[Icemage]

Originally Posted by LyonheartLakshmi

This is precisely why I think relic and mythic weapons are fundamentally flawed. Many posters are saying it's a tragedy that a mythic weapon doesn't surpass everything else in the game. But what's really tragic is that anything in this game requires as much time and work to obtain as relic and mythic weapons in the first place. To properly compensate for the time and effort required to obtain them, relic and mythic weapons would have to be terribly broken and unbalanced.

They wouldn't have to be terribly broken and unbalanced (though if you want a great example of broken and unbalanced, look no further than Gjallarhorn).

As long as they are functionally better than "standard" gear in at least a large minority of situations (even if it's a small and somewhat meaningless improvement like +5MAB or +10ATK over what you could get otherwise), that would be compensation enough.

The problem is that, with few exceptions, few of the relic/mythics pass this test. The only ones I think are OK mostly belong to melee classes - Bravura is an excellent example of something that's just somewhat - but undeniably - better than its competition, is worth going after, yet isn't in any sense broken or unbalanced.


Icemage

[Balfree]

Nerf the staves and you will be shot, SE.
Don't nerf the staves and no one will care about any other weapons for mage jobs, SE.

Silly idea to nerf the staves.

Maybe if the mythic had less accuracy and more magic accuraccy to it and instead of buffing Elemental Seal (which is already powerful enough) it had something crazy like refresh or conserve MP+... maybe then?

[Aksannyi]

I didn't expect this mythic to be all that special, and neither did a lot of people. I spent over four million gil on my 8/8 HQ staves, and they easily outparse a ... 100mil weapon? Roughly? (Naturally depending on the cost of Alexandrite on your servers. I'm guessing.) I think I'll stick with the eight staves and the inventory woes.

I'm still really holding out for the WHM mythic. I've got just under 1% of my Alexandrite on a mule (yeah, not much, but enough to make some gil off of if it turns out to be bust) and I've been slowly working on some of the other requirements. Back when mythics were introduced, I considered doing them for all jobs, since SE said they'd be more "accessible" than Relics. Um, okay. Whatever. After the requirements came out I figured I'd pick one, and once some of the fanfest testing came out, WHM became that one. But things have proven to not be so special since they've become completed and undergone concrete testing. I really hope the WHM one doesn't disappoint, since others have proven to be underwhelming. :/

At any rate, it still looks cool to have and if you've got mounds of gil lying around it's something neat to have. That's about all, unfortunately. At least the weapon skills look cool when performed with the Mythic, right?

[LyonheartLakshmi]

Originally Posted by Icemage

As long as they are functionally better than "standard" gear in at least a large minority of situations (even if it's a small and somewhat meaningless improvement like +5MAB or +10ATK over what you could get otherwise), that would be compensation enough.

If it only took a small amount of time and effort more to obtain than standard gear, then a small and somewhat meaningless boost would be a proportional reward. But it takes far greater time and effort than that.

[Malacite]

Originally Posted by Icemage

They wouldn't have to be terribly broken and unbalanced (though if you want a great example of broken and unbalanced, look no further than Gjallarhorn).

SERIOUSLY. I was praying that the Leavateinn would be a BLM Gjallar (encompass all 8 staves and be just a bit better than them) but it doesn't even do that;

No cure mod, no hmp mod, and while it offers more MAB, it also has less MAC and as Kanican's equation points out, lacks that broken-as-hell secondary modifier.


Plain and simple our Dev team doesn't know what the fuck it's doing. The reason we all put up with it is because FFXI is generally a fun and well made game, just with some glaring design flaws that we all wish they'd fix.

I know you all hate BG but Zilong over @ BG put it best;

It's entirely possible that they'd do a full blown revamp of all the mythic WS, I meand they did just that for the 225 WS back in the days.

Maybe they'd tweak the fucking weapon too...but who knows, maybe they're pulling the "oh it'd fuck with people that already upgraded because their choice might have been different" argument that they're doing with not improving some underpowered relic.

Newsflash SE, nobody hates across the board buff, power creep means jack shit when the item in question costs 90 million gil.

