Many players get to 50, and have no idea what to do next! Naturally, one of the biggest and most popular questions is 'Where can I get a better weapon?' (aka 'I want a shiny thing too!').
Well, look no further*. Coming to you now, from some jerk who calls herself Skybreaker (or Shut Your Face Before I Use It For A Spear Cozy), we are proud to bring you... a sort-of OOC guide**...
![[Image: ffxiv_03212015_204319_zpsyu7233zx.png]](http://i979.photobucket.com/albums/ae274/themeer/ffxiv_03212015_204319_zpsyu7233zx.png)
*You should totally look further.
**The management is not responsible for mockery, derision, bruised egos and lack and/or quality of actual guidance. For entertainment purposes mostly.
PART 1: RELICS AND YOU (Base, and Zenith)
So you just got to level fifty. Good job. You can hike your fancy little butt on over to the Quicksand and start flashing it at all the other ex-"adventurers", see if anyone stuffs some gil down your crack for a room in the FC, and maybe a weapon that doesn't smell like rust and broken dreams.
What? Beneath your dignity? Please. If you've done the main story, you know nothing's beneath your dignity. Fuckin' fetch quests. But fine. You wanna work a little more. Maybe pretend like you got a weapon that'll go with that fancy Artifact suit that the game practically handed to ya. Anything that'll get you out of my hair...
First, you're gonna get your basic Relic weapon. Oh sure you could start saving up Solds, unlock Labyrinth of the Ancients and Syrcus Tower, and run that bitch til you've got your Unweathered stabber, but if I saw your useless ass dragging some sub-fifty shiv through CT, slowing down MY raid, I'd kick you faster than you can say "I don't give a fuck about bonus solds".
Get your relic first. Actually, get some knock-off that doesn't suck goobue ass off the Market Board, or buy one from your Grand Company vendor, to stand you while doing THIS step. The base relic starts off with some jerk called Nedrick Ironheart in Vesper Bay, wanting to tell you about the Weaponsmith of Legend. Even an untrained opo-opo could do this part. Just follow the cookie trail (and meet Rowena!) until you're talking to Gerolt. Then, let the games begin.
He's gonna send you on a moderately tedious bit of running around, go here, talk to this, kill that, bring me back a weapon with materia stuffed into it (ask your damn FC I'm not here to hold your hand), and so on. Kill a Chimera. Run a dungeon. Kill a shitload of defenseless critters. Kill a Hydra. Kill Ifrit, Garuda, and Titan, bigger and Harder than before (but still fucking pushovers, just pug it, the DF'll match you up with people like me who'll carry your ass so hard you'll start a new bondage trend). Won't matter if you die. People will get a chuckle when Titan punts you off the cliff. Least you can do. Then go buy some Radz-at-Han Quenching Oil back in Revenant's toll and
CONGRATULATIONS you got your Relic!
You're now a bloody special snowflake just like a million people before you. It's a piddling i80, which is still a massive step up from whatever crap you were holding out with. At least slather it with some Thavnairian Mist (three of them, buy em where you bought the Oil) so that it's a Relic Weapon Zenith, which is i90 and has that fucking glow you wanted so badly.
Now store it in a safe place (you really don't want my suggestions) and get your ass into CT and ST until you can get a REAL weapon. The Weathered Soldiery weapon will run you 1300 Solds and one Unidentified Allagan Tomestone (from Syrcus Tower, aka ST), and is i100. Buy it back over in Revenant's Toll. So easy an idiot could do it. If the idiot also happened to get a Sands of Time, ALSO from ST, they can Unweather it (next to Gerolt, back in North Shroud) into an Unweathered Sold Weapon, i110, which is likely the last bloody upgrade you'll ever get until they release the same candy-ass process for the Poetics weapons in the next patch.
Now get out of here. I'm gonna go get a spicy fish wrap...
PART 2: RELIC ATMA
The fuck? You're still here? Oh, I get it. You heard someone babbling about Atma weapons and you were all omfg that's like ff6 that's so kawaii i must haz!
