What do you think of a beastmaster? (long)Follow

What do I want from this thread?
I want to find out what people think about high level bestmasters and how they pertain to an HNM/Sky/Dynamis linkshell. I want to find out what people think of inviting a beastmaster to a normal experience party and how they stack up to other damage dealing melee jobs.

What this thread is not.
This thread is not a flame war.
This thread is not about any kind of MPK.
This thread is not to bash any job.
This thread is not about anything that a bst can do solo.
This thread is not about "well, this one beastmaster I saw".

I will rate down every post that describes a situation as listed in the above section.

Some of the following information pertains to being in a party, some is for HNM/Sky/Dynamis linkshells to see and some is just information that many people do not know about the beastmaster job.

The beastmaster job in general:
Beastmaster for the most part is an axe wielding melee damage dealer that has the ability to charm certain monsters and have them attack prey. The pet is generally used to tank the prey as well as deal damage. Using a pet that checks "Even Match" a beastmaster and pet is usually able to take down a monster that checks "Tough" solo. Using multiple pets with the Job Ability "Leave" or by letting a pet die a beastmaster has the ability to kill monsters many levels above themselves. Please note that a pet that checks "Even Match" for the most part has better accuracy, hit points, defense, attack and evasion than most player controlled jobs. Pets have different jobs just as players do. Crabs have good defense as they are paladin, fungars are warrior so have better attacks and the ability of double attack.

Another note of interest is that by using a pet that is the same level or lower of the highest in the party (usually using a pet that is even match to the beastmaster) nobody in the party loses any experience whatsoever. If the pet is still alive when experience is awarded the person with a charmed monster will lose 30% of the experience they would have gained, this does not affect any other party member.


If you have questions about the beastmaster job I will answer them as accurate and honestly as possible.


Skibum's vitals:
Jobs and levels: 68 bst, 61 rdm, 52 whm, 50 blm, 37 war, 37 nin, 26 thf (yes thief is underleveled for bst, I know), sam is 12 and waiting on a semi-static.

Current Linkshells:
ChaoticRebelz - a small high level linkshell with some very nice people.
LordofTheBeasts - A mainly bst linkshell that is very helpful for people new to the job that is very open with information and help.

Beastmaster equipment of note:
Full Bst AF, Haubergeon, Full Thick set, Venerer Ring, Deft Ring, Life Belt, Kabrakans Axe, Royal Guards Collar, Assault Earring, Spike Earring, Amemit Mantle, Apollo and Dark Staves, Balance Buckler, Lightning Bow, Full charm gear(2 loyalty rings, corsette+1, beast whistle, maybe something else, I forget)

Missions:
San d'Oria 7-2
ZM6
CoP 2-5 - Ancient Vows (Riverne Site A01)

Crafts:
63 fishing, 69 woodworking, 58 alchemy, 58 bonecraft, 50 cooking, all others above 20, listed in my profile.

I also have about 2 mil in gil, saving for a woodsville axe which should be easy as I have over 6 stacks + 91 beastmen and 2 stacks + 11 kindred seals.

Normal experience party information:
Currently I am level 68 beastmaster. I have +42 accuracy and have ~314 attack without using food. As seen above I have the means to be +accuracy or +attack food as needed. I have war, nin, whm, rdm for leveled subs. Thief is 26 so it is actually under leveled and badly so because I would miss TA.

I happen to know a level 68 warriora(used for comparison only he uses single handed axes and is another melee DD). While I do not know his equipment and how it stacks up to mine I know that he has 330 attack and generally subs ninja. Granted he has the natural abilities of double attack, berserk and warcry which I can only get through a warrior sub(warcry at 70bst/war). I would assume that he would gain TP faster due to having 2 axes and a duel wield upgrade from ninja. The warrior also has aggressor which for every 3/5 minutes allows him to be more accurate. This is not available from a sub job and is very favorable for the warrior.

