Nin 70+ as damage dealer : Viable?

[Crimespree]

Im level 40 blink tanking nin with all my required equip on; im pretty sure all im missing is one snipers ring.

Was looking at AH and it got me thinking,
can level 70+ nin be dmg dealer?

All youd need is 70% HP or less and your 20% haste earring kicks in. if youre not tanking there shouldnt be any problems, utsusemi is there as backup. is this viable at all?

Equip:

2x Fudo
Optical Hat
Byrnie/Assault/Haubergeon
Bomb Core
Ochiudos
Sniper Ring
Jse Ring
Jse Earring
Merman/coral earring
Fuma
Dusk Trousers
Lifebelt/swordbelt/masters belt/haste belt
4/4 collar or PC charm
Amemit

total of +80ish attack max and a healthy dose of accuracy

when below 70% youd have 30% haste... just form equip.

katanas add up to 455 or so delay, so with dual wield 4 and all that haste, plus haste spell on you you could probably bring that down to around 280ish delay, like a 1h axe.

I was just thinking, the damage over time would be interesting :O But Its all just speculation... what do you guys think?

[evilution]

Any melee class with godly equipment and the right buffs can be VERY strong.

I've been in a PT with a tarutaru ninja whos damage was so good he didnt even need Fui from the THF to keep agro even when i was MB for over 1100 damage.


Then again I've been in PT's with ninjas who did such poor damage that even with fui I would draw agro tossing out a level 1 nuke when the mob was at 80% health.

[Stanislav]

My ninja has had +55 attack since 67
If i had byrine+1 and amemt+1 it could near 65 and other gear added i could have+70+80 or more

Since levle 40 I had all attack gear but I still tank

It costs me a lot more on Blink becuase I barely ever evade and have to use more. but the speed of killing and my dmg ouput is great

Ninja doenst need Evasion gear to tank but it does make it easier
I took the other way and I tank and fight I have the following.

- Assault Jerkin
- 1 Fudo and 1 Stun Katana (atm)
- Emperor Hairpin
- Ochiudos Kote
- Fuma Kyten
- Resatu Pants
- 2 STR+4 rings
- 2 Dodge Earring (maybe should change to Coral Earring ands that +10 more attack)
- Amemt Mantle
- RK collar

My goal is to chang emy gear to the following

- Scorpion Jarness
- 2 Fudo
- Emperor Hairpin
- Ochiudos kote
- Fuma Kyten
- Resatsu Pants
- 2 STR+4 Rings
- Amemt Mantle +1
- Peacock charm

Once again I learned ninja doesnt need evasion gear but if you choose attack then your pretty much working 2x harder to tank.

[Navia]

Stanislav , what belt are you using? Royal knights looks nice because i'm not having problems with accuracy so far, but I see half of highlevel ninja wearing rk belt, others with lifebelt.

I was this >< close to getting a SMN torque last night for the 5 evasion but the RK collar looks like a balanced choice for neckwear giving me def/evade/str until I can get a good +acc neck at higher level.

Some people carry around multiple armor pieces for a given slot, but with the amount of inventory spaces used for ninja tools for 4+ hr pt i'd like to not drag along excess stuff and have a couple slots to hold loot still :sweat:
How many hits are you taking on an average fight waiting on blink timers to recycle due to lower evasion?

I personally cant imagine dropping below the +30ish evade mark because when I get hit while waiting for Ni or Ichi to pop against totetote++ even when debuffed, it hurts bad :o
Having defender helps now but I like being able to evade alot and keep berserk on as much as possible (obviously clicked off when im going to get smacked)

[Mitsu]

When lvling on totetote++ mobs at 61-end of game....you have like a 10%chance of evading with +40 evade. I tried it and unless your chaining tote1 the amount of misses made by an enemy are few and FAR between. Right now we are lvling in onzozo...FOOKIN Torama's are HELL to tank simply bc of Paralyze and silence specials they have. After one night of lvling in there i decided to change my gear a bit.
Haubergeon
2 sniper Rings
Life Belt
2 dodge earrings
Amemet
Ochiudo Kote
Arhats Leg and feet
Spectacles
Bomb Core

