Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

Would it be possible to do Warrior to a level less than 18 AND while subbing either White Mage or Red Mage?

If you solo, sure.

Leveling by yourself will be slow after Lv.12 or so, but doable if you bring Selbina Milk and Pineapple Juice. Don't expect to take on Even Match (100 exp per kill) monsters, though; you'll mostly be hitting weakish critters ("Easy Prey") for 15-30 exp per kill, with lot's of down time.

That said, if you place your WAR/WHM out there in newbie area with seek flag up, sooner or later you will get an invite. You'd be an underperforming tank, but as a damage dealer you're not that much worse off than using the standard support job, /MNK.

/WHM is not a terrible support job for Tarutaru WAR's in parties--just that there are better support jobs. IMO, if you're only taking WAR to Lv.18, you can probably get away with WAR/WHM. But, if you want to tank, you won't beat WAR/MNK or WAR/BLU.

Also, what if I, while leveling White Mage, leveled it to 18 and used THAT as a support for Paladin?

I'm gonna break with the pack and say "Yes, while not optimal, PLD/WHM can work if you're a Tarutaru." HOWEVER, your invite rate will be low, and people who do invite you will likely:
A) Ask you to switch to /WAR; or,
B) Get mad that you didn't switch to /WAR before coming to camp.

The only reason I wrote that you can is that, as a Tarutaru, you'll actually have enough MP to main heal as PLD at some levels, and /WHM will give you many useful spells. (No, you can't tank like that--Shield Bash or no Shield Bash.)

Your chance of finding pick-up groups (PUG's) willing to take PLD/WHM as main healer is pretty close to 0%, though. You'll never as good of a healer/buffer as a WHM/anything, either.

* * *

BTW, I exp as RDM/WHM mostly. While as RDM/WHM I can't save party members by using Cover, I can rescue them from trouble by using Sleep and Bind and Gravity and Cure. >_> (Usually, though, I just enfeeble the monsters so much it has no choice but die quickly and without much fuss.)

It's much more efficient to keep the mob away from the party while everyone is recovering rather than make the mob hit my RDM, to be honest.

* * *

There are many non-standard job combinations which can work well in parties at certain levels, but not well accepted.

I'll list a few examples for kicks, and just in case you'd like to explore them. (Keep in mind they don't get you parties fast.)

Starter Levels (1-29):
WAR/BRD: Lv.10-19; basically, it's Paeon all the time. Good luck finding main healers who understand that. (I didn't find any while using DRG/BRD.) No good for tanking.
RDM/WAR: Lv.10-23; for RDM's who like to tank. Use Blind and Cure to generate extra enmity. (Eat defense food and bring juice.)
WAR/BLU: Lv.16-??: for tanking with Cocoon and attack food.. I'd imagine it can last to Lv.40-ish and beyond?
DRK/WHM: Lv.10-29; DD and suppliment healing. It's quite nice, and quite rare. (Why I would like this but not PLD/WHM? Well, because people don't ask DRK's to tank--usually. If you're not tanking, you don't need provoke...)

Note: I didn't list WAR/WHM, PLD/WHM, or PLD/RDM; they don't offer enough.
- PLD/WAR can tank; PLD/WHM or /RDM cannot tank, and do not make impressive damage dealers nor come close to utility of a real WHM.
- WAR/BRD can probably heal more over time than WAR/WHM, and doesn't require any rest time to recharge MP, allowing you to keep TP between battles and heal.
- WAR/MNK and WAR/BLU both edge out WAR/WHM for tanking easily.

RDM/PLD? I don't see a single useful thing that combination has over RDM/WHM at the starter levels. ^_^; RDM/WHM will serve you much better.

[Altae]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

I think you're contradicting yourself, Yellow Mage. First of all, everytime someone tries to persuade you to the disadvantages PLD subjob has for soloing, you proceed to praise the qualities a RDM/PLD can do in a party. What are you majorly planning to do if you ever hit level 75? Party often? Or solo? And by soloing in this sense, I do not mean fighting incredibly tough opponents for experience points. I'm talking about leisurly things. Such as doing a quest that'll spawn 3 level 68 bosses. Or farming for some item off of opponents who could kill you if you didn't use magic.

But of course, such tasks can be easily accomplished with a party. Yet, what you don't know is that often times you won't be able to form a party when you want to. People do have other things they want to do.

So, to fix that, you would probably "plan" your needs ahead of time. Okay, people agree to help, you get what you want in due time. However, what will everyone else think about you using RDM/PLD? These other players who are so accustomed to the other uses RDM can provide than trying to protect the a tank or healer who come close to dying. Really, I think I'd rather not help a RDM/PLD if they're looking to protect me with cover, should I be the tank who is there to protect that particular RDM. Does it make sense to have a Tank-like job protecting his/her party of a white mage, red mage, and a black mage to need protection by someone he/she is protecting? If you belive that to be the case, then you seek to use RDM/PLD as a last resort in times of dire need. "Oh, let me come along should you ever come close to dying, that's what you'll need me for."

