BST sub = Solo job?

[Lokkin]

This actually occured to me yesterday but I didn't have time to post. The BST job is solo, pretty much for the charm effect, with sub, you do still get charm, I'm just wondering if a BST sub would make it possible for any job to solo? feedback would be appreciated.

 

[Svina]

AFAIK your charm range is severely limited, as in you will have more difficulty charming a monster in the range that a BST would have little to no trouble.

AKA, I saw a DRK/BST in boyahda yesterday camping aquarius with a pt... he did a scan on one of the robber crabs and they are EP to me at 74... I'm assuming he was 75, but it read "So and so would have much difficulty charming the Robber Crab"
...so Idunno. Try it. I sure as hell can't.

 

[Mathurin_]

The problem with /bst sub is charm is based on the beastmaster level, which is only going to be half of your main. Even if you could find a mob around your beastmaster level, it wouldn't last long against a mob around your main level. Not to mention you wouldn't get the beastmaster abilities until much, much later.
Though it would be awesome if you could use it to solo any job. ^^

 

[cocyte]

I have tested the option as a 12 WHM/BST and a 30PLD/BST. I can say that the last poster is wrong. Your charm capability is definitevely based on your main lvl and not on your sub.
However, I do have noticed a lot more fails with BST subbed. Someone on the BST forum on allakhazam have suggested that it could be linked to the level of your BST as main. Its seems that a 75THF/37BST have a lot more fails than a 75THF/75BST (even is BST is subbed and appears to be only 37), but i have not tested this issue.

I should add that using a BST sub is not doable with all jobs. Several successful experiences of WHM/BST had been reported, but WHM is a "good" main for BST sub :
- The enfeeblings replace the damages.
- the low damages leads to a good hate management.
But in my experience, I've discovered that lvling WHM this way is slow and risky (i've made 9->12 whm this way, but stopped at this point ... much easier and quicker to get a party even as a galka :lol: )

IMHO, a good BST "main" should have access to enfeeblings, and should not produce big hate pikes (believe me, you dont want to tank for your pet, even at low levels).

Dont forget too that the best pet command of BST "release" will not be available before 70 as a sub. And without this command, XPing, even as a BST main, is much slower than in a pt (1,5k to 2k per hour for me).

 

[Kelsilv]

In my experience, where a true BST can easily charm an Even Match pet on the first try 9 out of 10 times, a /BST would have around 6 or 7 out of 10 times success rate. Once you land it though the length of the charm is the same as if you were a main BST. Also, I did this with a NIN/BST combo, so it's possible that a higher Charisma job(such as BRD), would have a better success rate. At the time my BST job was at 30, while my NIN was at 25, so I don't think what Cocyte said about it being dependent on what your BST level "truly" is is true.

Other things to consider, is that as a /BST, you will never be able to use Jug Pets, and will never be able to use Pet Food, since both are dependent on items that only a BST main can equip.

Edit: I think I also tried a WHM/BST combo, but biggest problem I had with that was having trouble at the level I was in finding proper pets and appropiate mobs for them to fight.

 

[Veresko]

Humm, there was a thread about DRK/BST on alla not to long ago and that is actually something I have been wanting to try for some time, just need to level BST to an approriate sub level

From the informations I gathered while researching BST, your charm success is determined by your CHR vs the mobs CHR (The higher the mob, the higer the chr), AT THE TIME WHERE YOU USE CHARM!!! This is the key to DRK/BST. Find a DC mob or EP to be sure (at least the first try) and cast Absorb-CHR. It will increases your charisma by 5 and reduces hte mob's by 5 (at my level anyway), creating a 10 points gap. Combine that with proper food and +CHR gear when you charm (gear swapping) and I say you probably have a pretty good chance of charming, even if the first spell generated some hate.

The duration of the charm is determined by the level of the mob compared to you. So if you succesfully charm a pet, you do not have a greater risk of seeing the charm break then a regular BST.

