Red Mage

Let me start by saying this: Being a rdm in dynamis is a PRIVILEGE. Red mages get THE best relic in the entire game, and it is so sought after that linkshells literally auction it off for millions. If you are reading this, you have been chosen for one the hardest jobs to perform in the entirety of dynamis. You are the glue that literally sticks the run together.

That being said, don't come as a Red Mage into dynamis half afk, or half alert, or thinking you can do "just the bare minimum" and nobody will notice. We do notice, and, as good red mages, do not tolerate it. When you are not on top of your game we are the ones who suffer, the other rdms that have to pick up the slack and often suffer the xp loss for it. Nevertheless, if you're serious about doing your best, get your game face on and read on.

To make clear EXACTLY what your job should be, I have written this small guide to accompany the one below (which I kept out of respect for its author). Whoever wrote the other guide did know what they were doing, and assumed you do too. In order to help those who are starting from scratch, I have taken painstaking lengths to spell out in the simplest way possible what is required.

Primary Red Mage Job

Your responsibilities are (unfortunately) NOT a little bit of everything. You are there to sleep, resleep, and sleep again.

You can read the fine art of sleeping/resleeping as much as possible, its a great guide. But, if there are mobs in camp, your timers better be rolling. Sleepga as soon as mobs get in camp, even if someone else casts! Even if you know every mob is asleep, toss out a sleepga whenever you can.

The reasons behind this are twofold:

1. You will catch any mobs that text-rolling spam failed to pick up as "resisted x player's sleepga." Maybe he just stopped to cast a ga3 spell, and you just can't see the animation.

2. You redistribute hate, so if 3 mobs wake up at once they don't automatically kill the person who originally sleepga'd. If you have any question as to who it is that is on the ball with their sleepgas, just look at how many times they die. If you die a lot, you're on the ball. If you rarely die, get it together and start casting. Not to say that you should die a lot but if everyone is helping either the deaths are evenly distributed or no one dies (ideal situation)

Next, Sleep 2. Sleep 2 everything. At all times your sleep 2 timer should be rolling if there are mobs in camp. It doesn't matter if you absolutely, certainly, KNOW someone else sleep 2'd them, do it anyway. Again, this is all about catching resists and dispersing the hate to more than just one red mage. This will also help so that mobs don't all wake at once and kill whoever is on top of the hate list. Once sleepga is cast start tossing sleep 2 around randomly.

There is the gear that you must have on you when you sleep 2. Make a macro, even those who play on a console can do that. Every single red mage, from the poorest 75 newb to the richest kclub owner should be using this gear to sleep.

1. Dark staff - very cheap and helps with resist rates. So stop using the wind staff and macro this piece in, please! You can get them signed in LS if you like ask around.

2. Red Mage AF1 body - If you are a 75 rdm and you do not have this, there's something wrong with your head man. Hell, I'll even HELP you get it any time, any day, if you don't have one. Enfeebling magic skill helps with both initial resist rates and timed resists (eg how long the mob stays asleep, up to its maximum time alotment)

Loading up on int gear is great, because sleep is primarily maximized in both initial resist and timed resist through it, but please, don't let me see you without macroing in those two pieces of gear for sleep. As you can see, I'm not asking you to go out and buy a pair of jet seraweels or anything, just use the stuff that helps in large percentages!

Note about pets: BST and SMN mobs have potentially devastating pets in dynamis. Goblins summon slimes, Yagudo summon crows, Quadavs summon scorpions, Orcs summon hecteyes and all summoner-type monsters summon avatars (except fenrir and diabolos). If any of these monsters come to camp they take priority. Pets must be held asleep while the melee kills off the master and the BLMs burn them. Furthermore BST pets must be kept silenced while they are burned or melee'd. Once you have the main group slept target and call out your target in LS chat. You will focus on keeping that one mobs slept and, if it's a BST pet, silenced. If you are not focusing on the one pet make then you are in charge of general sleeps. Once the pet is dead go back to your other duties. If you call a mob on LS chat other sleepers and mages will keep you healed and sleep any other mobs that come at you.

