Enhancing Magic Skill Gain Rate

[Randwolf]

Please fix it. It is ridiculous that I wear skill-up gear, eat skill-up food, and cast enhancing magic spells non-stop for 30 minutes and get 4 levels. In 6 hours of Aby worms, I cast enhancing spells every chance I could and went up 2 levels. An MMORPG game pretty much sucks when you spend days of sitting alone casting spells in the hope of capping one of your primary magic skills. This isn't like guard which is a nicety to have. But, not a deal buster.

I hear game 'balance' all the time from the developers. How about some balance between tedium and actually being able to play a job and get reasonable skill ups?

[Alhanelem]

Totally agree on that, it's completely needeless, especially with how fast XP is today. While they're at it, they should look at summoning, geomancy, and automaton ranged skill too, because those are awful as well.

[Luvbunny]

Agree, this need fixing VERY BADLY!! It's totally ridiculous the gain rate we have right now. Skilling ups should be faster overall period. The focus is gears and end game now, there is absolutely no reasons why players are tortured with these stupid archaic methods of skilling ups. That era is gone dead and buried - focus on what is current now.

[Kojo]

I have an odd feeling Parrying is re-broken. I thought they made it easier to skill, but it doesn't seem to hardly skill up, even when you parry...ALOT.

[Demon6324236]

I have an odd feeling Parrying is re-broken. I thought they made it easier to skill, but it doesn't seem to hardly skill up, even when you parry...ALOT.They fixed parry by removing the need to parry in order to skill up, so your parry rate should not effect skilling at all, all you should need to do is grab a ton of mobs and stand there facing them with your weapon out, I advise you use a high delay weapon with low DMG and you have low skill with, if using RUN to skill it I advise you use this...
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/images/d/d6/Chaosbringer_description.png
Due to its bad stats, but on other jobs like SAM and NIN you have the base relic weapons to use, which are even better for it. In either case, the more mobs the better, and you should be ok with skilling. The same thing can be said of Guard and the base relic H2H.

[Kojo]

They fixed parry by removing the need to parry in order to skill up, so your parry rate should not effect skilling at all, all you should need to do is grab a ton of mobs and stand there facing them with your weapon out, I advise you use a high delay weapon with low DMG and you have low skill with, if using RUN to skill it I advise you use this...
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/images/d/d6/Chaosbringer_description.png
Due to its bad stats, but on other jobs like SAM and NIN you have the base relic weapons to use, which are even better for it. In either case, the more mobs the better, and you should be ok with skilling. The same thing can be said of Guard and the base relic H2H.

Tried that, nothing.

[Caketime]

I've been a WHM for years now and my Enhancing is still uncapped. Granted, it's near cap but still, most grueling skill to level by far.

[Kojo]

Mine is 220-something, at BLM and RDM 99. I occasionally skill up on Warps.

[RAIST]

skilled mine to cap by taking advantage of Martial Master. Went outside town, thwacked enough bees to build some TP, then spammed the spells for a while. Granted, I didn't have too far to go because of all the soloing and low-man stuff I would do on WHM and BLM (not just trials, I used to fart around on them a lot just to see what I could pull off) and it was already just past 86 caps naturally....but it only took me basically one weekend to recap it during some down-time in game.

Maybe that is why it seems so harsh for some, idk....perhaps the new race to 99 deprived players the joys/benefits of soloing mage jobs, so skills are still really low at 99.

[NDSI]

Personally I was able to skill up parry quite fast couple days ago after I got RUN to 99 took me couple of hours to get it from 372 to 424, used skill up earring & ring + Maringna.

And as far as other skills go... nobody forces you to stay in abyssea for 69 levels, people who have played the game, the non-abyssea way, they know you would cap your skills before leveling up (well 99% of the time), so yeah fast exp equalls low combat/magic skills.

[orakio]

Personally I was able to skill up parry quite fast couple days ago after I got RUN to 99 took me couple of hours to get it from 372 to 424, used skill up earring & ring + Maringna.

And as far as other skills go... nobody forces you to stay in abyssea for 69 levels, people who have played the game, the non-abyssea way, they know you would cap your skills before leveling up (well 99% of the time), so yeah fast exp equalls low combat/magic skills.

