RB Final Fantasy XI Thread

[pierrot]

I'm a little surprised that there doesn't appear to have been a thread made for FFXI before. Granted, I didn't not search especially hard. Anyway, I feel like it deserves a topic, even though there probably won't be anyone posting in it other than Isiolia, or I.

Share your thoughts and feelings on this amazing, terrible, hair-pulling, jubilant MMORPG, which is now in it's 17th (!!) year of official operation.




I repeatedly take long hiatuses from this game, often with the intention of never coming back to it. As a result, I tend to progress very little in it, and I also tend to stop playing after making very little progress. Things are much easier than they used to be now, but I still ended up hitting a bit of a wall for what's really possible with my circumstances, a year ago. I had gotten to heights I hadn't really even dreamed of before, but I wanted more, much more. The meta is really all about the ultimate weapons, now. Weapons that take a fraction of the time they used to to make, but are far less "optional" for a lot of things. There are also a number of gatekeeper tasks these days that require groups for things like Vagary to unlock a higher level of reforged armor for Empyrean (read: Abyssea job specific equipment) sets. It bugs me that I can't upgrade my Bard Empyrean armor because no one ever does Vagary, and when they do, they're looking to steamroll it for certain items, and want people decked in very specific jobs that I don't have.

SE proffered a glimmer of hope for my kind, who can't really get into groups, with these new Ambuscade weapons. They're almost like mini-ultimates, with the dagger being about as good as, or marginally better than the two next best Thief daggers, with maxed out bonuses. I actually have a shiny Ephemeron for this, that people are clambering to get, because of how rare they are to acquire inside of their original content. I need a very large amount of Ambuscade Hallmarks to get it, though. This is apparently a very easy month to max out hallmarks on, with a group, but I don't think I'll be able to find anyone at this point to burn the frog down with. So it's the slow road, for me, probably.

I'm also thinking of putting in some more time on BRD, to work toward some of the Ultimate "Weapons" for it. At least the Gjallarhorn, and Carnwenhan. If I were able to get the ambuscade dagger, and the new neck for it, I could do a pretty solid DD BRD, which makes it seem very attractive to me. I love THF, but most groups don't. I'm also still trying to figure out how to win the game with SMN. I have heard that it can solo just about everything of consequence in the Escha areas, but I'm nowhere near that point yet, it seems. Probably not skilled enough, either.

[isiolia]

There are also a number of gatekeeper tasks these days that require groups for things like Vagary to unlock a higher level of reforged armor for Empyrean (read: Abyssea job specific equipment) sets. It bugs me that I can't upgrade my Bard Empyrean armor because no one ever does Vagary, and when they do, they're looking to steamroll it for certain items, and want people decked in very specific jobs that I don't have.

They did implement BCs to fight only the Vagary bosses. No loot, but you can unlock upgrades that way. I've never tried them, so I'm not sure how hard they'd be. Additionally, they did change the RoE for Vagary bosses (there are two per, so you get one of each of the materials they drop) from one-time to weekly. So, there are folks that will go pretty routinely to farm upgrade materials, since +3 Relic need them, and a number of crafts. The linkshell holder for the social shell I'm in, JTA, tends to put together a full run on Sundays after the reset (or pretty much every day during Vagary campaign). I'm sure he'd be happy to give you a pearl, and make a point to get you wins if you mention it. He's a very helpful dude.

This is apparently a very easy month to max out hallmarks on, with a group, but I don't think I'll be able to find anyone at this point to burn the frog down with. So it's the slow road, for me, probably.

You can split it up too. Total you need 26,250 Hallmarks, but, 10k of that is for the final upgrade, and Kaja is already solid. You don't get the Blau Dolch style crit bonus during TP is mainly the thing. The frog is very leechable, as a (very) good PUP can solo it on VD, or a couple of them and a COR. It's an interesting fight because if players are in range you basically need to stifle TP gain. I've been able to do it pretty easily on N with thrown-together MNK plus BRD and SMN for Mew, but D it seems to build too much TP during Chainspell from (I guess?) Occult Acumen. Or something. I'll still be going back to it for a bit, since I mostly just used up the vouchers I saved up during last month's Sahagin suckfest.