At 70 im gonna try throwing again when I can wear my JSE and equip 2 merman rings, but so far my haubergeon set up can help kill toramas b4 i go through the 3 cycles. Also if you have good comunication and a BLM,DRK, and.or war..you can make the downtime less hazardous by timing stuns and flash. As far as a HNM situation ill HAVE to make a evasion set of equip for HNM that I MUST tank, lol, but even thats is not necasarry unless I want to try and take one on with 3 people.

[Stanislav]

I am using a Life Belt
Its really the best belt this game has to offer besides Speed Belt but thats not worth the 3mil it is on my server.

Also the way i use Blink is cast on Last shadow if I am casting Ichi and for Ni there is almost no way to get hit unless you start to late.

My friend has +70 evasion at 75 and he still gets hit a lot, It only helps a little.

I have a set of evasion gear that gets me to +55 but I rarely use it.

[Reaper]

You guys have a point , I had up to plus 88 evade up for a certain period of time in the game. I was still getting hit by totes as if I only had about only plus 50 or 60 to evade. Of course at level 74 everything is tote to you but I figured at least you could dodge alot of it with about plus 88 evade.

I don't know all the names of the gear in english since I am playing on Japanese Version and I just recognize the Kanji, but here goes

Emperors Hairpin
Raesatsu Gloves
Raesatsu Boots
Survival Belt
Spirit Torque
Dodge earring x 2
AF pants
Bachelors Vest
Federation Ceremonial Shortsword ?? ( +3 to evade one)
Bat Cape
Wind Ring
Fenrir Stone



Alas I am almost done my ninja job and theres not much chance to switch gear around to try for the attack route. I did notice that the more damage did help me hold hate but alot of it I found after level 72 was just spamming Ku whenever possible and the guy will turn him around. I am sure though that with enough attack you wouldnt need to do that, since around 73 everything starts to weaken off.

I also carried around several pieces of gear on me for the same slot, like Assualt Jerkin and Republican Mantle , Shiva dagger, for more attack and stuff. But I think with warcry and beserk with food I could only get up to about 600 attk or so. I bet with the right gear one could bring their ninja up to 700 easily. But like Stan said, the more you go into attk the harder you have to work at dodging

I just wish S.E. would tell us where about the cap or the marginal return point was. I would sure like to swap out some pieces of dodging gear for attk just to see those low numbers go away. Too bad, my new job is ranger now :)

[Madden]

Here are the items I want for my Ninja:

Weapon 1: Fudo
Weapon 2: Shiranui
Ranged: Ungur Boomerang
Head: Optical Hat
Neck: Peacock Charm
Earring 1: Fenrir Earring
Earring 2: Dodge Earing
Body: Scorpion Harness +1
Hands: Seiryu's Kote
Ring 1: Boomqueen Ring
Ring 2: Bloodbead Ring
Back: Amemit Mantle +1
Belt: Sonic Belt
Legs: Byakko's Haidate
Feet: Rasetsu Suna-Ate

Will take time to get but I will get it ^^

[Mitsu]

>< Seryu and Byakko...the pain will be great. I too want alot of that, but you need excellent equip to beat those HNM. All i can say good luck and let us know when you taste death at Byakko's claws. I plan on dieing alot in our first fight with it lol.

[Kirk]

Originally posted by Reaper
You guys have a point , I had up to plus 88 evade up for a certain period of time in the game. I was still getting hit by totes as if I only had about only plus 50 or 60 to evade. Of course at level 74 everything is tote to you but I figured at least you could dodge alot of it with about plus 88 evade.


I just wish S.E. would tell us where about the cap or the marginal return point was.


