Newbie: Advice, Solo, Red-Mage, Beastmaster, White mage!?Follow

Times have changed since I've been active or in your position, so I'm not sure how good my advice is. If you're going towards RDM, then I would go with RDM. RDM is my main job and I spent most of my time as a loner. When I first started off, it was really troublesome to level, especially solo, but since then SE has introduced many things to ease the pain. Just realize that your first job that you level will be the most difficult/annoying due to a lack of funds, equipment, subjob and skills. It gets easier with the next jobs that you level.

I recommend levelling your BST, because once you have that up, you can use it as a subjob to level almost every other job in the game. With the addition of the field manuals, the sparks of eminence and the trust NPCs it's easier than ever to do, the exp flies in. I got my WHM from 40 to 66 in less than two weeks and barely died. You'll need to get something else to 30 to unlock it, I recommend RDM to do that if you don't have a pal to help level WHM.

It's pretty easy to solo /BST now too, because not many people still use parties in the areas where we camp. No more fighting over bombs at Garlaige.

Edit: BST is also extremely inexpensive and can make you rich if you level in the right places and take the opportunity to level some crafts.

Edited, Feb 24th 2014 12:15pm by Sioux

Thanks so much for all the replies. Looks like I'll try to level RDM to 30, then swap to BST.
Best race for BST? I'm keen on Mithra, but mainly because they look pretty. I'm going to be spending hours looking at their behind after all!


Edited, Feb 24th 2014 6:31pm by RedSunset

If you intend to do any endgame later, WHM would be the safest bet. Solo leveling might be a bit rough until Hexa Strike, but with the advent of Trust paired with FoV/GoV books, soloing it really shouldn't be that bad. But in the end, it'll be your choice. Each has gil expenses of their own beyond gear.

Just need to approach it differently. BST-types would probably tell you to go the route of soloing DC-EMs and trying to take out EM-VT prey in hopes of chaining for bigger numbers. WHM soloing, particularly with GoV/FoV and now RoE, would be more about steamrolling through EP mobs. With Signet's defense buff in old zones as well as the hour long Refresh options from the books, WHM's survivability potential is probably overkill even if solo. Trusts just multiply your kill speed significantly here and at no expense to your EXP like an above-level BST pet would.

Make some friends and you might even get into an Abyssea burn for fast EXP on anything.

But if I were to propose a path, it'd probably resemble something along the following:
1-15 in your starter zone of choice. Kill the mobs close to the town gates until level 8 or so, then start wandering outward. Set the zone kills from RoE objectives and crystals respective to the mobs you'll be encountering. This will pretty much apply to anything following.
15-22 will then be in KH, LTP, or Tahrongi. Post-20 might be rough, though, it's been a while for me.
22-30 head to Buburimu. Valkurm is an alternative, but the mobs go TW sooner. For Bubu, stick to the west end of the zone initially, focusing on mandies and the occasional rabbit or bird. Fight the low tier goblins at your discretion. At 26 or so, you can try more along the east side of the zone killing crawlers, birds, dhalmels, and gobs. This'll probably dry up around 32 or so.
31-45 zip on over to Qufim Island. Night time might get ugly, but your targets will be worms and the occasional crab. Around 35, you can probably add pugils and giants to the plate. 40+ will have you knocking off the leeches, where having Erase as a WHM will be handy to remove their ATK down debuff.
45-50 is kind of a weak spot. I don't know if RoE has been set up to account for East Altepa yet, but your target should be beetles, spiders, and dhalmels near the NE exit to West Altep. You will absolutely need the Trusts here if not BST or an appropriately leveled /BST as these mobs could be anywhere from DC to T.
50-52 is generally similar to the last, but simply in West Altep near Raboa or the KT zone. Just be mindful of earth elementals, cactuars, and the few scorpions.
52-60 will have you moving westward to Revelation rock and just circling around killing beetles. Trusts will also make the cactuars viable targets and 1 is required for an FoV objective alongside the beetles.

