Sad state of party invites

[Ameroth]

So, here I sit, typing this post up on my laptop while I've just hit the 2-hr mark of being LFG, and it gets me wondering: Is DRK invite rate bad throughout the entirety of the career, or just in my level range (DRK46)? I got DRK from 1 to 37-38 in about a few weeks time, but I mostly attribute that to people leveling jobs to 37 as subs.

After level 40, however, I am very lucky to see a party invite maybe once every 4-5 days, and most of the invites are DDs needing a replacement. Problem with this is that more often than not, the party is preparing to disband before my empress has even worn off.

So, I guess I'm just wondering if any experienced DRKs can share some light on if I should expect to wait until next year to hit 55+ or if it's just conditional (level range, times I am able to party, server, etc)? I really love this job, but the daunting wait between parties is really bringing me down.

[TheGrandMom]

It all depends on when you lvl'd your drk too. I lvl'd mine when drg's where pentawhores and trying to get a pt then was worse odds then winning the lottery. I don't know what its like nowadays though. I would think with the 2 handed weapon update that it might be a bit easier than back then. I just remembering sitting at my desk doing other stuff for 11 hours a day without an invite and that could happen for days on end.

[Caspian]

I don't think its b/c you're a drk. More likely its b/c you're a DD and the population for 37+ sucks. So many people at 75, only rarely lvl other jobs and thats usually with a static. I remember seeing the census a year or two ago, and only like 10% of people had characters in the 50-70 range. I don't know if thats the highest lvl on the account or all the jobs period, but its abysmally small no matter how you slice it. Hate to say it, but not a lot of options, other than use your empress ring as much as possible when you do get invites and tough it out, or try and get some friends to static with you.

[tdh]

It's partly your level range, it's party you're now a DRK. Even at Lv.75 DRKs LFP for hours on end. In that case it's more because DRKs are slow and everybody wants to fight mobs that automatically make you a leech. (Imps & Great Colibri)

I recently tried to merit up at least 7 merits for my SAM75 DING~age. One day I actually had my flag up for 6 hours before I got an invite that lasted 45 minutes. Now of course I got my full Empress worth of EXP, but I wanted much more.

Now at the level you're at, you may actually be put into a Skillchain party, but the TP Burn has taken over the lower levels now as well. At that range, DRK has crappy Weapon Skills, no Haste gear, and slow TP gain even with Abs-TP due to under leveled Dark Magic skill.

My suggestion would be to build a static. I think if not for several statics, I'd still be DRK51 like it was when I returned from my first break. Static got me to Lv.51, another static got me to Lv.55, another static got me to Lv.70. At Lv.70 I got tired of waiting and struck out on my own. It still took me 3 months to get to Lv.75 due to non-existent party invites.

As much as I've always enjoyed DRK, it's basically useless to me now since nobody wants it. (Spare us the Kraken Club DRK arguments please.) Of course having a RDM and now SAM at Lv.75 don't exactly help, but I wish it was more useful than a sub job at this point. DRK can do some pretty awesome things if allowed.

[TheGrandMom]

You know you might have a pick up on invites after the expansion is released. All of the high lvls are going to want to exp a new job probably and parties may be more easy to come by. In the meantime, farm and work up your stash of gil for food and equips so you don't have to take time out to do these things later. Good luck, getting pt's 70+ is much easier with melee burns!

[IfritnoItazura]

I was seeking for over 2 hours last night... on RDM75. Finally resorted to murdering Lesser Colibris to kill time.

Should've leveled BRD instead. >_>;

[Menelaus]

I have never leveled drk. If i do it will be to 37 for chainspell stun for rdm.
some reasons or ->opinions<- i have on the subject which may or may not be agreed with. I lvled mnk along side a drk (Drebian retired Ifrit) ; ; back before the tp burn days and leveling rate was about the same.

