Red Mage meriting

[Hyrist]

Then why would you recommend it to begin with?

We've got someone here who seems to be new to the realm of RDM meriting, so let's try to not give him bad information, ok?

Because the information isn't bad?

There may be better tactics in ABYSSEA than DoT kiting, but when you break it down to the actual facts, Bio III stands potentially as our strongest DoT Debuff we have. It is also, bar none, the strongest raw attack stat reducer we have.

You want to say that's ONLY viable for /blu soloing, you'd be flatly wrong. If you find additional use for it (Such as using it as a powerful DoT/Attack Debuff.) It becomes useful for soloing in all methods, unless you want to go ahead and call pinning anything short of 'Wall of Virtue -1."

It would be bad information to ignore Kite DoTing all together, instead of saying it is an older method of doing things for those who don't want to abuse pathing mechanics.

With a group with two RDMs. It's always good to have their merits compliment each other. One with Say, Paralyze and Dia, and the other with Slow and Bio.

During the tank/proc phase Bio III is kept up, when the kill order is given, Dia III as soon as Bio III wares.

And of course Para and Slow are kept up by their respective higher-merited RDMs.

Also, Slasher, I go 3 merits in Dia III for the increased duration paired off with Saboteur. Although, I considered swapping out my Blind II for one point in Bio III, just so I had a stronger attack debuff. (Sabo-Bio III to rape attack calculations.) But I'm waiting on the merit adjustments before I make that choice, as I'll likely take one out of Dia II and go 2 and 2.

[Crimson_Slasher]

Like i said, im not giving my exact values, i have a balanced set that many rdm are likely to say is useless, it works for me though and makes me flexible in what i do so rather than open myself to judgement on my merits, i just leave it to the imagination.

[Hyrist]

I flatly don't care about the opinions of people who'll never play with me anyways. My merits and my gameplay choices work around those I spend my time with and vice versa. It's why I never bothered giving the "Dnc + RDM DOSEN'T WERK!" Argument as I prove that wrong every time my DNC friends and I go out and kill stuff. People will refuse to accept anything they don't get to work, instead of asking how someone else manages it.

[Greatguardian]

Because the information isn't bad?

There may be better tactics in ABYSSEA than DoT kiting, but when you break it down to the actual facts, Bio III stands potentially as our strongest DoT Debuff we have. It is also, bar none, the strongest raw attack stat reducer we have.

You want to say that's ONLY viable for /blu soloing, you'd be flatly wrong. If you find additional use for it (Such as using it as a powerful DoT/Attack Debuff.) It becomes useful for soloing in all methods, unless you want to go ahead and call pinning anything short of 'Wall of Virtue -1."

It would be bad information to ignore Kite DoTing all together, instead of saying it is an older method of doing things for those who don't want to abuse pathing mechanics.

With a group with two RDMs. It's always good to have their merits compliment each other. One with Say, Paralyze and Dia, and the other with Slow and Bio.

During the tank/proc phase Bio III is kept up, when the kill order is given, Dia III as soon as Bio III wares.

And of course Para and Slow are kept up by their respective higher-merited RDMs.

Also, Slasher, I go 3 merits in Dia III for the increased duration paired off with Saboteur. Although, I considered swapping out my Blind II for one point in Bio III, just so I had a stronger attack debuff. (Sabo-Bio III to rape attack calculations.) But I'm waiting on the merit adjustments before I make that choice, as I'll likely take one out of Dia II and go 2 and 2.

DoT Kiting has been outdated since its inception. It's an overly cautious route that any decent Red Mage will never have to bother with, in or outside of Abyssea. DoT kiting is only "viable" when the Red Mage in question is incapable of putting together even a half decent nuking set.

Nukes are better, faster, stronger, and dwarf the overall damage/time of DoTs. Nuke more, suck less is the best advice anyone can give to someone who is actually utilizing DoT kiting.

Personal merit setup:
5/5 Convert
5/5 Ice Acc
2/5 Dia 3 (for 60 second duration, making it MP-efficient)
5/5 Slow II
3/5 Paralyze II

[Crimson_Slasher]

DOT kiting aside, it is still a valid spell to merit if one wants to work together with other mages on some mobs that are like a lot say "too dangerous to melee" where you can stack bio/dia III, burn/shock/choke, poison II, and a helix, on top of nukes to add some improved kill speed, again if you cant melee it, the physical defense reduction is irrelevent and the superior DOT would win. Situational yes, deal with it, thats ffxi.

[cidbahamut]

Because the information isn't bad?

There may be better tactics in ABYSSEA than DoT kiting, but when you break it down to the actual facts, Bio III stands potentially as our strongest DoT Debuff we have. It is also, bar none, the strongest raw attack stat reducer we have.

Those tactics work just fine outside of Abyssea.

