Downside of being a White Mage?

[sudo]

So far I've found the Pt skills for most american lead parties tend to be suffering. They are pretty good players but they almost always bite off more than they can chew and ultimately gets me, their whm killed. I've pt'ed a few times with the Japanese players and they haven't gotten me killed once yet. I guess they realized eariler on that 1 wa+1 whm+ 1 blm all at lv 10 can't take an Incredibly Tough mob where as the NA players seem to think that it's worth a try somehow. Espically grating is when I scream at them "wtf, wait for my mana to recharge damn it!" while they start attacking a dhamel and then blame me for not healing .... live and learn and die.... sigh... and you kind of wonder why windhurst is loosing territories to beastmen ...

I expect the skill levels to climb soon or else I might have to go learn japanese so I would stop getting killed in pt.

My solution: Just go solo. In 4 hrs of playing with pts, I got -300 exp. cause people kept getting killed. I got lv 11 in 1 hr on my own. I'm giving up the party racket till next month...

[Icemage]

Yep, when there are 2 WHMs, during such cases, most of the time, it'll be one WHM draining MP while the other rests, so while the other WHM is resting, I'll just charge into battle, enfeeble enemy while meleeing and use cure 1s so as not to get too much hate, when the party is about to use their WS, you'd most probably be having around 90% of your tp filled, so just whack away until the last guy uses Burning or Red, throw in your Seraph and let the party go wow at a WHM helping in a skillchain. ^^

Um... reread what I posted. Yes, at level 28, you can get away with a weapon skill every now and then. At level 50... forget it. You will miss half the time, even with max Club skill, and accumulate maaaaaaybe 5 TP per hit. At that level, you have NO TIME to attack - you are too busy casting healing spells because monsters are hitting your tank for 40-80 damage per hit, not including critical or special attack damage. You'd have to go about 35-40 combat rounds with no spellcasting to accumulate enough TP to activate a WS at that level, and if the fight lasts that long, you've already long since lost it because you've run out of MP and your entire party is dead.

That's why I asked StarvingArtist if he's seen a tactic that lets the WHM keep their TPs long enough to activate one of their GOOD weapon skills - I never saw a situation or tactical approach at higher levels that let WHM activate WS with any regularity.


Icemage

[Icemage]

Ahh... I get it. I hadn't realized that Hex Strike was literally "6 hits", much the same way Penta Thrust is 5 hits. Still, getting that first 100% has got to be hard unless your're not looking for XP - I imagine it IS pretty good when you're just item hunting weaker enemies, who will almost never evade.

That 1100+ damage with Sneak Attack is amazing though!

Thanks, StarvingArtist!


Icemage

[PetriW]

So far I've found the Pt skills for most american lead parties tend to be suffering. They are pretty good players but they almost always bite off more than they can chew and ultimately gets me, their whm killed. I've pt'ed a few times with the Japanese players and they haven't gotten me killed once yet. I guess they realized eariler on that 1 wa+1 whm+ 1 blm all at lv 10 can't take an Incredibly Tough mob where as the NA players seem to think that it's worth a try somehow. Espically grating is when I scream at them "wtf, wait for my mana to recharge damn it!" while they start attacking a dhamel and then blame me for not healing .... live and learn and die.... sigh... and you kind of wonder why windhurst is loosing territories to beastmen ...

I expect the skill levels to climb soon or else I might have to go learn japanese so I would stop getting killed in pt.

My solution: Just go solo. In 4 hrs of playing with pts, I got -300 exp. cause people kept getting killed. I got lv 11 in 1 hr on my own. I'm giving up the party racket till next month...

Mostly quite true but I find that with communication you can do a lot, adding one single skilled player to the party can make a world of difference.
Last night I got 3 warriors from completelly useless to nice people to group with. Observe how good players play (when you get a pt like that, people with a subjob or even better advanced job is what you should look for there) and tell the "less skilled" about that. I don't keep a Renkei chart but it actually might not be a bad idea to print one out. Once they see the damage they do on a successful renkei they will work on renkei, lots of "WOWs"!