I think one thing to recongnize is that in the combat calculation there is always a chance to land a hit. Even weak mobs can hit you at times. But anyway here is a method i use to see how effective my evasion is. Goto mystery tour and check the skill cap section. Goto the chart under the A- list and find your current level. Add your +eva to that level total to get what your active evasion is. The go up the chart and see what level your effecive evasion correspondes to.

Keep this level in mind and then visit the xp chart section. Find the level of the mobs you are attacking by how much xp you get for a single kill in pt. This will tell you how much levels above you they are. Basically you can then match the level the mob is above you with the level yout +eva brings you at. You can then buy up evasion to effectively bring the mob to a level that is EM, DC, EP whatever by how much eva you have.

Also one last point. In blink taking even 1 or 2 misses is all you need to have the evasion be effective. You just need it to bide your time between timers resetting :)

[Mitsu]

Eh..the EVADE skill leads to alot of misconceptions. First you must look at what the Evade skill is exactly. When an enemy misses and when you EVADE and enemy attack is 2 totally different things. In chat log if an enemy misses you it is mainly due to your characters natural evade+ any AGI/Evade equip you have. When you evade an attack that is purely the Evade skill. That is the reason why parry lvls up so much more slowley than a ninja's evade skill. With ninja evade always have priority over parry skill meaning that your character will attempt to evade b4 parry. As for IT mobs higher up, they are extremly accurate. Even with 55-70 evade your enemy will hit 90% of the time, and on the 10% they MAY miss they will miss at the wrong times, messing up your recast. Everyone must be paying attention in the pt, if your pt works well together then a nin tank has no worries when he goes from ici>NI to start the cycle over. I too have changed my set up to more atk/acc base equip, although i still have my throw equip, its just not feasable to throw ATM when the most efficent sub when throwing is RNG. NO, the cost is not unbearable, in fact, compared to other high lvl recipe....Manji, Fuma shuriken are cake

[Kirk]

Originally posted by Mitsu
Eh..the EVADE skill leads to alot of misconceptions. First you must look at what the Evade skill is exactly. When an enemy misses and when you EVADE and enemy attack is 2 totally different things. In chat log if an enemy misses you it is mainly due to your characters natural evade+ any AGI/Evade equip you have. When you evade an attack that is purely the Evade skill. That is the reason why parry lvls up so much more slowley than a ninja's evade skill.

What the heck are you talking about mitsu? There is only one evasion skill. Im not talking about when you 'Evade' an AOE attack.

[Madden]

Originally posted by Mitsu
Eh..the EVADE skill leads to alot of misconceptions. First you must look at what the Evade skill is exactly. When an enemy misses and when you EVADE and enemy attack is 2 totally different things. In chat log if an enemy misses you it is mainly due to your characters natural evade+ any AGI/Evade equip you have. When you evade an attack that is purely the Evade skill. That is the reason why parry lvls up so much more slowley than a ninja's evade skill. With ninja evade always have priority over parry skill meaning that your character will attempt to evade b4 parry. As for IT mobs higher up, they are extremly accurate. Even with 55-70 evade your enemy will hit 90% of the time, and on the 10% they MAY miss they will miss at the wrong times, messing up your recast. Everyone must be paying attention in the pt, if your pt works well together then a nin tank has no worries when he goes from ici>NI to start the cycle over. I too have changed my set up to more atk/acc base equip, although i still have my throw equip, its just not feasable to throw ATM when the most efficent sub when throwing is RNG. NO, the cost is not unbearable, in fact, compared to other high lvl recipe....Manji, Fuma shuriken are cake

No idea what you talking about...

[Mitsu]

LOL sorry about that, i rambled a little bit. Evade SKILL that you can raise helps contribute to EVADING hits. While it helps an enemy MISS, the more evedent affect is evadeing. For example..
Skimmer misses Mitsurugi
VS
Mitsurugi evades
If i can get a screeny of my text box its much clearer. During my first cycle of Utsu: NI the mob missed me once and I evaded another hit. You pay attention to these tiny details bc if not, it will screw your count up. Although they both cause the enemy to miss an attack, without high/capped evade skill you will not EVADE (note:literal wording) as much. Evade needs an animation like Parry then people will notice it more i beleive.
I hope it makes sense....:thumbsup:

[Kirk]

Mitsu in all my levels I have never ever EVADED a melee attack. The only time you evade is from an Area effect attack. Like the sleep attack onions do in Kazam.

