BCNM 40 (Elvaan)

[Zempten]

Hello

I've read other topics on this. I would just like to ask what you guys think of what I am planning on doing.

Well I know that most BRDs are for VIT and some are for CHR, but the question is that since I'm an elvaan will I really need alot of VIT? I'm not sure if Elvaan are ranked as 2 or 3 rd highest VIT or not.

As for armor, I plan on wearing

Weapon: BRD AF1
Head: Electrum Hairpin
Body, Hands, Feel, and Legs: Elvaan RSE
Rings: Astral Rings x2
Earrings: Drone Earring
Back: Nomads Mantle
Waiste: The one that adds like +5 to CHR I forgot the name.

I was also wondering if this tactic would work

PT made of:
1 WHM
1 NIN
1 BRD
1 THF
1 DRK
1 SAM



1) Cast Madrigral and Minuet on meeles, cast Mage on WHM and cast 2 knights on myself
2) Foe Lulaby the Black Mandy causing the other white mandys to run to me.
3) Horde Lullaby the white mandys
4) Foe Requiem 3 on Black Mandy and Battlefield Elegy on Black Mandy
5) Refresh Mage on WHM and Knight on myself
6) Repeat 3 to 5 until everything dies.

The question is, will I have enough time to land Minuet, Madgrigal, Mage, and 2 knights on myself before the white mandys wake up? If not, then which ones would be more important to cast?

Thanks again for all your help

[Akiro]

Make sure to get Mary's Horn and i think its just the Madrigal and Minne that you would do and leave the Ballad when the whm is near you and you are away from the melee people other then that you should be ok to that except the Battlefield Elegy i dont think you will have time for that once you sleep the black one

[Vilurum]

Suggestions:

Head: switch for Noble's Ribbon.
Neck: you didn't mention what you were using, but use Bird Whistle or Flower Necklace.
Rings: switch for 2x +2 CHR rings, +3 CHR if you wanna spend the cash.
Waist: if you wanna upgrade to HQ, it wouldn't hurt, but it's not a big deal. One more CHR, and the stat-downs are *decreased* so they're less of a penalty.

Party setup:

One mage works if you're good and if you have a lot of damage output. THF is good damage but only once a minute, NIN isn't such hot damage. DRK and SAM are good damage, assuming their accuracy is up to par. You do not need a "tank".

You may wanna consider replacing someone with a second mage (any mage will do, so long as they understand they're gonna be playing a healing role even if they're BLM/WHM; RDM and WHM are preferable for access to Cure III and Regen and Protect II, however).

Problem is that for one mage alone, it's a lot of people to heal and no real chance to rest, and so their MP will slowly but surely decline. And when it runs out, things start going bad. Having said that, one mage can manage all the healing at any given moment, MP notwithstanding, so ... with two mages, you can have one heal and one rest. And by the time the healer runs out of MP, the rester has full MP, and they can switch. And keep switching throughout the battle.

Advice:

The important thing is to get hate and keep hate and not get killed and sleep all the mandies every time. I suggest, for your own practice, that you run around in Sarutabaruta, get about seven of the local mandragoras mad at you, and then practice sleeping them.

Observe how they move, observe how they position themselves when you stand still (and how long it takes to settle into those positions). Observe how they position themelves when you stand still with your back to a wall. Observe how many of them you hit with a wind instrument. And a string instrument. When targeting the center, and when targeting one on the edge of the group.

BCNM40 mandies will behave pretty much exactly the same way, except they'll be more resistant to lullaby and they'll actually hurt you when they're awake.

Other useful things to know:

Stand with your back to a wall. That way the mandies can only arrange themselves in a semicircle around you, rather than a circle, meaning it's easier to get them all in the AOE of Horde Lullaby.

Mages should stand on top of you (and by on top of you I mean literally move until their graphic overlaps yours) until the black mandy dies. If they draw hate, you do not want any white mandies actually *moving* to go hit them.

Melees should stand far enough away that the black mandy's AOEs won't hit you/mages, but close enough that the mages can heal them without moving from on top of you. Too far is better than too close, as the mages can always tell them to move a little bit closer in order to get healed. (And it really sucks to get paralyzed by the black mandy's AOE.)

Don't resleep the mandies until they're *all* awake. You will invariably have early wakers. Just tank them until the others wake up too. Do not individually sleep them, you want them all on the same rhythm.

