[Sabaron]

Well now I can't decide >.<.

Slow II-3
Paralyze II-3

mebbe... but thats.... 34 merits or 340,000 Limit Points or what... 30-40 hours of meripo?

The reason I was looking at Bio III-3 is the efficiency of mp/damage on the DoT, not specifically the effect. 54/90sec is thrice as much damage for the same MP which, to me is the bomb. Maybe:

Bio III-3
Paralyze II-3 or Slow II-3...

I still can't decide between the two... Slow is really good especially for blink tanking, but I love Paralyze's ability to block moves and spells.

Curse you SE for making me choose between them!

[Raydeus]

That data is interesting, now about duration.

How long does Slow/Para II last on the mob compared to the Slow and Para?

[Kirsteena]

I found Para II, level 1, really didn't stick very long, but level 2 most definitely has longer staying power. Now, whether that means that first tier it is getting a partial resist, so wearing faster, or just it is designed that way I don't know. I'm working on getting level III of it, so can tell more then. Just need another 4 merits.

[Neomage]

How many levels can you put into each? 10? 6?

My RDM is only 37(for subbing BLM) but from, what I've sene I'd take both Paralyze II and Slow II to the max if you can only have 6 upgrades, or if you can have 10, I'd add in lv 2 Bio III and Dia III or lv 3 Dia III and lv 1 Bio III

[Icemage]

You can have a maximum of 6 upgrade levels total in Category 2, and up to 3 levels for any specific upgrade.


Icemage

[IfritnoItazura]

Originally Posted by Onionsoilder

How many levels can you put into each? 10? 6?

Merit, and Red Mage specific Merit.

[Taskmage]

Those numbers for Bio III are pathetic. I was going to pick up level 3 Bio III on the idea that it would be a more effective DoT spell for kiting than Bio II, but after looking at the numbers that doesn't seem remotely true.

Assuming Bio III does 6dmg/tick at 200 skill (even though it looks like it might be 5/tick just like Bio II ><), Bio II is a better DoT spell than level 3 Bio III, dealing 200 damage over 2 minutes rather than 180 damage over 90 seconds. Even if you extend the period to an hour it's 6000 vs 7200 damage, only two Blizzard IIIs worth of damage difference. Considering it would take 1080 mp to keep Bio II sustained for that long vs a whopping 2160 for Bio III ... that's just terrible! D:<

Projecting based on the two known tiers for Bio III, there should be another tier at 233 dark magic skill where it deals 9 damage per tick. Getting into that tier would require collecting all simultaneously equippable +dark magic skill items for rdm (Dark Earring, Dark Torque, Abyssal Earring, Crimson Finger Gauntlets, Merciful Cape and Nashira Manteel). Plugging that number into the comparisons above, ultimately maxed Bio III would deal 270 damage over 90 seconds, and 10800 damage in an hour. In the long-haul test, that puts Bio III 4800 damage ahead of Bio II for 1080 additional mp, which is still LESS damage than you would get spending that 1080 mp on 9 Blizzard IIIs for 600 damage apiece, even if you get 50% resists on two of your nukes.

As a DoT spell, the only thing Bio III has going for it is that, correct me if I'm wrong, the slip damage on it is unresistable. So, even though 18 unresisted Blizzard IIIs and 20 maxed Bio IIIs will do the same amount of damage for the exact same amount of mp, the latter can be assumed to have perfect accuracy whereas the former cannot. So, if you can push your dark magic to 233+, Bio III can be said to have the same damage/mp efficiency as nuking with 100% accuracy. I made this little chart to compare the efficency across tiers:

Dark Skill … … Bio II … … Bio III
…200-208… … … … 55.5%… … … 66.7%
…210-216 … … … …66.7% … … …66.7%
…217-224… … … … 66.7%… … … 77.8%
…225-232 … … … …66.7% … … …88.9%
…233+ … … … … … 66.7%… … …100.0%

This assumes that the minimum slip damage for Bio III is 6/tick, and that there is a 4th tier of damage for it at 233+ skill that grants 9 damage/tick. If someone could verify either one of these things, that would be appreciated. Also, Blizzard III damage is estimated at 600. Otherwise, you can read it like this: For the tier of dark magic your skill is in, if your Blizzard III deals less than the listed % of full damage on average, casting that column's DoT would be more mp-efficient.

