General

@ho4show: Ok, so right now here is my setup. now keep in mind im @level 204 and i've already gotten max sp (since it stops @200) and that training is monotonous.
But here is what i have:
Maxed bear - for bossing and overall training because bear is the strongest animal
Basic cat - originally i had maxed cat, but then i used an sp reset to have only the basic sp here ( like for the meow card/gold card (to boost my damage because it stays when u switch animal) and for the exp boost(because that is a necessity especially because i can just leech @sdh))
Enough sp into hawk to get the upwards jump thingy - i did this because i find it useful to have a double upwards jump to reach high platforms and stuff
the rest i threw into leopard - i just threw the rest into leopard because sometimes its nice to have that little bit of mobbing with it considering how stationary bear is. it's like all of bear is pretty much from one spot so sometimes its nice to be able to move and mob

But yeah, that's how my current sp is laid out. I suggest for you to be more with 2 animals i just did this because i was bored. Ultimately though u get enough exp to max 2 animals and then some extra

@epikkhighh: 15% drop in CL dmg for an extra hit, slight freezing effect drop. meh can't even call it a nerf, slight rebalancing lol.

[quote=ho4show]:
@epikkhighh: how could they really nerf i/l mages? it's not like they're even particularly strong right?[/quote]

http://orangemushroom.net/2015/06/24/kms-ver-1-2-238-maplestory-reboot-character-balancing/
Archmages had high damage over time with the use of Chain Lightning and Freezing Effect. In order to reduce their damage without changing their attack pattern, we have reduced Freezing Effect's damage boost. We have also buffed Lightning Spear and changed Chain Lightning's hit sound and effect to fit the skill more.

1st Job

Magic Guard Magic Guard: duration has been decreased from 600 seconds to 240 seconds
2nd Job

Magic Booster Magic Booster: duration has been increased from 200 seconds to 240 seconds, cast delay has been decreased from 1500ms to 990ms
Meditation Meditation: duration has been increased from 200 seconds to 240 seconds
Freezing Effect Freezing Effect: damage boost per Freeze counter has been decreased from 8% to 6%
3rd Job

Elemental Adapting (IL) Elemental Adapting: cast delay has been decreased from 2160ms to 1080ms
Elemental Reset Elemental Reset: duration has been decreased from 300 seconds to 240 seconds, cast delay has been decreased from 1500ms to 990ms
Thunder Storm Thunder Storm: cast delay has been decreased from 2760ms to 1050ms, storm's movement speed has been increased
4th Job

Chain Lightning Chain Lightning: damage has been decreased from 300% to 255%, number of hits has been increased from 6 to 7, hit effect and hit sound has been changed, the hit sound and effect will now be played for every hit instead of once per cast
Blizzard Blizzard: cast delay has been decreased from 1710ms to 1140ms
Elquines Elquines: duration has been increased from 160 seconds to 260 seconds
Freezing Breath Freezing Breath: this skill can now be affected by Combat Orders
Hyper

Chain Lightning - Reinforce Chain Lightning - Reinforce: damage boost has been decreased from 20% to 10%
Teleport Mastery - Reinforce Teleport Mastery - Reinforce: damage boost has been decreased from 20% to 10%
Lightning Spear Lightning Sphere: damage has been decreased from 700% to 300%, number of hits has been increased from 1 to 7, finish damage has been increased from 1000% to 1500%, cooldown has been decreased from 90 seconds to 60 seconds, this skill no longer activates Damage Reflect

[quote=yiffyfurry]@ho4show: np, i mained my bt, so ask as many questions as you want [/quote]

ok then, what are your favorite animals to use and when/for what?

@ho4show: np, i mained my bt, so ask as many questions as you want

@yiffyfurry: alright cool, thanks again dude you're a big help

@ho4show: Yes, with bear, fishy slap and table flip do it. i think fishy slap is one of the better beast tamer skills because its like phantom's tempest, you can hold it down for 13 seconds with constant damage. i think leopards final skill ( i forget the name) does it aswell. but all the listed skills have a cd. cd on table flip and fishy slap is like <10 seconds while the leopard skill cd i'm not sure on.