I guess just have to wait and see, maybe as more enter the circulation, SE would finally get their collective heads out of their asses.

That's from the lolGlanzfaust thread (people unanimously and unjustly bashing the thing as trash over there, big surprise.) but the point still applies across the board.



As I've ranted about over @ BG it's increasingly looking like Liberator and Kogarasumaru are the only mythics truly worth investing in, at least over a relic because of their ridiculous zerging potential.

[Ziero]

Originally Posted by Omgwtfbbqkitten

What other mage weapons focus on melee stats as immensely as these?

Think hard.

And why in the hell does a job who's primary focus is casting have their best weapons in game be *melee* oriented.

Think hard.

Originally Posted by Sabaron

Accuracy +30 and Double Attack mean that if you're using Laevateinn (and meleeing) that you can probably build TP. The ability to build TP enables you to use the Mythic Weaponskill Vidohunir which procs the aftermath effect which even further increases your accuracy and attack--above that of an elemental staff.

Therefore... The Laevateinn not only enables BLM Staff melee, it practically requires it as a prerequisite because, if you're not meleeing, then you might as well just whip out the Elemental staves.

Accuracy +30 will not let you melee anything other then Campaign mobs and DC things and the DA only procs at a 300 WS. So tell me, at what events that you bring Blm to do you have them meleeing things?

Originally Posted by Vyuru

I think it depends. If I can do 3800 nukes with HQ staffs, but only 3500 nukes with the mythic, but save 3-4 inventory slots, that may be worth it to me.

Fixed. Again, most staves have alternate functions, and the HQ Ice staff alone is easily the best staff to nuke with since on top of having the similar boosts of all the other staves, it has increased Elemental Skill and +Int. Not to mention Dark staff for resting, light staff for curing, earth staff for SS/survival builds and so forth.

Originally Posted by Omgwtfbbqkitten

There's lots of stuff we earn at endgame that we don't use for HNMs. How players fight HNMs has no barring on the intended design of a weapon. This is clearly a melee weapon for BLMs, otherwise there wouldn't be such tremendous melee stats given to it.

Why is a nuking job's best weapon in the entire game focused on a skill that the job is weakest in? Mythics are supposed to enhance a jobs primary function. And for Blms, thats NOT meleeing.

They made it better because SMNs had room to get something better. BLM doesn't really need anything better than what they have now. BLM has had luxurious gear to obtain for years, SMN can't exactly say the same.

Not only is the Nirvana better for Smns then the Elemental Staves, it's better then the Bahamut's Staff...which is also better then the Ele Staves. Saying "they don't need it" is a complete and utter BS response, no job needs Mythics. But they're there and they're supposed to be the best job specific weapons in game.

Originally Posted by LyonheartLakshmi

This is precisely why I think relic and mythic weapons are fundamentally flawed. Many posters are saying it's a tragedy that a mythic weapon doesn't surpass everything else in the game. But what's really tragic is that anything in this game requires as much time and work to obtain as relic and mythic weapons in the first place. To properly compensate for the time and effort required to obtain them, relic and mythic weapons would have to be terribly broken and unbalanced.

The problem is the fact that some Relic/Mythic weapons *are* broken and unbalanced to use while others are at most minor upgrades to common, easy to obtain gear and at worst utterly worthless. For a long time people have been testing the difference between the Mnk Relic and Destroyers to try and decide if they'd be worth upgrading and always find that the slight increase in damage isn't actually worth it. And now the Mnk Mythic comes along and they're actually weaker then the Relic, having similar-but-less-then bonuses...and it still means Destroyers are the best weapon for Mnks for their price. And of course, as is being discussed, the Blm Relics and Mythics can't even compete with level 51 AH items.

Originally Posted by Omgwtfbbqkitten

So what about things like Leaping Boots, O Kote, Empress Pin and Peacock Charm?

All of them get replaced and have clearly superiour upgrades, many of which are cheap and easily obtainable before 75. Unlike Elemental staves, which are better then the best weapons in game.

