Pullus Torque

[Bockage]

Coming back from a few months away from FFXI and I was wanting to start in raising my own racing bird to try for this torque. For those raising/have raised new birds recently, how much of an impact do carrots as a steady diet effect stat gains, enough to matter in the end or are most simply skipping them? If so, in favor of what?

Carrots are supposed to give a minor boost to stats as is walking with your bird. I think it's something like 4 (I don't remember the exact number off hand) vomp carrots are equal to a day walking in town care plan.

If you're raising a racer I highly recommend using carrots, if not you probably don't need them. You might be able to get away with cheap greens from the near by vendor, but you'll be running out of time to level DISC. All those carrots help your bird reach it's max physical stats a day or two early. That let's you hopefully get an extra day or so of digging for treasure before day 65. Carrots are pretty cheap as well, so they wont break your bank.

[Thistle]

Finally! I stopped counting after 200 tellings of the Canter story, but I had many days after that of 8+8+8 tellings of it (basic energy bar + two chocolixirs = 3 energy bars of stories) before finally getting a lightbulb day ("Good time for mental training!"). Learned on the third try that day!

Soooo close to being done. REC needs one last level, then I need to bump STR back up to first class with bucks, then I'll have my 8/7/4/4 gallop/canter bird done!

[Not Kuno]

So whats the deal with that trophy storage thing. I tried to give her my bronze/mithral trophy and she didn't take them.

[Ryphen]

So whats the deal with that trophy storage thing. I tried to give her my bronze/mithral trophy and she didn't take them.

I think it only works with the cups you get from the Crystal Stakes races.

[Apollyon]

Can anyone actually EXPLAIN how the races in the Circuit work? I've not really been able to figure it out. Pointing me in the general direction of a guide is fine, I've just never found one.

[Frenzy]

Can anyone actually EXPLAIN how the races in the Circuit work? I've not really been able to figure it out. Pointing me in the general direction of a guide is fine, I've just never found one.

There are four tiers of races C4 through C1 (C1 is the Crystal Stakes, which gives the Cups).
Here's the timetable.
First you can only start in C4 races.
As you gather Victory Points by racing and placing first through third the other races open up.
You can race once per 24 hours (RL).
Races cost Chocobucks (10 for C4), Gil and require a certain amount of Victory Points (0 for C4)

As the picture shows, application to C4 races starts at :00 (first NPC from the right, the orange one) and :30 (second NPC from the left, the red one) (RL) each hour. There are Circuit-wide announcements when an application starts and what the NPC looks like. There two NPCs for each race, it doesn't matter which one you take.

Talk to them when the time is right, set the jockey order and item. The apply option (don't know what it is called exactly, the second to last), you are committed to that race and can choose saddle, afterwards you can choose a lane (not all may be available, the only difference between lanes is the rider, try different lanes, you might get a jockey looking like your character).

When you are finished you can go up a level and wait for the betting to start (NPC correspond to the application NPCs), or you can go the stands (for free with you one time use VIP ticket) and wait for your race to come on.

Once you have raced often enough and C1 becomes available, C1 shares a spot with C2. There'll be more C2 races than C1 races, what race is when follows a predetermined scheme.

[Apollyon]

Awesome, thanks Frenzy

[Thistle]

Rain weather stops the cactaur from doing mad dash.


However I still lost to the bunny.

I wish I had reread this thread sooner. I lost to the cactaur four times this morning, all in clear weather. :/ I think I have enough chocobucks left for one last try when I get home for lunch.

I really should be patient, I'm not done raising my bird yet (he's 7/7/4/4 instead of 8/7/4/4) but it's hard to wait!

[Not Kuno]

I wish I had reread this thread sooner. I lost to the cactaur four times this morning, all in clear weather. :/ I think I have enough chocobucks left for one last try when I get home for lunch.

I really should be patient, I'm not done raising my bird yet (he's 7/7/4/4 instead of 8/7/4/4) but it's hard to wait!

It was raining because I used the item. That fight is always sunny normally.

[Thistle]

It was raining because I used the item. That fight is always sunny normally.

Oh! Thankfully I only had 40 bucks, so checked back here while I was making the last 5. Thanks for the info!

Edit: YES YES YES! Yay! That did it! Thank you! I got my pullus torque! :D Now to just finish raising the bird and then the dream race~!

Yay!

[Clave]

First, I'd like to thank everyone that provided such useful information in this thread, it's really helped.

