Cataclysm: Olde But

This won't be news to some (or possibly many) of you, but figured I'd post as general info.

Everyone knows about Fell Cleave burns and how well they do, particularly for farming chests (also for xp, but xp is a bit of a joke to worry about). Mnk can't really contribute to that with H2H because Spinning Attack sucks (well, relative to the damage needed for this to be effective). The new staff weaponskill, Cataclysm, has potential, but had been rather weak as an overall option; better than Spinning Attack, but not enough to stand on its own as an alternative to Fell Cleave.

Well, with some help from a poster on BG, I've found a combination that can keep up fairly well with non-2hr'd Fell Cleave numbers. Against mobs that aren't resistant to dark damage (so no bats or funguars, etc) it does reliable damage in the 2000-2200 range. With Ascetic's Tonic and favorable zone bonuses it can go up to near 2500, and occasionally can drop to the ~1900 range, presumably with poor zone bonuses.

Setup:

First, you need three atma. If you only have two available, I'm actually not sure which of them I'd drop (probably Cosmos, since the key atma appears to be Smiting Blow).

1) Atma of the Cosmos: Acquired from Iratham, the caturae in Tahrongi
2) Atma of the Ultimate: Fabricated atma, requires defeating Proto-Ultima
3) Atma of the Smiting Blow: Acquired from the iron giant, Ironclad Smiter, that gives one of the key items for popping Rani


Cosmos: +30% darkness damage
Ultimate: +50 MAB, +50(?) magic acc (useful for fewer resists)
Smiting Blow: TP Bonus (+100 TP to weaponskill; low level testing indicated about +45% damage for +100 TP; unknown fTP values)


And then a good int/MAB weaponskill set. Gear that I'm using:

Pluto's Staff (Can substitute Dark Staff, but you want the +magic damage bonus from one of these, not a high damage staff)
Artemis' Medal (variable MAB)
Moldavite Earring (+5 MAB)
Usukane body (+8 int; Kirin's Osode would be slightly better if you have that)
Spiral Ring (+5 int, should have this anyway)
~second int ring, or augmented Demon's Ring from Tahrongi; I'm using +2 MAB Demon's Ring
Denali Kecks (+3 MAB)

There are a few other improvements, such as Hecate's Earring or Novio Earring, and a handful of minor +int options. Other than one of the earrings, I don't think they're worth the inventory space for this, but if you have space, feel free.


This is the one case where I'd actually seriously recommend /sam for subjob. Hasso, 15 Store TP, Meditate and Sekkanoki all contribute greatly to making this work well. Plus subbing /sam gives you access to Judgment and Seraph Strike just like /war if you need proc weaponskills.

With /sam you can aim for an 8-hit build. With Pluto's Staff you need 39 Store TP to reach a comfortable 8-hit where you can swap stuff out during weaponskill. 15 from trait means you need 24 from gear. I get this with Usu body, AF3+2 legs, Usu feet, Rajas, Brutal and Belenos Mantle (27 total). Adding a Rose Grip means you could drop one of: Usu body, Usu feet or AF3+2 legs in terms of Store TP. Only 6 Store TP in gear is needed during weaponskill to maintain the 8-hit.

It's slightly easier to do using a Dark Staff, since it has a higher base TP/hit (can drop 3 Store TP).

A 9-hit build with Pluto's Staff only requires 22 Store TP, so trait + Rajas + Brutal + Rose Grip is more than enough; other options can be combined with various degrees of flexibility. Rajas is all you need with a Dark Staff.


Various party configurations are doable. Whm for simple curing (the amount needed isn't huge, but Cure V's can sure make things easier), Sch or Rdm for Phalanx, or Smn for Perfect Defense all work. A blm for supplementary -ga spells and sleepga can also be useful. In my case I had Whm and Blm with me, along with a thf that was pulling (we were doing Gnawtooth Gary for seals, and the surrounding rabbits don't link, so was easier to have the thf /ra a bunch and bring them back to me). Sea monks were a lot easier since they agro, and you can just run around to gather a bunch.

Use Hasso fulltime. Restore chests make Sekka+Cata+Cata easy, followed by Meditate for a third, and if you have sufficient numbers to maintain killing you can Hundred Fists each time as well (sort of compensates for not having Retaliation). The AOE range on Cataclysm is quite large, so it's easy to pull in nearby mobs as well.

Most mobs (once they're around T or above) have about 6k HP, so 3 Cataclysms should kill them. With the blm there, we also got into a bit of a pattern of Sekka+Cata+Cata+Blizzaga3 to clear everything out in very short order.

I used Tav Tacos for food to help reduce damage taken (and did see a pretty decent reduction compared to when food wore off). Also easily managed killing the NMs even without real DD atma; Victory Smite without DD atma was averaging about as much as Ascetic's Fury does with DD atma (maybe a bit less, given that the mobs are relatively weaker than when I last fought them). If you don't have Revenant Fists (or Verethragna) for Victory Smite your damage output on NMs may be a bit on the low side. On the other hand, if you're just an offshoot of the main group solely working on maintaining TEs, or if you're doing all your TE building beforehand, then it doesn't really matter.


As an aside, this setup should also do phenomenally if using Primeval Brew, since apparently magic weaponskills have much higher potential damage than physical ones. I intend to try it next time we do a Shinryu run.