Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

[hongman]

I finally managed to find the final heat element for my Ruby, and so I couldnt wait to change jobs and start lvling.

A few things i noticed whilst doing mobs in W Ron:

1. One time, I had Carby fighting a mob, I had 14MP left (only lvl1 lol) and he just disappeared. ??? Hp was not even half gone.

2. Trying out the 2hr, and the 1st time I cast it, Carby just lept up and disappeared, again, ???

3. Whats the difference between the "proper" avatars and the mini ones? Say I have the Garuda mini, then do the proper Garuda fight, does my Garuda just become stronger?

4. I have noticed that there seems to be a lot of soloability with this job - I was taking out fodders by lvl 2. Is this true?

5. What kind of +MP and other SMN specific gear should I be looking to get, say starting at lvl 20?

Thanks

H

[Shirai]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

1. One time, I had Carby fighting a mob, I had 14MP left (only lvl1 lol) and he just disappeared. ??? Hp was not even half gone.

Weird, no explaination for that.

2. Trying out the 2hr, and the 1st time I cast it, Carby just lept up and disappeared, again, ???

The Astral flow Blood pact brings your MP down to 0, even though Astral flow itself makes avatars free an avatar cannot be kept out at 0 MP.
The avatar will just dismiss itself at 0 MP unless you have some refresh that takes MP back up.
(IE Drinks or the Auto refresh trait at level 25)

3. Whats the difference between the "proper" avatars and the mini ones? Say I have the Garuda mini, then do the proper Garuda fight, does my Garuda just become stronger?

Just the fight, your avatars will have the same power in either way you beat it.
The only "advantage" you have when you get them by beating the level 60+ prime fights is that
you can use the mini forks for the level 20 solo quests to get to the cloisters fast when you repeat the prime fights.

4. I have noticed that there seems to be a lot of soloability with this job - I was taking out fodders by lvl 2. Is this true?

Yes summoner has a great soloability, it will get a lot better 51+ when you can keep out Carby for free with carby mitts + Light staff.

5. What kind of +MP and other SMN specific gear should I be looking to get, say starting at lvl 20?

MP gear depends on race on lower levels,
Tarus shouldn't need MP gear, better yet avoid it like the plague since most of it takes your HP down drasticly.
Humes and Mithra about the same although one astral ring (if you can afford it) wouldn hurt too bad.
Elvaan and Galka really benefit from those since they have a low MP pool but the HP to compensate the loss from astrals.
However normal mage gear will last you until level 50.
(IE Baron's @ 20, Seer's @ 29+)
At level 50+ go for Austere body and hat at least, the rest with Artifact as you get it and carby mitts will last you all the way to 75.
At level 51 you should at least have a light and dark staff, you should get the entire set though.

[hongman]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

thanks for that

1. what are cloisters?

Yeah. im Elvaan, so MP is crap. Chose the wrong race really

Always struggling for money in this game!

SHame also that you cant really PL a SMN, as I want to keep my skill capped and in most cases so far (well, based on all 10 or so fights), I dnt take any damage. And if i do need to melee, I die anyway lol

Does Carby get stronger with my SMN skill or my physical lvl?

[Shirai]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

Cloisters are the places you go to fight avatars, you'll find out as soon as you get the quests.

There are several guides that will explain to you in this forum how to obtain avatars by the level 20 minibattles.

As for MP gear, if you can't afford it it's no problem really, just buy a stack of melon or rolanberry pies to boost your MP.
To get money to fund that, level whm to 36 or 41 and teleport people for an hour every day.
This should make you enough to fund the simple things and save up a bit for future gear.
Making money for leveling your first job is always hard.
you will be asked to sub whm on summoner on later levels most of the time as you will main heal in parties most of the time.
So it is advisable to take whm up anyway.

Answer to the last question:
Carbuncle and the other avatars get stronger by level you gain.

[hongman]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

Ok, looks like I will have to level WHM then, sooner rather than later. What I might do is lvl whm to lvl 10 for now, so I can sub it until lvl 20 and get my avatars.

