Miner Class Discussion Thread

[goodr]

I realize I'm being a bit OCD about this stuff, and many won't find it worth the effort to squeeze out maximum SP/hour, but I do enjoy finding ways to maximize efficiency. Having it take only about 1:15 to finish my gathering for the day is a pretty good feeling.

No, I definitely appreciate the careful observations and insight.

[goodr]

Skipping Dowse / Prospect / Triangulate ranks

I went directly from Dowse II to Dowse V without issue. As a fisherman, this skill is less an issue since I just sit in one place all day. I saved my marks and picked up Dowse V as soon as I finished the rank 30 quest and didn't have any problems using it. I have not tested it against a grade 4 school, but grade 1 and grade 2 schools work as expected.

[Jamison]

Wow, I didn't know Sweat of Brow was that good. Maybe I should take BTN to 25 to get it for my MIN. Lots of effort though, my BTN is only 15 now.

I actually picked up some BTN leves the other day, figured I'd spend some free time doing that. Ended up leveling blacksmithing instead so that I could do something more constructive than NPC iron ore. 25 BTN should take about what... 2 weeks? And maybe better to do that now before the new 20/30/40 mining leves are introduced.

[Zisa]

It's definitely a great ability to have.. when it kicks in lol. Like all of the other abilities, it is completely random. I can get it on back-to-back nodes, or I can go 10+ nodes without seeing it and wonder if I remembered to equip it. It is especially nice on leves, though. If it procs early on the leve that has you looking for 3 of a certain item, and assuming the leve isn't low level, you can get 1k+ SP each time you successfully get the item, netting 3k+ SP if you're lucky enough to have all 3 on one node.

I haven't heard about the miner 25 ability.. how does that work? I hear the fishing ability gives you an extra turn on a node?

[miokomioko]

It sounds appealing on the leves that I'm already hitting 700~800 skill per catch on.

[Sephiroth]

I wish I'd skipped Prospect III. I guess I'll skip Prospect IV as I probably won't have enough marks until I do the 30 quest anyway.

[Jamison]

Even more numbers, and I'm starting to get a little worried for the future.

tl;dr - I theorize moderate/significant gathering fatigue kicks in somewhere around 130 successful gathers, after 20-24 hours of rest. Anyone care to track some of their own numbers to help confirm or refute this?

Gathering this morning: 21 hours after previous mining, no leves done in between. 21 nodes, 11.1k skill, 121 successful gathers out of 122 attempts. Started to see small gathering fatigue but didn't push through it because I wanted to do 8 leves and didn't want to run into problems. History would suggest heavy gathering fatigue in just 2-3 more nodes. After tracking numbers for about 4 days, the most consistent indicator of when it sets in is number of successful gathers. Skill points have varied, which is not unexpected as that goes in/out of surplus, and less skill/node as I level up.

Why am I worried? Today was only 11.1k skill, and that number has been going down constantly. I assume at 38 that will jump back up as I start on grade 5, but the grind is looking to take a good deal longer than I had originally anticipated. The introduction of more r20/30/40 leves in the next update should help with that as well, assuming they don't lower the amount of SP the leves give. Levels 36 & 37 look to be very difficult ranks due to the math of SP vs fatigue, and I would suggest to anyone approaching 36 to save as many leves as you can to help push through it.

Other random thoughts:

• At 36 I'm seeing (very) occasional one-hit successes with r39 raw gems, something that always required 2 hits before.
• The third miner quest is at rank 36, not at rank 40 as previously assumed.
• A node should start to show up on your screen around ~65 yalms away.
• With the r40 leves available, guild marks have become MUCH easier. The ones for Treespeak start at around 2000 marks and can be bumped up to as much as 3400.

[Jamison]

Just a couple of quick things:

• Others have been able to get much closer to the 20k exp before heavy fatigue sets in, I'm trying to figure out now if there's something I'm doing differently. Long story short, maybe don't panic just yet.
• Finished the level 36 mining quest. I won't spoil it, but it was actually pretty fun, actually involved something to do with mining, and almost makes up for how horrid the level 30 quest is.
• Rewards were gil, 3,600 guild marks and the unlocking of the final purchasable ability.

