pld's suck at bcnm 40?

[Gtsgunner]

Yeah every time I try to get into a bcnm 40 they always want one of three jobs ranger blm or brd maybe a redmage or beastmaster but other then that it feels like its hopeless to get into a darn bcnm 40 it suxs >_< and so many people have left to wow and other morpg's that my ls is really low on people for that right now. And yeah I was talking to my perma just a bit ago and they said that having a pld in bcnm 40 just slows it down to much :dead:

Is that true? because I want to do some bcnm's for money and It seems that unless I level up a brd to level 40 I'll never be able to get to do bcnms >_< can't level ranger to much money same goes for blm at the moment and I don't like being an elvaan mage that much

So is it true pld's just arn't cut out for bcnm 40 then or what?

[Elesirdur]

Well the reason your're having an issue is because you're only thinking about the Giddeus BCNM 40. I've done it before a few times and a Paladin can work very well for enmity control to keep the black madies off the mages. However, a lot of ppl do prefer a Ninja or some kind (Nin/War or War/Nin) just because you can remove a Whm from the equation and pop in another DD like a Ranger or Black Mage.

If you've got people in your linkshell(s) or on your /flist that want to do BCNMs then go trade in the seals yourself, pick something besides the same damn Madronga one that everyone always does and try something new.

I gave up on doing BCNMs becaues nobody ever wanted to try anything besides Giddeus 40. However, you should take the initiative, do your homework and read up on other BCNM locations, and have fun that way. Good luck!

[CarbonFibre]

PLD is kind of a waste of a spot for the two most commonly done 40 caps (madies and worms). For Steaming Sprouts, you're better off just having 2 or 3 melee jobs sub WAR and co-tanking everything. DRK helps for stuns on the black one and to use last resort, souleater, and provoke when the BRD has a lot of hate and you can't pull the next mandragora off easily.

PS: I'm going to do this one again with my BC set party, so I'll see how a PLD does in this thing.

[lionx]

My friend before he quit the game due to net problems tried this BCNM once with a PLD WAR and DRK setup...lets just say it was MEH! We lost it and the PLD slows down the damage gain. >< Its not that PLDs cant tank it, its just their damage output is too low..i wonder if a GSword is good vs the other mandies besides the black one(Sword and Shield for Shield Bash for Ancient magic maybe...not reliable but hey if it works, smex for you ). If its viable to use a GSword it might be ok i think?

On another note, my brother did it with a DRK RNG BLM WHM RDM BRD PT, and they suceeded in every single one cept the first since they ran out of time(and their first BC too).

[Dark Aphalite]

I did a run of about 8 BCNM 40 Giddeus with the following set up:

PLD, DRK, WAR/NIN, BRD, BLM, WHM.

I was PLD main tank and we never failed a single battle.
The only problem was the lack of damage.
So it was a very safe battle and a sure win but very slow (each battle taking at the very least 20 minutes.)
So if you are looking to make multiple speed runs to make as much gil as possible PLD will gimp it as they are slow paced but reliable whereas other jobs are maybe a little riskier but more efficient and quick.

But please keep in mind that this only applies to the lower BCNMs like 40. The other higher-end BCNMs very much need a PLD, so you only have to suffer for BCNM 40, the rest you will be welcome to join without any problems.

[Mithrael]

In Steamed Sprouts, the MNK is usually going to end up tanking regardless of what tank job you take. PLD can work, but if you can find another mnk, or better yet a SAM to meditate and stun the Black one's nastier spells if silence wears off, the battle will go a lot faster. As for DRK (note that I AM a DRK, so don't try to flame me), you're really better off taking pretty much any other job for melee DMG at lv.40. DRK can really only excel in this BC with souleater, and you can't afford to curebomb the DRK for a full minute 2-3 time during the BC. SAM is a superior choice for meditate/stun and meditate/ws-spam.

Also, there are unconfirmed rumours that the length of time it takes to win the battle affects the drop. This seems to be somewhat true. I've never done a 25+ minute run and gotten anything but utter crap. However, it's still possible to end up with 50k worth of junk on a 5 minute orb.