Also, do us all a favor and teach your warriors how to taunt, lead them through how to make a Provoke hotbutton (<-- super important) and tell them when and how to use it if they don't know. If a warrior is bad friendly hints are usually taken, actually I've never left a group with the warrior performing bad, they may have been bad at the start but in the end I trust them, makes for good groups and I believe most warriors will remember it in a good sense. :sweat:
If you're uncertain about taunting just go read the warrior job forum.

Another very helpful macro that I started to use regularilly is:
/target <bt>
/check <bt>
Which I use to target mobs for debuffs, this way I always know what the mob cons, if the mob is too hard I can say so from the start, it's not that uncommon that the puller forgets to check.

I've also found that grouping at 10-11 is painful, solo to 12 is my recommendation. When waiting to get a pt invite you can solo just fine at 13 and 14 too.
And buy slow, too many WHM skip the spell due to lack of money, people won't mind you not casting Dia but they will mind you not casting slow.

The learning curve of FFO is pretty steep, there's a lot to learn and we could all use some help with it.

[sudo]

Thanks PetriW!

You've helped me restore some confidence back in the field :D!
Say, you know if it's a good idea to just solo maze makers with banish till lv 15? I know blm can do it but I'm not sure how effective whm can be.

[Icemage]

Don't try to solo worms as a WHM. It's painfully slow. Find one or more BLM and/or RDM and take them on as a team. You can offer them Barstonra defensively, which is very helpful against worms, along with being able to cast Cure and Cure II to heal damage from Stonega.


Icemage

[Leri]

Well this will be my first post.. but oh well!

I was wondering as a person going from a healing type in a different MMORPG to a WHM would want to focus on. I've played RO as well and was a priest for like a year and a half. I loved it until it became useless at high levels (90+) because even my priest with her one offensive spell could toast most enemies. Thats just no fun --;

I'm a warrior right now which I am only leveling to 30 for Summoner now.. I orginally wanted to try something new. Now I just want my healing spells back because healing is just more fun for me.

Obviously if everyones dieing then HP is most important. I've noitced one of my friend uses some tactics such as Regen to reduce her use on Cure II so she an focus on status effects...

But I was really looking for maybe party-play tips you could give me for starting off? Just use common sense?

(Please don't tell me to search.. )

[PetriW]

Well, as I understand it healing is needed at 70 too. :D

As for tips, use common sense and the keyboard instead of a gamepad (faster macros). Shouldn't be much different from iRO. Hmm, and yeah, make macros, lots of macros. For all heals, buffs, job abilities, targeting and whatever else you need. =)

[Navia]

Have to rant here, some parties piss me off.

I get in a group to hunt deadly weapons in saramugue, we get setup and kill one, just barely (tanks all down to half hp from the AE, i have about 30mp or so left). 150xp.
No 2nd whm, my backup healer is BLM/WHM to help keep the tank standing because chain casting myself barely keeps him alive or pulls aggro.

They wouldnt wait for full mp and still pull when their shell/protect wore off so I had to stand near the mob and recast these. Was told to rest when i'm trying to buff myself with blink or barsleep or trying to debuff it.
I was constantly on the verge of having someone die on me playing at such a rushed pace. It was nerve wracking and i've killed IT stuff before - maybe it was moreso because I was barely into level 30 and didnt want to die :sweat:

Well eventually it all went to hell in a later fight, got put to sleep by a deadly weapon when overhealing with divine seal to save the tank (thx for giving me no time to keep barsleep on the party). Black mage goes into full offensive mode and uses his best -ga spell which hits a nearby diving beetle and he runs for jeuno but dies before he makes it.

I stand there asleep while 1 tank goes down, wake up after a bit and use the rest of my mp to save the samurai thats tanking - get aggro and use benediction to keep myself alive because they cant get it off me. I die, the 3 remaining kill it shortly after.
Black mage quits party, I leave in disgust. No wonder WHM are so rare when we are constantly hounded to keep the fat xp chain going and told we are just there to cast cure over and over.

I should have just told them I would leave if they pull when i'm not ready. WHM should really dictate the pace of the group, I have never lost anyone when I call the shots.

[LeFaye]

You'll always find parties. If they pull stupid shit use trial and error. Eventually you will find a good PT.