Project Degimpification

DRK was my first job to 75, and is really the reason I exist largely as a gimpy Elvaan mage. I knew when starting the game that I wanted to take DRK up, and chose my race because of that. I leveled it to 75 and was happy, somewhere in the timeframe of 2005-2006. After hitting 75 I joined up with Precedence, applying in a group application with my RL friends Andraana and Amatsukami, with whom I'd been playing the game since its NA release.

In this same timeframe I'd been leveling BRD, mostly to coincide with the release of the Merit abilities. Unwilling to deal with the horror of seeking endless limit parties on DRK, I leveled BRD primarily as a means to gain limit points. Also, it was a fun job to level.

I quickly found out that my DRK was not quite up to the standards of much of the rest of Precedence. Not to say that it was completely gimped: I had several pieces of Adaman gear, which was the best available at the time, and pretty decent gear swaps for TP, Weapon Skills, and Dark Magic, but Precedence was topheavy with much better DD setups and as such I found myself coming to more events than not as BRD.

BRD in endgame was not particularly satisfying nor challenging: there wasn't much gear I could really use, and there wasn't much skill involved in keeping two songs up on a party, which was all it really entailed.

At the same time, Precedence had a shortage of BLM's, which was the only reason I really ever leveled BLM to begin with. Once I did, though, I found that I loved it. It was so much more intricate a job than DD and BRD: its solo capabilities were something entirely new, and the crowd control aspects in Dynamis and other large fights were a welcome change.

Eventually, due to RL priorities (roughly the 2nd half of 2007), I took a ~6 month break from FFXI and upon returning found that Precedence had broken up and its members had moved on. I took this time to gain Sea access, level SCH, and study up on the ways the game had changed: the new available gear, the advent of zerging, and also to master the Spellcast plugin for Windower, which drastically advances the efficiency with which mage jobs spend their mp. I focused heavily on gardening in this timeframe and earned enough gil to bring my BLM to AH respectability, including a bare-bones 320/120 build and 8/8 HQ staves. I also brought my RDM sub, at long last, to 37, a necessary evil I'd been putting off forever.

I applied and was accepted into Remedy in this timeframe, focusing back on endgame activities. Once reaching SCH 75, in early May 2008, I found myself nearly full-timing SCH at endgame with Remedy, as its officers/tanks slowly warmed to the idea of a full-force AOE Stoneskin and Phalanx with realistic capabilities both for healing and nuking. They appreciated the versatility of the job.

Along the way my DRK became officially retired. The gear was too far behind, and I was focusing my merits 100% on SCH. Eventually I was able to merit my SCH to 100%, and was acquiring good gear for it, including Vicious Mufflers, 5/8 obis, Goliard Clogs, an Ixion Cloak, as well as Einherjar pieces including an Omega Ring, Morgana's Choker, and Gleeman's Cape. My HNM nuking set, pushing as close to 320/120 as I can get on SCH, is also coming along nicely: the Omega Ring and Gleeman's Cape are essential pieces to that, and I've recently acquired the necessary Limbus pieces to upgrade my SCH AF body piece to its +1 version, a necessary piece to the build. The only things I'm missing for a bona fide 320/120 build are the AF2 head (+7 elemental skill /drool) and the AF2 accessory. With Paradigm showing good success at Dynamis (3 DRK capes dropped in Dynamis Bubu on Wednesday), both are real possibilities.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. With my SCH gear inching closer and closer to where I want it, I've turned back to my first love in the game, my DRK. I realized that with my assets: an active nyzul group, a good salvage group, a decent source of gil at my disposal, a limbus group that could easily expand into omega-slaying territory, and a linkshell that's working its way back up to Odin access, turning my DRK into something of a force seemed plausible. Its gear was an embarrassment, but blowing ~2M on the AH (including 75 saved up ABC's) for some gear has punched it back up to respectability. This included Dusk Gloves, Dusk Boots, Black Cuisses, a Chivalrous Chain, a Potent Belt, upgrading my AF gloves to AF+1 (the upgrade pieces had been sitting around forever), and a Brutal Earring. I acquired a Forager's Mantle ages ago, I still had Snipers and Flame Rings x2, and the odd Heca Head I acquired from a random Fafnir with Precedence way back when.

So for the past few weeks my project has been my DRK. It's amazing how much progress you can make when you put your mind to it. A little luck also never hurt. My Nyzul group has literally gone 4/4 on Askar Bodies from Floor 80 bosses: meaning, we've fought a Floor 80 boss 4 times and gotten a damn Askar Body every time. So, even though my stated target with our Nyzul group is Goliard, the last Askar Korazin dropped to me because I was literally the last person left who could equip it. It's a very nice piece, too: Attack +12 and boosts to Double Attack and Store TP make for a great TP piece when I can eat sushi or when accuracy is otherwise not a primary concern, and it's a good WS piece under any circumstance. Of course, it's not an e.body, but what is?

I'd like to round out my hecatomb set for max WS potency, but honestly, for DRK, hecatomb is only marginally better than your TP set in most cases. Accuracy still means a great deal when it comes to Guillotine. You can't put up the gratuitous numbers, but you can put up respectable numbers more consistently.

I'd say priority #1 is getting some Homam at this point. My limbus static of 3 (myself, Andraana, and Miori) is perhaps expanding to ~5, maybe 6, and with the quality of that group should be enough to clear all Apollyon zones and take down Omega. I very much like a small group for this as it makes for more controlled fights, less organizational hassle, and a much greater likelihood of garnering drops. We also expand our Temenos repertoire, primarily for the opportunity to upgrade our AF. I still have a number of upgrades that would benefit me directly (SCH AF+1 head would be very nice, I also need BRD AF+1 hands, to think of two off the top of my head).

I'm also on the top of my salvage group's priority list for Ares feet, and 2nd on any other Ares that drops. Ares is actually only somewhat useful for DRK, but at least it makes for good WS gear.

Still, things are looking up. I'm hopeful. And Magi looks pretty damn good in her Askar body ^^