BLM solo in sea?

[Necropolis]

I've been looking through a lot of blm solo guides, and most of them are working out pretty good. Only problem I'm having is waiting on other people to vacat them so I can move in, and usually end in someone just coming through and taking my camp.

I've read in a few old threads here and other places that blm can solo in sea. However, I havn't been able to find on what, where, or general strategy about the camps.

I'm hoping one of the vetern blms here could point me in the right direction on soloing in sea, and if it's still a viable option. Most of the post regarding sea that I found were years old, so I don't know if the camps/blm have been nerfed to make it impossible to solo for decent exp in sea now. I'm currently 58 blm, hoping to hit 60 tonight off goblin bats in newton.

Thanks for the info.

[Neomage]

Re: BLM solo in sea?

Your soloing in sea at 58? wow, I can't wait untill I beat Tenzen... only 2 more missions to go.

[Necropolis]

Re: BLM solo in sea?

No no, I'm not soloing there yet, but I'm looking for advice as to what level I could solo there, and what I might kill.

I get tired of competing against 50000000 soloers for the same few camps and would like to go to a slightly less crowded area. I've seen sea in a few blm solo guides, but nothing as to what they kill or where.

[Necropolis]

Re: BLM solo in sea?

Well I havn't gotten much advice for soloing in sea, but through some experimenting and a few deaths I've come across a few things.

1. If your duoing, do not think you can take an Aern. I decided we could, I cast Gravity, it cast Thundaga III and one shotted me.

2. Solo, I can handly the goldfish quiet easily. I kill the ones right by the ramp. I find rdm sub best here for gravity. Just gravity it, nuke nuke nuke. Don't dot it incase it decided to rapid molt and gravity isn't up yet. Sleep at the top of the ramp and run back down with it. Should be dead with in the first few spells on the way down. I was getting anywhere from 97 to 300 exp per kill. These are great because you can enfeeble without them attacking and links don't matter.

3. Duo. I find this a great place for duoing. Duoing makes the goldfish die much faster. There are plenty of them, so I've never had to wait on repops. Best that one goes /rdm, one /whm. Every now and then they poison you, and having poisona accesable is needed.

4. If you're ambishious, as we were, you can kill the sharks as well. One would aggro, the other Gravity (though we didn't notice it move and slower), and just nuke away. For sharks I'd recommend both /whm till stoneskin is available from rdm sub. Bring echos, as one of thier moves will silence you. Try to bounce hate around so that it spends more time running back and forth than hitting you. Once you have stoneskin from rdm sub, they are quite easy. Phalanx, stoneskin, blink usually provides enough buffer to kill it before running out of HP or MP.

5. Xzombits suck. Saline coat increases magical resistance. I don't see them moving slower even with gravity on, and if the parent xzombit runs back by and sees you nuking it's kid, you're done for.

6. UFOs. No.

I soloed most of 66, and part of 67 in sea. Taru with decent gear, 3 HQ staves, 109 Int total. Hume might be a little low on MP for soloing, but duoing should be easy there. My duo partner was a 66 hume blm, in mostly AF , and no HQ staves.

The only problems I really encountered were sharks aggroing on pulls, and people running up and down the path blocking me and the mob catching up and hitting me. Hope someone else has some fun in Sea ^^v

[Susurrus]

Re: BLM solo in sea?

What level wouldyou say this caps at for solo efficiency?

[Taskmage]

Re: BLM solo in sea?

I've been doing a pretty good deal of solo farming in sea lately. Here's what I've learned from experience and friendly advice.

Phuabo - The deal with these guys is they're weak against dark element. Sleep-nuke is the way to go, not gravity kiting. They're also aspirable. Just make sure to stay at the longest range possible so they can't hit you with Voiceless Storm if you take more than 10 nukes to finish them off.

