One of 'those' smns.....Follow

Well, I'm certainly one of 'those' smns. The ones who are leveling in Kor. Tunnel without knowing a single thing about the job. I originally intended just to use it to help others level, but its getting to the point to where I need to equip it. I just don't have the inventory space or available T1 merit points to fully develop smn, but rather than be totally gimp I figured I'd at least ask how to be respectable with what I already have.



I have several 'main' jobs and when I leveled other jobs just to be more well rounded in events and asked 'how can I make this work w/o putting a ton of gil/time into equipping a job I will rarely play?' the response was, as you can imagine, a bit harsh. I understand that nobody wants someone to come into a job forum and essentially ask 'how can I half-ass this?'. But even though my gear will never be ideal, I do want to understand the concepts that make it work. There are several places I will want to use gear from other jobs for inventory reasons, so sticky suggestions are not always relevant etc. So if someone could just give me a bit of direction that would help. Below is what I'd like to use. If there are easily obtainable substitutes that would be better please let me know. Also, if my reasoning for equipping a certain piece is bad, please let me know as well.


Standing set: I would imagine a standing set for smn would be similar to blm/brd/etc: terra staff, cheviot cape (although I may full time gigant to keep hp bonus?), jelly ring, merman's ring, ethereal ear, +movement shantotto pants, marduk body, etc?



BP rage set:
fey staff with -BP timer
axe grip (hp)
Phantom tathlum (don't really want to afford HH bomb. any alternatives?)
Auster's hat (-1 BP)
Smn torque (+7 skill)
Stoic and Pigeon Earrings (hp)
Auster's Body (-3 BP)
Auster's Hands (-1 BP)
Evoker's Ring (+10 skill)
BQR Ring (hp)
Gigant Mantle (hp)
Hierarch Belt (mp)
AF legs (+avatar acc)
Nashira feet (+5 skill)

The likelihood of me doing dynamis again is slim. I do solo limbus from time to time for af items, but don't know if smn is on my usual track.



BP ward set: It is my understanding that I should shoot for +30 skill to make ward last 3 min? Are there any other stats that boost ward?

Auster's hat (2)
Smn torque (7)
Evoker's Ring (10)
Auster's hands (2)
Nashira feet (5)
Marduk legs (5)
total (31)

Fill in the rest with hp/mp and -BP time?

Thanks for all feedback.



edit: spell


Edited, Dec 16th 2009 10:32am by BarberofSeville

Correct, +30 skill is the number to shoot for in regard to Wards. That'll extend your 90-second BPs to 3 minutes (the maximum). In terms of gear, most of SMN's desirable equipment is Ex. So it's not so much an issue of money, but of time. If you don't plan to do Dynamis, you'll be missing out on a bunch of really great equipment from there. Limbus also has a fair bit of good stuff.

Really there are 3 main sets for SMN:

Perpetuation Down (your standing set without an avatar can be different, or it can just be the same as with an avatar)

BP (stats that make your BPs stronger, such as BP timer, smn skill, pet accuracy, etc.)

Rest

These are the 3 main sets. You can also get more specialized, and do things like a BP timer reduction set. So you'd swap to the timer reduction set, then trigger BP, then swap to your BP power set before the BP actually lands. You can also create different BP sets for your Wards, physical Rages, and magical Rages. It all comes down to how much effort you want into it. I'd recommend at least doing the basic 3, though, even if you don't take SMN very seriously. Looks like you have the BP set, and I'm assuming you probably have a resting set since it looks like you may have BLM leveled, so I'd suggest working on your standing/perpetuation set. Fay Crozier is a good first step, try to get one with perp-3 and maybe some other good stats. Evoker's Pigaches +1 are another piece you should try for, as it's not very hard to get if you do Limbus already. Also, Yinyang Robe is pretty easy to get, so consider looking into one of those. I wouldn't worry about making a strong damage reduction standing set. SMNs don't pull hate. Worry more about squeezing every drop out of your avatar because they are pretty weak and you really gotta work 'em hard.

Thanks for the tips. I know there must be a touch of resentment for people who use a cheap method to hit 75 when many people here must have spent months (or years) to hit 75. I also reckon the lack of playtime getting to 75 probably leads to some pretty bad representations of smns overall.


I don't have any misplaced assumptions that I would be able to replace a career smn in situations where they excel. But I've leveled a ton of jobs, merited them all out, and spent years equipping them. I'm just far too lazy to do that again so want to equip the best I can with what I have. I imagine I'll max avatar acc/att and that will be it for merits.


There are certain situations (most recently the ASA final battle) where having multiple smns would have turned a challenging fight into a cakewalk. Having that possibility in a linkshell as small as mine certainly would make things more simple.


I got subdefaulted (and appear to be on my way there again!) back when I started when I was one of the first to ask advice on the mini-fork battles when every other smn had to use carby only into the 60's. Now the stigma from obtained summons this way is no longer there. Perhaps one day this will be the case with astral burning but I doubt it.

For the head piece, the following is probably better for BP: Ward
Elite Beret (4)

This is cheaper (unless you want the +1, which is nice, but more expensive)

They are free... except for the dignity lost by wearing a dildo on your head. I would rather sacrafice the 20 MP for my elite beret +1 which also has +5 summoning skill :)

By the sound of it, you would also have a lot to gain from ACP7. You can get some really sweet pet pieces from it, on top of some really amazing earrings for other jobs. Definitely a huge boost to having a ton of jobs is that you have much better odds of getting something you want from the fight.

I'm confused why your BP set has so much HP in it. You could also consider a conjurer's ring, which would drop your perp cost another point and be pretty easy to activate (at least on a taru it's like shifting 150 hp, which gigant and -hp/mp rings nearly do alone). They're cheap and there really isn't anything else a SMN can gain from a 2nd ring.

Fortune egg gives me more MP than phantom tathlum, though max mp doesn't really matter that much in small doses.

although paying 400k to have an item less useful than a free item is kinda like having a dildo on your head anyway lol

I can't take anyone seriously who doesn't want a horn on their SMN. It is the trademark design. There is a reason you are supposed to laugh at the line in FFX that says "We'll make a statue of you Yuna. With a great horn!" from the blue animal guys with horns.

I did read the whole post. I was mostly saying the bare minimum should be four sets, not three.

As an aside, I honestly can't imagine a SMN not wanting Relic though.

BP timers worth varies depending on pacts. Lowering it for the endgame rages is not as important as for the low level ones. Which is ironic considering you won't get -BP timer until endgame.

The reason is that your BPs cost MP, so you never really need to be able to use more MP on pacts than you can regain in the same time. Siphon has slightly nudged this balance since it used to be about 200 MP return in resting 50 seconds and you would be wasting roughly 200 MP on BP+release. I.e. anything over -10 BP timer were going to meet its limit sooner or later and have you lose your shaved off seconds due to lack of MP.

Of course refresh also played some role, but you are talking to the person who played SMN for 3 years and never got a refresh support since I had auto-refresh trait. (And since we had to put in all the awesome melee so we could spare 2 slots of mages)

I have played 6 years though, but lately it has not been much and occasionally I've gotten refresh!

Well, the point I'm trying to make is that -BP timer is not always needed, it depends on your MP regeneration.