I'm fairly new at the game, I only picked up the game on Monday on the recommendation of a couple of friends (we all play on the Kujata server). I really like the game but I do have a couple of questions:

1) Is there any quick way of levelling up healing magic? I'm at Lv5 right now but my healing skill is only at Lv2. To contrast, my enfeebling magic is at lv8 (since I open every battle with Dia), Club is at Lv12 and Evasion is at Lv15 (i think). It seems like no matter what I do I rarely gain any skill points in Healing Skills. On the other hand I gain several +0.3's in Club, Evasion and Enfeebling every other fight but the only real way for me to gain a +0.1 is to let an Orc beat me down into the red then spam Cure and I get +0.1 each time. But since I run out of MP after about 4 cures it's highly counter productive because I tend to, you know die quickly or have to spend the next few minutes resting and putting myself in danger of being ambushed by aggressive mobs while at very low health. I've tried just standing there and spamming it on myself or random passers by but that rarely gains any sort of skill up and I run out of MP very quickly.

I have no problem with Levelling up in general, I have an Lv35 Red Mage friend who helps out a lot since he wants to level up his Warrior Class (Lv4) so we usually just run around for a bit until we level. He is quite happy to loan me gear to help so I have no problems with levelling or finding good gear and he has also taught me a lot about being a White Mage (His White Mage class is also Lv35). It's just levelling up that healing skill. I also have another friend who has a Lv60 Bard but she lives in a different time zone (She's on EST, I'm on GMT) so she's rarely on at useful times ("useful" meaning times she can help me out ^_^;; )

2) Should I really be concerned about it at this level or should I? I mean I'm only healing 10HP a pop which makes me pretty useless as a healer in parties. I was in a 3 person party (all Lv5's) that wiped out because I could only manage about 5 cures at 10HP a pop. I really don't feel like I'm helping anyone at all if I'm barely even adding anything to their HP, especially when the Warrior with a White Mage sub can outheal me despite being the same level as me.

3) Is there any real point in buying anything from the AH? I mean a 200 gil robe costs anything from 500-1500 gil on the AH and the asking price for a lot of crafting materials is sometimes ten times what you would pay for from a guild. Selling items is even worse as the items you can easily get from farming outside San d'Ora are rarely if ever in demand. I see Earth Crystals selling for 50 gil each or 800 gil for a stack but I can never get them to sell. NPC price is only 14gil but at least I can sell them to NPCs.

4) How useful are Ginger Cookies at this level? They only cost 12Gil each in San d'Ora and they're good for resting for MP but are they really useful at my level?

I'll answerasbest as I can, but Ihavnt been ingame inalong time so my answers could be a little off...

1) I found the best way (at lower levels mainly) is to stand outside your mog house and cast till out of MP, step inside moghouse *poof* full MP, go outside and repeat.

This is really only nessesary at lower levels (pre 10-15) where you arnt partying as much. Once you start to party full time your healing skill will be cappd rather easily.
This method can also be done with enhancing magics aswell (prtect, shell ect.)

2) As you increase your skill and get more +MND gear your cures will increase in potency. Cure 1 has a 'cap' of 30 (it can go higher but takes ALOT of MND to see an increase) Cure 2 is 90.. others i dont remeber offhand..

3) AH is your friend.. and enemy, at lower levels most gear/spells are cheaper at NPC shops, you can also sell certain 'junk' at NPCs, although your primary income will come from sellng on the AH, crystal especially at low levels due to every craft needs them and they typically sell quick.

4) at your level +hMP (+MP while resting) has little effect as compared to higher levels due to a lower MP pool. As you increase you'll see a much more noticable difference due to sitting for longer (IE- 1 less tick to get to max at low levels vs even more ticks less)
When I played as my WHM i used cookies all the time to reduce downtime (+hMP equip macros) between fights, or beng able to sit for a couple ticks mid fight to get more MP when I can.


Hope this helps some :)
As I said I havnt been ingame in along time so some of this 'may' have changed a little, but it should be fairly accurate.

1. Two options, but wait till you are a bit higher to try either.
Take on the skeleton mobs that spawn at night in the starter areas. You can use cures offensively on them which should mean faster skill ups. The only problem with this is that because you are using cures on the mob you can only skill up to the skill cap of the level that is equal to the mob. Those skeletons go up to level 8 so the maximum you could reach is your level 8 skill cap (27 for healing skill on a whm)
Second option is to wait till you are high enough that some of the mobs start to be very easy kills but still hit you enough to do a bit of damage. Do the letting them hit you and spamming cure on yourself. This will be slower than the skeletons but because you are casting on yourself but because you are not using the mob directly to skill up from you can get all the way up to your current level cap and are not limited by the mobs level.2. Yes it's too early to stress about it :) Honestly for most things, most of the time, your healing skill isn't that vital. Unfortunately hitting level 11 is one of the exceptions. You already noticed that your cure 1 is a bit disappointing at the moment. Cure 2 is just as disappointing when you first get it and getting your skill as close to cap as you can for when you hit level 11 and cure 2 helps make it a less painful spell (mp efficiency wise) to use.

Edit: You can cure spam on yourself outside your mh like cyrusblaze suggested, it does work. I just really hate doing it and it felt so very slow. If you are going to do it try and pick the least busy mh in your city as a courtesy gesture. Skill up spam can be irritating.


As for the whole party wipe thing. It's your first job at the moment and you don't have a sub. The war in your party will have capped skill from leveling on whm already which is why his cures are (at the moment) outdoing yours. Anyone you party with will see you don't have a sub and should be understanding of that (most will). Honestly most people just grab the best weapon they can and melee 1-10 because no one can really function in their usual party role well just yet and it tends to be faster. Your cure 1 will get a lot better very soon and your enfeebles will be helping a lot, so don't worry about it too much, this feeling slightly useless phase is over very fast.

3. Some people are just too lazy to look for the NPC that sells the item they want, you are a big step ahead on making money by not being one of them. Earth crystals tend to be common and in less demand. Try remembering the mobs that drop rarer crystals in the AH like fire crystal or dark crystals (I think the Funguar in Ronfaure drop those) and targeting those when you level.

4. I would say no on the cookie usefulness. Even in a party, 1-10 you should be meleeing and some cheap attack food (check out Grilled hare) can make a noticeable difference. If you really don't want to melee or the constant running out of mp is killing you then check out some mp food (pie or roast mushroom), you can get a huge relative boost pretty cheap at your level.

Roast Mushroom is +20mp, -1 str, +3 mnd (which will help you edge a bit closer to the soft cap), -1 enmity and +2hmp so it's not a bad all round food. If any of your friends have cooking 11+ they can even make them for you and from stuff you can farm in Ronfaure as you level. The other common mp food used at low level is Rolanberry Pie.

Once you start partying I would consider sticking with the mp food for a few levels (and keeping some on your just incase) because your mp pool will probably still be very small relative to the cost of your cures and so the boost you can get from even fairly cheap mp food is fairly large. Once you have enough mp to go through a whole fight without running out and a nice buffer on top for emergencies it's time to start thinking about trying out cookies.

Thanks for the advice. I really like how mature the community is here compared to other games. I've been getting a lot of help and advice from people ingame too.

I know it is a little early to be worrying about those things. I guess my habits from Phantasy Star Universe have carried over. Basically if you play any mage class (most notably Fortetecher and Acrotecher) and your support spells aren't levelled to your class's cap by the time you hit Mid to High level it becomes almost impossible to get into a party regardless of your level or gear.

My habits from PSU are also why I always check to see if the NPC shops are cheaper. People regularly charge well over the NPC price for items in that game. I have noticed that my Fire and Water Crystals do sell within about 30 mins to an hour and a half (even though Fire Crystals are dropped by every other Orc for me) so I think I'll stick to selling those for a profit.

I've been playing WHM for about 2 years now, and at 75 my Healing Magic skill is still 40 levels below the cap. It's not really something I can help ... with blink tankers and my love of Regens, curing gets put on the back burner. Nowadays, I get skillups more from casting Raise III than cures.

I wouldn't freak about it, no one's going to pass you over for an invite because your skill's not capped. People really don't care too much about that. :P

Just skill up on it when you can. Even curing yourself for 0 repeatedly outside the Mog House will get you (slow) skill ups, and you can zone into your MH for full MP and try again.

Good luck and have fun (which it sounds like you are) and if you need any more WHM advice you can bug me. ^^

There's a whole thread dedicated to new White Mages stickied at the top of this very forum, actually. :)

To answer your specific questions; yes, it's possible to level healing magic faster, but I seriously wouldn't worry about any magic skills on White Mage. None of them are so debilitating even if vastly under-levelled that it will significantly affect your potency as a healer. They'll go up on their own. The only magic-based jobs that seriously need up to date skills are Black Mages with elemental magic and Red Mages with enfeebling magic.

You'll notice that as you gain levels, the potency of your Cures will improve. If you're still unsatisfied with their power, try picking up some inexpensive gear to boost your Mind score (but be aware that enemies will get angrier about the amount you heal as it goes up).

One piece of gear you should definitely pick up as soon as possible is a Justice Badge, which is a level 7 neckpiece that gives +3 MND and 1 Defense. It can be acquired through a simple quest in Windurst ([url=http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Truth%2C_Justice%2C_and_the_Onion_Way%21]Truth, Justice and the Onion Way! - be aware that there is one pre-requisite quest you must complete before this one, however), or simply purchased through the Auction House from another player for a nominal amount of gil.

There are also Saintly Rings you can purchase from the Auction House, which are usable at level 10 and give +2 MND.


Icemage

I can get the justice badge quite easily. I know a white mage who can teleport me to Windhurst without much trouble so I'll ask him when he gets online

You will start healing as one of your only party/fight jobs as of lv 10. Your Healing will cap out and stay capped till about the 30s. That's when the cap rises higher than you'll hit between levels.

Now I've hit Lv10 I can see my cures begin to heal a lot now. With my White Mage's new Willow Wand her cures heal 23Hp a time which is great and saves a lot of MP in parties. I've only had one major screw up in a party and was forced to use benediction but it really wasn't the party's fault. Our Tank left so the Thief ended up having to pull (It was that or having a White Mage or Black Mage pull). It went badly when he hit a link and we got attacked by about 3-4 goblins. I ran out of MP and everyone was in red so I used it and luckily there were no chains and I had Shining Strike ready and the Thief had Fast Blade ready so the goblin that went straight for me went down pretty quickly and the rest soon followed.

Right now I have the following gear setup (Farming Fire and Earth Crystals makes me a lot of money which is good given how expensive the AH is):

Weapon: Willow Wand
Shield: Maple Shield
Body: Tunic
Neck: Wing Pendant
Hands: Mitts
Ring: Empress Band
Legs: Slacks
Feet: Solea

As for spells I have: Cure, Dia, Protect, Protectra and Poisona. What other spells would be useful to pick up? I know that Barwatera is useful and I get Cure 2 next level but how useful are the other spells that I can use right now? I was thinking of getting Paralyze but the Lv36 White Mage friend I mentioned earlier told me that it would be better to leave enfeebling spells to a Red Mage (He also has his Red Mage job at Lv31 so I guess he knows how Red Mages work more than I do).

Yep, White Mages in party should usually focus on healing. Later on you'll notice that its very important to conserve your mp ( meaning not casting any enfeebling or other spells than cures ). Sometimes just saving 5 mp could mean your party's survival.

