just when u thought it was safe to sub sch....Follow

Hey, I don't know if anyone noticed this at all.......I just finally got my sch to lvl 10 (and let me tell you, it was like an LSD flashback. I forgot what it was like to be weak). Of course as soon as I got my new abilities, I ran and attached it to my rdm. Apparently theres more than just a boost to magic skills while using light/dark arts. There's also an increased/decreased MP cost. This is outside of strategem use all together, and although I haven't finished testing it, this is what I've come up with so far:

Cure4 costs 88mp
using light arts it's cost is reduced to 80mp
while using dark arts increases the cost to 106
thats an 8 down and 18 up, just for using the job ability.

Thunder3 costs 128mp
dark arts reduces it to 116
heres the killer....light arts increases the cost of thunder3 to 154mp!
thats 12 down and 30 up!!!!!
As an Elvaan RDM, its enough just to hold on to my MP and balance the convert

Can you imagine getting into a situation where your timer hasn't cooled down and all of a sudden you have to switch gears? granted, it's not too often that anyone yells to the rdm, "hey, can you toss out a quick thunder3 on this monster!" but some of us (namely myself) like to toss a few nukes in with the healing and freshness cycles as long as its viable. There are soo many potential benefits to subbing sch as a mage......or rather, there are soo many benefits to subbing sch on blm or whm, cause frankly, attaching it to a rdm just seems like its gonna be even more work than we put into it already......at least I'll still have have enough HP to lose while i pick a strategem.

Edited, Dec 4th 2007 4:24am by RowenHero

edited for math errors, geez. As far as it making sense......I really feel like the penalty is a bit steep for some of those spells. There's plenty enough reason to switch between light and dark arts just with the bonuses to magic skills and strategems without imposing an 18mp penalty just because you had to toss out a cure4 right after doing a dark art sleep2 on a nasty link. Also, something annoying.....one of the benefits to rdm/whm is that u can convert->divine seal->cure4 yourself and keep going, but you couldnt really justify using penury to do that, not with a 4 minute cooldown.

I dunno, all in all I'm just saying subbing sch for rdm is gonna be much less of a blast than I had originally hoped

Edited, Dec 4th 2007 4:40am by RowenHero

I kinda hate to break it to you, but 106-88 is 18, not 8.

Just one question, I haven't leveled sch or I'd test it myself. Can you cancel the art effect?

Nope you can't other than through zoning. The situation doesn't really arise where you want to cancel it, at least on main. They overwrite each other, and are on 1 minute reuse times, so in general you can just switch to the one you need.

It's another one of those situational subs..
It will be pretty good in merit against Greater Colibris, just for RegenII and the Light Arts abilities.
Also very good for nuke/drain/aspir/bio with the boost to elemental and dark magic skill.

As a downside, with 1 minute recasts you'll only be doing one thing at a time...

Enfeebles like Paralyze, Silence and Slow have to be done under Dark Arts too.

As SCH, WHM/SCH, BLM/SCH, etc etc, yes.

As RDM/SCH, Dark Arts will not boost a RDM's enfeebling skill (damn you S-E), and thus gives no boosts to white enfeebles (Slow Para Silence etc). So you can stick with Light Arts for the MP and casting time bonuses.

VERY GOOD POINT! does the 'getto' fast cas of sch add t a rdm fastcast? or does their fc overight it...

i thought i d this proven by trying sch/rdm. i had fc1 then i remembered i had warlok mantel(increases fc with rdm sub) and that did increase the casting speed but was it added to the normal benifit of sch, or did fc just take over completly. ill have to test when i get home.

I don't see RDM/SCH being useful for most merit parties. If you're at the colibri camp, you should have more than enough MP already. I often sub retarded things like /COR and /BRD there, and still never drop below 50% MP. If it is needed for the colibri camp, your DDs are probably sponging big time or you're curing inefficiently or something. Basically there's something wrong. It wouldn't be useful for other camps either, like thickets or mire, because you're usually going to want /WHM for either curaga or status cures. With that said, it would be ideal if you were in a party with 2+ WHM or /WHMs and didn't need sleepga. It also has obvious applications for endgame. I could see this being incredible at sea, in particular. Usually at sea, I do nothing but nuke the entire time, and almost everything can be aspired. A lot of sky and sea gods I wasn't terribly useful for either, and the higher elemental skill would be a welcomed asset.