It's like saying you don't need a main attention grabber for your opponents to focus on. That you yourself would be willing to take up on that role. That's all what RDM/PLD is from how you explain it. A shield to take damage so your other party members live. You point out the PLD's attributes of shield expertise, cover, and even fighting undead with for more expertise than a white mage. And by putting those traits onto a RDM, you think you'll be able to do just as good or even better. "Hey, if you can do it, so can I."

Then there's the parts where you claim that having magic and spells to cast is a necessity to solo/survive. Well, you obviously don't want to solo since you prefer saving party members. Meaning, you prefer to be in a party than by yourself. So, why not level a job that uses the EX weapon skills you desire and deal more damage than a RDM can? Be a tank who can do that AND save other players from dying.

I don't think you fully understand what it is you want. You just looked at the skills, abilities, CHOICE cases/situations where those skill and abilities can be effectively applied. And such cases exist only when someone is about to get killed. So to not feel helpless, or useless, you wish to be the one there that'll use cover for that bit of recognition: "You'd of died if I didn't come with /PLD."

EDIT: Also, take a look at all the Maat fight topics in this RDM job forum. How do you think they all managed to eventually fight Maat? Think they went and melee'd him down? You obviously think that's what a RDM can do if it only had a subjob to enhance that attribute. "If I have this weapon skill, I can make RDM better." Right. Unfortunately, Maat fights take away the use of your subjob. Without /PLD, how could you ever defeat him and continue advancing the capabilities fo your RDM?

And in case you don't know, Maat is the level limit NPC. Upon hitting 50, you will have to take on this old man's challenges in order to be allowed to level up past 50. Then the next limit is 55, preventing you from reaching 56-60. 60 being the next limit, then 65, and finally 70. In order to advance past level 70, you must defeat the man who has been giving out these challenges to break your level limits. And to defeat him, you are not allowed to use a subjob. What will you do then? "Well, I picked up some tricks of the trade by playing my 70RDM/35PLD, I can beat him?"

[WishMaster3K]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

Yellow Mage, FFXI is a completely different MMO than anything that exists.


Ever.

It's not like WoW. It's not like EQ. It's not like Legion (sp?). It's not like any other MMO on the market, or any other MMO that came out.

I'm going to say this to save you a lot of headache, you can not solo effectively past 20. And getting to 20 solo will be a headache and a half. It may be "feasable" or "possible" if you fight EP--, but the fact is, it'll take years for you to do what you want to do solo.

And for the love of Altanna, just play the game and you'll realize these things. Trust me, it makes a lot more sense when you start playing...

Paladin's in FFXI are different from Paladin's in other MMOs, because in FFXI, we can change our subjobs. This makes PLDs deligated to tanks. WARs are more delegated to meleeing, and not tanking. RDMs (Druids) are pt support, and until you get to the 60s, soloing is very difficult unless you have HL abilities (meaning merits, or if you go to a BCNM and your skills are already capped).

In terms of comparing FFXI to something you've already experienced, don't. It's a totally different brand of crack.

[Altae needs a hug, btw]

[Yellow Mage]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

For goodness sake, I never said I WOULDN'T have /WHM available!

Untill level 30, that's what I'd basically do.

And I pretty much admitted that all arguements were completely on hold UNTIL I actually started, like you all are just telling me to do.

I'm not saying that you all don't have VERY good and convincing points. You all do, and I'll be sure to take EVERY arguement mentioned here in consideration when I start.

[Jei]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

Isn't it interesting how we don't say dear "god" anymore but instead dear "Altana."

The game is very involving. Would you believe it I tell you I feel connected to many NPC in this game more than many of my RL friends...?

[Raydeus]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

I never know shield mastery gives no TP without taking damage. Shield blocking with stoneskin won't do a thing? I don't know, ever test it out.

Yup, you only get TP when you take damage, so Stoneskin means zero TP for hits recieved regardless if it was a blocked by your Shield or not.

It would've been nice getting at least the TP bonus from blocking even if you didn't get the TP from damage taken.

[Taskmage]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

Isn't it interesting how we don't say dear "god" anymore but instead dear "Altana."
The game is very involving. Would you believe it I tell you I feel connected to many NPC in this game more than many of my RL friends...?

That observation is a little disturbing, Jei.

[WishMaster3K]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

Would you believe it I tell you I feel connected to many NPC in this game more than many of my RL friends...?