Here's the breakdown of how proficient a WHM is in their spell types:

Healing Magic A+
Divine Magic A-
Enhancing Magic C+
Enfeebling Magic C

And yes, a red mage's job is to enfeeble in the party. They also have higher enhancing magic than a White Mage (which I found odd).

Enfeebling Magic A+
Enhancing Magic B+
Healing Magic C-
Divine magic E

Nevertheless, you should still get the support spells. Shell and Shellra should be next on your list for that. I wouldn't worry about the other spells. So far in parties my 25 WHM has only been using cures, poisona, protectra and shellra.

And it looks like you're pretty good at being a WHM. Some WHMs I've met don't know when to use their benediction, or are too afraid that they'll die shortly after using it.

Hope that helped a bit :)

EDIT: Oh right, here's a link to more WHM info that could help you out.
White Mage - FFXIclopedia - a Wikia Gaming wiki (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/White_Mage)

I use ffxiclopedia practically for everything. I heard from some people in-game that the bar spells are essential at higher levels though. Don't think you need to be worried about getting them now, however.

If you are going to Windy for a Justice Badge anyway and you have some help consider getting a Pilgrim's Wand (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Pilgrim%27s_Wand), it's pretty easy to get and a really great resting piece that will see you to at least 32 and a lot of people use it up to 51.

Spells wise, get everything you can afford but prioritise cures, protectra/shellra, -na spells, enfeebles and barwatera/barfira.

Barfira can make a huge difference against goblin Bomb Toss. The strength of barspells is totally dependant on your enhancing skill though so it might not seem to do much when you first start using it but it's worth perservering with.

I know your friend said leave the enfeebling to the rdm and if there is one in your party who is actually enfeebling then yes you should but if there isn't then it's better to be able to cast your own.

Weapon: Willow Wand
Shield: Maple Shield
Body: Tunic
Neck: Wing Pendant
Hands: Mitts
Ring: Empress Band
Legs: Slacks
Feet: Solea


Probably should try to acquire:
- Pilgrim's Wand
- Copper Hairpin
- Energy Earrings x2
- Saintly Ring x2
- Justice Badge

Oh, and get a stack or two of Ginger Cookies before you start partying; those are 10-12 gil each from NPC, so less than 1,200 a stack.


As for spells I have: Cure, Dia, Protect, Protectra and Poisona. What other spells would be useful to pick up? I know that Barwatera is useful and I get Cure 2 next level but how useful are the other spells that I can use right now? I was thinking of getting Paralyze but the Lv36 White Mage friend I mentioned earlier told me that it would be better to leave enfeebling spells to a Red Mage (He also has his Red Mage job at Lv31 so I guess he knows how Red Mages work more than I do).

You can only count on always having one job around: WHM--yourself. Even if there is a RDM in party, there's no guarantee that player will use appropriate enfeebling spells. So, get Paralyze, and later, Slow and Silence.

Gather the scrolls, and make sure you have all your spells up to Lv.15 (keep Lv.16+ spells in Mog House) before heading out to Valkrum Dunes as WHM10.

Oh, at Lv.18+, don't actually use Diaga unless you have a very, very clear idea why you're using it. :rofl: Even then, consider not using it... (For the record, yes, it's a useful spells, just in very limited circumstances.)

Especially with WHM, a great deal of spells are situational, so you may be able to survive on the bare minimum, it has always been my philisophy that you might as well have them and not need them, rather then be in a situation where you need them and do not have them.

The bar spells are rather helpful if you have a good idea of the mobs you're fighting. Barfira is a godsend against goblins and other mobs that rely on fire based spells, while Barwatera will come in handy when you fight crabs and pugils. One thing to note is with status effect bar spells (barsleepra, barpoisora, etc..) many newer White Mages can get the impression that they do not work well because they never stop you from getting hit with a status effect, but instead lower the duration of that status effect. This will be very important when you get to places like Yhoater Jungle where your whole party can be blasted by Mandragora's AOE sleep due to lack of room/ bad party spacing.

Like others have mentioned, Enfeebling and Enhancing magics rely much more on their skill level than other types, so it is prudent to get the spells and try to skill up with them as you go along, rather then end up having to spend hours/days skilling up because you've reached a point where you cannot paralyze or slow anything, even with fantastic gear. Paralyze, Slow and Silence can be devastating spells, especially in lower level groups, where I've seen a good paralyze completely stop a mob in its tracks.

With the Protect(ra) and Shell(ra) spells, you really don't need to pick up the single target spells if you don't want to spend the money, as in 99% of situations you will much rather want to cast it on the group instead of one person at a time.

Deodorize is honestly the only spell that I think I have never used in two years of being a White Mage, save for the time when I was trying to get as many status effect icons on my screen as possible. Completely useless, the only reason I have it is for the sake of completion.

Poisona, Paralyna and spells that remove status effects are vital to your job, and I cannot think of any of them that you will not use repeatedly. Get them as soon as possible, if you can. Just like a bad status effect can be devastating to the enemy with the right timing, it can be just as bad for your party, and it is very important to be able to prevent disaster.

Something I did not find out for far too long when I was starting the game was that if you us an empress band, you can remove the band without losing the Exp+ status, so make sure to reequip your regular gear (Saintly Rings are extremely inexpensive and very helpful at your level, I'd suggest a pair.)

I'm going to go against what some others have said and tell you that if I would not under most circumstances melee in any party. It is much much more beneficial for you to be able to rest if you don't have full MP and don't have to be casting than the tiny amount of damage you will be doing in a party. At lower levels, you have a very small MP pool and it can be extremely difficult to keep everyone healed even if you're wearing the best gear and have a ton of experience healing, and you never know when a battle is going to take a turn for the worse, and you need to curespam. Also, the experience timing your rests and managing your HP is priceless, and is something you'll be able to pull on for however long you play the game.

Finally, welcome to the ranks of the White Mage! I would say that it is the most difficult of the base jobs, and pretty difficult even when comparing to the advanced jobs to get a hold on, and a good understanding of how a Healer works is priceless no matter what job you are.

Deodorize is honestly the only spell that I think I have never used in two years of being a White Mage, save for the time when I was trying to get as many status effect icons on my screen as possible. Completely useless, the only reason I have it is for the sake of completion.
It's great for getting away from track by scent monsters. Repose (or ES Sleep) a crawler, Deodorize, Sneak. Run for it. Handy when there's no puddles or streams around.

I'm going to go against what some others have said and tell you that if I would not under most circumstances melee in any party. It is much much more beneficial for you to be able to rest if you don't have full MP and don't have to be casting than the tiny amount of damage you will be doing in a party. At lower levels, you have a very small MP pool and it can be extremely difficult to keep everyone healed even if you're wearing the best gear and have a ton of experience healing, and you never know when a battle is going to take a turn for the worse, and you need to curespam. Also, the experience timing your rests and managing your HP is priceless, and is something you'll be able to pull on for however long you play the game.
Very sound advice; I second it.

would say that it is the most difficult of the base jobs
Pffft. You mean Red Mage, don't you? >_>b

Deodorize is honestly the only spell that I think I have never used in two years of being a White Mage, save for the time when I was trying to get as many status effect icons on my screen as possible.

You're forgetting cheesy jokes. Nothing like casting deodorize on random Galka and Elvaan until one of them feels bad.

Galka don't smell. You smell.

I'd suggest getting Silence @15. This spell - to be used on monsters that cast magic only (sorry, I see so many people silencing crabs in the dunes) - is incredibly useful right when you get it. Likely, you'll be fighting gobs, and half of them are mage types. Also, RDM doesn't get this spell 'til 18. By then, you're done with the gobs.

It's great for getting away from track by scent monsters. Repose (or ES Sleep) a crawler, Deodorize, Sneak. Run for it. Handy when there's no puddles or streams around.


You see, if I'm in a situation where I need to get away, in most cases, I'll just sleep + warp, or I'll just make a run for it; I've never once had the problem of a mob catching up with me once I've put a good bit of distance between us. It either loses the scent on its own (which has happened to me a fair number of times) or I am so far ahead that it cannot possibly catch up with me. Like I said though, if you have the money to fill out your spellbook, I recommend it, if only to be overly prepared.

And I think, of course, it must be said: LOLRDM

You see, if I'm in a situation where I need to get away, in most cases, I'll just sleep + warp, or I'll just make a run for it; I've never once had the problem of a mob catching up with me once I've put a good bit of distance between us. It either loses the scent on its own (which has happened to me a fair number of times) or I am so far ahead that it cannot possibly catch up with me.
If you don't need to remain near the vicinity, sure. In any case, not argument that it's not a frequently used spell.

I once had a crawler which followed me all the way from middle of Tahrongi Canyon to the southern zone line. Surprised the heck out of me when it hit me out of resting; I had thought once I couldn't see it for a while, it'd would have lost me, too.

And I think, of course, it must be said: LOLRDM
:vent: That is it. Next WHM I have in party, gonna make him beg for Refresh--he'll pay for your insult!

And I think, of course, it must be said: LOLRDM

:vent: That is it. Next WHM I have in party, gonna make him beg for Refresh--he'll pay for your insult!

No, Illuen is very much in the right: White Mages can both heal and melee better than us. What's there left for us to do, aside from Refresh (which, might I add, is not exclusive to us)?

You're forgetting cheesy jokes. Nothing like casting deodorize on random Galka and Elvaan until one of them feels bad.
Lol. I'm going to go buy deodorize now.

You see, if I'm in a situation where I need to get away, in most cases, I'll just sleep + warp, or I'll just make a run for it; I've never once had the problem of a mob catching up with me once I've put a good bit of distance between us. It either loses the scent on its own (which has happened to me a fair number of times) or I am so far ahead that it cannot possibly catch up with me.Not to be rude or anything, but I'm pretty sure mobs don't just go and lose your scent. They can lose you if it starts raining or if you go through bodies of water. You probably already knew this, but your post can be misconstrued by the OP and that'll get him killed quick.

Actually I found out the scent thing the hard way when farming Sheepskins. I accidentally hit a link and was chased by 3 Wild Sheep (I didn't realise that they did link until then ^_^;; ) from the mid point of East Ronfaure all the way to the south exit point leading to West Ronfaure. I had no MP and was in the red. Luckily I was close enough to the border to be able to use Benediction then quickly zone out and rest with no repercussions. That skill is highly useful in emergencies and getting rid of the hate is actually pretty easy as long as you give the party a clear warning before you use it.

IfritnoItazuna

The Energy Earrings are VERY expensive on the AH (I don't think I've seen one go for less than 5k on the AH) and the cheapest I've seen Saintly Rings go for are for 2k a pop so at my level it will take a while for me to get those items. My White Mage friend has loaned me a Copper Hairpin but they are extremely cheap so I'll probably get my own very soon. According to the Wiki the Pilgrims Wand is obtained through a NM quest so I will likely have to enlist help from some friends for that one since my gil will be being spent on the other equipment you suggested.

Yes, those gears would seem expensive to a new player, which is why I qualified my statement with a "should". ^_^;

All things considered, though, White Mage gears are relatively inexpensive. (Check out the price for "Sniper's Ring" at Lv.40, a borderline "must have" item for Ninja, for example, vs. "Rose Wand +1", a "luxury" item for White Mage at Lv.48.)

You don't need the Energy Earrings. Onyx Earrings will suit your needs just fine, and should be quite a bit cheaper.

