Dancer Guide by Carnivor

Category:Guides __NOEDITSECTION__
	
	A Dancer Guide - By Carnivor of Asura ~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~^v~
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First off, please consider that Dancer can be played in numerous different ways. I will give a recollection of my experience about the Dancer job as I have chosen to play it. This guide may or may not fit your own playing style. Even so, there are some things that are very important.
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__TOC__
= Introduction =
I chose to write this guide because Dancer is a new job, and one that I have found very exciting to level. I haven't been bored even once while playing this job. And I have explored many aspects of the job. Things like normal EXP parties, NM hunting, Solo and Duo/Trio, God runs, Dynamis, Farming (sky and normal) and Campaign.
There will be no speculations into math in this guide. I have never liked calculation, even though many parts of it fall easy to me. Instead I will describe Dancer from what I have seen work in different situations.
I hope some will appreciate this guide, and want to level DNC.
= Dancer in general =
Dancer is, like most of you already know, a Healer job. Yes, I know they engage in combat and that they debuff and have some buffs, but bottom line is that it is a fully fledged spot healer job. This does not, however, mean that you should disregard or toss the other aspects of the job. I will explain this during the guide.
What is so remarkable about Dancer is that for it to function properly, you have to use the other aspects to its full advantage. You can't do like mages and avoid certain spells to be able to do your job more fluidly. With Dancer, the table is turned. You can't do your job properly if you don't use steps (post reverse flourish) and fight.
To be able to do Dancer correctly, you will have to use steps and fight, which directly gives an advantage to yourself and the rest of your party/alliance.
There are ofcourse exceptions where you as a healer wont be as beneficial as opposed to a pure debuffing role. This is mostly using dancer end-game and such. After all, the harder the mob, the bigger most of your steps will count for, not to mention how easy you can land Weight and Stun given the right preparations.
As you level up though (not counting the glorious h2h levels early on) your main concern should be healing. And dont forget to use 2 types of steps.
= The Guide =
== Finishing Moves ==
You will get these, up to a maximum number of 5, as a reward for each step landed on a mob. Finishing moves are the baseline of a dancer's more powerful and noticeable effects. They give access to perform Flourishes on yourself or a mob.
The cost of each Flourish depends on the type. Also the potency of Reverse Flourish, Animated Flourish, and Building Flourish is decided upon the number of Finishing Moves.
== Steps ==
The baseline of every Dancer are steps.
In the time I have played Dancer, I have found it wise to focus on two types of steps max in order to pimp each out and to be able to keep them on the longest. Personally, I tend to vary between Quickstep and either Box Step or Stutter Step.
Every step can be increased to a level 5 Daze effect, With potency increasing with every step landed.
A good rule: Make hits land, then worry about how much they hit for.
New Edit: For some reason people seem to have problems stacking 2 steps (see this page: Talk:Quickstep). And i have actually met one. If you have trouble doing this, please choose another job. "One-step Dancers" are GIMP.
Yes you will eventually loose one or both of the step stacks, but seriously guys in a party you would never loose any of them before the mob is dead. If you are having trouble getting them to stack, but you want to continue level dancer, try stacking 2 or 3 quicksteps before beginning to build Box steps. that will give you 1.5-2 minutes to land a box step. Your recently landed Box step are now on a one minute timer. land another quick and you should be ready to refresh the box step when its timer are a little under 30 seconds. adding another 30 seconds to the duration.
Seriously. recast timer on steps are 15 seconds! if you cant land 2 sets of steps to 5/5 on a regular mob, and thus keeping to one step only, you are gimp. If anyone doubts me, give me a shout in-game and I'll show you myself. On another note, you will generally experience a great lift in you performance when you manage to do this. Not only will your TP gain get boosted, your fights will be much easier.
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===Quickstep===
Your very first step, gained at level 20. This is, in my opinion, the most valuable and versatile step. This is simply because it lowers evasion. And apart from making you and your party able to hit the mob more, it also makes future step combinations easier to land.
Quickstep will do the following:
1st Step: -8 Evasion.
2nd-5th Step: -4 Evasion each.
Totaling to -24 Evasion
With each step landed, the chance of Desperate Flourish landing is increased. On Kirin with 5 Quicksteps, I have yet to see Desperate Flourish not land, and that's saying something.
===Box Step===
The second Step you get. Amazing on high def mobs. Could possibly ruin the mob's defenses if applied correctly. I have used this Step on Kirin to great success (although Kirin is a complicated mob to fight, I'll get into this later). As I said on Quickstep, make sure hits land to a certain degree before applying this step.
Box Step will do the following:
1st step: -5% Defense
2nd-5th Step: - 2% Defense 
Totaling to -13% Defense
===Stutter Step===
This is the step I use the least. Unfortunate maybe, but as it is I feel I'm more of a melee support than a mage support. The only times I use this is when I really need Stun to land, when dangerous spells are being cast, or if I need to reapply Utsusemi.
I have been able to test it somewhat though, and my results are that it makes magic attacks more potent and debuffs and dispels have a greater chance of landing.
Stutter Step will do the following:
1st step: -10% Magic Evasion
2nd-5th Step: -5% Magic Evasion
Totaling to -30% Magic Evasion
With each step landed, the chance of landing Stun with Violent Flourish increases. Stun has a very high proc rate with 5 Stutter Steps. You can even stun with an acceptable proc rate using 3 Stutter Steps.