Unless it's changed since I last checked, Bio III's DoT is only marginally better than Bio II, and it won't even match the mp:damage ratio unless you put a full five merits into it, significantly limiting your options for meriting things that are more useful and used in a wider selection of situations. If that's changed recently, please enlighten me with this new information.

As for the attack down effect, if you're soloing that isn't really going to do much unless you gear for insane levels of Defense, via Cocoon. If you're not using a Cocoon build, then you're most likely not getting hit in the first place and the NM will have enough attack that it won't really make a difference if it doesn't manage to hit you.

You want to say that's ONLY viable for /blu soloing, you'd be flatly wrong. If you find additional use for it (Such as using it as a powerful DoT/Attack Debuff.) It becomes useful for soloing in all methods, unless you want to go ahead and call pinning anything short of 'Wall of Virtue -1."

No, that's not its only use. It is however the only use that really justifies burning 5 merits on it however.

It would be bad information to ignore Kite DoTing all together, instead of saying it is an older method of doing things for those who don't want to abuse pathing mechanics.

You're assuming straight up kiting doesn't involve applying DoTs. DoT onry is a terrible approach, which is why I give you grief. You kite things, which involves both DoTs and nuking, not one or the other. I'm not even going to touch on pinning stuff because I am terrible at it and therefor don't do it.

With a group with two RDMs. It's always good to have their merits compliment each other. One with Say, Paralyze and Dia, and the other with Slow and Bio.

I thought you didn't deal with ideal scenarios Hyrist.

During the tank/proc phase Bio III is kept up, when the kill order is given, Dia III as soon as Bio III wares.

No, you keep Dia III up so that when the kill order is given it takes all of 10 seconds to down the NM and you don't have to worry about Bio wearing off at the right time.

[Hyrist]

Nukes are better, faster, stronger...

You're forgetting more expensive, by a factor of 3.

There's a reason why people use DoTs while kiting and it's not sucking. It's because it's the most MP efficient means of downing the opponent, and also the most USE time efficient.

For less MP you'd spend for a single Blizzard IV, A 90 RDM with capped NATIVE Dark Skill will do 1350 slip damage with 3 Bios IIIs, while reducing the attack of the monster as well. So damage for MP wise, they're fairly equal (ignoring the initial damage on Bio III.) And you've still got time to nuke.

So sure, nuke more. But if you can afford to take the time to nuke, you can also slip in Bio III for the damage over time, unless your tactic relies on sleep/bind. (Which if you're pinning, it won't.)

Using the spell has absolutely nothing to do with sucking. DoTs save time and hassle for every tactic except sleep/nuke, and Bio III is the best.

[Hyrist]

Eh, you're arguing the same thing as I am Cid, but once again you jump into it with insults first.

Unless it's changed since I last checked, Bio III's DoT is only marginally better than Bio II, and it won't even match the mp:damage ratio unless you put a full five merits into it, significantly limiting your options for meriting things that are more useful and used in a wider selection of situations. If that's changed recently, please enlighten me with this new information.

Moot point if your primary passtime on RDM is soloing mobs now isn't it?

Merits are to be used for the situations in which you play your job. If you ply your Red Mage in a wide Varietiy of trades then your argument holds weight. But if someone enjoys the soloing passtime on RDM as their primary hobby, then those 5/5 Bio Merits will work for them.

And again, we've no clue how the Merit system will be adjusted. Personally I'm of the mind that we may have to reconsider the use of this spells in the future, especially if we DON'T get a debuff that regards TP moves.

As far as me dealing in ideals? Theorycrafting always has a wide birth of possibilities you have to consider when talking about options and choices. Sometimes, you can wind up with a partner or friend in game that you game with often, and you can play your game around. I have such friends, though now she prefers her dancer more often than RDM. But when we do go duo RDM, we've got that strength.

[cidbahamut]

You used the phrase "DoT kiting".

I regret nothing.

[Greatguardian]

You used the phrase "DoT kiting".

I regret nothing.

^

Supplementing Nukes with DoTs is obviously ideal. Sitting around kiting while only casting Bio III to deal damage is retarded. Hopefully we can agree on that. Personally, I don't think the spell is worth the 5 merit slots it takes to really outpace Bio II =/. Even if all you do is solo only, you may honestly benefit more from Slow/Para 2 at 5/5 assuming the game isn't completely immune to them forever.

When people talk about DoT kiting, the first image that pops into my head, and into many people's heads, is sitting around spamming Bio and running away. That's DoT kiting. Nuking will always be your primary, most time-efficient method of damage. If you want to tack on a DoT? That's fine. But they're nowhere close to being effective as a primary source of damage.

Edit: And a decent nuke set is going to be putting out more than 1350 damage on Blizzard IV anyways =/