A solution for the cost of gear would be to have someone help you get to Jueno. for the lvl gear you are looking for the tax plus cost of the item will be less than the other cities. Another option is to go for conquest gear(for whm Windy would be the better city). I find until lvl 15 you can get away with basic gear(unless you want to try to solo). If you have high lvl help, have them farm you gear off the beastmen(gob leechers will drop important spells for you also--invis, silence, deoderize(sp), re-raise(need at least a lvl 50 to attempt to farm this).


At your level, and item carrying capicity you will be better off farming any crystals or go for seeds from the saplings(real good seller on the ah for decent gill at lvl 10).

Spending an hour a day farming Crystals on Ronfaure is actually brining in quite a bit of money. Especially when I get the odd Goblin Mask (500gil but I've had someone blindly bid 1k for one) or Orcish Axe (150gil from NPCs) drop. I also spend that tme doing what me and my friend call "General White Maging" or simply just helping out passers by or parties fighting monsters.I've made a lot of friends simply by dropping protects and Cures on a party after a battle of giving a mid-battle party some emergency cures or cures to relive their main healer. It boosted my healing skills from 15 to 20 in one hour too ^_^

Currently I'm at Lv11. Cure 2 is fun but really eats up Mp so I see why Cure is much more cost effective MP-wise and Aquaveil is very useful if Paralyze fails to effect the mob and/or the tank is bad at drawing hate. I'll probably hit the Dunes tomorrow because right now I need sleep. Wish me luck I guess ^_^

Although before I leave I would like to share a pretty hilarious screw up story. My friend Lv35 White Mage) agreed to hep me with Bat Hunt and Grave Concerns since at my level I still fear undead. We got to the middle of the tomb but I accidentally turned the wrong way so instead of finding where I had to place the Well Water I found the "???" on the wrong side of the clearing. My friend has never actually done any missions so both of us had no idea what it did. After a moment we decided to enter and were greeted by a very nasty surprise. I think we lasted for 5 seconds before we were both killed by the Lv50+ mobs down there. The irony is that when we roleplay my White Mage is very clumsy and has no sense of direction. We managed to laugh it off very quickly when I claimed I was just staying in character.

Not to be rude or anything, but I'm pretty sure mobs don't just go and lose your scent. They can lose you if it starts raining or if you go through bodies of water. You probably already knew this, but your post can be misconstrued by the OP and that'll get him killed quick.

Hmm, now I'm rather curious about this. I've seen quite a few times someone sleeping a mob, running a fair distance (but not out of zone) and when the mob wakes up, it either A) walks back to its spawn point or B) Depop. I don't know if this has a name that I am not in the know about, or what, but I am fairly certain that it wasn't someone running through rain or a river, so I'm not quite sure whats going on.

Also, to be fair, if you have enough time to cast deodorize, you should have enough time to put enough distance between the mob and yourself to where you can zone safely.

No, Illuen is very much in the right: White Mages can both heal and melee better than us.
Heehee. RDM may be able to heal more efficiently because of Refresh and Convert, but WHM can absolutely heal "better" in the sense of being able to pull numbers out of our ass that you could only dream of.

You're right though, you can melee better than us, although there are some fairly fun solo WHM setups (I'm looking at you, my beautiful pair of Darksteel +1s; and I swear I will have a Reverend Mail someday) for endgame WHMs.


What's there left for us to do, aside from Refresh (which, might I add, is not exclusive to us)?

You're absolutely right. What would I do without (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Mage%27s_Ballad) RDM's (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Mage%27s_Ballad_II) refresh? (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Evoker%27s_Roll)


Note: All things said are said in jest. I don't have an evil evil grudge against RDMs. I just hate it when you cure over my Regen III =P.
______________________________

If you don't mind me asking, what server are you on, Firewind?

You probably already knew this, but your post can be misconstrued by the OP and that'll get him killed quick.

How many times have you run away from a monster, and deodorize is what saved you, honestly?

How many times have you run away from a monster, and deodorize is what saved you, honestly?

0, always forget I have the spell to see if it works!

Only works on mobs that track by scent.

Currently I'm at Lv11. Cure 2 is fun but really eats up Mp so I see why Cure is much more cost effective MP-wise and Aquaveil is very useful if Paralyze fails to effect the mob and/or the tank is bad at drawing hate. I'll probably hit the Dunes tomorrow because right now I need sleep. Wish me luck I guess ^_^

Good luck :)


Few practical things you might know some or all of these already but just incase.


I know I said melee 1-10 but once you get into the dunes and pretty much for the rest of your whm career you get out of AoE range and stay there.

If you haven't looked at this yet then check out Icemage's post in this (http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/white-mage/43156-help-me-chat-filters.html) thread for how to tweak your chat filters and colours. It makes the difference between ARRRGGGHHHH and being able to follow what's going on well.

Mobs you will probably fight in the dunes are
Lizards (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Category:Lizards)
Goblins (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Category:Goblins) - Bomb Toss is evil, watch out for the magic users Gamblers(blm) leechers (whm very evil) and Tinkerers (drk). Barfira as soon as you can.
Crabs (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Category:Crabs) - barwatera helps against bubble shower and the only other thing with crabs is that someone needs to keep Dia on them at all times because they have very very high defense.
Flies (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Category:Flies) - barwatera helps again. Vemon has a chance to poison so afterwards watch for anyone who is losing health every tick and remember to prioritise poisona for people who need to rest for mp.
Pugils (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Category:Pugils)- Barwatera again, watch for Screwdriver like a hawk it can do huge damage. You definitely need to keep your tank at full or close to full health for pugils.

Check out the TP moves for the mobs. People tend not to stress strongly enough or early enough how much white mages need to know about TP moves. Gaze attacks can be avoided by not being behind whoever has hate or by facing away from the mob. Cone attacks can be avoided by not being behind whoever has hate.

Barelement spells last about one game hour.

Don't be afraid to rest during fights, if no one needs curing or status removing and the mob doesn't need debuffing the best thing you can do is try and get back some mp.

Divine seal when you get it is your friend.

Enmity - where you can, without endangering anyone, try and save big cures for after a hate spike like a provoke or a big weapon skill, it will make you less likely to pull hate. If you have a suicidal blm in your party (most blm in the dunes seem to be) don't stand next to them, you will probably get hit with AoE if you do and if you die, the party is probably screwed.

When things go wrong - The thing to remember about the dunes is that you don't have any -enmity gear yet, you don't have regen yet, you don't a lot of mp relatively speaking, the tanks don't have most of their hate tools yet, the dds don't have any/most of their damage mitigation tools and fights last a relatively long time. So if/when something goes wrong, try not to worry about it too much, there is a good chance it wasn't your fault.

How many times have you run away from a monster, and deodorize is what saved you, honestly?


Honestly-I don't see a point to using the spell at all(other than possibly skill ups or messing around with people). On my rdm I waited until lvl 31 to get it(only because it was dropping so much that I figured what the heck), but have used it about 5 times in 1.5 years(only when we are in a group waiting for a garrison event(as a way to pass the time).




As a side question:is there any situation where Deoderize is necessary to use to get through a zone?

I can't see much of a way for there to be ... you'd need a true hearing mob that you could sleep, that tracks by scent, and that you can't avoid.

Oh, and it would have to be something you couldn't kill.

Heehee. RDM may be able to heal more efficiently because of Refresh and Convert, but WHM can absolutely heal "better" in the sense of being able to pull numbers out of our ass that you could only dream of.

You're right though, you can melee better than us, although there are some fairly fun solo WHM setups (I'm looking at you, my beautiful pair of Darksteel +1s; and I swear I will have a Reverend Mail someday) for endgame WHMs.

The first paragraph I have no qualms with.

The second one is, however, buh? The Bolded part contradicts the Italicized part. Meaning, I was claim that you can, in fact, Melee better than us, and I have the hard numbers to back me up:

Red Mage Offensive Skills versus White Mage Offensive Skills

Red Mage 1H Sword Skill - B: 75 Cap = 250
Red Mage 1H Dagger Skill - B (EX): 75 Cap = 250
Red Mage 1H Club Skill - D: 75 Cap = 210

White Mage 1H Club Skill - B+ (SP): 75 Cap = 256
White Mage 2H Staff Skill - C+ (EX): 75 Cap = 230

Bold = Superior primary weapon skill
Italics = Superior secondary weapon skill

And while I'm at it, let us add insult to injury:

Red Mage Shield Skill - F: 75 Cap = 189
White Mage Shield Skill - D: 75 Cap = 210

Now can you look at those figures with a straight face and honestly tell me that Red Mages are not so pathetic as to not be able to out-melee White Mages? That is my largest qualm with S-E at the moment: they say they're going to give us "more spells to let us be on the front line sometimes." We don't need any more flashy-do-nothing (en-)spells: we have enough to cast as it is, even with Fast Cast! What we need is some serious stat-fixing here! If Red Mages are being out-melee'd by White Mages, you know something's wrong with your system.

I don't see why Red Mages were so upset when Blue Mage arrived on the scene when White Mage was already one-upping them in two departments!

The first paragraph I have no qualms with.

The second one is, however, buh? The Bolded part contradicts the Italicized part. Meaning, I was claim that you can, in fact, Melee better than us, and I have the hard numbers to back me up:

Red Mage Offensive Skills versus White Mage Offensive Skills

Red Mage 1H Sword Skill - B: 75 Cap = 250
Red Mage 1H Dagger Skill - B (EX): 75 Cap = 250
Red Mage 1H Club Skill - D: 75 Cap = 210

White Mage 1H Club Skill - B+ (SP): 75 Cap = 256
White Mage 2H Staff Skill - C+ (EX): 75 Cap = 230

Bold = Superior primary weapon skill
Italics = Superior secondary weapon skill

And while I'm at it, let us add insult to injury:

Red Mage Shield Skill - F: 75 Cap = 189
White Mage Shield Skill - D: 75 Cap = 210

Now can you look at those figures with a straight face and honestly tell me that Red Mages are not so pathetic as to not be able to out-melee White Mages? That is my largest qualm with S-E at the moment: they say they're going to give us "more spells to let us be on the front line sometimes." We don't need any more flashy-do-nothing (en-)spells: we have enough to cast as it is, even with Fast Cast! What we need is some serious stat-fixing here! If Red Mages are being out-melee'd by White Mages, you know something's wrong with your system.

I don't see why Red Mages were so upset when Blue Mage arrived on the scene when White Mage was already one-upping them in two departments!

Okay, I took your entire post as sarcasm, hence me defending myself from it, but you're, in my opinion, being laughably naive in with that comment.. You suggest that White Mages are out meleeing Red Mages, which is just hillarious. You rightly point out that White Mages have a higher club skill than Red Mages have in Swords. Are you going to look at me with a straight face and tell me that Clubs put out more damage than swords? Besides the few hammers than can do half decent (read: Non-shitty) damage (and lets not forget Mjollnir, of course, cause it has a whopping 11.10 DPS, which can be outmatched by normal, non- incredibly difficult and extremely rare weapons, which Mjollnir IS) and Hexa Strike, what does White Mage have going for it in battle? Staying power, like the ability to tank a mob indefinitely? If used correctly, a endless supply of MP? Nifty toys like Joyeuse?

Also; look at the amount of shields available to White Mage, and then look at what is available to Red Mage. Who has the better Defensive prowess?

Really, just putting forward the idea that White Mage can melee anywhere near as decently, let alone better than Red Mage is just incredibly stupid and nearsighted.