==Flourishes==
The end-line of steps. Divided into two categories: Flourishes I and Flourishes II. The first ones are targeted toward and affect your enemy only. Animated Flourish does not require you to be engaged in combat, which is great ;). The second ones are centered upon yourself, with different effects. These effects move through many aspects of ways to play the game, such as Provoke, weight, stun, boost, skillchain, and of course TP regain.
==Flourishes I==
===Animated Flourish===
This is your Dancer's provoke ability. It only gives half the enmity of provoke, but that only makes it more efficient at pulling, as provoke would have no problems taking hate from the Dancer. This ability is instant, has the same range as provoke, and thus it can be used as effectively and quickly as any instant claiming abilities. Of course, it requires 1-2 finishing moves to use, so this require you to fight some before you are ready.
Not much else to say about this. Its a claiming/pulling move, but could also be used to draw hate if you ever would want to do that.
===Desperate Flourish===
Your own personal weight ability. This Flourish doesn't do anything except inflict weight upon the mob. But weight is quite effective in what it does. Proc rate is affected by Quickstep. If it lands it reduces the movement speed of the mob and jack evasion down by 10 points. 5 Quicksteps + Desperate Flourish = -34 evasion and Movement Speed decreased. This is invaluable if you are fighting a mob that has high evasion bonuses. Even more invaluable if that mob's hate is flying around the table.
===Violent Flourish===
This Flourish does 2 things. Firstly it almost always deals a regular hit damage to the mob you are fighting. Secondly it has a chance of stunning your target. Affected by Stutter Step, the Stun proc rate skyrockets with each step applied. Unless the target mob is immune to stun, 5 Stutter Steps has up to 95% proc rate. With the ability to cast Utsusemi with /NIN, this is a great tool for Soloing and Duo/trioing. Even in a situation where your alliance doesn't require Box and Quick more than stutters, it's great to get utsusemi up again or interrupt devastating spells or job abilities.
==Flourishes II==
===Reverse Flourish===
This is what you will be doing for the most part. This ability gives you TP back from the number of Finishing moves you have collected. At level 40, this gives your dancer a big jump in the healing department. You build up steps, like you should have done anyway, but instead of always sitting at 5 finishing moves, you just convert them straight back to your TP pool. The best way to do this is to stack two steps and then Reverse Flourish. This means you get full effect from all steps, and it fits in surprisingly well with the recast timer.
===Building Flourish===
This boosts your next weapon skill. I haven't used it much. It works, yeah, but it consumes 3 finishing moves, or otherwise empties them if less than three. I tend to only go with Wild Flourish. It's different opinions ;) make up your own. Ok, I'll give a reason. If you are going to weapon skill your enemy, you empty your TP. To land back at 5 finishing moves right after skillchain, you have to build this up over time. If I weapon skill, its on weaker mobs where I don't have to worry about healing, but still takes some time to kill. Either way, I want it to go quick. I don't want to spend half a minute just to get a bigger blow out. Like I said, I'd rather just fling in a Wild Flourish. But like I said, work out your own opinion when you get this. :)
===Wild Flourish===
Amazing ability that starts a skillchain. It's debated that the power of this ability isn't strong enough to be worthy of mentioning. I just laugh at that. They do not know enough about any type of skillchain to even start a general discussion about it. This ability and a Samurai..... yeah enough said. Easy like nothing else to do Fragmentation --> Light (Skillchain). And if you know anything about skillchaining, you should know that the potency of one skillchain is improved by stacking a skillchain before the next hits. I have jacked this chart from the Skillchain Guide to let you know how the pure damage output of a skillchain can be improved by following them up with more weaponskills resulting in multiple skillchains.
The Levels represent What type of skillchain .Ex. is it a Scission, Fragmentation or Light (Skillchain) (there are multiple but i just used examples.) In my example of me duoing with my samurai friend, we used Fragmentation --> Light (Skillchain). The effect this has on Light (Skillchain) can be viewed below. Instead of using only a level 3 skillchain, which would make the damage output a maximum of 100% of the ending skillchain, now me and my bud included a Fragmentation skillchain. This means we could bump the light up a notch, and make it produce a maximum of 150% damage output.
Skillchain Level	Maximum Damage Potential	Maximum Damage Potential	Maximum Damage Potential	Maximum Damage Potential	Maximum Damage Potential
Skillchain Level	2 Skills 	3 Skills 	4 Skills 	5 Skills 	6 Skills
Level 1 	50% 	60% 	70% 	80% 	90%
Level 2 	60% 	75% 	100% 	125% 	150%
Level 3 	100% 	150% 	175% 	200% 	225%
Now you can see the benefits of having a player that, relatively cost free, can open one of these chains. The recast timer is also excellent and it has always been ready for when another player has TP ready. There are though few Weapon Skills that produce a level 2 skillchain with Wild Flourish, but a level one isn't that bad. It's 10% lower damage output than a level 2 skillchain. If you are soloing, this is what I prefer to use to get things done quickly. It's the difference between a 800 damage WS and a 1200 damage WS. Go figure :)
Note on Wild Flourish: Lately i have leveled Samurai a great deal. i am level 62 with Soboro Sukehiro as my main weapon. i found Wild Flourish a godsendt on my previous Puk party.
