Guard Skill Up

[Knightblade]

Okay, with all these skill threads popping up left and right, it got me realizing that I want to skill up guarding. It seems like a serious pain in the ass to level...Any suggestions as to what gear/mobs I should use/fight to skill up? MNK @75. Also, does anyone know if AGI would affect guarding just as it affects most other skills such as parrying/evasion/shield? Any information about Guarding skill ups would be greatly appreciated, and thanks. 8)

Edit: Guard@ low 100's

 

[Bajaratt]

Guarding is easily the most difficult and slowest skill in the game to level up. I used to go out for a couple hours soloing mobs and would be lucky to see +1.0 skill over about 3 hours. What I did was fight lesser colbiri right outside whitegate, although crabs in kuftal/boyahda tree would work just as well since they're pretty weak; that should take you up to 180-200 skill. After that I'm not sure, I stopped months ago because it was taking forever with almost no payoff. +AGI should effect your guard rate since it effects every other boxing skill, I'd always wear my Seiryu's Kote when I went for skillups.

 

[Skaw]

Besieged, strangely, has been the fastest flow of Guard skill for me, at 196.

 

[Calais]

Chigoe seem to be popular for parrying and shield skillups, I assume guard skill would work as well. (Of course, my mnk is 10, so it's entirely possible I'm wrong <_<)

 

[Doumoon]

Try doing it in Dynamis...
Let some monk Hundredfist you.. GL on surviving ^^

 

[Reko]

It's skillups, I dont see why guard would be tougher than parry, except that you dont usually tank on MNK.
But you dont usually tank on THF either and some of em have good parry anyhoo.

And like people said, +AGI and +Guard will help it proc more and therefor more chance of skillups.
It's all about fighting mobs at the right level compared to your skill.
Not compared to your EXP level.

I mean, I'm lv75 war, but I dont take my lv100-ish polearm to steelshells now do I?

So start fighting mobs that are T compared to your skill and just move on as you need.

 

[Bajaratt]

It's skillups, I dont see why guard would be tougher than parry, except that you dont usually tank on MNK.
But you dont usually tank on THF either and some of em have good parry anyhoo.

And like people said, +AGI and +Guard will help it proc more and therefor more chance of skillups.
It's all about fighting mobs at the right level compared to your skill.
Not compared to your EXP level.

I mean, I'm lv75 war, but I dont take my lv100-ish polearm to steelshells now do I?

So start fighting mobs that are T compared to your skill and just move on as you need.

Guard is considerably tougher because it kicks in significantly less than parry can; therefore you have a much less chance of even seeing a guard, let alone a skillup. Plus, you can parry with utsusemi active so you can get skillups without taking damage; with guarding you have to let them beat on you and then rest, so it takes much longer.

Guarding is much harder to level than parrying, those who say otherwise have never guarded before.

 

[Reko]

Guard is considerably tougher because it kicks in significantly less than parry can; therefore you have a much less chance of even seeing a guard, let alone a skillup. Plus, you can parry with utsusemi active so you can get skillups without taking damage; with guarding you have to let them beat on you and then rest, so it takes much longer.

Guarding is much harder to level than parrying, those who say otherwise have never guarded before.

My mnk is lv 50, and my guard is like 80...
So being lv75 with less than 100 says alot to me.


Ofcourse you guard less than you parry in general, how often do you tank?
And how often do you solo without nin sub?

All I said is that if you *want* to skill it it's not tougher.


Maybe tanks got better now, or maybe mnk's got worse.
Up to all those lv75 mnk/nin w/ 50 guard skill to answer I guess.

And yeah, resting in signet areas is a pain these days... >.>

 

[Bajaratt]

My mnk is lv 50, and my guard is like 80...
So being lv75 with less than 100 says alot to me.


Ofcourse you guard less than you parry in general, how often do you tank?
And how often do you solo without nin sub?

All I said is that if you *want* to skill it it's not tougher.


