Jack Of All Trades: A Guide To Red Mage

I can confirm Demon Arrows additional atk down works on WS using Ambu bow and Exalted Bow.

I'm dragging my feet on making Raetic Arrows to give Empyreal Arrow a proper test.

Hey everyone I just wanted to make one little caveat about Black Halo. Many are saying to use Savage Blade gear, which is mostly true, but I would suggest changing it up a bit due the MND/STR actually being 70/30 instead of 50/50.

Here's what I'm currently using... there maybe be some improvements to be made, but I think you'll get good mileage out of it.

ItemSet 365737

My slippers have 9 WSD from dark matter, but if you don't have that you can just use whatever feet you have that have the most MND. Medium's or Carmine+1 depending on augs.



That was near attack cap with the above set, used at 2300~ TP. Though it's worth noting, I do not have Maxentius, just Kaja.

Black Halo seems like a WS that would really like the TP Bonus from a Thibron. And you're kinda forced to wear Accuracy gear because of low Club skill anyway, so I think it works out.

I don't really see any other improvements that could be made to the set. I guess Viti. Tights +3 might be slightly better than Atrophy if you're not getting enough buffs for capped Attack.

Hey guys, I got a question that might be a bit hard to give an definitive answer to.
I'm currently using Vitiation sword (R16)/Kaja Knife, mainly to solo stuff. This definitely improved my dps compared to what i was using before which was Colada/Ternion.

My goal currently is not to perform in wave 3 dyna and such things, but to be able to solo as much things as possible. Right now, the best I did is Omen mid boss and Reisen T1.

I've been stockpiling REMA currencies for a while but I'm a not exactly sure which one I would benefit the most of right now. I'll make an Excalibur but that's just for the nostalgia really. However, between Sequence, Murgleis, and Almace I'm kinda lost on which one should be my priority. I can see them all being useful under certain circumstances (just as explained in the first post) and I want to make each one of them at some point anyway, but I'm not sure in which order.

I've also been thinking about just selling everything to get the cash for a Croc, but at the same time I'm wondering if the improvement over Vitiation would really be worth it right now.

Or, last option : Use the currencies for other jobs REMA that would really need them. To give a bit more context, I also want to play COR and BRD (and GEO but I need to do coalitions first anyway), and don't have any REMA for them yet. But RDM really is my favorite job.

So, what should I do ?

Excal is not a solid choice right now. I have it, I'd love it to be better. They didn't do PLD or RDM any favors that I can see with R15 compared to the good relics unless they are going to change shields drastically in the future.

Sequence is good in capped situations, which soloing is not. Murg is good if you need to land spells and spam SCs, which is probably not better than what you are doing right now. Almace I'm biased against but I don't think it's going to do anything unless amnesia is a large problem you face, solid dps and DEX, but still probably not better than what you have.

COR vs BRD vs GEO: GEO is cheapest, but clearly not fastest as you've disclaimed. Idris and done. COR has a lot of latitude and can solo a fair amount of content with trusts and operates very well in most situations. It's expensive to completely max. You want either a Forma or Death Penalty to start as well as a decent TP set and the TP bonus Gun. BRD is almost as bad as COR for $$$s to start and if you are going battleBRD it's just adorning yourself with an absurd amount of sparkly things. BRD requires Ghorn, Aeonic Flute, and Empy harp of at least 1 song or other means to start as only support in current end game. Then you'll think about Carn, fancy daggers, and getting 2 songs out of your empy harp.

If you have little aspirations for party play then you could also consider BLU or SMN for more solo ability.

Thanks for your input !

So it's kinda what I thought. It's probably better for me to just focus on other jobs REMAs and keep what I have now for rdm.

Well I'm slowly gearing BLU/learning spells and was never a big fan of SMN. Thing is, I've always liked to go solo melee with my rdm even back at 75 era. So nowadays with everything that's available, it's a bit of a dream come true. Maybe not the best option, but it's the one I enjoy the most.

Also, I'm all in for party play but given my playtime and the fact that most of the time I'm subject to unexpected afks, I can't really do as much group events as I'd like to.

It's also worth considering though, COR is one of the best jobs in the game, but you have very stiff competition since many people play it. BRD a little less so, and of the jobs that get invites, I'd say BRD are the most requested, and probably BRD being the most requested of those two on Asura. That said, in situations where RDM is needed, it's usually very effective... the issue is, that after the update, it doesn't seem to be as rare as it once was.

So I can kind of see your dilemma here. What I will say is, if your primary problem is just finding the best way to be useful so you can get content done, the easiest path on Asura right now, and probably any server, is WHM... even if you hate playing it, it may be worth having it, just so you can get in a group where you otherwise couldn't. That is at least until you are done with coalitions and GEO can open more doors. BRD is honestly extremely expensive... but well worth the effort... but really only shines when you have Aeonic, Relic, and Empy instruments.