[Malacite]

Originally Posted by Ziero

For a long time people have been testing the difference between the Mnk Relic and Destroyers to try and decide if they'd be worth upgrading and always find that the slight increase in damage isn't actually worth it. And now the Mnk Mythic comes along and they're actually weaker then the Relic, having similar-but-less-then bonuses...and it still means Destroyers are the best weapon for Mnks for their price. And of course, as is being discussed, the Blm Relics and Mythics can't even compete with level 51 AH items.

Just want to nitpick at this. Destroyers are far from being the best MNK weapon, even for it's price. Spharai blows it out of the water, and Faith does a nasty number as well with Virtue Stones.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Originally Posted by Ziero

And why in the hell does a job who's primary focus is casting have their best weapons in game be *melee* oriented.

Think hard.

Let's ask WHM and RDMs who want their Mythics that also aren't better than staves. RDM Mythic certainly doesn't improve casting. When Are they going to melee an endgame mob?

You claim these weapons were created to enhance the main function of a job. I'm not really seeing that.

Tionza does not help enhance Blue Magic, it gives a % of MP back
Death Penalty does not enhance Phantom Roll, it augments Quick Draw
Murgleis is not better than staves for enfeeble/nuke/cure, it just makes Convert more forgiving
Yagrush is not better than staves for enfeeble/cure , it just perma-DVs status cures.

These are "other" funtions, not main ones. Looks to me like they enhance a certain dimension of a job, not the whole job. If BLM got every dimension of thier job buffed via mythic - which is exactly what making it better than staves would do - then it craps all over the rest of the mythics since they only enhance a part of the other jobs.

WHM is not and never has been (sans Stona, SCH notwithstanding) a status cure specialist, no job is. It requires no magic skill to perform a status cure. Anyone with /WHM can status cure most things, mythic just changes the nature of WHM's status cures. WHMs have to consider when to equip Yagrush and when to go back to staves. Can't have Yagrush on all the time or you'll get pegged for the enmity created off constant AoE status cures.

The secondary effect of Quick Draw is always active. Its like Dia or Bio in that way. However QD gets augmented by Death Penalty - be it the damage or enhancing the secondary effect of QD - a COR's main function remains to be Phantom Roll. Should it get buffed again? Merits and Relic hat already enhance it.

RDMs main function varies, but its not melee. Staves ore better, but perhaps having a RDM lower magic evasion near the start of the fight would be something. They got that bonus just from unlocking the weaponskill, not the mythic.

Not only is the Nirvana better for Smns then the Elemental Staves, it's better then the Bahamut's Staff...which is also better then the Ele Staves. Saying "they don't need it" is a complete and utter BS response, no job needs Mythics. But they're there and they're supposed to be the best job specific weapons in game.

I have to have to actually say it, because I actually find the mantra annoying, but:

Summoners summon.

They don't use elemental staves to nuke or enfeeble, only to help cure or rest MP and then there's the -perputation.

Why shouldn't they have something better than elemental staves?

And I think we're looking at the staves in too much of a mage-only scope - they're great for other jobs too. PLDs sometimes use earth staves for tanking and even NINs will for kiting at times. CORs sometimes use them for QDs, RNGs use them to enhance Holy Bolt damage. BST uses Light Staff to increase Charm success rates. BLUs make use of them as well.

Staves are not tagged BLM/RDM/WHM/SMN/SCH, they're tagged Level 51 - All jobs.

So Elemental Staves are a "bad idea" my ass. Make staves scale to 75? Uh, no thanks. The elemental staves are the most versatile set of weapons in the game and mean different things to different jobs.

[Armando]

Tionza does not help enhance Blue Magic, it gives a % of MP back
Death Penalty does not enhance Phantom Roll, it augments Quick Draw
Murgleis is not better than staves for enfeeble/nuke/cure, it just makes Convert more forgiving
Yagrush is not better than staves for enfeeble/cure , it just perma-DVs status cures.

