159 replies to this topic

[Iyouboushi]

So it is true. You have to beat the three hard mode primals before you can continue on in the 2.5 storyline.  Ugh.  That took about 3 hours (thanks to all the long queues and the battles themselves).  I guess I'll talk about each of them here a little bit (not going to do a guide or anything since you can look that up yourself) but just more of overall thoughts on them.
 

 

Ifrit

The easiest of the normal mode primals, Ifrit hard turned out to be the second hardest. Lulz.  I died twice on Ifrit.  The first time was when I was trying to use the limit break on him.  I got stunlocked in the animation while the ground exploded beneath me. To make matters worse, I missed.  People were laughing at me and making jokes.  But thankfully no one really got mad.  Second time I died was after Ifrit used his clone ability.  I'm not even really sure what hit me but it did a ton of damage.  Again, they were laughing at it and raised me..but oh well.  At least I got him done.

 

Garuda

The hardest of the normal mode primals turned out to be the easiest of the hard mode ones. No one died, no one even really came close to dying (I think I went down to 2k hp at one point but that's the lowest I ever got).  She didn't even try to limit break, that's how fast we burned her down. It's almost ironic that the hardest one would be the easiest lol.

 

Titan aka I want to shoot myself.

After waiting for an ungodly amount of time in the queue for this one, I finally got in.  I knew Titan would be the hardest just simply based on the patterns he has (he has a bunch) but I don't think any amount of talking about it can really prepare you for how insane this fight really is.  The dumbest part about this one is that people were dying on the easy stuff (the move Landslide, which pushes you over the edge if you're hit, and when he leaps up and lands people were standing in the red area and being knocked off).  It was also annoying because every time Titan would get his heart out for us to burn down, he'd start spamming the jail thing and we couldn't do enough damage to get the people out and kill the heart both.  So he'd just limit break and we'd wipe.  After three attempts I experienced my first ragequit.  Out of all the parties I've had in FFXIV and all the times people have made mistakes I've never actually seen anyone ragequit.  Sure, I've been yelled at for not knowing what I was doing in the last two storymode missions but even then it was just a simple "oops, sorry!" kind of deal and they understood.  Here we had someone snap and quit, leaving the duty entirely and leaving us high and dry.  Thankfully another person joined not too long after and the 4th time was the charm lol.  Somehow we won. 

 

Titan was the first real difficulty spike in this game.  I might have died to other bosses but this is the first one where I wasn't sure if we were going to be able to do it or not due to how crazy it was.  Of course a few hours later I did the Keeper of the Lake duty which made Titan look like baby's first primal battle. 

 

I'm now on the duty The Chrysalis which looks to be crazy but not as crazy as Keeper of the Lake. lol

[Iyouboushi]

For The Keeper of the Lake no one in the party had actually done it before.  That was kind of cool.  I had briefly watched a video on the bosses but I didn't really study anything so it was kind of like trying to figure stuff out on our own which is incredibly rare these days (now-a-days a lot of people have already done the trials and dungeons so many times they could do them in their sleep). 

 

This dungeon has three bosses.  The first has a weird mechanic in that it drops barrels that you have to attack to send away from you because those barrels can become 'live' and explode like a bomb.  The boss can also suck everything towards it, including the barrels, which can be a pain if some of them are lit and are about to explode (hard to dodge when that happens).  But it isn't too bad.  The second boss is a flying mech thing that basically poops huge fire spots on the ground.  It's really easy to get boxed in on that (and if you want to see how bad it can get go look at the pic I took where I was literally cornered).  Touching the spots will do damage over time (it's like the dot that bard can do with the fire circle thing except more damage of course). It also summons adds that need to be burned down fairly fast or else you might get overwhelmed.

 

The last boss is Midgardsormr.  At first he's pretty easy, just shoots out tons of AOE beams that you can dodge if you're paying attention.  Then he reanimates a dragon that you have to kill.  The dragon itself can do a breath technique.  As you're trying to kill the dragon, Midgardsormr is spamming things that you have to dodge.  At about 50% of the dragon's life a bird thing will show up with a generator.  You kill the bird thing and huddle together and activate the generator.  If you're fast enough you'll survive Midgardsormr's limit break.  If you're not.. it's insta-death and you have to restart.  Once the first dragon is dead, he'll take a massive HP drop before he reanimates the second dragon.  The laser light show becomes a bit more hectic in this stage because in addition to beams of AOE you have to dodge, the floor will begin to light up red and explode--like Titan and Ifrit's moves.  Again, when the second dragon's HP is about 50% another bird shows up and you need to get the generator activated asap.  Midgardsormr really doesn't give you a lot of time between killing the add to activating the shield before he obliterates the battlefield.  After the second dragon dies he'll take yet another massive HP drop but still continue to do beams and light the ground on fire.  So just have to kill him quick at that stage.