WHMs kick RDMs ass in melee for one reason. Melee RDMs are eternally associated with completely crap players. Melee WHMs is about the Vana'diel equivalent of getting your ass kicked by a dolphin.

Oh, Illuen, have you ever seen Guen fight? Obviously not what you'd expect from most WHMs, but still an amazing sight.

WHMs kick RDMs ass in melee for one reason. Melee RDMs are eternally associated with completely crap players. Melee WHMs is about the Vana'diel equivalent of getting your ass kicked by a dolphin.

Oh, Illuen, have you ever seen Guen fight? Obviously not what you'd expect from most WHMs, but still an amazing sight.

Yes, I have, and it is a wonderous thing. Seeing one of their vids is the entire reason that I eventually want to have the proper gear to solo as WHM. He's fucking awesome!

Also; dolphins are badass fighters who WILL cut you. I think it is closer to getting your ass kicked by a capybara.

Well, I thought dolphins and white mages went together pretty well because they both feel like wet rubber. But you might have a point.

Wow, I didn't know me asking a few questions would turn into a full scale debate on who can hit things with the blunt end the best ^_^;

Levelling in the Dunes is going really slowly. It took me 6 hours last night to go from Lv11 to 12 killing IT Hill Lizards. The exp gains were very sporadic: they ranged from 30 to 150 exp for each IT lizard with an Empress Band so levelling was going along very slowly. If I'm going to have to do this again when I get my Sub Job (I'll have to do it 3 times because I'm thinking of going WHM/SCH once I get the other expansions) then getting to higher levels is going to take a long time.

But the party I was in was great so I didn't really mind the slow levelling. I was struggling to keep up with the healing at first but a member had to leave and we got a backup healer (Scholar/White Mage) so things went much more smoothly. This is how the party was made up:

Warrior/Monk (Main Tank. She always knew when to time provokes well, especially when I had to drop some Cure 2's in an emergency)
Dark Knight/Warrior (Backup Tank and main Damage Dealer. Also did a great job at keeping hate when the main tank couldn't Voke or my cures drew hate)
Thief/White Mage (Puller. He is the White Mage friend I mentioned a few times and he tagged along to give me pointers and level his Thief Job)
Ranger/Thief (No idea what this guy was doing as he just stood there doing nothing for most of the time. I later found out that his keyboard was broken so he could only use a mouse to do things.)
White Mage (Me, the Main Healer, I also handed buffs, enfeebs and status cures)
Scholar/White Mage (Backup healer. Thanks to this guy we only had one close call when we both ran out of MP and both tanks went down into the red)

Ginger Cookies are now my best friends. Before I got a stack we were really cutting it close when I had to sneak in rests when my MP ran out but after I got them me and the backup healer were able to alternate rests and curing when we were running low on MP. Trying to get the one tick of MP you need to drop a Cure on your slowly dying Tank really does get your pulse racing regardless of if you have a backup healer or not.

Out of the time we were there we only had 2 deaths. Both being the puller. The first time was when he accidentally hit a link and we had to run from a pack of angry lizards and the second time was when he got aggro from a Goblin while out pulling (we couldn't get out there in time to save him :( ).

But despite this job just insane and hair-pulling at times I absolutely love it. it always keeps me occupied and alert and I love that feeling you get when you're passing by and you manage to drop a Cure on someone who is about to die or you manage to relive a party's healer as you pass them. Providing escorts around Ronfaure for people at lv1-10 while farming crystals is also a pretty good way of making freinds too.

Glad you're having fun. ^_^

Oh, occasionally, you'll come across derisive comments like "cure bots" for healers. Ignore the idiots, and move on--they don't understand why playing healer is fun, and don't want to. No point in sparing with them; your time is better spent elsewhere.

Warrior/Monk (Main Tank. She always knew when to time provokes well, especially when I had to drop some Cure 2's in an emergency)
FYI, a WAR/MNK doesn't really need to "time" the provoke; just use it every 30 seconds, and use Boost every 15 seconds. That should secure the monsters, easily.

Ranger/Thief (No idea what this guy was doing as he just stood there doing nothing for most of the time. I later found out that his keyboard was broken so he could only use a mouse to do things.)
RNG/THF is a pretty meaningless combination in party. All I can say is, don't be like him. >_>;

White Mage (Me, the Main Healer, I also handed buffs, enfeebs and status cures)
Scholar/White Mage (Backup healer. Thanks to this guy we only had one close call when we both ran out of MP and both tanks went down into the red)
With Dark Arts, Scholar has stronger enfeebling skills than WHM. I would recommend WHM get the Dia, while letting SCH/WHM or SCH/RDM handle the first attempts on Paralyze and Slow.

Dunes parties should pretty much have two healers each, IMO. SCHs make terrific co-healers because they can toss out cures slightly faster than WHM on Light Arts, even though they get Cure II a bit later. The only thing is, they (well, I) get distracted switching between Dark and Light Arts, so WHM should watch when they are enfeebling or nuking as clue when they would drop the curing duty.

Personally, I wouldn't recommend that a white mage go to the Dunes until level 11, at which point you get Cure II. (Likewise RDMs and level 14.) You can't really main heal in a party without it in the low levels, as you'll have nothing to react to minor emergencies with. Of course, you're liable to be forced to contend with PLers anyway at that level, but you should at least be prepared to actually do your job regardless. -- Pteryx

Very slow day today. Found it almost impossible to get into a party. had to wait in the Dunes for 2 hours and when I did get an invite I had to make it through the tunnels alone. They also disbanded after about half an hour leaving me stranded in the Dunes and having to contend with the tunnel full of bats alone again. Thankfully a passing White Mage was nice enough to dismount their hired chocobo (thus losing it in the process) and cast Sneak and Invisible on me that time.

So with 5 jerks added to my blacklist I decided to go farming instead and ended up levelling up to 13 by doing that (mainly because it was almost impossible to get an item drop from EP mobs in Ronfaure). Does level effect drop rate? I only seem to be getting items from the IT mobs in the Dunes now (I get a drop every battle without a thief). Ah well at least I managed to get 2 full stacks of Moat Carp and a full stack of Crayfish in the AH so that should get some money in.

Very slow day today. Found it almost impossible to get into a party. had to wait in the Dunes for 2 hours and when I did get an invite I had to make it through the tunnels alone. They also disbanded after about half an hour leaving me stranded in the Dunes and having to contend with the tunnel full of bats alone again. Thankfully a passing White Mage was nice enough to dismount their hired chocobo (thus losing it in the process) and cast Sneak and Invisible on me that time.

So with 5 jerks added to my blacklist I decided to go farming instead and ended up levelling up to 13 by doing that (mainly because it was almost impossible to get an item drop from EP mobs in Ronfaure). Does level effect drop rate? I only seem to be getting items from the IT mobs in the Dunes now (I get a drop every battle without a thief). Ah well at least I managed to get 2 full stacks of Moat Carp and a full stack of Crayfish in the AH so that should get some money in.
Not that disbanding after half an hour is a good thing, but if that's all it takes for you to label someone a jerk and whip out the blacklist, yours is going to fill up awfully quickly. Getting "stuck" on the wrong side of the bat cave happens all the time. It's not something a party is likely to think about when inviting someone, because it's just part of doing business at the Dunes.

In case you didn't know, you could also have gone the other way (instead of through the cave) and found some Easy Prey in Konschtat Highlands or North Gustaberg so you didn't have to deal with the bat cave. You'll end up there someday anyway, may as well take the chance to learn the lay of the land.

Level difference between you and the mob does effect drop rate, but not enough to be a real factor if you're killing Easy Prey. It was more likely moon phase (I can never remember if this has been thoroughly tested or just a very popular theory) or just a run of bad luck.

It wasn't just that. They were also complaining if I didn't heal the moment they got hit even though they didn't need it or it would just draw a ton of hate. Add in them constantly ignoring me and pulling another mob when I'm still trying to recover my MP and then complaining that I can't heal them. Basically they expected me to have infinite MP, keep them at 100% health constantly and somehow survive all of the hate that would draw. I was also expected to be able to use Stona at Lv12 despite that them looking away from the lizards would solve that problem instantly. It was a very bad party full of pretty rude and inconsiderate people hence why they ended up being blacklisted. If I remember right they used a Warrior to provoke.

I have found fishing to be very profitable now. After I was jerked around by that party I rescued someone in West Ronfaure after they hit a link. Turns out the guy was a lV 65 Dark Knight was was levelling his Samurai job (currently at Lv5). After talking to him for an hour or so he gave me some advice on making some gil and his suggestion of selling stacks of Moat Carp on the AH was a very good one. They sell for 2.5k each and take very little time to fish up ^_^. The random Crayfish I catch too also help to boost my cooking skill when I peel them and make good bait. So I can finally afford to update my spells and equipment now ^_^

NA partying attitude is pretty much do one's job while in party, but take care of oneself before and after. JP parties are more likely to gather together before starting, and run to city together after ending. It's a good idea to keep a stack of Prism Powder and Silent Oil in inventory at all times. Those two plus Ginger Cookies and Echo Drops almost never leave my inventory.

As for short party time, that's the hazard of being a replacement. On RDM75, I usually reject replacement invites; one never knows if the party's been going 4 hours and is 20 minutes away from breaking, or if people will start dropping one by one, disrupting the partying every 10 minutes. Or both.

Can't be as picky at lower levels and other jobs though... I pretty much take anything unless I'm on RDM75. Even then I'm not terribly choosy except for the "Don't want to be replacement" rule. ._.

Well I'm in the UK so European parties tend to be one or the other, or both. I've been in a few where the party meet up outside the Dunes or in the city and I've been in another where half of the party is at the Bastok side of the Bat Cave and the other half are at the Sand 'Oria so the Sandy members group up before going through the cave. I've also been in a few where I've had to just brave the cave myself since at this level it's hard to afford full stacks of Prism Powder and Sneak Oil while keeping spells and equipment up to date. Looking at the AH prices I don't think I have to worry about gear costs until I hit Lv20.

The only thing I'm really picky with in parties is having a PL. I do understand that having a PL will be inevitable at some point and it makes gaining exp much faster but thankfully pretty much all of them have been nice enough to tone it down and only step in in emergencies and let me get some experience with main healing. One even let me cast Protectra over his Protectra III so I could skill up my Enhancing Magic skills (since the guy knew how hard it was to get skill ups in Enhancing magic at my level) ^_^

Oh and a question. When I get my Sub Job would it be a better idea for me to switch to that and level that now so I don't have to do it later? I was thinking of going for BLM and if I get that to Lv20 as soon as possible then I won't have to touch it again until my WHM hits Lv42 (which going by what people on my LS have been saying will be months away).

Some people like to level WHM and BLM in tandem, switching back and forth to keep them around the same level up to Lv.37, because they share a good amount of equipment in common.

Other people just want to concentrate on one job at a time; it does take some time to farm up the gil needed (for equipment and scroll) and quest for some items, and doing all that for two jobs at a time may be cumbersome.

There's no wrong way of doing it, as long as you always arrive at the party with the appropriate, fully leveled support job.

The only thing I'm really picky with in parties is having a PL. I do understand that having a PL will be inevitable at some point and it makes gaining exp much faster but thankfully pretty much all of them have been nice enough to tone it down and only step in in emergencies and let me get some experience with main healing.

It definitely helps, glad you got some non asshole PLs

Oh and a question. When I get my Sub Job would it be a better idea for me to switch to that and level that now so I don't have to do it later?

