Merits for GEO and SMN: suggestions?

[Sechs]

What's the typical consensus for GEO Merits #1 and #2?

And about SMN ones, I currently have 3/5 Garuda, 3/5 Shiva and 4/5 Ramuh but was thinking to get other BPs as well.
Currently I have 2 scenarios in mind:
1) 4x 2/5, 2x 1/5 (which would you put at 1?)
2) 5x 2/5, 1x missing BP (which would you skip?)

Other options? Maybe 5x 1/5 and 1x 5/5 but I don't really like the idea.

[Kaisha]

For SMN I did 5/5 Thunderstorm ,1/5 the rest just so I had access to them to use w/ Mana Cede. I really like the Thunderstorm/Squall combo. Haven't toyed with it much on SoA content to see if the other ones have any other real advantages though for general dmg output. I need to figure out if I should bother switching my Cat1 merits though. Currently 5/5 ATT/MATT, thinking of dropping ATT for MACC given I hardly use physical BPs anymore.

Just really isn't much content to use SMN in if you have other jobs lvl'd, besides pet-army WKs.


As for GEO, I found a lot of it is preference since there wasn't anything outstanding besides Radial Arcanada.
Cat1 I went 5/5 Blaze of Glory/Dematerialize since I use them together. 5/5 Ecliptic is a decent option also given it's a 5min recast vs. 10min like the other JAs, probably better suited for the 5NMs in Delve than the other options now that I think about it.

Cat2 I did 5/5 Radial for free MP every 5min, and slapped the rest in 4/5 Curative, 1/5 Mending Halation.

I hardly see myself using Mending over a self-CureIV though since it's not worth blowing your luopan in Delve, particularly since I'm typically in the mage PT where only front-line GEO would get healed from it.

[Sechs]

I really like the Thunderstorm/Squall combo.

Yes Ramuh is probably my favourite (reason why I put 4/5 on it), but Garuda has merits because of the useful buffs.
There are other Avatars which could be beneficial in some situations but I never use atm because I no longer have their respective BPs. Can think of Leviathan and Ifrit.
Then you have Titan used for stuff like Hurkan for instance, altough I doubt I'd want to go over 1/5 there.
Let's recap my opinion on the 6 avatars/BPs:

Spoiler: show

• Ramuh - Love it, altough it's not the best for solo. On average I think it's the best if you want to deal damage and bring the additional utility of Shock Squall.
• Shiva - Used to love it in Aby days because of Atma of Beyond, that's why I had her first at 5/5 and more recently at 3/5. Nowadays though she's probably nothing special, could go 1/5
• Garuda - My favourite for solo, reives and that kind of stuff. Lot of utility (Fleet Wind), good damage split in Physical and Magical if you want, good buffs, good evasion etc. The Magic BP is nice damage too.
• Titan - Nice buffs maybe? But kinda meh. Aside from Hurkan I can't see me using it a lot
• Leviathan - Some nice buffs/debuffs/heals. Having merit BP would make me use this more often
• Ifrit - Decent DD/buff option, having merit BP would allow you to use Warcry, Enfire or even give a very small amount of DA to your pt.

So maybe I should go 3/5 on Ramuh and Garuda, and leave the rest at 1/5? Hmmm... think I like this.

I'm not a fan of 5/5 anymore because when you add the TP added by AF3+2 legs and the obvious TP your avatar is going to get through melee hits and AF3 neck, it means that legs get often partially wasted.
Of course if you intend to use other options (augmented AF2+2 or augmented hagondes?) then it becomes a nice option but personally I want to stay out from that approach.

I need to figure out if I should bother switching my Cat1 merits though.

The way I got it, Pet ATT was always useless because of the very minimal influence ATT has on most physical BPs. That's what I always read at least, correct me if I'm wrong.
ACC was arguably useful if you used a lot of them, but these days it's even more important to have Macc/Matt imho (I've always had those on #1, since Abyssea days at least)



Tnx for the GEO insight

[Fireon]

What Kaisha said about GEO tier 2 is accurate, but for tier 1 I prefer 5/5 Full Circle, 2/5 in Ecliptic timers, and 1 each in the other three. The reason for this is because I tend to burn all of these JAs at once. Blaze of Glory + Life Cycle + Dematerialize + Ecliptic Attrition, when used together, make the loupon effect as powerful as possible without Bolster, and ensures that it survives as long as possible to convey the effect. With the above setup, all four of these JAs will be ready for use at the exact same time, making it essentially one big JA with a slightly lower recast timer.

[Malithar]

For Geo cat2, I did 5/5 Radial Arcana, 4/5 Mending Halation, 1/5 Curative Recantation. While the reasoning given for Mending not being that useful is true enough, I find it far more useful in situations than gaining more HP back from Full Circle.

I've never found myself thinking "I need HP, lets Full Circle!" It heals back HP based on the MP cost and current HP of the Loupan, so in no way will you gain a net benefit from it, just some extra HP back when you're moving on from something (ex. a reive, roaming fights, etc) where as with Mending, you can blow it at Loupan 100% HP or 1% HP (be careful at such low amounts though, have had multiple occurrences of trying to slip it in, only to use the JA and the Loupan tic's itself to death before it blows up) for 500ish HP. While that HP on a 5 min timer by itself is rather lackluster, it does have its uses. Geo-Poison/Voidance make for extremely MP efficient spells for the HP you can cure by it, should it be needed by the group. Using it as a "Loupan about to die, lets get some use outta it" JA, if only to heal an inside Geo, etc.

Also, perhaps the biggest use to it, is its ability to hit everyone in range in Reive content. This makes it actually extremely easy to cap out on evals during WKRs with Geo, can make for some rather large evals during Colonization Reives as well, with how fast those typically go down and the amount of AoE healing you can get off with this single JA.

Gotta agree that cat1 is mostly personal choice, though I don't see the use in the above poster's setup with 5/5 Full Circle. 75% of the MP cost of the Loupan x current HP just isn't all that effective due to the lack of usefulness of Full Circle. Its use is in removing your Loupan to put up a more desirable one, or for when you're leaving the immediate area and no longer need it.

Lets assume Geo-Frailty, 294 MP. If say you were fighting some NM, killed it, and your Loupan was left with 25% HP, you'd get back 55 MP, with the merits. Without, you'd get back 36. Even say 100% HP (why'd you summon that Loupan? :O) you'd get back 220 MP with merits, or 147 without. I just don't see the use in that, personally. And while the reasoning for Ecliptic/Blaze/Dematerialization is solid, you could further reduce their recast times with 4 of the merits from Full Circle, and still have their recast line up. That's the real issue with cat1 though. There's no real "useful" merits to it. There's no "I feel stronger!" types, its all -recast, with a very low degree of effect. The difference between 5/5 and 0/5 on most of these is all but negligible, even over the course of a 45 minute Delve run.

[ChronicCettness]

SMN Group 2 Merits are more less a popularity contest with what ever event you intend to use SMN for. Just always go 5/5 into the most useful for the event you play and reset them (since merits are in abundance) as needed!

[Sechs]

(since merits are in abundance)

Are they?
Back in the Abyssea Days first and in the Voidwatch days then I would agree with you, I was always hanging around with 30/30 having nothing to spend them on.
But these days where on Delve you don't get XP and Skirmish you don't get XP, if you're not farming Colonization Reives you're not really swimming in merits anymore. And even if you do Colo the XP/hour isn't really that huge (at least before the last patch, haven't tried them after).

Not saying XP is as scarce as it was back at level 75 of course, but the current situation is nowhere close the last 2+ years either, imho.
When they released RUN merits I actually had to go XP to get some.
It sounds sarcastic/paradoxical, but the past 2+ years got us used in getting loads of XP not as a main goal of an activity (exping) but as a secondary consequence of something else. We got spoiled! Or well, I know at least I sure did.

[ChronicCettness]

Are they?
Back in the Abyssea Days first and in the Voidwatch days then I would agree with you, I was always hanging around with 30/30 having nothing to spend them on.
But these days where on Delve you don't get XP and Skirmish you don't get XP, if you're not farming Colonization Reives you're not really swimming in merits anymore. And even if you do Colo the XP/hour isn't really that huge (at least before the last patch, haven't tried them after).

Not saying XP is as scarce as it was back at level 75 of course, but the current situation is nowhere close the last 2+ years either, imho.
When they released RUN merits I actually had to go XP to get some.
It sounds sarcastic/paradoxical, but the past 2+ years got us used in getting loads of XP not as a main goal of an activity (exping) but as a secondary consequence of something else. We got spoiled! Or well, I know at least I sure did.

I just find myself always shifting my merits around. All jobs that are 99 have been 10/10 10/10 for years as I"m sure most have experienced. So I try to have fun with the merit combo's I use on SMN and some other jobs via their merit WS's if i find myself sitting on merits for too long etc. Anyway I usually idle with SHIVA and RAMUH 5/5 :3

[Trumpy]

for GEO:
I had put 1 in mending and radial to see what they were about and then i 5/5 curative. Ive done delve as geo and exploding my loupan to heal people doesnt work as i was usually in the mage party so i decided radial was the best to 5/5. so when low on mp i will explode it when we walk by or summon one really quick and blow it up for MPs. so 5/5 radial and curative for me atm.
group 1 I just 5/5 full circle and ecliptic attrition. I try to remember to use my 10 min JAs but i rarely use those kinds on any job cause im always afraid i will waste it on something dumb and need it the next minute. But i guess I am more cautious than most people. And since a couple of them for Geo are pop them before you cast I am always thinkin ok on the next cast i am going to blaze of glory it, then completely forget to use it before i cast.

Question: does radial give the same MP back regardless of what kind of loupan you use? I jsut want to make sure cause i could cast the lowest costing loupan and then blow it up for same effect I would be happy. Also does it matter how much HP the loupan has? I always seem to get the same amount (but I never really pay attention to it).

