Returning 75RNG...Ebow no more?Follow

Since it seems like an E.bow hasn't been sold on the AH for almost a year, what should I use now? I sold my E.bow right before I left because I figured I wouldn't be back, but I was wrong. I'm guessing that one of the new areas has introduced a bow that destroys the E.bow, so what bow should I use now that I'm back?

Until you get up to speed on a magian bow a siege bow can hold you over. Plus it's easy to get if someone is fighting chuckwa.

Isn't a Siege Bow level 79 though?

Just try and get into a dominion party. Several thousand exp per minute, on top of exp from mobs and chests. It would not be uncommon for you to get to 75-90 in 3-4 hours if your party does not kill slow.

Better than a siege bow but still meh compared to a flame bateleur

Thoughts on Flame Baleteur/Mayhem versus Harrier/Bedlam? To me, the factors are:

1: DMG - Harrier/Bedlam take a slight lead in base damage, if mitigated slightly by Flame Baleteur/Mayhem's STR boosts (unless circumstances have your fSTR2 capped).

2: Del - Bedlam has a higher delay than its flame counterpart, Mayhem. Could help with sTP builds, could be negligible. Harrier and Baleteur have the same delay.

3: WS - Jishnu's Radiance is Light/Fusion, Bedlam is Dark/Gravitation. Both of which are much more useful than Slugwinder's Reverberation/Transfixion/Detonation properties. Even if SCs are dead, it's nice when the accidents are T2/3. There's usually a DD willing to capitalize, anyways.

Harrier: Jishnu's Radiance. 3 hit critting WS, could be hawt with the Crit Hit %+ and Crit Hit Damage+ atmas in use. TBH, spamming this WS would get expensive.

Bedlam: Wildfire. Trueflight on roids, 5.0 damage multiplier, 60% AGI mod, enhanced by Fire affinity (aka Vulcan's Staff). MAB mod of course, INT may be in the mix as well. Not sure if it could pull ahead of Slugwinder without a supreme MAB build or a DD atma swapped out in favor of an MAB/AGI/Fire Affinity one. Nice to have a powerful Elemental WS option around.

Saying sayonara to the Slugshot RAcc penalty in either case wouldn't exactly bring tears to my eyes... Unless they were of joy :3

I believe /SAM 4-hit Bedlam wildfire would want to look like

Vulcan's (REQUIRED)/Rose/Gun/Bullet
x/x/x/x
Loki's/sylvan +2/rajas/x
sylvan/x/sylvan +2/x

Notable swaps as Regain allows being Vulcan's Staff, Uther's Grip (4STR)/Axe Strap, a real DD body piece, Skadi's Bazubands/CFG, Amemet/Terebellum/Libeccio, Hachiryu Haidate/Teutates Subligar.

Wildfire completely rapes with brew.

I didn't know it was possible to not rape with brew...

Yeah, I really hate when people say that something requiring a large time investment is "free". Do you know how many millions of gil I could make in the same amount of time it takes to do those trials?

Meanwhile, I'm going to make due with a Vision Bow for now while I focus on my BLM (always my first love in FFXI), and hope that SE revives crossbows by the time I'm ready to starting pimping my RNG again. Btw, Kur was a pushover.

To the OP:
Good move selling your e.bow while it still had some value. So what to get while you're leveling up? The problem is, without atmas, your gear doesn't even matter. You might as well not worry about the parse or being gimp, because you're barely going to show up at all. What I would suggest is that you focus primarily on the ~85 levels of skillups you're going to need along the way. Pick up something fast and cheap, like a Rosenbogen or a Lamian Kamen, and you might actually have a chance at getting a second shot off at whatever mob is being fought.

Of course, if you do have atmas (or once you get them), then you'll probably want to look at getting one of the other weapons mentioned previously.

No, really. A DD with no atma who is 10-15 levels behind others in the group won't be doing crap in terms of damage. And yes, my somewhat underskilled WHM with modest gear + atmas will blow a no-atma, underleveled DD completely out of the water, even if I can't compete with a proper DD.