How can you fail to see how BLMs got the shaft here? Perma-Divine Seal'd status cures VS +10 to +15 MAB (which even in the best case scenario is less than a 10% pure damage boost.) WHM gets Divine Seal on every -na cast (and on top of that allows them to dedicate Divine Seal purely to cures as a result,) BLM gets a mediocre damage boost on Elemental Seal'd nukes every 10 minutes IF they're not using it to land enfeebles instead.

I mean shit, if you were going to make the one non-Aftermath enhancement a damage boost, at least make it something impressive. The relic's gimmick is letting a 1000 damage nuke land for 1100 every ten minutes. That's one of the most boring things I've ever heard of and no one would even notice it's working if they weren't actively keeping tabs on your max nuke damage.

RDM Mythic certainly doesn't improve casting. When Are they going to melee an endgame mob?

At the very least RDMs are supposed to have some sort of melee capacity. They get a fair degree of melee gear and weapons, and a line of spells for adding some extra damage to their hits. It's not entirely out of place. And while it's not part of the job description even meleeing on WHM makes some goddamned sense. They get the strongest clubs in the game and a 6-hit Rampage.

Meleeing on BLM has always been nothing but a joke. Staves as a whole are rubbish for the majority of the game and BLM doesn't even get access to Kinkobo (yet WHM does - the only mage that does, in fact.) It got access to the best non-relic club in the game in the form of Perdu Wand but it's 26 points behind WHM in club skill, doesn't have any good club WS to work with since it doesn't have Hexa Strike and doesn't have anything like Reverend Mail to work in its favor either. Yet the WHM relic is much more impressive and useful in what it does for Divine Veil, while also belonging to a mage job much more apt at hitting things for damage.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Originally Posted by Armando

How can you fail to see how BLMs got the shaft here? Perma-Divine Seal'd status cures VS +10 to +15 MAB (which even in the best case scenario is less than a 10% pure damage boost. WHM gets Divine Seal on every -na cast, BLM gets a mediocre damage boost on Elemental Seal'd nukes every 10 minutes IF they're not using it to land enfeebles instead.

If you want to make the argument that the Elemental Seal effect should be improved, that I will agree with, particularly seeing now that SCH has Focalization to emulate the accuracy of Elemental Seal if fully merited five times in ten minute. I don't know if an effect similar to WHMs DV effect would be practical, but something that boosts the damage and accuracy much more frequently.

The problem is working it around Elemental Seal Merits.

As for making them better than the elemental staves - I still find the notion ridiculous. The other mytics enhance part of a job, making BLM mythic better than staves is basically enhancing all of the job and shafts every other mythic in the process because they don't enhance everything about a job.

[Malacite]

Originally Posted by Omgwtfbbqkitten

As for making them better than the elemental staves - I still find the notion ridiculous. The other mytics enhance part of a job, making BLM mythic better than staves is basically enhancing all of the job and shafts every other mythic in the process because they don't enhance everything about a job.

So what?

By that logic Aegis and Gjallar Horn should be nerfed because of how game-breaking they are. Get the sand out of your vagina already. For the ridiculous effort it takes to unlock a mythic in the 1st place, replacing the HQ staves for nuking and enfeebling is the least they could do.

even if by some chance it has some other effect on enfeebling spells and not just the hidden MAB bonus it's still trash. (Even with 5/5 ES merits I wouldn't touch that crap excuse for a weapon)

[Taskmage]

Originally Posted by Omgwtfbbqkitten

making BLM mythic better than staves is basically enhancing all of the job and shafts every other mythic in the process because they don't enhance everything about a job.

Not true, it wouldn't do a thing to enhance blm's ability to D2 everyone after events, which is nearly as critical to their performance in a group as their melee potential.
_________________

Originally Posted by LyonheartLakshmi

If it only took a small amount of time and effort more to obtain than standard gear, then a small and somewhat meaningless boost would be a proportional reward. But it takes far greater time and effort than that.

I think that Icemage has a point in that players are generally willing to pay increasing investments for diminishing returns. Almost any HQ item in the game is evidence of that. Still, one expects that an item that is more difficult to get will at least be somewhat better than the item that is easier to get, even if only marginally.