[Soliloquy]

Originally posted by Mitsu
LOL sorry about that, i rambled a little bit. Evade SKILL that you can raise helps contribute to EVADING hits. While it helps an enemy MISS, the more evedent affect is evadeing. For example..
Skimmer misses Mitsurugi
VS
Mitsurugi evades
If i can get a screeny of my text box its much clearer. During my first cycle of Utsu: NI the mob missed me once and I evaded another hit. You pay attention to these tiny details bc if not, it will screw your count up. Although they both cause the enemy to miss an attack, without high/capped evade skill you will not EVADE (note:literal wording) as much. Evade needs an animation like Parry then people will notice it more i beleive.
I hope it makes sense....:thumbsup:
I'm not sure I understand... when I have Utsusemi up, I get "<me>'s shadow absorbs the hit and disappears" if Utsusemi absorbs it; "The <t> misses <me>" if I dodge it, or "<me> parries the <t>'s attack with her weapon" if I parry... is there another line that I'm missing? I don't recall ever seeing anything like that, except on AoE abilities...

[Kirk]

Ok everyone, mitsu is not smoking crack ;) I saw this for myself the other day! I evaded a melee attack. Now like I said I have never ever done this for all my levels until now. The only thing I have changed recently was I got an evasion torque which adds +7 evasion 'Skill' so my cap was increased to 230 from 223. The only other thing that was different was I had my thief sub on at the time, which has an evasion boost. I was also farming so fighting low level mons. So if it was the torque or the sub, or a combination of the two that did it I dunno, but it happened. Mind you it must be a very very very low chance for you to actually evade an attack since i've only seen it this once and havent seen it since and i've farmed for many hours since then. Sorry Mitsu for thinking you were psyching out there :biggrin: Learn something new everyday.

[Brothershadow]

Thats strange that most of you havent seen it (Evades attack) because im a low level Ninja/Warrior and I evade quite often or I should say I see it alot when im soloing or farming.

[Mitsu]

YAY....im not crazy:sweat:

[Khaunshar]

somewhat on topic again....

Ninja's can do respectable damage. As Defender isn't needed (maybe in an emergency, but not permanently like a paladin) and accuracy ups are somewhat offensive in nature, I wonder what sub is , flat out, the most damage. And I think its /war anyway. Double attack and Atk up, along with warcry later on plus STR kinda beats the rest.

Thf loses a lot at 50/25 when double attack comes into play, and trick with low damage WS isn't worth it.
/Rng suffers from the same problem anyone subbing rng has.... the way ranged accuracy is calculated, and how it is usually ruining the regular attack/accuracy when you get a set of gear.
/Drk I could see as somewhat ok, 2 attack ups, last resort and souleater.... of course, no double attack, and forget the spells pretty soon.

Any opinions? Just playing with ideas, I know that blink tanking is the real job of the ninja.

[coolffxi]

what dmg are u guys doing with the setups? :thumbsup:

[Dtec]

my attack gear setup:

katana1: senju.. that katana from 30 kindred seals BC
katana2: shinarui
ammo: bomb core
head: optical hat
neck: royal gaurd's collar
ear1: suppanomimi
ear2: coral earring
body: shura togi
hands: ochiudo's kote
ring1: ruby ring
ring2: ruby ring
back: amemet mantle
waist: warwolf belt
pants: koga hakama (i have byakko's haidate now)
feet: rasetsu sune-ate

i was doing 80-100dmg per katana without a bard to VT-IT weapons in the shrine in sky. my blade: jin's were doing 500-800dmg average. i held hate through barrage + slugshot. i have pics to prove it.

