Summary
It's going to happen at some point in your online life. Your party is minding its own business, trying to earn some XP, or get a Rare/Ex item, or complete a mission, and some nosey and temperamental mob pops up and starts attacking. Or perhaps you've been pulling mobs all night, and suddenly you come face to face with some nasty mob that is chewing up your party like it's dinner. Ugh! Most parties loathe these situations, and rightly so. A party experience can go from pleasant chit-chat while accomplishing goals, to panic-stricken shouts and running amok while dozens of mobs aggro and add, decimating parties and alliances. This guide will hopefully shed some light on what can be done to cushion some of the blows, and make the best of a bad situation.
The guide will have several sections that deal with different spells and situations, and how they can contribute to getting out of the predicament. Please feel free to respond with any questions, suggestions, additions, or corrections, as I would like to keep this updated and useful.
Key Definitions
Some of you who are very new might not know the some of the terminology used here, so a brief description of the terms is listed here.
"Mob": Short for Mobile Object. Bascially it's the monsters you fight.
"Add": This refers to any mob that inadvertently joins the fight. Some mobs get very angry when they see their friends getting beat up, and join the fight. This is an "add"itional mob. Also known as a "link."
"Zone": The border of the current map, which leads to the next area. When you move from one map to the next, this is "zoning". You will see from time to time in a party someone state something along the lines of "zone!!!". This means disengage or unlock the enemy, and haul butt to the exit, because something is going horribly wrong.
"Pop": This describes a mob that has materialized nearby, which is either a potential or imminent threat.
Communication
One of the most overlooked topic as the party gets ready to fight is communicating who will be the primary add handler. Usually this job goes to the Red Mage, since they have a higher capacity for enfeebling, or a Bard since they have Lullaby. Make sure that everyone who has the ability to sleep a mob knows who the primary is, and establish who will back up (usually Bard or Black Mage). This will avoid unnecessary MP usage in a time that conservation is key, because more than likely you're going to have to fight 2 (or more) mobs with little rest between them.
The Infamous <bt> Macro
Using <bt> (battle target) in your macros is a great thing, because it always targets mobs that the party has engaged. The bad thing about it is it can and will target mobs that were meant to be slept. If you use <bt>, please be aware of this, and adjust accordingly by manually targeting the intended mob. If you're a mage, I highly recommend you manually organize your spells so that they're in an order that makes sense to you if you need to switch to manually targeting and firing off spells.
As jpreichel pointed out, the best solution is to have a macro that targets the battle target, and all other spells use the standard target macro <t>. This is what I use exclusively.
/target <bt>
Sleep spells
These spells are invaluable. Depending on job level there may be one or more of these in your ******** The time varies between each spell as far as the duration of the mob being slept if completely unresisted, with Sleep being the lowest, and Sleepga II being the longest. If there is an add that a Black Mage needs to sleep, it's recommended that Elemental Seal be fired off first, to cut down on the chance of it being resisted, and to maximize duration. The situation will determine which spell to use. If there are no nearby mobs, using Sleepga II would be the best choice (although this is not a cheap spell). Next in line would be Sleep II if there are either mobs close, or Sleepga II is unavailable. After that, it would be Sleepga if no mobs around, and last up Sleep.
There is a stacking order when it comes to sleep spells:
Sleepga II > Sleep II > Sleepga > Sleep
This means that sleep is the lowest spell, and each successive spell overwrites the previous. It would be interesting to get feedback on experiences people have had trying to stack these spells. I am unsure if throwing a Sleep II over a Sleep would wake the mob if Sleep II failed.
If there was an add, and the slept mob is still sleeping after the primary is defeated, MAXIMIZE THE OPPORTUNITY. Do NOT immediately attack the slept mob. Anyone with Provoke should use it on the slept mob. This will NOT wake it, but it will take some of the hate away from the poor mage who had to sleep it. Mages should cast all the non-damaging enfeebles they can on the mob while it sleeps... these also will not wake the mob. Slow, paralyze, gravity, blind, etc. Black Mages can also Aspir mobs that have MP without waking it. After this, take as much time as you can to med up. This way when the mob wakes up or your party is ready, you'll be on more even ground.
Lullaby
Lullaby is one of the songs in a Bard's ******** and is great at sleeping mobs. This spell has a 2 second cast, a 24 second recast, and is a light elmental song. It has a 30 second duration (+2 sec for each +1 on instrument.)
This sleep rarely gets a partial or full resist and can easily sleep undead and dark elementals, but not light element based monsters.
Sleep spells overwrite this, this makes it extreamly useful for sleeping a monster until the blm or rdm is free to cast, or you can tie up your bard and let them continue to sleep it.
(Thanks for the info, Jamini!)
Assisting with mages casting Sleep
In a link situation it is important that the RDM/BRD/BLM/WHM have the time they need to cast their Sleep spells. PLD should Provoke and engage the Pull and Flash the Link. Wait 10-15 seconds and hit Sentinel or Rampart. Often the 1st Sleep attempt is resisted so the Sentinel/Rampart gets the Link back on you and allows for an interruption free second attempt.
(Any other tank jobs with additional techniques to get hate on them would be appreciated.)
Thanks for this suggestion, kgav! Always good to have support in handling adds.
Summoner to the rescue!
