hay BG, ninja madness

[wintersquall]

so... i've decided to finish my ninja since there's never a gd tank around when i need one (and i wanna run faster at night, wut?).

problem is, i stopped lvling nin at 40 in like, late 2004 >.>


this weekend, i went and bought all the lvl 40 spells, geared the job, got a stack of tools for each ninjutsu (yes, all of them), and enough shihei to strangle a behemoth assuming they're stupid enough to try to swallow them.

here's the gear i'm starting with (mind you, i am poor right now - gonna try to fix that in the near future)

head: flax headband
body: jujitsu gi
hands: ryl mufflers (+2 acc)
waist: war belt +1 (survival, i know, need to farm 200k)
rings: rajas/venerer (have ulth for 50)
ears: drone/dodge
pants: san doria (+2 eva)
feet: elvaan RSE (+3 agi)
ammo: RSE sachet +2 STR
back: high breath
weapons: level-appropriate AH weapons

k, i know the gear is lacking, so any suggestions there that won't break the bank are welcome. but my more important question is how do i not suck?

do i voke, cast blind/slow then spam the ele wheel between atks while desperately trying to keep utsu up? or what lol...

un-noobify me before i cause some party a total headache.

[Tricen]

tbh, if anyone is ever thinking about lvling a melee job, camp VE LL and Argus and get the r/e since it's like the best thing ever in the long run. (Argus is kinda iffy, LL and VE is cake though)

[wintersquall]

yeah yeah, i'll def camp VE and maybe argus, w/e. just decided this last weekend

moar info please.

[chapstick]

do i voke, cast blind/slow then spam the ele wheel between atks while desperately trying to keep utsu up? or what lol...

basically what i did.. except not having :ni enfeebles failed at level 40. i've heard subbing RDM or BLM can work too, since the ele wheel alone at that level can keep hate.

[orson]

If you aren't terribly overcamping you can pretty easily use an evasion build and probably not have too many issues. Once you hit AF lvl most Nins focus more so on DDing just because it makes things easier for holding hate. Evasion build isn't necessary but before support like March, Haste, Flash, etc. it's nice. Nins aren't 100% reliant on support but like every job it sure as shit helps a lot. In short I'd focus on evasion for parties that have bad support but try to keep a +acc/att set handy otherwise you'll probably be struggling with hate control. The elemental wheel I've never really thought helped much (maybe Ni nukes to about lvl 60 or so) but again it's sorta how you build.

[Thistle]

(and i wanna run faster at night, wut?)

Hell with NIN, level BRD! Mazurka > *

[Waef]

Definitely get an empress hairpin. Bounding boots and Peacock Amulet, eh yeah they're nice (especially peacock amulet) but not really "essential" for ninja. (Peacock amulet is definitely a plus though). Empress hairpin, you'll love that thing.

As for tanking, I say go solo some Ts or something to get back to how it all works. Basically just voke, and leave debuffs to the rdm or blm (until you get :Ni debuffs, then do it yourself.) Start with a fresh Ni each battle as often as you can, and then alternate :ichi and :ni however you see fit (everyone does it differently I'm sure). Learn to cancel :ni while casting ichi (I'm sure you know how to do this, if not, practice, or ask what I mean.)

After initial voke, just spam the wheel as much as you can, but of course putting Utsusemi and voke as a priority to the wheel. You'll be doing very nice damage with it for a while so hate shouldn't be an issue.

When you can, try to get some enmity gear too, because personally, when I leveled nin, I felt like a FAILURE if I didn't keep hate. Evasion is important too, though, because it definitely works well for a while.

Hope that helped, I had more stuff to say but I kind of forgot.

[Raineer]

As for tanking, I say go solo some Ts or something to get back to how it all works.

This is pretty sound advice. With half-decent gear you can solo VT's pretty easily as well, once you can do that you're golden for tanking.

[Naver]

Peacock Charm, Fumas, and a Swift Belt. Oh and maybe eat Dorado Sushi for the Enmity+.

[Epical]

It's really not too complicated. Voke when a mob comes, do your enfeebles, and start poking it. If you're not evading too well, don't get careless with Berserk or anything, but if you find that it's missing you a decent bit, throw up serk to add to melee hate. If others gain hate over you (which DDs are meant to, and will do) voke again, then use your wheel if you need to. The only time I had pretty big trouble keeping hate was in the 50s before I got Jin. I leveled with a meritted WAR and RNG at the time and all they did was spam Slug/Rampage, so there really wasn't much I could do. Once I got Jin it helped a lot.