I just beat the Dream race yesterday, my chocobo's stats were SS/A/D/C with only Gallop as an ability because I got impatient and started the races early. I won one of the first two Pashhow Swamptrot races with Stamina Apple, but won the rest with a Speed Apple(All of these with the same stats mentioned above, Discernment just didnt want to go up to Average). Dream race took me around 5 tries. I tried once with Pepper Biscuit but Sakura resisted, and I noticed the race was very close on my losses with Speed Apple so I kept going at it. When I won, I believe Sakura got hit by a Gysahl bomb, got stuck in the mud, and got hit by a Fire Biscuit as well. I personally quite enjoyed the last cutscenes and the Chocochampion title.

Now today, my chocobo was unusually bright and focused and slightly ill. My chocobo's discernment was still A Bit Deficient, so I used an 80-chocobuck training to get it up to Average before spamming curious stories. This gave me the message that any further training would have a negative effect on other stats, but I did it anyway. It only took one to get DIS to average. Used up its energy, fed it Tokopekko Grass + Azouph + Chocolixir and read to it a few more times. Around the 12th try altogether I got it to learn Canter. It is around this time that I go back and check its stats just to finally see my chocobo done at SS/A/C/C/Gallop/Canter, that I noticed it now also liked sandstorms and disliked windy weather. I went back up to my log and it was there before all the training and such as well, I just hadn't noticed until then since I spammed through it. So now, I got a SS/A/C/C/Gallop/Canter chocobo that likes sandstorms. This makes me wonder a few things:

1 - How did the weather affinity happen? I had always assumed it is mostly due to taking your chocobo on walks to the corresponding places(and thus why sandstorm weather would kinda make sense in Meriphataud and maybe Tahrongi, though it has wind too). I am 100% sure I only read stories to it yesterday, and the day before, and it still had Clear Weather/None. My guess is maybe Digging for Treasure since it's been on that plan for a while, since day 40ish or something? Either that or the walks have a delayed effect? Thought that was interesting.

2 - How would the sandstorm affinity affect the chocobo? Does it mean it can somehow have accidents in clear weather or is clear weather considered neutral, while the other weather types would be strengths and weaknesses? Would racing during the corresponding weather cause the chocobo to be faster/better, or just avoid accidents? All I know for sure right now is that I should avoid windy weather in chocobo circuit races. I haven't had a chance to test in Free races yet so I don't know if it has changed my performance in there. It's too bad there's no item to cause the sandstorm weather effect, like there is for rain(foulweather frog). Also, kinda related thought I had wondered about, is Sunny weather the same as Clear as far as chocobo races are concerned, or would that be kinda like fire weather?

3 - When raising stats with chocobucks on a capped chocobo, you get the message that raising the stat would have an adverse effect on others. How does this work? Is it taken off the highest stat, a random stat, or the other 3 maybe? I noticed no change as far as the 8 general stat levels except for the increase in DIS from A Bit Deficient to Average, obviously.

4 - After a stat reaches first class, it's not capped, rather you can take it quite a bit further until it won't allow you to continue with chocobuck training(about as much as another full level). Does this make a difference? Is a chocobo with Chocobuck-capped-STR better than one with just borderline First Class?

This is generally just me thinking to myself but if anyone has experiences/answers that would be cool. I'll post my own findings when I have the time to test it out.

Edit: So far I've won a C4 race with no problem and Free race outcomes seem about the same, if not a little better now that my chocobo has canter and such(I even beat StarOnion on the first free race I did), so I shouldn't have to worry too much about it I would hope, unless they add another NPC with a new set of races with wind weather <_>

[Thistle]

3 - When raising stats with chocobucks on a capped chocobo, you get the message that raising the stat would have an adverse effect on others. How does this work? Is it taken off the highest stat, a random stat, or the other 3 maybe? I noticed no change as far as the 8 general stat levels except for the increase in DIS from A Bit Deficient to Average, obviously.

4 - After a stat reaches first class, it's not capped, rather you can take it quite a bit further until it won't allow you to continue with chocobuck training(about as much as another full level). Does this make a difference? Is a chocobo with Chocobuck-capped-STR better than one with just borderline First Class?

Congratulations on finishing your bird! You're like me, you have a super bird with a different-hopefully-not-negative thing instead of a just plain super bird. (Mine has normal feet/tail instead of large.)

As for your questions, I wondered about #3 as well. Since it took me well over 200 readings of the Canter story with average DIS, I was worried it would bump DIS up further. I wonder if you get an option on which stat to knock down or if it's random or the highest one?

4 is an interesting question. Someone had asked me that (lord knows how random people know I'm raising a bird -- BG lurkers?) and I had said all first classes were the same, but that was just an assumption. I could see it working either way...