Nearly every skillchain i made in conjunction with others resulted in healing the Puk (total of 6 ws's in party made this skillchain). However we got a dnc as a rep for thief eventually and i skill chained with Wild Flourish for mostly non resist SC damage (50%). To add on the positive side, the only job today able to skillchain every ws with a sam using Soboro Sukehiro is Dancer. Since the recast of Wild Flourish is as short as it is, the dnc had no problem making 3-4 Skillchains with me in one fight. I can barely wait to get Gekko and Kasha to make Fragmentation --> Light skillchains with Sekkanoki.
==Sambas, Waltzes and Jigs==
I will not say much on these abilities, they go by themselves. Instead, I will briefly explain what they do, and list links, so you can peruse them at your leisure.
===Samba=== 
A duration determined dance that inflicts a daze effect upon the mob you are hitting. Each daze has a very short duration, but are refreshed every time you hit the said mob.
Three kinds
Drain Samba Causes party members' attacks to convert some of the damage taken by the mob into their own HP.
Aspir Samba Same as above, only converts the damage into MP.
Haste Samba This ability gives every party member Haste when landing a hit. Haste % is 5% and you can increase this rate with 1% for every Haste Samba Effect merit.
(a little note here, that i forgot to put in. While usually haste reduces the recast and casting time of spells, this samba simply reduce the delay of you weapon with the said % rate. This samba has no effect on spell recast and casting time. That being said, it does stack with any haste spell, gear and songs introduced by other jobs.)
===Waltz===
Healing and Erasing for your survival needs. Dancer is a Spot healer, this is why.
Curing Waltz Tiered up to IV. They are based on your Charisma and the target's Vitality. Some pieces of equipment have a "Curing Waltz" Potency attribute to it, which means you cure for more HP. Not much else to be said, other than they are powerful.
Divine Waltz Your one and only Curaga. Can be powerful with the right gear, but I have always seen that gear to be wasted because you put aside so many other things about being a Dancer. This gear does, of course, also affect Curing Waltz.
Healing Waltz Erase. Be careful with it, especially if mob is hitting hard or fast. Long recast timer. Other than for Petrification it works wonders. Only one status at a time, though.
===Jigs===
Two kinds. Both affecting only you, but omg how free it makes you feel!
Spectral Jig Your own personal Sneak and Invisible. Both put down in one instant package for your survival needs. Short duration. Be aware.
Chocobo Jig My own personal favorite. Increase your movement speed by 25%. I've praised this ability so many times I can't count them. Nothing beats being able to travel faster in a way that never ceases to function. You can just recast this as soon as it wears. With AF boots it lasts even longer. Cities, caves, open areas, it always works.
==Gear==
First off, this section is gonna be my choice of gear and why I have chosen that road. I am not going to list up a ton of gear for you to choose. Instead, I'm gonna tell you what to focus on the with way I have played Dancer. You my want to focus your gear in another direction. That is for you to decide.
===Gear in general===
When it comes to my choice of gear, this is what I have focused on. It might not be according to the "commonly known" choices on how to build dancer.
Accuracy > Enmity - > Store TP > [Attack <> Haste] > DEX > STR > Evasion > CHR
As you can see from the first 3, Cobra Unit Gear lands perfectly here. Often I even use Cobra Cap over Turban, it all depends on the situation. If I'm farming, it all comes down to attack and haste, but in any hard fight (exp, gods, higher NMs, Kirin, etc.) it's all about accuracy. You don't waste accuracy for charisma to be able to cure for more if you can't hit your target as much. I think the only charisma gear I have on is the AF weapon.
Furthermore, every healing or damage dealing job should be focusing on enmity-. This has always concerned me. Enmity- will simply make you able to deal more damage and spam more cures before it hunts your sorry ass down and sends you to oblivion. Even in duo situations you should wear enmity- gear. It keeps hate on one target, which makes your job a whole lot easier. Remember, Dancer is a spot healer. Even when there are 2 people to cure instead of one, you feel it.
Store TP is nice, even though you won't feel it much unless there's a lot of it. My complete Cobra gear, Chivalrous Chain and Ecphoria Ring with +1 gives me like 1.5 more TP per swing. This starts to count when you get Joyeuse and Saber Dance. With both activated, Joytoy and Saber, 4 swings aren't really that rare anymore, and it gives me 21-22 TP each attack round, which is nice. 3 swings which are normal is always 17 TP.
When it comes to attack, I have read a lot on forums of people saying Dancer isn't a damage dealing job. The statement falls down dead to me. I can't understand them even if I tried. Wear your attack gear and eat your meat if the situation allows it. Don't let them box you in. 
A Dancer is a melee job. Just because we are not fully fledged damage dealers does not mean you should disregard this aspect of the job.
The more you can do to advance your job to be as effective as possible, in all ways possible, the better. For attack, I have chosen to wear Amemet Mantle +1 and Assault Jerkin. The mantle is always on, but for body I also carry with me Scorpion Harness, Dancer's Casaque and Rapparee Harness.
A general thought on gear, anyone is able to see a very good piece of equipment, but as there are many, you should also keep in mind what you loose when choosing the one you want.
===Weapons===
As you level up, stay with the accuracy and attack daggers/knives only. This is a great way to get an extra bonus there. As you get higher, aim for daggers with higher damage as well. Double attack is also something to aim for, so you might want to consider getting a Joytoy. Dancer has a low sword skill though, so it's not always plausible to use it in a beneficial way.
Azoth and Ermine's Tail would also be a very nice combo.