Yes, you need a fully leveled subjob as soon as possible. Honestly, once you get sch available to you I doubt you will want to use anything else for exp for a while/ever but getting blm to 20 gives you an alternative for a while and warp from sub so you can telewhore if you want to

Oh and a question. When I get my Sub Job would it be a better idea for me to switch to that and level that now so I don't have to do it later? I was thinking of going for BLM and if I get that to Lv20 as soon as possible then I won't have to touch it again until my WHM hits Lv42 (which going by what people on my LS have been saying will be months away).
The best way I've heard to do this, and this is how I did it on BLM/WHM (until my love of White Mage screwed things over) was go JOB1 to 18, get your subjob. Then go JOB2/JOB1, taking JOB2 to 37. Then you are free to take JOB1/JOB2 to 75 without having to stop every three or four levels and level up your sub so you aren't gimped.

I also must say that your LS is right, /BLM is one of the best subjob options for WHM and it is absolutely the best in terms of spell selection for most situations (Gravity and Phalanx are useful from /RDM, but the availability of Warp, Tractor, Sleep and Sleepga, along with Elemental Seal and the additional MP and MAB from BLM seals the deal for me).

ETAL: I've not yet finished leveling my SCH sub, and therefor do not know its potential, so I cannot speak for it as a subjob.

I also must say that your LS is right, /BLM is one of the best subjob options for WHM and it is absolutely the best in terms of spell selection for most situations (Gravity and Phalanx are useful from /RDM, but the availability of Warp, Tractor, Sleep and Sleepga, along with Elemental Seal and the additional MP and MAB from BLM seals the deal for me).
What does a WHM do with MAB? o_O? Holy?

IMO, /RDM's strongest point is Fast Cast II. Anticipation will always beat out Fast Cast, but you can't anticipate crit hit after big TP move from monster, and Fast Cast will improve your odds of landing that Cure V in time.

ETAL: I've not yet finished leveling my SCH sub, and therefor do not know its potential, so I cannot speak for it as a subjob.
Seems pretty simple on paper: Mostly, it's about Light Arts, Celerity; and, Dark Arts, Aspir.

Light Arts: Decrease cast time, recast time, and MP cost of all White Magic.
Celerity: Cuts cast time of Raise by half.

Dark Arts: Raises Enfeebling Magic Skill to B, giving a better chance of landing Slow and Paralyze (at additional MP and cast time cost).
Aspir: With Dark Arts, this can be used (and abused) on most critters which have MP (crab, beetles, worms, some beastmen, Lesser Colibri, etc.)

Penury is also kinda useful if you can anticipate when you'd need to drop a big cure way ahead of time, like when RDM Converts, and you can slip in a half-cost Cure V. Drain is also very MP efficient when on Dark Arts, but if you need to replenish your own HP while playing WHM then the tank may be iffy for safely casting Drain. Well, at least it should be usable after Devotion. YMMV.

A couple of high level people on the Kujata server are after the LS Rod so Carp prices just skyrocketed from 1k a stack to 2.5-3k a stack so i think I've found my income for a while. I took this morning off fishing and I think I may do it for the rest of the day to build up a nice chunk of gil before those players don't need carp any more.

I now have all of the spells up to my Level (Lv13) except for Slow which seems to be sold out in both Sandy and Jueno (Yay for higher levelled friends being able to check Jueno for me ^_^) so I will have to wait before I can get that spell.

And I can't unlock scholar regardless because I don't have Wings of the Goddess yet. According to the Wiki you need a mage job with a 2hr skill that lasts for a length of time (e.g RDM's Fast Cast) rather than an instant cast (like Benediction) so I will need to level something like BLM anyway. I don't think I'll be taking BLM all the way to 37 as when I get WoTG I will be subbing Scholar instead which is why I'm not concerned about capping BLM right now. My main target would be Lv17 so that I can use Warp when my WHM hits Lv34. But I'm still at Lv13 so it will take some time levelling in the Dunes before I unlock my sub anyway.

I now have all of the spells up to my Level (Lv13) except for Slow which seems to be sold out in both Sandy and Jueno (Yay for higher levelled friends being able to check Jueno for me ^_^) so I will have to wait before I can get that spell.
If San d'Oria is in first place, you can just buy it at the magic shop there. Or you can ask someone who's from the nation that is in first to buy it at their magic shop. No sense paying AH prices for it when you don't have to.

And I can't unlock scholar regardless because I don't have Wings of the Goddess yet. According to the Wiki you need a mage job with a 2hr skill that lasts for a length of time (e.g RDM's Fast Cast) rather than an instant cast (like Benediction) so I will need to level something like BLM anyway.
It's going to be a while for you regardless, since you need to hit level 30 in something, but just for clarity: you can use the RDM or BLM (or SMN) two-hour regardless of level once the quest is started. I flagged the quest on WAR, then switched to RDM (which was I think level 5 or something silly) to activate Chainspell for that part of the quest.

And I can't unlock scholar regardless because I don't have Wings of the Goddess yet. According to the Wiki you need a mage job with a 2hr skill that lasts for a length of time (e.g RDM's Fast Cast) rather than an instant cast (like Benediction) so I will need to level something like BLM anyway.
AFAIK, You need a Lv.30+ job to flag the quest for Scholar, but you can complete it as a Lv.1 BLM if you want to.

I don't think I'll be taking BLM all the way to 37 as when I get WoTG I will be subbing Scholar instead which is why I'm not concerned about capping BLM right now. My main target would be Lv17 so that I can use Warp when my WHM hits Lv34.
Unfortunately, you're not getting off that easily.

/SCH is probably the best support job for most exp parties.
/BLM is good all-around, and Elemental Seal is unbelievable useful when needed. (ES Sleepga from a WHM made a certain CoP fight doable for me.)
/SMN is a very strong support job for mobile fights; Auto Refresh will compensate for lack of time to rest, and the larger MP pool means lasting longer between rests.
/RDM is probably the only optional one of them all; with /RDM and appropriate merits and gears, gives a WHM the second fastest cures in the game.

What does a WHM do with MAB? o_O? Holy?

IMO, /RDM's strongest point is Fast Cast II. Anticipation will always beat out Fast Cast, but you can't anticipate crit hit after big TP move from monster, and Fast Cast will improve your odds of landing that Cure V in time.


You see, when I say MAB, I really mean Conserve MP. I mean really, you should've known that! =P

Seriously though, I've found conserve MP to be much better than SMN's Auto-Refresh for saving MP.

To be completely honest, I've not yet finished RDM sub, simply because I haven't had the time to do so. I do need to do so, however. Color me shamed for being such a n00b.

The only time I've used the Magic Attack bonus as WHM/BLM is during King Ranperre's Tomb parties where I'm casting Banish III to drop the defense on ghosts.

Regarding Conserve MP versus Auto-Refresh, it depends largely on how much extra MP recovery you're getting. Lots of +MP recovered while resting gear + a RDM / BRD / COR will make Conserve MP vastly outperform Auto-Refresh over time.

Neither /BLM nor /SMN holds a candle to /SCH in an XP setting, though. 10% MP conserved on every spell plus Fast Cast plus Penury. It's like being able to sub BLM and RDM simultaneously and getting triple the Conserve MP traits. There's absolutely no reason to use /SMN these days if you have /SCH at level 10 or higher.


Icemage

I finally got my sub job and I'm going through the hell of trying to level Black Mage. it's at Lv5 right now (WHM is at Lv18) and I already hate it and want to go back to White Mage.

Any advice on how to make getting this to Lv37 less painful? Bearing in mind that merely taking it to Lv5 has caused me a great deal of frustration (as my LS unfortunately found out after I snapped at someone offering helpful advice). I seriously do not like Black Mage as a job but as I don't have any advanced classes unlocked so I'm stuck with it (since RDM really doesn't sound all too useful until you are at Merit levels and a melee class would just be dumb). Anyway any advice on how to make this easier (other than praying for a PL) would be greatly appreciated.

If BLM really rubs you raw, then do this:

RDM to 15
WHM/RDM to 30
Activate Scholar extra job (get Wings of the Goddess)
Raise Scholar to 37 by using SCH/WHM
Raise WHM to 75 by using WHM/SCH


Icemage

I was thinking of simply doing that with BLM anyway. I wanted to get it to at least 17 for warp but I may stick it out until 20. My reason is that by the time I do finally get Wings of the Goddess (FF games in general are almost impossible to find in the UK due to their popularity) I may have hit 30. It won't take anywhere near as long as getting to 37 and Scholar seems to be the way to go for a White Mage sub.

Don't get me wrong I do like the bonuses of subbing Black Mage. The extra MP is always welcome (especially if you don't have a RDM or a mage class/WHM in the party to backup heal). I simply do not enjoy playing the class itself. it also took a friend of mine 4 months to get his WHM to Lv33 so the thought of playing a class I dislike playing for that long does put me off it a lot. But an LS freind who is at v75 BLM has told me that the class gets better when I hit Dunes level so maybe I should give BLM a little more time before I completely write it off as a choice.

But an LS freind who is at v75 BLM has told me that the class gets better when I hit Dunes level so maybe I should give BLM a little more time before I completely write it off as a choice.

That's entirely true, for two reasons. One, nukes seem balanced on the assumption that you at least have Magic Attack Bonus I, which you gain at level 10. MAB I increases the power of your nukes by a whopping 20%.

Two, BLM really works better in a party than it does solo. However, BLMs have been forced to develop a soloing strategy as of late due to their extreme unpopularity in all parties due to their being inappropriate for a specific type of high-level party. (Ridiculous, I know.)

As Icemage said, if you absolutely love healing and hate nuking, you could always sub RDM in the short term. Unlike many nonstandard combos, that one will not get you laughed out of a party. Heck, I did it myself and nobody seemed to even notice. Be aware, though, that only BLM and DRK get Tractor, which comes in handy if someone dies in an inconvenient spot. -- Pteryx

i have a level 62 White Mage and it should go up fast and stay up once you start healing in partys ^^

I got BLM to Lv8 today then repeatedly levelled down then up between 7 and 8 before turning off the game. The cause of death is always one or more of the following things:

1) Running out of MP and being killed while healing
2) Aggro while fighting. Not links, I'm talking about Orcs joining a fight with a sheep. What is then even worse is if the sheep and/or Orc then links (happened to me twice, nothing I could do since I couldn't zone).
3) Running out of MP, having to melee and getting killed as BLM's can't melee to save their lives.
4) Getting constantly interrupted because Bind failed or didn't last long enough.

I've tried just about everything, Bind and Nuke but that chews through MP, just sitting there and nuking but that uses more MP. Dia, Poison and melee with a pole but then I always end up having to spam cure through the whole battle and finish with next to no HP and MP. Getting this class to Lv10 is going to be a pain nevermind 37.

I am tempted to sub RDM instead but I've spent my entire weekend getting BLM to Lv8 alone and well my weekend will have been a colossal waste of time and the gil I spent of spells will have just been needlessly thrown away if I stop and switch to another sub. I just want to get back to playing as a White Mage but at this rate it will be a long time before I level a sub high enough so that I won't be gimped when I go back to White Mage. *sigh*

Sorry about that rant, I just really needed to vent somewhere before I got angry and stopped wanting to play the game

having to melee and getting killed as BLM's can't melee to save their lives.

This is apparently true! :rofl:

1) Running out of MP and being killed while healing
2) Aggro while fighting. Not links, I'm talking about Orcs joining a fight with a sheep. What is then even worse is if the sheep and/or Orc then links (happened to me twice, nothing I could do since I couldn't zone).