At this point it looks like the warrior is the best choice. Skibum uses Call Beast!

Hrm, how is that going to affect the mix? Granted I will take a 30% hit due to having my pet out all the time. If everyone in the party receives 200 experience for a monster we kill then I will receive 140. To be honest I'm ok with that as I can always go solo and pick it up again later. To be honest I believe in this situation I would outdamage the warrior over time given that the damage from the pet is added to my own.

But the pets damage is not your damage! It's unfair to add it to your total damage!
Then invite the warrior and receive less damage per fight, killing monsters slower and losing a person for crowd control. Another advantage of this setup is that I shouldn't pull hate due to my damage being split between 2 characters, the warrior will pull hate and require healing. If my pet gets smacked a few times I don't care and will let it die eventually and call another (they do all look the same anyway^^)

The last section assumes no even match pets are in the area. Currently where I am located (Boydaha Tree) there are even match Mouriches and the moss Eaters come pretty close. These I can release every fight and still receive full experience just as every other party member. While fighting the upper level Goobbue near the island (you pass these on the way to crawlers) my pet will do 30-50 damage per hit (mnk so he gets 2 hits per round) and this is to a monster that is at least 6 levels above me with very good vitality.

In short it would be interesting to see a beastmaster in a normal party. If a beastmaster refuses to use jug pets or local pets of similar level then I see no reason to invite them as they will most likely be an inferior damage dealer.

I realize that given similar equipment and level the warrior will own me with his damage without taking into account the damage of my pet. This is fully expected and I will 100% admit to it. However, not everyone has the same equipment I do, the time to farm, etc. Parties do not care if you didn't take the time to farm to get a haubergeon, snipers, etc. They care about what you can do here and now in this party. If you have very little accuracy and attack gear and don't happen to use food then most others who have adequate equipment will beat you down twice over.

After that long winded explanation of the beastmaster comparison is simple.

***** Question *****
Would you invite me to a party?

I'm curious as to why or why not.


As for HNM/Sky/Dynamis I have read on this website some things about what a beastmaster is responsible to do in some situations:

Fafnir for crowd control, sometimes used outside of the alliance as Bst/whm to toss heals as well. Can also be a DD by using 2h to throw a pet at the dragon.

Though my samurai is not leveled for a sub job I know some are used as Bst/sam for Spirits Within. Enter alliance, smack it with WS, disband, meditate to full, repeat.

Charm can be used as a fast claim on an NM, it also works to bind them as they cannot be charmed.

I believe in most Dynamis Bst is used as a DD, possibly subbing ninja for blinks. Depending on the Dynamis used they may have a pet or not (nothing to charm in Dynamis I believe, correct me if I'm wrong)

I've helped take down a few of the land NM's such as Serket and Guivre. Solo'd several NM's that nobody seems to care about as well and are easily soloable at 75 such as Aquarius.

After beastmaster is 75 I plan on leveling one and possibly mulitple of rng / rdm / blm.

***** Question *****
Would you invite a 75 beastmaster to your HNM/Sky/Dynamis linkshell?

What else is expected of a 75 beastmaster in an HNM/Sky/Dynamis linkshell?

Karma as of start of post is 3.56, I'm curious as to what this does to my rating as many people see bst just a job that people hate and like to MPK others.

Edits follow:
I have a woodville axe (level 72, highest damage single hand axe in the game barring fully upgraded Relic)
I have ZM12 done so I can access sky, am now rank 9 San d'Oria.
Limit Break 5 complete, dinged level 71 shortly after. (1/4 on Maat, used the least amount of items when I actually beat him, cost was 20k)
I've been farming eyes for my Optical hat, minimal success as of yet due to an insanely bad drop rate.

Bought a cluster, 680k (that hurt). Took down Hakutaku with 7 people for my hat, had done it the night before with 6 people.

