RDM Earrings need some input

[Mog]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

No one forgot it, it was mentioned several times. Most notably in the OP itself.

I'm too lazy to read posts. <.>

[Sabaron]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

You also have:

Astral Earring - FFXIclopedia - a Wikia Gaming wiki

Harvest Earring - FFXIclopedia - a Wikia Gaming wiki

and if you want to have some ENM Fun (I'm guessing your Elvaan):

Desamilion's Earring - FFXIclopedia - a Wikia Gaming wiki

[Evion]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

RDM needs a good INT boost IMHO, to land those enfeebles. If you're looking for Not Uber Expensive Gear, go with the Morion Earrings or the lesser Cunning Earrings. As an Elvaan, I really went for the few extra MP from the Morion Earrings... Also, you definitely should get a Morion Tathlum if you can.

[Sabaron]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

RDM needs a good INT boost IMHO, to land those enfeebles. If you're looking for Not Uber Expensive Gear, go with the Morion Earrings or the lesser Cunning Earrings. As an Elvaan, I really went for the few extra MP from the Morion Earrings... Also, you definitely should get a Morion Tathlum if you can.

You don't use INT for White enfeebles. You use MND. Stacking +MND increases the effect of Paralyze and Slow. Stacking +INT increases the effect of Blind.

You choose the attribute boost based on the individual spell, so even though you have a lot of natural MND as Elvaan, it doesn't hurt to pack on more. You need both.

You'll want to read this:

Magic Accuracy - FFXIclopedia - a Wikia Gaming wiki

It tells you how to land your spells.

Also read these:

Talk:Blind - FFXIclopedia - a Wikia Gaming wiki

ImageShack - Hosting :: slowoj8.jpg

Paralyze proc rate also increases with MND Differential just like Slow.

The Red Mage Hierarchy of Enfeebling (general theory) says to do this to increase your accuracy. Use this primarily on effects like Silence, Gravity, and Bind that only need to land. Bio also goes in this category since it's damage output is based solely on your Dark Magic Skill:

#1: Increase your Skill
#2: Increase your Magic Accuracy
#3: Increase your Attributes

If you want to put emphasis on power (use with Slow, Paralyze, and Blind):

#1: Increase your Attributes
#2: Increase your Skill
#3: Increase your Magic Accuracy

You can also shift to the Accuracy mode with Slow/Paralyze/Blind when you encounter more resistant opponents.

There is a theory that Magic Accuracy increases by only 0.9 per skill point above 200 (this follows the Melee Accuracy formula). If true, then above 200 skill, 1 point of +Accuracy is better than 1 point of skill. Fortunately, you don't need to choose because most +Skill items are much more powerful than +Magic Accuracy items.

[Mhurron]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

You don't use INT to enfeeble. You use MND. Stacking +MND increases the effect of Paralyze and Slow. Stacking +INT increases the effect of Blind.

As you just said, it depends on the spell.

MND Enfeebles:
Paralyze, Slow, Dia, Silence

INT Enfeebles:
Gravity, Blind, Sleep, Bind, Bio, Poison, Dispel

Though I suppose you could pull Poison out of there as just a DOT.

A good Taru RDM will stack INT for Gravity just as a good Elvaan RDM will stack MND for Paralyze.

[Icemage]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

The truth is that earrings are probably one of the least important slots to RDM at any level below 75. Minimal boosts to MND and/or MP are just icing. Insomnia/Antivenom are probably pretty good choices in that level range; eventually you can upgrade to a Loquacious earring, and should you choose to do so, a Magnetic Earring.

I currently use Loquacious and Magnetic on my RDM at 75.


Icemage

[Fynlar]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

Relaxing Earring is also a good one to have. That plus Antivenom has you covered for a good hMP set.

[Sabaron]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

Relaxing Earring is also a good one to have. That plus Antivenom has you covered for a good hMP set.

Even with a full complement of 70 inventory space, I'm rather unthrilled with adding most earrings (including Relaxing) as swaps. Sure, if you want maximum swapping, then of course, they're in, but I only have so much space, and sometimes I want to be able to pick up items that drop.

Magnetic & Loquacious is an excellent combination that you really have little need to swap out.

The second problem with gear swaps is that (unless you're using 3rd party macros), you only have at most 6 swap lines and 95% of the time, they will be used for the more powerful armor or rings. Swapping earrings is usually at the bottom of the list.