While the non-abyssea way of skilling up is true for melee combat and melee skills (if you are solo and the mobs are attacking you), it is far from true for enhancing, summoning, or geomancy magics. The OP is absolutely right in that these skills take excessively long and that the rate is a bit archaic at the moment. Spending hours of skilling up spells for 2-3 ranks is simply not a reasonable rate here anymore.

This is all because the calculation for skillup chance is different for effects used on players (like enhancing/summoning/geomancy magics) than it is for effects used on NPC's (like combat skills or elemental/enfeebling magic). If they altered these skills to at least use the same chance as NPC targetted abilities that alone would make a MASSIVE difference.

[tyrantsyn]

If you are looking for better skill up for enhancing I suggest doing melee combat with DC to EV prey mobs while casting. I've always seen my best skill ups on RDM while doing this. If you go this route on RDM I'd suggest skipping Composer.

[Hawklaser]

Just going to point out the spell Geo-Poison is cast on mobs and not the player, and does seem to skill Geomancy and Handbell faster like casting cures on the undead. Just find a worm or have someone tank a mob for you and Cast Geo-poison, when recast is up use Full Circle and cast it again.

Though I do agree that some skills like summoning and enhancing do need looked at.

[Horadrim]

Totally agree on that, it's completely needeless, especially with how fast XP is today. While they're at it, they should look at summoning, geomancy, and automaton ranged skill too, because those are awful as well.

Passive skills (Geomancy, Enhancing, Songs, Healing magic) should have skill up rate higher than aggressive skills such as weapons/attack magics. Even defensive skills such as Guard, Evasion, and Parry are excessively easy to raise since you can swarm monsters of the appropriate level against yourself or just go to Abyssea with with Cloak/Dagger+Ducal Guard+Mounted Champion. I got +200 Parry and +75 Evasion in less time than it took me to get +50 Great Sword on RUN.

[Merton9999]

I agree about enhancing magic.

Geomancy hasn't been slow for me at all though. Just about the time when Indi spam slowed down, I could then enter Abyssea and cast geocolure on worms. I'm sure the rate will decrease even on those, but at least up to job level 70, I've capped each level within a few minutes with frequent .4-.5's.

Has anyone trying to skill with geocolure on mobs noticed an enhancing-terrible skill up rate for geomancy post 70?

[Xantavia]

I would love a faster way to skill up enhancing magic. I don't think I ever joined a party on rdm after level 30 and instead soloed all the way to 99. I'd play 4 hours a day, constantly buffing myself while killing mobs, and at the end of the day might have gained 0.3 in it. Sadly, I got many more skill-ups when I decided to call my NPC and spam protect on them over and over again outside of town.

[Luvbunny]

Maybe if we keep bumping this thread and started similar one in Japanese forum, they would do something about it. I mean it took them like 9 years to update Guard skills up, I am sure we will still be here in 2022 for their 20th Anniversary.

[Explosive]

Yeah it is pretty annoying standing around doing nothing but spamming stuff in the hopes of getting some skill ups. Not really what i want to do with my subscription. I am fine with skill ups they should just be reasonable. Summoning magic should just randomly raise when you have an avatar out as far as i am concerned, you seem to be "channeling" it anyway with the mp /tick.

[Horadrim]

I agree about enhancing magic.

Geomancy hasn't been slow for me at all though. Just about the time when Indi spam slowed down, I could then enter Abyssea and cast geocolure on worms. I'm sure the rate will decrease even on those, but at least up to job level 70, I've capped each level within a few minutes with frequent .4-.5's.

Has anyone trying to skill with geocolure on mobs noticed an enhancing-terrible skill up rate for geomancy post 70?

It slows down horribly over 300 (individual), and consider the fact you do have 2 skills to cap. It can be pretty bad sometimes.

[Luvbunny]

It slows down horribly over 300 (individual), and consider the fact you do have 2 skills to cap. It can be pretty bad sometimes.

Not to mention, usually in normal battle you are not expected to spam these geo buffs over and over unlike say, elemental magic or healing. So even if you are levelling Geomancer the normal slow old school way, your skills still will not cap. The same problems is plaguing Summoner.

[Randwolf]

Checking in and I see no official response form S/E. Though, not surprising either. Adjustments that do not favor players seem to happen a lot faster, and more often, than ones that do.