Anyone who follows this thread on Mysidia?

[Zettofaia]

Fatigue has always kicked in after the 20k exp mark for me, and I usually take less than 15 hours break between sessions, I don't know if this is relevant but I have always put my points evenly between MND and VIT (at 100 MND/VIT at the moment), could they be a determining factor in how long it takes for a full reset?

Also, there's already a rank 50 miner on Mysidia, makes me wonder if there is a way to bypass fatigue... or the guy just went ape shit on them mountains lol;

[goodr]

Frankly, the 'gathering fatigue' we're talking about that leads to 'one hit fails', don't appear to drastically affect my skill up rate. I get about half the skill points for a fail, but I fail immediately, instead of 3-4 attempts to gain the full amount of skill points. It's annoying as hell, but as a fisherman, I don't care because I toss so much junk anyway.

[Zisa]

Unfortunately, it doesn't fail immediately on botanist.. you will only fail when you should have gotten the item. In other words, if you weren't close to the mark, you will have to try again until you hit it, so it can still take 2-3 swings before it "1-hit" fails. Even worse if the item is high level and needs 2 chops to get, making you hit the mark twice before it decides to fail it.

[Jamison]

I want to try and start logging locations and results for quarry locations. I'm wondering if anyone can pass along any first-hand experience to help get me started. Are there a set number per zone? Like nodes, does each one have a specific loot table? And can items that show up in a lower grade of a region also show up at a higher grade in the same region?

[goodr]

This is may only be a fisherman issue, but I've noticed areas where I'm clearly fishing in a grade 3 or 4 water, but neither Gulleye nor Dowse work. That is, instead of "no schools in a 400 yalm range", I just get "no schools". It's as if it's unfinished. I wanted to verify this wasn't some odd bug due to me skipping Dowse III and IV.

[Jamison]

This is may only be a fisherman issue, but I've noticed areas where I'm clearly fishing in a grade 3 or 4 water, but neither Gulleye nor Dowse work. That is, instead of "no schools in a 400 yalm range", I just get "no schools". It's as if it's unfinished. I wanted to verify this wasn't some odd bug due to me skipping Dowse III and IV.

You are right, it sounds like it's only with fisherman. I'm pretty sure I've always gotten the correct messages: "You sense no mineral deposits in this area" if there are none, or "You sense no mineral deposits Grade X or below in this area/400-yalm radius" if I don't have a high enough Prospect/Lay of the Land.

On that note, I'm curious what nodes are around Camp Bald Knoll? The message from Prospect IV indicated there were higher level ones there, but I couldn't find any on my own, and Grade 5 is around Camp Iron Lake. Just wondering if anyone happens to know that one...

[Jamison]

Grade 5 thoughts...

• Locations are Camp Iron Lake, Halalati, Treespeek and Camp Dragonhead.
• Gold Ore seems to be the only brand new item.
• Each area (seems) to have 2 quarry points per zone.
• I'm starting to see ( rank 38 ) an occasional third allowed attempt at the high-end items, and occasional one-hit successes on r39 raw gems.
• There's either RNG involved, or numbers may change depending on exactly how close you are to the item. There IS occasional variation in what is mostly otherwise static results.
• Treespeak seems to be the most efficient place to grind, given node placement.
• Aggro is generally not a problem. Halalati does have an occasional Rotting Corpse that can aggro. One of Treespeak's leves will take you past/to Black Efts. At Dragonhead, you can come near some vultures from time to time, but they are mostly just an annoyance. It is possible to wander slightly too far off at Dragonhead and find some red-con aggro.

So on a good suggestion from a friend, I picked up Beastkin Eluder last night. It works a bit... differently from what I was expecting. First, you don't target on yourself, you actually have to target a Beastkin to be allowed to trigger it. You are then only immune to attack from that one particular mob. If you try to target a non-beastkin, it won't let you. It's on a 10 minute cooldown, with *no visible way* to see how long the immunity lasts. I plan to test this at some point. The game has successfully let me target it on wolf-type and nannygoat mobs. I could not target it on cactuars or dodos (no surprise there). I'll be testing out other mobs, including efts, soon-ish.

