Help a newbie, get karma

[Quezi]

Hi there~ I am a taru blm in windy, and im level 10.. er well, i have been 10, thrice :sweat: I soloed to 10 in about 2 and a half days and it was for the most part easy enough, i think at level 6 or 7 i went through a hard time where it seemed like everything was either to weak or to strong, but for the most part iv just been steadily killing weak things for 12-38 and sometimes 50 exp nonstop and have made good progress. Iv been able to keep up on spells and equipment thanks to the auction, and have drain and fire waiting for me. Everything seemed fine until i got to level 10.

Now the problem i am having is, the last three levels i have been getting exp in horutoto off of goblins and bats and made myself two stacks of fire and wind crystals the last two levels by hanging out in the north-western most tower, at 8 i killed stuff in the entrance, and at 9 i moved over to the right hand tunnel and just sat there killing stuff as it spawned. But now i just dont know what i should be trying to do. Im assuming i should be looking for a party around now, but im not sure where i should be looking for one, does anyone even want a level 10 blm? My spells dont do very much damage and im sure a group of melees at this level could just kinda roll over things. I have no idea how to get to valkurm other than i, having started in windy, am probably in the worst possible place to be trying to get there from. Whats the safest way there? Could a friendly WHM teleport me somewhere close to it? How do i run there if i have to, should i even be trying to get there? I would not mind soloing another level or two even if its slow, as long as its reliable and not overly tedious. Im a poor lost newbie :dead: I dont really like windy, the grasslands outside seem icky to me, and the city itself is to er.. organic.. Im contemplating starting a melee in sandy, as im equally interested in a few other jobs but figured i would pick BLM because its supposed to be easier to get in a party and i figured that would be best considering i dont know anyone. I really like my magic tho and while im tempted to just start something easier i know that if i can just survive long enough to get away from this horrible place ill be happy. I just dont know what to do, i feel trapped and insecure. I need a direction, someone tell me what to do



A few random questions;

1. WHERE do i get a worldpass? I have seen this questions asked countless times on these forums, which usually ends up with someone getting the asker a wp for the server they want to go on, or saying that theres a forum for asking for WPs, but never once has anyone actually said what someone has to do to physicaly get one.

2. Should i bother casting bio to try and raise my dark skill? I really dont notice a difference when i use it, it does little damage, doesnt seem to really do anything else against what im casting it on, and it takes lots of MP. I know its supposed to do some extra things other than the initial damage, it just doesnt seem to be working very well at the time.

Help me and you get a special karma cookie

[ashirys]

Okay, for Worldpasses:

Kacheda in Port Bastok - Bastok
Ambleon in Port San D'Oria - San D'Oria
Gamimi in Windurst Walls - Windurst


As for leveling/grouping, your best bet is to stay in Windy if you want to be a blm, go out to Tahrongi Canyon (it's on the far northeast side of East Sarubaruta) and kill stuff there solo or pick up a group if you can find one. In a few levels, you'll be set to group in Shakrami Maze on the Maze Makers. Maze Makers are worm type mobs, which means they don't move. They're caster mobs usually, but if you can pick up a whm that has silence and some other casters or range-melees (rangers are great for this), then you can pretty much blast them to death. Anyway, until then, just run around Tahrongi Canyon with your seek party flag on and kill stuff until you find someone to group with. Honestly, even a trio of warrior, whm, and blm works pretty well at this level, though more people obviously speeds up the xp.

I would suggest sticking it out here if you like the black mage a lot. It might not hurt to give the melee a shot if you want, but for all of the game that I've played, black mages do a whole ton more damage than any melee I've played/grouped with. You'll eventually get to the point where you're fighting very tough and incredibly tough mobs regularly, and melees just have a hard time hitting those for any significant damage. This may change later on, I don't know, my highest job is only 18. *^^*

Oh..and if you want to brave Valkurm Dunes, you should probably wait until 12 or 13 if you want to be safe. To get there, you need to go E. Saru -> Tahrongi Canyon -> Buburimu Pennisula -> Mhaura (hop on the ship to Selbina and go up to the Captain's room for safety) -> Selbina -> Valkurm Dunes. Just keep in mind that there isn't a mog house in Selbina or Mhaura..so if you need something from back home or lose signet, you're most likely SoL, as the outpost in Valkurm is usually owned by either San d'Oria or Bastok (at least it is on Phoenix). It's a looooong run back to Windurst, so bring spells and stuff you might need with you to avoid making the trek so often. As a black mage, you might be better off to stay in the Windurst area fighting in Shahkrami Maze, though you'd probably find groups in Valkurm pretty easily as well.

