New to BLU, New to FFXI, need some advice.

[AitExcelsior]

Hello,
I haven't been playing ffxi very long, and as such I apologize in advance for anything I may be confused on.

I decided my first job with be blue mage, and just hit level 75. Even though I have managed to set up macros and skill chain myself effectively, my damage burst seems incredible but my over dps seems very lack luster most of the time.

I find myself mana starved nearly every fight if I straight up try and nuke mobs of equal level (using hysteric barrage, frenetic rip, etc.)

My question is this: How can I make myself more mana efficient so I'm not afraid of casting spells all the time. Resting in this game takes forever.

[Tennotsukai]

GoV/FoV refresh, destrier beret till 31, auto-refresh spells, cast mp efficient spells (no magical blu spells or breath spells), and swing your swords lots. If you find yourself healing yourself a lot, put on more eva gear and sub /nin. Before lvl cap was raised I used to sub scholar for sublimation, but you will be getting your own refresh spell very soon (battery charge) and you should find your mp better sustained then.

Also, for new blu's, it is always best to check out FFXIAH's blu forum for Prothescar's guide to being a blu. It's got all you need to know.

[Nykahrii]

Yeah getting mana-starved is an issue in any mage class and BLU is no exception.

As a BLU/RDM myself, I've found that five main factors have served to improve my own combat mana-efficiency:

• Food
• Medicines
• Gear
• Job Abilities
• Spell-set

Food
As a BLU/RDM, I have realised that kiting serves my needs best especially with respect to being able to slow the rate at which I am forced to cast spells for survival at a manageable mana-drain rate. Fish mithkabobs work wonders to boost Cannonball which does impressive damage from range along with Cocoon for the defence boost. In addition Refresh drinks like Yagudo Drinks or Melon Juice would considerable cut down the amount of time spent between or during fights.

Medicines
If possible always pack MP recovery medicines especially those without cooldowns like hi-ethers and hi-elixirs which provide sufficient MP for a few extra casts if needed. Pro-Ethers are also incredibly potent with the +3 version granting up to 320 MP (approximately 40% MP for the typical BLU/RDM in AF gear).

Gear
The AF gear set adds some decent stats depending on what your style of play requires but primarily if you want to become more mana-efficient, having a larger MP pool and stats that boost the effectiveness of your unique spellset is great. The more effective your spell-set is in a given cast, the less often you'd need to cast the individual spells. In addition this there is gear that boosts the MP Recovered While Healing because resting is critical for mages and although it cannot be avoided, it can be reduced.

Job Abilities
Chain Affinity and Burst Affinity are NOT ONLY for skill-chaining. Effective-use of these JAs will double Status Correction modifier of your next physical and magical BLU spells, respectfully, which in effect would increase the potency (or accuracy) of the spell. More effective the spell, the less often you would need to cast it.

Spell-set
There are many BLU spells that appear to deliver the same effects, e.g. Head Butt, Fry Pan, Tail Slap and Blitztrahl all deliver Stun, but if your focus is mana-efficiency then the choice of which spell you use for the desired effect becomes important for two main reasons: MP cost and Job Trait activation.
In terms of Job Traits, Conserve MP and Clear Mind work decently together to help reduce impact of your nukes and the time spend recovering from them.

Beyond this your support job choice would further affect your mana-efficiency by providing additional job traits, spells and in some cases TP abilities.

[AitExcelsior]

Thank you for the replies! I am still level 75 but I went down and learned Battery Charge last night in anticipation. I looked into some high elixirs and the like, but they are a bit out of my budget, all the the yugado drinks seemed reasonable for the price / length they last.

One question I cant seem to find the answer to in most guides:

Can I say, have an auto refresh item, drink a drink, have a book refresh, and battery charge all going at the same time? Or does one of these effects simply over ride the others?

[SpankWustler]

The monsters you're fighting for Fields/Grounds of Valor pages should be comparatively weak enough that you can save a lot of MP by eating attack food and beating the life out stuff with your swords. Just beat on those things like they are responsible for everything that has gone wrong in your life that has led you to play an MMORPG.

Try to avoid using MP outside of combining powerful spells with Chain Affinity and using cheap utility spells such as Head Butt.

[Dhragon]

Can I say, have an auto refresh item, drink a drink, have a book refresh, and battery charge all going at the same time? Or does one of these effects simply over ride the others?

The answer to your question would be...almost. You can have an item that gives refresh along with a refresh effect, but only either the book refresh or Battery Charge up (not both). The MP drink can be used anytime you need it. And since you have Battery Charge, you shouldn't be using the book refresh.

Just for stating so, Brd refresh & Geo refresh will stack with Battery Charge. If you find yourself in their company.

[Zagen]

Thank you for the replies! I am still level 75 but I went down and learned Battery Charge last night in anticipation. I looked into some high elixirs and the like, but they are a bit out of my budget, all the the yugado drinks seemed reasonable for the price / length they last.

