do i have 2 form a party?

[aeris2001x2]

i just read the topic on how annoying party members can be.

i certainly dont want assholes grilling me and calling me a noob when i first start playing on september 21st.

and i certainly dont want ppl who cant play to risk killing me and lving me down.

so my question is, how hard is the game if i dont join a group?

i,m naturally a loner and would prefer 2 just be a rogue ninja/mage Shadow type character. of course it may take years 2 reach the highest levels but i certainly dont want 2 be a hinderance 2 anyone in the early days or have liabilitys when i become experienced.

[Lionx]

Pass lvl 10 your ability to solo diminishes with each lvl onward til soloing is not a viable option at all. Partying is a MUST, and it is stressed in this game. If you dont want to party, lvl up a job to 30 and learn to play Beastmaster, thats the only soloable job from lvl 1-75 for the most part.

[Yeargdribble]

Agreed... you have to PT. Even if you want to solo as a Beastmaster you will have to start by getting to lvl 30 in PTs before you can do the quest to become one. You just have to learn to get along with people. I am also a loner and the concept of PTing was scary to me but I enjoy it now.

As far as the dying thing goes... you will just kinda have to learn to judge the quality of PTs you join and know when you should leave. I've learned that the hard way a lot by trying to stay loyal to an incompetant PT. If you think the PT poses a risk to you then leave and find another. I've had to do it a lot lately.

Plus you will just have to slowly adjust and be careful. If you can find someone nice and helpful to start you off with the basics you will not have to deal with the others calling you a noob. But it happens.... people are rude and mean. Instead of sending a /tell directly to you they will shout it to everyone and make sure your ridicule is public... For example.... a friend of mine was setting a macro (shortcut key for something) and forgot to put the tag line he was to say with his attack into PT mode only. So every time he said it everyone in the area heard it. Finally some meany started shouting so that even more people could hear that he was a noob and needs to learn to set his macros. She spammed it several times while he was in the middle of a fight. It's just not nice.


But hey... if you happen to land in Fenrir then look me up and I'll help you out. There is no need for all of that. Just slowly learn what little things piss people off and don't do them.

[aeris2001x2]

thanks alot. i hope i get dropped in the same server as u :cool: sum of these ppl sound riduclously scary. i would not be surprised if there was sum online bullying. :eek:

is there like any general rules/etiquette that is advisable 4 me 2 follow 2 get along better with ppl when i first join?

[Lionx]

I think this is the most important one out of all i can think of at the moment...DONT BEG FOR GIL! >< Ask how to get gil, but dont beg for it.

Come to our Midgard server :D

[aeris2001x2]

dont worry, i,d never beg 4 anything, would rather die and lose exp.

is there anyway 2 pick a server or r u just randomly put in one of thousands?

[Lionx]

Random, you can ask for someone already in the server you want to go in, and ask them to buy a World Pass (with gil) in their server, the cost of the World Pass is dependant on server population. You insert it when the character creation process says World: and you press enter, spell your server name, and then enter your pass. The world pass enters up to 5 ppl at once, and expires in a week after it is bought.

[aeris2001x2]

looks like it will come 2 the FF gods. Hopefully my server will have sum EoFF ppl i know and wont be full of annoying casual gamers :(

[UltimateSpamGrover]

you could play solo til level 20, if someone powerlevels you along the way

[Mikztsu]

As others has stated, partying is a must in this game. Don't worry, I was kinda "scared" of it first, but you'll learn it fairly quickly. dont be afraid to tell your party members if you don't know something, don't be afraid to ask them questions - afterall, they've all had to learn it that way and they've been in same position. Besides, 90% of people are nice in this game.

I myself couldn't imagine just soloing; it's just so boring. Even waiting for invitation flag up is more fun than soloing.

[UltimateSpamGrover]

on the Garuda server, about 60% of people are nice, if you end up on Garuda, I'll feel sorry for you

[Ultima Shadow]

Just one qustion... why is a party all that necessary? Why can't you solo?

[Vaprice]

Once you get to level 8 it starts to get hard for any charcter except for maybe Monk. Thats when you want to party, plus this is a game about teamwork and such. Blah blah blah you get the idea. It's just more fun when you get a party. Weather your pulling, nuking, a tank, or the healer. It's always a good feeling. :love:

[ZeZipster]

Just one qustion... why is a party all that necessary? Why can't you solo?

Parties fit together, the mages won't be touched because of the tank and the tank won't die because of the mages... Well, atleast in a good party that is true.

