Looking for BLM advice

Pasquale

Pasquale

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Hey all,

I feel weird making a thread about this, as my BLM is level 53, but I need to know how to play as a BLM.

I haven't leveled BLM in over 2 years, and I honestly cannot remember how.

Any "what to do in a party/while soloing" advice would be appreciated. I don't want to get a party invite, and look like a total noob in front of a bunch of strangers. (Instead, I chose to look like a total noob in front of all of you.)

Thanks.
 
If it should happen, that you actually find yourself in a party, wich is not 5x blm, 1 refresh wh*re, then remember your elemental debuff combo's. (Shock + frost is pretty standard, shock+burn+choke for mage type mobs, rasp+drown+frost for melee types).

Know what spell to use on what mob, in whatever MB (if you even get that lucky to see a SC happening). Usually its Blizzard(ga) or Thunder(ga) to go with.

Dont chain-nuke. Seen too many BLM's in pt, just nuking until they are either out of MP or dead... Most often the last.
Back in old days of regular pt's, I would wait for tank to do whatever he needed to have hate, then throw a Blizzard, maybe a tier 2. Then count to 15, and throw another. MB if needed. Or finish the mob with another nuke. BLM's are good at that.

Remember to keep your magic skills capped. Throw out aspir and drain once per fight, (aspir more often if fighting MP mobs). It should cap dark magic pretty fast. For enfeeb, usualy a Poison can do. Maybe even start with Dia, before Dia 2 comes in, to help enfeeble magic.

Stat-wise, as far I can remember, its elemental skill > MAB > INT > MP.
But for mobs with low magic def, MAB > elemental skill can work too.


For solo... well... Might wanna look up the BLM forum on allakazham. Seems like more data there, and a 19-75 guide too it seems. It usualy involve BST pets, and AM's.

Been a while since I lvled BLM, so dont know how much have really changed, except BLM now solo mostly.
 
Twist your melees' arms into actually using skillchains for a change, complete with TP and WS /p chat so you know it's coming, and can thus MB it. If partying with a BLU, they can and often will solo skillchain, so keep an eye out for that as well. Otherwise, it's already been mentioned - use the tools available to you, manage your MP well, and *manage your hate well* (debuffing or some very light nukes - or continuing to rest from the previous battle - gives the tank time to solidify some hate).

Also, while you are indeed a BLM, if stuff starts going majorly downhill, don't be afraid to touch your subjob and emergency cure. (Or if good on MP and the main healer isn't, backup cure for a while, while they get caught up.) Not recommending you should play healer in general (and hopefully situations that would call for your healing would be few and far between), but don't fall into the pitfall of so many BLMs who refuse to touch their sub even if it's called for.
 
Solo is where you'll get a majority of your experience now. Once you can solo in ToA, it gets much better though with the increased experience. I found myself soloing all of 65-75 in around 1-2 months. I saved my experience ring solely for BLM and made sure I used it once a day, twice on last charge when timer resets with full charge. I tried to maintain a goal for each day, around 10k seemed to work, but sometimes I just didn't have time and did just the 3k exp with ring.

Pre-ToA, you'll end up fighting mostly BST pets. Gustav tunnel has some leech pets on gobs in the lower areas, but I believe those are mostly DC-EM at your level. Those can be killed one shot with a quick AM, rest until one repops and repeat. Be careful; however, in the odd event a resist occurs, it can be deadly. I believe at your level, you can start in Pso'Xa. There is a camp with a few VT BST pets, but I don't know the exact place other than it's the 60 cap area. I tried to enter it once, but I got lost in it since its a stupid maze. I'd try getting info on that. Also, always do a quick search, usually some people already there. Perhaps you can form a party too? After that, at around 57-60, try Newton Mova. There is a couple of lower level BST pets one of which is at zone for safety. Only problem is you can only chain as long as BST pet respawns fast, but with the 1+ min respawn, you are limited to chain 3 tops.

At around 60+, I believe as soon as level 63, you can solo Qiqirn Ranger type mobs. I forget the zone name, but the first camp is in the zone off of Wajoam Woodlands. On those, for myself as a mithra, I had two full sets of gear, MP and INT/Mag.att. Because these are rangers, they will use ranged attack if you stand a fair distance from them, they only used ranged and ranged attacks will not interupt spell casts. So just nuke away with your hardest spells. Use MP set, empty it and then put in mag.att for more damage. Buffs are not entirely neccesary although on Tarus it might be, I usually used drain once midfight to get more HP and then resting MP usually got me to or near full. Make an enfeebling macro as well. Test a single mob and if you cannot kill before completely emptying MP save 60ish, then try to use sleep and if resisted, use ES+SleepII. The test is two fold, one to check resists on nukes and if you can last in a single attack and two to test if you will be resisted on sleep. Lastly, there is a danger with fighting Qiqirn, that being they tend to fight like any normal mob, but sometimes they like to run away. They're bastards like that. It's usually not an issue if it's into other type mobs or another ranger, but if it's any other qiqirn, you're just fucked. Keep RR up. You can do qiqirn to 75, just need to change areas for higher level mobs.

Sorry, didn't have time to actually organize my thoughts, my boss just got in. :ph34r:
 
on top of not chain nuking, don't start off the fight with ur highest spell, i know it seems common sense, but u'd be amazed at how many blms do that. do what kanash said and start with the elemental debuffs as those help the party and lets ur tank build hate (if u 4get which of those stack, sort ur black magic and its every other one on the list from the menu (thank you pomp for teaching me that) i can't remember if its the one above or the one below that makes whichever one u cast wear off, and the other way it would say No Effect. hmm for skilling up dark, if your party already has someone casting Dia2 on it (and its the effect of dia they want) u can cast bio on it to skill up and it won't write over it. If you are gunna pull hate (SC at the beginning) put up blink/stoneskin/phalanx and maybe shock spikes. altho having those up is a good idea at all times. (AoE and a taru blm = death)

one last tip i can think of. when ur soloing, it might seem like a good idea to put up spikes (like shock spikes to reduce the times u get hit) but it could screw u over when u have to sleep the mob. it weird, if u sleep it right when its hitting u, the spikes do damage to it and wake it.
 
Well, most info has already been given so you've got a good start. I'd say keep trying to find pt's until 60 if you can. Other than that, if you have other questions, look me up in game or here.

Peace,
Shmed
 
Good advice so far ^^

Only things that I don't see mentioned are:

Use Drain as much as possible. An unresisted drain with Dark Staff will generally do nearly as much damage as your penultimate tier nukes at a cost of 21 mp and the added bonus of being nearly hate-free damage if your hp is full. Casting this at the very beginning of a fight usually means it's ready to cast again near the end on an xp mob.

Use Bio(X) to finish a mob off. Bio does significant DoT and its starter damage is fairly high in proportion to its relatively low mp cost. It's really nice to use in parties when the mob's near death and the melee aren't closing out the kill fast.
 
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