Abyssea

[KoLAddict]

I hear that Abyssea is one of the best places to level. How do you get there, and do I have to do any pre-requisite quests? I play on Cerberus if that helps (I'm planning on renewing my subscription this weekend).

[Takelli]

Re: Abyssea

Get level 75 first, get the pearls from the guy that hands them out in jeuno (Can't remember his name.), unlock all the zones you can, and just find a random group that will go into Abby.

[Firewind]

Re: Abyssea

It's generally not a good idea to go to Abyssea before 75 because

1) Your weapon skills will be gimped to the point where you're useless at 99.

2) You won't learn much about your class.

3) You also miss out on a lot of fun with exploring the world

[Raydeus]

Re: Abyssea

It's always a good idea to unlock access as early as possible so you start getting stones. But going in there before getting your first job to 75+ is a very bad idea.

[KoLAddict]

Re: Abyssea

Is there a good place to level before then? I'm level 40/32 and all I've been doing, because I have never been able to find a group on Cerberus, is soloing mobs, which takes forever. Since gear is so expensive on the AH I'm sure my gear is the biggest problem, but I'm sure there's somewhere better for me to level grind if I have to solo mobs. I'm in the area east of Jeuno.

[Raydeus]

Re: Abyssea

I've heard GoV is pretty good for leveling, but now that I think about it leveling seems to go so fast nowadays it may not even make much of a difference whether you level inside or outside Aby. <_<

[KoLAddict]

Re: Abyssea

Well as far as solo leveling goes, it is definitely faster than it used to be, but it is still slow. At least for a first job.

What's GoV if you don't mind me asking? I'm fairly familiar with location names, but I'm not familiar enough with XI that I know the abbreviations.

[Raydeus]

Re: Abyssea

Grounds of Valor. Sadly I have close to zero experience with it because I quit not long after they were implemented. <_<

[KoLAddict]

Re: Abyssea

Oh those, thanks. I have heard of those, my problem is that whenever I find one in a level bracket I am in so I can do them, the enemies are harder than I can kill.

EDIT: Unless it was changed and you can complete pages on mobs that award no experience for you.

[Drkray]

Re: Abyssea

at lv 40 you can check crawler nest alliance party for GOV.

[Yygdrasil]

Re: Abyssea

Get level 75 first, get the pearls from the guy that hands them out in jeuno (Can't remember his name.), unlock all the zones you can, and just find a random group that will go into Abby.

This response was so painfully vague it made me want to cry. Stand-by while I find the Abyssea guide I wrote a while back.

- - - Updated - - -

Let me begin by saying that there is a much more detailed version of this very same guide on the FFXI wiki page... but I've heard from a number of people that the way they describe things can tend to be in a bit... too much detail.

I've taken the liberty of shortening their guide into a much quicker read that will hopefully help out those of you who are brand new to Abyssea and are feeling a bit overwhelmed by the whole thing.

ABYSSEA 101: For Beginners

*You must be at least level 30 to progress in the storyline. Before doing any of these quests, make sure you're on a job that's 30+*

1) Go to Port Jeuno and speak to Joachim at H-8. After a CS you'll get a KI called a Traverser Stone.

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A little about Traverser Stones...

- These stones are traded to an NPC just inside of any Abyssea zone to extend the amount of time you can stay inside (by 30min each).
- Once you finish this CS, Joachim will start to produce 1 Traverser Stone/20 (earth) Hours.
- To start, you'll only be able to hold a maximum of 3 on you at any time. Joachim has no limit... so don't worry about letting them stockpile.
- By speaking to him you can ask him to give you some, ask him how many he has for you or if he has none... how long it will be before your next one is ready.
- There are various ways to increase the potency of the stones... but we'll cover that later when I talk about Abyssite.

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2) After speaking with Joachim and getting the CS and your first stone, head to any of the 9 Cavernous Maws.

Visions of Abyssea Areas
Abyssea - La Thein Plateau @ (E-4) La Thein Plateau near the zoneline to Ron.
Abyssea - Konschtat Highlands @ (I-12) Konschtat Highlands near the zoneline to Gusta
Abyssea - Tahrongi Canyon @ (H-12) Tahrongi Canyon near the zoneline to Saruta

Scars of Abyssea Areas
Abyssea - Vunkerl Inlet @ (J-8) Jugner Forest East of the OP
Abyssea - Misareaux Coast @ (I-9) Valkurm Dunes South-East of the OP
Abyssea - Attowah Chasm @ (F-7) Buburimu Penninsula West of the OP

Heroes of Abyssea Areas
Abyssea - Uleguerand Range @ (H-8) Xarcabard near the OP
Abyssea - Altepa Desert @ (G-7) South Gustaberg near the zone to Bastok Mines
Abyssea - Grauberg @ (G-6) North Gustaberg on the opposite side of the map from the OP

Upon arriving at and examining one of the Maws... you'll receive a cutscene. After it ends, enter the maw and you'll be inside the "Base camp".