Maybe tanks got better now, or maybe mnk's got worse.
Up to all those lv75 mnk/nin w/ 50 guard skill to answer I guess.

And yeah, resting in signet areas is a pain these days... >.>

If you're going for guard skillups and you're subbing nin, you're retarded, end of story. No monk with a brain subs nin until 74+ anyways when they start cannoning in ToAU, so that's not even a valid point. I tanked a good portion(at least 10% of every fight) of leveling my monk up to 75, a year before monks had to sub nin to everthing and I still barely even saw a guard let alone a skillup. When I go for guard skillups, I sub whm; but only because I do not have pld or rdm leveled.

Your chance of guarding is lower than your chance of parrying, that means you WILL guard less and have fewer chances to get a skillup. Therefore, it's more work to level it up and therefore tougher. When you're soloing though it's 100% on you, and that's what I'm talking about for skillups. No shit you skillup parrying faster when you're tanking, stop acting like it's some kind of revelation when it's not even relevant to what I'm talking about.

There's a bunch of people with capped parrying, but almost no one with capped guard; obviously that means they're of equal difficulty. :wacko:

You don't have to rest as long with signet, you still have to rest more often without utsusemi.

 

[Rappa]

I tank a LOT on my mnk. It's currently lvl 58 and guard is around 70 or so. XP mobs do NOT skillup guard very fast at all. Honestly, if you want to skillup guard you need to do it on mobs that are too weak for faster skillups. The trick is to pull your weapon out and target some other mob so you don't hit the too weaks then let them wail away at you. It's way easier on pup than mnk because you don't counterattack. But you'll still get insanely faster skillups if you match your skill to the proper level mob (guard skill/3 + 3~5 = level of mob you want to fight).

Edit: Old pic when I was around lvl 40ish guard trying to skill it up on pup:
http://img353.imageshack.us/img353/619/skillinuptehguardde5.jpg

 

[Reko]

If you're going for guard skillups and you're subbing nin, you're retarded, end of story. No monk with a brain subs nin until 74+ anyways when they start cannoning in ToAU, so that's not even a valid point. I tanked a good portion(at least 10% of every fight) of leveling my monk up to 75, a year before monks had to sub nin to everthing and I still barely even saw a guard let alone a skillup. When I go for guard skillups, I sub whm; but only because I do not have pld or rdm leveled.

Your chance of guarding is lower than your chance of parrying, that means you WILL guard less and have fewer chances to get a skillup. Therefore, it's more work to level it up and therefore tougher. When you're soloing though it's 100% on you, and that's what I'm talking about for skillups. No shit you skillup parrying faster when you're tanking, stop acting like it's some kind of revelation when it's not even relevant to what I'm talking about.

There's a bunch of people with capped parrying, but almost no one with capped guard; obviously that means they're of equal difficulty. :wacko:

You don't have to rest as long with signet, you still have to rest more often without utsusemi.

I didn't say sub nin when you're going to skill.
I said you dont get as much random guard skills as parry, since most of the time mnk's sub nin.
But yes, mnk/nin to skill guard would be retarded.


I wonder though, where does it say that chance of a guard is lower than parry?
Or is it just "proof" you got from leveling mnk and other melee jobs?


The whole parry thing confuses me...

No shit you skillup parrying faster when you're tanking, stop acting like it's some kind of revelation when it's not even relevant to what I'm talking about.

and then...

There's a bunch of people with capped parrying, but almost no one with capped guard; obviously that means they're of equal difficulty. :wacko:

So... thought you said it wasn't relevant?

But again... (hope it get's through this time)...
More people have capped parry because you can get it all the time.
Guard you have to actually go out and work you ass off to cap.
And not many mnk's bother, since you dont really need that skill capped.


But. To get a 0.1 at lv 50 would be exactly as easy, wether it's parry or guard.

 

[Knightblade]

Thanks for the help guys, going to set out today and try to do some stuff you said. Also, I'm assuming guard skill+ would help as well?