If Lullaby is unresisted, you have time for two full-duration buffs between sleeps (along with a Cure II if you use Mary's Horn). It's generally safer to use only one per sleep cycle, however. (The buffs do last for four or so sleep cycles after all.) Only concentrate on buffing yourself and anyone nearby (i.e. mages). I suggest maintaining ballad + minne or ballad + paeon.

Ignore buffs on the melees. Requiem is dangerous if you mistarget. Elegy is good. If you can, use Elegy on the white mandies too (one after another), it makes them a bit less threatening to you.

Flood sucks. Have a reliable way of dealing with it. These include silence, stun, killing the black mandy, blinking it away (if it happens to be targeting a melee with utsusemi capability anyway), or bolting out of range.

See to it that when the melees finally kill off the black mandy, that they do not under any circumstances touch the white mandy whose name is in red. That's your sleep target and you don't want them moving it (by pulling it away from you to kill it). Leave that one for last.

[Sindinista]

Amazing advice, thank you very much. 5 levels until BCNM!

Another thing, would you recommend Monster Signa, or AF1 and Elegant shield?

[Spoony]

I use signa as a taru bard, and have never had any problems. Just make sure you don't gimp with the other equipment. Also, I use Fish Mithkabobs, which help considerably.

[Zempten]

The only reason why I thought that we can do it with just one mage is because we have a NIN tanking. Since we all know NIN tanking doesn't require that much healing, I thought one mage would be enough. This is also the reason why I wanted to use 2 Astral Rings so I can Cure myself as well in case things go bad.

Well I was hoping that having DRK and SAM should bo good enough damage dealing. I know DRK has very impaired accuracy so I was hoping to land Madrigal and Minuet on PT and perhaps since I am Elvaan I can suffice without needing to cast Minnie on myself for added Defense. I was also hoping that Fish Mithakakbobs would work fine as well.

There is also something else I want to ask. What do you think about BRD/RDM sub? I know I'll have access to the first versin of Fast Cast so that is about -5% in casting time. The key point was I was thinking of equiping the mantle that enhances Fast Cast. I think it's called Warlock's Mantle. Does anyone know how much it effects casting? 5% as well? If so do you think that it would be viable to use BRD/RDM? Also I want to point out that Fast Cast = Fast Recast as well, since most people didn't know this. So theoretically, if i sub RDM I should be able to sing maybe 1 more song after the occassional 2. IF (keyword is IF) I can, then I think i would sing Minuet and Madrigal and Ballad. You know? I think I'll try this out in Saratuba like you suggested.

Thanks for the help guys

[Gman]

Yes, Vilurum's advice was very good. Some things to add (from a non-bard... just observations on BCNM 40 in general)

-Regarding the distance to keep Black mandy at until its dead, I can't stress enough to keep bard, and the mage healing the bard out of its AOE range. I think personally I'm about 15-1 on this BCNM, and the one time we lost, it was because myself and the BRD got AOE sleep followed by AOE paralyze. This was a disaster. I was asleep, couldnt heal BRD, BRD was paralyzed... coulnt heal self or wake me up. We all died one by one after that.

-Have a melee who can do BIG damage (ranger preferably) since as time goes on, these white mandies REALLY hate the bard for making them sleep over and over. The last 3-4 mandies are hard to pull off the bard because he has too much hate. A few arrows doing 100+ dmg per shot, or Barrage helps resolve this. THF SATA will work as well, or a good WS from the melee.

-Our bard is taru, and eats Steamed crab, although hes stinking rich, so boiled crab or fishkabob would suffice. Have lots of HP as a Bard so you dont die if youre slow getting Lullaby off. Taru can use RSE for the HP+80 I think.

-Regarding mages.. take 2, just trust me. One cant handle the load. If you insist on just one, it better be RDM/WHM for convert, curaga, and -na spells, and that mage should have lots of Yagudo drinks, pumpkin pie and +mp gear. Convert will be absolutely necessary once, maybe twice in a fight. Save the hassle and have 2. One heals melee, one heals Bard (and helps heal melee if BRD is ok, and other healer resting or falling behind. BRD is number one priority, if he dies, you all die. Remember that.

-Flood is so annoying it drives me nuts. If it happens to take out one of your melee (likely since mage wont have hate yet) Raise him, and keep going... dont panic. Ways to avoid it were outlined by Vilurum, and they work.