When it comes to those two, it's typically just a matter of choosing where to fight and where to rest wisely. XP camps typically aren't just chosen for proximity to mobs, but for not being in the middle of mobs and mob spawns, for that very reason. Learn Ronfaure -- where it's safe and where it's not.

Also, I recommend stacks of Selbina Milk to anyone levelling a low job. They're a cheap, stackable source of Regen -- only 1 HP/tick, but it lasts for 40 ticks. It's not a complete substitute for Cure, but it can still help you save MP for actual offense. -- Pteryx

Actually, the question on BLM is as much about what to fight as much as it is about how to fight it.

If you're going to distance-nuke, you'd best be prepared for links if you don't kill whatever it is you're fighting quickly. Chances are, as a new player, if you're not Tarutaru, you won't have enough max MP to take down anything about a Decent Challenge by yourself by level 8.

It's a shame you picked San d'Oria to start with, as that general region is pretty hostile to low level black mages. There are a lot of aggressive enemies, and the whole region is lacking in the staple of black mage's favorite targets aside from the first few levels: worms.

You also have somewhat limited sight lines and lots of irritating terrain to deal with in Ronfaure, which can be a hindrance on Black Mage.

The only advice I can give at this point is to slow down and pick on weaker enemies; stay with Easy Prey if you can, and sprinkle in the occasional Decent Challenge.

P.S. Another option is to level your staff skill on White Mage first and just beat things down with your staff after nuking from long range. Contrary to popular belief, low level Black Mages can pack a wallop with a staff quite accurately, assuming they have a properly levelled Staff skill level. The trouble there is that most BLMs end up nuking their way up the levelling ladder, and neglect their staff skill, and that's what gets them into trouble.


Icemage

I think when I was leveling my BLM at low levels I would stand back a ways and hit "Attack," far enough away so I wouldn't hit it right away, then pull with Poison. That way, if my staff missed I was still doing DoT damage to the mob. XD After pulling I'd toss out a nuke or two, continuously whacking away at the mob.

It is pretty frustrating at low levels because of the small MP pool, but it gets easier. Hell, if you stick with BLM for a while, you'll be one-shotting mobs that con T-VT (pets, but still!) when you could barely take down an EP "back in the day." It's a powerful feeling.

I got BLM to Lv8 today then repeatedly levelled down then up between 7 and 8 before turning off the game. The cause of death is always one or more of the following things:

Soloing at that level... Well, if something can't be killed with a staff, it's too tough.

Eat meat, decent staff, go out and whack EPs (and maybe DCs). Fire off one nuke at the start of the fight, then finish it off with a few staff swings. It's slow, unglamorous, but pretty safe.

Before resting, pick a safe spot away from anything which can aggro. Take a stack of antidote if planning to fight anything which can poison.

Keep your camera moving while you rest, too. At least until you learn where good, safe resting spots are. You should be able to see anything that's going to aggro coming before it gets into aggro range. You can always get up and finish resting elsewhere if there's an orc wandering your way.

Same goes while you're fighting, too, really. Make sure you're unlocked from the target, and if you see something that might link or aggro, run your target off a ways and kill it somewhere safer.

I just stick to the lower lvl mobs that give 25 Exp per kill when low lvl you kill them fast and gain the exp fast. Also at low lvl i would not worry about using Bind as if it dosent hit thats mana wasted and the mobs already charging towards you while your casting another and has more chance to inturpupt you i would just stick to using the damage spells. Its all about how you play like i got my BLM to 32 took me a while in partys i would always die Solo. but my friend Shinron on the Shiva server took BLM from 1-75 Basically Solo.

I'm at Lv11 with my Sub, 18 with my WHM. Things are easier with the Magic Attack Bonus and Manafont when used right can bail you out of a dire situation. However experience around Ronfaure is really drying up and there are very, very few people at Lv11 on the Kujata server right now so getting a 10-12 party together at the Dunes takes anything from half an hour to three and a half hours and they hardly last long before people start to leave. PL's make this even worse as mage classes always get passed up since well they simply make mages, especially White Mages, redundant.

Are there any good soloing or duoing grounds for this level or am I just going to have to suck it up and just sit there at the Dunes OP for all day? I did go from 1-13 with my WHM by farming Ronfaure but it's taking much longer with a BLM even with MP boosting gear. This is what I have equipped on my BLM class:

Weapon: Legionnaire's Staff (switches to Willow Wand in parties)
Ear 1: Onyx Earring
Ear 2: Onyx Earring
Body: Royal Footman's Tunic
Neck: Justice Badge
Hands: Mitts
Hand 1: Saintly Ring
Hand 2: Saintly Ring
Back: Cape
Legs: Slacks
Feet: Solea

I do have the Linen Robe set with a Brass Hairpin so those items will be going on when I level. The MND gear is there because I already had it and thanks to PL's White Mages are almost impossible to find so more backup healers like BLM, RDM or BRD with WHM subbed have to main heal.

I never really had much of a problem finding a party as a White mage because I made a lot of freinds in the dunes so all I had to do was see if any of them wanted to party there. But now they have moved on to Qufim and I'm here levelling my sub, finding a party in the Dunes is taking a very long time indeed.

I also have a funny story. while running around in a party with my LS friends, the Bloodtear Baldurf spawned in the La Theine Plateau. After watching it destroy a Lv75 person who aggro'd it my LS stepped in and killed it while I was still in the party. To sum it up I now have the title for beating Bloodtear Baldurf despite my highest job level only being 18 ^_^;

Are there any good soloing or duoing grounds for this level or am I just going to have to suck it up and just sit there at the Dunes OP for all day?
Ronfaure, Gustaberg, Sarutabaruta, Ghelsba, Palborough, Horototo, La Theine, Konschtat, Tahrongi... Probably plenty more, those are the ones I've bothered with. Usually from 10-20 I'll OP to the Dunes, put up my flag, and run to La Theine to solo. At the earlier levels, you've got to watch it, since the Easy Prey are surrounded by lots of other stuff, including orcs, but as long as you're watching where you are, there's plenty there to solo, and duoing opens it up even more.

I don't know Ronfaure all that well, but surely there's a good gathering of EP somewhere in there. In North Gustaberg, just going up onto the big hill will get you to level 14 or 15 at least before it starts to dry up. If not, there's always Ghelsba.

You can also set your homepoint at the Dunes OP and pick up an instant warp scroll, put that in your search comment, and go solo wherever you want. The only parties you'll miss out on that way are ones where the leader doesn't know how to use the search function (a bad sign) or is too impatient to wait on a warp (a bad sign).

There's never any reason to just sit at the Valkurm outpost with your flag up.

Heh, cool story. That's one to remember! :)

My own recommendation is La Theine Plateau. Around the lake in particular you'll find good enemies to fight. Worms in particular are especially good targets for BLMs (and RNGs, and SCHs), as they don't move around while you attack them from a distance. Once you're done with all the enemy types there, Akbabas aren't bad targets, and after that the higher orcs can become viable. -- Pteryx

Finally got Black Mage up to Lv15 which is fine for now. I really want Scholar as sub job so I plan to do this:

White Mage to 30
Unlock Scholar (When I get WoTG)
Scholar to 37
White Mage to 75
Begin to level other highly useful sub jobs such as Black Mage, Ninja and Summoner to 37

I now see what a huge difference having a capped sub job is. Without a sub job I had to spend lots of money on sneak oil or bug a friend for an escort to pass through the bat tunnels in the Dunes but with a capped sub I can actually make it through the tunnels solo without any difficulty (unless I hit a link or something). The extra MP is always welcome since the one or two extra spells it will lets me fire off may just be the ones that save my party from wiping.

I can't wait to hit the 20's with my White Mage (currently 18) and I get Regen, my chocobo license and Raise ^_^

May need to do some farming. To unlock SCH, a stack of Vellum (18-19k on Kujata, Jeuno AH (http://www.ffxiah.com/item.php?id=2550&stack=1&sid=24)) is needed.

SCH is the dark horse in the useless job unlocking "quest" race.

May need to do some farming. To unlock SCH, a stack of Vellum (18-19k on Kujata, Jeuno AH (http://www.ffxiah.com/item.php?id=2550&stack=1&sid=24)) is needed.


I can get that quite easily by taking a day of fishing. 7 stacks of moat carp can fetch 15-20k in the Sandy AH's.

Currently I'm trying to get into parties at Qufim which means because everything outside of Jueno can kill me very quickly I'm stuck running around Jueno with my exp party flag up. It seems that now most parties leave the Dunes at 18 and go straight to Qufim at that level. Only problem is that there are rarely enough people at 18-19 in Jueno to actually go partying there. Last night 3 of us were waiting for a couple of hours with no luck. I did eventually find of party of people at about Lv20 but because they had a PL they weren't really interested.

Does Qufim have the same PL problem as the Dunes had? It was always very difficult to get into a party at the Dunes because of them and for that reason I'm in the position where my enfeebling skills are constantly capped but my healing skills are nowhere near half of the cap. It is tempting me to level Red Mage purely so I can put that high enfeebling skill to some use.


Anyway my main question is this: is waiting around for long lengths of time for a party normal? I have noticed that it is very easy to get into a party at about 1am GMT when all of the American players get on or at about 10am GMT when the Japanese players are on but as you can imagine, playing at these specific times as an absolute nightmare especially when I hardly ever get to play at these times.

Oh and a question, how do you raise reputation in Jueno? I have been doing the quests while waiting for a party but since I can only do the Rep 1 quests I finished them very quickly. Do you raise it in Jueno itself or is it like Selbina where you have to raise rep in another country too?

I can get that quite easily by taking a day of fishing. 7 stacks of moat carp can fetch 15-20k in the Sandy AH's.
That's good!

It seems that now most parties leave the Dunes at 18 and go straight to Qufim at that level. Only problem is that there are rarely enough people at 18-19 in Jueno to actually go partying there. Last night 3 of us were waiting for a couple of hours with no luck.
If you complete the Supply Run Mission (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Supply_Run_Mission) for the Zulkheim region, you'd be able to utilize Outpost Teleportation (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Outpost_Teleportation) to reach there from your home nation.

For example, at Lv.18 I would set home point in home nation, but go to Jeuno to seek. If I get an invite to Qufim Island party, then I set home point to Jeuno before heading out. If I get an invite to Valkurm Dunes, I'd warp back to Windurst (my home), then take outpost teleport to Valkurm Dunes.

No one would would expect a newbie player like you to have that kind of transportation savvy--but that doesn't mean you can't manage it. ;)

Does Qufim have the same PL problem as the Dunes had? It was always very difficult to get into a party at the Dunes because of them
Pretty much. I just expect some (most?) NA parties to have PL all the way to (and past?!) Lv.30 these days.

I'm in the position where my enfeebling skills are constantly capped but my healing skills are nowhere near half of the cap. It is tempting me to level Red Mage purely so I can put that high enfeebling skill to some use.
heh. Sure, level RDM. BTW, healing magic skill isn't that important, and eventually would cap anyway. I was no where near cap when I stopped leveling WHM at Lv.44. It started to come closer to cap for me when I leveled RDM fairly high (forgot when exactly). (Cam closer to RDM's cap, anyway.) That happened because it takes more exp to go up each level, so more opportunity to cast cures.

