Proc based job

[bloodwulf]

So i am thinking of boosting a job to try something different. I have a dragoon at 37 (have played it to 55ish in POTD) and not feeling the animation lock and rotation. I want to stick with dps, maybe dps with utility. In WOW i played classes that fished for procs and really enjoyed the more priority focused combat, so if there is something like that it would be ideal for me.

What i am considering so far is a Bard (like the ideal of mobility, and maintain song and dots seems fun). Blackmage seems to remind a bit of arcane mage from wow with the ebb and flow of fire to ice, so that might not be bad. I had looked at Summoner but i feel i don't know the game well enough to manage Bahamut summons in the correct time on fights. I have watched videos for basically all of the classes, and will watch more if necessary.

Any other classes pray to RNGesus and rely more on priority and less on rotations?

Thanks folks. Sorry for the questions, i am playing solo on Siren-US so don't really have anywhere to front questions.

[dope_danny]

Red Mage is entirely based around procs like "Dualcast" that let you cast every second spell instantly and using certain elements procs other elements to cast as you build up two levels of white and black magic to dash in, use your rapier to do a melee combo then disengage to trigger a flare or holy. But it unlocks at lvl.50,

[Preplol]

Bard would be the way to go if youre looking for something "proccy" It can be piss if you have to endure an entire song without procs obv.
Most of their procs are based off your dot crits, altho you can "force" a proc with Empyreal Arrow and once you get Refulgent Arrow you can spend your "Straither shot" procs on that too!
Bards are really mobile (Think BM Hunters) the only cast they have is Foe's Requiem. They get alot of raid utillity with their songs and role actions.

All in all a pretty solid job.

[Katchii]

So i am thinking of boosting a job to try something different. I have a dragoon at 37 (have played it to 55ish in POTD) and not feeling the animation lock and rotation. I want to stick with dps, maybe dps with utility. In WOW i played classes that fished for procs and really enjoyed the more priority focused combat, so if there is something like that it would be ideal for me.

What i am considering so far is a Bard (like the ideal of mobility, and maintain song and dots seems fun). Blackmage seems to remind a bit of arcane mage from wow with the ebb and flow of fire to ice, so that might not be bad. I had looked at Summoner but i feel i don't know the game well enough to manage Bahamut summons in the correct time on fights. I have watched videos for basically all of the classes, and will watch more if necessary.

Any other classes pray to RNGesus and rely more on priority and less on rotations?

Thanks folks. Sorry for the questions, i am playing solo on Siren-US so don't really have anywhere to front questions.

Of the DPS classes, Bard, Black Mage, Machinist, Summoner and Monk are the only ones that really have any RNG based procs to take advantage of. The Red Mage Dualcast Proc is the baseline class mechanic and is not RNG based, it automatically applies any time you use a spell with a cast time and don't already have the buff. The buff makes any spell an instant cast spell, regardless of cast time, so you weave faster cast time spells with instant cast (slow speed spells cast with dual cast buff) spells. I personally love it because it has a ton of versatility.

In any case, if RNG based procs are really what you're going for, Machinist would be the job to go with. The main attack abilities are entirely based on RNG, unless you have ammo. The combo isn't 100%, you have to fish for procs when you don't have ammo (which make the proc 100% and buff the damage of the ability you use it with) to do the three step combo. IMO it got REALLY fun to play from 60-70 with the enhanced abilities and animations, prior to that it's fine, but just not as flashy or satisfying in comparison.

Black Mage is a fun job...sort of. It's the poster child for turret casting, and it takes it to an extreme, with a buff called Leylines which literally places a circle on the ground that doesn't move and gives you a casting speed buff as long as you stay inside of it. It honestly is fun, when you get a chance to just sit and cast your rotation, however VERY few fights ever let you do that so for me, the turret style is just annoying. It has two procs, Firestarter which makes Fire 3 instant cast, and a Thiunder one (Thunder is a DoT here) which makes your next Thunder spell instant cast and do a good amount of damage up front.

