[Haggai]

I'm a Black Mage.

Seems as of lately, some melees are lazy and don't want to make a skillchain. So I try to figure out what we can do, so I can burst. I get out my trusty renkei chart and/or calculator and start looking.

I start by looking at what I want to burst (usually mob weakness), and find a proper skillchain. I mention one and all I get is, "I don't want to do that skillchain! Vorpal Thrust sucks!"

As a BLM, I have no idea what is good and what is bad for WSs. Is there anyone that can point me in a direction that will help me?

Well, I do know a few good WSs: Sturmwind, Penta Thrust, Rampage, Tachi: Enpi

I wish there was a renkei chart that excluded any "sucky" WSs.

[711rocks]

Make a party and invite a thf. Viper Bite/Dancing Edge are usually used to close distortion w/ SA & TA for nice damage. TP spamming does seem to be hot right now, but it's worth a shot. =/

[Murphie]

I've noticed the same thing, Haggai. People just aren't interested in setting up a skillchain anymore. Even at the low to mid levels where it can really help.

It's depressing.

[Ellipses]

Except in a handful of parties, I seem to almost always be the one setting up skillchains. On WHM. And BRD. When there are a BLM and a SAM right there. It's freakin' disconcerting.

If someone complains about a weaponskill sucking, I'll either just try to find a different chain (usually the 10 and 100 WSes are decent, sometimes other ones too). If I can't, I'll ask them to try it a couple times and see if the WS+SC+MB damage is worth it.

[Mhurron]

Originally Posted by Murphie

I've noticed the same thing, Haggai. People just aren't interested in setting up a skillchain anymore. Even at the low to mid levels where it can really help.

It's depressing.

Every level up to 37 as a DRK, there was someone in most parties that said 'Skillchains at this level are useless.'

[Khevn]

When I First started 2 1/2 years ago, if we could burst we bursted and we were doing decent chains even in valk if the group was compitent. Low lvl players wanting to play like they have +20% haste and think they have the acc Bonuses of the high lvl gear, and start trying to TP spam instea of taking advantage of the best damage source at the low lvls, "Hello" the Blackmage, are idiots. If you can burst from 10-60ish with a spell the monster is weak agianst the party should be taking full advantage of this to increase kill speed. Especially agianst the higher armor lower attack speed mobs that every seems to love to fight at these lvls. If you don't have Erase or Finale or your a standard party, you should be bursting.

[durecellrabbit]

At the low levels I played in, up to lvl30, not many parties wanted to skillchain or magicburst. Most experienced players did'nt help set on up and new players like myself had trouble with the timing for a skillchain and also had rather slow tp gain. The opinion the most people that I partied with seemed to have, was that as skillchaining and magicbursting is not needed, they could'nt be bothered setting one up or taking part in one.

[Omni]

OK, let's make a little list to help the OP figure out which are renkei worthy in most xp pt situations. Feel free to add others that I left out if you think they work well too. This is what I've found to be the most reliable:

Axe:
Raging Axe
Avalanche/Spinning Axe (decent alternatives to raging in those mid levels)
Rampage
Mistral Axe

2h Axe:
Sturmwind
Raging Rush
Steelcyclone

Sword:
Fast blade
Burning/Red lotus blade
Shining/Seraph blade (if PLD can get in on the renkei)
Swift blade

2h Sword:
Hard slash
Power slash
Sickle moon
Spin slash

Dagger:
(with SATA)
Wasp sting
Viper bite
Dancing edge
Shark bite

H2H:
Combo
Raging fist
Howling fist
Dragon kick
Asuran fist

Katana:
Blade: Rin
Blade: Retsu
Blade: Chi
Blade: Jin

2h Katana:
Tachi: Enpi
Tachi: Kagero
Tachi: Jinpu
Tachi: Yukikaze
Tachi: Gekko
Tachi: Kasha

Scythe:
Vorpal Scythe
Gulliotine
Cross reaper
Sprial hell

Polearm:
Double thrust
Vorpal thrust
Penta thrust
Wheeling thrust
Impulse drive

Archery/Marksmanship:
Flaming arrow/Hot shot
Piercing arrow/Split shot
Sidewinder/Slug shot
Arching arrow/Heavy shot

[Taskmage]

I thought "chance to crit" type ws like Rin and Power Slash were crap.

