BLM Gear Suggestions W/Blizzard IV's Vs Ebony Puddings

My game time is very limited right now so until that changes, the only changes I can make would be buying gear from the AH, for the most part.

The primary use for my BLM right now is killing Ebony Pudding's for fun with my limited gametime.

During the pt I had 5/5 ice potency and 5/8 Elemental Magic Skill. My average damage (when food wore) was a depressing 1137 on Blizzard IV's with the below noted gear.

Please, keep suggestions limited to AH-purchasable items. I can farm to make the gil to buy items eventually but most non-AH items are going to have to wait quite a while for me.

Thanks, in advance for your advice. (Also, yes... the Zircon is embarrassing, it'll be replaced soon!)

http://www.ffxiah.com/item_sets.php?id=159593

your current set:


From AH only:

Uggalepih pendant (neck) / philomath stole
errant/mahatma slops
demon helm +1
igqira hands or genie
witch sash or penitent rope.
prism cape or ixion cape.
Sorc. ring if you have MP<>HP convert gears.

there is the new neck and back pieces, but they are stupidly expensive, so just wait till the prices drop.

What I would do is, sell the 2 rings you have, buy 2 cheap INT+4 rings and with the rest of the money get an uggalepih pendant

Puddings really weak to magic, so get more INT. Your set is good for high resistant mobs.

This is pretty much the right idea

The first changes I would make are the legs and hands as AF and druids are doing nothing for your damage, and with 5/8 merits (I assume you are working towards 8/8) you should be ok as far as resists go.

After those 2, I would look at your ring/neck/ammo/grip slot.
4 or 5 INT ring (as money allows)
Neck should be P.Sole as it is super cheap
P.Tathlum for ammo
Bugard +1 for grip

After that you are getting into whitebox/rare gear territory, so I won’t go into that atm (unless you want me to).

That depends on the server, Hecate`s Cape dropped to 700k on Valefor already, that`s cheaper than Ixion.

dont know what your budget is but if ur just killing puddings

adding to previous suggestions

AH
crapaud earring
Genie Weskit
Lemegeton Medallion/(+1) for above 50% mp uggaleph blow 50% mp


I know you werent really looking at non ah items but vicious mufflers are not hard to get with only a couple of friends. Generally 2-3 is plenty to get a pair

I'm not a BLM, my BLM is level 34 at present, so forgive my lack of understanding, but I thought Elemental Magic Skill was better than Int?
So surely AF Hands are excellent for nuking?
Same with Ele Torque over Philomath?

Again, I'm not a BLM, this is just what I thought, and I see career BLMs are saying otherwise here, could someone explain it to me?

Thanks!

I'm no expert blm either, but basically Ele skill only improves your accuracy, not damage. So it's great when you're fighting mobs that have high magic def, or high lvl etc and resist magic a lot. Gods are what spring to my mind. But for mobs that don't resist much, it's almost pointless to stack skill, so putting on INT/MaB will improve your damage more.

Oyoyu:

Elemental skill is not like combat skills (which add both acc and attack when increased). Elemental skill increases only magic accuracy (not damage), which lowers the chance of a resist. Magic attack bonus (like the Moldavite and Novio earrings) add only damage, not accuracy. INT is a mix of both.

In example, assuming neither cast is resisted, a BLM casting Fire on a worm with 300 elemental magic skill will do exactly the same damage as a BLM with 5 elemental magic skill, as long as they both have the same INT / MAB.

As everyone has said

In very simple terms
* Skill = Big decrease in the chance of being resisted
* Magic attack bonus = Big increase in damage
* INT = Small increase in both damage and the chance of being resisted

Very approximatly, Skill is twice as effective as INT at reducing resist rate and Magic attack bonus is twices as effective as INT at increasing damage.

For lower level BLM, as Oyoyo and Superdan, elemental skill is critical when you do not have access to the elemental staves, which IMO greatly reduce your resists. Having your spells land consistently far outweighs having to cast three nukes to have one land potently.

