Info please on Bst solo/pt post update

[blazeofglory]

I was looking to find some information regarding how much the beastmaster job has been changed since the update that fixed MPK'ing. Going around I still see many bst's who solo, however, I have also seen a great deal also now pt'ing. My questions are

As far as solo exp goes, how has the method changed since the update ?

[Raid]

Re: Info please on Bst solo/pt post update

To my own knowledge since the update nothing really, I can only see positive sides. If you have aggro mobs you can take them out of their area of respawn wich makes them dissapear without much hassle. If you want to release heal your pet basicly just attack your mob and heel it back to the place you got it from. When you release before a kill it wont dissapear. I ran back and forth between 2 em birds in Sky worked great until I misscharmed and the jug pwned me.

[Khidir]

Re: Info please on Bst solo/pt post update

the mpk update means you can't recycle the same pet as a bst with the release let the mob get its hp back up then charm and it means that you have to search for new pets that are em (which is the best choice for solo) which can be generally to your disadvantage or risk getting killed by another mob

Double Post Edited:
forgot to add a plus is that you can now exp in pts with jugs since anything that is a jug pet will now not take any exp away from you in pt or solo. but it may be hard to get a pt like drg since you dont tend to have situations where you say "We need a Bst or we will have to disband" if you are for pting i suggest lving war as a sub

[Raid]

Re: Info please on Bst solo/pt post update

"We need a Bst or we will have to disband"

That would be so nice!

[Khidir]

Re: Info please on Bst solo/pt post update

just change that Bst part to Rdm and that what it is like getting 2-3 invites at once

[Tavarde]

Re: Info please on Bst solo/pt post update

In my honest opinion, the December 12th, 2005 Anti-MPK patch destroyed all I had known and come to love about BST. Take any other job and remove a critical job ability/spell/function and that is EXACTLY what SE did to BST. I have often (and still do) likened it to SE taking WAR's lv 10 Provoke and making it lv 37. It is as if the essence of PT EXP was taken out of the game.

First and foremost, I would like to say the new form of converting pets to a proper level of use is not a fair tradeoff, I repeat: IT IS NOT A FAIR TRADEOFF. SE misled us all when they implied that any monster which despawns would return at the same level. They effectively removed our ability to recycle pets, in itself a job ability unique to us alone. We were then given as a replacement "spheres of influence" we shall call them, essentially the radius any pet wanders when uncharmed. We have all now observed that this radius is not a uniform thing, it is entirely random and directly related to the actual line-of-sight path followed by the monster. This is unacceptable beyond all comprehension. Any BST is now forced to do one of three things: 1. go somewhere your pets max at EM; 2. fight within the natural radius of multiple monsters; 3. charm/release convert when needed.

Let us observe the downsides to these three things.

1. Some of the best solo EXP I could get was when I went to a place pets were EM to low/mid T and the prey was T to low VT. I loved it, I had become a master of it and I could spend hours upon hours out in the middle of nowhere, chatting in LS, surfing the net all the while EXPing at my own, comfortable pace with zero downtime. This first option is for those who despise charm/release convert as much as I do. If your pets max at EM there's no worry about getting a T pet. Unfortunately, the prey is now lower in level because you have to go these spots at a higher lvl to get the benefit of worry-free charming. The only place I have found that suits this at lv 75 is Korrigans > Goobbues in the Boyahda Tree.

2. Fighting within the natural radius of multiple pets is hard to do and even harder to survive doing. If your pets aggro it's virtually pointless, but chances are your prey will thus be nearby and pose an equal danger if your pets are non-aggro. Point being, it's dangerous and stupid and not worth the risk, quite frankly. This option is also for those who despise the charm/release convert. The only safe, effective camp I have found at 75 is Bibiki Bay, just as you enter the higher level part and up on the elevated land where parties fight tragopans are two rabbits. Their natural roaming paths converge in the far corner. I can still pull dhalmels to this point and solo like normal but it's quite tedious. The rabbits will respawn up to lv 76 if you let them despawn.