[Niland]

hmm, i had that katana but i chucked it.

do you actually rate it?

i've got max crit rate & katana merits

looking at your list i think something like this is how i'd tweak it.

katanas: 2x fudo
ammo: bomb core (i use the ungur boomerang because i'd just throw a bomb core by mistake)
head: optical hat
neck: RG collar is cool, maybe specs? (i still use evasion torque myself)
ear1: suppanomimi
ear2: eris +1 (i really like some +enmity when i tank)
body: shura togi for TP > osode for WS
hands: seiryu kote? hmm few choices here (rasetsu/yasha/noritsune/etc) if you have a BRD then i don't think ochidous are worthwhile.
rings: 2x flame ring (still on breeze myself ;_; really need to get a pair of flames soon)
back: amemet +1
waist: warwolf belt (i love this belt!)
pants: byakko's haidate
feet: fuma sune-ate

i _really_ recommend eating sushi as a ninja, its just incredible stuff.

byrnie is a more realistic option for many than the togi/osode i guess. i really hate wearing my harness in exp.

i'm still a ways off my ideal setup, but already my Jins are upto 800+ on occasion (972 is my highest in exp so far). its pretty variable since i just tend to blow it at 100TP^^

ninja does a tonne of damage in exp if you play right, i think the harness brigade have alot to answer for, theres no reason why a ninja shouldn't be doing around 25-30% of the damage.

[Russta]

Originally posted by Niland
ninja does a tonne of damage in exp if you play right, i think the harness brigade have alot to answer for, theres no reason why a ninja shouldn't be doing around 25-30% of the damage.

I must admit I raised an eyebrow at this when I read it yesterday but then I hit 73 and switched out Scorpion Harness and Arhats Hakama+1 for Shura Togi and Shura Haidate. The difference in my damage is pretty incredible with my crits gaining about 15-20 to each and Blade: Ku doing over 600 damage on seven occasions having struggeled to break 500 previously. Though I would be lying if I said I didn't notice the loss of seven evasion (I had Shiranui ready for 73 too), I quickly got used to it and learned how to rework myself to compensate. I also started using Suppanomimi in conjunction with this and, despite losing Enmity+3 overall, I found myself keeping hate significantly easier than ever before. I doubt the Shura set will get the nod over Byakko's Haidaite and Kirin's Osode in two levels but I intend to do some future testing to see how they compare.

However, I will say that tanking with 838 HP is pretty fucking scary.

[ZQM]

I PTed with a 75 NIN against statues using:

Fudo*2
Bomb Core
Optical Hat
R.G. Collar
Elusive Earrings*2 (Not sure why, considering his other equip)
Haubergeon
O.Kotes
Flame Rings*2
Amemit+1
Warwolf
Byakko's Haidate
Raetsu

And Squid Sushi+1 for food.

From parser results, we basically did the same damage (~1500 each per fight). Evasion equiped NINs were doing 700-900 per fight. He was holding amazing hate (With evasion equipped NINs, I pull hate a lot against them) and the only time he got hit was after Stun AOE.

Leveling NIN myself with an offensive build setup and it's working nicely. My damage isn't that good so far, but I think it'll get a lot better around 65 with the 4th dual wield trait. It's just like tanking on WAR pre-74, except this time I have 4 more shadows then I did before. :)

[Niland]

keep it hush hush tho :d

don't want my harness going down in value!

[BENWALLACE]

I must admit I raised an eyebrow at this when I read it yesterday but then I hit 73 and switched out Scorpion Harness and Arhats Hakama+1 for Shura Togi and Shura Haidate. The difference in my damage is pretty incredible with my crits gaining about 15-20 to each and Blade: Ku doing over 600 damage on seven occasions having struggeled to break 500 previously. Though I would be lying if I said I didn't notice the loss of seven evasion (I had Shiranui ready for 73 too), I quickly got used to it and learned how to rework myself to compensate. I also started using Suppanomimi in conjunction with this and, despite losing Enmity+3 overall, I found myself keeping hate significantly easier than ever before. I doubt the Shura set will get the nod over Byakko's Haidaite and Kirin's Osode in two levels but I intend to do some future testing to see how they compare.