Nice thing with DRK is you have a lot of ways to kill your prey fast. Charm, send your pet, watch the show or heal, cast some spell to help your pet if needed, try to have your pet killed when the mob has just a sliver of heatlh left, Last Resort (and maybe Absorb-STR at the end, should not get hate if the fight has been going on for a while) and slash the mob in half in one quick Scythe strike.

Anyway, this all looks good on paper but I have not tested it yet. I'll let you know if I ever do!

 

[Kurgon]

Yeah I leveled my wtm with a bst sub. I know that I haven't had a ton of experience with it but I've found that with /bst I was making a living on decent challenges and the occational even but trying to charm an even was riskier because the failure rate was a little higher. Some risk was also derived from from the fact that my main was a wtm. Waiting on the cooldown between recast of charm can be pretty scarey especially if you somehow fail on your second charm.

The hardest part is finding an area that is full of appropriate level mobs, like Kelsilv stated.

 

[Lokkin]

I was thinking that maybe with CHR+ gear, not to extremes of course but, you know, this might work, maybe we should talk to SE about it? if we can of course, would make the game a lot less party dependable, and you can switch subs whenever you feel like so its not like you will ALWAYS be alone.

 

[cocyte]

I would recommend a good old equipment swapping macro for handling the +CHR. It's very easy ... you put the /equip +CHR in your charm macro and the /equip +melee in your fight macro.

To answer the problem of Kelsiv and Kurgon (finding good pet/prey) i highly recommend the sticky in the BST forums of allakhazam about hunting places. very useful information here (but not completely up to date). My personal advice : avoid the regular partied/farmed zone. A lack of pet can kill a BST pretty quickly (and do kill your XP/hour).

Your idea about swapping between a regular sub and a BST sub to lvl your main depending on your needs is really nice (i had the same ), but i dont think it's doable in higher lvl range. The gap between each lvl become too important to lvl as a BST without release, imo.

 

[Duffman]

The problem with /bst sub is charm is based on the beastmaster level, which is only going to be half of your main. Even if you could find a mob around your beastmaster level, it wouldn't last long against a mob around your main level. Not to mention you wouldn't get the beastmaster abilities until much, much later.
Though it would be awesome if you could use it to solo any job. ^^

I completely stand behind these statements. It is almost to the letter
of what my reply was about to be. Good for farming i guess. I saw
a high level galka sam in the nest sam/bst and he was charming the
scorp that is near the secret room and was farming.

 

[Veresko]

The problem with /bst sub is charm is based on the beastmaster level, which is only going to be half of your main. Even if you could find a mob around your beastmaster level, it wouldn't last long against a mob around your main level. Not to mention you wouldn't get the beastmaster abilities until much, much later.
Though it would be awesome if you could use it to solo any job. ^^

I completely stand behind these statements. It is almost to the letter
of what my reply was about to be. Good for farming i guess. I saw
a high level galka sam in the nest sam/bst and he was charming the
scorp that is near the secret room and was farming.

I am not sure this is accurate. I never tried subbing BST yet, but from what I red in alla and on other places, the success of charm is not based on your BST level but on your Charisma vs the mob's charisma.

So if you sub BST, the charisma of your main job still determines wether or not your charm will succeed. Granted, it will probably be lower then if you had BST main at the same level, but it can always be boosted. Once it's charmed, your level difference with the mob determaines to duration of the charm (hence why BST switch to melee gear after).

So I am pretty sure you could still charm a DC mob with a BST sub and boosted CHR and keep it around you for the same amount of time as if you had BST main. (see the DRK/BST post above).

As I said, I did not try it yet, but from what other BST have told me and the information I could find, I think this is pretty accurate (Charm success and duration).

 

[Kurgon]

I never noticed a shortening of charms duration. Just that even charms would fail a little more frequently.

I have checked the leveling spot guides from Allakazham and I'll still run into some slow spots. Just have to power through it. Some levels are just perfect and you run through it easily and other levels are a little slower. You just have to determine if you are happy with lower xp but faster killing or if you want to take a little bit more risk. It's a fun class though. You have no excuses for things going bad except for user error.

 

[Kelsilv]

You have no excuses for things going bad except for user error.

If you can't find someone else to blame you just aren't trying hard enough! :twisted: