[Guide] Black Mage - Because, heavy deeps, that's why.

[OWS_Tonx]

I don't have it yet but that's kinda what my question was, what should I be aiming for. I guess I'll work around the tidal staff then

[Kaslo]

So looking at gear, and knowing that I'm Paladin first and foremost, meaning no new coil drops, nor soldier gear for me for awhile. I've decided to work on getting a Cashmere Robe HQ and melding with Crit4 X1 and Acc4 x4

Does that look like the proper meld? I think Acc and Crit caps at 35ish

[OWS_Tonx]

Someone in the crafting thread melded accuracy x2, determination and crit on theirs and that doesn't seem wrong to me. If you need the extra accuracy to be sure to cover yourself on the higher turns I'd say go for it.

[Kaslo]

Well I'm going to share a lot of gear with SMN which would mean needing more ACC for the pet, so there is that.

[Mira]

I was trying to figure out which pieces to buy, would this be a good set to go with for now?
http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/M5GK Evenstar Hat/Ring is what i'd be buying(atm i just have Levi staff but, i'll have Animus sometime this weekend or Tidal if a mirror would ever drop)

[Sylvrdragon]

So apparently, I missed the memo on a new top AOE rotation. I don't have a parser, so I wasn't able to test them against each other personally, but an FC member claims to have done so.

The old rotation was the All Flare rotation that went as follows:

Fire3 > Flare > Transpose > 2-count after first tick > Flare > Flare > Transpose > repeat (weaving in Convert+Swiftcast as it is available).

The new combo fits together much more soundly as there is no timing involved besides just mashing your buttons to cast as soon as possible:

Fire3 > Fire2 > Fire2 > Flare > Transpose > Fire3 ASAP on the first tick > Fire2 > Fire2 > Flare > repeat (Convert+Swiftcast Flare as it is available)

Every spell and tick line up perfectly once you settle into the rotation. You start jamming the Fire3 key immediately after your Transpose so you start casting when the tick hits. By the end of the cast, you'll get a second tick which gives you almost exactly enough MP for the 2 Fire2s and the Flare.

[Shenrien]

I use the fire3, fire2 x2 flare rotation and whenever its up swiftcast & convert and it puts out some good numbers, curious how it performed against people who do double flare its actually quiet far ahead.

http://cdn.guildwork.net/albums/imag...761778c833.jpg

Nearly identical gear at the time, major difference was I didn't have allagan pants when I did the parse, both of us used buttons HQ and used raging strikes when it was up for the pulls.

[Sylvrdragon]

If you're THAT far ahead of the next-best AOE rotation, then I have to wonder if that guy was messing it up. It does have much more room for error, after all. It's also possible that he simply had some Flares interrupted when one of your spells finished off the mob. With more instances of Flare in his rotation, it's bound to happen more often to him than to you. I suppose even that observation lends yet more support to the new rotation, though I'd still like to see a controlled parse against test dummies to remove some of those variables.

[OWS_Tonx]

Yeah, that guy fucked his timing up or something. My friend was parsing against me yesterday as BLM vs BLM on brayflox soldiery runs and he uses the fire2 spam -> flare rotation while I do fire3 flare transpose flare flare and I ended up doing about 40k total more dmg than him at the end. When I explained new rotation to him I was only about 10k or so ahead because random miss timings from him and such.

[OWS_Tonx]

I was trying to figure out which pieces to buy, would this be a good set to go with for now?
http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/M5GK Evenstar Hat/Ring is what i'd be buying(atm i just have Levi staff but, i'll have Animus sometime this weekend or Tidal if a mirror would ever drop)

I personally did my body first then earring. Or you can do earring/ring/belt combo for some accuracy to alleviate some of the required gear swap for t6 and stack on better secondary stats

[Indomitable Will]

So apparently, I missed the memo on a new top AOE rotation. I don't have a parser, so I wasn't able to test them against each other personally, but an FC member claims to have done so.

The old rotation was the All Flare rotation that went as follows:

Fire3 > Flare > Transpose > 2-count after first tick > Flare > Flare > Transpose > repeat (weaving in Convert+Swiftcast as it is available).

The new combo fits together much more soundly as there is no timing involved besides just mashing your buttons to cast as soon as possible:

Fire3 > Fire2 > Fire2 > Flare > Transpose > Fire3 ASAP on the first tick > Fire2 > Fire2 > Flare > repeat (Convert+Swiftcast Flare as it is available)

Every spell and tick line up perfectly once you settle into the rotation. You start jamming the Fire3 key immediately after your Transpose so you start casting when the tick hits. By the end of the cast, you'll get a second tick which gives you almost exactly enough MP for the 2 Fire2s and the Flare.

you get 3 fire2's in

fire3>f2>f2>f2>flare>transpose>fire3>fire2>fire2>flare pulls in brayflox don't last beyond that mostly unless the other dps sucks.

so far I have been top dps on every run i've done for aoe and single target, other than 1, where the other blm was doing a mesh of both where he would do double flare after his 1st f2 rotation, and even then we were trading threat spots between 2 and 3 the whole time, neither of us using quelling strikes.

