, on the AGI end, a mithra. This is where you should look first. RSE2 also offers some good options as well. COR does not have a lot of MP options, but I can get a handsome amount of it from RSE items, particulary on the waist and legs.

Blue Cotehardie is indeed ugly as sin to wear, but you can grab both AGI and MP from it or the HQ version and in nice quantities of 4~5 AGI or 40~50 MP. Pick one.

Uggilieph Pendant and Moldavite earring will give you more quick draw damage potential as well, offering Magic Attack Bonus. These are options worth considering. The Pendant has +20 MP, too, but the MAB bonus there is activated via latent effect.

Why Magic Attack Bonus? It affects Quick Draw, that's why.

Mistake #3 - "/WHM Onry."

There are other mage subs of use here. /WHM has great utility, but its not everything to COR. RDM and BLU offer a lot as mage subs as well. Both offer Magic Attack Bonus and support options. Additionally, BLU offers stat bonuses and job traits while RDM offers Dispel and the ability to cure outside of a party. The gear setups differ slightly, /BLU will need a little more MND gear to pull off better cures, but these other subs are worth consideration.

Mistake #4 - Swords and Daggers

If you've committed yourself to full support, please stow the pirate aesthetics. I already talked about armor, let's talk about main hand weapons. Now, if you're out soloing as /Mage, use a Joyeuse or whatever you like to melee with, but in a Party, if you're a full support COR, you should consider elemental staves instead.

Light Staff for better cures, Dark Staff for resting MP and then all those other staves - key ones being Earth, Ice and Wind. The elemental staves, like MAB, do affect Quick Draw damage as well. Something else to consider having.

But again, if buying stuff bothers you, you really shouldn't be playing the second most-expensive job in the game. If you came to play "Dress up like a pirate" just go cosplay a pirate or something, the aesthetic COR is no more or less annoying than the female WHM who wears a corsage and event gear in PT to look pretty.

[Callisto]

So far from 1 to just about 73 I've found the occassion to use /mage(usually /whm) twice: from 1-15 solo, and just the past 3 nights while solo/duo working on Coffinmaker(it broke last night!).

I have seen an absurd # of 70+ /WHM CORs using AF1fugginPANTS!!! though, and that drives me insane. War Brais are ridiculously cheap, like 5-10k on most servers, I got the HQs for only 80k.

Side rant: Never, ever using /NIN again if I can help it. The loss of RAcc is absurd compared to /RNG, and I can't figure out why. Yes I know I'm missing Acc Bonus II, but really I'm only missing out on about 12~ RAcc since I go from Acc Bonus II/Gun Belt to offhanding a Trailer's. Last night I went from hitting most Slugs in XP to hitting maybe about 6-10 the whole night, out of about 60, with more than +50RAcc in gear, Squid+1, and Hunter's with a friggin RNG in the party.

I would've been better off to just /WHM and play it like a BRD.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

I'm fortunate that I don't have to /NIN much these days as my lady is a BRD and we pretty much always go about meriting together, but I still advocate getting a peacemaker and being willing to pull as /NIN when needed. When you're pulling and sleeping full-time, you don't melee save for the odd slug or detonator to scare off greedy rival BRDs.

/NIN for pure DD purposes you will feel a huge loss in performance. So for COR, I use it purely for pulling or skill-up/weaponbreak purposes.

For post-30 EXP, I've never found a need to be /mage, endgame and solo I have found a need for mage subs. I just recently finished /BLU and its a damn sexy subjob to have around for COR. You can possibly get various bonuses from /BLU like +5 STR, AGI or MND, Magic Attack Bonus, Auto-Regen, Clear Mind and Beast/Undead Killer and/or +20 MP from set spells, all depending on how you choose to spend your set points. You also get Vorpal Blade, but its likely better felt with a Martial Analace and I'm not too keen on parting with my Joytoy.

Only cons are somewhat low healing capability without a MND build and the inability to heal outside your party, but I've found it pretty fun and useful otherwise.

I'm currently working out /SAM toward RNG and Dancer, as well as for PVP COR, but /RDM is next on my list and being a RDM in my Taru life, I know the benefits it offers me.

[Menelaus]

I hate /whm on cor i stopped cor at 50 because i became broke after the gun belt and all the bullets and whatnot. I took brd to 75 and i refuse to /whm unless im on a mp based job or bst for reraise. Like you said might as well be playing brd and i had enough of that.
I have all the mp gear anyone could want but that gets old. Why let someone else do all the @ss kickin when you can do a little yourself. I do believe in doing your best to fill slots for purpose and not for fancy apearance. That comment about the whitemage at the end of your post was hilarious..
by the way this is probably covered elsewhere but whats the max anyone has done with quickdraw?

this is my impression of me in a linkshell.......


L <-drk



<me

[Callisto]

I think the max documented QD was upwards of 400. I personally have pulled 276 w/ HQ ice staff and weekday bonus proc. IIRC, the QD formula was:

[(((Gun D + Bullet D + 5(w/ AF hat)) * 2) * MAB/day bonus]

Looking at this, the max Gun + Bullet D could be 112, 42 from Corsair's Gun and 70 from Steel Bullets. Added w/ AF Hat bonus it'd be 117 base, x2 is 234.

