Final Fantasy XIV Party Leveling Guide

[qpoiuwer]

With 15 men you cap most of the time (for me at least) and fight lasts about 40 sec, 3 or 4 hours to level at lvl 33 is a good pace imo

60-120 seconds is probably too long, that was just some estimate. It's probably more like 45-75 seconds for the sweet spot. I've been getting between 10-15k/hour in my last two parties which seems pretty decent, though I'm not sure how much others are getting. That would be about 1 level in 3-4 hours though.

[Nevex]

Ideally you don't want to be getting 500 sp every fight but around 200-300 on average with the occasional 0-100/4-500, otherwise all the time you're fighting and sitting at 500 sp is wasted. Unless you can figure out a way to get 500 sp per kill and still be killing in 60 seconds.

You could pop Voke/Taunt+Punishing Barbs, recasts are low enough to set a rotation but of course good luck doing that with random people.

I found that GLAs not only are completely useless in a party right now, but they kill mages' SP if you're fighting anything that doesn't have a decent radial (and not rarely used) AoE.
You should have a GLA only if you're not sure your party can handle the mobs you're fightning without deaths, but if your party is good enough they're a deadweight.

[Aegis]

Nothing is a dead weight in a party, even an afk party member is good for SP bonus. The damage that a gladiator does is proportional to the SP he's gonna chew away from other DPS which is not a big deal, they get SP from his own voke taunt and it's not affecting healers OR damage dealers.

[Karnja]

nevex, im con 32 and thm 30. i static with 2 gla 1 mrd and another con. i switch between my jobs.

the prob is not, that the gla dont take enough damage. we fight alot of efts, and the 3 melee stand all at the same pos and get hit by aoe. also we usually pick up 1-3 more random player.

the problem is the other con a static with. a regular skill up party cant handle 2 mages for skill. well i know you know because you mentioned that in antoher post. and it really becomes awefull if a third mage is in pt.

[Nevex]

nevex, im con 32 and thm 30. i static with 2 gla 1 mrd and another con. i switch between my jobs.

the prob is not, that the gla dont take enough damage. we fight alot of efts, and the 3 melee stand all at the same pos and get hit by aoe. also we usually pick up 1-3 more random player.

the problem is the other con a static with. a regular skill up party cant handle 2 mages for skill. well i know you know because you mentioned that in antoher post. and it really becomes awefull if a third mage is in pt.

That too. Mages are too reliant on cures to gain SP since their direct damage is considerably lower than melees so it's not optimal for that task.
I'm sure they'll fix these issues but right now one mage doesn't seem to be enough, especially if you need to handle adds. Add the occasional cure casting times taking much longer than it should because of lag and whatnot and you can end up in a wipe even if you were paying attention.

Of course melees don't give a damn about mages' SP and try to invite as many as they can because they only care about their own survability, while mages aim to heal the most damage by themselves. The whole system is fucked up and needs to be adjusted.
Which leads me to doubt about GLA's role in a party. Ideally you want to fight something that can damage more than a party member enough to allow mages to curespam without killing each other's SP but at the same time you need to survive if said curespamming is happening.

This conflicts with GLA because they aim to take the most damage by themselves because of SEN skill, but they're not contributing other than mitigating damage. You need damage and cures to kill a mob before it kills you and gain SP... so if damage mitigation is useless, what's a GLA good for in a party?
Obviously being able to heal up to 15 people for 350 HP each in a single cast is better than one guy reducing his own damage by 100ish.
I'll be glad to eat my own words as soon as I grind on something that really needs a GLA, but right now I really don't see them being useful.

[blomba666]

Awesome post, very helpful keep up the good work! I need some help from anyone willing to give some input. My gf and are are lvl 21 and looking for a good spot to ex together, any suggestions? preferably duo but maybe getting another member or 2 and taking some harder stuff would be better? any suggestions are appreciated ty

[Carraway]

Awesome post, very helpful keep up the good work! I need some help from anyone willing to give some input. My gf and are are lvl 21 and looking for a good spot to ex together, any suggestions? preferably duo but maybe getting another member or 2 and taking some harder stuff would be better? any suggestions are appreciated ty

You should try to grab as many people as possible in your rank range and slaughter Island Crabs in Cassiopeia Hollows. Barring that, you can duo in Coerthas starting with antelopes/squirrels/puks, just killing everything you can find, then moving to hippocerfs around ~22-24 (I don't really remember when you can start doing them).