I'm also thinking of putting in some more time on BRD, to work toward some of the Ultimate "Weapons" for it. At least the Gjallarhorn, and Carnwenhan. If I were able to get the ambuscade dagger, and the new neck for it, I could do a pretty solid DD BRD, which makes it seem very attractive to me. I love THF, but most groups don't. I'm also still trying to figure out how to win the game with SMN. I have heard that it can solo just about everything of consequence in the Escha areas, but I'm nowhere near that point yet, it seems. Probably not skilled enough, either.

I would work on Daurdabla before Carn. Not saying it isn't good, I've started one on Firekeeper...but it's just usually lower priority. BRD does tend to be rough in that you want (and will make constant use of) all of the REMA. Song related at least. On the upside, only Carn even has the potential to be Afterglowed/augmented, so the long term cost is actually not too terrible.

The bump from three to four songs is usually the major one. Gjallarhorn is nice, but these days you're often looking at a potential +8-9 to a given song. Dropping that down to +6-7 will mean less than lacking an additional song slot entirely.
Carn is mostly for convenience until you get pretty high end. It basically lets you ride NiTro until the timer is back up again, which is only usually a big deal if you're rotating parties. Makes it easier to sing and go do whatever else, but you can already do over 9 minutes without one, which is long enough to last for a lot of battles already.

THF, I think a lot of groups will bring a good one if there's room, and it can be a really good DD. It's just generally hard to stand out as a melee, and rarer to find folks who have invested into support.

SMN can do quite a lot, and I've seen some high end solos with it (Papesse is probably the best), but it can vary. It's also gotten a reputation as a job to level to gear up others because of how common it is to use for farming Aeonics. For that, it's sort of a cheese strat - zerg down with Astral Flow/Astral Conduit before the NM's AI really clicks on. The downside is that if anything goes wrong, you probably lose in a hurry and have to go reset SPs.

While there may be some solos that only a SMN could realistically pull off, most things in that realm are potentially doable by BLU, SCH, RDM, PUP, RUN, or others. DNC maybe, which would synergize a lot with efforts towards THF.


Anyway, personally, I'm being less focused than would be ideal, as usual. Taking some advantage of the CP campaign for my main, got MNK to Su3 levels for Kendatsuba in hopes of doing D Ambuscade...but it still wasn't quite there. So, picking back up on PUP, which I'd spent a bit to collect attachments for a while back, but then took a break from the game.
Meanwhile, I should be farming Alex for the aforementioned Carn, Beitetsu to afterglow Death Penalty, or Detritus to augment Tizona (or one of my others that can be).

Recently my event LS has been pushing to polish off our first round of Aeonics together. So Cataid still has a few to finish (Reisen T3s, so nothing big) for Sequence, Firekeeper got a Marsyas, and Isi got...a Sequence...which I'd barely use now, but I got the KI for it years ago. Also focusing on Dynamis D masks, which we can't "win" yet, but can accrue damage towards unlocking. Last couple have been Sandy, attempted with a ranged strategy, so I've been able to shoot things instead of be on WHM.

[pierrot]

They did implement BCs to fight only the Vagary bosses. No loot, but you can unlock upgrades that way.

Oh snap, I saw something about this when I was looking through the year's worth of updates that I missed, but I forgot to check to see if these fights actually unlocked Empyrean 119 upgrades.

JTA

Funny you mention JTA, 'cause I've gotten help from him indirectly before, which was cool, but before this most recent hiatus of mine, I had asked him if I could go on one of his Vagary runs (maybe more than once, I don't remember), and he was pretty adamant about not letting me go. Especially not as THF. I'm pretty sure I caught him when he was just starting to shout for people, but maybe I didn't mention that I just needed clears. I can't remember. I actually noticed him shouting for Vagary participants this Sunday night, I think, too. He was looking for every job I couldn't possibly go as, though. Maybe I'll try asking him if he can keep me in mind for clears, if I can't beat those BCs.

You can split it up too. Total you need 26,250 Hallmarks, but, 10k of that is for the final upgrade, and Kaja is already solid.

