RDM: My journey through it so far.

[Zaleshea]

What started out as a simply "hit and cast" thing, turned more into a "sit back in certain fights and play BLM". I like this... and people let me melee, which is all I ever wanted to do, while still heal members as well..

I started out bad at first. Until my whm instinct kicked in.

I like how you are able to "switch" mage styles depending on the situation. I'd say 70% of the time since I started, I've had to lean on white enfeebling magic. When I got to dunes, this changed, I started nuking and healing more, less meleeing. Infact, I guess the melee part is just the luxury of this job, I will buy a wand with some mnd addage, since I'm certain I'll be meleeing not all that much.

But still it is nice to be able to.

Enthunder is very nice.

I even asked people how I'm doing so far in the party.. I really dont wont to suck at this job.

[midnilux]

I haven't meleed in a PT ever, I stopped at level 10, I dunno how my sword skill was like 50, I hunted Lichs for like 50 hours to get the stupid papyrus for Genkai 1 and now it is 102, still pretty low, I think at level 51 my sword skills should be 160ish so I regret not having built it up a bit, now it's hopeless to try to build it up in a PT I cant even hit the damn things I hve to refresh every minute, dispel, heal, enfeeble etc, and most mobs im fighting at this level have AOEs so I wouldnt melee anyway.

I regret not meleeing on mobs without AOEs and such cause my sword skill sucks ass now, I'll have to be a paladin or something to ever hope to get it up. So try to melee as long as it is safe, if a mob has an AOE attack dont melee, like gobs or flies for instance, crabs and beetles are ok as an example. Don't melee however even on crabs if you are main healer or the mobs are too tough requiring you too constantly enfeeble and/or help heal.

Which brings me to another point, make sure your enfeeble skill is always capped, no one gives a shit if your sword skill is 1, but having crappy enfeeble skill does hurt your role in a PT. My sword skill is bad but as a plus my healing, elemental, and enfeeble are all maxed, cause thats all I do in PTs, cast spells.

[MrADC]

In regards to leveling up your sword or any other skills, you should do what I do, and level skills while farming. I never really used a dagger, bow or a club, and rarely get to use enhancing magic while partying. So I go out and farm mobs that I can give me good skills up in all low categories farely fast (went from dagger skill of 18 to 61 in approx. 5 hours of farming). Also leveled up archery to level 60, which is fun in itself!

Oh, since I fish, I usually cast enhancing spells inbetween waits. So if you find that some magic skills are lacking, cast them when you have free time, or against mobs while farming.

[Zaleshea]

I have certain days where my time is dedicated entirely to skilling up.

Enfeeble capping wont be too much of a problem, since that's all I ever do(more the once if resisted). And when it's time to level BLM again, I know my enfeebling will be like..capped forever, as well as elemental(also capped). Naturally, blasted enhance is going to be stubborn to raise. XD

[Sukashi]

Originally posted by Zaleshea
Enfeeble capping wont be too much of a problem, since that's all I ever do(more the once if resisted). And when it's time to level BLM again, I know my enfeebling will be like..capped forever, as well as elemental(also capped). Naturally, blasted enhance is going to be stubborn to raise. XD

Once you get Refresh at 41, Enhancing magic should be easier to raise since you'll be casting that three to six times every two minutes and thirty seconds in parties. O.G

However, Enhancing magic is also fast to raise while you're waiting for Boat or Airship, or also when you're farming. Protect, Shell, En-spells, Stoneskin, and Blink are spells you will cast a lot when you're farming for gil, and as a result it should go up very fast ^^

I haven't farmed in a while, so my Enhancing magic is lacking a few levels. ; ;

Dark Magic on the other hand..... /dies

[Gman]

RE: meleeing with crabs:

You start fighting Robber Crabs in Kuftal Tunnel at around level 51, and trust me... you DONT want to melee. The once harmless little bubble shower that did 0-10 dmg in Valkurm, Quifim, etc now does 150-250 dmg to anyone in range, and trust me... the range is HUGE. You practically have to stand in a different zone to not get hit by that. Barwater helps a bit, but you don't always have a WHM.

My enhancing has gone up quite a bit since getting refresh, but its still got a long way to go to catch my enfeeble. At level 52, my enfeeble is 161, enhancing is only like 139.

[ifandbut]

I intend to mele each level till I have my sword skill caped. And I will keep raising my sword skill untill I have Spirits Within
I dont lack on my enfeebs or my refreshes but I enjoy being able to swind my sword inbetween refreshes. I also know that shining blade does about 100+ dmg at 110% tp....thats enough to make a Skill Chain between me and the pld every once and a while.
My skill up is slow. I took me 7+k xp to cap it out for level 52 from haveing it allready caped out at level 51
I went through all of kazam and quifm without meleing and I am sad that I missed the time when a rdm could do decent dammage at those levels (of cource the pt allways wanted me to be main healer for those levels :mad: )

[Chucklez_1]

You start fighting Robber Crabs in Kuftal Tunnel at around level 51, and trust me... you DONT want to melee. The once harmless little bubble shower that did 0-10 dmg in Valkurm, Quifim, etc now does 150-250 dmg to anyone in range, and trust me... the range is HUGE. You practically have to stand in a different zone to not get hit by that. Barwater helps a bit, but you don't always have a WHM.