[Lionx]

Because later on Decent Challenge mosnters dont seem to be decent anymore, and they get harder and harder, soon you wont be able to take em on before dying. And if you do win, you wont get as much exp as a normal exp party. You can kill Decent for 50 exp and it would be lets say 7000 til the next lvl...and thats alot of Decents and near deaths since thats hard as you lvl up beyond lvl 10. In a party you can fight Very and Incredibly Tough enemies and if all goes right you can have up to 175-200 on non-chains(chain=you fight another monster within a certain ammount of time and beat it in a certain ammount right after another, has to be Tough or higher lvl to be chainable) and then up to 210-300exp on all chains.

So its like:

Solo: 50 exp....rest(long time)....repeat. If you die it takes longer to get exp back. Plus if i dare solo any Decent Challenge at my lvl 50, i would be creamed.

Party: (assuming same mob and toughness all the way) 175exp...finish fight...45 secs later...200 exp...then 232 exp(chain #2)...250exp...then 275 exp...then if you got an exceptional party...300 exp (chain #5). Rest a little bit...then repeat.

Everything is just faster that way. This game is BUILT for partying...no way around it unless BST..and its slow too.

[aeris2001x2]

hmmm. i,m starting 2 think maybe i should not get this game. i mean i,m not a hermit, i do like socalising. but FF for me has always been a 1 player game.

and wont u have 2 wait 4 your party members 2 come online before u can fight? such problems like that i perceive.

[Lionx]

Sometimes that missing job will make it long...but you can either be that missing job or something, just do what you can. Or pick another guy up.

[Mikztsu]

I also used to think when I started this game how it should have more soloing. Now I think it shouldn't. Trust me, once you get into it, you'll enjoy it and wouldnt wanna do it otherwise than partying.

Of course, those who still dont wanna party, should pick beastmaster as advanced job. With beastmaster you can solo all you want getting good exp. You'll have to get to level 30 first, though.

[Ouch!]

I have a comment about chains. When I began leveling my Elvaan warrior, I was able to chain even matches. This was at around level 3-5. Of course, that may have been because I was soloing, as you should be at earlier levels. Anyways, that's not the point.


and wont u have 2 wait 4 your party members 2 come online before u can fight? such problems like that i perceive.

I may be reading into this, but it would seem you would believe that once you choose a party, that's what it is for the rest of the game. You'll never have to wait for someone to come online, because you form parties with people who are already online. You just form groups with people who are looking for a group. Really, it's not that difficult.

As far as forming your own parties, you may want to just let some other people invite you into their parties for a while. Forming one can be a scary thing if you're not ready. Let other people start them so you can get an idea of how they form the party. Once you've got a good idea, go right ahead.

One note for starting a party, ask people if they'd like to join before you invite them. It's rude to do otherwise and will piss a lot of people off.

[Lionx]

O btw you kno that 45 sec wait i put..i am pretty sure its wrong..it may be at first for newb parties, but as you go up the lvls, it grows less and less and its more of 15 secs...basically you keep exp going and going and going and going...etc.

Its fun to be a party, trust me :P

[Citizen Bleys]

As a level 26 white mage, I can barely survive an assault by an Easy Prey...and if a Too Weak To Be Worthwhile happens to spawn nearby and aggro me, I'm DOGMEAT.

As I discovered to my dismay trying to get the Kazham keys. I managed to get the Giddeus key by myself, but only after I had help with Ghelsba and Palborough.

[Ryth]

Well I hear bosses are really tough and stuff in areas and you need teammates to win or you're gonna have to spend a lotta of you're time hitting goblins and rabbits but the best solo job is Red Mage with black magic, white magic, special aliment skills (poison, sleep, silence), and good hand-to-hand combat but Beastmaster is best boring cuz' the monsters do everything for you.

[Garland]

As a level 30 whm, I find I can solo undead such as ghouls much more reliably, and that con a much higher rating than standard enemies. Where a decent challenge goblin might leave me on the brink of death, an offensive barrage of Cure III (stronger than the strongest same level nuke) can take down undead with ease. With Protect II, Blink, and Stoneskin, I often win before taking damage at all. If you're a whm with soloing in mind, consider the undead. You won't have competition for them. In many cases, you'll be doing standard levellers a favor - the undead won't be alive to aggro their low hp members.

[Lionx]

I would say if WHM can stand to fight anything, its undead, like in FF1. So thats pretty cool to me ^^

Best solo job is BeastMaster, you charm targets and use them to fight the other mob, thats the BEST solo job. Next is Red Mage, their spells and melee dont excel in either way, only soso dmg and thats crappy. They can simply outlast their opponents in a 15+minute battle.