3. For those who love the charm/release convert method, this is for you. Honestly, I can't do it, it's stupid. With +40 CHR I can still easily fail a charm on a T mob when attempting to convert it, and if it is mingling with buddies there'll be links and I'll be dead. It's nearly as risky as camping within converging radii. I don't see any BST breaking 2k an hour working at a frantic pace using this method to EXP as one would have done in a standard camp pre-patch. Two thousand EXP per hour was my standard minimum when not working very hard and I have no intention of busting my ass for what I used to be able to do in my sleep. Not for EXP or merits.

So yea, that's how I feel about the state of BST. God bless those of you who can still successfully solo/duo/trio post-patch, I give you much credit. BST always was and shall forever remain my most prized job, it's just more of a chore to get to 75 now. Keep in mind, BST's general functions at endgame didn't change. Most of the time you don't charm your pets anyway, you use CourierCarrie. BCNMs, KSNMs, Sky pop items and Gods, Promyvions (and like the rest of CoP from what I've been told). The only exception that comes to mind is an all BST Hakutaku run. At 75 even basic farming is often best done with a jug as opposed to a local monster, though one exception I can readily think of is in CN, crawler hunters. Of course now, post-patch you can only use them until their HP is up. You "can" repeat charm to try and catch its natural regen but that is a real pain and not worth the trouble.

To close, this was a rant (and I hope no BST were offended) because I still harbor issues with the patch and the OP's topic offered me a suitable medium to lay all this out once again. I don't find too many who agree though. I see the anti-mpk as not just a change to the game. It was a complete and total alteration of BST at its most fundamental level caused by a seemingly unrelated aspect of the game. And that in itself shouldn't happen. It happened to DRG (and to a lesser extent, MNK, who still can get parties and don't sub whm to create their own solo method for EXP)when multi-hit weapon skills were changed. It happened to RNG when they made distance a factor in damage dealt. It kind of sort of (but not really) happened to NIN when they made shadow absorption cause hate reduction now apparently equal to normal hits. It just recently happened when they changed TP gain dependent on weapon delay. What have all these changes done? "Balance" they say. Balance = mediocrity.

So, a wag of the finger to SE. And that's the word.

[Wes311]

Re: Info please on Bst solo/pt post update

Yep, I just got FFXI for Xbox360 and a keyboard....had a 34 WHM on PC a few months ago and took break till it came out on Xbox. Had a 59 DRK longggg time ago when it just started, long since deleted. I am currently leveling WHM to 37/38 then I am going to be leveling BST...it seems BST got harder but I still think I can beat the odds. Only thing that will be tricky is not dieing like usual and working this release in their spawn method for healing.

[Khidir]

Re: Info please on Bst solo/pt post update

Look at it this way SE has taken a lot of power away from us to solo so pt leaders can't say that we can just go solo exp faster which even in teh past before 69 was still slower

the only good thing is that SE gave us an excuse to allow other jobs to realize hey we need a pt since SE crushed our release

[BYSBippy]

Re: Info please on Bst solo/pt post update

I've soloed most of my BST career, duoed slightly and NEVER joined a regular PT.

Granted I dinged 35 after the change to Leave, so I never used the standard tactic of keeping one pet and using him repeatedly. It helps that we can convert pets a lot quicker, only one minute to change a T --> EM/DC.

It bums me out that I won't be exping in the canal or in Fei'yin, but it has gotten a lot safer, no more worrying about link-trains.

[Thoronas]

Re: Info please on Bst solo/pt post update

I was in trio before the nerf and after the nerf my trio broke up. It wasn't because of the nerf itself but mainly because some of my friends schedules changed. Since then I've solo'd from 51 to 60 and have found bst to still be as fun and enjoyable as before the nerf. Yes I had to change my playing style but honestly I never found it that hard. After 50 you get so many handy tools to use to make soloing easier; such as crow gear, gaudy harness, and exp ring. I can't imagine how much harder it must have been to lvl before those little toys were introduced.

As far as the methods changing, I find that my pets have become much more disposable. I will send a pet at a monster and more often than not I will have to release with the enemy at around 40% health. My pet will despawn and reappear full health by the time my second pet and I have finished off the enemy. So now I try to have a disposable pet of almost any lvl and one EM pet that I always train the mob to finish it off. Hope that helps the original poster.