Monk post 60 gets a RNG mechanic with the chakras which fill when you get critical strikes rather than manually through an ability. Once the chakras are filled you get to use one of two abilities, a decent heal or a potent single hit attack. Downside with Monk, if you think of it that way, is it's almost entirely dependent on positioning for its attacks. DRG has a few abilities....almost ALL of MNK's attacks have a positional requirement for better damage, that's somewhat irrelevant solo though as you rarely have a chance to ever use the positionals in that situation.

Summoner post 60 gets a mechanic that makes your next Ruin cast instant and upgrades it to the next Tier so it does some additional damage. That's about it as far as RNG goes. I used to love SMN, but I just am not a fan of the Bahamut mechanic given how most boss fights are designed, as you alluded to.

Bard has one RNG type mechanic, with the songs it sings. Each song has a different effect, and changes things up a bit. One song has the effect of resetting a hard hitting attack if critical damage is dealt with your DoTs while active, another has a stacking cast time reduction effect that triggers of the DoT crit damage, and the third song allows the use of an ability that does more damage the more "combo points" you have and combo points are gained when your DoT's critically tick.

I like Bard a lot because it's very active, can attack on the move, provides good party utility, and just plays really smoothly.

If Bard is what you feel like going with, it's a solid choice.

[bloodwulf]

Thanks all. I feel like i got a good plan. First is stop trying to force myself to enjoy the Dragoon. I may come back to it later, but for now its just not for me. I will boost Bard and play through HW and SB. I will pick up Red Mage down the road to play with them as well as they were one of my favorite FF archetypes. I did not want to pick up a tank or healer until i get more experience under my belt because i feel like id let people down in dungeons (I was a tank main for 5 years in WoW, so i hope to pick them up eventually).

[Katchii]

Thanks all. I feel like i got a good plan. First is stop trying to force myself to enjoy the Dragoon. I may come back to it later, but for now its just not for me. I will boost Bard and play through HW and SB. I will pick up Red Mage down the road to play with them as well as they were one of my favorite FF archetypes. I did not want to pick up a tank or healer until i get more experience under my belt because i feel like id let people down in dungeons (I was a tank main for 5 years in WoW, so i hope to pick them up eventually).

Just to make sure the information is out there, and you're not potentially caught by surprise. Level boosting and story boosting are two separate things and are bought separately. They're both currently on sale, job boost for ~$18 and the story skip (for just ARR, not Heavensward)~$12, for a total of ~$30 for both.

[bloodwulf]

Just to make sure the information is out there, and you're not potentially caught by surprise. Level boosting and story boosting are two separate things and are bought separately. They're both currently on sale, job boost for ~$18 and the story skip (for just ARR, not Heavensward)~$12, for a total of ~$30 for both.

Yup, i was aware. I grabbed them on my lunch break and started the quest that it had me on. Will have to watch some more bard videos to get my bars setup the way i need them, but just the very limited i did with it was already an improvement. Won't queue dungeons or anything for abit just to let myself get comfortable without being a burden. Tonight i just plan to quest and maybe find an FC to join.

[RohanV]

Of the DPS classes, Bard, Black Mage, Machinist, Summoner and Monk are the only ones that really have any RNG based procs to take advantage of. The Red Mage Dualcast Proc is the baseline class mechanic and is not RNG based, it automatically applies any time you use a spell with a cast time and don't already have the buff. The buff makes any spell an instant cast spell, regardless of cast time, so you weave faster cast time spells with instant cast (slow speed spells cast with dual cast buff) spells. I personally love it because it has a ton of versatility.

Dualcast is not RNG, but the Verfire/Verstone part of the rotation is RNG, and it's pretty core, possibly applying every other spell.

[Katchii]

Dualcast is not RNG, but the Verfire/Verstone part of the rotation is RNG, and it's pretty core, possibly applying every other spell.