Gods. Fine. But you're wasting your goddamn time; you're never gonna get to the step where your POS Relic actually outclasses the Unweathered. But whatever, it's your monthly sub. Just don't say I didn't warn you when you're fifty hours in, broke and friendless, sitting and waiting for a FATE to spawn so you can get something useless.
The next step is kinda different. Your new buddy Jalzahn (near Gerolt) tells you that you'll need 12 Atmas, and then makes your damn quest log disappear, forcing you to open your completed quests each time you wanna remind yourself where you had to go to find stuff. Well, here's a handy-dandy list I tossed together, for myself.
Outer La Noscea = Lion
Upper La Noscea = Water-Bearer
Middle La Noscea = Ram
Lower La Noscea = Fish
Western La Noscea = Crab
Central Shroud = Maiden
East Shroud = Goat
North Shroud = Archer
Western Thanalan = Twins
Southern Thanalan = Scorpion
East Thanalan = Bull
Central Thanalan = Scales
'But Skybreaker, why am I going to those zones?' Don't you read fucking quest text? You gotta do FATEs in those zones. Yes, any FATEs. Yes, with your Zenith weapon EQUIPPED. Yes it is random. You've got a small chance, something like 10%, of getting your Atma each time you do a FATE in those zones.
What, you thought this was gonna be easy? Coeurlbait, you're just getting started! Get off your ass and FATE! Go! Go! Go!
Done then? Well well. Maybe you're not a total waste. I am pleased to announce that, returning to Jalzahn, you are now the proud wielder of a
i100 Relic Weapon Atma!
...NOT! Well, not the i100 part. 'But it says so! Right there!' Yeah, smartypants, and if you squint real good you'll notice the non-existent fine print: none of the fucking stats changed, not even the base attack damage. Your weapon color changed though, so.. woo?
Oh, and you lost the glow. Feel free to cry now. Heh. Once you're done wiping away the tears of failure, you can go ahead and look at the next step... also known as Where 90% Of Players Say Fuck It, or...
PART 3: RELIC ANIMUS
Now you're in for some fun, kid. And by fun, I mean schadenfreude for me. If you don't know what that means, look it up. I'll wait.
So. Let the reaming begin. You'll soon be directed to G'jusana, a sweet little piece who works for Rowena and whom you'll probably want to murder and stuff on your mantle (or your Company House's, more likely) by the time you're done with her. Because here is where the lore has started to kick in, and the term Zodiac Braves begins to get tossed around.
Ah, that got your attention, huh? Heh. Hold onto that enthusiasm. You're gonna need it.
See, when that cute little Seeker realizes how badly you want her bloody Books, the Trials of the Braves themselves, she wastes less than half a bat of a lash before gouging the fuck out of you, charging a whopping 500 Soldiery Tomes for just one of the nine you'll need.
Stop crying. It used to be 1500. Fuckin' spoiled newbies.
So hey, you buy a book, one of the lot. They all increase the stats piecemeal, and once you've read them all, go back to Jalzahn and your weapon, the Animus, will PROPERLY be made i100 and have a nifty glow to boot. Easy-peasy, right?
Haha, no.
Each book requires, while wielding the weapon, completing three specific dungeons, three specific levequests, three specific FATEs, and slaying 100 specific monsters. You can only work on one book at a time, so there are no shortcuts here; you just gotta get out there and all 27 FATEs, leves and dungeons, and slay all 900 mobs, as ordained by your wonderful zodiac books. This is the wall. The first one. Oh, you might do a few books. But sooner or later you'll say Fuck It!, throw your hands up, and go back to prodding at WoD, all the while cursing the Zodiac quest along with all the other drop-outs.
Don't feel bad. It's no more than I expected.
PART 4: RELIC NOVUS
Holy crap. Are you actually still here? Well well. Color me impressed. Maybe there's a bit more to you than your slovenly demeanor, worthless gear and vacant stare suggest.
Maybe.
Well you've come this far, so you must be used to being miserable RIGHT? That's good because this next step is gonna hit you someplace it really hurts: your wallet!
