Random Question Thread IV: ROCKY WINS

[drwaffles]

I originally did 5/5 Slow II, 5/5 Phalanx II for my RDM, until I realized that the only time I was ever really pleased that I had capped Phalanx II was when farming Big Bomb since it meant I didn't need to dispel Blaze Spikes. After I started soloing a lot more frequently (SCNM in particular) I switched to 5/5 Slow II, 5/5 Bio III to help speed up my kills. I had near-perfect nuking gear/merits so it fit me very well, and I was happy with it.

My new character just got RDM 75 this week, and I just yesterday finished her merits:

5/5 Slow II - this is an easy choice for me, since the extra potency and accuracy (which is essentially potency as well, albeit indirectly) is very welcome.

1/5 Paralyze II - although a lot more expensive than Paralyze, it makes an extremely noticeable difference on certain mobs (try killing Rapido using only Paralyze, then try it again using Paralyze II) and also means you can always be sure that any mob you're fighting as a group has a good Paralyze effect stuck on it. As many have pointed out in the past, there's nothing worse than having your MNDlicious Paralyze overwritten by some gimpshit's useless 320-skill Paralyze II.

2/5 Dia III - a must-have for zergs, so I'd recommend anyone that's likely to turn up to zergs on RDM to do at least 1/5. I decided to do 2/5 so that the effect will last for a full minute instead of 30 seconds. Of course, it's also useful in a lot of other melee-heavy situations.

2/5 Phalanx II - a more situationally useful spell (very nice when you don't have a SCH present and have the MP spare to keep it up, for example in Salvage). I could've just left this at 1/5, but it was a choice between superfluous extra duration on Dia III, a little extra accuracy on Paralyze II, lolBlind II or 1/5 Bio III (useless). I decided to go with this.

I did like having Bio III, but it requires 4/5 at least to be worth casting over Bio II, which I think is too many merits that could be spent unlocking other spells. Even at 5/5 it doesn't beat Bio II for efficiency - I believe only diehard soloists should bother with this. I don't need to bother explaining why I neglected Blind II.

[Thunder]

Well, aside from 5/5 slow I wanted phal2 5/5 for extra mitigation on hasso-not-/nin melee but now I think dia3 4/5 would me worlds better and usable in more places than phal2. The extra duration helps save mp, I suppose, and makes it a bit easier on you keeping it up on other(not merit or most einherjar mobs). 1/5 para should be a given if you have good gearsets for it.

[Effluo]

Can Third Eye blink 1000 Needles?

[Siniroth]

Can Third Eye blink 1000 Needles?

AoE, so no, unless it's different than every other AoE

[Effluo]

gotcha

[Znake]

I'm torn. Just got Novia and don't know in what ear to put it. I'll use it with a Loquacious Earring for WHM and when curing on BRD. So, Loquacious left and Novia on the right? That sounds like the best option, but then on BRD when I swap in a Musical for the Novia, the Musical will be in the right ear which just looks odd...

[cdgreg]

Here is a nice discussion and some testing with Paralyze II:

http://www.bluegartr.com/forum/59134...e-testing.html

Personally, I'm 5/5 Paralyze II 2/5 Phalanx II (To sync with Refresh) and 3/5 Bio III

I'm probably going to ditch the 3 merits in Bio III and put 3 into Slow II.

Ok so I just read the 3 pages of bickering about statics and it ended with a bunch of people saying they were going to do more testing but never did...I was definitely hoping for some final results there on page 3.

[Eldelphia]

I'm torn. Just got Novia and don't know in what ear to put it. I'll use it with a Loquacious Earring for WHM and when curing on BRD. So, Loquacious left and Novia on the right? That sounds like the best option, but then on BRD when I swap in a Musical for the Novia, the Musical will be in the right ear which just looks odd...

The answer for WHM is roundel on the right, Novia on the left ( /wave Znake) otherwise Novia/Musical for BRD !

[Despain]

Where is the best place and way to skill up shield from 216? Just dinged 75 on PLD :/ but level syncs have left my combat skills completely gimp.

[Siniroth]

Sub rdm and let chigoes beat on you I was under the impression was the accepted method

[Silversonic_11]

Is it possible to place dat swap music in to zones that don't originally have music in them? (E.g. Valkurm). I'd imagine they wouldn't have a music file for their zone if there was no music. Is there a guide to do this or anything? There's so many zones suitable for some music I have in mind, I'm just hoping it's possible.

[absolutezero]

I'm torn. Just got Novia and don't know in what ear to put it. I'll use it with a Loquacious Earring for WHM and when curing on BRD. So, Loquacious left and Novia on the right? That sounds like the best option, but then on BRD when I swap in a Musical for the Novia, the Musical will be in the right ear which just looks odd...

whm = Novia - Round / if no round go Loq

brd = Novia / Loq for curing. Other wise keep Mus / Loq.