One question I cant seem to find the answer to in most guides:

Can I say, have an auto refresh item, drink a drink, have a book refresh, and battery charge all going at the same time? Or does one of these effects simply over ride the others?

I'll just post about all forms of refresh just to cover all basis.

• Auto-Refresh Trait is it's own thing so it stacks with everything (strongest tier overwrites others if multiple traits are present somehow).
• Refresh Gear stacks with everything.
• Refresh Drinks count as Refresh spell effect so it doesn't stack with Refresh type spells.
• Battery Charge counts as a Refresh type spell so it doesn't stack with Refresh/II or Drinks.
• FoV/GoV Book Refresh counts as Refresh spell so don't use it if you can cast a Refresh type spell.
• Ballads count as music refresh thus stack with everything (except same tier ballad).
• Geomancer Refresh spells count as a GEO buff thus stacks with everything except another GEO Refresh spell (not sure if that's intended but I assume so).
• Evoker's Roll counts as a roll thus stacks with everything (only 1 Evoker's Roll may be given to a player so it doesn't stack with another Corsair's Evoker's Roll)
• For what it's worth Sublimation will overwrite Refresh spell effect but not the rest.
• Embrava counts as it's own buff so it stacks with other forms of Refresh (doesn't stack with another embrava).

[AitExcelsior]

So it sounds like the best thing I can do is have auto-refresh, some refresh gear, battery charge. Then use some ethers or elixirs to round out the rest?

I appreciate the help, I've already managed to increase my efficiency a lot with some of the guides + the information provided here. Tonight I will hit 79 so I can finally use battery charge. I will look into buying some refresh gear in the mean time as well

Thank you!

[Zagen]

You should be fine with just Battery Charge. Refresh gear should be for emergencies or when idle/running around.

It obviously depends on what you're fighting but in general the best way to do damage is Head Butt (replace with Sudden Lunge at 95) > melee > Head Butt > WS once enough tp, with a few spells for spike damage (Disseverment, Hysteric Barrage, and Vertical Cleave come to mind for your level). Combine your WS with Chain Affinity Spell to create a Skillchain. A good way to start a fight if it won't be a quick one is to use Sub-Zero Smash as the paralyze has always had a decent activation rate.

[Babekeke]

Since noone has mentioned this yet, I'll add it:

Look into your job traits, and try to choose your spells to suit.

When you hit level 80, you get access to both dual wield and double attack, so unless subbing war, nin or dnc, you should set both of those to help take down mobs faster.

By setting DW, you are automatically setting Animated wail. Try and keep it up full-time.

Also set Auto-refresh, battery charge, head butt, cocoon and of course, some sort of cure.

Even at lvl 80, Bludgeon is a nice, cheap spell to use for damage. If you would rather be casting than all-out melee and WS with only a couple of cures and a Chain Affinity every now and again (either through boredom of meleeing, or the need to keep your skills capped) then Bludgeon is the spell to use, along with Head butt.

Replace head Butt with Sudden Lunge at 95, as someone already mentioned, and at 92 replace Bludgeon with Heavy Strike.

Then there are a few situational spells that you might want to set, depending on what you are fighting:

A form of dispel, if you are fighting mobs that can buff themselves in some way that will either make a significant difference to how fast you can kill them, or how much they can damage you.

A form of sleep, if you are fighting mobs that can be tricky to pull without linking, or are fighting in an area with aggressive mobs.


Other points to note:

When soloing, you don't get any benefit from fighting mobs that con higher than decent challenge. So don't bother. You might like to see that you got 200 exp for killing that 1 Tough mob, but when you could have killed 3 DC mobs in that time, each giving 90 exp... you get the idea.

If you choose to use a sub that has native healing magic skill, your cures (wild carrot and magic fruit) will become more efficient. If that sub is SCH, then using light arts will make them even more efficient still.

If you're very new to the game, you may not have yet learned that the most important (just about) thing about killing a mob as fast as possible, is haste. So find as much gear with haste on it as you can, and try to get as close as possible to 26% haste from that gear.

If you haven't yet begun making gear-swap macros, full-timing gear with max haste will end up better than full-timing gear with better stats for your WS. Whilst you're killing mobs solo, you'll do well to fill any slots that aren't required for haste gear, with evasion gear. Getting hit less = less need to cure = less MP spent curing = more MP to deal damage (or if subbing DNC, less TP spent, so more TP to WS with and kill them faster).

Oh 1 last thing: Traits learned by setting blu spells, don't stack with traits from your sub job.

eg: subbing smn and setting auto-refresh won't give you 2 MP/tick.

Subbing war will give more DA than setting the DA trait.

Subbing DNC or NIN will always be on-par with, or better than setting the DW trait (for the amount of reduction), so no need to do both.

Read this as you make your way to 99. By the time you reach 99, you should have a pretty dam good idea what spells to set and what SJ and gear to use for various circumstances.

Good Luck and enjoy^^