Chocobo Racing

[Lucavi]

I agree with the above. You'll run with people that are far higher than you, stat-wise, in your natural weather as fair weather bird, but will be ground to a halt in the rain. Foul weather birds are more balanced and don't receive either a massive buff or penalty in good or bad weather.

[Jem]

Ah good, I'm not crazy then. I had always thought that my foul weather birds seemed way better than fair with the exact same logic as you guys.

Like with foul birds I don't care about the weather but with fair birds, especially the one bad one I got, I kept joking in LS than I may as well just AFK if the weather is bad at race start.

It's extremely noticeable with Head Start too. A fair bird in foul weather gets swallowed up really quickly but a foul bird in fair weather does not.

[Pooke]

765 experience and 403 mgp for 1st place in the 300 club, 3rd place gave 295 gp, before the patch 1st would give 203 mgp I believe. Last place is now 53 gp compared to 83.

[Kaeko]

Ran a couple races vs NPC and a couple with Pooke. Some notes before I head to work:

Still can win every non-meteor race vs. NPC on Sagoli. With Head Start / Dash combo I can just barely finish a Sagoli race without a stamina item + holding forward full time + well timed Dash (same as pre-patch). NPCs always get tripped up by the purple platform (gravity) mid-way during the race which gives you edge. Meteor is very rare. Saw only 1 go off in a total of 13 races (as opposed to maybe seeing it 50% of races and multiple going off constantly).

Frenzied is really really nasty now. Probably something like double the stamina drain of normal acceleration during lathered. Gravity going from 5 to now 10 seconds is also really annoying at R300 since the 2 best NPCs will overtake you (Star Breaker especially since he has Head Start). The frequency of gravity ball and water is drastically increased compared to before on R300 Sagoli.

Would need someone else to verify, but Choco Potion appears to give more stamina % than prior. Likely just mimics Choco Cure III so went from 9% to 12%?

You can definitely MGP farm this now. At 403 MGP (393 net gain per win) you are looking at about 8,500 MGP/hr, which is better than Imperial TT farming. Sagoli will probably end up really crowded later on though. Costa del Sol should be very similar to Sagoli (only 40 yalms more or +2 seconds). Tranquil (140 yalms or +7 seconds on race time) is probably a good farm if you have a strong stamina booster ability set.

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Random musings on the chocobo traits/abilities (thinking in terms of R300) now:

Head Start - Since it is still possible to finish a race by just holding down the forward button, this is definitely still a must have to farm NPC races optimally. Also, you do not want to be with the pack the first half of the race unless you have Reflect on now. Being ahead of the pack allows you to dictate chests which is more important than ever now. Meteor being much more rare also greatly strengthens the trait overall.

Dash III - still very useful but no longer the undisputed best ability. As mentioned in a prior post, it does lose some of its function at R300 since your max speed is the Dash speed. It is still a very versatile ability though. 3 seconds of free stamina comes out to about 5% on the stamina bar if you are straight holding forward the entire race. Sagoli is still doable by holding forward 100% using Head Start / Dash combo. Without some help, you will fall horribly short if frenzied though. It will likely fall short on just barely short on Costa Del Sol and definitely will fall short without help on Tranquil though. So you will not be as optimal on the other race courses (may be an issue if farming later when things are more crowded. Has a couple of added perks in that you can maintain max speed through about half of a gravity duration as well as run through some obstacles while maintaining max speed (like coblyns). If you're ever out of stamina near the finish line it's still your best friend. You may be able to make a case that it's still an optimal ability if you are running Sagoli in particular. When extending to the other 2 tracks I think Cure III may be better though.

EDIT: tried about 50 costa del sol runs with Head Start / Dash 3 chocobo and won 48 of them. got 2nd place on 2 of them. Head Start / Dash is probably still the best. You basically end up running out of stamina at the end and dash is OP when you're at 0 stamina (3 seconds at maximum speed and the extra distance covered as you are decelerating from max speed). Try at all costs not to get frenzied, but if you do you're usually OK unless you get frenzied twice. The NPCs behind you take out most of your competition with Baachus' waters. Frenzy status is really something to be feared now.