The max MAB possible for COR from gear in ideal circumstances would be 28:

Republic Circlet(5)
Moldavite Earring(5)
Novio Earring(7)
Uggalepih Pendant(8)
Denali Kecks(3)

Added to 15 from an HQ staff, you'd have 43 MAB, giving:

234 * 1.43 = 334

Tack on an optimal day + double weather proc and you get another .30 bonus

334 * 1.30 = 434

If my math looks off or I'm wrong on the formula let me know, but that's the most that I can see being possible.

Edit: I forgot that you could sub BLM for MAB II...so max MAB would be 67:

234 * 1.67 = 390

With day/weather:

390 * 1.30 = 507

Moar edit: Sorry for contributing to derail, BBQ. I can copypasta this post to another thread if you'd like.

[Armando]

Callisto: ele staves don't add MAB. They're a separate multiplier. That and I'm pretty sure you can have more MAB than that if you get a BLU to buff you.

[Menelaus]

So...... the answer to the QD question was : 434? every minute not bad!

[Armando]

You won't see that kind of damage on every Quick Draw as long as you're depending on day and weather.

[Callisto]

Ahh thanks Armando, forgot about that, and yeah I was just trying to find the absolute max under ideal circumstances.

*ninja edit* staff before MAB, never mind. I've only had 2 cups of coffee so far today, ignore most of what I say.

I'd say if you are doing something like Kirin/JoFort solo, etc where you are using mostly QD for damage, using Moldy/Uggy Pendant/Denali pants, Auster's and an otherwise AGI build, aim for 300~ a shot, that's a pretty respectable target without going batshit crazy on MAB gear and relying on day/weather bonuses.

[Menelaus]

I really hate working for the government everytime i want to look up how to obtain equipment or watch all the cool vids or see cool screens i get shafted by a filter on this crappy network.
Guess ill just make a list of the equips and go home and ffxiclopedia it up.

Obrigado peeps

[Omni]

I was asked to go /whm and then the brd asks me why im not shooting as much.

Gee, I just lost a shit load of r.acc and you're not giving me prelude so maybe I dont like throwing bullets away just for the sake of shooting, ya dig?

I'd be sitting on 175%+ tp and would still miss 3-4 slugs in a row.

/whm gets a thumbs down from me.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

I forgot Mistake #5 - Melee gear mish-mash.

Its all well and good to keep some melee gear on you for duo and trio situations, but one should consider a logical MP build. If you're not meleeing, melee gear serves little purpose. Melee rings should be replaced with AGI rings, body piece with Blue Cotehardie unless you're lucky to have Denali body (and legs, for that matter).

I see Neck, Waist, Back, Hands, Feet and body as all having MP options for COR. Since Crimson Finger Gauntlets and Greaves offer dual benefits for COR, these are nice to have and fairly simple to get with a sky LS, but you should consider filling those slots with RSE or RSE2 otherwise.

If Enmity is a concern, I suppose you could use AF legs to that end, along with Peacemaker and Staff Strap for a total -7 enmity. Plus staff strap gives +20 MP. Peacemaker is nice for unresisted Quick Draw, but it kinda sucks for QD damage, though, which is something to keep in mind.

At any rate, melee gear is questionable in a pure support setup, if you're gonna commit to COR/WHM, it should be done with a balanced AGI/MP/MAB setup. AGI and MAB gear like Drone Earrings and Moldavite are easy to macro around, but macroing out MP gear always comes at a loss of MP, which isn't good unless you're trying to trigger the latent on Ugglieph Pendant or something of that nature.

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As for WS under /Mage or /NIN, the August update did indeed make the Detonator Weaponskill much more favorable, particularly if you have a Martial gun handy. Before SE adjusted the modifiers on Detonator, the weaponskill was pretty much a joke, but with some nice attack buffs and 200%+ TP, you can dish out some nice damage with it now.

So under any sub Detonator is proving to be our most accurate weaponskill with respectable damage. I still kinda chuckle at it as RNG, though.

But then, /Mage would mean kicking back and soaking up Ballads if you had a BRD. In most cases, even some endgame ones, I still favor /RNG. But for stuff like sky farming and others, I'll be willing to /mage if asked.

[Karinya]

Originally Posted by Armando

Callisto: ele staves don't add MAB. They're a separate multiplier. That and I'm pretty sure you can have more MAB than that if you get a BLU to buff you.

Actually, ditch the BLU; FFXIclopedia claims BLU's MAB buffs (Amplification and Memento Mori) are self-only. Get a SMN with Diabolos instead, for Dream Shroud.

A BRD for stat etudes might be helpful too.

Do sea obis work on QD? They'd be a guaranteed way of getting day/weather bonuses instead of relying on luck for them.

[Armando]

Actually, ditch the BLU; FFXIclopedia claims BLU's MAB buffs (Amplification and Memento Mori) are self-only. Get a SMN with Diabolos instead, for Dream Shroud.

They are, but with Diffusion you can turn one buff into an AoE buff. Selfish? Yeah, but the question was highest possible QD, not highest practical QD ;o Forgot about Dream Shroud though.

As far as I know, no base stats affect QD so Etudes would be pointless.

Can't speak for experience but I'd assume Sea Obis work. Don't see why not.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

To my knowledge the Obis work on the word of the CORs that have them, I've not gotten around to them since I have the hurdle of two gorgets to complete. I really need to get some UFOs downed.