[ManaKing]

I have all of my skills capped on RDM except Divine magic. Healing took the longest and it was all from use. Capping Enhancing magic comes from buffing yourself meticulously and soloing. You could bot it too, but if you actually use your enhancing magic as much as you need it to solo on a RDM, you won't have problems.

It does take a while, but it's not unrealistic if you were here for 90+ for aby. I would cap enhancing before anything else when we went from 90 > 95 > 99. Back at release I used to skill up enhancing when I was on the boat going to selbina or on airships when I had nothing else to do or the game was just slow because sometimes this game was just slow.

[Jamerai]

Double Skill-Up Weekend please. Just an idea.

(I realize this does not solve the current issue, but it would at least provide some temporary relief.)

[Luvbunny]

Don't we have martial arts moogle for this kind of things?

[Alhanelem]

I agree about enhancing magic.

Geomancy hasn't been slow for me at all though. Just about the time when Indi spam slowed down, I could then enter Abyssea and cast geocolure on worms. I'm sure the rate will decrease even on those, but at least up to job level 70, I've capped each level within a few minutes with frequent .4-.5's.

Has anyone trying to skill with geocolure on mobs noticed an enhancing-terrible skill up rate for geomancy post 70?
Wonder what your secret is, I just passed level 200 and it's god-awful slow even with food (which makes a difference but it only upgrades from "god-awfol" to "atrocious.') and I only get .2s and .3s.

[Caketime]

Don't we have martial arts moogle for this kind of things?

Does Martial Master affect Enhancing skillups as well, or just combat skills? I haven't been able to eyeball a difference while skilling up weapons on WHM.

[Trumpy]

Skillin up is always slow. A few months ago though I was in Gustav trying to obtain the skillup item there and doing pages.
I was also trying to get some levels on my paladin i think i started at 73 and got pretty close to 90 if not over that in the process. I also was trying to skillup my shield on paladin. I had my whm mule with me whose skill was lacking big time.

I did not leave the zone for a couple days so i retained my prowesses. I had built up to like level 7 skillup prowess in time and I was bout to leave with still no skillup item in chest when the though occurred to me to try to skillup while i had the prowesses. Screw the ring/earrings, these prowesses have to be worth something right? I capped my enhancing in one day. I then worked on healing and capped that as well.

The sad thing is my mule doesn't have a melee job yet so i can do the same for my main character. But im working on its dnc and just need to get it a decent sub, and i will try this to cap skills for my main. I would suggest anyone able to do this (maybe with your friends) try and see how it goes.

[Trumpy]

Geo skills flew in super fast under 30 (prolly cause of my choco hat.) then i went to abby. then it skilled pretty fast til bout 180-200. then it was like 20 skill levels for 7 hours of skillin. and now i get bout 10 skill levels bout every 10 hours. I am currently geo 348 bell 361 and its like 5 skill levels every few hours. I dont have the magic skillup earring.

I tried food here and there but i am so broke from buying scrolls (under 100k ones, I have never been a rich player) that i cant afford to buy food that much for this. I tried using worms in abby uleg as i had read elsewhere would help but after an hour no skillup was had, so i just went back to skillin normal like.

[Tennotsukai]

The way I see things happening on my server. If you want to quickly cap anything like smn or enhancing skill then 3rd party program or you'll never cap anything.

My smn skill is the worst though. Even using skill foods in VW it lacks rate of skill gain. I was a sch for my nni group, though you would think I would have gotten somewhere but am still lacking around 100 pts. Those 3rd party programs are so tempting.

[Merton9999]

Wonder what your secret is, I just passed level 200 and it's god-awful slow even with food (which makes a difference but it only upgrades from "god-awfol" to "atrocious.') and I only get .2s and .3s.

Probably a silly question but you're using worms in uleguerand range? I used them from level 30-70. There definitely was some slow down maybe around 60, but it's possible I didn't notice because from then on I was also using them for solo xp. I'd get bored spamming nukes and switch to skill up to have some variety. I took a break for a bit. I'll check it out and see if it gets bad. I know before I was killing them .4-.5 was common and at least every other cast on average resulted in a skill gain. That was just under 200.