Cure III - got a slight boost with stamina increase from 9% to 12%. Should allow you to finish races easier. I'm not 100% sure if you will still be able to finish Tranquil consistently though. Possible contender for best ability in terms of versatility on all 3 tracks?

Reflect III - with waters and gravity balls being so much more common and effective this becomes a very good defensive move. If you're out in front it also makes it very dangerous for the person behind you to grab chests without thinking since they cannot free up their item slot without hitting themselves with gravity/frenzied. It lasts 25 seconds which is roughly 1/3rd of Sagoli's race time. If you are out in front you will both be able to dictate chests as well as know exactly when you need to use reflect. NPCs also blindly use abilities w/o considering reflect so you can eliminate your NPC competition. I can see this being a very strong move, especially against other players; however, since it is not a stamina boosting ability, just be aware that you cannot finish a race while holding the forward button full time unless you get some help. This is the only reason I don't see this being optimal for NPC farming.

Speedy Recovery III / Increased Stamina III - no experience with these so cannot comment much. However, the fact that Head Start is so good makes these 2 less appealing as you would ideally like to have at least 1 ability (not 2 traits) so that Aether waters do something. Someone else may be able to verify whether or not you can finish Tranquil with Head Start / Increased Stamina III?

Ease III - the stamina boost was increased and also potentially buffed by increase in frequency of gravity ball in the chests. Can always count on getting gravity at some point in a race since you can run over the purple platform; however, this is not optimal as some races can be pretty tight (vs Star Breaker or Joe). Star Breaker especially is Head Start / Dash combo and can run near perfect races. Still would not consider an optimal choice.

Esuna III - buffed so that the last tier has no chance of failure. The only thing that can clear meteor status. Meteor being rarer makes this less useful. If afraid of frenzied or gravity, reflect will likely be better. Again, not having a stamina boosting ability/trait means you will need a bit of help finishing a race while at max speed the entire time.

Shock III / Silence III - potentially awesome if paired with Head Start and attempting to race / grief other actual players. Shock is probably still more annoying even with the 10 second duration increase on Silence III. Would not consider optimal for NPC farming though as again, not a stamina boosting tool.

[Lucavi]

I wish they'd do something about the horrid RNG of gaining abilities. I'd taken about 2 weeks off of racing because I needed a mental break from the Korean-esque RNG. I've rerolled my racing ability ever since Rank 25, attempting to get any choco dash, much less III. Its now Rank 45 and I'm still sitting on nothing but combinations of shock, silence and resists. With this being a fair weather bird without 5stars in endurance, stamina is a huge problem, moreso with innate head start. 90% of those problems would be resolved by having a long dash period to soak up the stamina loss, but if I have to go another 3 straight levels of the same goddamn heavy resist, I'm going to swear off choco racing until thew new content is staight up added. Being locked in the R300 and losing constantly because of huge stamina drain isn't how I pictured it would go.

[Kaeko]

Just got home and tried Sagoli again. 1st place R300 now only giving me 403 (not 465 like this morning). Unsure of what's going on.

EDIT: nvm was always 403.

[Enygma55]

Man with how often grav and water show up, those resist skills and even choco reflect seem really good now.

The good side is NPCS wreck eachother really bad now, so if u can outlast them with enough stamina you'll win alot more often.

[Jem]

I wish they'd do something about the horrid RNG of gaining abilities. I'd taken about 2 weeks off of racing because I needed a mental break from the Korean-esque RNG. I've rerolled my racing ability ever since Rank 25, attempting to get any choco dash, much less III. Its now Rank 45 and I'm still sitting on nothing but combinations of shock, silence and resists. With this being a fair weather bird without 5stars in endurance, stamina is a huge problem, moreso with innate head start. 90% of those problems would be resolved by having a long dash period to soak up the stamina loss, but if I have to go another 3 straight levels of the same goddamn heavy resist, I'm going to swear off choco racing until thew new content is staight up added. Being locked in the R300 and losing constantly because of huge stamina drain isn't how I pictured it would go.

I have Lethe'd every choco from Ped 2 up to 7 and I still have yet to see Choco Dash of any sort once. The only time I saw it was on the bought covering of my very first breed!