==The Long Road==
Now we have come to the part of playing the job. The first part is of course Experience Points.
===Partying===
What should you do as a Dancer in exp parties?
When I leveled up, I was rarely invited to parties to main heal. Some actually did, and they were always good parties. When I told them I'd love to main heal, I was surprised they wanted me to because some people were laughing when I said I'd main heal. They said to me, "It's not our fault many people are stupid in their heads, please main heal." I went to party with them and played up the cards for 18k exp an hour, no Bard.
When it comes to party tanks my favorite, and also yours should become, Paladin. Like I said before, Dancer is a spot healer, and nothing keeps hate like a Paladin. Of course, it doesn't lower the attraction you'll grab, and since Waltzes are based on target Vitality as well as your own Charisma, your cures are gonna hit a Pally for more HP than a Ninja tank. This beats stacking up on all that charisma gear you eventually ain't gonna need. TP shouldn't be a problem with an Accuracy setup anyway.
The party setup I have found working best for incredible EXP, is Paladin, Dancer, Bard and 3 high DOT dealers. The problem here is often there's not enough mobs to kill. Move around and kill everything you see, having the Pally provoke each next target. The tower camp on lesser colibri is excellent for this, even though mobs are sometimes short.
Beware of parties with uncontrolled hate, Dancer isn't very good here. Although I managed some parties with a Samurai tank, you find yourself quenching macros at a speed you didn't think possible. If you have gear swap macros on anything except your samba here, you have a problem.
Finally, always keep a Samba active. I tend to rely on Drain Samba, since it makes you able to focus your spot healing. Let the DD regain HP with samba, unless he is hit for more tan 75% of his HP. I use Haste Samba if I get a good tank that can keep his hate.
Now for the levels.
===Starting Dancer===
In the beginning, your Dancer is gonna feel much like a Monk. Sub Monk until you can get /NIN at about level 24+ (if you have H2H merits, you might wanna hold on a little longer).
====Level 1-10====
At level 5 you get drain samba. up to 10-11 your exp is gonna be rolling in like chips in a casino.
====Level 10-20====
Not much is gonna happen here until you reach 15 when you get your first waltz. It Cures like a Cure II and the recast is so low the animation won't have time to finish before you can recast it. If you focus on landing hits and eat accuracy food, your TP should be OK. You should, however, only act as a backup healer. This way you can store your TP and cure when the healer is resting, or is in trouble. Functions for great exp.
====Level 20-40====
At 20 you get Quickstep... Spam it, always, so it never wears until mob is dead. You won't be able to use your Finishing Moves for other than Animated Flourish until later on, but hey, its never to early to take on a good habit. It means a great deal to your Damage Dealers that you do.
Divine Waltz you get at 25. A real life saver in the Jungle. Whenever that AOE sleep hits your party, demand that you gets cure first when it happens. Toss out a Divine Waltz and your party is all good. Again, lovely with a Paladin tank.
Level 30... Box Step and Desperate Flourish are your main concerns. You also get Curing Waltz II Very nice, but also use more TP. Even so, if you use it correctly, you should be able to save TP. Just hold back a bit more than usual before you cure the tank. The TP cost from each Waltz is not greater than the cost of using 2 lower level waltzes, and your tank isn't really in danger unless your cures don't regain more than he is losing, which I have yet to see. Again, the problem is hate travel.
Box Step - Like I said on steps, make sure your party hits, before counting what it hits for. Good on crabs.
Desperate Flourish - Get that Evasion Down! Get it in there along with your Quicksteps, make sure it lands, spam until it does, then spam again when it wears. Hate on mages is almost nullified, because the mob cant get there before tank has hate back (gotta love Paladins here).
Level 35! Drain Samba II... {Sweets}. Healing Waltz... nice to have, your own party eraser, long recast, be careful (all waltzes affect other waltzes recast).
====Level 40-60====
This is where it starts to happen for you. At level 40, you get Reverse Flourish and what a change. All those steps you where loosing TP on before is now suddenly returned to you with a bonus. Now you can start playing like a Dancer. Stack up those moves to 4 and Reverse. When you are safe at 300 TP you should not wait and do nothing, instead keep on going with steps and flourishes.
Level 45. Violent Flourish and Haste Samba. People will often want you to do Haste Samba, but you will have to weigh the situation at hand. Drain Samba is invaluable if hate is flying a bit. If you are able to keep cures, and do some flourishes to add up, you may want to switch to Haste Samba.
Violent Flourish is a great way to interrupt dangerous spells and abilities. However, it demands a certain amount of Stutter Step, which you gain at level 40. Unless you have a BLM or a RDM in your party that does elemental damage spells or are debuffing the mob, this will have no effect on the party situation other than your Stun. So it's a matter of where your party strength is at. 
Level 50. Building Flourish. Like I said when describing this ability, I don't use this much. You also should not use any weapon skill at least until Dancing Edge. It improves you next WS and can be stacked with Wild Flourish. The two are, however, on the same timer, which makes the build up not very realistic to me. Use this if you haven't got any healing obligations to your party and are invited for pure debuffing and damage dealing. 
Curing Waltz III Yay! This is where your cures really start to hit for a lot of HP. Of course it also cost 50 TP to pull off. But with Reverse Flourish this shouldn't present much trouble. Just follow what I said on Curing Waltz II and hold your Cures back a bit until the tank takes more damage, then toss it.