Edited, Fri Jul 1 12:42:47 2005 by SkibumOnShiva

Good point about the natural pets. Yes, an even match pet is always better than a jug pet for damage, accuracy and hit points. In the cases where a natural pet is not available such as level 65 in sky, etc a jug put would need to be used to boost the damage of the beastmaster.

If the party decides that the damage is good enough without the jug pet then so be it, more power to them and the beastmaster than happens to be there. I list the jug pet simply because an average beastmaster is probably not as effective at dishing out damage as a job that performs that as the main purpose, examples would be drk, war, rng, mnk and possibly sam and drg. Every job excels at something different so all have their high points and low points.

rate up :) ... i agree.. bst are awesome for end game :)

I think bst is awesome, and a wonderful job and would like to see how useful it would be at HNM/gods.

I can make a level 3 skillchain with a bst, although I'm certain I'll gain tp a bit faster and not quite sure how the bst would turn the mob for SATA on tank but there are ways around that.

I don't know why there aren't many bsts in HNM LS's. I know DL has 2 high level bsts in their LS and they're put to good use at Tiamat from what I've read/seen in videos, I didn't see it happening when I watched them fight it though.

Generally people don't even think bsts are looking for a non-bst pt, so they don't pay attention to them when a bst is lfp.

I want a woodville ><


Anyways, i finally unlocked BST, and will be lvling wiht my friend from lvl 1-whenever. I think i will enjoy it.

If you are interested you may wish to speak to Jae or Miriel of DeadlyViperSquad. They have formed a Dynamis LS and have branched off with DVSIII for HNM/Sky. Dollabill joins Chasing Infinity (the Dynamis LS). At this time they are seeking people who are willing to make DVSIII their home for Sky and HNM. Unlike most HNMLS they aren't requiring you to be in there 80%+ of your time. Speak to them and reference my name if you wish. I own my own small linkshell and I work with them for Dynamis and learning about Sky with them. Good Luck.

Id love to party with a bst but i dont see it happening. I rarely am leader in a party, and when I am, I would probably lose half the party if I invited a bst. Even if there are better DDs then bst it would still just be fun to have the added party dynamic of having a 7th member.

I still dont understand why people care more about getting exp then they care about having fun.

If any lvl 50 or so bst out there read this and wants to try and form a party, give me a /tell, my character's name is Kimimaru.

Ding 71, killed Maat (1/4, see above)

Got my Optical hat^^

Not true at all. We like all people/jobs/ect. I have helped countless people with Rank/AF/Quests/Items/NMs/LBs, ect ect. But when it comes to EXP parties I can either A) Sit with my flag up for days waiting for an invite or B) Gather a few other BST/ go solo and go to town that very instant. Choices are obvious as you can see. Trust me, there are some BST and some levels where you cannot find a duo, solo is a true grind and you would LOVE to be in an EXP party. Yet because of misinformation about the EXP cut because of a pet (which again, only the BST takes unless he charms a mob higher than the highest level of the party)and the misconception that we are nothing more than a gimped war (please read the above poster's comments, with an EM pet we are one of the best DD in the game) we hardly even get a thought regarding EXP parties.

the "like of all people" was a broad stroke, meaning BST don't discriminate against, say BRD for example, just because they are a BRD. Of course there are people we don't like, but we just don't like that person, not the job he/she is playing.

i was actually thinkning awhile back when i see u in SSG the last time... u were the RDM that helped me find Tonko spell like a long time ago .. :) u were in there fishing .. for some reason out of the blue it just came to me that .. u were the one that helped me with that lmoa ... small world

Good post. Being the 68 WAR mentioned, and having a (small) amount of BST experience, I would have to aggree, a BST with a proper pet can out-do me in an experience party (damage dealing, crowd control, etc). I would also say without a pet, or even with a jug pet, the damage dealing abilities drop alot. Sad thing is though, most people just don't invite BST very often, and when they do it is for the wrong reasons. Leveling BST, I put my flag up once just to see what happened, and got an invite to the dunes.........to be a back-up healer >.<