1. /sea all invite 45-48 = DRK DRK DRK BLU BLU MNK MNK SAM SAM PLD SMN(mayb)
2. Disbanding DD's search for replacements and get the same results
3. 3 out of 5 DRKs think its better to own and die than moderate and live
4. 2 out of 5 Drks believe its up to the main healer to keep them alive as if they were a tank
5. some Drks /thf and disregard trick attack
6. Even after they are dead they continue to brag about ws damage in party:thumbsup:
7. They tend to argue how awesome they are compared to others

These are based off of my own experiences with DRK's and a personal friend who wasnt like that at all and left the game. He would have loved ABS TP ; ;
On a side note I love DRK's my best friend was a DRK. I'm on Sereph now and any DRK who just wants to go out an train a zone... duo an nm or just hang out in dunes messing around for no reason let me know I am so wishing the fun would come back to this game.

if you read this.... COME BACK Drebian ; ; :o

[TheGrandMom]

3. 3 out of 5 DRKs think its better to own and die than moderate and live
4. 2 out of 5 Drks believe its up to the main healer to keep them alive as if they were a tank

Amen. I have a drk in my ls that has this attitude. He's a great guy but he just doesn't get that maybe he should tone it down. Aggressor + Berserk + Last Resort + Souleater + WS = DEATH, get it through your thick skull! lol He was in the outside alliance at Dynamis the other day and I was on rdm/blm and the only healer in the alliance. I had 2 people with the above attitude and trying to do the sleeping, healing, hasting, and refreshing with them in the ally was insane. He died, more than once, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it.

5. some Drks /thf and disregard trick attack

Interesting issue I had with this recently. I was in a regular exp pt. *gaspshockgasp* We had a nin, war, thf, drk (me), rdm, brd. So the war and nin (pt leader) were supposed to be bouncing hate back and forth. The thf took the nin and I got the war. Well the war /t'd me after several fights and told me to stop tricking onto him because he didn't want the colibris to steal his food. The nin and I discussed it and I didn't do it all the time but there were times I had to do it and the war had to take that chance. Well, the war had a solution for it. He'd save his TP/abilities and wait till I hit my macro and then ws and turn the mob briefly so that sneak/trick wouldn't do squat and my ws's sucked. It just aggravated the hell out of me! >< Or my favorites are the ones that do a little jig to the side so that sneak/trick doesn't land on them. I think some people get aggravated and just give up on trick attack.

[Lmnop]

He'd save his TP/abilities and wait till I hit my macro and then ws and turn the mob briefly so that sneak/trick wouldn't do squat and my ws's sucked.

I would have found this person's RL address and purchased a tazer for the impending confrontation. Or at least blisted and kicked out of party. My biggest hatred of /thf is that you're too dependent on the rest of the party for you to perform at your best. It's bad enough just with ignorance or people not paying attention. To me, purposely screwing up a thf or /thf is unforgivable. But then, that attitude is why my THF will never go above level 45. I couldn't bear stupid people.

[DakAttack]

Well the war /t'd me after several fights and told me to stop tricking onto him because he didn't want the colibris to steal his food.

You're not supposed to use food while fighting Colibri unless you've got a competant Paladin or Ninja. It's not like you really need food unless you're fighting naked.

[Menelaus]

I am not sure how Drk is but as SAM/THF i have a nice macro setup

F1 GEKKO/sneakattack Same for Kasha
F2 GEKKO/Trickattack
F3 GEKKO/SNK&Trick

a three macro set with Yukikaze/trick attack (on the tank)
GEKKO/ normal WS
KASHA/ sneak attack for light.

on the note of the food deal just do this.
lol ><
works for me.
I would sugjest this order in battle if possible, keeping in mind that its more important to keep the hate on the tank so you dont get smoked later on.

Save your tp for the beginning of a fight. Trick the tank with whatever WS
then build tp for the end of the fight for sneak attack. I still grab hate even after that.

If you just put pinning the mob on the tank as your priority and let the other DD's worry about trying to pull it off him this should keep you pretty safe. Tricking others gets anoying. If you have already tricked the tank then unload at will.