Then I can work the rest out later!

I am currently subbbing RDM.

RDM BLM and SMN are the only jobs I have tried so far!

[Gwynn]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

Yeah. im Elvaan, so MP is crap. Chose the wrong race really
Always struggling for money in this game!

On the race issue, don't worry yourself about it and don't let other people tell you that you're a subpar mage because you're Elvaan and they're Tarutaru. I know a lot of very good Elvaan and Galka mages who put a lot of their Hume and Tarutaru counterparts to shame. Its true that you'll have a little bit of a harder time in the early levels, but as long as you get some decent +MP gear and always use food (either pies or cookies, I personally prefer cookies but I'm a Hume so you'll have to use your own best judgment as to what works for you) you'll do just fine as a mage.

Money is always a problem, especially for your first job. Don't sweat it, just stop leveling and get the gil for what you need. Having WHM to 42 so that you can Teleport people for gil is a very easy (and sometimes quite lucrative, giving some of the high prices that I've seen people paying these days) way to make gil at lower levels.

Best advice I can give you is just to have fun and do your best, everything else will fall into place after that.

[hongman]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

Thanks for that - yeah I have seen some shouts in Jeuno for like 10k per teleport!

Also, Im thinking that lvling WHM should be quicker than most others, becuase (judging from my own party forming experience) they are always in shortage!!!

My ultimate goal so far is to do RDM and SMN to 75...who knows what else in the process.

[framerate]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

Thanks for that - yeah I have seen some shouts in Jeuno for like 10k per teleport!

Also, Im thinking that lvling WHM should be quicker than most others, becuase (judging from my own party forming experience) they are always in shortage!!!

My ultimate goal so far is to do RDM and SMN to 75...who knows what else in the process.

Don't get ahead of yourself big guy, you'll burn yourself out. I think I'm on 80+ days of solid play time and I have SMN73 and WHM61 under my belt (roughly 3 years off and on playing). The grind takes a long time and it takes a special kind of person to be able to do it fast and not get turned off by the mechanics.

best advice I can give you? Just enjoy being a SMN (or RDM or what not) and you'll have a blast on your way to the almighty 75.

[Shirai]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

best advice I can give you? Just enjoy being a SMN (or RDM or what not) and you'll have a blast on your way to the almighty 75.

That my friend are words that should never be forgotten.

And yes, races that have a natural lower MP pool do better in the end most of the time.
Simply because you learn to controll your MP pools at early levels.
As Gwynn sais, do some MP gear and I would advise you to use MP food as well being elvaan +35~ MP from the pies will really help you on lower levels.

You might want to take cookies later on in the game as Gwynn advises as they'll help you get your MP up faster while resting.
However at lower levels you don't really need to worry about those yet.
I'd say around level 40 when you can equip the electrum set they'll start to be useful.
(Electrum rings are a nice cheap! alternative at level 40 for the astral rings.)


Another advise I can give you to make money during the early levels is level up on bees and crawlers around Windurst until level 10 and sell the stacks of beehive chips and silk you get.
After that, save some crystals and start a cheap craft like cooking.
Most ingredients can be bought at local Vendors until at least high level 50's and the outcome is usually profitable.
Also when LFG in Valkurm dunes you can level up fishing a bit.
All in all it will not make you rich but will make you enough money to fund the gear and food you use around those early levels if you play it smart and have a little patience.

Also never throw away your beastmen seals, there are some BCNMs out there where summoners are extremely useful which drop pretty nice goodies that can boost your gil a bit if you need to buy something really expensive.
(IE Elemental staves etc.)