[Lekotas]

couple quick Questions:

If sandworm window closes and it hasn't popped yet, will it force pop(assume it hasn't)?

If Sandworm pops and is left to despawn, does it return to a 20-25 hr window form despawn, or does a new 5hour interval window open or what?

[DAKPluto]

OK, I know the magic number for DEX is 50 over the AGI of the mob...the thing I haven't been able to find, is what is those numbers at North Camp and Bird camp? What DEX should I shoot for at each?

[DAKPluto]

Is it possible to place dat swap music in to zones that don't originally have music in them? (E.g. Valkurm). I'd imagine they wouldn't have a music file for their zone if there was no music. Is there a guide to do this or anything? There's so many zones suitable for some music I have in mind, I'm just hoping it's possible.

Possible, yes. These zones don't have the normal background music files, and instead have ambient sound effect files (I believe that is the .spw files) There is programs to convert WAV to the format.

The one problem you might have, is I believe a lot of these files are "shared" among different zones, so if you change one, I believe it will affect multiple zones, not just 1.

The question is if she does get a 2nd Fay Crozier with -3 Perpetuation... is there any way for gear swaps to differentiate the two different augmented Croziers? I read there was some concern involving this, so I wanted to know if there was some solution.

No, you cannot. She would have to manually switch the staves to use both. /equip Main "Fay Crozier" would produce an error.

[Yugl]

OK, I know the magic number for DEX is 50 over the AGI of the mob...the thing I haven't been able to find, is what is those numbers at North Camp and Bird camp? What DEX should I shoot for at each?

117 for Colibri
North Camp depends on the mob:
Puks till I think BLU Mamools you need 117-121 DEX
BST Mamools 126
DRG Mamools I think is 132?
Lurkers and NINs not sure, but likely not worth mentioning

[Wolfknight]

OK, I know the magic number for DEX is 50 over the AGI of the mob...the thing I haven't been able to find, is what is those numbers at North Camp and Bird camp? What DEX should I shoot for at each?

117 dex is max crit on birds, not sure about mamool ja though.

[DAKPluto]

Awesome, thanks

[Znake]

I think I was hacked.

I logged on yesterday for a LS event, which went fine except for more lag than normal (repeating sequence of R:0 until about 72% connection and then went back up, about 2 minutes apart, since I logged on until I logged off) - anyway, I don't think this is important. I log on today and when logging in to POL, it gives me the error: "Incorrect PlayOnline ID or password." I checked my ID and password and they're fine according to me, so I guess I was hacked or something. So... what do I do? I don't live in USA so I doubt I can call Customer Service. Is there an e-mail or anyone I can contact to help me out? Or are more people having a problem and this is a server-side issue (doubt it, but can always hope)?

Thanks.

Details: I browse with Firefox only, NoScript installed, and had just installed AdBlock yesterday, while logged on FFXI I believe, maybe it was before I logged. I hadn't entered my password into POL for more than, like, 2 years, and I don't use the Security Token. FFXI sites I visit are BlueGartr, otherWiki, FFXIAH, Alla, and yesterday I followed a link to the Windower website with instructions on how to install NoScript and AdBlock correctly - after hearing about hackings even with the Security Token.

[cpu]

I think I was hacked.

I logged on yesterday for a LS event, which went fine except for more lag than normal (repeating sequence of R:0 until about 72% connection and then went back up, about 2 minutes apart, since I logged on until I logged off) - anyway, I don't think this is important. I log on today and when logging in to POL, it gives me the error: "Incorrect PlayOnline ID or password." I checked my ID and password and they're fine according to me, so I guess I was hacked or something. So... what do I do? I don't live in USA so I doubt I can call Customer Service. Is there an e-mail or anyone I can contact to help me out? Or are more people having a problem and this is a server-side issue (doubt it, but can always hope)?

Thanks.

Details: I browse with Firefox only, NoScript installed, and had just installed AdBlock yesterday, while logged on FFXI I believe, maybe it was before I logged. I hadn't entered my password into POL for more than, like, 2 years, and I don't use the Security Token. FFXI sites I visit are BlueGartr, otherWiki, FFXIAH, Alla, and yesterday I followed a link to the Windower website with instructions on how to install NoScript and AdBlock correctly - after hearing about hackings even with the Security Token.

If it wasn't your account to begin with then you won't be getting it back either way. Just consider it the risk you take when purchasing someone else's account. In the US they require a notary certified form proving that your identity matches that of the original account owner and they will rollback your account to when you lost it, so there's probably some similar method for EU countries. Here's a link to the EU support phone number and webchat:

https://secure.playonline.com/supporteu/index.html