[Vyuru]

Well, still haven't unlocked Drk myself, but....

Are you only LFG or are you trying to make a party yourself?

Most likely I think the best advice would be to make a static simply because nothing beats a good static party. My next best advice would be to make your own parties.

Making your own parties is great because in the low levels you have a ton of places to camp, the world is your oyster.

However once you get to the higher 70+ levels, I will warn you that you will most likely get burned out due to the, Imp ONLY!!!! attitudes that you will run into.

*rant*

(I mean seriously people?!?!?! There are 80+ people at the fricking mire camp, EIGHTY+ MERITED PEOPLE EXPING THERE, AND YOU STILL WILL ONLY GO TO THE MIRE?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!)

Sorry, that's been festering in me for a few days now....

If you've just been LFG, I would say to do some searches and see how many other people in your level range are LFG as well to start to get an idea of what is the best time to LFG.

Alot of times though nobody wants to be the party leader, so you could have many optimal party setups that just don't get started, so I would highly recommend that you make your own parties.

Another thing, if you make your own parties and you see a job you want but the person isn't LFG? Ask anyway, alot of people will take the party even if they aren't LFG.

Some might argue that it is rude to ask people who aren't LFG, but hey, that's what /anon is for, and it doesn't cost them anything to either respond with a "Yes", "Maybe", or "No" to your question.

[Ameroth]

Ya I'm thinking about just building my own parties whenever I can. The past few nights there were tons of DDs looking, but not a single mage. And a simple /sea of mages in my level range shows maybe one or two people already in a party.

I had a static getting started, but then it fell through and that LS disbanded. ><

If all else fails, I'll just give DRK a break for now and continue to party on another job.

[Lionheart]

I've waited 6 hours or so before, and by the time I finally got an invite I turned it down because I didn't feel like playing anymore. At lv62 currently.

Long story short, we're not a priority class, maybe more-so for missions and bosses because of our ability to stun, etc. But we just don't have much love in leveling parties. Maybe that will change when I can close level3 skillchains. Who knows.

[Menelaus]

OR! do what everyone else seems to be doing.
Level BST to 75 then change to DRK/BST and solo it up like all the grumble grumble blue mages.
iv seen it done with rdm, drg, blu, nin, on and on.

one more thing the party invites in general have sucked all up ons. I remember when you had to fight for party spots.
I really hope they introduce new areas to level lower end jobs in the expansion. With newer areas it seems that this would boost interest in raising another job or push people away from the mire and whatnot.
Seriously your badass now move on ^^

Imagine if they doubled the amount of low level xp spots.
Take the same amount of viable xp spots for lower levels double it and add like 3-4 jobs. It would pump some major life into the game.

[Ellipses]

OR! do what everyone else seems to be doing.
Level BST to 75 then change to DRK/BST and solo it up like all the grumble grumble blue mages.
iv seen it done with rdm, drg, blu, nin, on and on.
I know this is a horrible derailment, but... what? How on earth does that work any better than good old-fashioned Healing Breath soloing?

[Menelaus]

ok maybe he wasnt /bst, i seen him in a bst camp last night and maybe i mistaked his drg for a bst pet. all i saw were pet colored letters from afar.

:worry: <my bad

[Lionheart]

They should just give me 1K exp for ever hour I LFG, I would probably level faster, lol.

[Menelaus]

Ok but.... you cant be /anon and it resets everytime you recieve a tell and your blacklist must be empty.
Seems like a good feature.
Mercy Pts.
Lionheart gains 1000 mercy points.

[Lionheart]

lol, thats no fair, I detest anyone on my blist, and 90% of the time people sending me /tells are just people wanting help for quests. If I was losing possible EXP for them asking questions, there would be some problems.

[tdh]

TGM hit on a great point about the new jobs. There will probably be a lot of lower level people for the next few months to let those of us struggling to level get some EXP finally. Time to bust out that MNK I've been dreading.