As far as other BCs, it's hard to say on that too. We did an uncapped BC the other day with DRK/MNK/RNG/WHM/RDM/BLM. MNK tanked with /nin subjob. Depends on the BC, I guess. Some BCs are best done with BLM/BLM/BLM/BLM/BLM/BRD or other silly combos like that. BCs in general are when normal party tactics are completely thrown out the window. BLMs seldom nuke (they're just sleepers), RDMs don't have a lot of time to enfeeble, BRDs may not be able to ballad (then again, bcs are so short you don't really need refresh as much), etc.

[Asherek]

PLD can work just fine in BCNM40.

Cap Greatsword, 2 Sniper Rings, +attack gear, Meat Mithkabobs, you'll do fine.

I've done BCNM40@Giddeus at least 40 times now (40 orbs with my set PT) and when we last did it, our time was 13 minutes. Not earth shattering, but by no means was it 25+ mins and the drops were just fine.

Setup was: PLD RNG DRK RDM RDM BRD

While I did have difficult holding aggro, I contributed decent damage, Covered whenever it was up, spammed cures + flash + everything I could and I'd say I contributed well enough. Can we replaced easily? Of course! But by no means are we useless and you can still score a very decent time with the setup I just pointed out.

Flood isn't even an issue, when you see Black Mandagora casting Flood, just run away. You have plenty of time to get out of distance and RNG should have Shadowbind up so they continue to pummel away at it while it's casting. Of the 40 times I've been, I've been only hit by Flood once (that was the first time I had ever done it), so it's not really very difficult at all.

[Glucian]

Paladins work just fine in the sprouts BC. May not win as fast but if you have skilled people you can take just about anyone (You do need a brd).

I have done it several (12-15) times successfully with my set bc 40 pt.

BRD,RDM,SMN,DRK,RNG,PLD

Bard runs in slightly ahead of Paladin. When bard gets all the hate he pulls to the left, Paladin vokes black Mandy and pulls right. Red mage and Bard are sleep patrol, Summoner heals, and the melees take'em down one at a time. Have not lost yet.

I am not included in the Dark/Ranger renkai. I do hit for some damage and I keep hate well. When its time or a new mandy, I will do the 'pulling' by voking and hitting a few times. (The last mandy has quite a bit of sleep hate and can't be pulled with a single voke.)

Would a War/Nin or Rng/xxx be better? Probably. But don't say it's not do-able.

[Karinya]

The best BCNM40 drops I ever saw were from one that took 29 minutes 30 seconds.

No, that is not a typo. We finished with 30 seconds left on the clock... it was Worm's Turn and two of the worms *moved* to the entrance of the circle where you normally try to stand to cast on Franz (a bug I have never seen before, or fortunately, since). So they kept getting missed by sleepgas and we had several deaths as a result (well, that and the whm was too distracted to keep up barstonra). Eventually we killed Franz, raised everyone, and came back in to kill the rest of the small fry (the ranger had picked off the two worms that moved by that time, IIRC).

Erase, utsu:ni, nemesis earring (70k) and some other stuff totalling over 600k.

The good news is, we were using "orb user keeps all drops" rules, and it was my orb :D although really I don't prefer those rules, 30 more seconds and I would have gotten the shaft for loot in addition to being one of the people who died.

But pld are really unnecessary for worm's turn, and also for royal jelly, which are probably the two easiest and thus most popular BCNM40s (if you don't have BSTs; if you do, pretty much any BCNM is easy).

I've had a lot of trouble with steamed sprouts - have never won it, in fact. (Well, one time the healer got disconnected during the fight, so maybe I shouldn't count that one.) Glucian, what do you do about flood? Have the DRK stun it? And if so, doesn't make the DRK an essential part of the strategy since no other job can reliably stun at level 40?

The most recent time I lost it, the NM started flood as soon as we pulled, I ran out of range, but had some trouble getting hate back when I came back; but then at about 25% he started casting flood *again*. Tried to finish him off before he could finish it, failed, tried shield bash, it didn't interrupt him, died. A DRK could maybe have saved that run, but we had RNG and SAM for DDs; I think SAM is probably sub-optimal for steamed sprouts because the BLM is too preoccupied with sleep to have time for MBs (at least until near the end), and without MBs, SC aren't much good at lower levels.