-Strategy to start the fight is all up to the individual, but what we did (worked very well) was for the PLD to run in and get all mandies to link to him and run to right side. Bard then goes in and stands next to PLD and does Horde Lullaby. One of the melees pulls the Black Mandy to the other side of circle and they start beating on it. If BRD is competent, he should be able to get all mandies to sleep within one or 2 Lullabies. PLD or tank is not to leave BRD until there are no mandies following him. You dont want them to be spread out. Everything should go smooth from here assuming all the above advice is taken.

Good luck.

[Zempten]

Well since this is a LS event, I don't have that much to work with as being picky. All I want right now is to know we can do it with the PT setup and then cut down from there.

As I mentioned, I am an elvaan. My HP and VIT is a bit different from that of a tarutaru. Which is why I labeled this topic as "BCNM 40 (Elvaan)" as I have only read other topics that were expereince from either a Hume ( but I guess Hume and Elvaan are the same) or Tarutaru and I am wondering how much my race would effect the issue on VIT and HP for this BCNM. Hopefully Fish Mithakabobs will take care of me enough.

As far as having a RDM for convert, I have thoguht about it but two of my LS RDM is only 26 atm so it will be a while before he gets to 40 so I do not have that option. But as I stated before we have a NIN so healing will basically be focused on me. NIN can take care of himself thru Utsusumi and he can do the enfeebles as well for some added hate. So needing 2 mages ( 1 for tank and 1 for BRD ) isn't really needed since it can basically be ( me for tank and WHM for me). Also in all my other BCNM40 expereinces as a RDM, I never had to us Convert once and we beat the BCNM at around 11 minutes, but that's RDM expereince. I need BRD expereince now ^^

Regarding Flood, I have DRK that can Weapon Bash or WHM that can ES + Silence or I could probably Foe Lullaby it after I resleep all the white mandys or whenever it is needed. Plus, Flood takes a while to cast so I think we can do either of 3 before it casts it. By the way does anyone know the results of Utsusumi vs Flood. Does it just take 1 shadow? If so the yeah I have a NIN who can probably have his shadow up.

I agree that AE paralyze and sleep is the worst so I will deal with it accordingly.

I might try for a Mary's Horn but it is at 400k right now and I'm only at 330k ; ; *sigh* So sad so sad

[Xodia]

I Think The Best BCNM40 Giddeus party is :

RNG/WAR - DMG
RNG/WAR- DMG
DRK/WAR/SAM- DMG + Tank + Stun Blk Mandy
WHM/SMN- Healing Melee's OR Bard + Buffs
RDM/BLM/SMN- Healing Melees OR Brd


Hope It Helps ^^.... Oh, And The DRK Does Tank The Blacky Pretty Well For Some reason...

[Gman]

Originally posted by Zempten

As far as having a RDM for convert, I have thoguht about it but two of my LS RDM is only 26 atm so it will be a while before he gets to 40 so I do not have that option. But as I stated before we have a NIN so healing will basically be focused on me. NIN can take care of himself thru Utsusumi and he can do the enfeebles as well for some added hate. So needing 2 mages ( 1 for tank and 1 for BRD ) isn't really needed since it can basically be ( me for tank and WHM for me). Also in all my other BCNM40 expereinces as a RDM, I never had to us Convert once and we beat the BCNM at around 11 minutes, but that's RDM expereince. I need BRD expereince now ^^

Ninja would be ok I guess assuming he has Ni, which I'm sure he would.

Also, I know youre Elvaan, just wanted to stress the HP you need. You should be fine with just fish kabobs, and no +hp gear will be needed for you. Maybe some +Mp gear, but make sure to load up on CHR too.

11 minutes? Huh? Damn usually it takes us 17-21 mins depending on certain factors. You must have had all RNG as DD's or a DRK or SAM for tank (we use PLD so dmg output isnt great)

[Zempten]

Back then before a lot of my LS moved for another game we had...

DRG
RNG
THF
BRD
RDM
WHM

DRG was tank and skillchain was easy between the three of them, not to mention I think they had some of the best equipment at their level. I could also remeber that the BRD kept songs on the meeles and sometimes Ballad on us.

Thanks for the help, I hope this goes well^^

Yes, NIN has both Blink.

EDIT: It was around 11 minutes, maybe 13? It was just somewhere along those lines.

[tdh]

I highly suggest you find a RDM. The BRD needs a dedicated Cure Monkey, and the actual killers need a Cure Monkey.