For the OP, INT rings such as Diamond, Omni, or Snow rings do fairly well. These are the AH choices with the most INT. Hale ring is decent for free with assault points, Tamas from CoP, and Omega from Einherjar are little more difficult, but also good.

Elemental Torque for resists, Philomath Stole if you're broke for neck. The ele skill is preferred. On that note, focus your merits on 8/8 elemental and 8/8 enfeebling if you're going to main BLM, helps with RDM and SCH later.

Elemental staves... no brainer. Go HQ when you can. 7/8, missing the light staff as BLM doesn't necessarily use it.

Igqira body for INT, elemental skill and MAB. I would also look into gloves if you have no problems with resists, the AF hands are beast for HNM and gods, who resist often, but puddings high INT can be beat with little prep. Zenith mitts are second to Morrigan Cuffs. Those two might be rough to get depending on your endgame capabilities.

For the feet, its a little hard to say. I use Yigit, its not that hard to get a party to go into Halvung. Otherwise, R pumps have good INT, Mountain Gaiters can be ok if you're really lacking, and Errant as a last resort.

Earrings, I would suggest Phantom earrings from the AH, Abyssal if you can do Divine Might. Loq is good for MP and faster casting on your nukes, but some BLM do not like to use it due to it has no INT. Moldy is an obvious choice, and an easy kill, the drop rate can blow tho. Novio when you get to sea and a LS can support you. Or if you have milz of gilz.

Rainbow cape is cheap. Prism cape is better. Ixion cape is beast. Any will do. There are others, see what you like.

Penitent's Rope's INT is great, Witch's Sash if you can afford it, the MACC is awesome, the crit chance is meh, but can be fun if it procs. Sorcerer's Belt from dyna is best for nukes.

Mahatma Slops has best INT. Jet Serawheels following that. Errant legs last, they're cheap on AH.

Bugard Strap +1 is INT for the works, Ice Grip is elemental accuracy and some more MP. Either works. Bugard is cheaper I think.

Phantom Tathlum for the INT and MP for ranged slot. The MACC book is good too if you can get it. Tarutaru RSE slot items isn't bad if you're taru.

Think thats it. Sorry for wall of text.

You must of missed the bit about AH only and nuking Puddings only

Otherwise, sound advice.

Yeah for puddings just go all out on dmg. You resist should be floored in full dmg ah gear. Especially with what is available now

Ahh thanks for the great info everyone!

My boyfriend is a recent 75 blm, and I'd always assumed Ele>Int, so had ignored those hand pieces with Mag Att on them, but now I know, I'll take a good look at his gear.
I've been buying a lot of his gear for him as pressies as he's not on much due to work so can't farm much.

He does need some important gear upgrades.
At the moment he has:

Ele staff (Ice, Thunder, Wind HQ), Ele grips, Phantom Tathlum
AF Hat / Igqira Tiara
Elemental Torque / Philomath Stole
Phantom Earring
Moldy
AF Body / Igqira Weskit / Relic Body / Errant Body
AF Hands
Level 72 Int 4 rings
Red Cape +1 (definitely needs an upgrade!)
Penitent's Rope
Errant Legs / AF Legs
AF Feet / Mountain Gaiters

I think that's all of it.
I'm rather broken on gil atm myself though, so I need to do a lot of farming for myself and can't buy him too much at the moment.
He doesn't have Sea / Sky yet either.

Is there a cap with Ele skill then? So we can work out what he should be using that on rather than int?
He's a taru, so int is high.
He does Dyna, campaign and gets xp, that's pretty much it though at the moment.


Thanks everyone!

It isn't that there is a cap on ele skill so much as on say puddings capping hit rate is pretty easy and once you do that skill is useless.

The more or less old thumbrule for HNMs was 120int 320 skill. But for most NMs and even more so most non NM mobs that is way way overkill. Also now there is alot more macc gear which is same as skill pretty much. And more is known on macc and hitrates and effects of skill/macc/int etc on all that.