Bringing greatsword is an interesting idea - you don't really need a shield to survive the physical attacks, but I'd be concerned about the loss of enmity from grudge sword, especially if you miss a couple swings in a row with the high delay of a GS. I assume you're joking about the snipers - defense isn't *that* unimportant - but a venerer might be worthwhile.

[Asherek]

I've had a lot of trouble with steamed sprouts - have never won it, in fact. (Well, one time the healer got disconnected during the fight, so maybe I shouldn't count that one.) Glucian, what do you do about flood? Have the DRK stun it? And if so, doesn't make the DRK an essential part of the strategy since no other job can reliably stun at level 40?

Easy. Just run from it. Seriously, it's not very hard to run from Flood in this battle. Not to mention, it doesn't *really* matter if you have hate or not for most of this battle, just get the mob killed. I lost hate to my Ranger a few times, but just slap on Cover and continue to plug away at the mob.

DRK is useful for Stun, yes, but keep in mind that if you have a RNG/NIN for this (or a WAR/NIN), if they have hate when Mandy starts casting Flood, it's actually a good thing, since all they have to do is re-cast Utsusemi and Flood will be eaten by a shadow.

As well, if you're bent upon stunning the black mandy, use sword+shield on only the black mandy and save up TP for Flat Blade and use it when you see him casting Flood.

However, the concept of running away works perfectly fine and I've yet to lose BCNM40. In fact, the very first time I did this BCNM with my set, I lagged and wasn't watching carefully and I ate a Flood and died. RNG/NIN ended up tanking while my weakness wore off (I helped cure her) and I resumed tanking once I was full health. Time taken to beat battle: 27 mins. Next time around? 15 mins, since I didn't die.

Bringing greatsword is an interesting idea - you don't really need a shield to survive the physical attacks, but I'd be concerned about the loss of enmity from grudge sword, especially if you miss a couple swings in a row with the high delay of a GS. I assume you're joking about the snipers - defense isn't *that* unimportant - but a venerer might be worthwhile. [/B]

Seriously, for this battle, -20 DEF isn't too bad at all. If you're concerned you're getting hit a decent amount by the black mandy, switch to 2 +3 DEX rings instead while fighting him, then switch to 2 Sniper Rings for the other mandagoras. Great Sword + Sniper Rings actually helps you deal decent damage to them simply because you can hit them. Capped GS Skill is a requirement.

[Steelshine]

If your intrested in a BCNM 40 a Paladin is needed for, at least in my opinion, check here .


For the BCNM, we tried with PLD BLM RNG, but found PLD RNG RNG is best combination from our experience. The drops are really good, and worth more since this is a 3 way split. We did this with Rng/war because the extra berserk damage seemed better then being able to blink a few hits. But I'm not sure, and either will work. /war is nice because it offers voke incase you get a bad paralyze at a bad time, and need to save the other rng.

The Pld needs : 2-3 Yagudo Drinks, 10x+ Hi-potions. Maybe a few ethers. Remedies incase paralyzed.

RNGs needs Both Bow and Xbow. The level 40 +1 bow, and I believe the 30ish Xbow with bloody bolts. A remedie incase paralyzed.

Strategy is everyone buffs up in begining, gets Protected and shell'ed by Paladin. When everyones ready, Paladin runs in the middle and aggros them all. Paladin Vokes Opo-Opo Monarch, and the Rng each let loose a Barrage+Bersker+Sharpshot on a SEPERATE Myrmidon. There are 3 Myrmidon. The trick to this BC is the Heir will not attack until the Monarch is dead.

After Rng each kill thier respective Myrmidon, they team up on the 3rd remaining one. It is at this point I recomend switching to bloody bolts for HP regen.

After the three Myrmidons are dead, you may want to have 1 ranger shadowbind the Monarch, who is going 1 on 1 with the Paladin. Have the Paladin move away and chug a few ether/hi-potion and get HP back up.

At this point the BC gets tricky. One rng must lower the Opo-opo Heirs hp to a sliver. If the heir is accidentally killed before the monarch, the Monarch gains physical damaga immune and your pretty much screwed. The other Rng gets the monarch down to a sliver.