You're right, TBH I didn't even really think about that. I missed it, thanks for pointing it out.

Those spells don't really change much though, they're the same cast time as Jolt/Jolt II/Impact, you just substitute your short cast time spell for either one when they're available. I was thinking of abilities that recharge, or aren't available otherwise that you have to make somewhat snap decisions about and it just didn't stick out to me.

[RohanV]

You're right, TBH I didn't even really think about that. I missed it, thanks for pointing it out.

Those spells don't really change much though, they're the same cast time as Jolt/Jolt II/Impact, you just substitute your short cast time spell for either one when they're available. I was thinking of abilities that recharge, or aren't available otherwise that you have to make somewhat snap decisions about and it just didn't stick out to me.

I think they actually change a lot, though in a very smooth and clean fashion. A Verfire proc changes how much black mana you have, which changes what spells you want to cast next to keep your Black and White mana balanced, which ultimately changes which of Verflare/Verholy you use after the melee combo and the amount of Black/White mana you start the next spell cycle with. For example, a cycle featuring two Verfire procs and zero Verstone procs is a very different sequence of spells than one which featured one of each. It just feels so natural that you don't really think about it.

[Katchii]

I think they actually change a lot, though in a very smooth and clean fashion. A Verfire proc changes how much black mana you have, which changes what spells you want to cast next to keep your Black and White mana balanced, which ultimately changes which of Verflare/Verholy you use after the melee combo and the amount of Black/White mana you start the next spell cycle with. For example, a cycle featuring two Verfire procs and zero Verstone procs is a very different sequence of spells than one which featured one of each. It just feels so natural that you don't really think about it.

That's it right here. It's so fluid you don't really even notice. It of course affects overall performance, but not really game play, not IMO anyway. They get you more black or white mana faster which gets you to the melee combo faster, but in my head I'm just tracking the mana all the time anyway and use the combo whenever I have the mana to use it, I'm not even really paying attention to how long it takes or how many casts it's just a "do I have at least 80 of each? cool, melee combo" kind of thing, for the most part.

[Lynarii]

Thanks all. I feel like i got a good plan. First is stop trying to force myself to enjoy the Dragoon. I may come back to it later, but for now its just not for me. I will boost Bard and play through HW and SB. I will pick up Red Mage down the road to play with them as well as they were one of my favorite FF archetypes. I did not want to pick up a tank or healer until i get more experience under my belt because i feel like id let people down in dungeons (I was a tank main for 5 years in WoW, so i hope to pick them up eventually).

If you're familiar with tanking in WoW, you'll probably have little trouble picking it up in FFXIV, since it's basically a similar passive threat/defenses + cooldown useage that WoW had before it went ham on things like vengeance and active mitigation. Dungeons don't really have much in the way of tank-specific information that you need to know ahead of time, so it's really just a question of being able to hold threat and popping CDs at the start of a large pull rather than waiting until you're one swing away from death and wondering why you died.

[bloodwulf]

If you're familiar with tanking in WoW, you'll probably have little trouble picking it up in FFXIV, since it's basically a similar passive threat/defenses + cooldown useage that WoW had before it went ham on things like vengeance and active mitigation. Dungeons don't really have much in the way of tank-specific information that you need to know ahead of time, so it's really just a question of being able to hold threat and popping CDs at the start of a large pull rather than waiting until you're one swing away from death and wondering why you died.

Tank will likely be my next job. Enjoying bard a lot but will want to pick up one of the tanks. I can not decide which one though. Might just wait til Gunbreaker since i am super casual. Most of the fights ive done so far seem pretty straight forward, even frankennidhogg was easy mechanically on the regular difficulty. This game does a good job make it clear what you are supposed to do with a mechanic without reading it.

[icausewipes]

wibbly wobbly timey wimey

Proc based dps - Machinist

If you are taking up tanking then give WARRIOR a shot.


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