Yes, with a NIN tank, they won't take any real damage, but a DRK is going to hit those Mandys like they're Even Matches. They just have a ton of HP. At Lv.40, with out Sniper Rings I had absolutely no troubles hitting as an Elvaan DRK w/ a Scythe. And with being hasted, a PLD with THF's help had a hard time keeping hate off me. I even went as a DRK/THF to lower my attack. I'm worried about that NIN keeping hate. DRK and SAM both could draw a lot of hate.

A DRK should have no problems with Stun'n Flood. I've only failed once, and that was because the fight just started, and I was drawing my weapon. By the time my damn weapon was out, and I was mashing the hell out of my macro, the THF was already dead. RDM Raised the THF, the fight went on like nothing happened. (Another reason you need a second mage.)

Now, I haven't spent much time as a BRD, so I can't tell you about doing a BRDs job in BCNM40. However, I have gone with about 4 different BRDs. One had Mary's Horn & Monster Signa. Using Mary's Horn the whole time, no Signa, and had no problems. I've also seen somebody with the Signa and no Horn and did just fine as well. And another one with the horn, who kept getting random resists.

Almost all the BRD ate Steamed Crab. I can't recall the difference between HQ crabs and fishkabobs, HQ or otherwise.

The party I ever went with was:

PLD
DRK
THF
RDM
BRD
WHM

We did about 12 of them together. PLD and THF got used to my high damage output and did better at keeping hate off me the more we did. Either way our average time was about 16 minutes.

Suggestion for your DRK: If they've leveled Marksmanship, to about Lv.100, have them bring a X-bow, and Bloody Bolts. It's a great way to lower your damage slightly so tank can regain hate, and recover HP. I had very little problems hitting those Mandys as an Elvaan DRK, and Marksmanship not cap'd. DEF Down bolts worked great as well. I can't remember what they're called right now though. (Venom Bolts?) Bloody bolts did about 10dmg, and they drained about 45-55HP I believe. Drain itself worked very well against the Mandys as well.

[Zempten]

Oh! I completely forgot about bolts! Stupid me ; ; Thanks for the tip!

Ah, really? Hm........... that might be a problem then. Didn't realize DRK had such a great time with mandys. lol it might be strange since I might be replacing SAM with another DRK as well.

The thing is my LS doesn't have another healer type that is at lvl 40 so................... man I'll just drink lots of potions ^^ I have around 200 MP ^^ I guess that's about 8 Cure 2 ^^

Steamed Crabs eh? I'll test it out between Steamed Crabs and Fish Mithakakbobs.

BTW, does anyone have an answer to my BRD/RDM question?

[Gman]

DEF Down bolts worked great as well. I can't remember what they're called right now though. (Venom Bolts?)

Acid Bolts. Love these...very useful.

[tdh]

Yeah, I really let those Mandys have it. I went in all nervous. I'd never done a BCNM as a melee before. In beta I went as a RDM. After that 1st big hit, and a real nice Sneak Attack, I realized I what my job was. lol Nearly half way through the black mandy, the PLD said, "Holy Jesus you hit hard." The 1st time we went, the PLD forgot to bring a Lv.40 Sword, so they used a Great Sword. Even after bring a Sword and Shield for the next trips, I hit like nobody's business. After a few of them, I considered not eating my usual steroids. (Mithkabobs - Don't leave Mog Home with out 'em!)

At Lv.40 I didn't have the greatest gear honestly, I was wearing a few of my RSE pieces for the DEX. I don't think I had any Acc+ gear, or Atk+ that I can remember. I did go ahead and buy a +1 Scythe just for BCNM40s. I did have DEX+15 though. (Wish DRK AF1 was Lv.40. I would have had STR+10 along with food, and gear.)

A second DRK would help with the Stunning, if the black mandy just goes nuts early on. I never had a problem with not having Stun ready, (Only once I had Haste, afterwards I was doing too much damage for Haste, so the left me as my usual slow butt. lol) but a second DRK with a NIN tank. Might cause some problems. But you might also kill the damn things faster. lol

EDIT: Keep in mind, this is just from my experience.

I've actually heard of groups going in with a MNK tank, and cleaning house in about the 12-15 minute range. A good NIN tank, with a good THF could probably hold hate like a pro. Perhaps subsequent patches have changed things as well. (It's been a while since I've done BCNMs) So give it a go. And let us know how it went. Everybody seems to have a "fail proof plan." The only BRD that said it worked 100%, we all died inside of 30 seconds. /sigh So go break the mold!