If there's an add, a Summoner can sic it's avatar on it to keep it busy while the party deals with the 1st mob.
Also, after level 39, Shiva gets Sleepga which can be utilized to sleep mobs if there are no mobs nearby that might be hit by the spell.
Beastmaster as add control
Along the same lines as Summoner, if you have a Beastmaster in your party, they can send their pet off to attack an add and keep it busy.
When Sleep fails or is not available, and other tactics are exauhsted
This is what to do in the event sleep fails or you don't have someone with the spell in your party. We'll go from best to worst.
Kiting
If you have a non-linking add (say a melee used an AoE weapon skill on accident, or a mage targeted wrong mob, etc) you can always "kite" the add around. The way you kite a mob is as follows:
Provoke or use whatever means you have to get enough hate so the add focuses entirely on you, then it's time to start running around, forcing the mob to follow you. You'll want to put as much distance between yourself and the mob as possible by using the terrain to your advantage, like weaving in and out of trees, rocks, hills, etc. Enemies such as spell casters or ranged attackers will be easier to do this with since they often pause to shoot or cast a spell. Once your party is safely done fighting the current mob and rested enough, you can bring the enemy back to your party to finish off.
Note that if your party members cast any huge spells as you were running away that would cause them to draw more hate, you may need to continually provoke to maintain hate while you're running around.
Make sure you let the party know what you're doing so they aren't confused.
Thanks for this suggestion, jerji!
Escape (Dungeons only)
If you have a Black Mage in your party and things go horribly wrong, you can always Escape. If the Black Mage has too much hate, Manafont and then cast Escape. Spells can't be interrupted during Manafont, so this guarantees that the retreat will be successful, as long as the Black Mage doesn't die while it's being cast. Now is the time to do that Divine Seal + Curaga, and voke, flash, or whatever else you can to keep the mobs from bashing the Black Mage. This is the best option, because any aggressive mobs won't be trained to the zone.
Black Mages, your responsibility is communicating that you are casting Escape. Don't leave people behind because they were unaware that everyone was hitching a ride out. Get close to the melee, then fire it off, and spam the log with "Casting Escape! Gather!" or something to that effect.
At level 58 a rdm/blm will have escape and be able to cast it faster, can take more hits, and generally has less aggro built up than a blm. Chainspell can also be used to make this a virtually instant party saver.
Teleport
If you have a White Mage in your party, and you either have no Black Mage, or are in an outside area, have the White Mage teleport everyone to a nearby crag. Sure, it may take a while to get back to camp, but in later levels the amount of XP you lose makes up for it.
At level 72 a rdm/whm can use chainspell and cast one of the first 3 teleports.
Call for Help
As a last resort, you can call for help. Hopefully there are some people nearby who can assist you in killing the add. If you are going to have to zone an aggressive mob, it's probably a good idea to call for help on it anyway so anyone near the zone can try to take it out. Which brings us to the next section...
Zoning
I would highly recommend that your party just die if eveything above fails or is unavailable in the event that you're fighting aggressive mobs. There's nothing worse or more selfish than wiping out other parties because of what happened to a single party. Don't be "one of those" parties. If you absolutely feel you have to zone aggressive mobs, at least be courteous and shout which zone your headed to, so others won't suffer because of your decision. If you are going to zone an aggressive mob, or one that will link to other mobs that parties are xp'ing off of, call for Help. At least then they have the option of getting a group of people together to snuff out the mob. Now, on to some of the available options while you make a beeline for the zone.
Gravity
Red Mage can throw a Gravity on at least one of the mobs that have added, or the single mob if the party is headed towards disaster on a particularly vicious mob and the only choices are zone or wipe. This spell will give the party some breathing room if it sticks, because the mob will crawl along as the party hightails it out of there.
Stun
An overlooked spell in situations like this. The cast on this spell is instant, so if one party member is getting beat up, there should be enough time if you're mid-flight to target the mob, stop, and stun it. This will halt the mob in its tracks for at least a second, and hopefully draw hate away from the player, or give them a little bit of room on the way to the zone.
Bind
If sleep has failed, there's always Bind. Bind is notoriously useless most of the time, but if all else fails, try to stick bind as you're zoning. Even a second's worth of a bound mob can be the difference between everyone getting out safely, or one or more members biting the dust.
Provoke
While zoning, if a member of a party is dying from the mob bashing him/her up, target the mob and use Provoke on it if you have it. This hopefully will draw hate off the player so they can safely zone.
Cure
Last, but not least, if a melee is in danger of dying, and you're close to the zone and ahead of everyone else, target him/her, stop, and throw the strongest cure possible on the dying player. This will draw hate off him or at least give them a better chance of making it to the zone.
In conclusion
Hopefully this guide helps people get out of bad situations, and demonstrated a few tips and tricks that you may not have known were available. Personally it's very satisfying to successfully use the tools at my disposal when a sticky situation comes up and it saves the party from disaster. Again, feel free to respond with missing or inaccurate information, and I will update as needed.
(First update.)
Edited, Wed Feb 9 20:58:53 2005 by Fhqwghads
(Second update.)
Edited, Wed Feb 9 21:08:40 2005 by Fhqwghads
(Third update.)
Edited, Sat Mar 5 12:45:42 2005 by Fhqwghads