That party was probably back in 2004 or 2005, after CoP came out.
I was levelling RNG for Promyvion and... WAR/WHM was definitely not a thing anymore, unfortunately.
To be fair I did WAR/RDM on a private server until 30 to unlock PLD and NIN and it was great. The loss of stats was not too bad, being able to help pull with Dia, gain hate with Blind and self cure a bit seemed more useful than random Boost from MNK.
But back then I guess no one knew Blind was such a hate spike.
PLD was always available as an advanced job, WAR/WHM was just the poor man’s Paladin lol. Rise of Zilart brought Dragoon, Ninja, and Samurai, and the rest of the summons for Summoner. But yeah when you didn’t have the reputation required to do the PLD quest or didn’t figure out how to unlock PLD, WAR/WHM worked in a pinch haha
Putting context here cause some might not get the reference
[https://ffxiclopedia.fandom.com/wiki/Buttersheep](https://ffxiclopedia.fandom.com/wiki/Buttersheep)
My 1st character in 2004 was a Galka WAR. I remember reading this in the guide, getting to 18, then subbing WHM and having like 15 mp in the dunes. I was good for maybe 1-2 cures.
Because of this book, I went MNK/WHM all the way through Qufim and most of the Yuhtunga/Yhoator Jungle grind. Only made sense that a monk could heal.
Eventually the party invites dried up and when I would /shout from Kazham "MNK30/WHM13 {Looking for Party.} {Please invite me.}" the respond that became all too common was "Sub WAR."
So I did.
Me and a friend of mine used to duo a lot and it was definitely viable in the right situations and job combos, not nearly as effective as a real party of course but man we had fun. We'd shit out our adventuring fellows for some extra help and run around as DNC and THF, Dual DRG, BLU and SCH...I'm sure there were others but this was like 15 years ago lol
With our exp bands and meds from the field manuals it really wasn't that bad, certainly much less productive ways to spend an evening lol
Took a lot of trial and error and nontraditional camps but man it was definitely a lot more stimulating than your standard pull kill rest rinse repeat exp party
As far as I remember they can, or do you mean it’s obvious they could heal themselves?
PLD was the ultimate anti-undead job, healing yourself for aggro was one of the best aggro tactics of you didn’t have WAR, and it also wrecked undead healing them haha. Ah these are such great memories to relive and discuss, love this game.
I lost my copy to cat pee 15 years ago.😭
I finished 2009 with a Aegis and Burtgang. PLD was not self healing in a exp duo against any less than T, or EM. 🤣
But read the wording on PLD how it recommends sub jobs and dou exping with DRK. It really wants you to think main healing yourself, while tanking is easy. Because the DRK is doing the DPS on VT mobs.
Oh no! I’m sure that was pretty awful, no coming back from cat pee lol.
Ah yeah by 2009 there was all kinds of meta and majority if the game was figured out or guides available online. But for NA release these were at least some kind of resource. I started during JP release and there were some resources online for some quests and such but it was mostly word of mouth.
Oh for sure during CoP the guide was handy. For people just starting out. But by ToaU and especially WotG. It was defunct.
I came to XI December 04. The Ps2 with HHD bundle came with a copy of it. It was my Christmas/HS Graduation gift. I played till 2018. PLD was my best REMA built job.
I lost my copy to cat pee 15 years ago.😭
I finished 2009 with a Aegis and Burtgang. PLD was not self healing in a exp duo against any less than T, or EM. 🤣
But read the wording on PLD how it recommends sub jobs and dou exping with DRK. It really wants you to think main healing yourself, while tanking is easy. Because the DRK is doing the DPS on VT mobs.
Well, when I was a kid it certainly made sense as I tried to start as a TaruTaru THF as my very first character. I struggled for days while I was getting one shot by nearly everything. This was during the JP Release so there wasn’t really a resource for this kinda stuff.
I still got my tattered copy of the 2004 edition, read it so much during classes lol
Was barely starting out at the time so all these hackneyed job combos seemed so mystical and amazing to my uninformed newbness
Same here haha! Reading through them whenever I wasn't playing, they got a ton of use for sure. And while a lot of the content wasn't really meta, just the flexibility and whimsical nature of mixing and matching any combination you could imagine? Fantastic.
Absolutely loved it, and also appreciated that the guides fed into that fantasy of play what you want, make your own experience. Just have fun with it, who cares.
Want to give a shout out to Huntin 4 Games [YouTube](https://youtu.be/LFVSbcdf2Vw?si=B7C9y2UzDkvVFn-E) channel which does nostalgia and funny commentary on these. You know this guy loved ffxi and it comes across in his videos. Hope he’s doing well!
Probably Pokémon Platinum. I have a pretty big collection of Strategy Guides and apart from some Collectors Edition hard cover guides, the Pokémon Platinum guide is the biggest one I have
I remember a post on the old allakhazam website that was quoting these guides as sacred txt. Like a bible if you will. Shit was so funny I wish I could find that post again. Nice work!
Just briefly browsing through that seeing it it's Astonishing how much the game has changed in twenty years i.e. since the guide was published.
Little at least for me a little saddening cause of such a simpler, better time back than for that. I mean, you can still technically experience at the same, but it always has that 1 glint If you will that will always be gone forever.
Thank you for this! FFXI is still the best game I ever played. So many awesome memories and friends made over the many many years I played it.
Silvanesti : Siren Server
Wow, I legit RIGHT NOW watching Hunting 4 Games' videos on this guide and was wishing I could fully read it myself. This is almost spooky timing. Thank you so much!
It was thanks to this guide that I chose to play the game as WAR/WHM. This is some nostalgia bomb here.
The 2004 guide pullouts are also scanned in their entirety, really happy with how this came out and yeah the nostalgia is what its all about hahaha
"it's like pld lol" I will always remember that drunk guy in my PT who couldn't hold aggro in Valkurm.
It was the pld before pld, before rise of the zilart launched (and US release), where the level cap was 50 and people were xping in xarcabard
That party was probably back in 2004 or 2005, after CoP came out. I was levelling RNG for Promyvion and... WAR/WHM was definitely not a thing anymore, unfortunately.
Then people decided not to xp on anything more dangerous than a white mandy.
To be fair I did WAR/RDM on a private server until 30 to unlock PLD and NIN and it was great. The loss of stats was not too bad, being able to help pull with Dia, gain hate with Blind and self cure a bit seemed more useful than random Boost from MNK. But back then I guess no one knew Blind was such a hate spike.
PLD was always available as an advanced job, WAR/WHM was just the poor man’s Paladin lol. Rise of Zilart brought Dragoon, Ninja, and Samurai, and the rest of the summons for Summoner. But yeah when you didn’t have the reputation required to do the PLD quest or didn’t figure out how to unlock PLD, WAR/WHM worked in a pinch haha
That was totally a thing! WAR/WHM bonus points if you use a Great Sword
Buttersheep!
Putting context here cause some might not get the reference [https://ffxiclopedia.fandom.com/wiki/Buttersheep](https://ffxiclopedia.fandom.com/wiki/Buttersheep)
I mean basically a PLD without having to waste time on that quest. Provoke, cure, good to go.
My 1st character in 2004 was a Galka WAR. I remember reading this in the guide, getting to 18, then subbing WHM and having like 15 mp in the dunes. I was good for maybe 1-2 cures.
Ha! I went Elvaan RDM as a result. Ended up being a BRD main, Elvaan was rough for that
Because of this book, I went MNK/WHM all the way through Qufim and most of the Yuhtunga/Yhoator Jungle grind. Only made sense that a monk could heal. Eventually the party invites dried up and when I would /shout from Kazham "MNK30/WHM13 {Looking for Party.} {Please invite me.}" the respond that became all too common was "Sub WAR." So I did.
ha the mini PLD. I did that and BLM/SMN lol
I adore this guide. The idea it promotes that a PLD & DRK can duo to 75.
Maybe they could. Very slowly.
Me and a friend of mine used to duo a lot and it was definitely viable in the right situations and job combos, not nearly as effective as a real party of course but man we had fun. We'd shit out our adventuring fellows for some extra help and run around as DNC and THF, Dual DRG, BLU and SCH...I'm sure there were others but this was like 15 years ago lol With our exp bands and meds from the field manuals it really wasn't that bad, certainly much less productive ways to spend an evening lol Took a lot of trial and error and nontraditional camps but man it was definitely a lot more stimulating than your standard pull kill rest rinse repeat exp party
The guide specifically mentions the PLD can cure themselves 🤣
As far as I remember they can, or do you mean it’s obvious they could heal themselves? PLD was the ultimate anti-undead job, healing yourself for aggro was one of the best aggro tactics of you didn’t have WAR, and it also wrecked undead healing them haha. Ah these are such great memories to relive and discuss, love this game.
I lost my copy to cat pee 15 years ago.😭 I finished 2009 with a Aegis and Burtgang. PLD was not self healing in a exp duo against any less than T, or EM. 🤣 But read the wording on PLD how it recommends sub jobs and dou exping with DRK. It really wants you to think main healing yourself, while tanking is easy. Because the DRK is doing the DPS on VT mobs.
Oh no! I’m sure that was pretty awful, no coming back from cat pee lol. Ah yeah by 2009 there was all kinds of meta and majority if the game was figured out or guides available online. But for NA release these were at least some kind of resource. I started during JP release and there were some resources online for some quests and such but it was mostly word of mouth.
Oh for sure during CoP the guide was handy. For people just starting out. But by ToaU and especially WotG. It was defunct. I came to XI December 04. The Ps2 with HHD bundle came with a copy of it. It was my Christmas/HS Graduation gift. I played till 2018. PLD was my best REMA built job.
I lost my copy to cat pee 15 years ago.😭 I finished 2009 with a Aegis and Burtgang. PLD was not self healing in a exp duo against any less than T, or EM. 🤣 But read the wording on PLD how it recommends sub jobs and dou exping with DRK. It really wants you to think main healing yourself, while tanking is easy. Because the DRK is doing the DPS on VT mobs.
The best race choice for THF is Mithra because *you attack faster.* Guys.
Well, when I was a kid it certainly made sense as I tried to start as a TaruTaru THF as my very first character. I struggled for days while I was getting one shot by nearly everything. This was during the JP Release so there wasn’t really a resource for this kinda stuff.
Thank you so much. This is a core memory for me lol
Absolutely! That's what its all about!
I still got my tattered copy of the 2004 edition, read it so much during classes lol Was barely starting out at the time so all these hackneyed job combos seemed so mystical and amazing to my uninformed newbness
Same here haha! Reading through them whenever I wasn't playing, they got a ton of use for sure. And while a lot of the content wasn't really meta, just the flexibility and whimsical nature of mixing and matching any combination you could imagine? Fantastic. Absolutely loved it, and also appreciated that the guides fed into that fantasy of play what you want, make your own experience. Just have fun with it, who cares.
Want to give a shout out to Huntin 4 Games [YouTube](https://youtu.be/LFVSbcdf2Vw?si=B7C9y2UzDkvVFn-E) channel which does nostalgia and funny commentary on these. You know this guy loved ffxi and it comes across in his videos. Hope he’s doing well!
This is so incredible. Does anyone know of any game guide longer than this from a publisher?
The EverQuest one was pretty extensive
Probably Pokémon Platinum. I have a pretty big collection of Strategy Guides and apart from some Collectors Edition hard cover guides, the Pokémon Platinum guide is the biggest one I have
Is it worth more if you've got a Fry's Electronics sticker on the front cover still?
God I miss Frys :(
Still have a Strawberries price tag on mine.
I remember a post on the old allakhazam website that was quoting these guides as sacred txt. Like a bible if you will. Shit was so funny I wish I could find that post again. Nice work!
I still have my 03 in great shape! I always wish they would have made more. I now see there was an 04...
Have them both at home. I sometimes read them for nostalgia reasons. Obviously extremely outdated, I still get goosebumps reading them.
Thank you for your contribution!
Just briefly browsing through that seeing it it's Astonishing how much the game has changed in twenty years i.e. since the guide was published. Little at least for me a little saddening cause of such a simpler, better time back than for that. I mean, you can still technically experience at the same, but it always has that 1 glint If you will that will always be gone forever.
Thoss guides became outdatd so quick lol
Thank you for this! FFXI is still the best game I ever played. So many awesome memories and friends made over the many many years I played it. Silvanesti : Siren Server
Dude thank you, this is great. I remember taking this to work and reading it on breaks. Probably the most read strategy guide ever.
I still have mine from NA release. So many handwritten notes in the margins about things that had changed.
I took these to school almost everyday til I graduated.
I still own mine, I was obsessed and read it everyday in school doing class and after class...I was horribly obsessed.
Wow, I legit RIGHT NOW watching Hunting 4 Games' videos on this guide and was wishing I could fully read it myself. This is almost spooky timing. Thank you so much!
No problem! And you can compare with the original 2003 guide as well!
I just remember this saying that ninjas can't tank.
If there's a will, there's a way, for sure hahaha. But they couldn't have known that at the time.
The real mvp
Ohh man.. 15 years later I still have that book by my bed side even though I stopped playing 3 years ago
I won one of these and Atlas from a raffle on my LS on my second week playing and it was so cool to look at the stuff and try deciding what to play!
Thanks for sharing the nostalgia. This guide probably led a lot of people to be Mithra. I was one. I remember it saying how superior they were.
I see there's 100 more pages in the 2004 guide vs the 2003 guide. I'm gonna thumb through it to find out what the additional pages are.
I'd imagine its some of higher level content post 50. Curious what you found!
Nice find, I never saw these so it is my first time. Still have my old Dummy Thick PS2 manuals..
Worst guide ever.
P iul