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Soloing at Lvl 30Follow

#1 Jan 14 2004 at 10:00 AM Rating: Good
A lot of people have trouble soloing into the 20's apparently. I am currently a RDM30/BLM15 and have no trouble soloing an even match still. I thought I would share my usual process for engaging an EM at level 30 that always ends in success for me. Just wondered if anyone else does similar. I assumes up to date equipment and spells etc;

Pre-fight

1) Protect II
2) Shell
3) Apple Pie - good for the next few fights too
4) Blink
5) Blazing Spikes
6) Enthunder
7) Regen
8) Orange Juice - mp refresh

Start Fight immediately

1) Attack with sword
2) Paralyse and Silence or Sleep
3) Attack with sword

Mid Fight

4) Attack with Sword
5) Drain
6) Cure 2 and TP attack as required
7) Nuke and Cure to Finish

Always works for me. I find that too many debuffs when soloing are ineffective, because it takes away times for damage dealing. Try and get as many spells in before you fight, so that when you engage you are mainly swinging sword or top up healing.




Edited, Wed Jan 14 10:05:45 2004 by terrordactyl
#2 Jan 14 2004 at 11:20 AM Rating: Good
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491 posts
Thats a great strategy if you are a RDM .. but since BLK/WHT cant do any damage at all its not really effective for any other class but RDM. most melle classes should be able to take a EM with no problem at lvl 30, with the exception of the THF and maybe the RNG since neither can take much damage at all.
#3 Jan 14 2004 at 11:25 AM Rating: Good
Depends on the Mob!!!!!! A marboro checked easy prey and beat the living F out of me and my 200 defense. I even slowed it and the sucker hit like it was hasted. I was like wtf it would hit me and stop my casting of cure II very very unpleasant thinking easy prey my A$$..........................
#4 Jan 14 2004 at 11:34 AM Rating: Good
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216 posts
At the lower 20's, for the RDM, it looks the same:

1) Protect
2) Shell

-- Med to full mp

3) En-elemental
4) Blaze Spikes
5) Blink
6) Regen
7 - for higher Tough 140xp mobs only) Food effects / Juices
8) Target Lock
9) Attack Mode
10 - for caster mobs only) Silence
11) Paralyze
12) Blind

-- Usually, mobs is in melee range by now. Cast between attacks.

13) Slow
14) Dia
15+) Cures if needed; if not, Nukes. I keep hp just above yellow-level until I'm nearing the end of the fight, when I'll let it drop to borderline orange, to conserve mp.

I'll also recast Refresh on myself when it drops, mid-battle.
#5 Jan 14 2004 at 1:05 PM Rating: Good
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132 posts
"most melle classes should be able to take a EM with no problem at lvl 30, with the exception of the THF and maybe the RNG since neither can take much damage at all."


huh? what mobs are we talking about? EASY cons at 30 can dice you up pretty well, no matter your class.


-------------
fsst
35thf/28drk/15sam...
theConch - ragnarok!
#6 Jan 14 2004 at 1:47 PM Rating: Decent
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171 posts
There are a lot of variables that affect this equation. As Saiyajinknight points out mobs have powers that vary greatly within levels. In addition different jobs and playing styles provide advantage or disadvantage when fighting against particular mobs. I thought I was doing great when as a L23 paladin I was soloing tough land worms in korrolaka, until I saw a L16 blm soloing the same mobs :-) There are levels where you can use a lot of new equipment and all of a sudden you are kicking butt, and levels where you haven't had anything new to put on for ages and barely squeeking by against easy prey mobs. Really optimizing yourself for soloing at medium levels does require quite a bit of effort, and terrordactyl has some very nice advice for how to do it as a RDM. More generally:

Food can be very effective
Keep your gear up to date
Use an appropriate subjob and keep it levelled up
Plan out your battle strategy before you engage
Have a backup plan in case things gang agley
#7 Jan 14 2004 at 2:07 PM Rating: Decent
28 posts
My question is... Why bother? Yay, you beat a EM at a medium level, now you have to rest full for 5 minutes before you can fight another one after all those spells you just cast and healing to full.

If you're not a BST, there is just way too much downtime between fights and really no upside benefit unless you're camping a NM. And last time I checked, almost all NMs are unbeatable that are the same level as you. (Even Tom Tit Tat will wipe the floor with any level 10)

If you're farming for items to sell for gil, go fight beastman that are 10-20 levels lower than you. You'll be walking through them like butter and gain far more items/money for an hour of fighting than taking on 5-10 EMs in the same amount of time.
#8 Jan 14 2004 at 2:15 PM Rating: Decent
whoa, am i missing something!! Any class should be able to take an Even Match. My lvl 30 War gets worked down to 1/4 to 1/2 when i fight Easy Prey! Is it maybe because i use a spear? Should i maybe change to something more effective, like sword, or i hear Great Axe is the best for War?