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A little about visitant status...

- Once you enter you'll see a message in your chat log that says you have 5 minutes before being ejected. If you remain inside the zone for more than that 5 minutes without getting "visitant status", you'll be warped out and not allowed to enter again for 1 (earth ) hour.
- To extend this time, speak with an NPC called the Conflux Surveyer (Flanked by 2 other NPCs near a Nation Flag) and select the option to "extend your visitant status".
If this is your first time inside of an Abyssea zone do not use your stone yet. You'll need it to progress to the next CS. If you use it, you'll have to wait 20 (earth) hours before Joachim will have another one ready for you.
-The most you can extend your visitant status to from this NPC is 120minutes. Any time beyond that is lost. To start, each stone is worth 30 minutes... so 4 would grant you 120 minutes.
- You can check how much time you have left at any time by resting.
- When you leave an Abyssea zone, any time you have remaining will be saved and can be used in whatever zone you choose to go to next. (this time is capped at 120minutes. Anything time you have in excess of 120 will be lost when you leave the zone)
- Your Visitant status continues to tick down if you log out while inside of Abyssea, so it's highly suggested that you zone out before logging off if you'll be gone for a while. If you don't, you'll log back in to find yourself outside of that zone's maw and unable to re-enter for 1 (earth) hour.
- If you find yourself running low on time, you can always return to the NPC and trade in more stones to extend your time further.
- There are ways to extend your time in each zone without using stones, but I'll cover that later.

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3) After getting your CS at one of the 9 Maws and entering for your first time, you can now return to P. Jeuno and speak to Joachim again. This will flag the next 9 quests in the series. In order to trigger these CS you will need to be in posession of at least 1 Traverser stone. If you do not have one on you, you will simply enter the maw without recieving the CS.

- Each of the next 9 quests are triggered separately when you examine each of the 9 maws. You'll get a short CS about the "Terrible Beast" that is terrorizing that zone. This beast is the "Mega Boss" for that area. Defeating it and zoning out of that Abyssea area will complete the quest. Credit for completing these quests is determined by your title. If you manage to kill any of these bosses before you flag its respective quest, it will still count as a win after the quest has been properly flagged. More on that later.

- At this point, you are free to visit any of the 9 zones. After the "Mega Boss" CS AND entering the zone AND receiving visitant status, you will be able to warp directly to that zone's Maw by speaking to an NPC named Horst (He's the one standing right next to Joachim) for the fee of a small amount of cruor. There are also versions of these 2 NPCs in each nation who perform the same tasks as Horst and Joachim. These NPCs do not flag quests. They are located at in the Port Zone of each nation (as well as the Chocobo Circuit and Ru'Lude Gardens).

Congratulations! You now know how to get in an stay in! Now... here comes the fun part... how things work in there.

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A little about EXP...

- Experience gain works very differently in Abyssea. The game... it has changed.
- Abilities such as Corsair's Roll and items such as Empress Band that normally increase your experience gain do not effect experience in Abyssea.
- Experience can be gained by defeating mobs, completing quests and from treasure chests called "Sturdy Pyxides".
- You can increase the amount of experience you gain from mobs in 2 ways: By killing the same type* of monster repeatedly, or by collecting Golden Lights (I'll cover lights later).
- Unlike the standard kill chain of yester-year, this one does not break on it's own and your experience points/kill will not change until you either zone, or kill a mob of a different type.
- If you aggro a mob of a different type and do not want to break your chain, you can Call for Help. Mobs who have been called for help on will not break the chain.

*When I say same type, I don't mean creature type. The mobs you're killing must all have the exact same name*

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A little about Cruor...

- Just like many activites in FFXI, Abyssea has it's own form of currency called cruor.
- Cruor is obtained from killing mobs, completing quests and from treasure chests called "Sturdy Pyxides".
- Cruor is not tradeable and is exclusive to you.
- Cruor is spent to do just about everything.
- Cruor is also... very very easy to obtain, unlike gil.

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A little about Sturdy Pyxides...

