Subjobs? What're you using?

[VZX]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

My point is, DNC still missing a critical component to perform both DDing and healing.
Releasing your WS is the most vulnerable period for DNC. You can't do healing after you WS, even if you store Finishing Move, it takes a lot of overhead for releasing WS.

Can't WS, but Storing TP all the time is too.conservative.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

My point is, DNC still missing a critical component to perform both DDing and healing.
Releasing your WS is the most vulnerable period for DNC. You can't do healing after you WS, even if you store Finishing Move, it takes a lot of overhead for releasing WS.

Can't WS, but Storing TP all the time is too.conservative.

I'm not really seeing the problem in a PT context. While DNC has a skill close to THF's with Dagger, its still not on par and they do not get the high-end ones THF does. This tells me SE intended them to have high accuracy to fuel TP for cures, but not so much that they were intended to be a pure DD.

Your problem seems to be that DNC is forced to choose between DD/Enfeebling or Cure/Enfeebling. Is this any different than what SCH deals with? Not really. SCH can't be an effective main healer and an effective DD at the same time. If I choose to DD, I have to live with D skill Cures at higher cost, slower recast/casting time and no access to Accession SS/Phalanx/Regen/Cure.

Is it any different than what RDM has to deal with? They're constantly discouraged from melee and they could if they really needed to, but the casting they're invited to do often gets too much in the way of that. So again, we're faced with choice of what another job has to focus on.

Even a job like DRG or PUP is forced to make a choice in what thier specialization is in a given situation. PUP can't be a good DD and a good healer at the same time, they have to use thier automation and subjob to supplant whatever function they're choosing to provide. Oftentimes these days, that's subbing /DNC and using Soulsoother frame.

DRG/Mage has to give up melee JAs/Traits from other subjobs to fufill a worthwhile healing capacity. Either they're full on melee or they're an average melee with a pet healer.

Why should DNC get the best of everything? Most other hybrids (I hate that word) don't.

The only problems from where I am standing for DNC is:

(1) Much like COR, they're rendered powerless by amnesia and SE has yet to add a genuinely practical status cure method for that ailment. Ecphoria Ring doesn't cut it, its nice DNC ring otherwise, though. Magic users can fix silence easily with echo drops, Amenesia doesn't have a fix other than waiting it out or using the enchantment on Ecphoria.

(2) Its rendered powerless in fights where TPing a mob/NM would generally be a bad idea.

(3) It cannot provide things like Protect, Shell or Raise to a party.

[Temagori]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

I have been staticing with a good friend of mine with my SCH and his DNC and I have to say oddly enough his Dancing Edge creams THF's.

Granted he is a Galka, but I think the better reason for this is the more CHR based gear you wear as a DNC and the fact that that is a high modifier in Dancing Edge. He has been forced to DD due to me main healing and a either a rdm or whm as well. DNC can self SC with their Flourishes and do some decent dd addition with the extra emergency healing and/or main heal for periods at a time. I have noticed, though, as much as he would like to say he can, DNC can't main heal a party in all situations as well as a mage.

I've been made to be a Nuking SCH and had to rush cure people because of him running out of TP. DNC is extremely beneficial for back-up healing and with any other healer there is no need for any other healer in that respective slot. They can add decent damage from WS if they are given a chance to and offer some nice little perks. I am a little worried though about their actual usefulness end-game since their bread and butter is TP.

Hopefully /SAM makes up for this, cuz for Gods and Jailers I don't see DNC hitting enough to be effective in their job quite like they can in a party set-up.

[Illyria]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

Would subbing RDM be good alternative with a DNC? I'm thinking for the extra enfeebling you can cast at the start of battle and then maybe even the En spells on the dagger. I just don't have the energy at the moment to level Monk or even start the Dragoon or Samurai quests.

[Armando]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

Disregard! I misread. Note to self: don't post at 6 AM.

[Ellipses]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

Would subbing RDM be good alternative with a DNC? I'm thinking for the extra enfeebling you can cast at the start of battle and then maybe even the En spells on the dagger. I just don't have the energy at the moment to level Monk or even start the Dragoon or Samurai quests.

RDM doesn't have anything that helps you gain TP. Casting spells interrupts your melee swings, further reducing TP gain. The MP pool of a mage subjob doesn't last very long when you're trying to use it regularly, and half-level Enfeebling skill isn't going to get you very far against XP mobs.

You might get away with it if all your parties have low expectations or don't really understand DNC, especially early on, but no, it's not a good alternative.

[Nuriko]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

Does Reverse Flourish need a target? If not, you could always aim to finish the fight with a WS then get some TP back in any downtime between mobs...

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

/ja "Reverse Fourish" <me>

That's how it works, you can only target yourself.

[Karinya]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

The only problems from where I am standing for DNC is:

(1) Much like COR, they're rendered powerless by amnesia and SE has yet to add a genuinely practical status cure method for that ailment. Ecphoria Ring doesn't cut it, its nice DNC ring otherwise, though. Magic users can fix silence easily with echo drops, Amenesia doesn't have a fix other than waiting it out or using the enchantment on Ecphoria.

You could fight something else. I think there's only one mob family in the game that spams amnesia (unless there's more in WotG). Several other jobs have a few mob families that they're weak against (piercing users:bones, blm and rdm:colibri/ahriman/pots, most melee:elementals/ghosts, etc.) Taking highly-JA-dependent jobs to fight imps is like taking those other jobs to fight the monsters they're weak against. Why do that?