For example, let's say I have Crimson Finger Gauntlets and a Dark Torque, which puts me in the 217-224 dark magic tier. About half my Blizzard IIIs land for full damage and the other half get 50% resisted, so on average my nukes are coming through for 75% of full damage. For my tier of dark skill, casting Bio II would not be worthwhile, since its mp-efficiency is equivalent to my Blizzard IIIs only doing 66.7% of full damage on average. Bio III on the other hand is slightly more mp-efficient, so if I had it at level 3 it would be worthwhile to cast.

To me, Bio III doesn't become significantly better than Bio II until the 225+ tier, which I can't even attempt to reach without both sky and sea access and a good HNM, and would still be difficult if I had those things. The last tier where Bio III becomes actually impressive would be impossible for me to reach without meriting dark magic or choosing Abyssal Earring over Suppanomimi, which I would be extremely disinclined to do considering the Abyssal would serve a very narrow purpose whereas Suppa would be great for my rdm, blu and ninja as well as war and pld which I'm mildly interested in leveling. As such I'm going to pass on getting Bio III altogether and spend my points on something I don't have to work as hard to make usable.

Ignoring the DoT effect, I'll grant that the additional -5% attack would be useful for a rdm personally tanking a very strong mob, but the number of mobs hit hard enough to worry about that are unkitable that I have any interest in soloing is extremely small. If I can get someone else to tank for me, Phalanx II would mitigate more damage.

If you followed all that congratulations. >.> Hope my rambling thinking out loud was of any use to someone.

[Shinhiryu_Kage]

Thanks very much Taskmage for this information.

It's dissapointing about Bio 3. I liked how in EQ that Druids were the kings of Damage over Time spells and I thought RDM's should get that kind of title here on FF11. I guess they have the psuedo-title of DoT Spell King, but with what you presented about Bio3, you can get better overall effectiveness putting your merits elsewhere it seems. All that work just to get some impressive #'s isn't really "cost effective."

[Armando]

Not much to add to the current discussions, but...

There was a very thorough test done on Paralyze by members of Allakhazam's RDM forums. You can find the info here if you're interested.

[arkaine23]

Paralyze and Slow: Always use MND to enhance potency. Even trade skill for mind at a certain point when you're skill's already very high, except against very resistant targets.

Blind: INT maybe. Never seen solid test data. We hardly ever cast it anyway.

Gravity: INT maybe. Because of long recast, I'd stick with skill, magic accuracy, and fast cast/haste items.

Bind: INT maybe. See gravity above.

Silence: MND maybe. But its usually something you need to stick on the frist try, as in the mob is casting something deadly that needs to be stopped with Silence, so like gravity, I'd opt for skill and magic accuracy over stat, also fast cast in front of the /ma Silence line if it doesn't cause an equipment swap blink (loquacious earring), but not haste.

Sleep: INT maybe. See Silence above.




Regarding tier II merits: Slow II is very nice with 1 2, or 3 levels. Dia III at 2 or 3 upgrades is pretty useful for zerging HNMs, besieged, assaults, and merit parties. Phalanx II's pretty nice, though upgrades are pretty weak for it. Its just for tanks of course or for helping buddies skillup Parry/Shield/Guard rapidly on chigoes.

[Fynlar]

My take on the merits:

Dia 3: Yawn. Even maxed this spell doesn't last as long as Dia 2. 2 is good enough anyway. Perhaps the biggest thing going for this spell is that it has the ability to overwrite that damn BLM's Bio 2.
Bio 3: Yawn. Even maxed this spell doesn't last as long as Bio 2. Doesn't hold a candle to the mobs' version of it anyway.
Blind 2: Yawn. Never bothered casting Blind 1 much, I can't see this one having THAT much more of an improvement based on how Para 2 and Slow 2 are. NINs can cast Kurayami, PLDs probably won't evade anyway.
Para 2: All or nothing on this one. At just level 1 it costs way too much MP for not enough extra benefit.
Slow 2: Everyone should get at least one point in this due to its ability to overwrite and stop Haste; that and it actually has a noticeable effect over Para 2, and it actually has a mostly consistent duration unlike Para so you can usually rest assured you aren't dumping 45 MP on a spell that will wear off quickly.
Phalanx 2: This sorta depends on what you do, but for what I do, this spell is godly. If you do get it reserve at least 2 points for it. You're mostly meriting it for the added duration, not the added 3 points of damage blocked. At 1 point it only lasts 2:00, shorter than Refresh, which can screw you up. 2 points makes it 2:30 which allows you to tie it in with your Refresh cycle.