 

It took us three tries to beat him.  First time we died while trying to activate the generator (we waited too long to kill the bird).  Second time we beat the first dragon and was about 20% left on the second dragon when the exploding floor killed all but me and I died to the second dragon a few seconds later when it turned its attention on me (hard to kite when half the battlefield is shooting lasers and exploding XD).  Third time we beat it... but man.  That was hard.  I'd rather do Titan hard over and over than do that again.

[Iyouboushi]

Woo. I finally made it to Ishgard and finished the 2.x storyline entirely!  RIP my wrists and hands.  They hurt so bad after bumrushing the story so hard the past few days lolol.

 

I went ahead and unlocked dark knight and machinist.  Both start you off with the level 30 abilities (about 12 each) and don't really explain how to play the job well.  Upon unlocking it a job duty quest is immediately unlocked.  I tried the dark one twice and kept failing so I gave up on that.  I have no idea how you play dark.  I know the job uses MP for some of its moves but it has absolutely no way to heal when you first get it (and can't use mnk or cnj's healing stuff).  I kept getting murdered and the NPC that is supposed to heal you in the fight is so slow that he probably shouldn't even bother.  By the time he healed me from almost dying my HP was gone again and I died. lulz. 

 

Machinist, on the other hand, is a bit easier (I actually did that one on the first try).  However, at the beginning it's basically a very slow paced bard.  And again, no way to heal yourself. lolol I still don't know exactly how to play the machinist entirely as there's stuff for ammo and I'm not sure what that affects.  Guess I'll have to play around with it some more and try to figure it out.

 

Overall, I'm happy I made it to Ishgard but kind of disappointed at the two jobs I've unlocked so far. I know it's only level 30 so it's kind of early to judge them but I just expected more out of them.  I figured DRK would be a lot better (i.e. wouldn't have the defense of a squishy mage) and was hoping machinist would be something more than a slow bard.  Ah well.

 

For what it's worth, I probably won't touch any more storyline quests until Smz catches up.  For reference, I stopped immediately upon arriving in the city of Ishgard itself (I didn't talk to the npc to finish the quest that brings you there). I'll also probably be taking a break from the game when the subscription runs out.  Not a long one, I suspect, but maybe a few weeks just to let my hands rest up and to play something else for a while lol.

[Iyouboushi]

Level update time!

 

 

Disciples of War
Gladiator - 25

Pugilist  - 15
Marauder  - 9
Lancer   - 16
Archer   - 52
Rogue - 27

Disciples of Magic
Thaumaturge - 10
Conjurer   - 10
Arcanist   - 2

Extra Jobs
Dark Knight - 32
Machinist - 31
Astrologian - 0

Disciples of the Land
Miner   - 15
Botanist - 13
Fisher - 7

Disciples of the Hand

Carpenter - 4
Blacksmith - 3
Armorer - 5
Goldsmith - 12
Leatherworker - 2
Weaver - 1
Alchemist - 9
Culinarian - 17

 

 

And for whatever it's worth:

 

Player Commendation: 26

 

Currencies:

 

Gil: 205,598

Company Seals: 6,884/45,000

Manderville Gold Saucer Points: 440

Tombstone of Poetics: 1,553/2,000

Allied Seals: 4/4,000

[Iyouboushi]

I'm now 0/3 on that dark knight first job duty quest.  I don't know what I'm doing wrong. I think I'm getting pretty close to the end but I keep dying at the same spot, basically.  You have to fight packs of mobs (soldiers).  There's an NPC with you and if the NPC dies the duty fails.  If you die the duty fails.  If I pull all the hate (using flash) I get slaughtered.  If I let the NPC tank some of them while I try to kill a few at a time he usually gets slaughtered (not on the first pack, but towards the end[?]).  I'm now level 32 DRK.  Two levels higher than you can do that first duty..and I still can't complete it.  I'm starting to think that DRK may not be the job for me lol.  Unlike other job duties, you don't gain the echo bonus either.  You do it on normal difficulty or you don't do it at all.

 

Honestly, at this point I think I'm going to just continue to main bard.  I was kind of hoping that machinist or dark knight be would be -amazing- jobs and that I'd get sucked into either one of those and pick one as a new main.  But machinist just feels like a really slow bard (albeit it with guns) and dark knight is apparently too difficult for me to play (you'd think I'd figure it out enough to do that duty by now lol).  I may work on them slowly in down time or while waiting for queues but I don't think I'm going to try to blitz them to 50 to use as my every day job. 

 

I guess I should've expected this to happen.  I spent 70+ hours playing one job and now I could do it in my sleep.  Switch to a new one, especially one that is completely different, and I feel like I've never touched XIV before in my life.