Yeah, I know. I just kind of hate spamming Ambuscade solo. Especially when I know that I could be capped for the month in maybe an hour if I could just tag along to Mew with a group that's otherwise set. I was seeing a variety of very abuse-able strats for VD that mainly avoided TP feed. I can't even solo it on VE, but the normal ambuscade I can do on D, and maybe VD, so I'm pretty much stuck there. Also, it kind of sucks never getting galantry.

You don't get the Blau Dolch style crit bonus during TP is mainly the thing.

Oh, what? Is it only on Weapon Skill? It's not only when using Evisceration, is it? You don't happen to know if it's applied somehow to SA/TA, do you?

It's still a pretty big difference in base damage, and stats, though. The Kaja would help me out immediately, for sure, but the Tauret would actually be a huge bump for me. Plus, glowy.

I would work on Daurdabla before Carn.

Yeah, I technically have been working toward Herbaderb, for a quite a while. I'm still at 30 Iron plates out of 50--. I really hate farming for that crap in Abyssea. I'd probably rather farm Dynamis currency.

The bump from three to four songs is usually the major one. Gjallarhorn is nice, but these days you're often looking at a potential +8-9 to a given song. Dropping that down to +6-7 will mean less than lacking an additional song slot entirely.
Carn is mostly for convenience until you get pretty high end. It basically lets you ride NiTro until the timer is back up again, which is only usually a big deal if you're rotating parties. Makes it easier to sing and go do whatever else, but you can already do over 9 minutes without one, which is long enough to last for a lot of battles already.

Yeah, I mean, I could get to four songs on a number of things, with Clarion Call, but you're right. I actually have an All Songs +3 Linos, also. Gjallarhorn is technically within reach for me, though, even if I just bought currency. Maybe that would be better spent on Relic gun, though. I do want Carn for the convenience. I kind of care more about that than anything else, since I could kind of set it, and forget it, in favor of DDing. Really, I would need a Marsyas for BRD, but if I were even able to get an Aeonic Weapon, I'd really want it to be an Aeneas. Doesn't matter, though. Probably won't happen, either way.

Taking some advantage of the CP campaign for my main, got MNK to Su3 levels for Kendatsuba in hopes of doing D Ambuscade...but it still wasn't quite there.

Is Monk decent now, or is it still trash?

Dynamis D masks

What're those?

[isiolia]

I had asked him if I could go on one of his Vagary runs (maybe more than once, I don't remember), and he was pretty adamant about not letting me go. Especially not as THF. I'm pretty sure I caught him when he was just starting to shout for people, but maybe I didn't mention that I just needed clears. I can't remember. I actually noticed him shouting for Vagary participants this Sunday night, I think, too. He was looking for every job I couldn't possibly go as, though. Maybe I'll try asking him if he can keep me in mind for clears, if I can't beat those BCs.

Possibly. Something to keep in mind about Vagary is that it's very mage centric. To be fair, a good party can run through it no problem, but it's probably a matter of securing those key roles. Melees - even super decked out ones - are going to spend most of the run doing literally nothing. I know he takes people on whatever for unlocks though. Part of why I'd say to just get a pearl first though.

Oh, what? Is it only on Weapon Skill? It's not only when using Evisceration, is it? You don't happen to know if it's applied somehow to SA/TA, do you?

Just normal hits, not WS (which I think Blau did since technically TP drops to zero first). It's just a fairly good crit boost under 1k TP, so it suits Evisceration spam.

Is Monk decent now, or is it still trash?

Kind of mixed. Relative to the real heavy hitters, the spike damage isn't great. It's always been more about the regular melee hits, which add up a lot. Counter helps reduce damage it takes. The big thing is that MNK can do a lot to reduce enemy TP gain, so if a party is actually set up around that, it can make for a smoother if possibly slower fight. So it's a fit for this month's Ambuscade. The Su3 set - like most of them - has high magic evasion, along with Subtle Blow and TA.

What're those?

REMA augments need unlocking. There are basically three routes to doing that.