When I obtained Regen, the already slow healing magic skill rate up took a nose dive--and I couldn't have cared less. Also, if I recall correctly, my sister's WHM didn't cap Healing Magic when she reached Lv.75, but that didn't get in the way of anything.

So, again, no worries; keep doing what a WHM is suppose to do, and the healing magic will skill will take care of itself--and probably cap sometime after you hit Lv.75, if you're smart with Regen.

Anyway my main question is this: is waiting around for long lengths of time for a party normal? I have noticed that it is very easy to get into a party at about 1am GMT when all of the American players get on or at about 10am GMT when the Japanese players are on but as you can imagine, playing at these specific times as an absolute nightmare especially when I hardly ever get to play at these times.
In short, the two largest player sub-populations are:
1. Japanese players.
2. North American players.

Everyone else is more or less a round-off error. >_> <_<;

You may have to do a bit of soloing to supplement parting at your level range, if you are unable to fit into NA players' prime time. Buy a high damage club (unless there's a good hammer?), aim for low, low EPs--creatures 5 or 6 levels below you. Consider it a chance to farm Beastmen's Seals.

Oh and a question, how do you raise reputation in Jueno? I have been doing the quests while waiting for a party but since I can only do the Rep 1 quests I finished them very quickly. Do you raise it in Jueno itself or is it like Selbina where you have to raise rep in another country too?
The easiest way to raise Jeuno fame is to raise Selbina fame, via the repeatable quest Only the Best (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Only_the_Best). (Which, incidentally, also help your reputation in Bastok and San d'Oria.) The cheap but slow way is to buy Miliioncorn (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Millioncorn) from regional merchants and turn them in for the quest. Takes quite a few trips, so try to clear out inventory and fill your mind with patience.

Of course, if you're just sitting around Jeuno anyway, you can try to do the lamp-lighting quest once per game day. Note that only one person can get this quest, so take it right at 18:00 if you can.

Thanks for the great post IfritnoItazura. My main intention is to get to lv20 so I can obtain my Chocobo license. It would be very useful as teleporting to OP's often leaves me in an area with monsters that can easily kill me (Dunes, Buburimu and Jugner Forest are the main culprits) which leaves me with playing Metal Gear Solid with the mobs until I can get into a safer area. At least you can't get aggro'd on a chocobo so travelling instantly becomes much, much safer for me.

I have been talking to a few people in my LS and I may well start levelling Red Mage as a sub instead. The solo capabilities and the option to carry on main healing does appeal to me a lot so I may go and level that instead of Black Mage.

playing Metal Gear Solid with the mobs until I can get into a safer area.

You might as well get used to it though, you will be doing it a lot for pretty much the rest of the game, though it gets easier with Sneak and Invis spells/items.

Then you get to play with true sight/true sound mobs.

And I solved my lack of invites problem. The second I put up the exp party flag (instead of just seeking normally) and put in a message I was swarmed with invites from all over. Feel free to laugh at my mistake if you want but I genuinely belived that it didn't make a huge difference. Oh how wrong I was. Thanks to realising my mistake I hit Lv22 today and I have 3 words:

Regen is awesome

I would have added a certain fourth word before awesome but it would be a TOS violation so I will refrain from that. I am in love with that spell. 150HP for 15MP is enough to make me cry with joy. Having Sneak also means that I don't have to shell out 10k a time for stacks of Silent Oil (so that money can go into spells and gear) and Blink makes soloing quests that much easier. I can't wait until I hit 25 and get to play around with Raise ^^

I've also switched to using the wired pad from my XBox 360. I would have prefered to use a PS3 pad (since I only have that one wired padd for my 360) but XBox pads are much easier to setup and have noticed just how much easier things have become. I don't have any more mistargets and viewing my surroundings is also much easier. And I have vibration, while I usually don't care about it, it does tell me when I'm too close to an AOE spell or if a mob had just sneaked up on me and hit me from behind.

Qufim is a bit of a nightmare. Especially due to the number of undead. I died twice in a row (Died once then HP aggro'd an Undead the second i was raised. My party thought it was hilarious. I obviously did not) because several undead popped near out camp. Still I find it more manageable as it seems to be a bit smaller than the dunes and you only really need Sneak to get through so getting back to the camp if you have to Home Point isn't a huge issue.

You can say super here. "Regen is super awesome!"

You'll still want to keep some silent oils on you for those times when you're near mobs that aggro to magic, but you won't have to use them nearly as often you did.

Could someone offer any advice for levelling Black Mage past 15? I don't have WotG yet so I can't level Scholar yet and I'm at the point where I can't level White Mage any more without being gimped. Currently there are rarely any parties at the dunes; all I seem to come across are soloing Lv20+ people and Japanese parties that gathered outside the dunes. My only options seem to be sitting around bored for several hours while praying that a party needs a replacement or stay up until 4am and get about 3 hours of sleep for the night.

I have tried soloing at both Konschtat and La Theine but it seems pretty useless. EP mobs rarely give me more then 20 exp a kill and surviving the encounter is even more rare. If I go for Worms at La Theine I rarely get more than 15-20 exp (17-25 with the Empress band) so levelling up would literally take an entire day. That is assuming that I don't get aggrod from a passing crab or gob as that has happened multiple times and has dropped my level to as low as 13 on occasions. I've even tried going to Maze of Shakrami with very unsatisfying results. I would rather risk a level down to gain 200-300 exp a battle at the Dunes than risk levelling down to gain of 20-30 exp soloing EP mobs. If I die it the Dunes it takes minutes to regain the exp, if I die solo it can take hours unless I bring a PL.

It's getting to the point where my second character (Elvaan MNK used for HELM and fishing to support my main character) is actually at risk of taking over my main character in terms of level which is why I'm so frustrated about this.

I'm not asking for a magic wand wave for an insta-fix here (Even if I would like that to happen so I can party with my high level friends ^_^; ). Just advice on how I can get my subjob out of the Dunes ASAP so I can start playing a class that I actually like playing as again.

There really isn't much more to it at that level, unless you want to learn EM-T worm soloing (personally, I couldn't stand it at level 16ish).

Grab a good staff (Bastokan/Republic, or wait til 16 for the Holly Pole), and either cast a few nukes per fight or save all your MP for cures, while going through Easy Prey. It's slow, but that's just how it is at that level. Keep your flag up in case a party wants you. You might consider eating Meat Jerky while soloing. It's stupid food for a mage in a party, but if part of your soloing strategy is swinging your staff (and unless you're worm-soloing, it almost certainly is), it'll help.

And aggro is just something to learn to avoid. Hang out in an area enough and you should learn where some safe spots are, and where the beastmen wander. You're not getting aggro from crabs. Don't know if that was sarcasm or not, but crabs at that level don't aggro, so if you have them attacking you, it's because you did something to piss them off, and you should stop doing that. :)
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Personally, the way I look at it is: This is going to be slow anyway, so screw it, I'm leveling my Dark Magic (since I'm not about to cast Bio in most parties). I just cast Bio and Drain on everything, and nuke a few times. My MP pool only lasts a couple mobs, but I treat it more like a skill-up/farming run than an exp run.

Also, obviously, keep Blaze Spikes up at all times.

Could someone offer any advice for levelling Black Mage past 15? I don't have WotG yet so I can't level Scholar yet and I'm at the point where I can't level White Mage any more without being gimped. Currently there are rarely any parties at the dunes; all I seem to come across are soloing Lv20+ people and Japanese parties that gathered outside the dunes. My only options seem to be sitting around bored for several hours while praying that a party needs a replacement or stay up until 4am and get about 3 hours of sleep for the night.

I'm not asking for a magic wand wave for an insta-fix here (Even if I would like that to happen so I can party with my high level friends ^_^; ). Just advice on how I can get my subjob out of the Dunes ASAP so I can start playing a class that I actually like playing as again.
It's not a magic wand, but I can give you some help.

I'll give you a big hint: Worms.

Worms are Black Mage's best friends in the early levels (and Scholar, and Red Mage). Aero kicks the stuffing out of them, since they're weak to Wind magic, and unlike most other enemies in the game, they can not move once they are engaged in combat.

The main impediment you have is that worms like to cast Stonega and Rasp, but there is a special technique to avoid both. Stonega does all kinds of big damage. Rasp keeps you from resting. I'll try to teach you how to get away from both of these effects while still be able to pummel a worm into submission.

So the first thing you'll want to do is find a worm (see end of this post). It can be any level - Very Tough to Tough is recommended, but if you have nothing else around, Incredibly Tough can be managed with a little resting.

All spells have a maximum casting distance; this is true for enemies as well as players. Your personal casting distance on black magic is just a little over 2/3 the range of a Worm's.

Start off by finding two places to stand. The first is just within your casting range. Use a macro and set a relatively long casting spell on it, like Aero (which you'll need anyway). Slowly approach the worm until the red "not within range" message disappears, but do NOT finish casting - you just want to find the spot where you can successfully nuke from. The moment the spell starts casting - MOVE to interrupt the casting, because you aren't done.

The second location you want to find is a spot at least half again (150%) as far away from the Worm as the spot you can cast from. That location should be your "home base" for the fight. This takes a little practice to find, and may be very difficult in some spots due to tunnels or other terrain. If you don't think you can find such a safe spot, leave that worm alone and go find another one until this one moves to a spot you can safely attack.

Ok, so now you've found the two important spots, move to the first spot (the "attack spot"). Cast Dia on the worm (Bio works too, but is more often resisted), and IMMEDIATELY run to/past your "home base". The worm will immediately attempt to cast a spell on you; either Stone, Rasp, or Stonega. You have enough time (with some margin) to get out of range of that first spell for anything except Stone, which will "probably" hit you for a little damage, but isn't that big a deal.

You have about fifteen seconds from the moment the Worm first tries casting a spell on you until it can try again. Once you're back at "home base", turn around and run right back to your "attack spot". You now have time to cast up to one to two spells. On this first pass, you only have time for one spell, since you used up a lot of time running away at the start.

Once you've finished casting one or two spells, move almost all the way back to "home base" - but not all the way. You want to be just within casting range of the Worm. Stay inside range until it initiates another spell on you; then run to "home base" and get out of the way, leaving enough time for the spell to "fizzle", then repeat. Since you're now not running away as far, you can now repeat the above steps over and over. If you do it perfectly, with no mistakes, you won't take any damage at all except perhaps the odd Stone. If you hose up and get slammed by Stonega or Rasp... don't worry, just chalk it up to experience. It's easy to mess up even after you learn how to do it right, but it's not fatal.

The best part about this is that any time you want, you can just run past "home base" and be 100% safe.

Things to watch out for:

- Running out of MP. This is a problem for non-Tarutaru mages with this approach. Juices help, ginger/wizard cookies/HQ pies help, but chances are you'll still need to rest once in a while in the middle of a fight because you're low on MP. This is how you do it:

Monsters don't regenerate while they are taking damage. So - if you know you're going to need to rest - wait for Dia to fade on the Worm, then cast it again. Run past "home base" and rest in safety. You have 60 seconds (about 5 ticks of rest) before the effect wears off. Use it to get more MP to blast the worm with.

- Worm loses aggro. Sometimes the worm will change from red to unclaimed after failing a spell. Take this opportunity to slam it with a spell.

- Worms LINK. Do not attack worms which are close together; the other(s) will attack you as well, making this tactic very difficult to pull off against two enemies with different spell timers.

- Try to keep Dia on the worm at all times (recast it after it wears, since you can't "reset" it by recasting); it should last for maybe 60 seconds, and has a pretty good unresistable damage-to-MP ratio.