Yes, and I agree. Well, my RL friends that play on the same server, that is. That's because my NPC hits me off with Cure 4 when I'm close to death, while my RL friends are all useless melees.

And sorry for the badgering, Yellow, I was feeding off of Altae's post.

[Raydeus]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

That observation is a little disturbing, Jei.

Wanna hear disturbing? I wanna marry my npc because she is better company than most people I've met in-game

And I pretty much admitted that all arguements were completely on hold UNTIL I actually started, like you all are just telling me to do.

I'm not saying that you all don't have VERY good and convincing points. You all do, and I'll be sure to take EVERY arguement mentioned here in consideration when I start.

Here's something else you gotta consider, a RDMs role in a party changes as you level up.

-The first 40 levels RDM is a backup-main healer/debuffer/semi-DD in that order of importance.

-After lvl 41 your role changes to debuffer/support/backup-main healer in that order most of the times.

-At lvl 48 when you get Haste it just reinforces your role as support/debuffer/backup-main healer

This means you wont be using your sword/dagger much after lvl 40, and even if you somehow have enough inventory space to carry all the gear to do your job well (specially after getting access to elemental staves) plus all the meleeing gear your meleeing isn't gonna do much.

And the truth is after level 55ish your B skill rating on Sword/Dagger will start affecting your accuracy bad, and by level 65-70 you wont be able to hit an XP mob unless you get a good amount of +stats on you just to hit the mob, and even if you hit it the damage would be quite meaningless compared to any other DD in the game.

In fact only Bards do less damage than us (but get access to better DD gear and songs XD), WHM and BLM can in fact deal more melee damage because they get access to higher damage weapons and weapon skills, it's stupid but that's how it is.

If you really want to melee in a party and do all that stuff you want to do BLU is a much better option, they are indeed a jack-of-all-trades job. Now don't get me wrong, I still like RDM more than BLU or any other job, but for the kind of aproach you want to take maybe BLU would be best suited for it.

Even if I love RDM I gotta admit the job is very limited in the damage dealing department, but if it wasn't that way everyone and their mother would be screaming "NERF!!!!1one" so I just take it as the price I gotta pay for the good stuff from RDM job.

[Celeal]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

PLD is a weak subjob choice for all jobs in this game in most situation.

For party: If you are looking for a job combination for the best in support, healing, nuke, melee and tank at the same time, it is not going to happen. PLD as a subjob is not even close for filling in any of the role above:

For tanking, PLD as subjob does not offer enough tools for holding hate or damage migration to make much different/impact.
For melee, PLD as subjob does not offer any real damage dealing abilities.
For nuke, Banish-line white magic is not efficient in terms of mp/damage ratio.
For healing, PLD lacks status removal spells, lacks buff, lacks debuff, with small mp pool.
For support, PLD lacks tool for reducing downtime or speeding the kill.

For solo: RDM covers all that PLD can offer.

Basically, when RDM/PLD, most of the useful stuff comes from the RDM portion.

[Raydeus]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

For solo: RDM covers all that PLD can offer.

Basically, when RDM/PLD, most of the useful stuff comes from the RDM portion.

For Utsusemiless skill up, or Undead mass murdering /PLD is a really nice sub, specially since with auto-refresh you can use a Rune Blade and do some nice Vorpal damage without the -mp affecting you much, Flash is nice too and it usually lets you get Stoneskin up the same way Utsusemi would on mobs up to EM.

So for me /PLD is the Undead slayer sub while /DRK is the Arcana slayer one.



But for XP/Endgame-event situations except for Auto Refresh and Flash (lvl 70 and 74) /PLD has nothing to offer.

[Celeal]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

For Utsusemiless skill up, or Undead mass murdering /PLD is a really nice sub, specially since with auto-refresh you can use a Rune Blade and do some nice Vorpal damage without the -mp affecting you much, Flash is nice too and it usually lets you get Stoneskin up the same way Utsusemi would on mobs up to EM.

So for me /PLD is the Undead slayer sub while /DRK is the Arcana slayer one.



But for XP/Endgame-event situations except for Auto Refresh and Flash (lvl 70 and 74) /PLD has nothing to offer.

If you are fighting very weak undead, properly you won't need Undead Killer anyway. For Undead that are Easy Prey or above, Holy Circle may make things easier. But it is still random, last only a short time with 15 min /recast timer. You may also get Undead Killer and EX Sword WS from /BLU too: Smite of Rage(34) + Bludgeon(18) = Undead Killer. RDM/BLU is more appearing to me.

In my opinion, Spike spell (I forgot the name, is it Frost Spike?) or Paralyze make much more sense for solo compare to those Killer Job Trait...