This was nice to have though at least. Far superior to indi spam for those levels. The fact that even geo on Aby mobs sounds like it will suck after 300 is just... boo. I doubt the mob type makes any difference for the rate but I've read people are also using the higher level versions of those sea goldfish that only aggro damage. Might be something to try.

[Horadrim]

Does Martial Master affect Enhancing skillups as well, or just combat skills? I haven't been able to eyeball a difference while skilling up weapons on WHM.

I believe it does, but it may deal only in combat skill.

The best skill up practice I've found is to cap Fields Magic/Combat skill up bonus against lv. 100+ mobs. Problem is, to cap it quickly (Because its so random) you need a lot of people or folks who are very well geared and that can hinder the skill up effort after you're capped unless you're doing something passive like healing or buffing.

For combat skills its disgustingly easy by comparison, I literally went from 93 to 220 skill in Marksmanship in maybe 4 hours of work -- only stopped because I ran out of bullets.

[Tsuneo]

The fastest way to skill up Enhancing is to find someone with a high level Adventuring Fellow. You'll skill up so much faster spamming protect on it than you will casting on yourself.

[RAIST]

Does Martial Master affect Enhancing skillups as well, or just combat skills? I haven't been able to eyeball a difference while skilling up weapons on WHM.

Yes, if you are triggering the latent effect properly.

[SMD111]

Please fix it. It is ridiculous that I wear skill-up gear, eat skill-up food, and cast enhancing magic spells non-stop for 30 minutes and get 4 levels. In 6 hours of Aby worms, I cast enhancing spells every chance I could and went up 2 levels. An MMORPG game pretty much sucks when you spend days of sitting alone casting spells in the hope of capping one of your primary magic skills. This isn't like guard which is a nicety to have. But, not a deal buster.

I hear game 'balance' all the time from the developers. How about some balance between tedium and actually being able to play a job and get reasonable skill ups?

if you want to skill up your enhancing skill just cast your bar spells over and over
this works because thay cast fast and use minimal mp so you can cast 50+ times before you need to rest for mp

i did this and capped my enhancing skill on my whm in less then 4 hours(that was about 100+ lvls)

if you realy want fun skill up summoning skill

[Randwolf]

if you want to skill up your enhancing skill just cast your bar spells over and over
this works because thay cast fast and use minimal mp so you can cast 50+ times before you need to rest for mp

i did this and capped my enhancing skill on my whm in less then 4 hours(that was about 100+ lvls)

if you realy want fun skill up summoning skill
We had the reverse experience. I actually was using your method but used RDM/WHM. Maybe WHM gets a bonus to leveling Enhancing Skill. While SMN wasn't fast, constantly using Offensive BP's on high level stuff really helps.

For Diving, Healing, and Enfeebling Skill Ups, go RDM/WHM and kill dead heads in Tahrongi using healing magic. Repose them, Flash them, Cure them, Silence them, Paralyze, Bind, etc. Still takes a while but I was getting great skill ups.

[FrankReynolds]

My mule is used on 99 whm 99% of the time. He constantly buffs himself and my main. I have capped enfeebling, dark and elemental magic on him. He has capped evasion skill just from death warping and the occasional duo-box fight gone wrong.

His enhancing magic was around 200 last I checked. That is some serious BS.

EDIT: To be clear, this is a character that I have duo boxed three empyrians and half a relic on among other things. I've been playing on him full time for more than a year. That is a long ass time to play and still be only half way to cap on a skill that you use constantly.

[Randwolf]

I tried the High Level Fellow suggestion. It helped slightly. But, still horrible. With most of the new content for individual group play (e.g. - Reives) absolutely sucking, I usually log on, try to skill Enhancing and fall asleep within the hour. But, I'd say falling asleep is a pretty good analogy of where this game seems to be heading, at the moment.

[SMD111]

We had the reverse experience. I actually was using your method but used RDM/WHM. Maybe WHM gets a bonus to leveling Enhancing Skill.

i did have on my skill up earring(Liminus Earring) and no skill+ gear when i did it

[Naraku_Diabolos]

What I do for enhancing magic is go to Kazham near the Nomad Moogle. There I go as my RDM and just spam the Bar-elemental spells on myself. When I run out of magic, I quickly change my job and switch back to RDM to get full MP. I have had good luck doing that. But, I can agree with the summoning, geomancy, automaton and the like. I've also been trying to raise my divine magic skill, and it's slow, too.