DNC are also weak to aoe tp-reducing mobs like fomor and gnats, IMX. But again, that doesn't describe most mobs.

(2) Its rendered powerless in fights where TPing a mob/NM would generally be a bad idea.

Unless there are other mobs nearby to tp, yeah. You can /SAM or use opo necklace, or even 2hr, but all of those are mediocre solutions at best.

Of course, there's lots of endgame content where you can tp just fine, so maybe the answer to that one is to get another job for those few specific fights. Like I said for point 1, some jobs are weak against some enemies, and that certainly applies to HNMs too.

Show me a good place for, say, THF in any of those same non-TP-able fights, aside from being swapped in at the last second for TH.

(3) It cannot provide things like Protect, Shell or Raise to a party.

Intentional limitation, I think. All the jobs that can provide those things are dependent on MP and resting, and all are worse than DNC at at least one of DD or healing (although a SCH can choose which one to be worse at, they still must be worse at one or the other at any given time, in addition to being dependent on MP).

DNC also can't provide Dispel and crowd control, but those can be worked around by choosing the right camp, or getting a party member who can provide those things.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

Of course, there's lots of endgame content where you can tp just fine, so maybe the answer to that one is to get another job for those few specific fights. Like I said for point 1, some jobs are weak against some enemies, and that certainly applies to HNMs too.

That's more of a problem in and of itself than a solution. There shouldn't be situations where one particular job is made so powerless they can't be viable for a certain event. Its things like this that damage the perception of certain job classes and led to them not being used for other things they could have done just fine in.

[Karinya]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

That's more of a problem in and of itself than a solution. There shouldn't be situations where one particular job is made so powerless they can't be viable for a certain event.

In theory, I agree, but in practice, almost every job in the game faces that situation in some content or other. Even bard is weak in some 3 man BCNMs.

Any place a dancer can't fight for TP, a warrior, a monk, a dragoon, a dark knight, a thief, a beastmaster, and a puppetmaster can't either; and since it's probably a level 90 HNM that (non-avatar) pets are going to be a worthless liability against, three of those jobs have a double disadvantage. And SAM will only be sitting back meditating and waiting until they can run in and WS.

I think that's more a function of those particular fights than of any one job. And it doesn't extend to most newer content like limbus, assault, salvage, einherjar, campaign or ZNMs.

Its things like this that damage the perception of certain job classes and led to them not being used for other things they could have done just fine in.

SE can't be blamed for player stupidity.

HNMs that are strong or weak to particular jobs have been around a long time, and short of homogenizing endgame content somehow (which would make it less varied and interesting), I don't see a way around it. Other than the job change system, which every character gets for free.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

I think that's more a function of those particular fights than of any one job. And it doesn't extend to most newer content like limbus, assault, salvage, einherjar, campaign or ZNMs.

If the concept behind the design of Zilart endgame was "Well, they could always change to another job," then its no wonder this other content has become so much more successful and popular with the players. Zilart takes the much-vaunted flexibility of FFXI and turns it into its bane, most of this other content does not.

[Karinya]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

It's not just Zilart - JoL and AV are even worse in that regard. And AFAIK, so are CoP wyrms and the TOAU HNMs (Cerb, Khim, Hydra). Kite, nuke and blink tank {Yes, please.} Anything else {No thanks.} Some BCNMs too.

Those are the most effective tactics in this game because they're overpowered against single mobs. The fact that some endgame content can be beaten without resorting to them is nice, but it doesn't change the fact that kiting and blink tanking are overpowered, and against the toughest mobs, you *have* to (ab)use the most overpowered tactics available or get left in the dust.

Which is why it's nice that there's endgame content that consists of plowing through large numbers of individually less badass mobs - any job can contribute to that, it has more to do with organization and crowd control.

DNC, ultimately, is just another victim of this overall imbalance.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Subjobs? What're you using?

I've done JoLs and there's nothing terribly dramatic about the setups for it, we had melees up front, RNGs, SAM/RNG in the back for melee. BLMs to control the baby mobs it spits out and such. Only thing that was ass backwards about the fight was where the LS put the BRD and the COR, but then, the RNGs couldn't trust the BRDs to do anything right for them anyway.

AV... If you can show me an LS that can get it down to 90% without wiping, I'd be impressed. I've watched an LS have one RDM tank it for about 13 minutes before they all died horribly, so we've really not figured out the optimal way to do that yet, though the RDM tank thing seems to have some merit.

I tend to place CoP wyrms and ToA HNM under the Zilart umbrella of the flawed design. They have a different respawn time, so extreme it actually discourages camping the way we do it for kings. The windows are different. But it still boils down to job exclusivity and the jobs that are favored just happen to work just fine everywhere else, too. And the jobs that don't just happen to be the ones shunned elsewhere. Victims of endgame's tendancy to drag everything into hyperbole? Sure is.

So out of the last five jobs created, SE has had an epic brainfart with three of them at endgame levels. PUP became the "good for solo" job (same as BST). BLU is welcomed into just about every mission setting, but shunned from god/HNM. And now we have DNC, which is a great job... for EXP and non-HNM/god content.

COR and SCH struggled getting out of the gate, but in time got the tweaks they needed to be useful pretty much everywhere. These jobs were just planned out better.