If I can interject, a lot of the material here is hearsay and while it's a good guideline for successful pick-up parties, for a group with a strategy the Promyvions can be relatively flexible for most jobs. There are only 2 jobs that I have taken through in the past that going forward I will request a person swap to something else at 30 (and they will have something else at 30 because they are advanced jobs) and that is BRD or COR.
Paladin is useless.
I disagree. I've done each promyvion crag upwards of something over 20 times... I honestly stopped counting... and I've had PLD, NIN, and WAR (including a WAR/MNK) all tank with EQUAL efficiency. The difference is preparation, player skill, and gear. A PLD wearing shade will get ripped to shreds. A PLD wearing eisen does a fine job tanking any of the 3 lesser promyvions. Of course, the player has to know their sword from their shield.
DRK is useless.
Again, I disagree. While ranged attackers tend to need less curing in the promyvions, so are typically preferred, having 1 close range melee on the team is not a hinderance as long as the team is prepared with proper meds (for holla holy water, poison pots). For this close-range DD slot we've taken SAM, DRK, WAR, MNK, BST, BRD, THF... although BRD are the hardest, in my opinion.
RDM is useless, second heal nobody needs and takes up space for a damage dealer, can't raise
BLM is useless, the magic at that level does crap all damage to the spire mob
I
strongly disagree here. I will not take in a promyvion party without a 2nd mage. And a smn is not a 2nd mage for a lesser promyvion battle as all their MP leaves when they 2hour. Against Mea especially, gravity is your best friend. RDM are priceless. Paralyze, Slow, and a 2nd mage focused on curing the tank so the tank lives makes a world of difference. In all of the strategies I use, the 2nd mage is ALWAYS on debuff and backup cure, holding nukes for the last 10% of mob life if needed. We bring along enough DD to kill the boss, the mage is there to keep the boss slow and stupid and the tank alive. With the strategies I use, not having a rdm or blm along would end in absolute disaster.
So what works?
my personal preferred arrangement:
TANK (WAR, PLD, NIN)
HEAL1 (WHM)
HEAL2 (RDM, BLM)
DD1 (RNG*, SAM, DRK, BST, THF, MNK, WAR, whatever... damage 2hour preferred)
DD2 (RNG*, SMN)
DD3 (RNG*, SMN)
While SMN are king for Promyvion-Dem, I really don't like them for Holla at all. Too much rides on their 2hour. A sleep at the wrong time is a guaranteed party wipe. For Holla I prefer to take melee rather than mana parties where 2hours are happy, but not needed to beat the boss unless things go really wrong.
*Despite the "supposed" RNG-nerf, I still prefer RNG over SMN for the promyvions. You give me a team with the proper prep and meds and anima and 2 rng... and we can win without 2hours on any of the 3 crags. Which is helpful because I have this BAAAAAAD habit of taking 2-4 parties up at a time where the RNG need to repeat for all the teams to win and get through.
Another reason why I tend not to bring SMN except for Dem... it sucks to have to sit and wait 2 hours to take the 2nd party through because you need someone's 2hour ability to come back.
Sorry if I come off a bit strong about this, but one of my biggest petpeeves in FFXI is the commentary on our servers that people *HAVE* to be a certain job or other jobs are *USELESS*. Yes, certain jobs lend themselves better to certain strategies. But that doesn't mean there aren't other strategies that are just as effective that can use a wider variety of jobs to full advantage.
I'm sure if I limited the promyvion runs that we do at this point to people only having specific jobs that we could win 100% of the time. But that defeats the purpose of FFXI for me. I play this game for the strategy, for the challenge, and for the fun and teamwork. I won't ask someone to level a different job when the one they have already will work perfectly well once we figure out how to use it properly.
As an example, the team I originally beat the lesser promyvions with included some of my closest friends and the best we could do at the time job-wise was:
WHM
RDM
NIN
NIN
SAM
RNG
Was it hard? You bet. Did we win on our very first try? umm... no. But Holla took us the most tries at 5 and Mea the least tries at 2. It was possible and totally fulfilling when we were done.
~e
Which... brings me to date/time. Would Saturday, 7/1 at 10 AM EST work for ya'll for a promvyion-holla (hopefully enough in advance of the ZM6 for those needing that fight as well)? Let me know if so, I'll post it up on my side as well and with the official date/time post give you guys the prep list. Once I see who we have that needs it and what jobs you can bring I'll be able to figure out what job I'll be. ^^ /dance /dance Once you confirm if it's a go I'll reconfirm with Leonis since he's on England time and 5 hours ahead of us. Heaven forbid I overlap a rave. XD