FFXIV Random Speculation/Question Thread XI: "How you liking that Beta Phase 5?"

[Carraway]

I bet Balmung is locked too. Must get off butt and hop on PC to see. Thanks.

If you can be patient about getting started, I would highly recommend trying to get onto one of the currently locked worlds. Masamune, Durandal, Aegis, and Gungnir are all "full" at the moment. I'm on Durandal and activity seems healthy: almost non-stop shouts for various activities, people seem to use the search function to find other people, etc. A few players from these forums, who are also going after what is considered the current endgame in FFXIV, are on these servers, including Euphoria on Masamune and Kaeko on Aegis, so they might be able to offer an additional perspective.

[Jem]

That's great, thanks. Does Alesone's still beat a double melded Crab Bow (DEX +16, PIE +16)? Alesone's are pretty cheap here so could pick one up easily. Hardest bit would be offloading the Crab Bow. I was worried about ACC when I made the choice but your guide mentions that's pretty moot.

[Carraway]

That's great, thanks. Does Alesone's still beat a double melded Crab Bow (DEX +16, PIE +16)? Alesone's are pretty cheap here so could pick one up easily. Hardest bit would be offloading the Crab Bow. I was worried about ACC when I made the choice but your guide mentions that's pretty moot.

Base damage trumps everything else in terms of point-for-point effect on damage output, plus the higher your base damage is, the higher your stat caps are. I would say, try to sell the Crab Bow and pick up the Alesone's until you can manage to snag an Ifrit or Moogle weapon.

[Raldo]

Maybe this is just me and my HQ crab bow talking here, but I'd rather have the +30 accuracy (plus whatever materia is socketed) over a couple points of base damage and +25 attack.

If you're rocking an NQ crab bow, I could see the songbow as an upgrade, however.

[Jem]

Well maybe one thing to consider is that our LS is only 5 people atm (Ragnarok is dead and we could only get 5 Chroma people to play XIV). So we'd only be getting the full party bonus for stuff that absolutely needed 8 people.

But at least you guys verified that Alesone's is worth getting. Worst case scenario, I'll lug around them both and just switch back to Crab if acc is an issue?

[Odin'sLaw]

really sorry to have to put this here but is there a shell that's willing to take a 14 noob? 7 years of ffxi so i should hopefully pick this up fast

[Raldo]

Not offering 'cause I don't have anything to offer, but I'll ask anyway...

Server?

[Odin'sLaw]

any will do don't start til my new pc gets here tomorrow

[Kidzukai]

Got a little group of a few (5-8) ex FFXIers from Fairy along with a few people we picked up in parties on Balmung... Most of us are mid level or just hitting 50, looking to get into the endgame stuff soon as we have the people. If you're interested hit up Casparus Babylon (me), Dev Mani, or Dan Stens. There's probably like 14 people in there total, and 3 more FFXI endgamers joining Thursday. Obviously a bit more laid back but we are serious about doing that stuff eventually. If not, I'm sure there's plenty of better places you could go if you rather hardcore it up.

[Odin'sLaw]

Got a little group of a few (5-8) ex FFXIers from Fairy along with a few people we picked up in parties on Balmung... Most of us are mid level or just hitting 50, looking to get into the endgame stuff soon as we have the people. If you're interested hit up Casparus Babylon (me), Dev Mani, or Dan Stens. There's probably like 14 people in there total, and 3 more FFXI endgamers joining Thursday. Obviously a bit more laid back but we are serious about doing that stuff eventually. If not, I'm sure there's plenty of better places you could go if you rather hardcore it up.

thanks man appreciate it, i'm currently on sylph so you may have seen Aldric running around

[Kidzukai]

If you knew Cossack, Elysianne, Shotaro, Marillian, I dunno... I played there like 8mo ago before I finally called it quits.

Sorry to repeat - I just got Paladin to 50 and I've had at least 4 people tell me different things as far as my attributes... The patch notes said STR MND, I've heard STR VIT, also heard mixing DEX, etc is the best way to go. Currently I'm doing STR VIT cause I thought itd be a good idea to waste a respec, just wondering if it's worth it to change or should I just focus on a different type of gear set? Also, rings?

[Niiro]

You're getting so many mixed messages because no one really knows what to do with PLD. Their HP sucks so they need to gear for that but their damage sucks as well and neither STR or MND add any survivability. They need enough HP to survive and enough damage to keep hate, unfortunately they're disadvantaged at both from the get-go.

I don't remember what PLD's base VIT is like, but either way, it and DEF start becoming more and more worthless when fighting things that are actually difficult (just like old times).

I don't know if anyone's tested DEX to see whether or not they remembered to make it effect block rate.

[Elcura]

I did VIT/DEX a while ago, and considering what was discovered about PLD hate generation I'm considering switching to VIT/MND (at least it helps curing a bit).

I guess there's not really a right answer yet, so play PLD and see what you need and your style. I tend to cure a lot so I like using MND/Hpotency where I can (though now I have better equipment I don't use them nearly as much).

[Kidzukai]

Thanks guys, that's kind of what I was guessing. I was really just curious if MND actually helped your damage or not. Guess I'll just roll with it for now, maybe change out of VIT. Pretty sure that PLD has higher VIT than any other stat, but could be wrong.

[Grey Jorildyn]

MND is a damage modifier on sword and iirc it also effects the enmity generated by flat blade combo, but that caps low or something.

[rezn0r]

Ragnarok sucked for me. I restarted recently and was playing there with one other person... we'd shout for three hours and still not have a full exp party. Rerolled on Balmung after getting to 47, sooooo much better at all times of the day. Just hit 50 yesterday. Rag might be okay if you're on in the morning.

blast from the past, what's your name on Balmung? a few others of us from Fairy/Sylph are on there now

[Celeste]

I'm Celeste Mourne, Elezen Thaumaturge Extraordinaire on Balmung. Chillin' in Uldah.

[Jem]

thanks man appreciate it, i'm currently on sylph so you may have seen Aldric running around

If you can't get on Balmung (I believe it's closed?) then I don't see an issue with you hooking up with us. We're currently 5 XI players who have only just really started up in XIV (barring 1 of us who has played XIV a lot) and I'd hope we're decently competent or will be since we've been in an endgame XI LS for 5+ years that is still going strong although obviously not quite the same endgame nowadays (Chroma from Asura). We're on Ragnarok.

Only downside is we're EU's and still play XI so your playtime isn't guaranteed to match up if you're not European. We generally do stuff at ~1PM EST assuming you're NA. And sod off to bed at like 6PM EST.

[vitali]

Does anyone know the more active linkshells on Aegis with competant players? Just reactivated and looking for a shell. All the previous ones I joined on Figaro seemed to have died.

[OneTwo]

Hello all. First time poster long time follower.

I just recently reactivated my account after having not played XIV since, Nov 2010. There seems to be little to no low level activity on my server, so I was just wondering if anyone could roughly tell me how long it would take to solo a job to 50. I am able to play around 8-10 hrs a day and was hoping that I would be able to have all jobs to 50 by the time 2.0 rolls around. If someone could give me a rough estimate that would be greatly appreciated.