I would try to wear one good pair that matches my intended role and leave the rest in my MH. There are a few that might warrant occasional appearances or swapping like Enfeebling Earring or the ones you use for Convert (+MP earrings are quite potent compared to other types).

A new guy is going to be hard pressed to farm the Rare/Ex ears like Relaxing but if you happen to have it, obviously you'll want to use it. I wouldn't go out of my way though.

Bottom line: Good earrings are either hard to find or very expensive. Don't worry too much about them until end-game. The Anti-venom/Insomnia combo is a good bet for you all the way up through 75. Focus on your larger armor pieces and rings first, and only fuss over your earrings if you have extra cash.

[Fynlar]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

Magnetic & Loquacious is an excellent combination that you really have little need to swap out.

Keeping Loq Earring on for resting unless you're resting to maximum MP = fail. If you don't have Relaxing, at least put an Antivenom on.

A new guy is going to be hard pressed to farm the Rare/Ex ears like Relaxing but if you happen to have it, obviously you'll want to use it. I wouldn't go out of my way though.

A new guy isn't going to have Magnetic/Loq, either. If you have had sea access for long enough to get Magnetic/Loq, there is absolutely no reason why you shouldn't be able to get Relaxing. RDM doesn't even need any help to get it.

Magnetic is kind of a lolearring, to begin with. I dunno why anyone would waste their sorta-one-time-only earring choice on something that pretty much replicates AH earrings, but to each their own... I guess they're the same sorts of people that get Bushinomimi just for the +2 str >_>

[Icemage]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

Keeping Loq Earring on for resting unless you're resting to maximum MP = fail. If you don't have Relaxing, at least put an Antivenom on.

Red mages rest at level 75? This red mage doesn't... ever.

As I posted in the Convert ratio thread:

A new guy isn't going to have Magnetic/Loq, either. If you have had sea access for long enough to get Magnetic/Loq, there is absolutely no reason why you shouldn't be able to get Relaxing. RDM doesn't even need any help to get it.

Magnetic is kind of a lolearring, to begin with. I dunno why anyone would waste their sorta-one-time-only earring choice on something that pretty much replicates AH earrings, but to each their own... I guess they're the same sorts of people that get Bushinomimi just for the +2 str >_>

Magnetic has +5 Conserve MP. What AH-available earring can replicate that?


Icemage

[Fynlar]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

Red mages rest at level 75? This red mage doesn't... ever.

No nuking gear either, I take it? Because whenever I nuke stuff down, I happen to do a lot of resting. Only something like having 2000+ HP and MP would let me be able to rely solely on Convert for upkeep, which isn't feasible anywhere outside of Besieged, and nuking in there as RDM is pointless anyway.

Maybe in typical TP burn parties you don't get to rest, but saying you never need to rest at all in any situation and therefore need to pay no attention to hMP gear is a bit of a stretch. It's also quite inadvisable as far as being a mage goes.

Magnetic has +5 Conserve MP. What AH-available earring can replicate that?

Who cares? The effect of Conserve MP gear is so minor, it's practically placebo. +5 saves you approximately 1.5 MP over every 100 MP you spend. Not to mention that for many of the things you cast, this isn't an earring you'll want to be wearing anyway. If it was something you could actually wear 100% of the time without being gimped, it would be more worthwhile.

I don't know about anyone else, but the time my MP goes down the fastest (therefore, the time when the +5 CMP would be the most worthwhile, or at least as worthwhile as +5 CMP can be) is when I'm nuking.

If you nuke in Magnetic, ur doin it wrong.

[Sabaron]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

Keeping Loq Earring on for resting unless you're resting to maximum MP = fail. If you don't have Relaxing, at least put an Antivenom on.



A new guy isn't going to have Magnetic/Loq, either. If you have had sea access for long enough to get Magnetic/Loq, there is absolutely no reason why you shouldn't be able to get Relaxing. RDM doesn't even need any help to get it.

The point of that quote is that he doesn't need any of those earrings, Relaxing, Magnetic, or otherwise. I did not at any time imply that Magnetic earring was something that one needed but Relaxing was not.

Let's look at the difference between Magnetic and Relaxing.