Level 55! By now you should have gotten some of your AF pieces. The Dancer's Bangles, especially, should improve your game a lot. Steps are going to hit way more often now, thus making your curing a lot more stable and reliable. These are the levels where Dancer really begins to shine. You also get Chocobo Jig at 55. Let's just run there!
====Level 60-75====
Smashing your way to end-game opens up new challenges. Campaign Battles are something you should start doing now. Not only to gain EXP, but also save up Allied Notes for your Cobra Cap set. I will describe campaign more in detail later, so lets just stick to parties for now.
At level 60 you finally get Wild Flourish, another way to cause damage to the mob through your fellow party members. Of course, there's the problem that many DDs don't even know what it does, and some won't even listen to you when you tell them. There are, of course, those that don't care anything about their jobs as long as they get exp to it. That they can increase the damage to a mob with at least 50% doesn't bother them. But if you are lucky enough to find those who care, and there are a lot of them, exp an hour could get bumped quite a bit if you play your cards right. Listen to TP calls, especially if there's a Samurai in the party. Toss it out there when you know the WS is about to come. Be aware that there is no delay after Wild Flourish before the WS can hit to inflict a skillchain. The WS can come half a second later and there will still be a skillchain.
Aspir Samba II will be added to your list, but you will rarely use it. Those who need MP seldom hit the mob or hit it hard enough to get decent numbers. The only exception is Dark Knight which could be profitable. I wouldn't know, I tend to avoid partying with Dark Knight simply because they tend to utterly destroy party exp when they die countless times, laughing and bragging about the damage they did right before they died while waiting for weakness to wear. Any DD can pull hate and die if they have an ability that is like a constant Provoke and doesn't have the IQ not to use it at the beginning of battle along with a WS, to be sure to screw it up for the rest of the party. Let it be known though, that I have partied with several excellent Dark Knight individuals! ENMITY- guys {Can i have it?}. Blue Mage could be a plausible player who does want Aspir Samba II. But on a general note, it's not worth it.
When you reach level 65, you are gonna see what Drain Samba is all about. Drain Samba III, my friends, is incredible. When I got it while leveling up, I was using Haste Samba, but as I dinged 65 I said we should probably switch to Drain Samba III because we didn't have a real tank and because it was kinda powerful (my words). After a few fights on the next colibri and trees, the party leader said, "Kinda powerful? It damn near destroys it. (PS! This is someones words, it does not mean that drain samba adds the drained amount into the mobs total HP loss)" And it did. With the numbers our DDs were hitting those birds 50 hp each attack round wasn't unusual, counting in double attacks and so forth. Party moved from struggling without tank to a good exp party simply because the fights went along so much easier.
At level 70 you will gain your last dance, Curing Waltz IV, which cost a whopping 65 TP, but oh so worth it. Tank @50% HP? No problem just toss this in there and Reverse Flourish Stepx2 and your back. Powerful spot heal that rivals Cure V and its instant. A bit longer recast on waltzes, so if you need to do massive curing, throw in a Curing Waltz III first or Curing Waltz II.
The rest of the way to 75 is just smashing and macro crunching, and you will finally arrive to start on merits. What you should focus on in my opinion will come in a later section.
===Level Sync===
I just want to say a few things here. While it's an excellent step from SE to implement this, it does have its drawbacks, and as a Dancer you should take extra care. Since you sync your level down, you wont be able to gain skill-ups for your higher level combat skills, specifically with dagger. Remember this, as your accuracy and somewhat weak attack is very important for you to be able to gain TP. By all means, take advantage of Level Sync, but remember to have parties your own level every 3 levels or so (or solo even matches!) to make sure you can keep up on skill-ups. 
On another note, Level Sync could possibly screw up your setup entirely. The way it gimps your gear is flat out insane. No realism in it. Be very careful at higher levels syncing down to 55 or below. At the very least you should be able to wear your AF hands ungimped.
===Campaign===
This incredible way of getting EXP solo is like a godsend for Dancer. It's like Dancer was made for it. Plain and simple. Not only should you strive to get AN for your Cobra gear, you will also get great exp from this.
In the early levels, I'd say about lvl 60-70, spam invite all the damage dealers and tanks you see. The more you can cure them, the more exp you will get. After 65 you should also start soloing imps wherever you can find them. This only applies to offensive operations in beastmen strongholds. Imps will not show up if you defend your area. Doing the above mentioned will give you amazing amounts of EXP and Allied Notes.
After level 70 you can start soloing Yagudo. Simply cast Utsusemi as often you can in the beginning, then when you start to get close to 75, don't cast it at all. The damage you take will also give you exp. Just solo, take the damage and spam heal yourself and have Drain Samba III up... It's amazing.
But of course, along with Level Sync, you wont gain any skill-ups in campaign. This is the draw back. So you can't rely on Campaign alone. You need to get those skill-ups. How you do it doesn't matter, just get them.
==End Game==
A lot of things here to do. Because it is a new job, you don't see many Dancers playing End Game. Some laugh it down, arguing from pointless speculations why Dancer won't fit end-game. Why bring a Dancer when this and that does it better. I pity the fools, they do not even know what stacking effects means (shhh, they think they do, so let's keep them in their dream).
The way dancer works is so simple, yet so advanced. Take Box Step for example. It lowers your chosen enemy Defense %. You further argue this point that it again will cause the Damage Dealers attack to rise on the mob. They go yes but Dancer only lowers defense by 13% max, whereas bard raises attack xx amount to the Damage Dealer, so bard is better. o.O...... OK? 