[Zubis]

You should try to grab as many people as possible in your rank range and slaughter Island Crabs in Cassiopeia Hollows. Barring that, you can duo in Coerthas starting with antelopes/squirrels/puks, just killing everything you can find, then moving to hippocerfs around ~22-24 (I don't really remember when you can start doing them).

I wouldn't reccomend doing crabs unless you get atleast 10 people or more at that level, though. However if you do get together a group it can be really good and net you a few ranks very quickly and while waiting for people you can always grind on the Cassiopeias/Puks that are in there.

[Celeras]

the problem is the other con a static with. a regular skill up party cant handle 2 mages for skill. well i know you know because you mentioned that in antoher post. and it really becomes awefull if a third mage is in pt.

That too. Mages are too reliant on cures to gain SP since their direct damage is considerably lower than melees so it's not optimal for that task.

The only reason this is the case is cos most mages are bad, waiting for damage and trying to snipe heals. I've been in plenty of multiple-mage parties.. and always end up laughing at the others playstyle. Mostly consisting of idle time waiting for Thundervapor to charge.

I get that it's a new game and theres a learning curve. I also get that seeing multiple 100s on a single cure is pretty sweet, and I certainly take advantage of it should the opportunity arise. But the above quotes, to be blunt, is absolute nonsense.

http://img201.imageshack.us/img201/7852/baddies.jpg

Those numbers are on the low side, but it's all I could find in my screenshots. Usually debuffs are procing for 150-250 when the parties setup correctly.. and a double-proc banish can top 300. Yet I still get rejected from an undersized group because the leader was a the lone mage and wanted to keep it that way? L2p already.

[Karnja]

Celeras dont mess with me lol...

I can show you the same screenshots you post here; like i said my con is 32, and my thm is 30, i grinded now for some times with diffrent setups and tried lots of diffrent stuff.

i know how enfeeblings etc can proc; the amount of sp is great and not the problem; the rate it is.

Im with nevex for most parts he said.

[Nevex]

Double SP proc on Banish/Scourge is cool and all if you like their long casting times, absurd stamina costs and the ~25% proc chance... or you know, you could cast a Sacrifice 2 which can potentially net you 500 SP in a single cast (and even if it doesn't it gives you way more SP gain chances) and helps your party more while melees safely kill stuff.
There is no "good" or "bad" mage when you have 10-15 people zerging mobs that can never oneshot you. It's mindless grinding plain and simple, and people are looking for the best SP/time ratio they can find.

Melees get up to 450 SP from a single WS on those mobs, if you think that mages can consistently get that amount by simply DDing good luck with that.

[Karnja]

i even use purge.... was also thinking about getting taunt and voke, but dont want any other jobs 10+ beside thm and con because of guild marks.

[Aegis]

i even use purge.... was also thinking about getting taunt and voke, but dont want any other jobs 10+ beside thm and con because of guild marks.

Only affects low level leves like those in bloodshore, you won't get marks for low levels jobs such as 10 at R30 leves.

[Karnja]

i gott offered thm marks on 30er leve when i was 17 thm (con 25 at that time). guess what, i did the quest on thm and didnt get a single mark.

[Elcura]

guess what, i did the quest on thm and didnt get a single mark.

I dunno what you want to hear. Sounds like a case of doing it wrong though.

[Celeras]

Melees get up to 450 SP from a single WS on those mobs, if you think that mages can consistently get that amount by simply DDing good luck with that.

Have, and will continue to do so while the other mages fight eachother over damage and complain about poor SP.

[Ratatapa]

Celeras dont mess with me lol...

I can show you the same screenshots you post here; like i said my con is 32, and my thm is 30, i grinded now for some times with diffrent setups and tried lots of diffrent stuff.

i know how enfeeblings etc can proc; the amount of sp is great and not the problem; the rate it is.

Im with nevex for most parts he said.

All I see is I'm an Internet tough guy don't mess with me or i will send you millions of ping -t mwhahahahaha

[Meresgi]

Melees get up to 450 SP from a single WS on those mobs, if you think that mages can consistently get that amount by simply DDing good luck with that.

Seriously? I get maybe, tops 150 SP from a weaponskill on occassion. I've never got 450 SP on a WS. o_O

[Crizto]

Seriously? I get maybe, tops 150 SP from a weaponskill on occassion. I've never got 450 SP on a WS. o_O

Doing it wrong then! Nah but I don't tend to get SP anywhere near that mark either.

[Karnja]

I dunno what you want to hear. Sounds like a case of doing it wrong though.

no, i did it as intended. it just doesnt work as aegis said.