Hopefully this has helped you out some, at least.. If you happen to be on Phoenix server, feel free to send Jhalu a tell sometime. >^-^<

Edit: Oh, and I have no clue about Bio, unfortunately. I'm pretty sure it doesn't stack with Dia, so there may be some defense lowering going on with Bio, but beyond that, I really don't know. I'm still a newbie black mage

[Oompa]

At level 10 your best bet would probably be to get a party in Tarongi Canyon or get together with some people in the Maze of Shakrimi. Wait until you're a couple levels higher before trying to venture all the way to the dunes. It can prove to be very frustrating getting there without a higher level friend to take you.

Once you hit 12-14 you can try your luck at the dunes. The hardest part is getting past the nasty goblins in Buburimu and the Dunes to make your way to the safer side of the dunes. If you happen to be on Lakshmi, I'll gladly meet up with you in Windhurst and escort you at any time you wish to the dunes. Make sure you take about 500 gil with you, perhaps even more if you're wanting to set your home point on the easy side of the dues (this will cost you from 800-1600 gil, depending on which nation is in control of the dunes at the current time). You can't get a teleport until you've already been to the crag (the huge white bony structure in the canyon, konstat highlands, etc) to get a crystal.

Don't let the slow going discourage you from being a BLM. We have the most consistant damage throughout the game. It's hard now because you're in a bit of an akward stage in your characters growth. Definately get with a party and start to learn the ways of fighting as a team. Before long you're going to be dependent on fighting as a team so it's better to learn it early.

1) You get a world pass from Heavens Tower. The large tree in Windurst walls. To to the entrance, you'll see a blue light, step into the light, it will warp you inside the tree. Once inside the tree walk straight forward around the circle "pond" and into the room. You'll see three people there. Talk to the person in the middle and buy yourself a world pass. It costs around 900 gil, so be prepared.

2) Bio isn't the greatest spell to use right now as it costs a lot of your MP for a simple attack down and gradual damage, but in the near future you may want to start casting it to start off a battle. It helps greatly for your melee party members and definately good for raising your much needed dark magic skill for when you get Drain and Aspir.

Best of luck to you, and if you ever need any help should you be on the Lakshmi server, let me know. I'll help you the best I can.

[Keji]

10-11 or 12 u should kill the weak things around tahrongi canyon at like 12-13 u can kill dhalmels and at 13 or 14 u can kill the stuff in the maze i dunno when to stop i guess around 16? but at 16 best xp is at bastok korroloka tunnel cuz thoise worms are sick and they last till 19 or 20

[Quezi]

Hurray~ after reading these forums for months and months i finaly know where worldpasses come from :spin:0

Ill stick with blm. Really its what i want to be, i was kinda interested in both THF and PLD, but for other reasons, none of which have anything to do with the playing of them, i was just wanting an excuse to go make a monk so i can run around and not die as often

I suppose i should update my info now, im on mid. Thank you for the support =D For some reason im afrade of asking to get in a PT, which is foolish of me, i have been playing mmorpgs for 5 years and never used to feel this way, but those past experiances mean that now im a newbie that realises just howmuch of a newbie he really is, and that makes me feel scared and afrade of everything=P I think the problim is i have become so accustomed to knowing everything about the games i play, then when i start something new i feel totaly lost, more lost than i probibly should be feeling. Its always been my place to know things and make sure that anyone that other people know them to, thats what i do, but when im the one doing the asking i just feel like crap =x

Thanks again :sweat:

[Dux]

Hi there.