So in a way, the choice really boils down to, how deep are your pockets, and are you fundamentally against playing WHM... if not, I'd do WHM, then GEO, then COR, then RDM, unless you're just dead-set on playing BRD and have the determination to see it through getting harp.

Now... I can also say, this changes quite a bit if you have a good linkshell that doesn't mind investing in you. If you have/can get Marsayas without having to pay for it, and people don't mind helping you with, or payrolling Daurdabla, this whole heuristic may flip on it's head.

Just something to think about.

RDM solo experience is one of the main reasons I'm still playing. Wave 3 was completed a long time ago amd now it's just fun to beat things up on RDM or RNG.

Hey, you do you, everyone's got their reasons for playing; if that's what you enjoy, own it.

Bought an Enriching Sword last night to test and see if the Enspell+30 worked on both hands.... sad to say I don’t believe it does.

I used Crocea/Kaja knife to start then swapped to Crocea/Enriching and my offhand enspell damage was the only one to get a boost by equipping enriching sword.

I used macro orb VD (Orcs) to test.

I figured that this would be the case but I didn’t see any confirmation here on the fourms or anywhere else so I just had to see for myself. Kind of a bummer but at least I can wipe that idea from the list of possible boosts.

Sooo... for Sequence Main Hand what is supposed to be the new best offhand?
Tauret? Naglring? Or still the old Ternion+1?

dex15 and mnd15 cover both cdc and savage

dly+5
for dmg+25 acc+13 att+30 skill+22 and dex/mnd/int15

I would assume Tauret is best

I only use ternion to off hand for tauret anymore personally

Same, to me, it seems that given how small a margin in damage you are dealing with, it's value is totally overshadowed by how much magic accuracy and accuracy you gain from Tauret.

Rude.

I can confirm on this that Thibron ended up being far more viable than I would have initially thought. Unlike on BLU where you may or may not have RDM, you can always rely on distract if you're ON RDM (outside of extreme circumstances of course)

That, and, since much of your white damage comes from enspells in higher level content, the total white damage loss is less noticeable.

Bio and Dia rweaks incoming.

"For April we’ve got some changes to ranger job abilities, as well as minor refinements to Dia, Bio, and Light and Dark Shot. We hope that these spells and abilities will once again be brought front and center."

Enfeebling Magic Effect increasing the potency of Dia III by 1% Defense Down per 1 of the value would be a really big deal.

1% per 1 Enfeebling potency, as in -54% Defense down for having full potency gear in addition to the -15% base? That seems massively broken.

I can see them just doing it as a multiplier, i.e. -15%*1.54 = -23%~ Defense Down at best.

15/30/45% atk&m.atk down bio or def&m.def down dia.
Stacks with shots up to 60%.
make it happen!

Dia can now overwrite dia, same potency tier!
Please enjoy.

Maybe you can have Dia and Bio up at the same time.

I wouldn't be too surprised if they just allow Dia/Bio III to be brought up to V rather than IV via double Dark/Light shots.

Good to hear. That should also work for Empyreal Arrow as well, right? We are reverse Savage Blade CORS?

Tbh, I wouldn't even mind that change, as long as it doesn't reset Light Shot bonuses. Assuming Dia+LS won't change completely with the update.

So all of this accuracy permitting of course:

I did some testing on Kaja Rod/Thib, and I while I shouldn't say I was surprised by the outcome, I can certainly say I was impressed.

I tried to stay away from blunt weak monsters to get a better idea of what it's really doing for damage. I tested on Chapuli, Tigers, and Panopts. So with a Black Halo set, and pDIF cap, I was hitting for about 36~38k @1k TP, which is pretty good for not getting a second hit. On ascended mobs the numbers varied from 42k to just under 50k. The ascended ones have alot fewer samples as I wasn't testing for all that long, just about an hour or so. At any rate it seems to keep pace well with Savage Blade in general, even having an edge over it in some cases.

Now again due to accuracy constraints this isn't something you'd be doing all the time, and your attack will be even lower than usual.

It might be good fun to do in some lowish level content or Aeonic burns if any of you still do those.

I also personally think BH looks cooler than Savage Blade does :p

Edit: With bolster up doing MND/Frailty (which is obvious pandering to this WS and will never happen in real world scenarios) I got this to single hit on a Chapuli for 47k, so it looks like it could be fairly exploitable with certain buffs even on non-blunt targets. Obviously still super niche, but pretty neat.

Big if true.

Any plans to test it on Apex mobs? Stats-wise those mobs are the closest thing to actual NMs where it would kinda matter.

Oh, good idea... Don't know why that slipped my mind, I'll go check it out.

So tested a bit on some Apex Bats, this was my result.

Gonna go test on a few other Apex things.



Accuracy was about 98% on these guys, but they are small fries, I'll go test on higher level apex mobs.