After making sure Barrage timer is back up (we lost one time because of timer not being up due to killing Myrmidon too efficiently, and not waiting). The Rng on Heir will ready barrage+sharpshot. The Rng on monarch will finish his sliver of HP with Flaming arrow after activating sharpshot.

Now is the dangerous part. Upon the Monarchs death, the Heir will use Magic fruit and recover 4-600 HP and then start attacking for 70-120. I've seen this possible "bug" and recover to half HP. The Rng will use barrage as soon as he sees monarch fall. The Heir will start weaponskill spam, and probally kill the Rng on him. Thats why its important the Rng gets off Barrage then EES if he has time. The rng who was killing monarch will then use Barrage + EES to finish the Heir.

Some notes...
Looking back, I'm about 50% win rate on this. Mainly due to not shadowbinding the Heir when monarch dies, giving you time to get off both Barrage and EES. Also Invincible can be used any time the 1 on 1 fight does not seem to be going well, so HP can be recovered. This is a difficult BCNM, not a cake walk with near garunteed win like Worms turn and Steamed sprouts with proper strategy. The drops we got show this. I posted this while sick with a cold..if I left out something that seems like it should be there just ask.

[Karinya]

Reportedly you can do the monkeys easier by killing the myrmidons, reducing both monarch and heir to a sliver without killing either, then luring them close together and finishing them off with a single Stonega2 (or Thundaga, or Banishga II, etc; a SMN could do it with 2hour, but then you can't go 3 times in one run.) That way, neither of them gets the huge HP recovery + buff from the other's death. Seems like a much better strategy than a 50% win rate with multiple 2hours... also, a BLM/WHM or WHM can provide Paralyna, which is very helpful vs monkeys.

You need a PLD to tank the monarch + Epa for the first part of the fight (put Spo to sleep and have the DD kill Apu, then move on to Spo, with the BLM or WHM providing healing and -na spells).

I haven't done this myself, but might try it soon, as it sounds like fun, and the loot from the jellies is getting lower in value on my server (except the scrolls, but you don't always get good ones).

[Glucian]

Originally posted by Karinya

Glucian, what do you do about flood? Have the DRK stun it? And if so, doesn't make the DRK an essential part of the strategy since no other job can reliably stun at level 40?

Yea Fus (the dark) is the stunner. Shield bash never works and flat blade is a waste of tp. I have never eaten a flood yet. I have seen flood shadowed late in the fight by the rng/nin one time when cover wore and stun was down. Lucky indeed.

I am looking into gathering a 60 bc pt since there are so many goodies now.

Has anyone tried the new alliance bc's? Wondering how the Paladin vs Ninja thing measured up to those.

[Asherek]

Originally posted by Glucian
[B]Yea Fus (the dark) is the stunner. Shield bash never works and flat blade is a waste of tp. I have never eaten a flood yet. I have seen flood shadowed late in the fight by the rng/nin one time when cover wore and stun was down. Lucky indeed.

The very last run of this I did we used a DRG instead of DRK and still won. :sweat:

You don't need Stun to win this battle at all.

[Steelshine]

Originally posted by Karinya
Reportedly you can do the monkeys easier by killing the myrmidons, reducing both monarch and heir to a sliver without killing either, then luring them close together and finishing them off with a single Stonega2 (or Thundaga, or Banishga II, etc; a SMN could do it with 2hour, but then you can't go 3 times in one run.) That way, neither of them gets the huge HP recovery + buff from the other's death. Seems like a much better strategy than a 50% win rate with multiple 2hours... also, a BLM/WHM or WHM can provide Paralyna, which is very helpful vs monkeys.

You need a PLD to tank the monarch + Epa for the first part of the fight (put Spo to sleep and have the DD kill Apu, then move on to Spo, with the BLM or WHM providing healing and -na spells).

I haven't done this myself, but might try it soon, as it sounds like fun, and the loot from the jellies is getting lower in value on my server (except the scrolls, but you don't always get good ones).

The reason we are about 50/50 is we did this with very little info and felt around for a couple matches. Our wins came after we got the strategy down solid. We wanted to try with a SMN but never got around to it.