Maybe he merits with 2 bards? DD's that don't sponge up mp for their epeens? Dalmatica? Deulist's Chapeau? or.. All of the above and thus gets a steady mp regen of 9/tic and only really needs to cast Dia II/III on each bird and the odd cure IV after pecking flurry...

Hell with just bard x2 sanction refresh and smart DD's I get bored at colibri camp and afterawhile randomly cast spells to be reflected for some entertainment.

I hope you don't honestly think COLIBRI are hard to heal for. Before the colibri camp, people merited at mamool, sky, or KRT; all of which were tremendously difficult. Maybe I seriously underestimate how terrible the standard mage is.

Um... earth to noob: what else is there to do? Everyone is hasted. I throw out some dias and occasional sleeps. Whoopie. Seriously, is this a joke? It's not like I have to cure AoEs, statuses, refresh people, or enfeeble... This is absolutely nothing compared to what's demanded of me at the easiest of endgame events...lol Have you ever even BEEN in a merit party? GTFO

SMN healer =/= RDM

Decent DDs, decent MP management, and a few pieces of +HMP are all you need. I don't have a dalmatica or deulist's, so you can cut the sh*t. If you can't keep up, then either your party is terrible or you're the one to blame. Usually I have sanction refresh, and about half the time a BRD. Usually the BRD doesn't even bother with ballad though (who would, when your MP is always full?). Eventually I just start nuking too. The real kicker is when I get a merit party with a NIN or PLD in it. You can pretty much finish your haste cycle and go AFK in those parties.

Amateurs are seriously lowering the bar if they can't handle it. I main healed as SCH with FIVE DDS and I was still above 50% MP the majority of the time. It wasn't even remotely difficult either; they rarely broke stoneskin...

I wouldn't use RDM/SCH, unless you already have AoE curing in the party. They can seriously screw over your MP and create a dangerous situation. It does work pretty well though, for the few situations where you do not need -nas or curaga.

I'm a little sad that mamool, deco weapons in sky, and KRT are seen as hard now. Harder? Yeah.. but let's not go overboard here. Somewhere in this completely unfounded elitist attitude you've taken up.. you've managed to prove you're just as much a newb as the people you are complaining about.

While you had a point later in the post.. I found it really hard to take you seriously after that opener.

Step down off the high horse, chief. You need a serious reality check. There's always someone bigger, badder, smarter, faster, stronger.. than you. You should remember that from time to time.

Please proceede to make fun of my post count and or spelling/grammar/opinion.. becuase lord knows what would happen to you if you're precious forum rep was a little tarnished. Espcically with the serious ammount of rimjobbing you get by the pup's.

Toodles.

lol. There's a few funny things about this that I could point out, but it's been done already.

Natey still has no clue that it's the melees that make a merit PT difficult, not the mage. Nice to see that some things never change around here.

If you can't see why weapons > Colibri, you haven't fought weapons in awhile. Tremendously difficult is an overstatement, though.

I said that main healing on weapons was more difficult than main healing Colibri, but that doesn't make Colibri difficult (or weapons) difficult to heal. The last time I fought weapons in a six person party was years ago, but even decent challenge weapons can be annoying when they AoE damage+stun you. What can Colibri do? Peck you...

RDM/SCH could be very good indeed, it takes a bit of practice though, also you want to line up when you are going to cast each spell for instance i'll use dark arts at the start of the fight, get all my enfeebles in, then switch to light arts for curing, by the time the fight ends I'll be able to use dark arts again at the start of the new mob. I know that sounds a bit crazy considering you'll never know when you need to use one or the other but its worth a try, I think tossing in a one or two cure IV"s while under dark arts isn't so bad considering overall you'll be saving more mp than what you actually had to sacrifice just for that. Just takes practice, practice makes perfect thats all gl with it.

What is wrong with the player base today?!?! It just eats a small piece of my heart hearing someone say they wont party without two bards, or two of anything for that matter.
Customary?? No my friend this isn't custom, it's ridiculous saying you wont join a party without having two bards in it.

Edited, Mar 2nd 2008 9:50am by jayfly

Duno about the rest of the player base but I for one actively hate being a refresh/haste bitch. If I want merits/fun I go solo on BLM, if I want fast merits/boredom I go 2Xbrd with rdm. I don't see that as being a problem. I'm sure if I didn't have BLM lvl'd I probably would accept invites with 1 or less BRDs for a merit party, but as I have aternatives, I don't.