Thematically, it's kinda cool. Your new buddy Hubairtin wants to make some fancy-shmancy Sphere Scroll, stuff it with super power, and fuse that shit with your weapon to bring out new levels of awesome. Sounds sweet, huh? Can't be as bad as those damn Animus books... -snicker-
Alright, alright. Let me lay it out. You're gonna need 75 Alexandrites, and at least 75 materia, split up through levels 1 to (probably) 4.
'But Skybreaker, what the hell is Alexandrite, and how do I get it?'
Well, you've got a couple options there. One is to do the daily quest now open in Revenant's Toll; some crazy lady wants you to do Ex Roulette and bring stuff back to her, for which she'll give you a map. Decipher the map, find the treasure, fight a horribly friendly monster (or swarm thereof.. I can solo that shit easy but you might wanna bring friends cuz you'll cry if you fail) and bam, one fucking Alexandrite. You can also buy treasure maps for Solds now, too.
The BETTER option, since they upped the drop rate, is just to do FATEs with your Animus equipped. You got about the same chance as you did for Atma, way back then. And count your fucking stars because it USED to be 3%, much like Atmas. I spent hours farming those bastards, and days, and weeks more for my Alexandrites.
Pro Tip: Wear Spirit-bonding gear while doing the FATEs. So you get materia. Cuz remember those 75 materia you need? Well, here's the story with them!
You gotta infuse the Sphere Scroll with the Materia. To do that, you choose the flavor of materia you like best. I'm a fan of DET and CRIT but whatever floats your boat. Going partway with ACC might save you some cash too. One way or another, each stat starts with level 1 materias, and, once you get to +11 (or +7 for DET) you move up to the next tier. Each infusion will only increase the stat by 1. You CANNOT use higher or lower tier materia than what it says.
It's pretty idiot-proof... but not FAIL-proof. Because here's the fun part: Infusion can fail.
As you go up the range in any given level of materia, you'll notice the success chance starting to drop. If you fail, poof, you lose your materia. But you DON'T lose the Alexandrite, at least.
What, this doesn't sound so bad? Well, that depends how many dicks you've sucked. Because those fucking Savage Might 4 and Savage Aim 4 are gonna run you over 300,000 gil each if you buy 'em, and that's on a good day. Let's see you smile when you've got a 50% fail chance, and fail six times in a row thanks to RNG (that's Random Number Generator, or Random Number Gods depending how much you feel like cursing), dropping two or three mill down the drain. To cap out ONE stat.
Are we having FUN yet?!
That said, if you succeed, then you've got your fucking Relic Weapon Novus, and good fucking job. It's i110, and astute readers will note that it is actually BETTER, stat-wise, than your i110 Unweathered weapon, despite having the same ilvl. The glow changes color, and you can now officially start feeling like it was all worth it.
But it ain't over yet.
PART 5: RELIC NEXUS
You're not giving up now are you? Didn't think so. Then I have good news, and bad news. The good news is, this part costs all of nada, and is stupidly easy (pretty damn grindy, but easy) compared to before. First, good ol' Jalzahn and Gerolt are gonna soulglaze your Novus. Mmm, glaze. This'll keep all that shiny aether from flashing off uselessly while you're killing stuff.. and that's the bad news: You're gonna be killing LOTS of stuff! Because it's time for the Light Farm!
Here's how it works. Whenever you do THINGS (dungeons, trials, treasures, fates, pvp) you gain Light. Here are the values. They're double what they used to be, so cheer up.
Feeble 2 points
Gentle 4 points
Bright 8 points
Brilliant 12 points
Blinding 24 points
Newborn Star 32 points
'But Skybreaker! How do I know what activity will give how many points! Is it random?!'
Sorta. FATEs are always Feeble. Most Trials will be Gentle or Bright. Dungeons, through Roulette, tend to be Bright or Brilliant. Big suckers like CT/ST/WoD will be Brilliant, Blinding or Newborn Star.
Most people form Light parties, figure out which Trial is Bright in the current window, and farm the fuck out of it. When you got 3 or 4 minute kills, you rack up the Light pretty quick compared even to the big towers.