[Omni]

Well, blade jin and rampage are chance to critical ws too.

Rin and power slash are used not mainly for dmg but to open distortion.

[tdh]

Honestly, there are a number of WS that stink for damage Vs. EXP mobs, but we use them because they open or close a certain Skillchain Element so mages can MB for the big damage. I personally think that Vorpal Scythe sucks! With all the toys DRK has Vs a Too Weak mob I have problems breaking 400dmg, against EXP mobs it's usually in the low 200's (A very rare, and extremely surprising 640 V. Scythe once, but that was a HUGE fluke!), but it opens Distortion for THF and WAR. So I sacrifice doing more damage to open for somebody else doing big numbers, big Distortion, and BLMs Nukage. (SATA Viper Bite for 500dmg, Distortion 100~400dmg, Ice MB 200~1.kdmg. I use this example because I static with a THF currently.)

Look at WAR, by the time Rampage really starts to drop big numbers, they have to switch to Mistral Axe to open Light, and Mistral is usually half the damage. So they sacrifice bigger WS numbers to allow a DRK to close Light for 1k or more.

Tell these people to get with the program, or get off the bus. You invite a DRG to skillchain with certain people, and unfortunately our best/favorite WS isn't always the best options in EXP. DRGs seem to love Penta Thrust, but it only closes Gravitation, when nobody wants to MB with Stone Vs Crabs. There are other viable options for Skillchains than Distortion, but Gravitation isn't really one of them.

[Asir]

Since starting the game over, I find it next to impossible to get people to even think about having a skill chain. I'll get the rare one or two players willing to give it a shot. When I played on my taru, I didn't get to MB until the late 20s but luckily I had someone in that party explain the timing and which MBs go with which SCs.

When I started over, I went to one of the SC calculators, made a list of every level 1 & 2 SCs with their MBs for weapon skills up to level 75 and printed them out so I'd have them handy while I tried my hand at melee. I've only had a couple of parties that actually let me use the list to set up SCs and MBs and I've tried to base them on what the mob is most weak to.

I find playing with the new players makes it easier to suggest SCs since they won't be jaded by the TP parties at endgame.

[Taskmage]

The last part I was in with my blm was in the 30s with a sam, cor, pld and blu.

We could've done:
Hot Shot > Tachi: Enpi Distortion
Tachi: Enpi > Fast Blade Distortion
Tachi: Enpi > Red Lotus Blade Liquefacation
Red Lotus Blade > Tachi: Enpi Scission

All decent skillchains with good damage closers. Couldn't get a skillchain out of them for the life of me. Now granted, the pld and blu were resting for mp, but they were doing RLB anyway, and the cor was using Hot Shot. If I were the sam I would've probably held my WS until someone else used theirs since I could close a SC off of anything. Between the three openers, he shouldn't have had to wait long after getting 100% tp, and +50-75% damage on your WS ain't nothing. Not to mention I'd get to MB. Even with my skill capped an absurd amount of int stacked up, my free nuking was still getting resisted more than I was happy with.

Surprisingly, once the cor was replaced with a thf we had no trouble setting up Tachi: Enpi > SATA VB Distortion every other fight, taking our chains from 2-3 to 4-5. I guess people only care about the skillchain when it puts a single huge number up on the screen. Still, I think the cumulative effect of one or two non-SATA skillchains with MB every fight would've put our killing speed up there on the same level, but DoT is a lot harder to understand than spike damage apparently.

[Akashimo]

skillchains, oi >.< personally i'd like just a break from mobs and parties that need skillchains to speed the killings. Or at least not something that's soo standard..... /ja TA <me> /ws SH <bt>... opened/closed light ~.~ joy... always with a mistral axe or wheeling thrust. Most dmg they do does suck, even light does when lag gets inbewteen my TA and SB macro. And those are the times where i just think TP burn would be much better. Though i do like sc with a blue to make light now :x Blue > Red lotus blade > Jet Stream > Fusion > Shark Bite > Light @.@ fun~~. Heh, find a way to make darnkess with a thf, and i'll love to sc with that :x Otherwise Dancing Edge spam, yes please.