#9 Jan 14 2004 at 2:35 PM Rating: Good
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216 posts
Quick notes:

1) No, you're not missing anything. Most classes can *not* solo Even or Decent Challenges by level 30. RDM's, PLD's, BST's are notable exceptions, while RNG's and BLM's are selective exceptions. RNG and BLM can solo certain types of mobs that con Even. Everyone else doesn't really have an option: go find a group or suffer 12xp per + downtime. Sucks, but this is largely believed to be "by design," i.e. SquareEnix doesn't want you accomplishing anything by yourself.

2) Why solo? For a slower leveling rate, I get several benefits:

a) less risk. You'd be surprised how much one idiot can tank your XP rate. But I bet you wouldn't be surprised how many idiots there are. ;) As an RDM, I know exactly what I can take and what I cannot take. In a group, there's always that one moron who wants to pull three linking IT's and bring them all back to camp like they're best-friends coming for a playdate.

b) more fun. By far, for an RDM. Put it this way: For any job in a group, if you mess up, the odds are great that someone in your group will die. If you're an RDM, you have so much to do and so much to pay attention to that your odds of messing up are much higher than almost anyone else's. There's a lot more stress, and a lot less appreciation - in fact, in my experience, people are more likely to get pissed off at the backup healer (the RDM?) because they don't want to offend the WHM and drive him away. Thanks, but no thanks.

c) more flexibility. I can pull at my own rate. If I want to stop and have a conversation with a friend, I certainly can. If I need to use the bathroom, no problem. If I want to stop and help a lower level group in the same area, nobody's ******** at me. If I change my mind after two pulls and decide I'd really rather be questing, that's great

d) less dumbtime. By dumb time, I mean sitting in town with your LFG flag up, constantly sending /tells to group leaders asking for a spot. That's just dumb.

Don't get me wrong, I love to group - sometimes. But sometimes (increasingly often, lately, as more and more "new" players accidentally stumble into the 20's and 30's), I just don't want to cope.
#10 Jan 14 2004 at 2:50 PM Rating: Decent
Like I said easy prey can kill a level 30 it all depends on the mob!!!!!! For a quick example a mage casting silence on a magic casting worm gets a huge advantage and can solo the worm easily, a War by itself just doesnt have the magic unless carrying items which do not regen like mp.

Side note the GREAT AXE is the weapon of choice for War IMHO my AXE does 48dmg and a WHM sub goes along way to helping solo mobs. A War by himself is really handicapped that is why I have resisted the Aholes who are like what a waste yadda yadda yadda. Just last night SAM/WAR aggros IT Gob gets owned trys to run and dies, I get aggro lose half Health the battle isnt going well hit divine seal Cure 2, nice 180 hp back, Cure 2 again still fighting 90 hp, decide time to go hit defender I have the best armor and of course I have protect on myself and make zone saving 580 xp. Where was the groups whm oh well he warped out thank You very much.....
#11 Jan 14 2004 at 3:00 PM Rating: Decent
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107 posts
Quote:
Why bother? Yay, you beat a EM at a medium level, now you have to rest full for 5 minutes before you can fight another one after all those spells you just cast and healing to full.


I'll tell you why I solo. When I do get to play on weekday nights, I normally can only log on for ~2 hours. It beats going to Qufim sitting LFG/LFP for 30 minutes, another 30 minutes getting everybody together and finding camp/deciding renkei/buffs/etc... play for 1 hour and say I have to go. On top of that, most groups I've been in Qufim don't net as much xp as I do when I solo during those 2 hours.

My fights are fairly short, and have the same setup as terrordactyl, except I do it a bit different.

Protect2 is always on.
-Cast En-xxx, blaze spikes
-med 1 tick
-If mob is Tough, Meatkabob & OJ
-pull with Silence or Paralyze from max distance
-back up
-cast slow, by the end of slow, mob is within melee range
-swing one hit
-cast blind
-cast dia
-melee and C2 as necessary
-end fight with TP skill

On even mobs, my fights end before my Enthunder and Blaze Spikes wear off, and I normally have around 120-150hp and about 100mp. I cast regen, med up, than I'm good to go. When I was killing sheeps in Dunes, I timed my kills the moment my fights end and it took avg of around 5min from end of kill to end of kill.

Partying. Yes I do party on the weekends, but most of the time I just party to socialize with new people and get to know them. XP for me when I socialize isn't much. The other day I was grouping in Batallia, we were pulling everything we can and were getting 30-40xp each. We know there are IT's, luck just wasn't on our side and couldn't find any. I didn't mind at all about the 30-40xp.
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