 

[Reko]

Thanks for the help guys, going to set out today and try to do some stuff you said. Also, I'm assuming guard skill+ would help as well?

Yes, the more skill you have the more guard kicks in and the more chance of skillups.
Good luck, keep in mind, fight mobs EM > T vs your skill level.

 

[neophytal]

i tanked 50% or greater in xp parties from 60>75 and i didnt see more than 100 out of guard by 75.

currently, i think i am 105. yes, i solo tons. yes, i tank all the time when i solo (well duo cuz i use rones to cure myself).. i do have 3 evasion merits, and capped counter merits, which probably do hurt though.

this post annoys me because people who are lvl50 think that guarding is so easy to level, when in reality, most skills are easy to gain at lower levels anyways.

 

[Skaw]

I wish Guard was as easy to level as people think. It took me a year to go from 192 to 196.

 

[Blackchaoshero]

guard, facts of life.
A) i have, conclusively proved with a pen paper and months of time burning my eyes out in front of a screen that AGI does NOT affect guard at all. it does effect your evasion though, which helps you not get guard more. the only thing that will affect guard is your guard + gear.
B) Guard is harder to level than parry, or pre patch summoning skill. it started as and still is the hardest skill to level. this is an important note for ninja. i know ninja have lots of fun skilling parry, but at least you have a stat you can stack on and see drastic improvements in proc. also, your proc to skill rate is close to 25% higher. and you're tanking more. it's a lifelong goal. there exist, and have been probably a hundred nins with capped parry, there are probably in all of the game history like 15 guard cappers. and there are a lot of monks who solo a lot. there are a lot of monks who even tank. hell, /nin my monk damage tanks half a fight anyhow and it's still pretty gimp.
C) you aren't gonna cap it.

summary
i want to stress, conclusively parsed fact that guard has a lower ratio of proc to skill. we have no stat to boost, just skill+ gear.

 

[Knightblade]

guard, facts of life.
A) i have, conclusively proved with a pen paper and months of time burning my eyes out in front of a screen that AGI does NOT affect guard at all. it does effect your evasion though, which helps you not get guard more. the only thing that will affect guard is your guard + gear.
B) Guard is harder to level than parry, or pre patch summoning skill. it started as and still is the hardest skill to level. this is an important note for ninja. i know ninja have lots of fun skilling parry, but at least you have a stat you can stack on and see drastic improvements in proc. also, your proc to skill rate is close to 25% higher. and you're tanking more. it's a lifelong goal. there exist, and have been probably a hundred nins with capped parry, there are probably in all of the game history like 15 guard cappers. and there are a lot of monks who solo a lot. there are a lot of monks who even tank. hell, /nin my monk damage tanks half a fight anyhow and it's still pretty gimp.
C) you aren't gonna cap it.

summary
i want to stress, conclusively parsed fact that guard has a lower ratio of proc to skill. we have no stat to boost, just skill+ gear.

Oh, I know I ain't capping it, I got that in my head a loooooong time ago, but I want to get 150+ or so at least.

 

[Ryuhei]

It's definently easier on PUP. Not only do they not have to deal with Counter killing their targets, but they can sub WAR for Defender, and have a Puppet CureBot to save them if things get rough.

Also, PUP is more likely to solo exp in their career than a MNK, and as it's been said, when you're working with a low skill (like Guard will most likely be for you), fighting EXP level mobs won't help you. PUP solo's weaker mobs, most commonly, so they don't necessarily have to make Guard skill up an event to see results.

Here's a video of it [url="http://youtube.com/watch?v=MP5rA_xZKWU]the PUP way[/url].

 

[Reko]

I took all this "it's so much tougher" as a challenge, as I am one of the bigger skillup-nerds around...
Just getting some mnk gear and exp is a go. Then, guard skills baby, here I come

 

[Bajaratt]

I took all this "it's so much tougher" as a challenge, as I am one of the bigger skillup-nerds around...
Just getting some mnk gear and exp is a go. Then, guard skills baby, here I come

See you in 5 years when you cap it.