Anytime you can replace enmity with something that will significantly increase your damage, I'd have to say go for it. Evasion setups aside, I'd say enmity pales in comparsion to straight damage. The easiest way for me to pull hate off of a strong slugshot is with a provoke and a high damage jin.

As far as the Shura set vs. God Set... I think that it depends on what food you eat. If you eat sushi accuracy foods, then the usefulness of the Shura set diminishes, especially in comparison to the god set. Before the major food update, my favorite part of the shura set was the accuracy bonus. I think if you eat sushi, your accuracy is parrallel or even better than with an accu gear setup; Essentially you'd only be gaining attack and str bonuses from Shura.

Considering the pieces themselves: I'd think that 5 str from the legs is inferior to the haste itself, not to mention the crit rate increase from 15 dex. Concerning Osode vs the Togi... I'm a little less unsure. I have both the osode and koga chainmail, and I can't really tell the difference in normal attacks myself. It seems like my lowest dmg hits increase a bit with koga, and my higher end hits increase with osode, but I can't really say for sure. It's something I'd need a parser for. However, once you factor in the crit increases from the 10 dex, and the fact that jin/ten are str/dex based, I'd say that osode has the clear advantage. The second fact is probably even a better determinant in picking between the two. Once I got osode/haidate my jins went up dramatically; my previous highs were 600ish before god set, 900ish after.


Leveling NIN myself with an offensive build setup and it's working nicely. My damage isn't that good so far, but I think it'll get a lot better around 65 with the 4th dual wield trait. It's just like tanking on WAR pre-74, except this time I have 4 more shadows then I did before.

I found that from 60 to 70, ninja changed at certain levels. Up until 57, I tended to rely on elemental ninjutsu for keeping hate. Ninja gets a lot of nice gear from 60 on, so I gradually stopped relying on ninjutsu and just focused more on damage. By the time I hit 70 with fudos, warcry, and optical hat, I had to cut back on provoke or monsters wouldn't turn for SC. My point is, the higher level I got, the easier i found it to hold hate, 65 being one of the key levels. I think at 66 all I ever really did was use 2 or 3 debuffs a fight, then spam ten.

[ZQM]

Big Ben stopped smashing things?

:(

[BENWALLACE]

sorry













BIG BEN IS STRONGEST THERE IS

ASKLDFJKLASDJFKLASJDFAJSDLFKASKLDFKLASFKASDLFAKLSD FLAKSDF;L

[Gryff]

My current attack setup:

Mamushito+1x2 ( Sorry I know I know, I need fudos again but first I need to pay off a debt the size of a small nations GNP )
Ungur Boomerang
Shura Zunari Kabuto
Peacock Charm
Suppanomimi
Cassie Earring
Kirins Osode
Seiryus Kote
Sniper Rings x2
Amemet Mantle+1
Lifebelt
Shura Haidate
Fuma Sune-Ate

Link to that setup is in my sig.

Accuracy+42
STR+23
Attack+15

Flaws with this setup:

No fudos, not enough attack+

What to do:

Get some attack+gloves and maybe a bomb core ( always fearful of tossing it ), and swap snipers to flame rings.