- Pyxides are just treasure caskets, renamed.
- There are 3 types with 3 distinctly different contents:

Blue Pyxides contain one of the following:
- An assortment of random temporary items
- A constant (see: always the exact same) assortment of temporary items
- Cruor in various amounts between 250-1000
- Experience Points in various amounts between 250-1250
- A Strangely Familiar Stone Fragment. These extend your visitant status by 10 minutes.

Red Pyxides contain Abyssea Lights of various strengths: (explained later)
- Ruby
- Pearlscent
- Azure
- Amber
- Ebon
- Gold
- Silvery

Gold Pyxides can contain any of the following:
- Key items (used to pop NMs)
- Various augmented weapons
- Assorted treasure
- Temporary Items
- AF3 Feet (In Visions of Abyssea areas only)

You can glean the contents of a Pyxide by examining it and selecting the option to "sneak a peak" inside. It's pretty self explanatory after that.

You can open a Pyxide in 1 of 2 ways. You can either play out the chance-based mini-game specific to that type of Pyxide or alternatively, you can purchase items called "Forbidden Keys". Forbidden keys are purchased from an NPC called the Cruor Prospector (standing to the left of the Conflux Surveyor in every zone) for... you guessed it... cruor. If you're just starting out, you likely don't have enough cruor to afford to buy any of them, but that’s ok... nearly everyone in every party you join has plenty and you won't have to worry about them right away.

*To open a chest using a Forbidden Key, all you need to do is trade the key to the Pyxide and it will open... using up the key.

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A little about Lights…

- As I listed earlier, there are 7 different types of Lights that can be collected and accumulated in Abyssea… namely Ruby, Pearlscent, Azure, Amber, Ebon, Gold and Silvery.
- Each Light has a different effect on you that increases as you collect more.
- Your current Lights total can be viewed at any time by resting.
- Every Light besides Gold, Silvery and Ebon* can be obtained from killing mobs. Gold and Silvery are only obtained from Red Pyxides.
- When you obtain a light, it not only goes to you, but to every member of your party/alliance.
- Lights are reset if you zone out of Abyssea
- Lights obtained from mobs are determined by the killing blow.

Ruby Lights:
- Increases the rate at which Red Pyxides appear
- Obtained from killing a mob with a physical weapon skill.

Pearlscent Lights:
- Increase the drop rate of Blue Pyxites
- Obtained from killing a mob with a regular melee attack

Azure Lights:
- Increase the rate at which All Pyxides appear
- Obtained from killing a mob with Magic

Amber Lights:
- Increase the rate at which Gold Pyxides appear
- Obtained from killing a mob with a magical weapon skill

Ebon Lights*:
- Increase the amount of cruor/exp gained from killing mobs
- Obtained occasionally from killing NMs and from Red Pyxides

Gold Lights:
- Increase the amount of experience gained from killing mobs
- Obtained from Red Pyxides only

Silvery Lights:
- Increase the amount of cruor gained from killing mobs
- Obtained from Red Pyxides only

There is a cap on how many lights can be obtained.
Ruby: 255
Pearl: 230
Azure: 255
Amber: 255
Ebon: 200
Gold: 200
Silvery: 200

*It’s important to note that not every mob will drop every type of light. It is best to refer to the complete list of mobs and the lights they drop on the wiki page. Type “Abyssea Lights” into the search bar and about halfway down the page you’ll see graphs that have been drawn up to denote what mobs drop what types.*

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Notorious Monsters

There are many types of NMs in Abyssea with many different ways to fight them.
Timed Spawns
Force Spawns
KI Spawns (Key Item)
VNM (Voidwalker Notorious Monsters)
Special Circumstance

Timed Spawn NMs

These work the same way as they do outside of Abyssea, namely that they spawn in a designated territory and wander it until claimed and killed. Unlike the timed spawns outside of Abyssea however, these ones have repop timers that are much lower. Most repop within 15 minutes while others repop at worst 1 hour later.

Force Spawn NMs

These NMs are popped by trading a rare item (see: the items themselves are labeled rare… not rare to come by… so you can only hold 1) to a designated ??? spot.

As a general rule, the pop item can be obtained from killing the mobs of the same family as the NM that are in the area surrounding the ???.

Example: A Crawler NM named Pascerpot is popped using a rare item called Crawler’s Floatstone. The floatstone drops off the normal crawler mobs that spawn all around the ???.

All of the pop items used to spawn these NMs can be bought and sold on the AH under Misc>>Other.

*In some cases, the pop item to spawn an NM is a drop off of another NM.
*In other cases, multiple pop items are required to pop a given NM.