Most dynamis stuff isn't that much more resistant then puddings. If you got the time and patience checking your resist rate on mobs over time is a good way to tell if you need more macc/skill/int in your setup

Thank you everyone for the advice!

Not many mentioning the Sorcerer's Ring? If you want to really put out some extra damage, I highly recommend it. It's expensive, but I'm pretty sure you can activate it with all AH purchasable items. I'm still missing a few different things Rare/EX id like to have, so it takes me 4 macros to activate. It's been totally worth it for me.

Prior to the Sorc. Ring, my Freeze II knocked a pudding down to 62% on average. Now the average is 58% on my first nuke. Three-hitting them is simple now, and the last nuke is overkill. I know the other gear I'm wearing makes a difference, but the ring is the one piece I couldn't live without.

Aphy: You've pretty much sold me on the Sorc's Ring. I've been looking at it but wasn't quite sure. A lot of people I've burned with have told me conflicting stuff..

Good to know it does make a good chunk of difference!

Never ignore 10MAB. It is single handedly the biggest increase in dmg in one piece of gear outside of obis on day and staffs and really good augmented weskits

Sorc ring rocks if you can use it, depending on other gear it will give you a 6-9% boost in damage.

I assumed that the OP probably didn't have the money (or the -hp gear) for it.

Glad to know you'll be trying it out. You wont be sorry! :-)

MAB and INT the most of whatever you can get on either rings and earrings.

The Ebon Coat set pieces body legs and head with mab vs amorph will reach higher than maybe anything else for damage on puddings.

Is My Blizz IV Set Since You Dont Play Much Some Gear IE Selenian Cap u prolly wouldnt b able to get (b4 that im pretty Sure i Used Demon Helm +1) For Tamas Just get a Snow Ring if you dont have 1 ~.

Selenian Cap is freakin' incredible. My friend and I were just going to start these missions. A few of the fights look really tough, so I'm hoping we can find people to help out.

Here's a gil friendly way to boost your BlizIV damage, I'd opt. PRope over your current waist, since we're talking about SOLELY upping your damage, and Phantom Tathlum over the MACC ammo, since your resist rate should be floored on flans.

Not sure about Phoenix, as I didn't look it up but everything listed there is 300k or less on my server. If you can't afford the whiteboxes I listed, keep using Rainbow, and use igqira hands and errant legs and NQ demon's until you can afford the HQs. Also you don't need that ice acc strap. Upgrade to the HQs when you're able and get snow rings and/or sorc ring. I know you already have a snow ring, but you should sell and use two diamonds, work on other slots first and upgrade to snow rings last.

Not sure if you have sea access, but if you do work on a Hyorin Obi, it's not too time consuming and it will increase your BlizIV damage drastically on iceday or if you have hailstorm on from a SCH.

Grab the hecate's over ixion or prism capes, it does beat them both and on my server at least it's around same price as prism.

Hecates will only win by a tiny amount on AM2. On blizz 4 as per the OP ixion will do more.

Oh and on my server hecate is about 300k more than ixion

my server it started selling for 1.3m, after second takeover it fell to 300-400k and selling like hotcakes.

you use your ixion, I'll use my hecate's :P

Lol over hear it started at like 9mil then dropped to 1mil. BUt that caused ixion to go to like 600-700k.

If I was really motivated I'd use hecates for AM2 and ixion for T4... but yeah not for like 5 more dmg on 2 spells I cast lol

This is a bit off subject, but wouldn't Dorje or Laevateinn with their 20 and 25 MAB respectively be the penultimate goal in reaching highest damage for nukes?

Or do staves add a linear damage bonus not equated into MAB? Seeems to me Staves and MAB are the same thing.

Dorje adds a static straight line bonus...

NQ ele staves adds +10% potency
HQ ele staves adds +15% potency

Most people would take the % bonus.