What's the best way to keep your MP up as a spellcaster?

Honestly, the only way to keep your MP as a Red Mage is Lucid Dreaming, which all Ranged Magical DPS get at 24 as a Role Action.
Generally, Red Mages don't use up that much MP unless they have to spam Verraise or maybe Tether (which most people don't bother using).

Lucid Dreaming should be all you need, unless something is going seriously wrong with the run. Usually, you won’t run into MP troubles unless you’re back-to-back dying or back-to-back raising. So Lucid Dreaming (and perhaps a few HQ Super Ethers) will be more than enough for you. Refresh is not needed to augment its effects. You’ll only want Refresh if you’re dying a lot or raising a lot.

Ideally, I would recommend using your first Lucid at 60-75% MP, and then keep it on cooldown throughout an encounter. It will serve as an MP refresh every 2 minutes, as well as an enmity dump for your personal aggro. Never use it when you’re almost dry unless you have absolutely no choice to (e.g., it’s still on cooldown from your last usage, and a lot of crap has hit a lot of fans—people dying a lot or you dying a lot).

People already answered, Lucid Dreaming.

But since you can't tell what's going to happen once in instance, having some Ether won't hurt as a last resort.

RDM melee combo also cost tp and not mana. Passive regen will bring you 2% mana every 3 second, so using melee combo often as possible make you save some mana.

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Originally Posted by Canadane

On long fights, Lucid Dreaming should be used as soon as it's ready from the last time you use it.
Keep it on cooldown.

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+1.
I wouldn't save Lucid Dreaming for when MP is almost dry. On big boss fights or longer solo story fights, I usually start using it when my MP is at about 75% and then keep it on cooldown to avoid having to worry about MP running low.

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Originally Posted by MetalSnakeXI1

I'll try to mostly save my Verraise for when all healers are dead or if we're running really low on DPSes. Otherwise I'll let the rezzing for the healers when they're still in.

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Actually, as a WHM main, I really appreciate when RDMs (especially with Dualcast) or SMNs help with raises. Having that support lets us focus on keeping the remaining people alive.
For healers Swiftcast is precious and if it's on cooldown, then the long cast time of Raise is one of most dangerous things to do.

Red Mages offensive spells have rather low mana requirements, to the point that Lucid Dreaming is close enough to a break point if not more than that if used on cooldown. That means that you absolutely should not avoid using Verraise two or three times in a fight. If you do, really, a red mage isn't exactly the best choice to pick. It is easy to play well enough in comparison to other casters, but its damage does suffer for the sake of it being able to heal and revive. Not using those two basically removes the reason why the red mages damage output is considerably lowered in comparison to other casters, being around the support classes.

So yes. As a red mage it is a good idea to actually use Verraise, just not to pick up someone that constantly dies. I can tell you from practice though that there are fights where it's actually better to bottom up on mana raising people to the point you cannot even DPS anymore than focusing on DPS and letting party lie dead. It is extremely rare, extremely situational and rather obvious...if the healers are either dead or low on mana themselves.

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Originally Posted by Mikita

+1.
I wouldn't save Lucid Dreaming for when MP is almost dry. On big boss fights or longer solo story fights, I usually start using it when my MP is at about 75% and then keep it on cooldown to avoid having to worry about MP running low.




Actually, as a WHM main, I really appreciate when RDMs (especially with Dualcast) or SMNs help with raises. Having that support lets us focus on keeping the remaining people alive.
For healers Swiftcast is precious and if it's on cooldown, then the long cast time of Raise is one of most dangerous things to do.

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It all depends on the situation really,if the boss doesn't have really tight DPS checking like Exdeath(savage) or phase 1 Shinryu EX then yeah I can definitely help with rezzing.

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Originally Posted by MetalSnakeXI1

I'll try to mostly save my Verraise for when all healers are dead or if we're running really low on DPSes.Otherwise I'll let the rezzing for the healers when they're still in.

Thanks for the advice everyone ^_^.Been trying to experiment with ranged options since some fights like Lakshmi EX sometimes forces you to be away from melee range.

I do have a BRD on level 50 but I've been eager to give Red mage a try for a while

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generally Save veraise unless healer is struggling to keep party alive and is too busy to raise/not enough mp to raise the other healer MP regen tools are much better then yours

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Originally Posted by MetalSnakeXI1

It all depends on the situation really,if the boss doesn't have really tight DPS checking like Exdeath(savage) or phase 1 Shinryu EX then yeah I can definitely help with rezzing.

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Unless the entire party is completely dead, that Dualcast GCD you'll spend on the raise while the healers are healing or dpsing themselves isn't what's going to make or break the dps check. If anything, it'll help clear it because now you have a dps or two back up, even with weakness.

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Originally Posted by Duskane

generally Save veraise unless healer is struggling to keep party alive and is too busy to raise/not enough mp to raise the other healer MP regen tools are much better then yours

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This is the best way to wipe. If you start raising only after healers are down on mana/dead it's already too late and the party will struggle.

Healers have higher mana regeneration, yes, but healers also have significantly higher mana costs. Healers burn though their mana WAY faster for healing than red mage does for attack. If you're a red mage, go ahead and spam Vercure. See how long you're going to last. That's the cost of the cheapest heal that healers have. Three heals cost the same as five Jolts/Verstone/Verfire. Four heals cost the same as five Veraero/Verthunder. In fact, Verflare/Verholy cost the same as Vercure.

In comparison, Cure II costs twice as much as Vercure and Cure. Cure III costs 3,75 times as much as Cure. Medica costs 2,75 times as much as Cure. Medica II costs 3,30 times as much as Cure.


Stop worrying about DPS and actually help your party. That's what is the point of Red Mage. If you want DPS, go Black Mage. If you want DPS but want to be able to help recover from healers death, go Summoner. A Red Mage that never heals and only raises when healers cannot do that anymore is a bad player in much the same way as a tank that never uses any stance, a healer that never uses AoE heals or a bard that never uses the MP/TP refreshes or songs.