Conserve MP - FFXIclopedia - a Wikia Gaming wiki

Eh... never mind... I miscalculated my first attempt. [Excised bad math]

The power of a Magnetic earring is about 1.5mp per 100 spent, so on a 1000mp bar, I save a whopping 15mp. Magnetic will always save about the same amount of MP over my cycle. Let us take a look at the difference between the earrings on a RDM with a 1000mp bar and both a relaxing and magnetic earrings which he swaps. The percentage listed is the amount of time he spends resting and we'll graciously assume that each 10 second resting tick yields MP (which it won't). Remember that the Magnetic Earring is always going to save us an average of 15mp on our full bar of MP as long as we're good and use it all up each convert cycle.

10% Resting over 10 minutes: 60 seconds = 6 ticks * 2mp = 12mp
20% = 12 ticks = 24 mp.
30% = 18 ticks = 36 mp
40% = 24 ticks = 48 mp

In order for your Relaxing Earring to restore as much mp as a magnetic earring saves, you'd have to be resting for around 15% of your Convert cycle (9 ticks) or 90/600 seconds which is decidedly well within the realm of possibility. Of course, if you can't do that resting all at once, it'll add more waste ticks and I didn't consider the base 1 waste tick for starting the first /heal, so if you do it over 2 rest periods, that's 11 ticks or 110/600 seconds or 18% of your Convert Cycle.

I suppose Magnetic Earring's Conserve MP effect is rather "lol". I will have to agree with you, then, that Relaxing Earring (afa Conserve MP is concerned) definitely outclasses Magnetic in terms of how much mp it saves you.

Oops again... I forgot Magnetic Earring has +1 hMP too, so it's not nearly as bad as I made it seem.

If I use only magnetic earring, remember that I always get +15 mp just for wearing it when I cast. I also get 1mp per rest tick, so let's look at Magnetic vs. Relaxing as a non-swapper.

10%: Relaxing gets 12, Magnetic gets 15+6 = 21.
20%: Relaxing gets 24, Magnetic gets 15+12 = 27.
30%: Relaxing gets 36, Magnetic gets 15+18 = 33.

So there's the break-point for a non-swapper. 30% resting or 180seconds/600. We can assume 3 cycles for an extra 30 seconds of rest time, so 210/600 seconds or 35% or so resting out of your 10 minute refresh cycle. 35% resting is kinda tight, I don't think I get that much most of the time.

Either way, the amount of mp conserved is rather minute. 36 MP isn't even enough savings to cast one Cure III. Therefore, I will have to renew my previous comment and say...


You definitely don't need to worry about either of these earrings before 75 and even at 75, you should probably concentrate on more powerful pieces.

There's no need to fight over a 3mp difference when resting 30% of your Convert cycle. In fact, I daresay there's no reason to call "lolRDM" on someone who doesn't have either one of these. You wouldn't be able to tell any significant difference between a RDM with neither of these and a RDM with both. Now the Spell Interrupt Rate and +MP on Magnetic does make it more appetizing IMO than Relaxing, but it's worthless when you're not getting hit.

On the plus side, I've now decided without any further competition, which earring I'm getting from Apoc: Hollow Earring.

Scratch that... Hollow Earring has Diabolos and Fowling to contend with...I guess I haven't decided yet >.<

[Dahc]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

First iwant to say I appreciate all of the post on this thread. As always you guys have great input and I learn alot from reading the info you guys give. I think for me at this point my goal is going to be to aquire anitvenom and insomnia along with some emfeebling earrings. For 90% of the time that I play my RDm Iam always RDM/WHM. While I dont' mind main healing I really wnat to focus on max emfeebling magic and maximize the change of having my enfeebles stick. I agree that earrings are one of the last Items I focus on when it comes to getting new gear. But since i am in the stretch of lvls where I am just getting to wear my AF armor, I am pinching my pennies in order to prepare for the lvls after 60 to get the gear that will get me through to Relic armor. Besides that I also have to get Fire andt Water Elem staff still. With access to assualt now, I will be able to work on getting my earrings that way instead of having to buy at AH. And hopefully I can get a few brave souls in my LS to run ENM with me in attempt to get Emfeebleing earring.

[Icemage]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

No nuking gear either, I take it? Because whenever I nuke stuff down, I happen to do a lot of resting. Only something like having 2000+ HP and MP would let me be able to rely solely on Convert for upkeep, which isn't feasible anywhere outside of Besieged, and nuking in there as RDM is pointless anyway.