Guppy had mentioned wondering if big feet/tail had to do with physical birds' stats caps -- maybe the two are related. Maybe with big feet/tail you can get "credit" for that training above first class?

Either way, my bird isn't finished yet (STR needs its final boost up to first class), and I still beat all the mission races before dream, C4-C2 races (only after last night's did C1 become open to me), and now and then I beat the super birds in the free races, so I'm not too worried about the feet/tail thing.

[Not Kuno]

Oh hey making it rain won it for you? Nice. Making that race rainy caused me to lose to the bunny but that might of been shitty luck. XD

I wouldn't make a bird that likes sandstorms because theres no item for it. I bet you can rape the last 2 races (torque + dream) if you had a rain bird with that item. Nobody there likes rain and they all like normal weather.

[Clave]

I wonder if you get an option on which stat to knock down or if it's random or the highest one?

You don't get an option. Only difference is he asks you an extra time if you are sure you want to go through with the upgrade after warning you about other stats decreasing, so I wondered how it worked.

Also I've answered quite a bit of my own questions myself. I don't think I have anything to worry about with the likes sandstorms thing, unless again, I get screwed with a new NPC having races in windy weather and no sandstorm item. In fact it's probably more of an advantage is my guess(I'd hope later on if they do add more weather variations they'd add the items for them). I haven't seen any chocobo circuit races with sandstorm weather though, has anyone? I'm pretty new to those so I just may not have seen them.

Also, I doubt you'd have anything to worry about with the physical appearance stuff, Thistle, seems you're doing well with it.

The main thing I'm wondering now is how long I should keep my chocobo in the stables and checking it everyday. I assume letting it idle in Basic Care doesn't further change stats if it's capped either?

[Thistle]

Oh hey making it rain won it for you? Nice. Making that race rainy caused me to lose to the bunny but that might of been shitty luck. XD

In my four tries before using it, I had come in second, second, third (got hit with multiple bad items), and second, always losing to the mad dash. So it seemed reasonable that if I could knock him out of the race that might be enough for me to win. And it was! Yay! :D

You don't get an option. Only difference is he asks you an extra time if you are sure you want to go through with the upgrade after warning you about other stats decreasing, so I wondered how it worked.

I haven't seen any chocobo circuit races with sandstorm weather though, has anyone? I'm pretty new to those so I just may not have seen them.

Ah, good to know. My bird hit first class STR from overnight training... but REC fell down a level. >< I'm almost back up to 80 bucks again, so I'll toss them at REC and hope that does it, then: Retirement!

And nope, I've only seen rain/sunny weathers. That does lead to another question though: I wonder if SE will keep adding more stuff to racing. More mission races, more weather...

[Max™]

<==

I must get this necklace, but I hate the idea of going through another bird (did 3, one that I screwed up, one that turned out decent but yellow, and my fast black rider) raising feat...

I've had people ask me questions from BG too, was kind of random, but hey.

[Apollyon]

That does lead to another question though: I wonder if SE will keep adding more stuff to racing. More mission races, more weather...

I anticipate more, based entirely on the fact that the two trophy's so far are Bronze and Mythril. Just feels like there will be more to me. I hope there are prizes as cool as the Pullus Torque though!

[Thistle]

I anticipate more, based entirely on the fact that the two trophy's so far are Bronze and Mythril. Just feels like there will be more to me. I hope there are prizes as cool as the Pullus Torque though!

I hope so, too.

And yay, I retired my bird this morning! 8/7/4/4 gallop/canter!

one that turned out decent but yellow, and my fast black rider

My bird is yellow, and I couldn't care less. No one ever sees it (unless they happen to get a race against me), so I didn't even bother worrying about color.

Ever notice how yellow is often the rare color in the races? A couple times I was the only yellow bird, all the NPC ones were colored. Amuses me.

[Max™]

Well, I started before the racing, I think I got the one I ride like...

Fuck, was just a couple months after they implented raising, I think she's named SweetJoyeuse, cause I got my Joyeuse around the time I started raising her, so that had to be well over a year and change ago.

[Gwynplaine]

I anticipate more, based entirely on the fact that the two trophy's so far are Bronze and Mythril. Just feels like there will be more to me. I hope there are prizes as cool as the Pullus Torque though!

In the data files, there are options for every kind of weather, including snow, dark, and auroras. All of the elemental weather seem kind of pointless atm, so I'd think they probably will. Not to mention if they ever completed all the chocobo content it would be a sad day indeed. No more surprise update notices where people are outraged with "WTF is this shit?! Where's the double-sided Ridill update notice I wanted???"