How To Get into the Raid Scene?

[Istus]

Hey guys new to FF. Im still leveling a white mage and my goal is to get heavily into the raid scene, but after I do all the story quests how do I start progressing to get raid gear? I saw flow charts showing what dungeons to do and how to get there but that was 2.2 or something like that. Can anyone enlighten me by probably showing me a new one for Heavensward? or by explaining how to get into it now? Thanks in advance

[TSLsmokey]

Well I haven't found one like that myself, but depending on what part you're in right now(either level 50 raiding or level 60) there's always a couple things to do. For the level 50 raiding, a good idea would be to get poetics armor asap if you haven't reached the heavensward areas yet and haven't gotten to 56 or higher. It's somewhat amusing that ironworks gear outranks a good chunk of HW gear. The coils are also highly recommended to go in the party finder or with friends instead of doing them through DF and good luck getting in the crystal tower as well. I don't have a plan for you for HW raiding though unfortunately.

EDIT: After thinking it through there is a couple things to do in heavensward raiding right off the bat to get you prepared after you reach 60. First, you'll want to get the esosterics gear. You likely won't reach 60 fast enough before the law tomes are no longer obtainable so focus on esosterics and the lore tomes at that point. The lore gear will likely outrank the esosterics but it'll also likely be capped to a certain about of lore tomes per week. Go through the level 60 dungeons as well to get the tomestones from there as well as gear(while the esos gear outranks the current dungeon gear and is upgradeable, you still can get some nice pocket change from selling the dungeon gear). Also make sure to do the Alexander Gordias normal, you should only require a guide for a4. a3 is useful with one but it's not needed. And also the Void Ark. When you're ready to do Thordan's Reign, Bismarck EX, and Ravana EX, you should be well prepared... actually over prepared in the latter 2 cases. With Alexander Midas on the horizon, this should also help you prep for that as well as Gordias Savage should you plan on doing that. Be warned that the savage raids allow no mistakes. You mess up in your rotations or get nailed by an aoe, the entire raid could potentially wipe. They are strict... very strict. Kinda why I haven't even done them yet.

Good luck out there!

[Istus]

Thx TSLsmokey! your in depth advice will hopefully get me on the right track! Good luck to both of us then!

[Taika]

Hey Istus,

you're in luck as the new patch is coming up next week, raid content will start anew and people will be more or less in equal grounds. If you really want to get into the top raid content, that would be Alexander: Midas (Savage). I would advice you to get to level 60 asap and then try to grind as much level 200+ gear as possible (esoterics will be uncapped when the patch comes next Tuesday so that'll be a good way to get gear you can upgrade to 210). The normal Alexander: Midas will likely also offer higher item level gear than 210, but that and the new tome gear will be locked behind weekly caps.

You should also start looking for a raid group asap. At least on my server there are many groups recruiting right now (you can see multiple advertisements in party finder in game and here on server forums). I would imagine it to be possible to find a group that's willing to help you catch up before you start running the new content.

In addition to gear, you will need all the vital subclass abilities for your job. You seem to be missing at least Eye for an Eye from Arcanist. Be prepared for raid healing to be very different than what healing the leveling dungeons or easy endgame fights is. As a White Mage, you're expected to be the main healer of the party and also to solo heal a lot while your co-healer does DPS.

Good luck!

[Nekotee]

As taika said you should maybe start asking now...
Or finish leveling as soin as possible to be ready.

And yeah
Unlike lv50 raid
Lv60 raid as gordias savage are heavily healing dependent

The incoming damage are huge on the group and more on tank
Be prepared to work a lot !