Also does Head Start 2 actually exist? I've seen it mentioned once or twice early in this thread and then never again. Everyone I've spoken to has not seen it on any of their chocos so guessing it's extremely rare.


And items seem to be an absolute bitch now, Bacchus especially but even Heavy is annoying as hell as NPCs sometimes like chain cast on you. I spent like 35 consecutive seconds heavied in a race yesterday. I do prefer it though because before it was simply get in front and basically ensure nobody behind you gets an item that will derail you. Now it doesn't seem as possible because there's so many waters/graviballs.

[Edelweiss]

Did they increase stamina consumption from being lathered? It certainly seems like they did.

Also the NPCs seem to be unaffected by it.

[Enygma55]

Yes they did its in the patch notes. Water burns stamina faster now.

[Edelweiss]

Not talking about Bacchus' Waters; i'm talking about pushing your chocobo into being lathered. Because i'm hanging out in the back of the race and my stamina seems much lower than it was last week; i'm not being hit with any statuses either.

[Korialstrasz]

Weather effects maybe? They did change it a bit, in particular how foul birds function.

[Kaeko]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PD7EvJa72_I

Random video of me farming some R-300 Costa del Sol versus NPCs. Video shows 7 wins then the last is a loss. It's about 7,500 to 8,000 MPG/hour. I went 28/30 during the farm session. 2 losses were both due to getting frenzied early on followed by a meteor (1 4th place, 1 8th place). On a side note, I wonder how well a maxed out bird with Level Head V and Increased Stamina III would do at AFK racing. I think it would do pretty well at placing 2-5 given how many races seem to end in everyone at 0 stamina before crossing the finish line.

[Jem]

What benefit would Level Head V offer to an afk bird? Or do you mean AFK with sprint held down?

[Korialstrasz]

AFK would still come last for sure, but if you had the right traits to make you immune to slow/frenzy you could probably avoid 8th even if you just watched Netflix while hitting an occasional button to sprint. It's what I do when I don't care to focus on racing, because any MGP > 0 MGP, even for a loss.

[Pooke]

Just saw a double bonus game, both had the same exact finish time heh.

[Shaano]

Any "Tips and do this first" while leveling spam? Been trying to keep up with racing and leveling so I can knock out the achievements, but some moments I hit a dry spell of losing to NPC's a fuck ton. I'm fine with hitting 7th but 8th hurts. Usually been putting my points into Max Speed/Stamina when I start seeing races getting a bit more difficult but it's hit or miss if I can place first.

[Kerberoz]

Need more info. What are you losing to? Running out of stamina? Getting hit by too much crap? What rating/pedigree?

One extremely important thing that a lot of people don't realize at first is to watch the upcoming crates and adjust accordingly. Sometimes it's better to intentionally miss. Keep track of what powerups the racers ahead of and behind you have at the moment. Be extremely careful when briars are involved. Try to remember which NPCs have steal and/or immunity.

No idea if you're still on the first generation or have started breeding, but, for low pedigrees, just try to get a good inherited ability and higher stats than the last generation. G-9 permissions are cheap now, so there's really no point bothering with the cheaper ones. Since the patch, most abilities are at least somewhat useful, but not all of them. Use a lethe water if you're unhappy with your current learned ability. It's generally best to have one active and one passive.

[Shaano]

Ped 4 almost 5, Running out of stamina almost always on Tranquil if no Green pad to the end of the race.

Crates I can plan accordingly, the skill that removes frenzied/returns stamina, if it is coming up I'll skip it and let the person behind grab it so they pop on me/cure it to gain back some stamina as well.

Two skills I have is Choco Cure II and Choco Calm atm.

I also have my next ped on me, but hell if I can "Read it". Shows two genders, is that the outcome will be possible stats or is that if breeding with one, it'll have these x stat chances.

Spoiler: show

edit; if I do feed my bird, it's just cheap t1 food since it doesn't really matter..?

[Kerberoz]

Stats are pretty low, but that shouldn't really break it.

Sagolii is the shortest track, btw, so it's usually the best to spam.