So the good, IMO, is that we seem to have a way to know definitively if a mob is a particular -kin or not. I'm a little surprised that it only takes effect on one mob, and is not just a generic status that you are given. Still, I think it will be useful in specific situations.

[Leelya]

Thanks for sharing what you've found out so far.

I've all but shut down my miner until the update, but I'm curious as to if anyone has found any DoL food?

[miokomioko]

Grade 5 thoughts...

• Locations are Camp Iron Lake, Halalati, Treespeek and Camp Dragonhead.
• Gold Ore seems to be the only brand new item.
• Each area (seems) to have 2 quarry points per zone.
• I'm starting to see ( rank 38 ) an occasional third allowed attempt at the high-end items, and occasional one-hit successes on r39 raw gems.
• There's either RNG involved, or numbers may change depending on exactly how close you are to the item. There IS occasional variation in what is mostly otherwise static results.
• Treespeak seems to be the most efficient place to grind, given node placement.
• Aggro is generally not a problem. Halalati does have an occasional Rotting Corpse that can aggro. One of Treespeak's leves will take you past/to Black Efts. At Dragonhead, you can come near some vultures from time to time, but they are mostly just an annoyance. It is possible to wander slightly too far off at Dragonhead and find some red-con aggro.

So on a good suggestion from a friend, I picked up Beastkin Eluder last night. It works a bit... differently from what I was expecting. First, you don't target on yourself, you actually have to target a Beastkin to be allowed to trigger it. You are then only immune to attack from that one particular mob. If you try to target a non-beastkin, it won't let you. It's on a 10 minute cooldown, with *no visible way* to see how long the immunity lasts. I plan to test this at some point. The game has successfully let me target it on wolf-type and nannygoat mobs. I could not target it on cactuars or dodos (no surprise there). I'll be testing out other mobs, including efts, soon-ish.

So the good, IMO, is that we seem to have a way to know definitively if a mob is a particular -kin or not. I'm a little surprised that it only takes effect on one mob, and is not just a generic status that you are given. Still, I think it will be useful in specific situations.

I purchased Wavekin Eluder a while back and tested just a little bit.

It appears to simply de-aggro an already aggressive mob of the appropriate family. I have yet to figure out for how long or any other instances where it would prematurely wear off.

I used it from a distance > approached > got killed.

I approached > got aggro > used ability > it de-aggro'd and I was able to stand right in front of it for at least a minute or so. It ended up re-aggroing after I exited Active Mode and moved away... I'm not sure which action caused the aggro or if it was just the time that passed since I used the ability.

Also, 10-minute cooldown is crap unless you hit your gathering class actions/abilities macro 10+ minutes before you actually go gathering. At least Wavekin Eluder is more specifically useful for Fishers... as I'm not sure about the utility of any of the others... it's not like mining points are generally guarded by beasts, or logging points by birds.

I was just really hoping it would be like sneak/invis for aquans... single-target, active-mode, 10min recast, etc. are all bummers. It was probably a waste of my hard-earned Fisher marks.

[Sephiroth]

I can't believe the luck I had. My MIN reached 25 last night. Picked up my first 30 leve today for a pair of padded leather workboots and 2264 marks.

At 25 gold sand and mythril ore were one hit fails. I don't think I could complete the HQ ore leve if it came up so I will avoid it unless it's a good reward. The above was the promising points leve.

No point using these boots yet, 12 ranks below the optimal. You'd think 30 leves would give the rank 27 boots lol.

[miokomioko]

The gear from leves (as rare as it may be) seem almost too-high for the leves they come from. Rank-25 Canvas Tabard from a Rank-20 leve. Rank-17 Tarred Walking Hat from a Rank-10 leve. It's like the gear is meant to be used on the next tier of leves.

[Sephiroth]

I suppose I can see why. Efficient players will already have rank 27 boots by rank 30. But you start doing rank 30 leves at 25 so you could look at it either way.