[keflynmahon]

I've been playing FF11 on and off since about 2004. No matter how many times I quit I have to play again. My highest character is a level 42 WHM so I was wondering how all this abyssea will effect me? How does "leeching" in abyssea work? Sorry if this is a stupid question, I'd just been interested to understand.

Another question is which one of them should I buy for leveling reasons? Is it considered bad to "leech"? I am happy enough to party like usually, I've done it for about 6 years but I don't want to speed 2 hours waiting for an hour like I used to.

Lastly, I was on Remora which got merged with Leviathan and I think someone of that server already has my name, do I have to rename my character?

*edit* just read about cruor? I googled it to find out it is some armor but how does it effect the opening of chests?

Anything extra that you will be willing to tell me would be nice.

Thanks in advance.

This post has been edited by keflynmahon: 24 November 2010 - 09:50 AM

[Aleera]

Leeching in Abyssea usually requires you to be on box duty. I don't know if you know how abyssea parties usually operate, but what happens is when you kill a mob a certain way (i.e. via magic, melee kill, WS kill, etc.) it produces a certain type of light. Magic kills produce Azure light, melee kills produce pearl, WS kill produces ruby, elemental WS produces amber. Once you've started collecting enough azure lights at first, blue chests will start dropping, to which the chest person will check to see what's inside and pop it accordingly. Time extensions (familiar stone fragments), cruor (self explanatory), and exp (also self explanatory) are all stuff you pop right away. Temp items (laden with temp items) or JA/2hr restoral (intense soothing light) are usually called out to parties so people can either use up their temp items or a SMN or BRD can 2hr and restore it instantly so that the party progress speeds up. Usually when these parties get flowing, a person with Forbidden keys stockpiled will handle the influx of chest pops (as mobs die rather fast, and with sufficient light built up, almost every mob will drop a chest). Cruor is used to buy these keys, as well as certain armor as you mentioned, which includes the full Perle, Teal and Aurore sets, as well as empyrean head pieces.

Being your only job is 42 WHM, this may be a difficult task for you, as you won't have any cruor built up just yet, let alone a sufficient amount to be able to obtain stacks of keys to handle chest popping. Leeching may be an issue unless you have a friend who will let you join just to leech. Generally you can run a good alliance with a few leeches here and there, seeing that you really don't need more than about 12 people to get a good, fast exp pt running.


As far as name change, yeah you will have to change your name if someone on the Leviathan server has the same name as you once did. I know a lot of people had to undergo name changes during the migration.

[Nanako]

As mentioned above, you need to have a sufficient supply of cruor to get started as a key leech. And unfortunately without having the necessary key items to provide auto refresh, you won't be able to be much of a healer there either.

To get started with abyssea, you'll have to do a few quests, mostly involving seeing various cutscenes in Port Jeuno and the different Cavernous Maws. Once you've completed the basic requirements, you'll start accumulating Traverser Stones which provide the time used inside of Abyssea. So even if you can't get started right away in Abyssea, you'll still want to start accumulating Stones for later use. Once you've done the steps necessary, they'll accumulate automatically and you won't have to do anything further except ask the NPC to hand them over to you as needed.

During the time that your accumulating stones, you can solo WHM on Fields of Valor training regiments to get a few levels while seeking for a pt. You may get lucky and be invited to a level Sync party somewhere and get a few levels that way. Hopefully by the time your WHM is in the 50's you'll start being able to be a backup healer for abyssea and may be able to get away with that for a few levels.

Completing certain missions (Windurst story missions and A Shantotto Ascension) will grant you key items called Atma that you can use in Abyssea to grant you a 5 mp/tic auto refresh that stacks with other forms of refresh.

Edit: Make sure you have the WoTG expansion, and have access to the East Ronfaure [S] zone for level sync purposes.

This post has been edited by Nanako: 24 November 2010 - 12:56 PM

[keflynmahon]

Thank both of you two for your very detailed posts. Its weird how much this game has changed in a space of a year. Which of the mini-addon/expansion packs do you recommend getting?

Also, fields of valor are them books things correct? Its been so long haha.

and lastly, what did you mean by 'the time used' Nanako? in the sentence "you'll start accumulating Traverser Stones which provide the time used inside of Abyssea"?


Thanks again, I had also forget how much nice the FF11 player base is as well.

[Nanako]

I'll try to clarify what I meant. You have limited time inside of Abyssea in a sense. Each Traverser Stone allows you to add 30 minutes (modified by key items) to the time you can spend inside of Abyssea. You can have up to 120 minutes of time when you enter a zone, through a combination of time remaining from previous visits and Traverser Stones used. It's possible to extend your time in the zone through Time Extension chests (part of why there's a key leech).

A good xp pt will get lots of time extension chests, a pt I was in last night disbanded with close to 500 minutes left in the zone, though unfortunately all time above 120 was lost when I left. Basically a good xp pt will be "free" in terms of stones. I already had max time when I entered, and I had max time when I left. So another good pt wouldn't cost me any additional stones.

Stones regenerate at the rate of one every 20/16/12 hours depending on how many of the key items you've been able to obtain and provide 30/33/36/39/42 minutes per stone. The NPC will keep track of the stones for you. So 3-4 stones will max out your time in abyssea.

I recommend getting all 3 Abyssea add-ons (the 3rd just became available for purchase) if you intend on coming back. I'm sure the new one will be quite popular when it is released. Keep an eye out for announcements for a package deal for all 3 Abyssea chapters, I'm sure there's bound to be one soon. WoTG is good for a few level sync areas. The 3 previous add-ons aren't as useful as they once were, but may still provide some valuable items for beating them.

Fields of Valor are the books you'll see in various zones. They will give a list of training regiments you may attempt to do. Finishing them will give you bonus xp, gil, and a currency called Tabs which may be used to purchase temporary buffs or teleportation back to your home nation.

[keflynmahon]

I'm not sure how long I will stay for, I have a tenancy of being very unstable of the game. I don't want to spend loads of money on add-ons that I won't use.

[Ryo-go]

On and off since 2004 and only level 42? ;3

[keflynmahon]

Haha! I have taken year breaks before and I was always very slow with leveling. I leveled up a Mithra to level 40 in my first set of years before switching to my TaruTaru.

[Ryo-go]

lol I went through 7-10 character's which I leveled to 50 then got bored and deleted them to start again before actually keeping one and leveling it to 75 haha

[keflynmahon]

The last time I played was March 2009! And everything is so different now.

[Banter]

Honestly, with how casual you are and how heavily the game has swung towards end game with Abyssea, you'd be better off playing WoW or some other like minded MMO. Standard XP parties are still around, but they are really rare and also extremely slow leveling (not that you would care, I imagine). Getting help for quests isn't terribly hard, but does require a lot of shouting and can be really frustrating at times.

[keflynmahon]

The problem is. I'm having my annual FFXI cravings. Which means I have to play or I'll go crazy. I don't like WoW and I've played all the MMORPGs that I wish too. I think the first abyssea would be the best to buy?