First off, you rarely have any idea how much the attack equivalent would be to your damage dealers by lowering the defense of your opponent by 13%; it isn't a fixed number. But I can say for certain, without any doubts, indisputablely, that the harder the mob are, the greater defense it has, the more effect your box steps will have upon it. Further more, it is an effect that applies to anyone engaged to the same mob, it's universal. And to top it up, it stacks with any buffs you already have from Bards, Corsairs or whatever. It doesn't even have a status effect on the player.
Now take Kirin for example. Great evasion, huge defense. I have personally seen and done step by step, and watched his HP bar. To me it's incredible. I have no parser to prove it, since I am on Xbox 360, but it doesn't even matter to me, because I know a fact when I see it.
One fight I got in 5/5 of box and quick steps together with Desperate Flourish. When one of these rows fall and you have to start over, you can see Kirin's HP bar slowing. We did this fight in 25 minutes including summons. When steps fell, it slowed a lot.
I ain't one to say this was all because of my steps, as in every such fight with alliances and all, every little bit counts. But it should be plain to most people what a percentage decrease in defense on a mob like Kirin means. And thus you have Dancer in sky. Not end-game? lol.
===Merits===
All of our merits have finally arrived. And they're very good ones I must say. These are my choices in merits, but once you have reached this point, you should have made up your own mind as to what to do here. I will, however, give my choices in merits and why I have chosen them.
====Group 1 Merits====
 	 	 	 	 		
 	Steps Accuracy 	Haste Samba Effect 	Reverse Flourish Effect 	Building Flourish Effect		
Merit Point Cost	1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 	1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 	1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 	1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 		
Effect 	Increase Steps Accuracy with 3 points for each upgrade to a total of +15	Increase the potency of your Haste Samba with 1% each upgrade to a total of 5%	Increase your TP gain from Reverse Flourish with 3% each upgrade to a total of 15% TP. This effect is static regardles of finishing moves are 1 or 5.	Increase the bonus to weaponskill when using building Flourish by:
2 accuracy, 1% Attack and 1% Critical Hit Rate to a total of 10 accuracy, 5% Attack and 5% Critical Hit Rate. 
Each of the three are applied if you use the required number of Finishing Moves.		
The natural choice for me is Step Accuracy and Reverse Flourish Effect. I want my Dancer as End-game as possible, and most of all Step Accuracy seems the way to go. Furthermore, my Gear setup has been taking a pounding to Charisma, so getting more TP for waltzes seems to me a viable option to be able to keep cures more stable. Also, I want full effect from the Group 2 merit No Foot Rise.
Increasing your Step Accuracy will ensure your effectiveness in End-game. I truly hope I will get to do some HNM with my Dancer really soon, and Step Accuracy to me is probably the most important Merit there is.
====Group 2 Merits====
 	 	 	 	 		
 	Saber Dance 	Fan Dance 	No Foot Rise 	Closed Position 		
Merit Point Cost	3 + 4 + 5 + 5 + 5 	3 + 4 + 5 + 5 + 5 	3 + 4 + 5 + 5 + 5 	3 + 4 + 5 + 5 + 5 		
Effect 	Gives Double Attack for 5 minutes. Recast timer is 5 minutes. Gives 50% the first minute and then decrease by 10% each minute. Each upgrade takes 30 seconds of recast timer. This abillity makes you unable to perform Waltzes while active. Overwrites Fan Dance	Reduce physical damage taken and increase enmity, but makes you unable to perform samba. Takes away 90% damage taken, this will decrease by 10% with each hit landed by enemy until it reaches 20% where it will stay until it wear off. Each upgrade lowers recast by 30 seconds. Overwrites Saber Dance	instantly grants you 1-5 Finishing Move, each upgrade gives you one more Finishing Move. Recast timer is 3 minutes.	Each upgrade gives you +3 to evasion and accuracy up to +15 with full merits when fighting an enemy face to face. Job traits are always active.		
I'm more split on this one. No Foot Rise is a certain home run, 5/5 no doubt. As I said on Reverse Flourish Effect, I want these two stacked up together for easy TP and finishing moves. No more relying on a kind Samurai for TP before a Kirin fight. As well as a very nice backup in any situation if things should go bad. This would mean 60+75=135 TP every 3 minutes with /SAM.
Saber Dance: I went 1 on this one, for those annoying slow kill farming sessions. I am willing to give up 30 seconds on Fan dance to be able to get this.
Fan Dance: Yeah, me like! I'm going 4/5 into this one. Very nice for pulling and those solo situations you want that little extra edge. This open new realms of soloing. Even though you still need have your enemy slow hitting, this is gonna be very nice to have either way. I have some concerns about this one not being fully up to the task of filling the spot for Drain Samba III, though. We'll see. But as far as pulling goes, {Can i have it?}. I'm not going to bring up tanking here. After being three shotted by Byakko mini in Kirin after Utsusemi Ni, I'm kinda comfortable not having to tank, even with this ability. If recast was 30-60 seconds, maybe.
====Other Merits====
Dagger: This should be an area of focus. With your B- skill in daggers this should be merited ASAP.
Enmity Decrease: Again. If your main is not a tank, for god's sake, merit this. Same goes for every damage dealing or healing job. Except maybe Thief.