I played my BLM to lvl 16 in Shakrami Maze (an excellent zone often overlooked by people) in total safety. I almost never died (I did once at lvl 11) but you do need to watch out for the undead though.

Even at level 16 I was still get very good EXP (130+) from IT Maze Makers in Shakrami and the fights were happening with great regularity (in my expereince 130+ is better than Valkrum EXP generally). Due to the drastically reduced downtime (WHM specifically) and the abundance of easy to kill monsters you will gain EXP far quicker than in Valkrum.

Everybody says go to Dunes (I have no idea why) but I would recommend staying in Shakrami Maze until you really have no other choice but to leave.

As a side note I was getting 200+ EXP per kill easily at levels 11 through 14 inclusive.

[ashirys]

For some reason im afrade of asking to get in a PT, which is foolish of me, i have been playing mmorpgs for 5 years and never used to feel this way, but those past experiances mean that now im a newbie that realises just howmuch of a newbie he really is, and that makes me feel scared and afrade of everything=P

You should *never* be afraid to ask for help, especially information. There may be some people who blow you off and call you a n00b or whatever, but there will be many others who would be more than glad to help and will think all the more of you because you bothered to ask, rather than just continuing on in ignorance, doing stuff wrong, and potentially getting your party and yourself killed. ^-^;;

Since you've played other games, put yourself in that perspective: if you were in your old game, grouping up an alt or whatever, and you had some guy in your group who was new to the game but asking questions about how things worked and obviously trying really hard to beat the learning curve, would you not have some respect for him for at least knowing that he doesn't know a lot? I know I'd sit there and talk to someone like that for a long time, trying to help, if they were reasonably polite in asking.

As for asking to get in a party, you don't necessarily need to do that, per se.. just turn your Party Seek flag on, and you'll probably get tells pretty quickly asking you to join a group somewhere. I know when I was leveling up in Valkurm, my husband and I would put together a party and we *always* looked for black mages. ^-^

[Scatman]

I would actually suggest looking for a group in Zulkheim around LaTheine, Valkurm or Konschtat. The reasoning is that most of the mages will be Taru and will start in Windurst, whereas most meleers (IE warriors due to PS2 starters) typically will either start in San D'oria or Bastok. The key to finding a party is to avoid competition. The last thing you'd want is 3 other taru mages LFG in the same area, as that will reduce the chances of you finding a party. Obviously all this is highly fluid and situational, and different rules may apply to different servers, but this seems to apply to my server. The eastern side of Valkurm where the hill lizards are, are huntable at lvl 10 if you have a decent party.

[AtraposBLM]

Personally, I stayed in Shakrami until lv18, went to Valkurm for my subjob quest (I'll explain it in a bit), then went back to the maze and solo'd up to level 20. I died on the way to Jeuno trying to get my chocobo license, so I went back, got lv20, got the license, and then stayed in Qufim.

I found that in general, since a lot of mages start in windy, Shakrami is truly your best bet. The more mages you have in a Shakrami party, the better. The best party I had was 4 blm's, 1 whm, and 1 drk. Nobody ever got within melee range, and everyone made sure to stay at max range so the worm couldn't cast back at us.

At level 10, you COULD solo a maze maker or two, but it wouldn't be very effective. At lv13, you can EASILY solo your way to lv18, but again, it's faster with the more black mages or rangers you add. White Mages help as well.

I can show you around windurst and the region around windurst if you like when I get back to college on sunday (on spring break now and I don't have my discs >_<), as we're on the same server. I also have to farm up some gil anyways, so I can show you shakrami and clear the dangerous goblins If you manage to get to lv12 or 13 and you want to brave Valkurm, I can also help you get to Mhaura safely.

Just let me know
Also, if you have more questions in game, feel free to /t Atrapos whatever your problem is

[Quezi]

HI there, more questions ^^ (and an update!)

