Frugal Pirate

A Guide By Azryel ^^ thumb |
Disclaimer: This Guide was SOLELY written as a template to level up Corsair as inexpensively as humanly possible, and it is just that, a GUIDE, meant to express the opinions of the author. I skilled up on Bronze Bullets, and pulled with Bronze Bullets all the way up until the 70's... Now at 75 I wouldn't be caught dead with Bronze Bullets, but when I was leveling up and using them I didn't care, I just wanted to 75 as cheaply as possible. I did not run around with Bronze Bullets equipped, however, because that's just silly, and you’ll look like complete noob- if you’re the type that actually cares what anyone thinks- but just for the sake of argument and to avoid asinine comments from “epeeners” (every server has ‘em!), I ran around with Bullets equipped... That aside, even with the inexpensive Ammo I was using I still got propositioned to party more than a blond at a single's bar! Lol... And my Slug Shots were hitting upwards of ~700+ in Aht Urhgan area bird parties while using AF Gun and level 22 Bullets, which was solid enough damage to pull hate and keep our tank on their toes. Also, if anyone feels like adding anything to this page along the lines of, “Well, if you use more expensive Ammunition, you’ll do more damage,” please don’t. We know… And that is NOT the point of this Guide. – Thank you.
Corsair (COR) owns: It's fun, it's in demand, you get a cool hat; it's basically like playing Bard (BRD) that doesn't make you want to kill yourself. I have personally attempted to level Bard on several occasions solely to be a Merit Points job, but it just sucks so bad, and is so boring, that I have officially quit again at level 53... But I digress...
Corsair is a wonderful job, and being as such you can expect to be invited to parties very quickly compared to most other jobs: I 75'd COR in just a few months, and now it's my main merit job.
A lot of players are initially put off by Corsair because of the vastly popular rumor that it's such an expensive job; that's all I've ever heard about COR even from the days of my "noobness" in the Dunes... This is NOT entirely true! Granted, Corsair CAN be a very expensive job, but if you play smart, and use your head instead of your Gil pouch, you can 75 this job on the cheap.
Rule 1: 
NO SHOOTING WHATSOEVER unless you are fishing mobs, skilling up, or using Weapon Skills... And all of which, save the Weapon Skills, should be done with level 1 Bronze Bullets- which are inexpensive, and run about 3-4k a bag on my server. If your skill is capped, you should be storing TP using melee.
*If you have ANY job already leveled that you can pre-skill Marksmanship on, please do that! The cheapest bolts are significantly cheaper than the cheapest bullets, which can potentially save you a LOT of Gil! 
By using this strategy I managed to 75 COR for around 220-250k in total Ammunition: that’s starting from 0 Marksmanship skill with my first gun (Musketoon) at level 6, all the way to capped Marksmanship skill of 250 at level 75, as well as unlocking Detonator… NOT BAD! So essentially one Royale Ramble run can completely fund your Ammunition ~75 and then some! Yeah, baby!
*I COULD have spent less on Ammunition in total, but sometimes Bronze Bullets were not available for purchase at the Auction House, forcing me to buy more expensive bullets, and other times I just got bored with melee and decided to blow off a bag or two of Ammo for a change of pace... I blame my attention span for the latter ; ; 
The nice thing about Ranged Attack Weapon Skills is that changing Ammunition has no affect whatsoever on your TP, giving you the option to use cheap Ammo for pulling, skilling up, etc., while allowing you to macro in decent/good Ammo for when you Weapon Skill.
Example Macro:
/equip Ammo “(good ammo)”
/wait 2
/ws “Slug Shot” <t>
/wait 2
/equip Ammo “(cheap ammo)”
I’ve never had a party complain about my performance on Corsair doing this. As long as you’re attentive with the rolls, no one is going to care- they’ll just be happy that they have a COR and are getting buffs (Roll Effects).
Rule 2: 
After level 40 don’t waste Gil on guns. You’re not going to do anything even resembling decent damage until level 56 when you get Slug Shot, so don’t even bother keeping up with guns until you hit level 40 and can get your AF gun (Trump Gun), which is a nice piece of equipment, and best of all free… Personally, I used my AF gun from 40-72, then I switched to Coffinmaker, which yes, is also free! 