Critical Hit Rate (Merit): Always nice to have, as long as you're meleeing, this is a nice bonus to have!
Evasion: Can't get enough of this!
Parrying Skill: Same as above. Nice for all melee classes except MNK and PUP.
===Sky===
I'm going to take the whole progress from farming to regular gods and eventually Kirin.
====Farming====
When you farm in Sky, it's basically gonna be like EXPing, you got more people there, but you don't need to worry about those, just your own party. Step the mobs down if they're tough enough that your party damage isn't capped on them, cure those who need it, and put your samba up. Not much more to it than that.
Of course, subbing NIN would give you an advantage when moving around being able to use Chocobo Jig and ninja tools for Sneak, along with the obvious advantage of copy image should you lack the gear not to take hate. TP shouldn't be an issue here.
There are some NMs that pose a threat no matter what, but most are easy.
Always keep in mind where you enemy's weakness lies, and where your alliance strengths lie on that particular enemy. Faust you don't even have to worry about. Just use your 2-hour if there's some heavy damage put on your party, your enmity gear should keep you from not getting hate. Mother Globe is Stutter Step Stun. Otherwise they are normal situations.
====Regular Gods====
Again, keep in mind what weakness and strength you should consider. Do Steps that lowers resistance to what your party is doing to them. Magic is Quickstep and Stutterstep, and melee is Quickstep and Box Step. Quickstep, of course, is for you to be able to land more of the others, as well as melees being able to hit.
====Kirin====
This fight can be done in different ways. The way i have usually participated in taking him down is mostly straight tanking (not Zerg setup) and kite if things start to go badly.
Kirin is kited by a kite party until he has spawned his Mini-gods. An alliance with a designated tank and a puller, is picking off the mini's one by one.
I played the part of puller on DNC for this part of the fight, so i will include the tactics i used to pull off the minis from the kiter.
=====Kiting / Pulling=====
As soon as Kirin is popped, you keep Chocobo Jig up and make sure your utsu and if you have it Fan Dance is up. The Kiter will run in circles around the big room, and the mini alliance will stay away from the kite lane. Always try to stay ahead of the tank (be sure not to position yourself in the lane). This is because when the mini is summoned, it wil chase after the kiter, And obviously the kiter is running in your direction. If you time this right, the kiter will pass you when kirin finish summon, and the mini will run straight for you, placing you in an excellent position to target and claim it.
As for the claimng itself, depending on wether or not you have No Foot Rise, the best option is to use Animated Flourish as it is instant, and pose no danger VS a provoke. This is a certain pull.
You may also use you af Chakram, but a bit of timing here to get it claimed.
After you get the mini back to alliance camp, engage the mini and build up a few Finishing Moves i recommend a Quickstep and 1 or 2 Box Step. This will ensure you have enough finishing moves for the fight itself, as well as make the job easier for the alliance in taking down the mini's. Now disengage and start over until all 4 mini gods are killed.
=====Main Fight=====
This is when it gets exciting. I must admit i wondered how dancer would perform in this kind of fight, but i was very pleased.
Kirin got a very high eva and def bonus. and many melee experience problems when actually trying to hit it. This is where you as a dancer can be very helpful. Do not expect to land every step you attempt. The way i handled keeping steps to a max, require a bit of time before you can start punish him with Box Step.
Firstly. Get your Quicksteps to 5/5. That is easy enough. Save your Desperate Flourish until he starts moving around, because he will eventually resist it. 
After 5/5 Quickstep to gain timer on those, get in a few more. Your timer should be about (45 sec + 15 sec + 15 sec + 15 sec + 15 sec + 15 sec + 15 sec from 7 steps) bringing you to about 2 min 15 sec timer on Quickstep, if you get that step in as soon as the timer is ready. This will give you plenty of time to save the quicksteps if kiting occurs. And will also ensure that quicksteps wont fall for a long time if you use the following tactic on Box Step.
When you feel confident about yourQuickstep timer, start doing Box Step every other step, or 2x Box Step and 1x Quickstep. Remember that the first step duration is 1 minute (this is what makes you able to stack steps). When you have 5/5 steps of both, do every other step until a row fails. This should be the Box Step. When this happens do a series of quicksteps again, to rebuild the timer. Quickstep is the most important one, so try to keep it high at all times.
To keep these 5/5 steps on Kirin is hard to achieve, but it is fully possible. I have done it myself on several occasions. Your gear is important, and you should gear up with focus on Accuracy only. Anything that gives Acc is more important than anything else. Step Accuracy items will help you by a longshot, so bring those Dancer's Bangles and if you got it Etoile Shoes.
Eat Sushi, any sushi, i use Tuna Sushi. As long as it gives Accuracy.
Concerning cures. You dont go to this fight to cure. You go to debuff Kirin. Save your TP for when those aoe's land and cure yourself. With the cobra set, you will practically be one of those the healers wont have to worry about.
When He runs away, or you find it right to do so, toss in a Desperate Flourish for more EVA down and Movement Speed decrease. But keep in mind that he will in the end resist this. With 5/5 quick step you wont see this one miss.
When Kirin is kited, unlock from him and try running ahead of him when doing steps. this will be easy to do if he's slowed down, and hard to do if he's not. Do whatever it takes for those steps not to fall. You will experience that playing dancer on Kirin is quite fun, and keeps you occupied at all times :) Good luck!