The "easy" route is to turn in 10,000 Job Points to Oboro. Per type. Which even splits off Ergons (Idris/Epeolatry) into their own thing. It's capped at 700 per week as well. So, it's the route anyone can take, but it's designed to be less appealing.

The other two are Dynamis D Wave 3. As soon as you kill one of the fetters (8 per zone, need to kill to open up elemental damage) you get a Mask of Darkness for that zone/race. Doing damage to the real boss fills a meter, I think 30,000,000 damage done finishes it. Which is cumulative between runs. Fill it, and you get the Mask of Light and can augment the REMA corresponding to the zone.

The hardest, but fastest way, is to actually kill the wave 3 boss. Only about 20,000,000 damage that way.

[pierrot]

Part of why I'd say to just get a pearl first though.

I suppose I could do that. I actually had someone give me a pearl for a social LS, randomly, while I was killing bats in Dho Gate. I ended up in a CP party with a number of them, and I don't think I've ever seen mobs that much higher level than me die so quickly. We started out with five in the group, and Sylvie. Wouldn't you know it, though, JTA shows up to fill the GEO spot. It's not his LS. I didn't get a chance to see if he was actually in this LS that I have a pearl for, though.

I could barely keep up with what was going on, even though all I really needed to do was engage, and hit a single macro for the skill chain, but there was a COR in the party who started talking about Vagary, at one point. I couldn't keep up with the party chat, though, much less mention that I still needed the clears.

How many Monsters+5-hour Energies do you need to keep up with your triboxing setup, Isi? The speed of the game these days makes my head spin a little.

I finally got the Dual Wield Job Point Gift on THF. So now I only need one Dual Wield+ item equipped when at haste cap, which means I can say "so long" to the Suppanomimi, switch my Shijo to path D, and swap Adhemar NQ body for Pillager's Vest +2. All somewhat marginal gains, but still. It makes me happy. Even more reason I need to get that Kaja or Tauret in my mainhand. It's gonna take me 16,250 hallmarks just to get the Kaja, though. I still need ~14,000 of that, which is about 46 times through Vol 2 VD. Takes me, probably, close to 10 minutes to get through a cycle of fight, and collect ambu primer, if everything is done optimally, so that would be almost eight straight hours of watermelons--.

Maybe this is the problem for me; That I'm always mathing out investments of things in this game. I see people throw around the notion that 'Oh yeah, Gjallarhorn is only 20 million gil, and that's nothing.' For one, it's not "nothing" for me, and I'd like to know how to make it nothing. For another, even with Asura prices, it's considerably more than 20 million gil, unless there's some way to buy the currency for well under 1000 gil a piece.

Oh, what? Is it only on Weapon Skill? It's not only when using Evisceration, is it? You don't happen to know if it's applied somehow to SA/TA, do you?

Just normal hits, not WS (which I think Blau did since technically TP drops to zero first). It's just a fairly good crit boost under 1k TP, so it suits Evisceration spam.

Oh I see what you were saying, now. So Tauret has the Blau Dolch bonus, and you were saying that it would be the main thing Kaja doesn't have. Got it. I found out last night that my eviscerations are pretty hot trash, garbage. Even with all the Frailty, and Minuets, my Evisceration didn't really do much more than what it would without all that. Rudras I could push 30K, but Evisceration was still hovering around 10K, with some spikes up around 15K. I don't have the Fotia gorget or belt, though. Can't imagine it would just be that, but I can't remember how difficult it would be to get them. For some reason I had sort of deemed them somewhat impossible for me to get.

The big thing is that MNK can do a lot to reduce enemy TP gain, so if a party is actually set up around that, it can make for a smoother if possibly slower fight.

That's cool that it has some utility now, anyway. So SE's fiddling did do something, at least?

The "easy" route is to turn in 10,000 Job Points to Oboro. Per type. Which even splits off Ergons (Idris/Epeolatry) into their own thing. It's capped at 700 per week as well. So, it's the route anyone can take, but it's designed to be less appealing.

Yeah, that sounds god awful, but apparently it's the route JTA was taking. I hope he was joking, but I don't know.