Maybe in typical TP burn parties you don't get to rest, but saying you never need to rest at all in any situation and therefore need to pay no attention to hMP gear is a bit of a stretch. It's also quite inadvisable as far as being a mage goes.

If I have to REST to defeat something on RDM, I'm already doing it wrong, when I have 1200 x 2 = 2400+ MP available to me, plus whatever I get from a Vermillion Cloak + Refresh + Conserve MP in the mean time.

Naturally I do have a nuking gearset, but no, I basically never rest on RDM no matter what I happen to be doing, from Besieged to BindNuking NMs to TP burn merit parties. It is an inefficient use of my time when I have a quite large amount of MP available to burn through, and almost insufficient time to cast enough spells to burn through it.

Who cares? The effect of Conserve MP gear is so minor, it's practically placebo. +5 saves you approximately 1.5 MP over every 100 MP you spend. Not to mention that for many of the things you cast, this isn't an earring you'll want to be wearing anyway. If it was something you could actually wear 100% of the time without being gimped, it would be more worthwhile.

What am I wearing instead of Magnetic Earring that I would prefer not to save 1.5% of my MP on?

Let's look at our candidates, shall we?

Novio Earring: Magic Attack +7
Moldavite Earring: Magic Attack +5
Enfeebling Earring: Enfeebling +3
Abyssal Earring: Dark Magic +5
Loquacious Earring: Minimal Fast Cast

When nuking, assuming one has access to both Novio and Moldavite Earrings, then yes, you wouldn't use Magnetic on them. If you're like 99.9% of the RDM population, though, you probably don't have a Novio, and Magnetic has applications in many more circumstances.

I don't know about anyone else, but the time my MP goes down the fastest (therefore, the time when the +5 CMP would be the most worthwhile, or at least as worthwhile as +5 CMP can be) is when I'm nuking.

If you nuke in Magnetic, ur doin it wrong.

Funny, last time I checked, no matter what you're wearing, RDM nukes are still pretty lackluster. Nothing above Tier III, and the accuracy even with a slew of merits, an HQ Ice staff, and all the INT and Elemental Skill you can muster still doesn't impress even your most gimped BLM with an NQ staff.

Frankly, if I wanted to stand around and do nothing but nuke things down, I'd just get down to business and level BLM to 75 instead of going for half-measures like trying to optimize RDM's limited nuking efficiency and power.

To paraphrase you, if you're doing some dedicated nuking at all on RDM instead of getting off your butt and levelling BLM - "you're doing it wrong".

---
Regarding the choice of Magnetic Earring that I made...

This is the MP I have available to me:
Level 5 Convert Merit for Convert timer at 8 minutes 20 seconds ( 500 seconds )
Refresh +2MP per 3 seconds net (is actually slightly higher but no one really gets every Refresh recast perfectly on time)
Vermillion Cloak effectively +1MP per 3 seconds
Convert Ratio of 1212

500 seconds / ~3 seconds per tick = ~167 ticks

This gives me, each convert cycle:
+1212 MP for Convert
+334 MP from Refresh
+167 MP from Auto-Refresh gear

= 1713 net MP to spend in each Convert cycle

Also note that I've figured in 3.3 castings of Refresh during this period, which is an additional 133MP, so my actual MP available/spent during that 500 seconds is 1846MP.

Applying the 1.5% Conserve MP against that results in an additional average available MP to me of about 27 extra MP per cycle, which means the Magnetic Earring, when worn by me is worth ~+47MP on average.

These numbers go UP if I have Sanction in a ToAU zone, Sigil in a Campaign zone, or am participating in Beseiged where there are HP/MP booster items, MP restoration items, and JA restoration items.


Icemage

[Sabaron]

Re: RDM Earrings need some input

Applying the 1.5% Conserve MP against that results in an additional average available MP to me of about 27 extra MP per cycle, which means the Magnetic Earring, when worn by me is worth ~+47MP on average.

These numbers go UP if I have Sanction in a ToAU zone, Sigil in a Campaign zone, or am participating in Beseiged where there are HP/MP booster items, MP restoration items, and JA restoration items.


Icemage

Ah, yes... I forgot to add in the Refresh MP.

Yes, 47MP would put you at the 40% rest tier which is getting into the realm of RDMs who rest too much as far as Relaxing Earring goes which makes Magnetic better still.