KI Spawn NMs

These NMs are popped by being in possession of 1 or more KI. These KI are dropped off of NMs within the same zone. The drop rate on KI is low naturally, but can be increased to a 100% via “Weakness Targeting” (I’ll cover weakness targeting later).

*KI will only drop to the person who originally claimed the mob it drops from. If the NM is a free-roaming NM, the person you claims it will receive the KI if it drops. If it’s a force spawn NM that drops the KI, the person trading the pop items will be the one who obtains the KI.

Similar to the Force Spawn NMs, these one have a ??? spot somewhere in the zone that you need to check while in possession of the necessary KIs in order to spawn the NM.

Voidwalker Notorious Monsters (VNM)

This system was introduced exclusively to Abyssea and can be a bit confusing if you’re learning it for the first time. I’ll try to make it simple.

To begin, you will need to purchase a “Clear Demilune Abyssite” KI from the Cruor Prospector (in any zone) for 300 cruor.

Using this Abyssite, you can now hunt down the Tier 1 VNMs. Yep… that’s right… it’s a Tier system, sweet huh?

VNMs are unique and challenging in that they are INVISIBLE and tend to wander very large territories. They are not aggressive until claimed… so don’t freak out about invisible mobs just yet.

The only way to claim a VNM is by resting on top of it while in possession of the correct Demilune Abyssite.

While in possession of your Clear Demilune Abyssite and resting inside of an Abyssea zone, you will receive a message in your chatlog (on top of the message you already get about visitant status and lights count… enuff info SE?). This message can say a number of things… each one pertaining to the location of the VNM you’re after. The messages are as follows:

“The abyssite quivers ever so slightly, and emits a feint light”
This means that the VNM you’re hunting is up… but not near your current location.

“The abyssite quiver ever so slightly, but emits no light”
This means that the VNM you’re hunting is not up… or is claimed and being fought.

Or something along the lines of…

“Your abyssite emits a strong light that goes “lancing off”
… and will provide you with a distance and direction.

Run your character in the direction that the message says and rest again. 1 of 2 things will happen.

You’ll get the message “A Monster Appears out of Nowhere!” and just like it says… the NM will appear claimed to the person who popped it. Or you’ll receive a new set of directions to follow. As these NMs are almost constantly moving, it’s hard to pinpoint them exactly and you may be forced to play hot and cold for a while.

After defeating a Tier I VNM, your Clear Demilune Abyssite has a chance (around 10-20%) to turn into a Colorful Demilune Abyssite. If this happens, you will no longer receive messages about the locations of the Tier I VNMs, but rather… the Tier IIs.

Each zone has an abundance of Tier I VNM spawns. All of them are exactly the same and many are up at the same time. Most can be solod by just about any job.

Clear and Colorful Demilune Abyssites can be used in any zone to pop any Tier I or Tier II VNM respectively.

As you probably guessed, fighting and defeating Tier II VNMs has a chance to change your Colorful Abyssite. What color it changes into depends on the zone you’re in. For example, defeating Koios (The Tier II VNM in Abyssea - Altepa) has a chance to change your Colorful Demilune Abyssite into an Emerald Demilune Abyssite. From now on, that Abyssite will only track the Tier III (Final Tier) VNM in Abyssea – Altepa.

Once you pop the Tier III VNM, your Abyssite will break and will be lost. You only have 1 shot at the Tier III, so make it count or you’ll be starting from scratch.

Special Circumstances NMs

These are a few of these… with some strange and sometimes inventive methods of spawning. Because they’re all unique, there’s really nothing to teach. You’ll have to learn about them as you research them.

There’s one that flies around above your heads in Abyssea – Konschtat. You need to stand directly under him to force it to land.

There’s one that you need to actually FEED a different NM to in order to make it targetable… kinda fun.

There are others… but those are just a few examples.

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A WHOLE BUNCH about Weakness Targeting…

This is a system introduced with Abyssea that allows players to “Stagger” NMs by targeting their various weaknesses. By exploiting these weaknesses, party members can increase the drop rate on Equipment, Weapons and Upgrade Materials as well as Atmas and Abyssites.

There are 3 types of weaknesses:

Red !!
- Produced by a randomly determined Elemental Weapon Skill
- Increases the drop rate of Atmas and Abyssites to 100%

Blue !!
- Produced by a randomly determined Physical Weapon Skill
- Greatly increases the drop rate of Equipment and Weapons

Yellow !!
- Produced by a randomly determined Magic Spell
- Greatly increases the drop rate of upgrade materials for AF3 Empyrian Armor

Although each of these categories of possibilities seems daunting… there are tricks to narrowing down the possibilities.