For SMN
I was told that physical acc and att were wasted stats ad mab was the way to go. at the time there were few pet:mab items but i got most of them and i definately notices the difference. so I 5/5 macc and mab. but i was doin alot of soloing NMs like iron giants and when they changed that 5th merit to casting time i 5/5 that instead of magic accuracy. so for me 5/5 pet mab and cast time.

solin iron giants Levi was the way to go for me and also that fire loving tonberry in konschatt so i have merits on him 5/5 and the other i switched between shiva and garuda, cause shiva was awesome in abby and garuda was nice for that earth dragon in tahronghi i fought many times for some item i cant even remember right now. Then at some point i always never had a pact i needed (I cant remember if it was for vw or what) so i split them all up to get all the pacts. but now i am thinkin about goin 5/5 ramuh and 5/5 garuda. Id say these options are jsut dependant on what you are doin with SMN

[Spira]

for SMN, i've always favored 5/5 and the rest 1/5. It doesn't really matter which you pick because the damage is the same. I suppose by itself Titan is better for the stun.

as far as combos within avatars, I like Ramuh because of the Thunderstorm/Stunga combo, like most people. Garuda has an arguably better combination for certain situations.. you'd have P.Claws / Hastega / Whispering Wind and Fleet Wind all in 1 and rarely need to switch away from her to do anything.

That being said, physical BPs normally do more damage than magical. I don't have any of the new SMN weapons that give huge MABs to know how that would compare. so.. putting 5/5 isn't quite as important as it used to be

[ChronicCettness]

for SMN, i've always favored 5/5 and the rest 1/5. It doesn't really matter which you pick because the damage is the same. I suppose by itself Titan is better for the stun.

as far as combos within avatars, I like Ramuh because of the Thunderstorm/Stunga combo, like most people. Garuda has an arguably better combination for certain situations.. you'd have P.Claws / Hastega / Whispering Wind and Fleet Wind all in 1 and rarely need to switch away from her to do anything.

That being said, physical BPs normally do more damage than magical. I don't have any of the new SMN weapons that give huge MABs to know how that would compare. so.. putting 5/5 isn't quite as important as it used to be

Interesting note, Predator claws is always a common BP people tend to favor since the 75 days... Flaming crush has a much higher damage potential. No math to back it up just pure experience... 15.8k Flaming crush on Behemoth vs 7k Predator claws vs behemoth (both are my highs)

However I do see that Garuda is more versatile in use if you're aiming to just keep 1 pet out... but it takes 2 seconds to swap pets!! So that seems irrelevant to me.

[Darkmagi]

af3 set proc or was that a common occurrence?

[Tachi]

Flaming Crush is a very special BP but incredibly powerful on low-level targets with Pet MAB equipement, Dia II, Crimson Howl etc. My personal average vs a target like Behemoth is 12-14k with 17-19k spikes, no AF3 set proc. KB takes barely less.

[Trumpy]

So i was looking at gear now that i have some hagondes peices, and i was wondering how much pet MAB is needed to be better (if even possible) than caller +2 body and legs, with body having 10% more dmg on bloodpacts and legs having a tp bonus?

[ChronicCettness]

So i was looking at gear now that i have some hagondes peices, and i was wondering how much pet MAB is needed to be better (if even possible) than caller +2 body and legs, with body having 10% more dmg on bloodpacts and legs having a tp bonus?

Not mathed out the body, though 5% increase on mandies was about 232 dmg for me so i'm guessing 460 dmg increase is a good average (for the body). Where as MAb +20 was increasing dmg roughly 300ish vs Mandies outside town... ANYway

don't need a high amount of MAB to beat out the Caller's legs +2.... simply because if your pet has capp tp they provide you no benefit and you should be using MAB or BP dmg +% gear anyway.

[ChronicCettness]

Flaming Crush is a very special BP but incredibly powerful on low-level targets with Pet MAB equipement, Dia II, Crimson Howl etc. My personal average vs a target like Behemoth is 12-14k with 17-19k spikes, no AF3 set proc. KB takes barely less.

mmm MAB really? lol I can imagine this working this way... but never really thought about that... really!?

[Tachi]

Yes and Burning Strike is also concerned.
Burning Strike is 1 physical hit + 1 magical hit. If I use it on a TW monster the BP will deal about 1900-2200 dmg with BP dmg+23%. On a TW monster who has more HP (i.e. who can survive the first "hit") the BP will deal 3800-4300 dmg and 7000-7500 dmg with all my Pet MAB gear.
Flaming Crush works the exact same way except it's 2 physical hit + 1 magical hit and stronger. You can also see the difference in Abyssea with and without MAB atmas/Balsam Staff/etc if you can find a target with a lot of HP, most mobs there can't survive to the first or second FC hit for me.

[Dotsudoku]

I was aware of the damage type duality associated with Flaming Crush, but where are you drawing the information regarding the individual hits from?

[Trumpy]

Its regular Wiki so i dunno but i found this earlier, does it answer your individual hits question?

http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Flaming_Crush

Flaming Crush consists of 2 physical hit, and one elemental hit. This is evidenced by the fact that this move can only generate 2 hits worth of TP.

[Spira]

oh gee.. i've always known flaming crush has both physical and elemental component but was never really aware that the elemental bit was affected by MAB.