Merits?!

[snewt]

By next week, I'll be asking which merits to pump for an entirely different class.

For now - What are the cookie cutter merits for WAR? Only one that sounds like a no brainer is 5/5 Double Attack.

Based on recommendations...

For BST, I went Reward, Call Beast / Beast Affinity, Beast Healer

For WHM, I went Cure Cast, Bar Spell Effect / 5 Shellra, 4 Devotion, 1 Protectra

These two sound pretty standard?

[Malacite]

Go look at the wiki and try to decide for yourself, but if you want a couple of pointers;


I did 4/5 Double Attack for WAR and 3/3 for both Berserk & Aggressor. Most people go 5/5 Berserk & Double Attack, but I honestly found having both Berserk and Aggressor coming in 30s sooner more useful overall than 1% more DA (plus that way it doesn't screw with my timers). For group 2, 5/5 Warrior's Charge is a no-brainer especially since they boosted it (at 5/5 it now gets a 20% chance to triple attack instead) and then either Tomahawk or Savagery depending on your preference. Savagery is really nice for extra WS dmg with Warcry up, but Tomahawk also really helps on enemies with physical or magical damage resistance.


For WHM I personally went for barspell effect for extra magic defense & resistances (they are changing the whole system for the next expansion) and Regen Potency as I felt curespeed was a bit superfluous - Cure V/VI is already pretty fast and I've yet to see an instance where the quarter of a second or w/e the hell it shaves off at max really made a life or death difference (not that it can't or hasn't happened to others). I maintain for Group 2 that Martyr and Shellra V are no-brainers, but they are going to buff protect spells quite a bit - what did tanaka say about Protectra 5 ? Something like 4x more defense ? I forget the exact number he threw out but it was large.

BST merits choices are spot on, though I'm curious to see how good Feral Howl is now since they buffed it = with the +2 Relic Body you can potentially get a 20s terror with 5/5 Merits and this can proc on any mob, even NMs. It's a bit of a gamble, but terrorizing a major boss NM for 20s (as we've all seen in abyssea and voidwatch) is nuts. Probably not reliable enough though.

[Satori]

The only bst merit option I wouldn't take is Beast Affinity,
I used to have it 5/5 but since 99 cap I have removed them, Considering the level most of the jugs that you will be using cap at.

Feral howl is serving me pretty well, I must finish increasing it 2 more levels.
Oh also a note for your Bst, 2x Zoral Jaa's axes are no longer required for the max reward build, Since upgrading dynamis gear through trials only 1 axe is needed to reach cap.

[Romyro]

I setup my Bst merits as follows…

Group 1 - Reward 5/5, Call Beast 5/5

Group 2 - Killer instinct 5/5, Beast Affinity 4/5, Feral Howl 1/5 (I think)

While it’s completely up to you, I wouldn’t rule out BA entirely. There are plenty of useful jugs that don’t cap at 99. And even the jugs that DO cap at 99, pretty sure they don’t always pop that way w/o some BA merits.

I do find myself using Raptor, Sheep, mandy and courel on occasions. All of which don’t cap at 99 iirc. Pretty sure sheep (one of the more common jugs) caps in the mid-80s. And if you do BCNM/mission fights, these certain jugs can really come in handy.

Killer instinct is actually pretty good. With 5/5 merits and Monster helm +2 (w/ augments) you can almost have it up full time. Which iirc gives you (the Bst) +15% damage dealt, -15% damage taken and +15% intimidation rate. And if your pet is strong vs your enemy (as in it will intimidate it), you will also pass those buffs on to other party members.

[Malacite]

Feral Howl's not really worth it unless you max it out, as each merit increases the accuracy of it.

[Romyro]

i disagree. It can proc in dynamis as well as stun spells or TP moves. Still pretty easily on mobs. While longer duration is nice, a stun is a stun.

And it's an instanst JA that can be used for fast claiming.

[Squiggs]

I don't know Romy, Mal obviously uses it more than you do.

[Romyro]

Tell you what…when I finish meriting up some of the WSs and cap 30/30 merits, I’ll switch it up and do some eyeball testing.

My hypotheses…
It works well for smaller NMs and mission type things.

It doesn’t work well (if at all) on VW or Legion type NMs.

[Malacite]

Actually I never bothered with it, I'm just going on what the Wiki says - each merit increases it's accuracy by 5% and if you're going to use an all-in ability like that, you may as well max your chances.

Killer Instinct doesn't really jive with me, and as was pointed out Beast Affinity is pointless now as well with the new jugs.

[Yygdrasil]

So I'm capped out 30/30 on merits again with nothing to spend them on besides maybe BLM AM2 spells. From what I gather, they're pretty much a waste of time compared to the T5 spells... so I'm not sure if it's even worth my time to put anything into them.

Are the AM2 spells worth shit?

I finished my Last Stand merits 5/5 for COR and have had the Blade: Shun merits 5/5 for a while now.

[Romyro]

It’s like you’re trying to get me riled up…

Actually I never bothered with it, I'm just going on what the Wiki says - each merit increases it's accuracy by 5% and if you're going to use an all-in ability like that, you may as well max your chances.

It’s an ability with limited uses. A short terror with a low chance of landing (most likely completely missing) every 5 minutes. I personally would rather have 4 minutes of nice buffs with 1 minute down time. As in, merit KI over FH.

Killer Instinct doesn't really jive with me,

+15% damage, -15% damage taken & +15% intimation rate for 4 out of every 5 minutes doesn’t really jive with you eh??
And the fact that you can spread it to the other dders in your party(if you use the correct pet) just doesn’t tickle your fancy as much as crappy terror?

To each his own I guess

and as was pointed out Beast Affinity is pointless now as well with the new jugs.

/sigh…

nooooo, its not pointless.

Jugs cap at certain levels. That level is not always = to YOUR level. So no, you’re not always going to get a capped pet if your level 99. At the very least, pop 1 or 2 merits into it. More if you plan on using different jugs with different caps to boost you’re parties performance.

- - - Updated - - -

@ Yyg

I did Freeze II and Burst II. And I only use them when a mob is Terrored and V and VI are down. Like when you proc Red on an abyssea mob and everyone zergs it down.

Don’t thing they are VW procs anymore either so…probably don’t need to spread them out.
I’d assume the potency ones are still important though

dont quote me, i dont play blm often enough to give you sage advice.

[Yygdrasil]

I'm just going to ignore them. Screw it.

[Romyro]

if everything else is merited, might as well toss them somewhere...

[Yygdrasil]

Maybe. Maybe...

[Squiggs]

Yyg, I gave you some bad info before. I've been using Freeze2 a lot recently while working on trial staves, since it doesn more damage than T4. I'm actually going to put merits fully into it and Burst2.