[Indomitable Will]

you get 3 fire2's in

fire3>f2>f2>f2>flare>transpose>fire3>fire2>fire2>flare pulls in brayflox don't last beyond that mostly unless the other dps sucks.

so far I have been top dps on every run i've done for aoe and single target, other than 1, where the other blm was doing a mesh of both where he would do double flare after his 1st f2 rotation, and even then we were trading threat spots between 2 and 3 the whole time, neither of us using quelling strikes.

you know what though, I am going to actually have a parse done today, since I've been doing enough brayflox on BLM to have an awesome sample size lol, like, enough to accurately math out magic dmg forumulas, a LOT, thanks animus.

[Shaano]

I personally did my body first then earring. Or you can do earring/ring/belt combo for some accuracy to alleviate some of the required gear swap for t6 and stack on better secondary stats

Did exactly this to use allagan body on lower content but still have the acc. Will buy body when I have enough points, but if I need the acc to hit 460 I slap on Myth.

[Sign]

What do you guys do to hit 251 PIE? None of the i90+ gear has PIE on it and most people seem to eat Stuffed Cabbage/Buttons in a Blanket. Do you just forget about PIE and focus on maxing out other stats?

[Crizto]

I never worry about it, never have.

[Seravi Edalborez]

Think you always hit 251+ PIE if you have a SCH in the party, so it only really matters in 4mans with a WHM I guess?

[Niiro]

What do you guys do to hit 251 PIE? None of the i90+ gear has PIE on it and most people seem to eat Stuffed Cabbage/Buttons in a Blanket. Do you just forget about PIE and focus on maxing out other stats?

No casting gear has PIE on it at any level, it's a healer stat as far as the game's concerned.

[Sign]

Think you always hit 251+ PIE if you have a SCH in the party, so it only really matters in 4mans with a WHM I guess?

I am at 241 naturally, with 248 in a SCH party. Was trying to keep at least 251 to fit in that extra fire on single target rotation.

[Sephiroth]

So apparently, I missed the memo on a new top AOE rotation. I don't have a parser, so I wasn't able to test them against each other personally, but an FC member claims to have done so.

The old rotation was the All Flare rotation that went as follows:

Fire3 > Flare > Transpose > 2-count after first tick > Flare > Flare > Transpose > repeat (weaving in Convert+Swiftcast as it is available).

The new combo fits together much more soundly as there is no timing involved besides just mashing your buttons to cast as soon as possible:

Fire3 > Fire2 > Fire2 > Flare > Transpose > Fire3 ASAP on the first tick > Fire2 > Fire2 > Flare > repeat (Convert+Swiftcast Flare as it is available)

Every spell and tick line up perfectly once you settle into the rotation. You start jamming the Fire3 key immediately after your Transpose so you start casting when the tick hits. By the end of the cast, you'll get a second tick which gives you almost exactly enough MP for the 2 Fire2s and the Flare.

How is this a new rotation? I've been using that for my AoE rotation since launch.

Though I tried that in Brayflox and decided against it after the first run because the other BLM in the group out parsed me using:

Fire III > Flare > Convert > Swiftcast > Flare > Transpose > Fire III > Flare.

At this point the large pull is dead. I don't know if there's a better one but it certainly improved my DPS.

I think going forward I'll keep the Swiftcast for the third Flare however because I've had cases where my third Flare would interrupt because the mob has died before the spell went off. Then I have to fanny around trying to cast it on another mob that is at 5% HP.

I'm not sure which rotation would be better for a typical 3-4 pull dungeon scenario where you don't have two BLMs to put six Flares out, and where Convert and Raging Strikes aren't available for all pulls like they are in a Brayflox speed run. It's a completely different situation so I'll probably stick with the Fire II rotation.

[OWS_Tonx]

How much did a fire3 -> flare increase your total dps by when done after transpose? Flare isn't too much longer than fire3 when done from UI1 but at least flare will hit everything for 600ish

RE-EDIT: as far as PIE, I had to allocate like 2 or 3 towards it as a male miqote (I'm not the ash grey race of cats, i can't remember their name. Seeker of the Sun?) to hit the 251 with sch in pt