Xzomit - Watch these guys zooming around the zone at their normal movement speed. Gravity actually does make them move a lot slower, but when they move at nearly double a player's base movement speed normally, that's still not slow enough to be able to run out of their range. Ul'xzomits travel in those packs, so I haven't bothered to figure out how to deal with them. Om'xzomits in the west side of Al'taieu travel alone and don't link. They're DC-T at 75. I've been practicing my bind-nuke on these guys as rdm, but idk if a blm without haste could keep it up safely. Sleep does stick on them though, so sleep-nuke might be viable. Oh, and Saline Coat shouldn't be a problem for a 64+ blm/rdm. Just Dispel it.

Aerns - These guys aren't that big of a problem to kite with gravity, but they have all kinds of tricks up their sleeves. Reraise is the worst one. If you've spent most of your resources killing it the first time, you're probably not ready for round 2 when it is. Linking isn't quite as bad if you can find a good aern-free area to kite them around in, but they have wide wander ranges and can surprise you sometimes. Then there's the fact that you can't tell what job they are until you start fighting them. Pet jobs aren't too bad. If you just keep an eye out for the summoning animation and sleep the pet as soon as it pops out, you can usually kite and kill the aern far enough away that by the time the pet catches up with you it's forgotten why it was mad at you. Mage jobs I can silence. You might not have as much luck depending on your enfeebling skill. Even then you still have MDB to contend with if they're whm or rdm. Annoying. Much safer to sub whm to counter all their status moves and get a tankish friend to duo them with you.

To Susurrus, 75s can find T-VT here so you could continue soloing in sea up through merits, but Zhayolm is probably a better option in the 70s.

[Icemage]

Re: BLM solo in sea?

Phuabo - The deal with these guys is they're weak against dark element. Sleep-nuke is the way to go, not gravity kiting. They're also aspirable. Just make sure to stay at the longest range possible so they can't hit you with Voiceless Storm if you take more than 10 nukes to finish them off.

Correct. This is a BLM's primary target. However, they're very high level (78+ usually, even for the Ul'phuabo). You really can't solo these guys until at least 72ish with great gear. Without great gear, probably best not to try until 75.

Xzomit - Watch these guys zooming around the zone at their normal movement speed. Gravity actually does make them move a lot slower, but when they move at nearly double a player's base movement speed normally, that's still not slow enough to be able to run out of their range. Ul'xzomits travel in those packs, so I haven't bothered to figure out how to deal with them. Om'xzomits in the west side of Al'taieu travel alone and don't link. They're DC-T at 75. I've been practicing my bind-nuke on these guys as rdm, but idk if a blm without haste could keep it up safely. Sleep does stick on them though, so sleep-nuke might be viable. Oh, and Saline Coat shouldn't be a problem for a 64+ blm/rdm. Just Dispel it.

I can shed light on the Ul'xzomit patterns. They travel in packs of 3. The one in the front is the "leader". If you attack it while the other two are alive, the ones behind it will link and attack. You can pick off the trailing members without repercussions.

Aerns - These guys aren't that big of a problem to kite with gravity, but they have all kinds of tricks up their sleeves. Reraise is the worst one. If you've spent most of your resources killing it the first time, you're probably not ready for round 2 when it is. Linking isn't quite as bad if you can find a good aern-free area to kite them around in, but they have wide wander ranges and can surprise you sometimes. Then there's the fact that you can't tell what job they are until you start fighting them. Pet jobs aren't too bad. If you just keep an eye out for the summoning animation and sleep the pet as soon as it pops out, you can usually kite and kill the aern far enough away that by the time the pet catches up with you it's forgotten why it was mad at you. Mage jobs I can silence. You might not have as much luck depending on your enfeebling skill. Even then you still have MDB to contend with if they're whm or rdm. Annoying. Much safer to sub whm to counter all their status moves and get a tankish friend to duo them with you.
To Susurrus, 75s can find T-VT here so you could continue soloing in sea up through merits, but Zhayolm is probably a better option in the 70s.

I really, really don't recommend soloing Aerns unless you have a dire reason to (need organs, etc.). They have way too many special tricks up their sleeves (Biotic Boomerang being the worst).


Icemage