The 6th Ministry's Secret: A Summoner's Guide (v2)

Dawn can be soloed by a SMN pretty easily on normal, however I really encourage you to try all your attempts on Difficult since you have Nirvana and you want the body.

I spammed Dawn on Difficult as SMN/THF (with TH sash) until the body finally dropped. First phase I used Amchuchu, August or Gessho, Apururu, Cheruki, and Koru. Second phase I resummoned all trusts, but replace August/Gessho with Joachim. First phase I found to be the most challenging. I almost always reserved all my Wards for carbuncle to remove silence off my trusts.

The moment I saw promathia do that TP move that gives the green ring, I wait briefly to make sure it doesnt follow up with amnesia. Then I Garland of Bliss, and pop my 1hrs to zerg it down. Doesn't always kill it right away, but it will bring it down to a manageable percentage. I favored Flaming Crush but also used Volt Strike time to time.

No Nirvana Reforge. RIP SMN. /toss {Nirvana}

I noticed that also. Surely it's just an accidental omission.

Yeah it is, Shirai brought it up on the official forums. She quoted the Japanese thread and ニルヴァーナ was fortunately there.

Thank god, if Nirvana did not get an update, I think something bad may happen to SE :3

They specifically mentioned the shields and instruments so I figured it had to be a mistake.
They've put it on there in the English translation now too.

What do you guys expect as REALISTIC stats adjustments to Nirvana?
Normally the pattern we saw from the swords is just to raise the basic stats without touching the special ones.
Yet we know they're gonna adjust something for relics.
Furthermore and quite frankly if the adjustments for nirvana were just about adding more master accuracy, master magic damage and base weapon damage, well, it would be welcome but also very disappointing?



I hate how you have to swap out nirvana for magical blood pacts and for stuff like smn skill, but I don't see it likely for SE to add smn skill to nirvana.
Maybe though they could add magic damage for the pet instead of the master?
It's not as good of a stat as pet mab, but considering it would be added to +2 levels and +40% bp damage maybe it could be enough to make nirvana better than espiritus/keraunos for magic bp?

I'll take another few Avatar levels. That would be nice.

I'd love another two levels to Avatars and something to make there be no need for a Pet MAB staff. I don't really care about needing a staff for wards, but only one for rages would be nice. If it is solely updates for master only (which I doubt it will be, but SE) I will be in no rush to upgrade it as I have other things to spend gil on. I'm already free from having to worry about upgrading my Ghorn, which is clearly so strong vs an Idris that they need to buff that *** club up a little more.

I doubt we will see any sort of pet stat change for nirvana, this rem update is about the weapon's base dps and weapon skill+.

I got my Nirvana last night, I'm a bit disappointed actually :( I knew going in that it wouldn't do jack for magical WS, and that the time to reward ratio was way off base. What I didn't expect is how little it seemed to help physical pacts as well. Using Espiritus path D I average about 12.5k volt strike, and with Nirvana only about 15k. I was hoping for more like 20k :( I can consistently one shot with thunderstorm for 19k damage things around #3 in Reisenjima, but out of 30 tries I got a few 8-9k, mostly 14 to 15k something and one 22.9k for some reason. I tried boosting with changing to path B apogee, using dia 2, and so on but it seems at least on those I'm already near attack cap cuz it didn't change much. Just seems for all that effort and time it would be more than something I use on magical resistant mobs and gives flaming crush a few more levels of use on high level stuff.

Originally nirvana was MAB staff, now it's bp damage staff, and physical pacts also benefit most from the + to levels because magic damage has no level correction so it only benefits from the stats. Each level diff is -5% damage so 10% damage to physical pacts and 40% bp damage, it's significant but I honestly feel they need to add lots of pet MAB too, or boost the bp damage to like 60 or more. Espiritus path D is what I compared it to, I know with dia 3, frailty and garland of bliss, volt strike is a fine setup. Just sucks when thunderstorm does more than it w/o and mdb down or magic evasion down and I put dia 2 on a mob and volt strike still inferior as a pact. It did boost my flaming crush a bit though, and that's our biggest boomstick so I'm not completely dissatisfied just, disappointed. I have 2 +1 apogee, and some of the best gear in the game, just feel like physical pact should be able to one shot this fodder gear 100%, but if it doesn't crit there's no way that happens. I'm willing to share my set for feedback if you would, even hoping I'm wrong in this case. Like i said I know with right setup and stuff especially on magical resistant mobs pred claws and volt strike can do well. But why does it do so bad on fodder then?

Congratulations on your Nirvana! Once it's 119 you'll notice the difference in damage. I'm assuming you haven't done all the trials yet.

Congrattulations Verda,

I really hope you'll like it as much as I do! Maybe you were already pushing your Summoner to the limit, but for me, the quantity of content I can solo with is (no, you don't need a revitalizer to solo reiseijimas T1, and even some escha sky t2).

I just hope they'll push it a little further with the update, nonetheless, it's a great weapon!

Grats!

Edit: Also yeah, 119 is huge difference!

Verda's Nirvana is indeed 119 as of last night, I cheered him on at the W Adoulin AH (and didn't threaten to steal it!)

Grats man, you shoved right on through and did it.