[Smz]

Man, whoever thought the level 20 Arcanist job duty was balanced needs to be fired. Ugh. Right, because I can totally take out nine enemies with one AoE ability on a long recast! Oh and heal the npc to the npc doesn't freaking die. I've already failed twice because I can't keep up with everything.

 

..I bet the same person did the Dark Knight one. If I wasn't leveling White Mage for myself, this job would stay at level 0. Forever. That's how annoyed I am with Arcanist.

 

On non-lulz, took down Leviathan and Ramuh, I think Shiva is next. lol So not really too far away, I think?

[Iyouboushi]

  You're getting there.

 

You still have Snowcloak (if you haven't done it), Shiva, the three hardmode primals, the Chrysalis, and the Steps of Faith to do.   Then you'll be caught up (after 40 minutes of cutscenes )

[Smz]

...... I had a different post to write, but it vanished somehow. lulz. So guess will be a different one.

 

The level 20 Arcanist wouldn't have been too bad if the stupid ACN npc would actually MOVE out of the way of attacks. Oh gee, I'm a squishy mage but I'll try to tanks hits like I'm a Paladin! I know all npcs do that, just they really need like -50% damage taken or something. Which then makes the ACN quest a pain, as it somehow expects you to take out all enemies and keep the main npc alive too. Yet the enemies do a ton of damage even to Topaz Carbuncle and trying to keep them off you at the same time. And job/class quests have to be done solo no matter what. I was about to just forget about the quest if I had lost a third time. Playing a class I don't like makes it worse when it then has lulz quests on top of it.

 

The only reason I'm leveling this to 34 is to have a cross-class action for WHM that's really important, in the 1% chance I decide to actually use WHM in dungeons. Since I'm leveling it past 30, I might as well unlock Summoner and Scholar, despite the fact I'll never use those jobs. Ever. Kind of what I did on XI.

 

Lancer I'm getting to 34 so I can use Blood for Blood on Monk. A guide says Mercy Stroke at level 26 Marauder as well, though Mercy Stroke can only be used when an enemy is at 20% health or below.

 

And levels update, kind of behind on this. lol

 

Disciples of War
Pugilist - 51
Gladiator - 16
Marauder - 15
Lancer - 23
Archer - 16
Rogue - 18

Disciples of Magic
Thaumaturge - 30
Conjurer - 35
Arcanist - 21

Extra Jobs
Dark Knight - 0
Machinist - 0
Astrologian - 0

Disciples of the Land
Miner - 52
Botanist - 51
Fisher - 50

Disciples of the Hand
Alchemist - 25
Blacksmith - 33
Carpenter - 30
Leatherworker - 23
Armorer - 21
Goldsmith - 33
Weaver - 28
Culinarian - 30

Soul Crystals

Spoiler

Soul of the Monk
Soul of the White Mage
Soul of the Black Mage

 

 

Almost done getting all crafter jobs to a base of level 30. Might throw the daily beast tribe crafter ones to Weaver to finish that to 30, then Alchemist, Leatherworker, and Armorer. I could do 9 of the Ixal quests a day now, which helps me keep leves for combat classes at the moment. You can do 12 a day, so the last three will be for Amalj'aa for now.

[Smz]

Okay, who made Ramuh angry? Storming all day, so I guess won't be playing XIV tonight. Will try to do more of the story tomorrow, so will let some of the leves build back up, I suppose. lol

[Iyouboushi]

Lulz.

 

Meanwhile I haven't been able to play due to lolwork and not feeling so good (yay congestion/headaches/whatever).  I'm going to try to hop on tomorrow if I can though, regardless of how I'm feeling.

 

The only question is.. what to do?  Part of me wants to continue grinding DRK even though I'll probably never use it outside of just us (if I can't even beat that stupid duty there's no way I can use it to actually tank things for a group of players).  Another part of me wants to get machinist to whatever level the armor is given at.  Their armor looks pretty cool and I think it'd be kind of funny to glamour my current bard armor into the machinist armor (talk about confusing people).  At least, that's assuming that A: you can actually obtain the armor that the screenshots and concept art shows them wearing and B: you can glamour it the way I'd want (the armor I'm currently wearing on bard can be worn by both machinist and bard, but of course machinist armor would probably be machinist only).

 

Anyway, it'd be a long grind regardless.  At least machinist I could use in duty finder once I get a little more familiar with how to play it.  I really need to figure out rotations (bard doesn't have to worry too much about rotations but just about every other job does) and maybe set up 3 different rotations and use the three hot bars for them.  That way I can just click one thing after another on the bar and not try to jump around between 3 bars like a madman.

 

Or I could just do Adamantoise Tears until 35 then go to dragonhead and get into a FATE party and get 14k xp per FATE doing almost nothing for hours on end..