Thanks again you guys~ Everything instantly got better after i went and loged back on. I got a PT in canyons for a couple levels, then we all moved to maze, i went from 10-15 in the same pt in one night! I then stuck around at maze untill 16, at which point i went to dunes, and found the place to be terrible =x I spent a whole day in PTs that had tanks that would run away out of healing range, people who would join and then leave after like 3 pulls.. i managed to get to 17. Then the next day i got to 20 and seemed to have better luck avoiding idiots, and still haveing no luck findeing a magicked skull a sam in our PT felt sorry for me and changed into her level 60 DRG and took me to those one mines that had lots of ghouls.. after attaining the skull i thanked her, but then she just disbanded with out any sort of generic ~have fun~ or ~good luck~ type things =x i hope i didint anoy her D=

After finishing the quest i tried to run to jeuno, the marshlands are scarry at night and i died just before zoneing.. So i decided to try from the other side, and found it much easyer traveling from windy. After getting my chocobo i went back to windy and well, now im a 9whm/4blm ^^ Windy always seemed anoying to me, but i was kinda happy to get back iv been dirt poor 10-20, so i was looking forward to leveling from 1-10 to make some money(fire crystals arent selling fast enough on mid! someone go buy them!=P).

Ok now i have a few more questions.

1. casting blaze spikes and protect and other buffs seems to make my (enhance? i cant remember type of magic =/) skill up really slowly, im wondering what exacly a higher skill does for that? Does it make the buffs more powerful? Last longer? What?

2. Im takeing whm/blm up to 30 so i have my whm sub leveld, in that time should i bother working on divine magic skill? Will i ever need banish as a blm/whm? It seems like haveing light attacks would be usefull, but at the skill level a sub would have im wondering if i would ever use them.

~Thanks~

[Nodoka]

>1. casting blaze spikes and protect and other buffs seems to make my (enhance? i cant remember type of magic =/) skill up really slowly, im wondering what exacly a higher skill does for that? Does it make the buffs more powerful? Last longer? What?

It wont really do much for BLM. It wont make spells last longer or stronger. It is just for the bar- etc spells that give resistance to elements. Also, it is used for RDM with their en-element spells. It would be great if the spikes did more damage with enhancing magic. T.T

>2. Im takeing whm/blm up to 30 so i have my whm sub leveld, in that time should i bother working on divine magic skill? Will i ever need banish as a blm/whm? It seems like haveing light attacks would be usefull, but at the skill level a sub would have im wondering if i would ever use them.

I hardly ever use divine magic as a blm. Most of the skillchains are fusion (fire/light) instead of transfixition (just light), so you wont have to worry about white magic. Plus your skill will be halved so it wont be as great as your other magic anyway. Its nice to have if you want, but you wont be doing much with it.

[Quezi]

How exacly does it effect the bar- spells? Becaus it looks like a level 50 blm/whm would have all but 2 of the bar-s so surely it could be usefull? How usefull are the bar- spells? Id think that if they made enough a differance where they would, say, need to be recast mid fight against hard things that its better the blm does it than the whm. Altho it looks like theres -na for all negative status effects, so really the only useful bar- are to help against elemental based attacks? :sweat:

[Nodoka]

Yea, barpoison and barsleep never seem to work. Barwater helps for poison and barice works for paralysis etc.

Also, I really dont use barspells much. The whm ususally have tons more enhancing than me cause I dont cast stuff often enough to have as good skill as them. Oh, and the barelement stuff works wonders, if you have good skill. ^^

[Ungerpurr]

Bar-elemental spells give you 40 + (enhancing magic skill)/5 resist in that element, rounded down. For instance, at level 23 on whm with 66 enhance skill, my bar-elements give 53 resist. For my rdm friend with a skill of 108, it's 61 resist. A level 75 rdm with capped skill (276 I believe) could do 95 resist, throw on some gear and they're fully resistant to a particular element (or, at least, never take more than half damage). Very nice.

The only use to enhancing magic as a blm is to increase the power of your sub's spells. Sneak / Invis tend to be more reliable the higher your enhancing skill gets (on average, at least). Blink and stoneskin are also better as your enhancing skil rises. I thought blaze spikes damage went up as skill did (I remember going from 6 to 7 damage from spikes), but I could be wrong about that. You don't want to get hit anyway.