Wow thanks for all the congrats! :D It was indeed 119 at the time of posting but I think I've come to terms a lot more with it after seeing how much better volt strike does on some NM's than merit pacts or flaming crush. I guess it's as they say, ***'s situational. Did Belphegor and Taelmoth and it is so much easier doing volt strike on them than other options. Thank you again for the congrats :')

I for one think the 99 rage BPs suck
example any mob in Reisenjima,
Flamin Crush 35-65k one shots
Predator Claws 20-35k almost a 1 shot every time
Chaotic Strike 20-35K almost a 1 shot every time

On almost any Ascended NMs do apogee shattersoul>Flamin Crush>Flamin Crush=Dead

Level 99 BPs
Conflag Strike meh sucks big time. good luck trying to 1shot
Volt Strike my best ever was 32,457 most are in 15-17k

I'll stick with 70bps

Another thing is
70BPs start out with a LV2 SC
99BPs start out with a LV1 SC

In my testing with it on using kusamochi, dia 2 and the setup I posted above pred claws was doing about the same or worse. I'd like to know what setup you have to get 20-35k pred claws, I don't think there's much room for improvement on my gear outside what I said above, unless we were doing it on different mobs or something. Flaming crush I get those numbers, even 70k sometimes. We could have different vorseals but I don't think any I'm missing would make the kind of difference you're saying, so I'd like to know what the difference is, because well who wouldn't want 20-35k pred claws on a consistent basis. FYI I was testing on mantis and chapuli at #3, only time physical only pacts had what you're saying I've seen is on Belphegor I had 22k-33k volt strikes (and that was in path A, but he is undead), but I was both Astral Flow and Conduit. Thanks for your feedback on it, I'm always looking to improve any way I can.

PhysicalBloodPactRage = {main="Nirvana",sub="Vox Grip",ammo="Seraphicaller",
head="Apogee Crown",neck="Sacrifice Torque",ear1="Gifted Earring",ear2="Gelos Earring",
body="Convoker's Doublet +1",hands="Merlinic Dastanas",ring1="Evoker's Ring",ring2="Fervor Ring",
back="Conveyance Cape",waist="Mujin Obi",legs="Apogee Slacks",feet="Apogee Pumps"}

MagicalBloodPactRage = {main="Nirvana",sub="Vox Grip",ammo="Seraphicaller",
head="Apogee Crown",neck="Eidolon Pendant",ear1="Gifted Earring",ear2="Gelos Earring",
body="Shomonjijoe +1",hands="Merlinic Dastanas",ring1="Evoker's Ring",ring2="Fervor Ring",
back="Scintillating Cape",waist="Caller's Sash",legs="Apogee Slacks",feet="Apogee Pumps"}

:0

Needs more Esper!

That said, Garuda can be weird. Sometimes she's accurate as hell and is my go-to when Ifrit can't bully things and Ramuh isn't working out. Other times she can't hit the broad side of a barn.

Shomonjijoe +1 is a terrible magic BP piece. you're better off using convoker's +1 which should be slightly better or going for helios apogee or merlinic.

Easier said than done! I haven't been able to get anyone to help with legion at all to even get a chance at it.

I got incredibly lucky with mine; two Esper drops in one run. Im convinced that the THF who came with us makes it rain Espers.

I do agree with not using Shomonji for magical BPs; use Convoker's +1 until you can obtain well-aug'd Merlinic or Apogee.

Speaker's Ring from Warder of Temperance is an upgrade for non-Ifrit magical bps as well, and with trust SMN can kill it fairly easily if you know your avatar damage types. Piercing phase sucks, I personally use Fenrir but Carby's Poison Nails is an.option.

Shomonjijoe +1 is a terrible magic BP piece. you're better off using convoker's +1 which should be slightly better or going for helios apogee or merlinic.[/quote]


Depends on what place your unity leader is.

No, just no.

The BPDMG% outstrips even capped unity bonuses.

^
This, Shomonjijoe is an idle piece and no more than that.

Returning player that has a question. I have a pair of hagondes sabots and a pair of helios boots and im trying to decide which is best to use. Would really appreciate any feedback.

Hagondes feet have pet mab +23
Helios feet have BP dmg +6%, pet crit rate +4 and pet mab +18

I'm also curious if I should be using Nirvana over Keraunos for magic rage pacts. My Keraunos has BP dmg +9%, crit rate +4 and MAB +20. Would Espiritus be better here?

It depends on the rest of your gear, but every single time I've ever actually crunched the numbers, Hagondes can never win against Helios. Even with absolutely stacked BPDmg and using Nirvana instead of a Pet:MAB staff, Helios Boots still came out ahead.

Which is a great segue into your second question: You should definitely be using Pet:MAB staff for magic pacts and not Nirvana. Keraunos is a pretty good one. Espiritus is the new hotness, isn't very hard to obtain, and yeah I think it would beat your current Keraunos though not by a big margin.

Most of my helios parts have BP dmg +6, crit 2-4 and mab 20+.
The next thing im trying to decide on is what to do with Apogee gear.

Hello Ppl

i just got my Apogee Slacks and im wondering what is the best path to augment them.
those 4 options look really interesting and i'd like to cover ifrit's flaming crush, magical and physical with 1 pair only.

are i going to need more or 1 will be enough?

AugmentA: MP+60 Pet: "Magic Atk. Bonus"+30 "Blood Pact" damage +7
AugmentB: MP+60 Pet: Attack+30 "Blood Pact" damage +7
AugmentC: Pet: Attack+20 Pet: "Magic Atk. Bonus"+20 "Blood Pact" damage +7
AugmentD: Pet: STR+15 Pet: "Double Attack"+3% "Blood Pact" damage +13

my helis pants get BP dmg+6 crit hit rate +4 and mab +30
and my Enticer's pants are Avatar: "Double Attack"+3% Critical hit rate +5% TP Bonus +650 "Blood Pact" damage +12
with pet acc +14