Note about kiting: Eyes in dynamis-Xarcabard don't sleep jsut like statues in any other dynamis zone, gravity works very well on them so they become just about as slow as statues in other zones. If there are eyes, they should be gravitied whenever possible because they move uber slow and you should always be on the run away.

Red mage primary job 2

This is your secondary job, and its very important. Do not just sit there when there are no mobs in camp. Refresh and/or haste every member of your party that needs it. If you are the main healer of a party now is when you spam cure 3. Try to keep them refreshed and/or hasted and alive as much as possible. I see Red Mages that don't even try to set up a refresh cycle, and only refresh when they are asked and at no other time. It breaks my heart to hear new people ask me "why haven't I gotten a refresh this entire time" or "I need refresh to do my job and this red mage doesn't refresh me ever." Don't make them ask for it, if unsure just recast it.

Prioritize sleeping mobs over refreshing and/or hasting people, but don't ever use that as a crutch. If you need practice, we'll put you in the main tank alliance, and let the plds yell at you (and yes, they will yell and eat your babies) if they don't get semi-regular refreshes. If you are lucky enough to be in the black mage party, keep them refreshed the entire time as much as possible. Don't hold back, don't let me see you with full or even semi-full mp. If you are doing your job right, you should be sucking fumes for mp about 1/4 of the time, and your mp should be running at about half-full the rest of the time.

Red Mage Tertiary Job

This is extremely tertiary, aka after everything else is done.

- Gravity and Dia3 the current mob being killed by the main tank (and not the ones being pulled to the team). Make an assist macro for the calling tank, wait 1, then gravity that mob as the DDs start to beat on it. Most high damage ws are multi-hit, and maximizing their damage is key to taking down mobs fast. A samurai that misses a ws is frustrating, but gravity helps them by hit approximately 33% of the time that they would otherwise miss.

- Dispel/Slow/Slow II/Paralyze/Paralyze II mobs that are slept, right after casting Sleepga and Sleep II. This generates a fair amount of hate and helps the tanks and those who heal them tremendously! Even if the mob only gets off 5 hits the entire fight, he'll get off 4 hits if he's debuffed, and 3 hits if he's fully debuffed. Mobs hit tanks (and melee) really hard, so just think of this as a cure 4 that only costs 15-45 mp.

- Don't DoT the mobs. Its a bad idea, because if you mess it up, somebody is probably going to die (and most likely you). Rely on the blue mages to use defense down on the mobs. Also the BRD, WHM or other support person in the tank party will DoT a mob if it needs pulling to team and is being stubborn.

A Red Mage's job should never be to "just stand there" ever. If you are in the tank party and Rath is yelling at you because he can't pin you down for songs, then you know you're probably doing a good job. If your whm has to ask you where you died at, you're probably doing a good job. If the puller comes back and gets eaten and there's only four mobs at camp, that is a fail as a red mage.

Get some +int gear for sleeps and +mnd gear for enfeebles. Even if its cheap gear, its better than wearing hmp gear all the time or a str/dex ring.
Also, it's generally a waste to nuke a statue unless you have over 110+ int and ~300 elemental magic skill. It wastes mp and all you get to see is your tier III spells hit for 25 damage.

Red Mages are experts at enfeebling mobs.

While RDM could do a little of everything, in Dynamis, a RDM's primary focus is crowd control. Sleeping mobs, kiting or assisting kiters with unsleepable mobs, and keeping mobs silenced are top priorities. RDM are also expected to {Refresh} party members, back up heal when safe, nuke statues and generally support a party.

Typically, RDM/BLM is the preferred combination for Dynamis because it gives RDM {Sleepga}. RDM/DRK is used for specific tasks, such as for Dynamis Lord kills or some of the Dreamlands bosses.

Some Dynamis Specific Red Mage Guides:

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