Don’t worry about being underpowered using your AF gun and low-level bullets: using the above mentioned Ammo-change macro I was doing 500-700 damage Slug Shots (depending on luck of roll) on Lesser Colibris in Wajaom Woodlands’ parties, which is impressive damage considering I was using level 22 Bullets.
Rule 3: 
Dice are expensive, so just buy the ones you need. You can basically 75 Corsair using 4 rolls if you really wanted to: Hunter's Roll, Chaos Roll, Fighter's Roll for situations where accuracy is unnecessary - which are common at higher levels - and Evoker's Roll, but I won’t be so extreme as to completely dismiss all the others of course. There are instances where Samurai Roll, etc., will be a better fit depending on your party’s setup. That being said, I would recommend the 5k investment of Healer's Roll to help you bridge the gap between levels 20-40 until Evoker's Roll becomes available. Granted, Healer's Roll only works while resting, but it doesn't cost much, and it will help reduce your down time by adding some MP Recovered While Healing to your mages... And less down time means more exp per hour! /cheer
Use your own discretion here on what rolls you’ll actually “need,” and make your purchases accordingly… That being said, I can pretty much all but assure you you’ll never be in an EXP party where people are going to complain that they’re not getting Choral Roll, Monk's Roll, Puppet Roll, etc. Some of these Rolls are just a waste, like Gallant's Roll for example at 90,750 Gil which I would categorize as situational at best.
Rule 4: 
Fight the urge to spam Quick Draw. I have only ever purchased Cards to use for Light Shot, and Dark Shot, and have done just fine in any given situation. The other cards just seem to be a superfluous expenditure, but being that a stack of cards is fairly inexpensive from NPCs, you can feel free to experiment if you wish without doing too much harm to your wallet.
If you follow these suggestions you can 75 Corsair very inexpensively!
Another suggestion to save a few Gil is to not have COR AF gloves (Corsair's Gants) crafted... I mean, just look at 'em! They suck! They are COMPLETELY useless!
Armor
The Frugal Cape gives you the ability Recycle at a very low level saving you even more ammo.
Support Jobs:
You can experiment with any number of Support Jobs, but due to laziness on my part, and just overall practicality, I'll only discuss the main choices:
/RNG: Ranger is the best choice of support job for a number of reasons: increased Ranged Accuracy, Sharpshot (which is nice), and Barrage, just to name a few. I didn't get to use this sub much in exp parties because I was usually stuck pulling mobs- if your party already has a puller, then by all means /RNG! This sub definitely has its visible advantages, but it’s a little riskier due to a complete lack of defense- if you go all-out DD with this support job you’re just going to get yourself killed unless you’re an expert manager of hate control, which I clearly am not! Just exercise some caution, and try to make your weapon skills kill shots to be safe.
 
/NIN: The second best choice of sub is Ninja. You get the survivability of Utsusemi (VERY helpful if you decide to start spamming Slug Shot, and to avoid taking damage if you get stuck pulling mobs), and the Job Trait of Dual Wield to help you build TP faster. Granted, /RNG is better for ranged accuracy and overall damage output, but if you utilize Dual Wield you can help even the gap somewhat on ranged accuracy by equipping a pair of Archer's Knifes, or Trailer's Kukris at later levels. I used a pair of Archer’s Knives from 28-70, then I swapped out an Archer’s Knife for a Joyeuse to build TP faster. Be warned though, at higher levels your party is not going to want Hunter's Roll, so if you don't use Archer's Knives or Trailer's Kukris on top of an already heavy ranged accuracy build your Slug Shots will miss, and likely miss frequently. 
/WHM: A White Mage sub is really only useful if your roll in the party is that of pure support. Backup heals, Silena for Imp camps, etc. The only reasons you’d want to /WHM is if your party doesn’t have a real healer, like using a SMN/WHM as a main heal, or to provide some situational emergency healing, or if you’re the buffs for a BLM party in an Alliance, etc... Helpful, but usually not the best choice, unless you're in a very low level party where the two prior subs benefits would be null and void. I personally used this sub job until level 24 when I could take advantage of both Dual Wield and Utsusemi with /NIN.