I don't have a problem building parties, I just really dislike the issue of selecting a camp. 1) I hate Imps (Whoever brought this point up, I <3 U.) 2) Colibri piss me off because I can't eat food or as DRK can't use spells. 3) Camps are over crowded. Nobody respects the camp any more. 2 camps already at a camp that only really supports 1? Let's camp on top of both of them and try to out pull them. Suddenly EXP camps turn into NM camping - who can claim first!

Hopefully we'll have more VT~IT camps like the 2 or 3 we currently have, and more people will consider checking them out. 4 SAMs at the Treant Camp can chain 10 before mages need MP, and we have no mobs to kill. With EXP bonus and Chain bonus can you basically get 300EXP from Chain #4 to 10.

[Vyuru]

Ya I'm thinking about just building my own parties whenever I can.

One of my favorite party setups in that level range when I took Drg through was:

Drg, Pld, Thf, Drk, Whm, (Smn or Blm or Rdm)

Drg, Pld, Thf, Drk, Whm, Smn was my preferred setup pre Refresh, and I think it could work again now with the Signet enhances and Pld auto refresh.

Acid Bolts + Absorb Vit + Dia I/II/III = one hurting mob. Drg, Thf, and Drk can all SC together pretty well as I recall, which gives alot of MBing potential. I like the Smn for better party support, but I like the Blm for better MBing, so it's a tossup as to which to invite (I'd probably go Smn for party buffs and damaging BP)

You could try creating a small static of say, 2-3 people, I think it could work pretty well.

I just really dislike the issue of selecting a camp. 1) I hate Imps (Whoever brought this point up, I <3 U.) 2) Colibri piss me off because I can't eat food or as DRK can't use spells.

Yeah, if you can avoid ToAU camps I would do so, most RoZ/CoP camps you only have tumbleweeds to contend with, and the exp is so much better there because no one else is there you can get alot more exp than you used to be able to.

I also dislike Imps because they interefere with my JA, which as Drg/Sam, are rather important to me that I get Third Eye up again, or Meditate, or Jump/High Jump.

Colibri, I would honestly just say use Meat Jerky, or Meat Mithkabobs, something cheap. I used Jerky mostly because I was at that stage in my cooking and I figured if food is going to get stolen might as well use it up.

[tdh]

Yeah, if you can avoid ToAU camps I would do so, most RoZ/CoP camps you only have tumbleweeds to contend with, and the exp is so much better there because no one else is there you can get alot more exp than you used to be able to.

I also dislike Imps because they interefere with my JA, which as Drg/Sam, are rather important to me that I get Third Eye up again, or Meditate, or Jump/High Jump.
Colibri, I would honestly just say use Meat Jerky, or Meat Mithkabobs, something cheap. I used Jerky mostly because I was at that stage in my cooking and I figured if food is going to get stolen might as well use it up.The problem is the sheep won't leave ToAU. So I'd spend more time re-inviting people who left because ToAU only. MP Refresh, longer food, EXP bonus, weaker mobs, etc; I would love to hit a Conquest camp, but it's impossible to make it happen. Closest I've had has been a Sky LS party. Get a Sky weapon vets and you can demolish the place. And nobody else goes there.

I hate Imps for most of the same reasons you do. That and they are hyper resistant to magic, so my Dark Magic spells are again useless. As SAM it's a little better because my Demon Killer kicks in quite often, but it sucks to be in a big Chain and have it die because the whole party gets Amnesia as soon as the mob gets to the camp. (Anybody else starting to notice that either mobs start with 100% TP, or some moves are 'job abilities' and not TP moves?)

[Vyuru]

The problem is the sheep won't leave ToAU.

Oh how well I know your woes -.-

Getting people out of ToAU camps is a pain, and mostly why I don't lead parties anymore.

It's strange, alot of people from what I have seen don't have Tavnazia access, so I can't get people to go camp the birdies, it seems mass chaining the higher level self killing goblins is out of the question.... And really those brass airtanks for spawning that bugbear NM fetch a pretty penny, you could practically farm whilst you exp.