For using swords, if you intend to use Rune Blade.. well, besides /PLD, I think /BRD or /SMN may work too. If you intend for both Vorpal Blade + Rune Blade, well, only RDM/PLD works. However, there are other good swords and better subjob for using sword too.

As for putting Stoneskin during battle, beside Flash from /PLD, we can have Utsusemi from /NIN, Stun from /DRK, Head Butt from /BLU. Even RDM itself has Slow + Blind + Paralyze + Bind + Sleep + Gravity + Aquvail (spelling?)....

No matter how I see it, RDM/PLD is still a weaker combination compare to other subjobs.

[Icemage]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

For Utsusemiless skill up, or Undead mass murdering /PLD is a really nice sub, specially since with auto-refresh you can use a Rune Blade and do some nice Vorpal damage without the -mp affecting you much, Flash is nice too and it usually lets you get Stoneskin up the same way Utsusemi would on mobs up to EM.

Rune blade sucks, especially for RDM, who rely so heavily on their MP pool. Joyeuse and Justice Sword both vastly outparse Rune Blade even before taking enspell damage into consideration; with enspells counted, it's a landslide.

So for me /PLD is the Undead slayer sub while /DRK is the Arcana slayer one.

That's pretty much what it boils down to. WHM/PLD and RDM/PLD are "acceptable" subs in King Ranperre's Tomb, for instance - though I really think /BLM is still by far a better choice if for no other reason than you can Escape if things get really ugly due to bad spawns.

RDM/DRK is much more than Arcana Slayer. Chainspell + Stun is simply amazing, and even without Chainspell, giving Stun to a job with as much Fast Cast as RDMs have is a huge plus in a variety of battles. Even solo, /DRK gives a hefty Attack Bonus and gives access to the super-efficient Drain and Aspir (not to mention Souleater, which is really cool for RDMs since you can absorb the damage via Stoneskin).

But for XP/Endgame-event situations except for Auto Refresh and Flash (lvl 70 and 74) /PLD has nothing to offer.

If my strategy revolves around a RDM casting Flash, I've already lost.


Icemage

[Raydeus]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

There are many ways to fight as a RDM, I'm just talking about PLD specifically, but I use many other subs.

When I'm fighting Undead up to EM and I'm tanking I find that /PLD is more my style, Flash, Shield Bash and even Cover are nice to have, not only Vorpal but also for Auto-Refresh and Shield mastery are also nice aditions specially if you are using a Rune Blade.

I'm sure /war or /blu could work better in some situations but it depends on your playstyle.

About spikes, unless you are using shadows Ice Spikes are always up if you are the one taking the hits, but if you stack it with Undead/Arcana etc. killer it makes fights even easier, it doesnt make much of a difference but it helps.

I'm sure there many are other ways of doing things (some even better) but in this case PLD sub isn't as gimped as you may think.

(And subbing BRD or SMN for soloing is almost as bad as subbing /PLD for XP parties )


I have drk, pld, nin, whm, blm, thf, war, etc. subs and I use them all according to what I'm gonna do.

That's part of the fun of being a RDM.

Edit >

Rune blade sucks, especially for RDM, who rely so heavily on their MP pool. Joyeuse and Justice Sword both vastly outparse Rune Blade even before taking enspell damage into consideration; with enspells counted, it's a landslide.

Nah, you are entitled to your opinion but Rune Blade is a good weapon, I've been trying out many swords and the only one I've kept is Rune Blade because for other things I'm usually using a dagger.

I don't know about Justice sword because I don't have sea access and Joyeuse is a nice TP toy but I rather use Rune Blade or another kind of sword, which is why I haven't even tried to get a Joy.

If my strategy revolves around a RDM casting Flash, I've already lost.

I have never seen a RDM/PLD in any end game event myself, but I was just pointing out that those would be they only "useful" things from PLD sub, I wouldn't use it though. /shrug

[Jei]

Re: Looking for an endgame Taru RDM/PLD

My personal opinion. When I'm out fighting easy preys not for drop, I like to use PLD just for the auto MP refresh. It's a neat little thing to have that helps me with downtime. I can careless about the EX sword WS... approximately ~200 more damage from WS is not that big of a factor since, like you said, Rdm is already lacking in the damage department. We rely more on En spells than anything IMO. When I'm out helping friends with keys too. If we already have Thf or /Thf, I just use /PLD for MP refresh too.

It's convenience, nothing ground breaking tho. I got spoiled after having my vermilion cloak for too long Before I had my PLD level up, I always wear my very everytime I farm with /Thf and the little refresh there really eliminates my downtime.

But man, as soon as I get my AFv2 hat I probably have no reason to sub PLD ever again.... if I only have that hat... >.>