[raidenn]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

THis might help you out:
Dried Date = 200 gil from the whitegate NPC. Cheap!

http://ffxi.somepage.com/itemdb/8524

[Neppy]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

This is just some friendly advice and completely just an opinion. SMN as it was first designed and still is to an extent, is an end game job. My suggestion would be to keep leveling RDM til atleast 65 before you really fully dive into SMN. The reason I say this is because it will be tough being a "complete" SMN making it your first main job to take to 75. Example of this is getting Fenrir and Diablos, Carbuncle Mitts. I was 65 when I got Fenrir and even now at 75 I still dont have Diablos (not paying attention to CoP like I should). Now, with saying that I went SMN main job first job to 75 and to be honest at times I was very very very frustrated because of the need of alot of high lvl help even to get simple things like carbie mitts and Fenrir, I didnt like the feeling of having to leech NM and prime fights from other people, and I felt extremely gimp only having 1 avatar for the first 20 levels of this job. I did get all the avatars that I could get from the lvl 20 battles because it was something I accomplished by myself and I felt I earned them in that respect and it really pisses me off when I have complete stranger ask me to fight a prime avatar for them so they can get the avatar pact and have a lvl 20ish SMN and no other jobs above 30, carbie mitts are a different story for some odd reason because I don't mind helping a low lvl get them (Maybe its because there is no way they can get them on their own).
Anyways man like I said this is just my opinion on this Im sure someone will bash my brains for some of this post (/em twirls finger in the air), play it like yah wanna play it, try not to get discouraged over little things, 1-75 isnt a race enjoy each lvl if you can its how you learn the job very well, dont be affraid to ask questions and make mistakes from time to time (people who dont make mistakes dont "DO" anything)

[Gwynn]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

best advice I can give you? Just enjoy being a SMN (or RDM or what not) and you'll have a blast on your way to the almighty 75.

QFT


From a strictly common sense point of view, if you want to level both RDM and SMN (as I did when I started), I would personally suggest leveling up RDM first. Get RDM up to 65+ (70 is more of a nice number to shoot for Fenrir and Diabolos) so you can do the Prime Avatar battles, Fenrir, Diabolos, and have an easier time doing the Carbuncle Mitts. Now, this is under the assumption that you want to level RDM and SMN equally. If you want to level SMN a lot more than RDM, by all means do it. Not having Diabolos is not going to affect your performance at all (although he is nice to use for certain situations) as he doesn't start to truly shine until far later in the game. I didn't get Fenrir until my SMN was 38 or so, and I have to admit having Fenrir made my job as SMN much easier and more enjoyable (especially once I got Ecliptic Growl), but not having him certainly isn't going to make you really gimp or anything. In the end, do whatever it is you enjoy the most, but know that to be truly effective as a SMN its easier to have another job 70+ beforehand.


...now if I could only put down FFXII enough to level my SMN past 51 ; ;

[SharMarali]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

1. One time, I had Carby fighting a mob, I had 14MP left (only lvl1 lol) and he just disappeared. ??? Hp was not even half gone.

This may sound like a completely stupid question, but I have to ask it anyway as I have no other possible explanation.

What was buncle fighting when this happened? Is it possible that it used a highly damaging attack (you know, like jet stream) and killed him even though he was at 55-60%?

[hongman]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

Wow havent checked this post for a bit, thanks for all the replies!

I have read and taken everything on board.

I am going to lvl SMN to the point where i just feel like a change I think and then flik over to RDM again - there are so many ways to play this, I think Ill just "go with the flow"

Really appreciate all the comments made!

To answer the last question, carby was fighting a Forest Rabbit - so not likely to kill it in one hit. ALthough I have noticed something anoying - if I get Carby to do something like Poison Nails and the mob moves more then 2 or 3 paces, it screws it all up! Now I tend to stand next to the mob whiolst doing it.

ALso, the SMN Skill takes AGES to skill up doesnt it!Esp with only 1 summon - have to wait the full recast time. I think my SMN is now lvl 6 or something and my skill is 8 - waaaaaaay below cap

[neighbortaru]

Re: Just started SMN - a few hints/tips/questions

ALso, the SMN Skill takes AGES to skill up doesnt it!Esp with only 1 summon - have to wait the full recast time. I think my SMN is now lvl 6 or something and my skill is 8 - waaaaaaay below cap

oh god yes! why do you think people just stand outside of town and summon, dismiss, summon, dismiss, etc. the avatars over and over again.