True but with a /whm sub, those 250 dmg goes to only double digits. What's great about rdm is that they're enhancing is maxed quickly...thus status/elemental resists are WAY higher (10 more resist in water really helps). But Gman has a point here...there are some that are not worth the balls meleeing

And in my observation, I highly recommend meleeing ONLY to the point where you can still do your job very efficiently (and I mean not avoiding those enfeebles and tracking enfeebles and haste, refreshing non stop, buffing, etc.). We do crap dmg very true but it's this time where we can save time in general by skilling up our weapons. Refreshing 3-5 people takes forever and since you can't really rest in between, you might as well poke that enemy before you can rest. We might miss, we might do 5 damage, but getting that .5+ skill up is worth it imo.

[Zaleshea]

Originally posted by Gman
RE: meleeing with crabs:

You start fighting Robber Crabs in Kuftal Tunnel at around level 51, and trust me... you DONT want to melee. The once harmless little bubble shower that did 0-10 dmg in Valkurm, Quifim, etc now does 150-250 dmg to anyone in range, and trust me... the range is HUGE. You practically have to stand in a different zone to not get hit by that. Barwater helps a bit, but you don't always have a WHM.

My enhancing has gone up quite a bit since getting refresh, but its still got a long way to go to catch my enfeeble. At level 52, my enfeeble is 161, enhancing is only like 139.

Mines 57 capped with enhance at 47.

I bought a hermit wand... I'm finding that the only real way to keep my enfeeble up and capped is to party very often. Solo? It wont raise at all..and I fight all easys and decents..

[Karinya]

RDM never has to rely on someone else for Bar spells. Bar-elements cast in about 2 sec, it takes me longer to type the command than for the spell to actually cast. And who cares about 150-250? Drain now, Regen at the end of the battle, you got it back (and that's assuming you didn't bother to Stoneskin). If you count that and the en spell as costs of meleeing - it's still cheaper than one nuke. Maybe for Taru, one nuke outdamages the whole fight's worth of melee, but not for me.

But even if you consider crab AOE dangerous, that still leaves monsters without any damage or bad status AOE at all - bats and beetles for example. Ooh, lower my evasion, I'm so frightened.

On the other hand, there are definitely things I wouldn't want to melee. Meleeing skeletons is usually a bad idea - if you can stand far enough away to be out of blood saber range, do it. (If the area is so cramped you can't get away, you might as well melee even on things with nasty AOE as you will get hit regardless. Keep up stoneskin in this case.)

Also, I wouldn't go to Kuftal at 51 unless you like seeing resist resist resist, Dia2 succeeds, resist resist resist (even with maxed skill and a ton of int/mnd gear). Most of those crabs are well above 60.

The higher I get in level, the more important I find it is for RDM to be near the top of the party in level - you can't get away with being 2 levels behind everyone else the way a whm or brd can. And if your whole party is level 51, taking on robber crabs is painfully slow exp at best, mass suicide at worst.

PS. I maxed my enhancing skill doing Genkai 1 - also gained some healing subbing WHM for blindna and paralyna (both very handy in Eldieme), they seem to raise healing skill faster than cures. I'll see if I can keep capping it every level, but I bet so.

[Synbios]

DRK magic isn't that hard to cap, just throw a Bio every battle, /BLM and Seal + Drain/Aspir after curing everytime you Convert. I didn't have a problem with Healing since WHM is my main, but raising Dark is really a bitch. >.> Also, in a party which is safe and prolly won't need Escape, 2 hr Drain is both fun and a good way to raise your skill.

As for skilling up melee weapons, just do it on Even mobs, all your current level skill caps on Even mobs.

I'm having a big problem with Shield and Parry tho.. ; ; And I believe that if capped, I'd have more parry/shield blocks when soloing and maybe helps to kill VT easier. Soloing T isn't a big problem. :\

[Zeyno]

I found that the difference between being an OK RDM and getting praise of "wow, you are one of the best RDM i've ever pted with!" is sitting during battle. If you aren't casting for 10 seconds, its better to get that one tick of mp than the meesly damage you could do by meleeing. Not to mention the cost of en- spell.

Regen helps a lot with this. During qufim and later kazham, when my Cure II capped at 90, I could easily throw regen on the tank then sit and only stand for a Cure II or two. Being the main healer isn't so bad when the pt can chain faster than having a full whm. Please don't try this without a good tank.

Once I got to crawler's nest at 35 I stoped sitting so much. Since I had to be standing to cast dispel, I wanted to get it off as soon as possible. Not to mention that you can't skimp on the enfeebles and heals anymore. Regen 1 just isn't powerful enough anymore on its own. I have been meleeing on crawlers and later beetles. Just remember to stand to the side of the crawler so you aren't hit with poison (from the front) and aren't in the way of SATA (if you have a thf). I did damage comparable to the pld, but I'm not set up to melee so it wasn't bad.



On a side note: I just came back from deleveling down to 39 and not getting a party all night. @#*%^ I want Refresh!!

[Zaleshea]

Thanks everyone.