[Pawkeshup]

Wow, let loose the dogs of opinion!

Ok, let me try to tidy up what I've read and add in my experiences.

Basically the general consensus was that the duo combination you chose was bad. I'd agree. From a strategic sense, the best way to duo is to have one melee and one healer. That way, if the stuff hits the fan, you can survive.

As for duoing, my wife and I have done it with multiple combinations. Currently we were messing around with SMN/WHM and SAM/WAR. As Tarutarus no less. That means she has very little HP in comparison to other races. The EXP was slow, and we had plenty of downtime.

I do keep the statistics in mind, and Khei, I'm afraid you've just been soured by a bad experience. A good party, well balanced and prepared, can grind out 5-10k an hour even in the range you discussed. You did not provide a set-up for that party you joined. Most likely it was thrown together. Had you partied in Yuhtunga, you'd have made better EXP, being on the bubble between zones.

A duo cannot even match an EXP party, pound for pound. Duos are fun ways to play with someone who you'd normally not get the chance to consistantly party with in a relaxed environment. When planning a Duo, you have to consider how viable the jobs are. DRK is very physically weak, and as such will take a lot of damage. You would need the best possible armor to mitigate that, and a lot of MP to keep your partner alive.

The people duoing DRK/THF and RDM/WHM are experienced players, most likely with some bank for at least decent if not very good gear. If this is you and your friend's first time around, you will need to do a lot more work to get yourselves established.

My personal suggestion is to either do the good old BST-BST or DRG-DRG duo since they can both duo well AND cheaply. The best part about BST-BST is that it opens up NM camping and BCNM possibilities to fund your daily grinding.

IF you want to go for a melee/mage combo, my personal suggestion is WAR and RDM. Why? Well WAR can still do some hefty damage without sacrificing much armor. If you do PLD-mage, you will find it takes far too long to kill mobs. PLDs aren't DD's, and if you don't wield sword-shield holding hate early on can be hard. So you wind up with one of the lowest damage weapon classes for DoT. With WAR, you ca sub MNK to toughen yourself up some, wield an axe/shield combo, and have some decent DoT.

As for RDM, RDM has Refresh and Convert, two very crucial skills as your get higher in level. They can both mitigate downtime and keep you prepared for those OMG WTF moments.

Also realize as you level, you will progressively have a harder time making the next level. EM at 30 and EM at 60 are worlds apart for difficulty. Ever hear of 75's biting it to an EP bunny? Well, bunnies are just evil... But it's meant to reference the fact that the con you see is a RANGE not a fixed value. Jumping some visibly low mob at a higher level will show you how much different that can be.

Non-optimal duo setups will not be fun. You will die a lot, have long downtimes, and become frustrated with the grind.

Regardless of the posts here, of our OPINION of your situation, try it out. Just remember the good advise here in this thread and understand that your choices might not be the most optimal available.

[KalemLyco]

Me and my friend duoed the other day in Qufim Island. I was 21NIN/10WAR and he was 19RDM/9WHM or BLM can't remember which but either way we were duoing IT Worms just out of the cave enterance. I told him it was impossible but he proved me wrong getting 200xp per kill and if it got tough we'd run out of range had to be carefull not to get aggro and of other parties.

[Lmnop]

I think a lot more jobs are capable of duo'ing than people give them credit for. DRK, for instance, has most of the same gear options as WAR, as well as having slightly higher VIT. They also have the same evasion, though lower Parrying it seems (not that Parrying comes in terribly frequently).

Big thing to remember is that on EM-T stuff, you don't need much - if any - accuracy gear. And while you have like a 3% chance of avoiding attacks from VT-IT mobs, you actually have a decent chance on lower mobs. My Warrior uses an evasion/agi set that I bring with me when I expect easy fights. Fighting T Robber Crabs in Kuftal, I was around 20-30% evasion rate. My friend and I duo'd those a lot with him as WHM using Lilith's rod (skill up, naturally). His rod and my damage negation made us able to kill them nearly indefinately - even considering that I was using a level 20 Spear for my weapon. Also, +attack gear seems to still have an effect on lower level mobs, but it's not -as obvious.- Berserk just doesn't seem to do as much for me on those guys (meanwhile, the -defense is certainly noticeable). So yeah, I think drk (particularly drk/nin, though drk/thf does give you Evasion Bonus traits) on an aspir-able mob that's been blinded, slowed and being shot at by acid/bloody bolts should work pretty decently.

On the flip side of DD tanking, PLD are actually meaty fellas. I hate to be a contrary kind of guy, but sword is actually quite potent. Additionally, Pld have a very nice STR growth. With a shield, their damage mitigation is nice enough that they can focus on some +attack (if, once again, it actually makes a difference for you).

I did a trio once with Pld, Sam(me), and Whm in Rolanberry fields. I don't remember what level we were but T-VT Quadav were our targets. If we were in a situation where we had a "camp" and could pull things to it, I think we could've done so safely for a good 3k/hour. That's not bad. Of course, we all split up and went hunting for potential targets and spent more time looking than killing so... yeah the exp sucked.

All the jobs that work well solo work even better duoing (except the primary pet jobs e.g. smn & bst). Drg, Nin, Rdm, Thf, even Pld. Mnk is also great. If guard is somwhat high, then that + counter + chakra + B rank evasion + Dodge amounts to something worth taking a beating. High HP to outlast is nice, but the fact that they kill so damn fast means you won't usually have to worry about "outlasting."
Brd/whm is an incredible compliment to most of those jobs.