I have 1 in Para, 1 in Slow, 2 in Phalanx currently. My plan is to take Para to 3 points and see how much I like it, because as it is currently it's just not worth using at all. If it's good, I'll keep it like that. Otherwise, I'll take all the Para points out and use them to max Slow and Phalanx.

Best tip I can give to people who get Para/Slow 2: if you haven't already, start looking into getting a set of +MND gear, or upgrading the set you already have. These spells can pack a real punch if you load up on that stat.

Not much to add to the current discussions, but...

There was a very thorough test done on Paralyze by members of Allakhazam's RDM forums. You can find the info here if you're interested.

Yey, I helped with that. ^_^

[Taskmage]

/necro

So it seems that with the addition of /sch, not only is 233 dark magic skill attainable by rdms with no additional equipment or merits but we start working from a base of 250 dark magic skill. If the 233+ tier actually exists, that would make Bio III our most efficient, consistent damage spell. If there are additional tiers beyond that following the same pattern, then with Dark Arts Bio III would do 11 dmg/tick (330 DoT fully merited). Add a Dark Torque and it's 12 (360 total). Plus Crimson Hands is 13 (390), plus Dark Earring and Merciful Cape is 14 dmg/tick or 420 unresistable damage for 54 mp with full merits, not counting initial damage.

If you can't tell I'm rather excited about the idea. Can anyone confirm the slip damage of Bio III as rdm/sch?

[Callisto]

Sorry, another necro-ish post for me today, but I had to find somewhere to say "WTF??!!"

I was fighting Kirin on Friday, and I was actually pretty pleased with my enfeebling magic. I stuck Silence quite a few times, my Gravity wasn't bad, Poison still kind of sucked but I need a Neptune's Staff.

Near the end of the second fight, I witnessed something that destroyed my faith in enfeebling magic skill altogether:

Motown casts Paralyze.
Kirin is paralyzed.

Motown was a 75SMN/37WHM at the time. I myself couldn't land a ParaII for shit after I saw him do that...so, WTF??!!

[Mhurron]

Originally Posted by Callisto

Motown was a 75SMN/37WHM at the time. I myself couldn't land a ParaII for shit after I saw him do that...so, WTF??!!

There is always random chance.

[Sabaron]

Originally Posted by Taskmage

/necro

So it seems that with the addition of /sch, not only is 233 dark magic skill attainable by rdms with no additional equipment or merits but we start working from a base of 250 dark magic skill. If the 233+ tier actually exists, that would make Bio III our most efficient, consistent damage spell. If there are additional tiers beyond that following the same pattern, then with Dark Arts Bio III would do 11 dmg/tick (330 DoT fully merited). Add a Dark Torque and it's 12 (360 total). Plus Crimson Hands is 13 (390), plus Dark Earring and Merciful Cape is 14 dmg/tick or 420 unresistable damage for 54 mp with full merits, not counting initial damage.

If you can't tell I'm rather excited about the idea. Can anyone confirm the slip damage of Bio III as rdm/sch?

I'm now undecided on my second merit spell. My first choice was lovely Paralyze II, but I had planned to get Phalanx II for balance. Now that SCH gets Accession Phalanx, I'm no longer so keen on Phalanx II. It the slip damage cap goes up using /SCH Dark Arts I might consider Bio III as an alternative. The only thing is... How often will it be useful to be RDM/SCH and use Bio III for this? Many soloing strategies rely on Bio slip, but with /SCH, I'm losing significant defensive ability.