The other two are Dynamis D Wave 3. As soon as you kill one of the fetters (8 per zone, need to kill to open up elemental damage) you get a Mask of Darkness for that zone/race. Doing damage to the real boss fills a meter, I think 30,000,000 damage done finishes it. Which is cumulative between runs. Fill it, and you get the Mask of Light and can augment the REMA corresponding to the zone.

So it only has to be done once per category, or does it need to be done every time you want to augment a new REMA?

The hardest, but fastest way, is to actually kill the wave 3 boss. Only about 20,000,000 damage that way.

At damage cap, that's only about 200 WSs, not including any Umbras/Radiances, etc that might work their way in. That'd be maybe seven minutes with things firing off at a rate of ~5 seconds. That sounds pretty easy.

[isiolia]

How many Monsters+5-hour Energies do you need to keep up with your triboxing setup, Isi? The speed of the game these days makes my head spin a little.

I usually only play one of them "for real" at a time, as I don't automate. Folks that are running more than me tend to at least call on scripts. At most, I try to only be toggling between two of them quickly, with the third just there to do buffs.

Maybe this is the problem for me; That I'm always mathing out investments of things in this game. I see people throw around the notion that 'Oh yeah, Gjallarhorn is only 20 million gil, and that's nothing.' For one, it's not "nothing" for me, and I'd like to know how to make it nothing. For another, even with Asura prices, it's considerably more than 20 million gil, unless there's some way to buy the currency for well under 1000 gil a piece.

Some of it is bravado. With relic, the final stage does refund you 30 hundred pieces (like, you turn in a Stripeshell, and you get back the horn and 30 Jadeshells, which is why people often try to find a loan for that instead of buy all of them). However, many folks abuse Gain Experience. 99k Sparks and Accolades both can be converted into NPCable items for about 1M gil each (Accolades is tedious though, I think a lot of people bot that if they convert it). So if you're making a concerted effort during "gainz", you can do that several times, meaning you can make several million gil appear out of thin air. Then factor in those of us multiboxing... (I don't make a point to do that, just saying), and some people really can just materialize 20M for doing fairly little.

Folks that are farming a lot of Ambuscade will quickly turn to buying currencies there to sell. You can also farm things like Swarts (for augmenting REMA) from Omen - a solo THF can often pull in 10-20 of them doing the farming path there, and a stack of them tends to float between 18-20M (Justanotherdude does this a LOT on THF and could give tips). Folks doing Dynamis may accrue materials/medals from there to sell, or you can get them randomly from the Moblin Mystery Boxes. Or just plain farm stuff like Salvage.
A few years back, I could never see myself ever having the kind of gil that it takes to fund REMAs...but it's something that ends up coming together easier than you think if you work at it.

Oh I see what you were saying, now. So Tauret has the Blau Dolch bonus, and you were saying that it would be the main thing Kaja doesn't have. Got it. I found out last night that my eviscerations are pretty hot trash, garbage. Even with all the Frailty, and Minuets, my Evisceration didn't really do much more than what it would without all that. Rudras I could push 30K, but Evisceration was still hovering around 10K, with some spikes up around 15K. I don't have the Fotia gorget or belt, though. Can't imagine it would just be that, but I can't remember how difficult it would be to get them. For some reason I had sort of deemed them somewhat impossible for me to get.

Stacked or not? Evisceration is usually seen as being a weaker stacked WS. It shines more unstacked, or nice as a linker with Rudra's too. Also does benefit from different gear, including the stuff you mentioned.

That's cool that it has some utility now, anyway. So SE's fiddling did do something, at least?

Not especially - the MNK update pushed H2H accuracy cap to 99%, which helped out Impetus a bit. Performance still really, really depends on making optimal sets for when different JAs are up, and adjusting WSes. It's more content driven. Stuff like this month's Ambuscade, or some of the new HTBs, really encourage actually bothering to set things up around minimizing mob TP use (there are some high tier Reisen NMs that do too, but usually those are handled with not engaging at all). Ruamoko went into it a lot in his job video, and it's something NIN (particularly) can shine with as well.