Honestly, no matter what you do, your first few parties will be pretty rough. You'll probably cast Ichi over Ni a few times, fubaring yourself for that fight, but as long as you aren't parties with tards, you should be fine. The more you play NIN the better you get. You'll pick up little things like when to start casting Ichi for which mob, when it's safe to gamble a WS over recasting shadows, etc. Expertise comes with time. =)

[vagus]

tbh, if anyone is ever thinking about lvling a melee job, camp VE LL and Argus and get the r/e since it's like the best thing ever in the long run. (Argus is kinda iffy, LL and VE is cake though)

Can also camp Fuma and O.Kote, personally i liked use Horamusha kote. Might want to consider getting a swift belt as well. Mermaid ring is a must imo. Everything else looks pretty good. Oh and use enfeebling magic powder, for the love of god. Lol.

[Tricen]

tbh, if anyone is ever thinking about lvling a melee job, camp VE LL and Argus and get the r/e since it's like the best thing ever in the long run. (Argus is kinda iffy, LL and VE is cake though)

Can also camp Fuma and O.Kote, personally i liked use Horamusha kote. Might want to consider getting a swift belt as well. Mermaid ring is a must imo. Everything else looks pretty good. Oh and use enfeebling magic powder, for the love of god. Lol.

Oh, fuma's and okote are like manditory lol.

[wintersquall]

wth is enfeebling magic powder?

[Obev]

That would be kurayami, hojo and jubaku.

[Rocl]

I loved the elemental wheel until about level 50. It was amazing and I wish I could use it every day of my life, plus it totally kept my Ninjutsu capped. Then Colibri came in and I wanted to an hero myself.

[wintersquall]

oh... haha, my bad. yes of course, i plan on always, always having tools for those, especially as they overwrite rdm enfeebs - never thought of them as powders. i'm a few levels behind in ninjutsu for some reason (it's 93 @ lv40), so i imagine this'll catch it up pretty quick. damn tools are expensive though >.>

thanks for the advice, it doesn't sound too bad... when i finally get the time, i'll head down to CN and look for something to solo with flag up i guess.

[Bakthi]

I loved the elemental wheel until about level 50. It was amazing and I wish I could use it every day of my life, plus it totally kept my Ninjutsu capped. Then Colibri came in and I wanted to an hero myself.

This is pretty much it. People used to talk about using the wheel until around 60, I think, but as soon as you start on Colibri it just turns into total crap. Which blows, since you're not hitting them with your katanas much either, because you can't use food. Trying to keep hate off a MNK/WAR with enmity merits and a DRK/WAR...did not happen. I did reasonably well after I got Jin, and great while I could still use the wheel, but there was this big colibri-shaped hole of "hate4all" in the middle.

I used Federation Kyahan instead of Fumas because I didn't care that hard about 3% haste with no other haste equipped. YMMV.

[ferigor]

I just recently started leveling nin as my next 75, have gone from 40~64 in the last couple of months (yes, I'm slow, I know). Here's my advice:

Get a high breath mantle. The 5 emnity is really noticeable, and honestly there isn't really much for a back piece for awhile (Nomad's or Jaguar are the only other pieces that I think are viable, and I liked the enmity over their bonuses). I had one high breath mantle and it lasted me from 40~61, in fact I still have 2 charges on it that I doubt I'll ever use.
I tanked as nin/rdm almost exclusively from 40~55 depending on what we were camping against and the set up of the party. As nin/rdm beetles were definately my favorite target as they don't seem to have very good resistances so I almost never lost hate. If you plan on tanking this way though plan on spending extra gear on tools and equip. I am elvaan so I dumped everything I could into INT and I'd still get resist (which really hurts, especially at the beginning of the fight when hate is shakey). Also, I'm sure you know the obvious bonuses of nin/rdm, but don't forget other hate tools you have (sleep, bind, shit that works for nin/drk) or Aquaveil (possible placebo, but I feel like this saved my ass a few times).

Everything else I know I think has already been said.

[wintersquall]

yup, my first purchase when equipping this was a high breath. didn't know it'd last THAT long though, i assume you switched to amemet +1 at 61.

i've thought about alternate subs (i have blm, rdm, drk, war, sam, whm, thf, drg subs available all the way to 75) but i don't really see the benefits it gives other than a few spells and shitty mp, and it seems like until /drk and stun at 74 i'd be better off just cookie-cutting /war and having guaranteed voke every 30 sec... not to mention assclown noobie pt leaders not inviting me because i'm LFG as nin/rdm.

any thoughts on that? what's the big benefit to subbing mage?

[Rocl]

Trying to keep hate off a MNK/WAR with enmity merits and a DRK/WAR...did not happen.

Jesus christ did we level Ninja with the same people? You're like the alternate universe me.