That's really all you need. With this tactic, you can, as a solo BLM, RDM, or SCH, take down any worm solo for 100-200 XP per kill (even WHMs can do it, though Banish isn't nearly as good as Aero in terms of damage, and has a very long recast timer).

Level 14-17:
Maze of Shakrami (northeast corner of Tahrongi Canyon)
Stand inside the main tunnels and nuke Aero on worms from your extreme casting range. Watch out for multiple worms inside the tunnels, and watch out for Ghouls and Goblins - avoid these at all costs, as you can not fight either.

Level 17-22:
Korroloka Tunnel
A Worm paradise! This zone has numerous worms scattered at both ends of the zone. The easiest one to get to is near Bastok -> Zeruhn Mines -> Korroloka Tunnel. Lots of open areas to nuke from, and lots of worms, but also a higher chance of linked enemies, so watch yourself here.

One last note: This tactic works VERY well with multiple ranged attackers. Scholars, Red Mages, Black Mages, and Rangers can all do this trick successfully, while other jobs with decent ranged skills and appropriate weaponry, like Thief, Warrior, and Samurai, can also pitch in with sufficient ammunition. Grouping together in duos/trios is very effective and fast levelling.


Icemage

I managed to get into a party. Well when I say party it was 3-4 people (including my character) just killing IT Damselfliies and the odd Goblin or Leech. Levelling went of at about the same pace as normal because while stuff was actually being killed faster, the mages would often run out of Mp after 1 or 2 battles so downtime was frequent. Still using Manafont to pretty much solo an IT+ Gob was highly satisfying. Although duoing with a BST/WAR after was more hilarious.

Basically he would pull an IT mob and I would nuke it until I gained hate. Then I would fall back behind him and rest for some MP while he voked and whacked it for a bit. When Provoke was charged I would nuke it untill gained hate, fall back and let him voke it. Repeat this from the Selbina entrance to the Outpost and you will get the idea. We managed to keep a Ghoul constantly moving so it only ever got off about 3 or 4 attacks on us in total. Has anyone else tried anything like this when duoing? We were pretty surprised at how quickly we were able to kill this thing by simply alternating DDing and resting while keeping the mob moving and unable to properly attack. Although I do remember using a similar strategy in a Lv19-20 party when our puller went a did a Leeroy Jenkins and charged in at a Bogy. Although Slow, Paralyse and Poison actually sticking also helped out a lot

As soon as I find out where I can actually get warp from (The AH's never seem t have it for sale) I think I'll be able to get my subjob out of the dunes and take a break by going back to my main for a little while.

Edit: Hmm looks like it's a quest reward item. And I need 2 rep in Bastok. I guess I'm lucky I have several stacks of Zeruhn Power in my MH.

Does anyone know if there is a place other than the jungles around Kazham that people go to at Lv25? I've been stuck at that level since last Friday and I'm pretty bored and ridiculously fed up of trying to find help to get the keys. Soling the quest as a 25WHM is pretty laughable since I can barely damage the mobs I need to kill for the keys. Basically Decurion's Hammer and Seraph Strike seem to be the only way to cause any damage at all. But at 25WHm even EP mobs can kill me quite easily. I must have died at least 5 times trying to get those keys and I have no keys are I'm close to levelling down to boot.

I have tried asking people for help but I rarely get a response and I can never find anyone trying to do the same quest. I can enlist the help of high level friends but they are usually heavily engaged in merit parties and so rarely get the time to offer anything but the odd bit of advice.

I have tried soloing but being Lv25 it can take anything from 2-15 minutes to kill an EP mob for 15-20exp depending on what it is. And most of the time said EP mob stands a pretty good chance at killing me. And well I would rather stick to my "I would rather party and risk levelling down for 1kgil per hour then solo and risk levelling down for 100exp per hour" mantra

What makes this more depressing as that during the week I've been spending trying to find someone to help, a freind I made who was my level when I hit 25 got his third SAM AF piece today which would put him at about 50*something IIRC.

So my question is this: Are there any other places to party at 25 or am I doomed to being stuck at Lv25 forever?

Generally no one ever goes anywhere but Kazham at that level, so you are pretty screwed there, but I wouldn't give up just yet. You can try going to the zones where the keys drop and shouting for the key, sometimes higher level people there won't mind inviting you and killing the mobs for you as you sit safely at the zone. I've done that on occasion to help people.

You can also try shouting around Jeuno, there may be a few other 25's who need the keys as well, hopefully someone with a DD job leveled. When I did this key farming we had 3 RDMs and a WHM, all level 25.

Does anyone know if there is a place other than the jungles around Kazham that people go to at Lv25? I've been stuck at that level since last Friday and I'm pretty bored and ridiculously fed up of trying to find help to get the keys. Soling the quest as a 25WHM is pretty laughable since I can barely damage the mobs I need to kill for the keys. Basically Decurion's Hammer and Seraph Strike seem to be the only way to cause any damage at all. But at 25WHm even EP mobs can kill me quite easily. I must have died at least 5 times trying to get those keys and I have no keys are I'm close to levelling down to boot.

I have tried asking people for help but I rarely get a response and I can never find anyone trying to do the same quest. I can enlist the help of high level friends but they are usually heavily engaged in merit parties and so rarely get the time to offer anything but the odd bit of advice.

I have tried soloing but being Lv25 it can take anything from 2-15 minutes to kill an EP mob for 15-20exp depending on what it is. And most of the time said EP mob stands a pretty good chance at killing me. And well I would rather stick to my "I would rather party and risk levelling down for 1kgil per hour then solo and risk levelling down for 100exp per hour" mantra

What makes this more depressing as that during the week I've been spending trying to find someone to help, a freind I made who was my level when I hit 25 got his third SAM AF piece today which would put him at about 50*something IIRC.

So my question is this: Are there any other places to party at 25 or am I doomed to being stuck at Lv25 forever?
Kazham has become a "firewall" against newbies ever since since Rise of the Zilart was introduced back in 2003. There are some alternate camps but hardly anyone goes to them except for static parties who talk about it ahead of time.

At this point, I would try leaning on some friends (like aforementioned Samurai at 50+) to get the necessary keys for the airship pass. Any player at 50+ can obtain the keys with ease, but it does take a little time investment.

If you were on my server, I'd offer to help you myself; it doesn't really take that long with Teleports and a chocobo.

By the by, the keys aren't terribly common drops. Without a Thief around, I'd guess the drop rate on the keys is about 5% on average. Sometimes you'll get lucky and get the key fast... other times it can take as much as an hour+, especially if you have competition splitting the potential targets with you.


Icemage

Sorry to hear you're having such difficult time.

I'm surprised that no one from your LS would help; meriting all the time can easily become monotonous, and I for one would gladly help out lowbie LS members instead (especially with something as simple as Kazham Airship Pass), unless I'm already in party.

You can probably pass the time farming in the zone (Giddeus has good drop rate for Beehive Chips, for example) while doing a once-every-15-minute shout for help.

I have tried asking people for help...

I remember what a pain it was getting those keys. My play time is limited, but I'd be happy to give you a hand. ...besides that, I need a break from leveling. I'll look for you when i get on. I'd like to say that I'll be on today, but it will realistically be some time this weekend. What is your timezone and what time(s) do you generally play? I'll see what I can do to wrap my schedule around that.

Everyone should experience the wonders that are the jungles. :thumbsup:

Thanks to help from WovenDarkness I now only need the Giddeus Key. It shouldn't take too long considering I know a high level freind who wants to camp a NM over there so I could join him until the key drops i guess.

Just joining him while he camps won't get you the key. The NM he's almost certainly after is in an area of 2nd-tier Yagudo. The key only drops from 3rd-tier Yagudo, further south of that area. Not that a detour to get the key should be a problem or anything, just want to make sure you know that going in.

He is after an Aspir Knife as he is levelling his THF class. I'm not entirely sure just how useful Apsir is to a THF but that is the item that he is going after. To be honest a detour won't take long. The keys drop very quickly and while most stuff there won't aggro I can just Metal Gear my way (What my LS calls using Sneak and Invis) past the ones that do aggro me.

He is after an Aspir Knife as he is levelling his THF class. I'm not entirely sure just how useful Apsir is to a THF but that is the item that he is going after. To be honest a detour won't take long. The keys drop very quickly and while most stuff there won't aggro I can just Metal Gear my way (What my LS calls using Sneak and Invis) past the ones that do aggro me.
I can't for the life of me figure out what a thief would want with an Aspir Knife, to be honest. Be that as it may, as long as it swings you close by there, more power to you. :)

Realistically, for someone helping you get keys, it would be better for you to just stay safe at the zoneline, or busy yourself farming bees and yagudo in the outer areas. There's no reason to go all the way in when you're not going to add much firepower to the mix, and are in significant danger if you're there.


Icemage

It took me a minute to figure what you meant by "Metal Gear" ... XD

That's funneh.


I can just imagine Snake walking up behind Yagudo and snapping it's neck, then pulling off a mask to reveal... a cute little whm XD



Also: Many classes solo this stuff, but it's terribly unpleasant to do so. I'd just sit around the spawn area, and wait for someone else to come by and ask to group with them. That's kinda what I did. Worked out well for me :D

Thanks to help from WovenDarkness I now only need the Giddeus Key. It shouldn't take too long considering I know a high level freind who wants to camp a NM over there so I could join him until the key drops i guess.

Happy to help.

Hopefully you won't have a problem getting that last key before next weekend. Should that not be the case, feel free to look me up in-game Friday-Sunday.:thumbsup:

Turns out that my friend wanted the knife to level BLM and RDM without checking that BLMs and RDMs use daggers, not knives. Still we duo'd the last key a few days back so it was no problem.

Kazham is a lot, lot better than Qufim as far as party maturity does. leaders will actually assign roles and people actually wait for the mages to get back to at least 75% Mp before pulling.

I only ran into a couple of idiots there. the first was a Red mages who thought he could do everything. The following was said during the exping time:

"You might as well leave Enfeebs to the Red Mage i mean White mages are so much better with thier C+"
"Don't bother using regen, it wastes MP"
"Don't use Cure III, I can get the tank out of the red with Cure II" (which was nowhere near capped)
"Stop overhealing!" (After I took the front line jobs out of orange health after a nasty bomb toss)
"You know I can handle healing better because my equip is better" (All of my cures are capped and Cure 3 heals 170. his Cure 2 didn't even hit 70)
"Don't nuke, save your Mp for healing"
"I already regen'd the tank so you just wasted MP again!" (He often regened people without saying)
"Oh I have protect 2 so don't bother buffing" (After I protectra and Shellra'd the party when he would only protect the Blink Tank)

So I was stuck with a RDM too far up his own ass to even let the WHM heal nevermind relieve the RDM of some tasks.

Kazahm has also taught me just how useless Blink Tanks really are bad at both holding hate and actually tanking. In another party our DRG ended with all of the hate while is bounced between him, myself and our SCH. Kazham has also taught me that I don't have to stay in a bad party. I was invited to one party that consisted of a BLM/WHM, SMN/WHM, WHM/THF (Don't ask) and myself (WHM/BLM). We then invited the DRG mentioned earlier and the following happened:

WHM/THF (leader): lol ok lets pull! Sardia [me] man heal ok?"
Me: Wait who is tank?
Leader: Pulling1
DRG: Wait why are you WHM/THF?
Leader: lol I who level subj