SCH - How should i solo at low levels (10-30)?Follow

I have recently taken up SCH, and have found it is near impossible to make a party, even a duo isn't usually possible because of lack of people willing to join a group. So, I have decided to humbly ask the SCH forum users how should I solo at levels 10-30 as a SCH.

What I have been doing is cast Paralyze > Dia on a mob and then attempt to melee them while casting a nuke sparingly, but the process is extremely slow, even with FOV. I am doing Easy Prey and Decent Challenge mobs to make things easier, but it is still really cumbersome and boring. I have read here and there that some people follow the BLM soloing guides from 21+, but that's still not an option during the teen levels.

Any advice would be greatly welcome.

I solo'd to 20 back when valkrum was still viable leveling spot. IT WAS HELL. I used pup until 10 since it's such an awesome sub for that. Then I tried dancer for basic surviability and... well.. It was slow. Then tried /whm for stronger weaponskills but then had to rest.

It's just a slow slow slow job to solo in early levels. It's tough to even break into soloing beast pets since there such a penalty on learning black magic spells at low levels... Hmm.. well I just checked I could of sworn they use to learn spells slower then a rdm would until they hit like tier III ohwell. Still the level difference and the lack of ancient magic makes it a tough job to solo beast pets with like blm can.

Edited, Apr 25th 2011 7:45am by Laxedrane

If you have a high-level RDM or SCH friend, you can start on Gigas pets in Delkfutt's as early as level 14. Write some macros to join and disband party quickly and have them cast Accession + Enspell on you, preferably of the element closest to your level to keep the duration penalty to a minimum. Use a club with accuracy food and the Enspell damage alone will kill the bats in a few swings. As many as 3 BSTs can spawn at the top of the stairs to the west of the entrance; 2 in the large room, one down the hall where the NM spawns; if you're fast, you can kill them nonstop.

Reducing delay is only better when you have the accuracy to support it, which is unlikely until well into the 20s, and there aren't many options to improve ACC at such low levels. Gotta use every edge you can get to make it work if you start at 14.

I've done 1-20 in the last two nights. Basically, 1-10 was easy, just kill mobs in your starting area (I used South Gustaberg). Always go for the EP mobs, you'll kill them quicker, and at 100-150xp a go, you only need to kill 20 or so at the upper end of the curve to level up. 1-10 took no more than 90 minutes.

For 11-20, I started off in the Fumaroles (near Leaping Lizzy spawn area) and just repeated the process. Yes, it's boring, but it works. When I got to 13 or so, I went into Dangruf Wadi and headed to the large area at the south end of the map and just killed lizards and gobs until I hit about 16. Getting to 16 took maybe 2 hours, perhaps a little more.

My plan was then to head to Konschtat Highlands and repeat the same process again, but I ended up getting invited to a Dunes party, so I went 16-20 in the Dunes. Ironically running to the Dunes took longer than the 16-20 stint *laughs*

Two things to think about though; firstly, always get Regen+Refresh from the field manual. It basically means you can go non-stop without resting. I was averaging 12k/hr at the lower levels, and 8-9k/hr in the teens and never had to /heal once. Secondly, take advantage of the adventurer appreciation event going on at the moment. The Norvallen (think that's how you spell it) ring you get gives you +100% (or double) XP with an upper limit of 9000xp for 12 hours. A huge help. I was getting 25k/hr in the Dunes with it!

So all up, 1-20 took me perhaps 6 hours at most across two evenings. Post 20 I can't help yet, but I have a friend I'm going to try to duo with in Qufim.

Edited, May 13th 2011 12:25am by Drusenija

Months later... Eh, might as well put this out there for anyone that might be looking for the same advice as the OP.

You'd save yourself a load of headaches by leveling up BST if just to use to level up low level jobs that have a hard time soloing. Before Abyssea I leveled SCH/BST up to around 40 relatively easily, just charming an EP or DC and fighting EP-DC mobs. I can imagine it'd be even easier with GoV now.

BST is extremely easy to level to 30 now, and it would serve you well as a subjob for jobs that are frail, limited by having to use lots of MP to kill things, or in other ways inept at soloing at low levels. /BST is a bigger boost to your damage output and survivability than any other sub. You can heal yourself and keep MP up thanks to FoV/GoV Refresh, Light Arts, and Penury, making downtime minimal.

If you don't have BST leveled up already I'd highly recommend it, if just to use as a subjob to level up new jobs or subs. For those that aren't aware, /BST's Charm will work as if it were the same level as your main job, provided that your BST's actual level is at least equal to the job you're subbing it for. So if your BST is 30, and you're SCH20, you can charm like a BST20. But if you were SCH20 and your BST main is only 15, you can only Charm like a level 15 BST.