===Limbus and Dynamis===
Dancer perform well in both these events. Make sure you are placed in either the tank party, or in the DD party.
If you are placed to look after 1 tank together with a whm, it might be a bit overkill, since 1 player to cure would basically make you sit mostly at 300 tp.
====Dynamis====
The important aspects here is again steps. unless you got some other way to get tp, these need to land every chance you get. your DD's generally take a great deal of damage, so Drain Samba III should be your samba of choice.
Use mostly Box Steps, since the fights rarely last long enough for you to get in any step builds. Acc is rarely a problem in Dynamis.
What i have noticed the most is the rappid damage taken by DD's. usually this would result in using tier 4 waltz. however, due to the recast of tier 4, i tend to use tier 3. unless the damage is over 75% of HP. I had occasionally trouble keeping all DD's healthy. Mainly when fighting thf mobs with perfect dodge 2 hour. this makes you unable to get tp from them and thus gimps you for the duration of the abillity. Be carefull when you fight these mobs, and rely on assistance from your mage healers on these, so you can keep your tp better.
====Limbus====
This has been a fun event no matter what job i go as. DNC doesnt do any worse than any other jobs in this event. I mainly play healer role with steps.
=== Views on end-game situations from other players (See Talk:Dancer_Guide_by_Carnivor) ===
While I don't have DNC at 75 (yet! its the next job after war75) I do know a few things that DNC could be used for.
ON KINGS(Faffnir/Nidhogg, Aspid, KingBehemoth) and WYRMS DNC can help claim with Animated Flourish. Once the fight begins, it depends on how your LS likes to do things. I do not have experience with the ToAU or WotG end game mobs as I had to quit FFXI when ToAU came out due to personal reasons (like getting married!). I have returned recently and play from time to time, but never have the 3hr+ you need to camp an HNM/KING. I might get back into instanced things like Einherjar, Dynamis, and KS99's, Sea mobs etc.
Heavy Magic Group 
In this situation the wonderful SAM/thf + THF/sam setup for LIGHT skillchains and all the BLM's M.Bursting it (Burst II, Thunder IV, etc) the DNC can go with Quickstep and Stutter Step in order to lower the mob's Magic Def. This makes the difference of bringing BLM's Aero's on Kirin up from 800-900'ish to over 1k, I can only imagine what it'd do for fully merited BLM's bursting Burst II's... probably be able to break 2.5k each and with 8 BLM's... basically the DNC just did (~300'ish per BLM x8 blm's = 2,400) 2.4k damage. And that's every time they skill/burst.
There are concerns that a DNC will "Feed the mob tp!" While this is true... as all Melee/Blm's/SMN's give the mob TP, I don't think it is as significant as some LS leaders make it out to be. TP moves will occur regardless of how much you "Feed the mob" tp. On Faffnir/Tiamat/Jorm/Vrtra I know wings can be devistating, espcially if they're spammed. On the other hand, with 5/5 NFR and Med. a DNC can keep Stutter step on the mob... without ever engaging it. -- Note: You have to engage, but you can have your back turned, so that no other attack moves are used on your enemy. and you dont really need to have 
meditate, a few NFR and your good, seeing as reverse flourish gives you more tp than you use. --Carnivor-Asura 15:42, September 28, 2009 (UTC)
Heavy Melee Group
Haste Samba alone is worth looking into. This gives an overall DoT improvement of (5[Un-merited haste samba]*(.95[acc cap])= 4.75% increase in melee damage. With merits this increaces to a (10*.95)= 9.5% increace in overall DoT. While this won't help with Hundred Fists MNK zerg, it will help with the (imo: cheesy) K-club DRK SE+BW zerg. 
On top of that, you'll be giving more acc and more att to all the members of the alliance, not just your pt. (By subtracting from the mobs eva you're basically giving everyone a sword madrigal and valor minnuette III-IV depending on mobs Def). This alone should be enough to warrent having a DNC in the endgame group for melee'centric styles of play.
Add to that some extra heals and *poof* you've got a very valuable member of the alliance that can replace a RDM or WHM in the melee PT while giving everyone Bard-like songs... 3 of them...
If feeding TP to the mob is an issue, remind them that DNC has a Subtle Blow III, and with Auspice(if whm's are around) it reduces TP given to the mob by 25%, which is half way to cap WITHOUT subtle blow gear. A single DNC won't give so much TP to the mob that it makes a noticeable (by noticeable I mean by those that arn't actively looking for the difference. For most people this is at around 10-15%) increace in the mob's number of TP moves. Some mobs even have a TP regen ability (like Kirin and Fafnir) where they will gain TP or use TP moves even if none has been given to them via melee.
Besides... if you're in a Melee'centric group... EVERYONE will be adding TP anyway.
Avatar Battle
This is when you take many SMN's with (BRD/COR/RDM)'s in their group to give them enough MP to summon Garuda/Levi and have them all use PredatorClaws or other high damage skill from their avatar, creating a hateless form of burst Damage that can be sustained. This is the method my LS used back in the day for taking down the 3 CoP wyrms (1st NA shell on the server to take down all 3). 
If this method is still used, DNC brings to the table the exact same things they did with the melee group... minus the haste. DNC and COR are probably the only 2 jobs that give "buffs" to pets, and thus would be just as valuable as the bard... especially if you put them in the tank pt and have them go /sam for extra healing.
--Noreenoflakshmi 20:17, September 26, 2009 (UTC)
==More later==
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