@yiffyfurry: ooh awesome feedback dude, really. One last question, does leopard/bear have a skill that'll hit the top and bottom platform in RnJ?
@epikkhighh: how could they really nerf i/l mages? it's not like they're even particularly strong right?

also check orange mushroom for future buffs and nerfs, if you are playing for quite a while. if you plan to quit soon ignore it,but i believe i/l are getting nerfed

They are adding a SP and AP reset for mesos in the update. So you may want to hold off on deleting a character just because its stats aren't optimal.

@ho4show: Ok, so i will say that when finding a party, a lot of people like having cat mode for that hs they get and all the party buffs. but cat isn't focused toward attacking. i will say if u wanted your bt after the link, definitely have cat, it helps finding a party in sdh and it can increase your damage because the card skill they have transfers between animal modes. bear is definitely something you want to max when making a beast tamer, bear's attacks are the strongest and probably would be the best or second best in RnJ (depending on your party size and platform issues, leopard would be good to have the bottom area with) leopard is good mobbing wise, but it moves all over the place, i came into that problem when i first made my beast tamer; idk what they did when they redid evo lab a while back, but when it was good in link 3 i had problems staying by the machine that sucked them in. keep in mind that all our attacks (except for hawk) had a damage increase, so im not sure how much damage beast tamers really gain. hawk is really bad damage wise, its only good as that third animal you dump your remaining sp in @lvl 200 for the mobility. (here is a comparison, with bear i hit a few mills, with hawk i hit a few 100k's (using bear and hawk's basic attacks)

Animal reset: these are actually quite simple. What they do is reset only the sp you put into one animal. so like, lets say you go through your levels, you max bear, and max leopard (which, maxing two animals doesn't come until around lvl 190) and you decide that you hate the playstyle of leopard. an animal reset would allow you to reset all the sp put into leopard and apply it to a new animal, leaving bear untouched.

[quote=yiffyfurry]Should just make a beats tamer for burning.i find the playstyle to be fun and besides, we get like 40% more damage everywhere[/quote]

alright, i think that's what i'm going to do. I've looked at a BT guide and it suggests going bear and leopard if i'm just going for lvl 120, but as a BT yourself what are your thoughts? I know once i'm 70 i'll just be in RnJ pq and wasn't sure which animal is best suited for that. I wish the bird was better because it seems like fun, and how does resetting animal/sp work with BT?

Should just make a beats tamer for burning.i find the playstyle to be fun and besides, we get like 40% more damage everywhere

[quote=DrkShiryu]Make a phantom![/quote]

Already did when they came out haha, quit around 170 because i'm afraid of committment. hence why all my chars range from 140-190 lol

Make a phantom!

Just play whatever you like the most and hate the least.

[quote=drag0onboy]Hold on to ur i/l mage since there's gonna be an event for lvl 100-149 players called A Hundred And Then Some!. When they get to 150 they get a bunch of semi useful stuff but theres a random chance to get a 100% unqiue pot scroll or 20k reward point within it.[/quote]

I have a bunch of 100-149 characters though and since you can only do it once per account i don't really need to save my i/L mage for that

7m reset comes once update comes. Save yourself some trouble and don't delete.

Hold on to ur i/l mage since there's gonna be an event for lvl 100-149 players called A Hundred And Then Some!. When they get to 150 they get a bunch of semi useful stuff but theres a random chance to get a 100% unqiue pot scroll or 20k reward point within it.

Buy some nx

I would make your beast tamer your burning character since it stops after you hit level 100 anyways so might as well get there quicker to get over it quickly to get to the character you actually enjoy. Then I would remake your i/l mage unless it has bound equips that are nice or nice royal face/hair, if that's the case then I'd just do the ap resets. If you have nx stuff, you can just put in the cash shop then take it back out on your new ice lightning if you choose to do so.