I may have to hunt around some for more exp sites, I see alot of potentials on the websitarus, but it's like all anyone wants to do is fight imps, and I am soooo sick of imps x.X

[Nuriko]

I'd love to XP on something besides imps, but these days it's like:

(8 PTs in Mire)
"why don't we go somewhere else?"
/em listens to the crickets chirping...

[Ameroth]

Imagine if they doubled the amount of low level xp spots.

People would still go to the dunes or just solo. Nothing would change.

Level BST to 75 then change to DRK/BST and solo it up like all the grumble grumble blue mages.

I'm pretty sure I would hate that idea. I want to have my PLD to 75 first anyway. DRK is just another job I really enjoy and like to party with.

Long story short, we're not a priority class, maybe more-so for missions and bosses because of our ability to stun, etc. But we just don't have much love in leveling parties.

Ya I get that impression also. My friend is a DRK75 and tells me all the stories of people kicking him, insulting him, and just down-right bashing DRKs. Meh.

[Telera]

The problem is the sheep won't leave ToAU.

I'm only SMN62/WHM31, but I wish to hell someone would invite me for exp somewhere besides AU areas. (And besides always main healing with no refreshers. *sighs*)

I am sick of them and I'm not even 70 yet.

Change of scenery {Yes, please.}

[Ameroth]

I wouldn't mind partying somewhere in the conquest zones either. You really can do just as well with the right setup at the right camp as you could over-camping imps in the mire. I just hit 68 a week ago or so, and I'm already tired of the mire. Imps suck. Too many parties. Blah.

here's hoping that there's a few new areas to exp in at higher levels with WotG. Then again, if they're too good, people will just ditch AU areas and we have the same problem again.

[Arosan]

From my experience i got an invite maybe once or twice between the level range of 10-70. If u decide to be a drk ur gonna be making the partys. drk and drg have around the worst invite rate from these levels. However upon hitting 75, invites arent as bad because DDs are needed (Or at least wanted for most merit parties). Also sadly BLM invites have died upon reaching 60ish+ because of ToAU, many people would love to kill colibris with their dam reflect! ; ;

[Ridgual]

My static and i decided to switch it up and xp at moon the other night. Completely empty, but obviously much slower xp. I was still having fun since we had to actually put forth effort to gain xp. And, i hadnt been there in a few years. DRK73/THF36

Believe it or not, but there was 1 member of the static that wasnt in our ls, and was filling in for a friend that couldnt make it that night. Props to this female whm for sticking it out with us and having some old school fun despite a slower grind.

[KaiKai]

every single level I gained after 37 (75 DRK now) was in a PT I was leader of. I don't see how you could level up reasonably without doing so. Not as a DRK.

[Nandito]

What is it with newbies bumping 5 month old threads? >.>

[little ninja]

What is it with newbies bumping 5 month old threads? >.>

LoL I dunno, But Drk invites have sucked big time since 04 lol.

[Karinya]

DD invites have sucked big time since 80%+ of the players at any given level wanted to play DD. Even some (most) people with a job that can play multiple roles just want to DD with it (war, blu, supposedly even some cor and smn... I don't think I've seen any dd-only dnc yet, fortunately.)

[Ameroth]

So I made this topic like over a year ago. Just putting that out there.

[Nandito]

Yeah, but try telling that to those who can't read thread dates. :X

...but when you're on, say, page 10 of a topic section and you reply to a thread... wow. You lose ten Internets.

[Takanaki]

I don't know if it's just Bahamut, or because i've not got past level thirty yet since starting a week ago. However there seems to be a lot more spellcasters than tanks or DDs. I could get a full party of WHM and BLM tonight without problem but finding a tank took an hour.... then he d/c and left a short while after.

Invites are horribly slow, but you can do something about it. I make my own parties whenever it's an option, tends to be much quicker and more productive than waiting for someone to invite me.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

DD invites have sucked big time since 80%+ of the players at any given level wanted to play DD. Even some (most) people with a job that can play multiple roles just want to DD with it (war, blu, supposedly even some cor and smn... I don't think I've seen any dd-only dnc yet, fortunately.)