And hey, since I'm in a good mood, here: http://www.reddit.com/live/tlfmtjl4fteo A live thread where people report what's what brightness. You're welcome.
You need a grand total of 2000 points. When you use the handy-dandy Zodiac Glass they give you, you see a level of glow in your relic, indicating the ballpark you're in:
No Activity 0 – 199
Indistinct Activity 200-399
Faint Activity 400-599
Slight Activity 600-799
Modest Activity 800-999
Distinct Activity 1000-1199
Robust Activity 1200-1399
Vigorous Activity 1400-1599
Intense Activity 1600-1799
Extreme Activity 1800-1999
Bursting Activity 2000+
Once you're Bursting, bring 'er back to Jalzahn, rip off the soulglaze, and voila! You've got a genuinely badass-looking glow now, on your brand new i115 Relic Weapon Nexus. Congrats. Feel free to rest on your laurels, at least for a bit... because the next one is a bitch. But it's a big one.
PART 6: ZODIAC WEAPON
Now we're fucking talking. Get ready to suffer, but if you make it through this, your toy's gonna change shape and become an all-new implement of destruction (or healing, if you're into that shit).
I ain't gonna walk you through all the steps one by one. It's four quests, three of them in Revenant's Toll and one at the Bonfire (the materia place) in Central Than. You're building a godsdamned weapon of legend, so you need all the craziest shit. They're gonna make you buy stuff; to quote another source.. "To obtain all of the items, players need: over 400k gil, 80k Company Seals, 6400 Allagan Tomestone of Soldiery, drops from 16 dungeons, 8 3-star HQ crafted items, many desynthesis items and some miscellaneous items."
Now, all this seems like a lot.. and it is. But what's REALLY gonna make you weep tears of blood is gonna be those 16 dungeon drops. Maybe by now you've run with people, workin' on their Zodiacs. Complaining how they've 'done this dungeon 20 times and no drop' and shit like that. Yeah, that's you now. To be fair, they're kinda unlucky. I've heard it said there's as much as a 20% chance of getting your drop, from any of the Zodiac dungeons. Or as low as 11%. Depends who you ask.
Either way, you'd better start praying to the RNGods now, because you're up to your neck in it now.
Welp! All that shit ain't gonna farm itself! Get crackin'! The jerks who you're doing these quests for demand only the best, and will ring every last drop of sweat and blood from your sorry behind to get it. Oh, and don't worry about all that desynthin' noise that they yelp at you; you can buy the junk you need off the MB. Unless you're ass-broke since Novus... but eh! You'll find a way. You've come this far, you can almost taste that sweet Zodiac weapon.
And if you stick it out, if you go all the way, get every frickin' drop and all the stuff you need... then oh boy, are you in for a treat. You get cutscenes. You get lore. And you get a sweet-as-sin bonafide i125 Zodiac Weapon. With names like Excalibur, Longinus and Ragnarok, you know you want that bastard. Just having it lets you look down upon all the plebs who gave up long before you, feeling inherently superior, and vindicated for the lost friends, missed RP, millions of gil and countless hours consumed.
PART 7: ZODIAC ZETA
Now now, don't go freaking out. This part's just the icing on the cake. It's another Light farm, and it's easier than before; only a total of 960 Light to farm if you go by the old scale. You're gonna end up paying 2400 Solds, but you won't even notice them, after those stupid 1600-Sold waters from the last step. It's even in cute little 200-Sold chunks as you attach super-Atmas, Mahatmas, to your weapon step by step, seeking to wake up a living sentience in it that will make it bond with you for all eternity.
D'aww.
The Light is exactly the same as before, same windows, same info. You can even farm with your buddies still working on their Nexus. Just stick it out, and when you come out the other side, you are rewarded with an honest-to-god i135 weapon, a true juggernaut. Best In Slot, better than the Dreadwyrm stuff out of Final Coil; same ilvl, but higher stats, like Novus before it.
And there you go. Con-fucking-gratulations. You're a Zodiac Brave. You've endured, overcome, weathered the worst that SE can throw at you.
For now~
Well, look no further*. Coming to you now, from some jerk who calls herself Skybreaker (or Shut Your Face Before I Use It For A Spear Cozy), we are proud to bring you... a sort-of OOC guide**...
So You Want To Be A Zodiac Brave
or
Things To Do When You're 50 And Want To Make Things Dead
or
How I Learned To Shut Up And Love My Welfare Epics
Things To Do When You're 50 And Want To Make Things Dead
or
How I Learned To Shut Up And Love My Welfare Epics
![[Image: ffxiv_03212015_204319_zpsyu7233zx.png]](http://s979.photobucket.com/user/themeer/media/ffxiv_03212015_204319_zpsyu7233zx.png.html)
*You should totally look further.
**The management is not responsible for mockery, derision, bruised egos and lack and/or quality of actual guidance. For entertainment purposes mostly.
PART 1: RELICS AND YOU (Base, and Zenith)
So you just got to level fifty. Good job. You can hike your fancy little butt on over to the Quicksand and start flashing it at all the other ex-"adventurers", see if anyone stuffs some gil down your crack for a room in the FC, and maybe a weapon that doesn't smell like rust and broken dreams.
What? Beneath your dignity? Please. If you've done the main story, you know nothing's beneath your dignity. Fuckin' fetch quests. But fine. You wanna work a little more. Maybe pretend like you got a weapon that'll go with that fancy Artifact suit that the game practically handed to ya. Anything that'll get you out of my hair...
First, you're gonna get your basic Relic weapon. Oh sure you could start saving up Solds, unlock Labyrinth of the Ancients and Syrcus Tower, and run that bitch til you've got your Unweathered stabber, but if I saw your useless ass dragging some sub-fifty shiv through CT, slowing down MY raid, I'd kick you faster than you can say "I don't give a fuck about bonus solds".
Get your relic first. Actually, get some knock-off that doesn't suck goobue ass off the Market Board, or buy one from your Grand Company vendor, to stand you while doing THIS step. The base relic starts off with some jerk called Nedrick Ironheart in Vesper Bay, wanting to tell you about the Weaponsmith of Legend. Even an untrained opo-opo could do this part. Just follow the cookie trail (and meet Rowena!) until you're talking to Gerolt. Then, let the games begin.
He's gonna send you on a moderately tedious bit of running around, go here, talk to this, kill that, bring me back a weapon with materia stuffed into it (ask your damn FC I'm not here to hold your hand), and so on. Kill a Chimera. Run a dungeon. Kill a shitload of defenseless critters. Kill a Hydra. Kill Ifrit, Garuda, and Titan, bigger and Harder than before (but still fucking pushovers, just pug it, the DF'll match you up with people like me who'll carry your ass so hard you'll start a new bondage trend). Won't matter if you die. People will get a chuckle when Titan punts you off the cliff. Least you can do. Then go buy some Radz-at-Han Quenching Oil back in Revenant's toll and
CONGRATULATIONS you got your Relic!
You're now a bloody special snowflake just like a million people before you. It's a piddling i80, which is still a massive step up from whatever crap you were holding out with. At least slather it with some Thavnairian Mist (three of them, buy em where you bought the Oil) so that it's a Relic Weapon Zenith, which is i90 and has that fucking glow you wanted so badly.
Now store it in a safe place (you really don't want my suggestions) and get your ass into CT and ST until you can get a REAL weapon. The Weathered Soldiery weapon will run you 1300 Solds and one Unidentified Allagan Tomestone (from Syrcus Tower, aka ST), and is i100. Buy it back over in Revenant's Toll. So easy an idiot could do it. If the idiot also happened to get a Sands of Time, ALSO from ST, they can Unweather it (next to Gerolt, back in North Shroud) into an Unweathered Sold Weapon, i110, which is likely the last bloody upgrade you'll ever get until they release the same candy-ass process for the Poetics weapons in the next patch.
Now get out of here. I'm gonna go get a spicy fish wrap...
PART 2: RELIC ATMA
The fuck? You're still here? Oh, I get it. You heard someone babbling about Atma weapons and you were all omfg that's like ff6 that's so kawaii i must haz!
Gods. Fine. But you're wasting your goddamn time; you're never gonna get to the step where your POS Relic actually outclasses the Unweathered. But whatever, it's your monthly sub. Just don't say I didn't warn you when you're fifty hours in, broke and friendless, sitting and waiting for a FATE to spawn so you can get something useless.
The next step is kinda different. Your new buddy Jalzahn (near Gerolt) tells you that you'll need 12 Atmas, and then makes your damn quest log disappear, forcing you to open your completed quests each time you wanna remind yourself where you had to go to find stuff. Well, here's a handy-dandy list I tossed together, for myself.
Outer La Noscea = Lion
Upper La Noscea = Water-Bearer
Middle La Noscea = Ram
Lower La Noscea = Fish
Western La Noscea = Crab
Central Shroud = Maiden
East Shroud = Goat
North Shroud = Archer
Western Thanalan = Twins
Southern Thanalan = Scorpion
East Thanalan = Bull
Central Thanalan = Scales
'But Skybreaker, why am I going to those zones?' Don't you read fucking quest text? You gotta do FATEs in those zones. Yes, any FATEs. Yes, with your Zenith weapon EQUIPPED. Yes it is random. You've got a small chance, something like 10%, of getting your Atma each time you do a FATE in those zones.
What, you thought this was gonna be easy? Coeurlbait, you're just getting started! Get off your ass and FATE! Go! Go! Go!
Done then? Well well. Maybe you're not a total waste. I am pleased to announce that, returning to Jalzahn, you are now the proud wielder of a
i100 Relic Weapon Atma!
...NOT! Well, not the i100 part. 'But it says so! Right there!' Yeah, smartypants, and if you squint real good you'll notice the non-existent fine print: none of the fucking stats changed, not even the base attack damage. Your weapon color changed though, so.. woo?
Oh, and you lost the glow. Feel free to cry now. Heh. Once you're done wiping away the tears of failure, you can go ahead and look at the next step... also known as Where 90% Of Players Say Fuck It, or...
PART 3: RELIC ANIMUS
Now you're in for some fun, kid. And by fun, I mean schadenfreude for me. If you don't know what that means, look it up. I'll wait.
So. Let the reaming begin. You'll soon be directed to G'jusana, a sweet little piece who works for Rowena and whom you'll probably want to murder and stuff on your mantle (or your Company House's, more likely) by the time you're done with her. Because here is where the lore has started to kick in, and the term Zodiac Braves begins to get tossed around.
Ah, that got your attention, huh? Heh. Hold onto that enthusiasm. You're gonna need it.
See, when that cute little Seeker realizes how badly you want her bloody Books, the Trials of the Braves themselves, she wastes less than half a bat of a lash before gouging the fuck out of you, charging a whopping 500 Soldiery Tomes for just one of the nine you'll need.
Stop crying. It used to be 1500. Fuckin' spoiled newbies.
So hey, you buy a book, one of the lot. They all increase the stats piecemeal, and once you've read them all, go back to Jalzahn and your weapon, the Animus, will PROPERLY be made i100 and have a nifty glow to boot. Easy-peasy, right?
Haha, no.
Each book requires, while wielding the weapon, completing three specific dungeons, three specific levequests, three specific FATEs, and slaying 100 specific monsters. You can only work on one book at a time, so there are no shortcuts here; you just gotta get out there and all 27 FATEs, leves and dungeons, and slay all 900 mobs, as ordained by your wonderful zodiac books. This is the wall. The first one. Oh, you might do a few books. But sooner or later you'll say Fuck It!, throw your hands up, and go back to prodding at WoD, all the while cursing the Zodiac quest along with all the other drop-outs.
Don't feel bad. It's no more than I expected.
PART 4: RELIC NOVUS
Holy crap. Are you actually still here? Well well. Color me impressed. Maybe there's a bit more to you than your slovenly demeanor, worthless gear and vacant stare suggest.
Maybe.
Well you've come this far, so you must be used to being miserable RIGHT? That's good because this next step is gonna hit you someplace it really hurts: your wallet!
Thematically, it's kinda cool. Your new buddy Hubairtin wants to make some fancy-shmancy Sphere Scroll, stuff it with super power, and fuse that shit with your weapon to bring out new levels of awesome. Sounds sweet, huh? Can't be as bad as those damn Animus books... -snicker-
Alright, alright. Let me lay it out. You're gonna need 75 Alexandrites, and at least 75 materia, split up through levels 1 to (probably) 4.
'But Skybreaker, what the hell is Alexandrite, and how do I get it?'
Well, you've got a couple options there. One is to do the daily quest now open in Revenant's Toll; some crazy lady wants you to do Ex Roulette and bring stuff back to her, for which she'll give you a map. Decipher the map, find the treasure, fight a horribly friendly monster (or swarm thereof.. I can solo that shit easy but you might wanna bring friends cuz you'll cry if you fail) and bam, one fucking Alexandrite. You can also buy treasure maps for Solds now, too.
The BETTER option, since they upped the drop rate, is just to do FATEs with your Animus equipped. You got about the same chance as you did for Atma, way back then. And count your fucking stars because it USED to be 3%, much like Atmas. I spent hours farming those bastards, and days, and weeks more for my Alexandrites.
Pro Tip: Wear Spirit-bonding gear while doing the FATEs. So you get materia. Cuz remember those 75 materia you need? Well, here's the story with them!
You gotta infuse the Sphere Scroll with the Materia. To do that, you choose the flavor of materia you like best. I'm a fan of DET and CRIT but whatever floats your boat. Going partway with ACC might save you some cash too. One way or another, each stat starts with level 1 materias, and, once you get to +11 (or +7 for DET) you move up to the next tier. Each infusion will only increase the stat by 1. You CANNOT use higher or lower tier materia than what it says.
It's pretty idiot-proof... but not FAIL-proof. Because here's the fun part: Infusion can fail.
As you go up the range in any given level of materia, you'll notice the success chance starting to drop. If you fail, poof, you lose your materia. But you DON'T lose the Alexandrite, at least.
What, this doesn't sound so bad? Well, that depends how many dicks you've sucked. Because those fucking Savage Might 4 and Savage Aim 4 are gonna run you over 300,000 gil each if you buy 'em, and that's on a good day. Let's see you smile when you've got a 50% fail chance, and fail six times in a row thanks to RNG (that's Random Number Generator, or Random Number Gods depending how much you feel like cursing), dropping two or three mill down the drain. To cap out ONE stat.
Are we having FUN yet?!
That said, if you succeed, then you've got your fucking Relic Weapon Novus, and good fucking job. It's i110, and astute readers will note that it is actually BETTER, stat-wise, than your i110 Unweathered weapon, despite having the same ilvl. The glow changes color, and you can now officially start feeling like it was all worth it.
But it ain't over yet.
PART 5: RELIC NEXUS
You're not giving up now are you? Didn't think so. Then I have good news, and bad news. The good news is, this part costs all of nada, and is stupidly easy (pretty damn grindy, but easy) compared to before. First, good ol' Jalzahn and Gerolt are gonna soulglaze your Novus. Mmm, glaze. This'll keep all that shiny aether from flashing off uselessly while you're killing stuff.. and that's the bad news: You're gonna be killing LOTS of stuff! Because it's time for the Light Farm!
Here's how it works. Whenever you do THINGS (dungeons, trials, treasures, fates, pvp) you gain Light. Here are the values. They're double what they used to be, so cheer up.
Feeble 2 points
Gentle 4 points
Bright 8 points
Brilliant 12 points
Blinding 24 points
Newborn Star 32 points
'But Skybreaker! How do I know what activity will give how many points! Is it random?!'
Sorta. FATEs are always Feeble. Most Trials will be Gentle or Bright. Dungeons, through Roulette, tend to be Bright or Brilliant. Big suckers like CT/ST/WoD will be Brilliant, Blinding or Newborn Star.
Most people form Light parties, figure out which Trial is Bright in the current window, and farm the fuck out of it. When you got 3 or 4 minute kills, you rack up the Light pretty quick compared even to the big towers.
And hey, since I'm in a good mood, here: http://www.reddit.com/live/tlfmtjl4fteo A live thread where people report what's what brightness. You're welcome.
You need a grand total of 2000 points. When you use the handy-dandy Zodiac Glass they give you, you see a level of glow in your relic, indicating the ballpark you're in:
No Activity 0 – 199
Indistinct Activity 200-399
Faint Activity 400-599
Slight Activity 600-799
Modest Activity 800-999
Distinct Activity 1000-1199
Robust Activity 1200-1399
Vigorous Activity 1400-1599
Intense Activity 1600-1799
Extreme Activity 1800-1999
Bursting Activity 2000+
Once you're Bursting, bring 'er back to Jalzahn, rip off the soulglaze, and voila! You've got a genuinely badass-looking glow now, on your brand new i115 Relic Weapon Nexus. Congrats. Feel free to rest on your laurels, at least for a bit... because the next one is a bitch. But it's a big one.
PART 6: ZODIAC WEAPON
Now we're fucking talking. Get ready to suffer, but if you make it through this, your toy's gonna change shape and become an all-new implement of destruction (or healing, if you're into that shit).
I ain't gonna walk you through all the steps one by one. It's four quests, three of them in Revenant's Toll and one at the Bonfire (the materia place) in Central Than. You're building a godsdamned weapon of legend, so you need all the craziest shit. They're gonna make you buy stuff; to quote another source.. "To obtain all of the items, players need: over 400k gil, 80k Company Seals, 6400 Allagan Tomestone of Soldiery, drops from 16 dungeons, 8 3-star HQ crafted items, many desynthesis items and some miscellaneous items."
Now, all this seems like a lot.. and it is. But what's REALLY gonna make you weep tears of blood is gonna be those 16 dungeon drops. Maybe by now you've run with people, workin' on their Zodiacs. Complaining how they've 'done this dungeon 20 times and no drop' and shit like that. Yeah, that's you now. To be fair, they're kinda unlucky. I've heard it said there's as much as a 20% chance of getting your drop, from any of the Zodiac dungeons. Or as low as 11%. Depends who you ask.
Either way, you'd better start praying to the RNGods now, because you're up to your neck in it now.
Welp! All that shit ain't gonna farm itself! Get crackin'! The jerks who you're doing these quests for demand only the best, and will ring every last drop of sweat and blood from your sorry behind to get it. Oh, and don't worry about all that desynthin' noise that they yelp at you; you can buy the junk you need off the MB. Unless you're ass-broke since Novus... but eh! You'll find a way. You've come this far, you can almost taste that sweet Zodiac weapon.
And if you stick it out, if you go all the way, get every frickin' drop and all the stuff you need... then oh boy, are you in for a treat. You get cutscenes. You get lore. And you get a sweet-as-sin bonafide i125 Zodiac Weapon. With names like Excalibur, Longinus and Ragnarok, you know you want that bastard. Just having it lets you look down upon all the plebs who gave up long before you, feeling inherently superior, and vindicated for the lost friends, missed RP, millions of gil and countless hours consumed.
PART 7: ZODIAC ZETA
Now now, don't go freaking out. This part's just the icing on the cake. It's another Light farm, and it's easier than before; only a total of 960 Light to farm if you go by the old scale. You're gonna end up paying 2400 Solds, but you won't even notice them, after those stupid 1600-Sold waters from the last step. It's even in cute little 200-Sold chunks as you attach super-Atmas, Mahatmas, to your weapon step by step, seeking to wake up a living sentience in it that will make it bond with you for all eternity.
D'aww.
The Light is exactly the same as before, same windows, same info. You can even farm with your buddies still working on their Nexus. Just stick it out, and when you come out the other side, you are rewarded with an honest-to-god i135 weapon, a true juggernaut. Best In Slot, better than the Dreadwyrm stuff out of Final Coil; same ilvl, but higher stats, like Novus before it.
And there you go. Con-fucking-gratulations. You're a Zodiac Brave. You've endured, overcome, weathered the worst that SE can throw at you.
For now~
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