1) Each NM’s Weaknesses are randomly generated the moment it’s claimed. It will have exactly 1 possible proc for each color. No more. No less.

2) From testing we know that not every weapon skill/spell is a possible weakness trigger. There is a complete list of the ones proven to work on the wiki page. To see it, type “Weakness Targeting” into the search bar and scroll down until you see the diagrams.

3) Blue Weaknesses are tied to the Time of the Vanadiel day the NM was claimed.
- If it was claimed between 7:00 and 14:00, the weakness will be caused by Piercing Weapons… namely Archery, Marksmanship, Dagger or Polearm.
- If it was claimed between 14:00 and 22:00, the weakness will be caused by Slashing Weapons… namely Sword, Katana, Axe, Scythe, Great Axe, Great Katana or Great Sword.
- If it was claimed between 22:00 and 7:00, the weakness will be caused by Blunt Weapons… namely Club, Hand-to-Hand or Staff.


When a weakness has successfully landed, a brightly colored set of exclamation marks will appear above the head of the NM you’re fighting. The color will denote what Weakness you triggered.

In addition to the effects that weakness triggering has on drops, they also have an effect on the NM itself.

Triggering Blue !! will render an NM unable to use TP moves for around 20 seconds.
Triggering Red !! will render an NM in a state of Fear… freezing it in place for around 20 seconds.
Triggering Yellow !!will render an NM unable to cast Magic for around 20 seconds.

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[Jarre]

Re: Abyssea

Is there a good place to level before then? I'm level 40/32 and all I've been doing, because I have never been able to find a group on Cerberus, is soloing mobs, which takes forever. Since gear is so expensive on the AH I'm sure my gear is the biggest problem, but I'm sure there's somewhere better for me to level grind if I have to solo mobs. I'm in the area east of Jeuno.

This is how I have been doing it using the Grounds tome books.... (based on me soloing / duoing)

40-46 - Delkfort Tower middle and upper.
46-61 - SeaSerpant Grotto
61-66 - Labyrinth of Onzozo
66-75 - Quicksand caves.

The level 50 limit break quest can now be solod with sneak and invisible as you have to locate and collect 3 pieces in each zone at ???'s as an alternative to having to kill higher level mobs for the key items. as in the guide here
The level 55 limit break quest you will need help with to kill the 3 NM's. Yyg and Firewind helped me.
The level 60 limit break quest is difficult to do without a lvl 99 player or a group of high levels as some of the NM's near the ???'s for the crests are true site and lvl 80's and as Hayde and I found out they agro from afar and en-mass!
The level 65 limit break is a piece of piss. Trade 12 beastment seals to Shemo in port jeuno, convert them to 4 kindrid seals. remove them from his brother next to him (shami) then trade them to the people as described by maat.
The level 70 limit break (i.e. maat fight) isn't to bad with a melee job, just make sure you have plenty of potions and gear up to date.

- - - Updated - - -

at lv 40 you can check crawler nest alliance party for GOV.

The problem with alliance partys in these areas is yes you level up quick, but to actually learn your job, constantly upgrade equipment and spells etc. and learn how to use them properly its very low.

[KoLAddict]

Re: Abyssea

Thanks all of you.

So is Abyssea I take it, the area most people level now? I'm still working on getting into the game (being a headache, lol) but am wanting to figure out the best thing to do once I am in.

[Hayde]

Re: Abyssea

BTW..important point no one touched on; when you do GoV/FoV's (Gov's are better because the amount of exp per page is increased every time you finished...amongst other things)...don't look at the wiki and do pages for your level; because the mobs are going to be at least decent challenge or harder. Find a page where you are higher than by at least 2-3 levels, and yet under the maximum level on wiki. Sure, you might only get 60 exp or less per mob, but if you can finish a page every 3-5 minutes for 1500 exp, it's quicker than taking 10 minutes to finish a page for the same amount of exp. Page EXP doesn't vary much, and even the highest level pages for level 99's usually cap around 3k, so go with the most efficient path.

It's the same logic used by Gusgen/Crawler's/Bostineaux Alliances, they might be only getting 18 exp or less per kill, but they're finishing pages at a fast pace.

FoV = Fields of Valor (usually in the open world)

GoV = Grounds of Valor (in 'dungeons' like Gusgen, CNest, etc.)

[KoLAddict]

Re: Abyssea

What's a FoV?

Thanks Hayde, I do need to look up and find specifically pages that are lower level for me so I can actually solo them.