[Omni]

i became very intersted in this idea after reading it a few times so i decided to give it a try. i went to bibiki bay last night at 72 and everything there is VT or low IT, this the setup i had:

stun katana x2 (i had bought 2 fudos before i left ragnarok for 100k a piece and now they are 1.2 mil on remora. sold them way long ago ; ;)

emp. hairpin
spike necklace/r.g. collar
dodge earrings x2
haubergeon
raesetu hand piece
sniper/venerer ring
amemit mantle
warwolf
arhats hakama
raesetu kyahan

squid sushi

going to try to pick up a ochuidos kote, str rings and a bomb core soon.

but with this setup i was doing a combined dmg output of 80-130 on goblins and dhamels and landing blade jin for 400-700. numbers arent as great as ive seen other people say they can be but this is a whole new game for me. ive been evasion tanking for all of my nin xp time and this looks like its going to be fun esp. when i gain another lvl or 2.

what earrings do you guys use? i have coral earrings to use but i was thinking about the earring that gives 1str 1dex and suppanomimi once i can get a ark angel alliance. any other earrings that might help out?

[Russta]

Originally posted by Omni-Ragnarok
what earrings do you guys use? i have coral earrings to use but i was thinking about the earring that gives 1str 1dex and suppanomimi once i can get a ark angel alliance. any other earrings that might help out?

I use Suppanomimi and Minuet Earring though I carry with me Fenrir's Earring and two Melody Pierce+1's. No earring stat can ever top "haste"+5% (in an attack sense) and I always party with a Bard so get the small Accuracy+3 boost from Minuet. I'd still recomend getting a Minuet Pierce even if you don't party with a Bard often as STR+1 and DEX+1 in itself is pretty damn amazing for the price.

Got an Auditory Torque last night, gonna try that on a full attack build Ninja soon...

[kisada]

What is an auditory torque?

Also I'm curious, what's your perspective on STR vs ATK for WS? I was thinking about grabbing a minuet earring, but I'm not sure if I'd rather have 1 str or the 6 atk from a Merman's earring.

[Russta]

Originally posted by kisada
What is an auditory torque?

DEF:5 Latent Effect: STR+4 VIT+4 ~ Lv47, All Jobs.

Also I'm curious, what's your perspective on STR vs ATK for WS? I was thinking about grabbing a minuet earring, but I'm not sure if I'd rather have 1 str or the 6 atk from a Merman's earring.

As a general rule, I would seldom take attack over any STR item there is. It's impossible to answer such a vague question, though, as other items available and their positives and negatives need to be considered. Would I take Alkyoneus's Bracelets over my Horomusha Kote because it's STR+11 vs Attack+15? No, because you have to consider the effect DEX and AGI-6 is going to have on your overal damage and ability to tank. Relating to that, look at what you asked - STR+1 and DEX+1 or Attack+6? What you fail to mention is you're getting an Evasion-4 penalty from the Merman's Earring which, although not much, is a penalty no matter which way you slice it. Minuet Earring not only has zero penalties but has a nice bonus in the form of Accuracy+3 (it all adds up for a three hit WS). On top of that Jin, Ten and Ku's modifiers are all STR and DEX further adding to it's more overal damage in the bigger picture.

[kisada]

Right, I definitely understand what you're saying. When considering the situations and other factors, and especially other stats, it makes that question a totally different one.

However, I think what I should have asked instead was your opinion of straight STR vs ATK, all other factors aside. This is a little more off topic but its mainly because I'm looking for ways to boost damage from sneak/ws (for heavy duty monsters, cop wyrms). Maybe you'd have greater insight because you play brd and war also, but the main reason I bring it up is because I have trouble deciding between etudes vs minuet. There's gotta be point where a large amount of atk is greater than some str, and vice versa. Any thoughts? Thanks

[Russta]

Originally posted by kisada
There's gotta be point where a large amount of atk is greater than some str, and vice versa. Any thoughts? Thanks

The key is balance.

The difference Minuet III makes on top of Minuet IV is, in my opinion, unnoticeable but seeing as we don't need Madrigal anymore (<3 Sushi) what else should the Bard play? I like to have STR Etude as my second song and I notice it alot but that's just me on Ninja and Warrior. Also you have to consider that Etude's deteriorate so if the Bard can't effectively keep it up it becomes less efficient than having another Minuet on. Factor in that most Bard's have to pull due to the nature of partying at 75 and you can understand why not many bother to do it.