Quote from: Zerila on August 24, 2007, 12:53:23 PM
Chocobo races? With our own chocobos or rentals? 

With our own, of course!  Chocobo Circuit fun!

Heh, or maybe M:tG cards.

Areya Bard

4/6

Tap - Counter target party invite.  Play this ability only as an interrupt.

"I don't have anything to give you."

So many choices...

Work on my FFL3 walkthrough some more...

Continue my single character challenge in FFL or FFL2....

Work on my Zelda Classic project...

Play FFXII...

Start up some random RPG...

Work on my RPG2K game...

Continue my FF5 Mystic Knight Straight Character Challenge...

Sleep..

For some reason the way you did that reminds me of Triple Triad, a la FF8.

Just needs the numbers on the sides....

Zaxby's
Jack's
Chick-Fil-A
Wendy's

Some people don't like PvP and others don't need DM.  Nekkid races might be fun, as long as they're not in Ulegerand Range!

Three words though: Lucky Chocobo Races.

*walks in and puts briefcase on table* Good evening class.  Today's discussion discusses the fine art of pet pulling.

-------
Pet Pull
-------

Inevitably you'll have situations where you cannot pull a single mob safely.  So knowing how to properly pet pull is useful.  This is basically a variation of Carby Pulling, and many of the same rules apply.

Here are some general tips:

1)  If your pet misses with the first hit, DO NOT pull back.  The very low hate you generate with Heel or Leave is still enough to where you'll get hate immediately, which can lead to disaster.  I usually wait for two hits personally.

2)  Unlike avatars and puppets, beastmaster pets will change attack targets based on enmity.  If for some reason your pet swaps targets without you telling it to, it's OK.  When you leave, the original target will come after you and the rest will ignore you.

3)  If not all of the mobs linked immediately, use Heel to drag your target back first.  If you use Leave, you may pick up a link when a mob moves, and it will be linked to you, not your pet.  This is most common with sight linking mobs.

4)  Pet pulling is good for mass clearing of crowds too.  Simply attack one target, then drag a whole linked group out of their area and Leave.  They'll all despawn (as per my discussion of this a couple of posts back).

5)  Be wary of mobs that either cast or use ranged attacks.  They may inadvertedly link more mobs while they're waiting, so Heel and drag them back a ways first.

6)  Have a target you want to charm but don't want to run the risk of a mass link on mischarm?  Charm a weak target and send it versus your desired pet!  Then drag it out, Leave, and Charm.  This works well if there are weak targets around that are too low for general use, like triple bats.

Meh it's more just a warning.  You know, don't stand next to a bound mob, etc.  Charm is a light based move but bind is an ice related effect, so not sure whether light resist, ice resist, or just raw CHR affects how well it lands.

"Why are you here, soldier!?"
"I'm here because I'm bored!"

Sad, very sad.

I didn't pet any of the bunnies but I think Jormugand ate a few of them...

First, to clear up a couple of things Eva said: Charm does a Bind effect, not a Stun.  And Reward and Sic don't remove Sneak.  Additionally, Gauge does not remove either Sneak nor Invisible.

And now, a discussion about regions, the MPK patch, and converting pets.

------------------
Home Sweet Home
------------------

Every critter in the game has a home area.  Basically, they never wander outside this area if left alone.  The only ways for a mob to leave this home area is to aggro, to link to something else, or to be charmed.

If a mob aggros or links, it will stay in an engaged state until the target (and any target that gets placed on the mob's hate list) is defeated, or out of play (zone, warp), or if they lose the pursuit.  At this point it goes into neutral mode.

If a mob is charmed, it will return to neutral mode when Leave is used.

When in neutral mode, there is a grace period where the mob does nothing.  After this grace period, the game runs a check to see if the target is still within its home area.  If it is not, the mob will despawn, then respawn in the new area after a short period of time.  I believe it's like 60 seconds but uncertain.  If the target is still in the home area, it will simply start wandering normally (and will start aggro/link etc. normally) and will regenerate hp provided no DoT is active.

----------
Conversion
----------

Once you have Leave, you can take advantage of these properties to "convert" a group of charmable monsters to Even Match, which is the maximum rating you can charm without incurring exp penalty.  The process is as such:

1) Charm a DC / T that you want to convert to EM.
2) Drag the mob outside of its home area.
3) Leave.
4) Wait for it to respawn.

Every time the mob respawns, the game will reroll its level.  If it does not roll EM, simply repeat.

In this way, you can make a zoo of EM pets to swap between when taking on a camp.

