skill up problem

[DubaI]

i am currently lvl 32 @ 1000 tnl
my scythe , great sword and dark magic are skilling up to slowly and are all 5 lvls below current cap.
no matter which party i join i seem to lvl up faster then my weapons
any tips on getting them up to date?

[Mithrael]

Pre-lv.50, pretty much the only way to cap Greatsword AND Scythe is to fight a bunch of Even Matches and Toughs (basically, to join a skillup party of sorts...) Don't worry about it too much. If you keep scythe or greatsword maxed, and use the other for everything else (quests, missions, etc.) you'll be pretty well caught up at lv.51-52. By then you can afford to swap as necessary.

As far as Dark Magic goes, Offer to cast Bio for your party, and use Drain every time you take damage.

[DubaI]

thanks for the reply
1 last question what mobs check as even-tough at lvl 32 and wont be hard to kill?

[Zafron]

The difficulty of capping dark magic skill follows from the fact that you begin 33 skill points behind. DRKs learn their first dark magic spell in level 10(Drain) when the skill cap is 33. Before this there is no other way to level dark magic unless you level BLM or RDM before starting DRK.

So now you have to make up 33 skill points. Then the problem is that the early dark magic spells take up such a large percentage of your mp pool that you can only cast a few times before you run out of mp. In the absence of RDM refresh the only way to get this mp back is to sit which is somewhat taboo for drks since we are bar none some of the slowest tp builders out there.

There are 2 things you can do:

1) in Qufim, skill up dark magic in much the same way RNGs solo land worms, run in range, cast bio, run back out of range, rinse lather rinse repeat.

2) Use lots and lots of juice. Sitting is bad, RDM can't refresh till 41, Ballad is not very usefull to DRK since it is for inbetween fights only(BRD should have minuet and madrigal on you while fighting). Juice is the only thing that will allow you to cast dark magic spells in the volume needed to catch the skill up.

Doing these things i was able to cap my dark magic before i learned my first absorb spell. Also there is almost no reason you can't cast Bio repeatedly during fights. If you notice, 99% of the BLMs/WHMs/RDMs you group with will cast Bio/Dia at the start of the fight, but they will not recast when it wears off, and on IT mobs it wears off fast. On some mobs you can cast and recast bio 3-5 times without it being a redundant cast.

Also Aspir is only 10mp, but don't use it on mobs that you can't aspir from just to level your skill. That is unfair to your party members.

Everyone has the GS/scythe capping probem and it starts in the 30s. My recomendation is go back and level your WAR now. Take it to 37 using GS all the way. At 37 the difference between GA and GS cap for WAR is 5 points, so you aren't that gimped. This will cap your GS until you are a lv35 DRK, and allow you to use scythe exclusively until 36. After that it will till be a struggle to keep both capped. I recommend keeping 1 capped and letting the other fall behind. The logical thing to do would be to keep GS capped and let scythe fall back. GS at this level is the more versitile weapon in terms of skill chaining until 49, but the problem is you will group with alot of people who are ignorant about DRK and they will think you are gimping yourself by using GS, so for this reason you might want to just cap scythe and let GS fall behind. Just do the best you can. Genkei 1 will solve all your capping problems.

[Crug]

the way im doing it is a bit bass ackwards but i used scythe excusivly up untill 50 during my breaks from lvling my main (i take them every 10 lvls so i do not burn my self out) i normaly go farm and use a gsword to do the killing but i keep my scythe on me if i get in to trouble. like the previous poster said when you lvl your sub do your best to use the weapon you need to get points in to

i really wish i had kept up with my g sword luckaly im at a point where my scythe and vorpal scythe are prefered for renki but i know the day is coming when i will have to bust out a great sword. and its gona be a long road to walk alone.. guess i will tag along on a fue ls genki raids with my faussar (sp?) straped to my back.

[Varo]

My drk magic is always capped. However, because of this I pay a heavy price with my other magics. I'm horribly gimped in my other 2 magic categories. Enfeebling and Elemental lag 100 points behind my drk magic. I felt that the need to keep drk magic capped was stronger than the need to try and keep all 3 at a decent level. I'll level the other 2 in a skill up party......at some point.:sweat: