DAWNTRAIL Guides! Dawntrail L90-100 Miner Leveling, Botanist Leveling
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Ambitious to be an Archer? Allow yourself the advice found in our FFXIV Archer Basics Guide & FAQ! As implied, this is for players wanting to know the absolute basics, and answer some of the most common questions regarding ARC.
Likely, one of the main reasons you’re here is either unlocking Archer, or wondering about the eventual advanced job you can evolve into, Bard.
How to become an Archer? Unlocking ARC:
Primarily, you can begin your journey into Eorzea and start the game as an Archer – simply choose it as your starting option upon character creation.
If you didn’t start as an ARC, you can unlock the Archer class by going to the Archer Guild in Gridania – New Gridania (around 15,12), look out for the quests either “Way of the Archer”, or “So you want to be an Archer”.
Other unlocking prerequisites? I’m 99% sure you need to complete the Level 10 class quest of your STARTING CLASS if you want to unlock any other new ones.
Why should I play or choose Archer?
This question is semi irrelevant as, along with any of the other base classes, the only reason you’re an Archer is simply a stepping stone into Bard. But, I’ll give you a little description of what to expect anyway.
Archers (and eventually Bard) are your resident ranged, well, Archer. While not typically known for heavy hits, they have more of a DoT / Supportive playstyle. They aren’t your typical “Hunter / Sniper”, and more of a “Ranger / Naturalist”. If Bards sound like a bullseye to you, then hurry and level your Archer!
You’ll do well to learn a little more about what you’ll eventually BECOME:
FFXIV Bard Basics Guide.
Archer Crafters and Gatherers?
I often get asked “What Disciple of Hand or Disciple of Land classes go well with ARC?” Another related question to this is “Should I level them with my Archer simultaneously”?
Leveling up your DoH and DoL classes should be thought of as a separate goal all on its own. I suggest leveling up DoH classes all together, and all DoL classes together (except the optional Fishing). Do not try to align your combat class levels to your non-combat levels. Trust me.
My only advice related to this is to never cap your levequests. If you’re at max leve allowances, feel free to spend them on Fieldcraft, Tradecraft, or Battlecraft leves just to uncap ‘em.
What’s the best race for Archer?
TLDR: I don’t know a single person who changes race for their main class for stats. The gain is not even .1% from worst to best. My advice? Choose for aesthetics.
If you REALLY wanna do it, check out our FFXIV Racial Stats Guide, which, FAIR WARNING – I am about to recheck and update next week. But honestly, it’s best you don’t even click on that – THE MICROSCOPIC INCREASE IN STATS IS NEAR IRRELEVANT.
Related Archer Guides – Read More!
Here are a few useful links for you:
- General Leveling Guide for ALL combat classes / jobs
- Archer Leveling Guide
- Bard Basics Guide & FAQ
- Adding new links as we update them!
Upcoming Odds and Ends
Here’s a few things we’ll be adding on here in the near future:
- A small skill list for “human readability”, as the in-game one seems like the best source for EXACT information.
- List of relevant links for this for Archer, and some links for Bard.
Feel free to suggest anything else via comment or socials!
Summary & In Closing
Well that’s it for our Archer Basics Guide & FAQ. There’s not much to say but these are really basic little guides to help out the budding or confused ARC, and hopefully future BRD! Hopefully we answered a few of your questions.
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You have the levels for flaming arrow and quelling strikes switched
You know i’ve been meaning to fix up the skills tables on all classes to feel “Less like a WIKI”… hmm..
I started out as an archer but now I am kinda wishing I had picked something else…. I really don’t want to end up as a bard. D: sounds so boring…. but maybe it isn’t. IDK. I am playing solo, and I really wish I had a tank. Maybe I should have picked arcanist to start (?) I guess it’s too late to switch now? D:
fyi, i didn’t see how i could edit the page, but misery’s end has attack potency of 190
FFXIV –
What are some of the other jobs, whose class “actions” / “traits” pair well with an Archer?
Just to clarify your question, I’m sure you mean which classes not Jobs. Jobs are the advanced version of classes and do not have any actions that are usable by other classes/jobs.
That being said, every class has cross class skills. In your case, as a Bard, you can use up to 5 cross class skills(at level 50) from either Puglist or Lancer. If you check the skills of those two classes, you will see the BRD tag. Only take note of the BRD tag because once you get to your advanced job, you can only use cross class skills with the BRD tag not the ARC tag.
Also, no traits are shared among classes/jobs.
This page is supposed to be about Archers but all the info is about Lancers.
Hi Tobais, thanks for the correction! Made the changes and took out the LNC and replaced with ARC. Typo