Yeah, that sounds god awful, but apparently it's the route JTA was taking. I hope he was joking, but I don't know.

He has already gone that route. Twice. (Mythic and Empyrean) He's out CP'ing very often as a result, but always seems open to inviting people if there's room (based on LS chat at least).

So it only has to be done once per category, or does it need to be done every time you want to augment a new REMA?

It's a permanent KI once you get it. Can augment as many as you like of that type. Technically, you do get a new temporary mask of darkness and complete it over and over, but it just rewards crystals for augmenting after the first time.

[pierrot]

I usually only play one of them "for real" at a time, as I don't automate.

Yeah, actually, I get the sense that this is what the RDM was doing (Mirnaid, I think was his handle). He had another character decked out in the BRDness, but was just setting songs, and probably going back to RDM, I think. That makes sense. Even still, just what he was doing on RDM (because he was also pulling, and main healing) made me think there's probably no way I ever play those main mage jobs. I mean, I died more than once, and the COR, and other THF also died at least once, so it wasn't necessarily that he was perfect, but I was still in awe.

Some of it is bravado. With relic, the final stage does refund you 30 hundred pieces (like, you turn in a Stripeshell, and you get back the horn and 30 Jadeshells, which is why people often try to find a loan for that instead of buy all of them).

Oh~, that suddenly makes so much more sense, but even still, that's some shady accounting.

However, many folks abuse Gain Experience. 99k Sparks and Accolades both can be converted into NPCable items for about 1M gil each (Accolades is tedious though, I think a lot of people bot that if they convert it).

Yeah, I do the Acheron thing when I cap sparks, but it's not all that often that I get to do that. I thought about the accolades one, but that's way too tedious without a script. With multiboxing, sure, I could see it being very effective. I'd like to be at the point where I could farm ambuscade for all the REMA upgrades, but I still need too many equipment things from it. So, I also don't really see how that's an especially effective newbie strat, either.

You can also farm things like Swarts (for augmenting REMA) from Omen - a solo THF can often pull in 10-20 of them doing the farming path there, and a stack of them tends to float between 18-20M (Justanotherdude does this a LOT on THF and could give tips).

Whoa! Okay, I need to look into this. I need to get some paragon cards anyway, even though I'm probably not going to get the scales for it regardless.

Stacked or not?

Unstacked--. I have that gear set leaning more towards multi-hit, and crit, but I haven't put as much work into it as the Rudra's set. I don't have that Tonberry ring either.

[isiolia]

Whoa! Okay, I need to look into this. I need to get some paragon cards anyway, even though I'm probably not going to get the scales for it regardless.

Campaign is still on for cards, so it's a good time. Main thing I'd say is to bring something to pull with, so you don't need to get too close. Mobs there don't link, but they do have a wide aggro range.

Scale for THF (and RUN, DNC, and NIN) is Gin, who is the easiest one by a good margin. I've triboxed it many times. Midboss is more of the deciding factor - if your group can do that, they should have little issue with Gin. Or I can probably take you.

[pierrot]

Oh, for some reason I though it was Kin, but you're right. I need all kinds of Omen things, but I'm probably not out of the "deadweight" category for that content. I can farm fairly effectively in there, at least, unless you're talking about some new area that was added to Omen, or something. There seemed to be some Omen stuff being done by a few of the people in that LS, last night, but I think it was probably for an event shell. Wouldn't mind the help, but I need cards first, anyway. There's a free scale from the content RoE, right? Maybe if you happen to need something from Gin, and you can take me along with you, then I wouldn't have to feel like quite so much of a charity case.

[isiolia]

You get one scale from the respective RoE yeah. Would be nice if it was a repeatable one, but it isn't.

Only drop I haven't gotten from Gin is Ashera Harness, and the body drops are incredibly rare (many that people have now are from AMAN Trove, not Omen ). Still, there's always that chance
Or you do need to kill all the other bosses for KIs for an Ou pop. It's sort of like Einherjar where it wipes all KIs for participants when you go up to Ou's floor, so you usually get pop sets on alts and rotate them in. I've yet to need to go farm the KIs I can get myself for my event LS...but it's a possibility.