Ancient Magic

Description

Ancient Magic is the term given to an ancient varity of elemental spells; each of which are tremendously powerful, yet require a large amount of mystical energy and long periods of steadfast concentration to properly cast. Due to the extreme nature and power of these spells, they are only available to the most learned sorcerers of Vana'diel.

List of Ancient Magic Spells

Lv50:Freeze
Lv52:Tornado
Lv54:Quake
Lv56:Burst
Lv58:Flood
Lv60:Flare
merit:Freeze II
merit:Tornado II
merit:Quake II
merit:Burst II
merit:Flood II
merit:Flare II

Nuke and Sleep

Black Mages can solo reasonably effectively by using Ancient Magic and Sleep spells to deal large chunks of damage to the monster and then prevent it from damaging the caster. AOE nukes and AOE sleeps can also be effective for soloing multiple monsters simultaneously. By using the in game clock to help synchronize casting, this technique can also be used by multiple Black Mages to take down single or multiple targets. This is the basis of many Black Mage only parties. The general concept follows a pattern similar to this:

1. Pull a monster with a non-DOT spell to a safe location and sleep it, or select one that will not link.
2. Move to where the monster is far enough that you will have time to cast Sleep/Sleep 2 before it reaches you.
3. Cast an Ancient Magic (or other highly damaging spell) on the target.
4. Cast Sleep or Sleep II.
5. If you don't have enough mp for another cast and sleep, rest for a bit.
6. If the monster isn't dead yet, start back at step 2.

The benefit of using Ancient Magic is that by the time the damage spell is cast, the recast on sleep should be finished. This means the caster doesn't have to pay as much attention to recast timers. Faster casting spells can be used, but the caster must ensure the recast on sleep is ready or near ready before waking the monster. For Black Mage only parties, often a Bard or Red Mage is used for sleep control and pulling. Typically, four Ancient Magic spells will kill any low IT/high VT monster instantly.

Ancient Magic in Parties

While the use of Ancient Magic in traditional PTs is limited, it used to be popular to burst Freeze on distortion skillchains. This practice has fallen out of favor due to the lack of use of skillchains and magic bursts being used in experience parties.

Additional Effects

In addition to the high damage, AM weakens the enemy it is cast on to the weakness of that spell. Such as, casting Flare (Fire element) will weaken your enemy to water.

This is occasionally used on HNM to weaken them for a large volley of spells, such as casting Flood, followed by a large string of Thundaga III