The Ultimate Black Mage Resources with Damage Calculator

[Sleigh]

Cleared it with 6.1K, which is i130 weapon and 2 i90 accessories with VIT maxed out; otherwise full i110 crafted, so you don't NEED drops (and hey if your luck is as bad as mine, 4 weeks of T10-11, 3 weeks of T12, and 1 clear of T13 without any drops, well, it can happen). It's really not bad with 5800+ but you will just need to be topped off for everything. Also need a MNK for sure, you will NEED Succor/Soil for every Megaflare without Dragonkick.

Doesn't manaward work? Also, surely you survive with full HP since we have quite a bit of magical defence? Or am I missing something?

It's not one attack, like in T9 with Megaflare. It's ... well, Megaflare again, but it happens constantly throughout the fight, quicker than your Manaward will be up by about a 2 to 1 ratio. You may also need Manaward for one of the plethora of raid damages listed below, if you're not topped off or you mess up.

- Megaflare is every minute more or less. Will do about 6.3K unmitigated and without Dragon Kick, more like 5K normally. The kicker here is it's very MP draining and time intensive to be topped off for this. Later in the fight you may have to take 1.5K immediately after, and you may not get healed for more than that immediately so there you would need a surplus of HP or even more healer attention than normal (2X Succors, C3, Adlo/SS). In the middle of the fight you are forced to take full damage ones and if you don't have Succor + high 5K you will need Adlo/Manaward to survive - this is also too frequent to Manaward every one.
- Gigaflare mitigated with Soil + Dragon Kick + Virus does about 5K.
- Rage of Bahamut does about 5K with full mitigation and some protection if you have 2 orbs, a bit less if you have 1 or 0.
- Teraflare can't kill you regardless if you have LB3. If you have LB2 you need extra protection if you don't have 6K and the amount of protection required to survive ... it's really quite random with LB2.
- Earthshaker, p1 and final phase, will 3 shot you but you can and should Manawall and otherwise get heals in between. HP doesn't matter here unless you have low HP + Weakness in which case you can get 2 shot.
- There are twisters later on the final phase which, depending on your strat, can be placed on an Earthshaker target. Most strats involving a non-tank taking these involves heavy mitigation but more HP makes it safer, though you honestly could have full i110 and survive cleanly.

You gotta understand you're not gonna be topped off completely for every mechanic, some are straight into the other, so those 5K damage attacks can be hitting your 90% health character. To be fair BLM is easily the most survivable DPS in T13, due to Manawall and Manaward and being magical, but even BLM just really wants a certain amount. Go below, and you sacrifice healer DPS or just plain heals to other more important people, like tanks ... or Dragoons ... and the enrage on T13 is legit, unlike previous turns. Healer DPS is important; there's a reason almost every group clearing in the first few weeks either won during enrage, or it was queued up behind one final Megaflare.

[OneWingedSora]

Healer DPS is important; there's a reason almost every group clearing in the first few weeks either won during enrage, or it was queued up behind one final Megaflare.

But they mostly all had 115 weapons. If 3 or 4 DPS have I130 and are on top of their game, healer DPS shouldn't be necessary.

[Sleigh]

But they mostly all had 115 weapons. If 3 or 4 DPS have I130 and are on top of their game, healer DPS shouldn't be necessary.

It's not 100% necessary for the clear if everyone plays at their max and no deaths, it's true, the healers can focus purely on healing. That said, realistically, it's supremely useful though for phase pushes and margin of errors. Even with a few i130 weapons my group would have failed enrage on our clear run with one death if SCH didn't DPS a large chunk of p1/p2 and a bit in final phase. As we gear up more and more, and maximize all phases, it'll become truly unnecessary, but at that point we'd probably seek more and more healer DPS, not less.