[Alhanelem]

Checking in and I see no official response form S/E. Though, not surprising either. Adjustments that do not favor players seem to happen a lot faster, and more often, than ones that do.
You're not going to get an official response on every issue, no matter how big it is to you. The reps have to check with and see if they get a response, then translate it, before they can post something for you.

Anyway, boink.


What I do for enhancing magic is go to Kazham near the Nomad Moogle. There I go as my RDM and just spam the Bar-elemental spells on myself. When I run out of magic, I quickly change my job and switch back to RDM to get full MP. I have had good luck doing that. But, I can agree with the summoning, geomancy, automaton and the like. I've also been trying to raise my divine magic skill, and it's slow, too. A much better option (lv30 or higher) is to just go into abyssea and get minikin monstrosity, then you can skillup nonstop for 2 hours.

(you could also use a macro keyboard to press the buttons for you so you can do something worthwhile with your time but that's a bit shady in regard to the rules. Don't do it if you're going to leave the house or something- just stay nearby and you're fine, as you're not absent)

[Economizer]

I've been a WHM for years now and my Enhancing is still uncapped.

In any given party you have to case your barspells a bunch, but even moreso you have the shortest duration single target Haste spell of any class that can cast it, and everyone needs it. From this I have capped Enhancing Magic (and from constant cure spam my capped Healing Magic), whereas it has been my Divine and Enfeebling which are close to cap but never seem to budge closer to it.

Obviously WHM+RDM should get Hastega (I hate haste cycling with a passion), and obviously skill ups should be allowed in Campaign Battle, because even though I've skilled up my Enhancing "the legitimate way" without spending hours spamming barspells on myself in the middle of nowhere or relying on skill up food or items, doing it naturally still sucked. At least with spamming cures there is a reason you use single target cures, whereas with Haste it only seems that SE wants mages to suffer constant repetition.

[Zumi]

Does SE only listen to the JP forums when they want something fixed, cause this has gone on for so long and needs a fix badly.

[Caketime]

In any given party you have to case your barspells a bunch, but even moreso you have the shortest duration single target Haste spell of any class that can cast it, and everyone needs it. From this I have capped Enhancing Magic (and from constant cure spam my capped Healing Magic), whereas it has been my Divine and Enfeebling which are close to cap but never seem to budge closer to it.

Interesting, for me Divine and Enfeebling were easy. But like I said, it's close just not quite capped. I'm like a dozen levels off cap now, will probably throw a party when I finally do. :3

[Xantavia]

Interesting, for me Divine and Enfeebling were easy. But like I said, it's close just not quite capped. I'm like a dozen levels off cap now, will probably throw a party when I finally do. :3
I found that for divine and healing, I went and played with skeletons in Attohwa Chasm[a]. Granted, this was on pld, but casting on mobs always seems to work better (which is why enhancing is to tough).

[Tsukino_Kaji]

Does SE only listen to the JP forums when they want something fixed, cause this has gone on for so long and needs a fix badly.You must be new here.

[Alhanelem]

You must be new here.
I don't think JP players truly enjoy using macros to cast the same 2 spells over and over for hours than we do.

[Duzell]

My enhancing was capped on rdm at the 80 cap easily. Go into Besieged an use chainspell Protect on the serpent generals. You get fast skill ups since your casting on a npc. This will bring you roughly to around the level 82 cap before it tapers off. At that point casting on a level 95 Adventuring Fellow is the best advice, but it will still take some time.

[Doctrine]

You must be new here.

it's sad too, because Square used to care. I can remember a time when I was hospitalized for several years for a medical condition, and my only way to pass the time was playing various Gameboy games. when I would get stuck in a game, I would write a letter to square asking for a hint, and they'd always send a letter back with hints and tips and encouraging words (because they saw the letter came from a hospital)

now though? they don't seem to give a shit about anyone but the Japanese.

I mean, they remade final fantasy legends 1, 2, and 3, which I played the ever loving SHIT out of as a kid while I was hospitalized, and would buy the remakes in a heartbeat, but they refuse to release them outside of japan.

it's getting to the point where square enix will be joining my 'do not ever buy a game from this company again' list

right up there with EA, activision, and capcom