Then its Ninja with blink tanking and lots of money for them, then RNG with Shadow Bind or they fight solo worms.

[aeris2001x2]

well i shall become a beast master Black mage and reign in my server without any help...
* runs out for combat and is decapitated by the first Behemoth*

[Mikztsu]

Well, all I can say is...good luck. o_o'

[Yeargdribble]

Still at a lot of problems with become a BST/mage of any kind.

You have to be level 30 to do the BST quest. If you wanna have mage as a sub you MUST party. A BLM can dish out the hurt but can't take it and a WHM can't really dish out enough to kill a monster before running out of cures.

I would say that a good number of easy prey monsters (the lowest you can get EXP from) can kick the crap out of my WHM. Even then it's just not viable. Getting 12 EXP for a 10 minute fight when you need 5000 EXP for the next level? It would take you at least a week to gain a level.

Also if you want to have a sub you will need to have a job in it's 30s to solo monsters and get the goods for the subjob quest.

You will NEVER make it above Rank 2 PERIOD!!! You must fight a monster with your level capped at 25 that you can do only mildly well with 6 people... It would be impossible to solo.

I can go on for quite a while explaining how impossible it would be to solo but there's no need.


______________

Yes all of the others FFs have been first player. I was a little afraid of this too and I've completed them all. But once you start playing it will not be an issue. You will learn to love partying. You probably will enjoy it enough that you decide not to be a beastmaster after all.

[Grand Lethal]

yeah, this game is definitely not designed with soling in mind, but SE should really tweak it a little bit... I mean if something comes up as 'Easy Prey with low defense and evasion' it should be a cakewalk, not a 10 minute life or death struggle lol. I do have to disagree with one statement though:


You will NEVER make it above Rank 2 PERIOD!!! You must fight a monster with your level capped at 25 that you can do only mildly well with 6 people... It would be impossible to solo.

I have heard tale of DRG/WHM soloing the dragon before, so I think it can be done. I have also done it with a party that was capped as follows: 20/10 THF/NIN (me), 20/10 RDM/BLM (ls member), and 20/10 DRG/MNK (some guy we picked up).

3 members, and we wasted the dragon battle easily. We would have had a full PT, but everyone else was R2 and not on this portion of the mission. Of course the LS mate didn't know we needed them higher rank or on the same mission, and the BRD we had kept claining he had his RDM at lvl 70, even though his gear was sub-par, and he was R2. Long story short 3 made it in, 3 stayed outside, and we kicked some dragon butt as a gimped party... are what great stories are made of :)

I hope SE changes the way Mobs con to you as a character though, I'm tired of thinking I can kill a goblin that is easy with my WHM only to die ><

[Lionx]

Go to www.ffxionline.com and d/l one of ping's music vids, he soloed the Dragon as a DRK/WHM taru...the Dragon is a total pushover if you know what your doing.

[DJZen]

Anyone worried about parties in this game should hear this story that just happened to me. I was running a mission in an area I'd never been to before, and was a little confused about what to do next. So I asked the first guy I happened across, and not only did he show me what to do, he even showed me how to get back. He had no incentive for this, he was just a nice guy. I've never encountered rudeness, just lots and lots of l337spe4k. Also, because I'm new to the game, I ask a lot of questions, and I get those questions answered. This is one reason why I like parties. The game is so vast that it actually helps to have other people around so you can know where you're going and what you're doing.

[Rostum]

The way you can have alot of fun in this game, and meet lots of nice people, is not to think and act like you know everything. I think alot of people that are comming through to Valkurm after leveling their level 60 job, to level a lower job, don't realise this. They will go off at a newbie person for doing something wrong and it just won't be fun at all.

Ask questions in parties, be nice and just have fun; alot of "l33t" players have forgotten this it seems, IMO.

[Kegsay]

Give it a go aeris, try to level a job to 30 solo. I'm being sincere in this, I certainly haven't followed main-stream in my job selection *nudges Lionx*. Try it, it might be long and tiresome, but you should be able to do it. :D Good Luck

[Lionx]

Only cuz you got Harpolye and friends and you go /anon :p I seriously doubt you can easily get a job to 30 especially as a White Mage ;)

I personally would give my best out there, and always when in doubt, ask how i can improve the current situation and what i can do to further my character as a White Mage. I just give it my all to 5 other people there. But usually as long as you can decent skill, you get decent exp, however i push as much as i can, and therefore at least getting the feeling i get even more exp and love <3