---------------------
Conversion Prevention
---------------------

Now, sometimes you'll have a situation where your pets will only have a 1/3 or 1/4 chance of being EM.  To avoid a lot of time reconverting if they die, here are some tips:

1)  If your prey doesn't link, try this one:  Dia your target and run back to your pet's home area.  Then when you Leave the pet will simply start the regen process.  If Dia is too dangerous, Fight then Heel.

2) An alternate strategy is to Leave right when the mob is very weak, and WS to finish it off.  (This is normal BST strategy.) Then swap your charm gear back in quickly and recharm your former pet while it's still in the grace period, before it despawns.  Then run back to its home area and drop it off to heal.

3) Obviously death is a bad thing for your pet.  A Pet Food Zeta is a good way to
help keep it alive.  With AF you can get rid of poison and such too.

Since there's a fair amount of people in the Linkshell either leveling Beastmaster, or expressing interest in doing so, I thought I'd start this topic and relinquish various tips and advice I've accumulated in my experiences with the job.  Maybe a bit later I'll post some camp advice as well.

-----
General BST tips:

When fighting spellcasting monsters such as magic pots, stand opposite of your pet, and barely in melee range.  If set up correctly, any -ga spells that target
your pet will not affect you.  This works best if your pet is at maximum distance
from the target as well.

When charming a target, it's a good idea to run away from the target as you charm.  If you mischarm, you'll have a head start, and in many cases you can
just kite the mob around until your charm timer is ready.

Kiting Tip:  Know your terrain.  You can use pillars, rocks, and other obstacles to keep a mob busy.  Additionally, you can use pathing to your advantage.  Sometimes if you drop off a cliff, your chaser will take the long way around.

If you're in a camp that requires pet swaps, save Tame for midfight mischarms.  You can typically handle one mob attacking you, but having a mischarm and your original target on you at the same time is dangerous.

After a pet swap or in the event of a mischarm, it's useful to have a hateloss equipment swap macro.  An Earth Staff, Crow gear, and AF body are all useful to put in.  Your Haubergeon is definitely not going to improve your survival with -20 evasion....

Keep an eye on your surroundings.  If you're in a camp that has a lot of aggro, or elemental pops, it's useful to unlock the camera and do a 360 around your character to check for danger.

Pet food is handy if you need your pet to survive just a little longer.  AF also allows it to cure status ailments, most useful for paralysis.

If a suggested camp is too dangerous or aggravating, you always have the option of grinding through EP-DC targets.

(More to come.)

You can ask any of the sackholders, some of which are me, Selan, Ketsuki, Ryudei, Sheilah, Zerila, Charmainesheh...

Just send a tell if you see any of them on.

Someone's having entirely way too much fun with smilies....

I don't think anyone would disapprove.

Hey hey now, I wasn't the one that put up the post about Yinyang and stuff.  I think it was you.   

I suppose in this case both work.

And I wanted to see some other pic besides the Yinyang one which had been up there since April.  And I didn't want to give people heart attacks by posting one of Vivec!

Greetings, everyone.  Areya here.  The past few months have been relatively quiet on the site here, with only limited activitiy on the forums.  Anyways, we may try
to put together some events and the like soon.  If you have any ideas, feel free
to post them on the Forums.

Also, if you haven't registered yet, don't be shy, jump right on in.

You do know you misspelled Crusader, yes?

And if you readers are totally clueless about what Enna means, the "titles" for people based on number of posts have been changed.

Another job that seems to be popular in discussions is Geomancer.  There's a few issues here however.

1) How would Geomancy skills be implemented?  Would it be dependant on the
ground you're standing on or just on the area?  What about weather?

2) There are basically three incarnations of Geomancer.  In FFV, they were very magelike, using daggers and bells as weapons, and their spells varied on where
they were fighting.  In FFVI, Mog was basically a Geomancer, he had to fight
in different terrains to learn different dances.  And in FFT, Geomancers were
basically fighters using axes and swords, and they could use elemental skills
based on the tile they were standing on.  Which one would they choose to
base a FFXI version of the job on?


As for the Chemist issues, indeed balance would be a problem.  Perhaps formula
would have "cast times" which would be fairly lengthy, as opposed to instant
use.  Obviously you'd want potions to be fairly low in this regard.

Another thing to note is, Chemist would be a viable sub job for nonmage classes.
Instead of relying on a very limited MP pool as, say, a COR/WHM, you could
instead go COR/CHM and bring healing items/etc.

And yeah, the idea of reagents is, it would be another consumable that different
crafts would be able to produce.  Naturally most of them would be Alchemy but
there would probably be room for other crafts, such as Cooking, Goldsmithing,
etc.