Back in the day, I just would've done Campaign from 60+ for some lazy, but easy EXP. It probably isn't as viable now due to diminished interest, lacking RoE in WotG zones, and of course Abyssea burns. You can probably head to the Oubliette and just solo to 99 there, starting with the wolves page and eventually moving down to the basement for leeches at 72+. If you're lucky, there might even be other people there party up with and could wiggle in sooner since WHM = Heals. Time will need to be taken for limit breaks come 50+, though.

In addition to all of the other suggestions, one of the best ways to get through a level range (aside from finding someone to Abyssea or GoV burn for you) is to find spots that align with the timed RoE goals.

For some of the less fun levels in the 40s, I specifically waited for the timed RoE to be beasts and did the 9 tigers page in Batallia Downs (with zone kills, crystals, etc. as always) and then the Tigers and Goblins in Beaucedine after those became too weak.

After that, Crawlers Nest GoV becomes a good option and can be tied in with "Vanquish Vermin" for a nice bonus - though being GoV it does well enough on it's own.

As previously mentioned, the Oubliette is a great place to go as soon as you can rush through the easier pages. If you see any 99's killing leeches in the zone, ask for an invite for a nice bump in exp (not abyssea-levels, but good).

Isn't that really only true for level 76+ jug pets?

Ha ha. I "soloed" WHM as my first job back in 2008 by grinding healing in campaign battles once I had 150 MP weakened. (I soloed WHM to 30 just before the Sep 2008 adjustments and it was really painful.) It even taught me quite a bit about hate transfer and where to stand and stuff.

These days it's all about having three Trust NPCs out. You should be able to take on Even Match or Tough stuff, which also means that your skills advance nicely. It isn't hard to get to level 50 in one day if you know where to go. (Though it helps a lot if you have an anniversary exp ring and are playing when SE turns on double exp.) In fact, this is exactly what I did on a mule alt a few weeks ago. Between 50 and 75 the exp curve is at its steepest, though.

(Does anyone know if SE has any kind of schedule for double exp, or if it's possible to know when they are planning to turn it on?)

You also want to hit as many RoE goals as possible for faster exp. At low levels, those make a big difference. I was doing Gusgen Mines skeletons the other day to grind off the 200 with Level Sync on. He dinged 27, then a moment later got the 200th kill and dinged 28.


...then once you hit 99, suddenly it becomes much easier to get exp, to the point where I have to find places to dump all those merit points.

No, you're right, I was being flippant: I meant using one set of gear as in a pure DD set, just throwing a pet at something and then going in and meleeing. Nothing against WAR, no job in this game is that easy if it's done right.

No snarl with charmed pets... which he was expressly talking about using - but otherwise you're right on the money

Edited, Feb 26th 2014 4:41pm by Olorinus

Not to get off topic, because what I'm asking would be beneficial to the OP as well, but how do you repeat those limited time RoE objectives? I have completed them, and they don't reappear on my list, and I have no idea how to get them back, Sometimes they will come back randomly, and "You have a new challenge" will pop up, but there doesn't seem to be a way to do it manually. I know you can only get one copper voucher for the first one you do, but the extra 1500 exp would be welcome, and would change the zones I level in for sure. Any assistance is appreciated.

Yes but my question is HOW do I repeat it? Once you finish killing 20 mobs, or getting 5000 exp, or 5 seals or whatever, that objective clears from your quest list... I want to know how to get it back to repeat it.
Thanks.

2 is probably the right answer. Either way, you won't get the voucher reward for repeats, either, so it'd just be EXP and sparks.

Edited, Feb 27th 2014 10:50am by Seriha

You are given a new objective at three times throughout the RL day and those objectives will restart for 2 hours from that point. There's a table of the objectives (in JST) on http://wiki.bluegartr.com/bg/Category:Records_of_Eminence#Limited-time_Challenges.

Basically, if you can complete the challenge before the 2 hours is up, you will be allowed to complete it once more - assuming another timed challenge doesn't start before you're done.

The "Gain Experience" one is great even for Abyssea leveling, as the kill experience there does count and it provides a nice ~30% boost to that source (exp chests are unaffected). The same technically applies to the seals objective, but that one is so random.