List of rarely used abilities for the benefit of SE

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Originally Posted by Billzey

BRD has the best utility among all DPS. There are certain fights where you cannot win without songs. There isn't a single fight in the game that requires you to use SMN.

And SMN most certainly does not have the highest single target DPS (lol).

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What are you smoking? No fight in this game requires a Bard's songs.

In terms of utility I would say SMN edges out BRD simply because battle rez saves parties more often than Mage's Ballad and Virus + Eye for an Eye also edge out Foe's Requiem and Army's Paeon imo, but your mileage may vary. Single target DPS is questionable I agree, perhaps in non-ideal fights.

I spam Scathe in FATEs so I could get Gold ranking in them. It's not useless.

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Originally Posted by givemeraptors

Single target DPS is questionable I agree, perhaps in non-ideal fights.

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mDPS takes significant hits to its damage in practice. SMN basically loses nothing, regardless of what you're doing. mDPS might have the best numbers in a straight up tank and spank, but there aren't any of those in game.

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Originally Posted by Alberel

No mention of SMN's Tri-Disaster?

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Binding multiple targets for 20 seconds seems like a pretty good spell to me..

Was thinking about something similar lately.


- Enhanced pet action is pretty much pointless. it doesnt effect the pet, the duration is too short and activation rate to small.
- Tri-Disaster is BL (the bind is nice somewhere, i guess, just unneeded in the current content), so is Ifrit.
- Shadowbind is only used in t7 with a brd kiting and that's pretty much it. Rain of Death became useless after the change, way too high tp cost.
- Circle of Scorn, while not rarely used it just has no purpose, no enmity+, nor is it spamable.
- Fracture has no use while tanking and costs too much tp as off-class skill. Holmgang's use is very limited especially if you compare it to hallowed ground. Also the whole concept of mercy stroke doesn't fit WAR.
- Featherfoot, Haymaker, Fists of earth are solo abilities without the solo content to use them. Fists of wind is just... idk.
- Keen Flurry = tanking drg? and Elusive Jump on the other hand?
- Overcure doesn't really make sense either. getting reduced mp on an AoE spell by using a single cure...

Though the clear winner for most useless skill (in pve) goes to surecast and especially the trait.

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Originally Posted by bennettaj

its weird no one is mentioning Surecast for blm. its practically useless imo. i never use it as blm. i use it more for my whm.

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That's true, there's almost no reason to use it as a BLM.

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Originally Posted by Starkbeaumont

Fists of earth

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I didn't come up with this, I learned it by observing a pro-MNK, but since there's no penalty for changing stances mid fight he would switch to Fists of Earth for unavoidable AoEs (stomps, big primal moves) then back to Fists of Fire immediately afterwards. I was like O_O NEVER THOUGHT OF THAT

It's pretty boss. It's like getting an additional Sacred Soil placed on top of you.

I like your reasoning on most of them, but your title is just a little misleading. Listing something like Bane under rarely used is utter nonsense, as it's one of a Summoner's (and even a DPS'ing Scholar) most important AOE tools. Of course it would be nice if it spread to more than three enemies, but it doesn't make it any less used because it doesn't.

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Originally Posted by Billzey

There are certain fights where you cannot win without songs.

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I totally forgot bout this, thanks for bringing it up.
Yeah, most songs for bard not so much used. I'm sorry but they aren't, not until end-game which still isn't much.
Army's Peon - Used when tanks dies, which I don't see so often.
Mage Ballad - Who need this at all minus the WHM and that's if they die as WHM must learn MP Management the most.
The rest of us virtually have no Mana issues unless it's T2 Engrage crap.
Swiftsong: Good for solo, without a Chocobo.
Foe Req: This is most used of the songs...By the slim chance you have a BLM or SMN, since if you're queing for DF, they'll try to match you with a Melee DPS.

I also do not use Miasma II .. at all, I do use Bane sometimes. I personally think they messed up bard.
Good idea on paper, just not played out well.

I use Thunder 1 over Thunder II in my BLM rotation, Thunder II is the one that never gets any use from me.

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Originally Posted by Varicose

Binding multiple targets for 20 seconds seems like a pretty good spell to me..

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No, it's awful, the only place where you think it might have a use (turn 7) and it's outclassed by Miasma, a spell that doesn't cost as much and has a shorter cast time, and the effective bind lasts 4 seconds longer.

Tri-Disaster is a terrible spell.

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Originally Posted by Insidious

I use this mainly on levi when people have a stack of elemental resistance debuff or if a fellow blm is in the group I throw it on them and they throw theirs on me. Ideally, I would like to see it apply to the entire group for the same duration, or like 20s. Or maybe offer it as a passive buff but reduce the % to 10-15% resistance. And yea, the game is a pain to tell if it's elemental or physical. Like dreadwash, it's a physical attack blms can negate.

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Apocatastasis doesn't affect anything in that fight, Leviathan is water damage, Apocatastasis is Ice, Fire and Lightning.