A DD BLU or COR is far more useful to a PT than those who take the full-support perspective to either job. And if you look at the equipment we get - especially in the case of COR - you find its the COR/WHMs trying to drive a square peg into a round hole, not those that play it from the DD angle. What's more is either job could sub /DNC these days to the same end as /WHM and lose a lot less potential than they would had they subbed /WHM.

I personally find WAR and SMN far more guilty of shunning what they've very capable of doing. Worse, in the case of WAR, is that the community lets them get away with it. Meanwhile SMN is pidgeonholed into the role of a healer upon just about every invite they get and they're expected the accept it.

[little ninja]

I been lvling War on my mule. An so far I have tanked about 99% of my lvls from 1-47.....

[MrMageo]

I wouldn't worry about the lack of invites. I am trying to level 3 different jobs that are not 100% DD and offer multiple options, atm. (COR18 although if I had /RNG id be more DD oriented than I am /whm, BRD21 party support onry, and SCH24) 2 of those can out put decent damage as well as support. Its not just DRK's and other DD's missing the parties, there is a low amount of parties 10-40 across all servers (at least from folks ive talked with during maitnence). As a matter of fact I tried to make a party last night on my sch and had a pld, 2x whm 1x sch, 2xBLM seeking and no DD. Its not the jobs its the amount of people.

Ive heard ragnorak,odin,and bahamut are decent atm low level party wise just due to the numbers on the server, if its really causing you greif try a swap to the. Although I think Odin is still of limits not 100% sure though.

[Aaramis]

The PT invites have always been bad on DRK, but in the past year or so I've noticed them being even worse.

Add onto that the skill level of people slowly dwindling (remember when people knew how to skillchain?), perhaps the lack of invites isn't altogether a bad thing.

My last PT, for example, included a WHM with horribly underlevelled sub who overhealed, drew aggro, and never had reraise up; a PLD who would go AFK every couple minutes without telling anyone; a DNC/WAR who couldn't pull a single mob to save his life (80% rate of adds); and a THF who couldn't SATA to save his life.

So, yeah.
Stick with soloing. Trust me.

[Jei]

I used to go a full whole week LFGing without any invites, as RDM. Just had to get used to it.

[Karinya]

A DD BLU or COR is far more useful to a PT than those who take the full-support perspective to either job.
Possibly. But a hybrid perspective is better than either.

There are (rumoredly, I haven't actually seen one yet) some CORs that actually won't roll during a fight because they're too busy shooting things. If you want to be a RNG, just be a RNG, you'll get A skill in multiple types of ranged weapons, RNG abilities earlier and regardless of SJ, better gear selection, etc. And nobody will expect you to use abilities you don't have.

Similarly for BLU - it won't kill your party for you to occasionally cast something *other* than Death Scissors or whatever the main attack spell at your level is. In fact it might help them. I'm not saying BLU should go backline - except maybe if the party is *really* stuffed with melees and desperately needs more healing, and even then, as you point out, /DNC is a possible alternative - but your MP has more potential uses than turning it all into damage. (Or, if what your group needs is a tank, why don't you do that?)

DRK doesn't have a lot of options in this regard - they're not nearly as hybrid-ish as BLU, COR, DNC, etc. There are a few things they can do besides hit things, but mostly, they hit things; it's what the job is designed for and what it does well. <i>But there are always too many players who hit things.</i> It was true at release, it was true in RoZ/CoP and it's still true for *at least* everything other than 74+ exp/merit (and even then you need *some* non-DDs). It's a disease caused by the players and it won't be solved until enough players *want* to do something other than hit things, and play jobs/playstyles where they *do* something other than hit things, or until there's an MMO where all-DD parties are viable and useful (and I predict that that will be a very boring game to play; if mobs hit back you need to deal with it somehow, and if they don't it's the Lebros wall mission *all the time*).