I was in the mood for FATE grinding last night, and got Black Mage to 80 off Shadowbringers FATEs. So today was the first day I could do Arkasodara tribal quests on that job, and wow, I forgot how much XP they give! Between six Arkasodara quests (I got extra just for today by passing a reputation threshold) and a leveling roulette (a low level dungeon, boo) I reached 81 easily. That’ll be the last leveling roulette I run on Black Mage until the end of the mogtome event, because I’m avoiding all duties that give mogtomes due to being tired of spending time with bored cranky grinders, and the Endwalker leveling dungeons yield mogtomes.
Meanwhile it was also a big day for Pixie quests on Blue Mage. It seemed like I hit the climax of their story, but there’s still more reputation to be gained, so I’ll see if I get another quest when I complete this rep tier. Pixie quests and maybe Shadowbringers FATEs are probably how I’ll level Blue Mage, because I’m not all that interested in the job, I just want to level it so I can throw away my lower level equipment. It seems like there are some cool ideas on BLU, but not being able to take it on duty roulettes sharply limits its utility for me.
Finally Astrologian is shaping up. I got it to 65 today, with a 50/60/70/80 roulette and some Ananta quests. The Stormblood tribal quests aren’t worth much XP, but they’re mildly interesting and that XP trickle is better than nothing. I went ahead and ran Shisui of the Violet Tides to spend some of my rested bonus too, and it went fairly well. Astro will probably be shooting ahead now, because I will be feeding it my leveling roulettes, at least until I get into the high 60s. (I don’t want to get mid-Stormblood leveling gear that I’ll only use for a few days, but I also don’t want to be underequipped for a dungeon as a party support job, so I avoid leveling roulettes when I’m around 7-9 levels into an expansion’s level band on a tank or healer.)
I find it interesting with both Black Mage and Astrologian that I used to hate both jobs, but I’m warming to them a bit. They definitely have some good quality of life improvements as you level: Astro’s added OGCD heals, and Black Mage’s Triplecast. I also discovered I was playing Black Mage with far too little spell speed through the 70s due to equipping Augmented Scaevan casting gear I had left melded for other jobs. It turns out Black Mage doesn’t feel like ass when you load it up with spell speed! It’s still my least favorite caster, but I don’t hate it any more, and I think Astro is becoming my third favorite healer rather than my least favorite.