Bit of a dilemma

[Empedocles]

On Fenrir, the price of Byrnie has dropped to the same price as Haubergeon.

I have a Hauby, is it worth me selling it for the Byrnie? I like the removal of the evasion -, but also lose acc+...

Thoughts?

[IfritnoItazura]

Byrnie looks more reasonable for a hybrid DD/tank build, with its smaller AGI penalty and no accuracy down. Haubergeon looks better for pure DD work, except maybe in merit levels where you have gears and merits enough that accuracy is no longer a concern. Even then, it may be a good idea to macro it in for Vorpal Blade.

I dunno; it's all speculation on my end, since I can afford neither. The consensus is likely "Keep the Haubergeon!"

[Ameroth]

Kinda hard to make a solid recommendation without actually knowing what job you're playing...

[Empedocles]

Kinda hard to make a solid recommendation without actually knowing what job you're playing...

Well as I was posting in the Paladin forums I thought it'd be a given that my main is Paladin, but you do make a point.

Paladin 75, mainly in meripo.

/WAR:
Head: Adaman Barbuta
Neck: Shield Torque
Earrings: Fowling & Hospitaler
Body: (Currently Haubergeon)
Hands: Valor Gauntlets
Rings: Woodsman & Hercules'
Back: Psilos Mantle
Waist: Lifebelt/Warwolf
Legs: Adaman Cuisses
Feet: Gallant Leggings


/NIN:
Head: Walahra Turban
Neck: Royal Guard's Collar
Earrings: Fowling & Hospitaler
Body: (Currently Haubergeon)
Hands: Jaridah Bazubands
Rings: Venerer & Woodsman
Back: Psilos Mantle
Waist: Lifebelt/Warwolf
Legs: Royal Knight's Breeches
Feet: Tabin Boots +1


I feel that the Byrnie will help me better overall than the Haubergeon currently does, I generally don't macro swap equipment.

[Necropolis]

Personally I'd take the Haub, but because it's more useful for other jobs as well. If you don't have another melee job that you'd wish to use it for then the Byrnie looks like the better choice for PLD in merpo.

I'm guessing if PLD is your main you would have sword merits, and eatting sole for meripo? That would probably compensate for the lost accuracy; though I am no expert in melee equipment to say for certain. I might recommend parsing a fight for an hour or so in Haub, then in another piece that doesn't have the added acc (such as AF or whatever else) to see if the acc drops below an acceptable level.

The small increase in HP as well as a bit more attack looks more benificial to me over all though.

[Akashimo]

I'd say its a tough choice on my end.

Byrine: Yeah, if you want to put out some DD while tanking. Long run if you anticipate for taking hits with the other jobs that can access it. If you should ever take up nin, saves you more than hauby taking hits since no eva down.

Hauby: Good for lack of acc food using, probally gonna evade or block with shield less. Similar points as to hauby, but the eva down and agi is gonna hurt. Also, no +vit on it and less HP.

Overall its what you believe you're gonna end up doing with yourself with another job that gonna use either. But, then again, same for just pld. Personally I'd get the bryine to make up for not having af body, adaman or some other war/pld body piece on when taking hits.

[Lmnop]

I like the byrnie, but there's not enough justification. If it were STR+7, I'd almost consider it.

As a hybrid, you need gear in slots that can perform many functions. You won't evade anything unless Flash is up, and the AGI difference is so small that even an hour of parsing wouldn't show an improvement in shielding/parrying rates. Oh wait -- Byrnie has -3 AGI as opposed to -5. So now there's a 2 AGI difference instead of 5. Now it'll take about 30 hours straight of parsing to notice a difference. VIT is mostly useless. You won't notice the 2-3 defense increase (counting the VIT).

Meanwhile, +6% hit rate will go a very long way. And while the +10 attack will make a difference, once again you'll need a hefty parsing to notice. I've always wanted to play with a Byrnie+1, though. +25 attack would be funny.

I really hate to be the guy that says "go with the haub" because we're all tired of hearing how good Haubergeon is. But... it makes a difference, pure and simple.

[Ziero]

Haub, no question.

iirc the concept is basically that Byrnie+1 > Haub+1 > Haub > Byrnie. And as a Pld, your eva is a joke already while your acc and att are notibly lower then an average DD due to tanking gear over DD gear.

And you lose about 13 acc by choosing the Byrnie over the haub as the 5 dex gives you about 2.5 acc on top of the solid +10 while the Byrnie gives you -1.5 due to the dex minus.

The Vit, Agi and Def bonuses of the Byrnie will mean very little at endgame in parties, you'll usually be fighting T to low VT mobs for high chains, and they won't hit that hard. And if you sub /nin you won't need a shield so the Agi really isn't that useful anyway.

Long story short, go Haub.

[Ryoii/Nonomii]

Whenever evasion is a concern, you will want to use a Scorpion Harness anyway (ie when soloing Prime Avatars or helping out on a coffer key hunt). I would recommend an Assault Jerkin over Byrnie if you really want something to boost ATK. Personally I carry around a DD set and an evasion set on my SAM, but at Lv75 SAM has 31 more evasion just from skill.

[Callisto]

Haubers > Byrnie, although Byrnie gets more style points. The 10 Acc will make a greater difference to your overall DD output than an extra 10 Attack would. You're going to evade like a brick no matter what you put on, so the higher defense of the Haub would make it preferrable to wearing a SH for TPing.
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Add: I'd keep the Gallant feet on as /NIN, the emnity will do more than the small acc/eva boosts.

[IfritnoItazura]

Haubers > Byrnie, although Byrnie gets more style points. The 10 Acc will make a greater difference to your overall DD output than an extra 10 Attack would.

What if the OP is able to hit the accuracy cap without Haubergeon? I routinely see sushi using melee at Lv.75 hitting 93%~95% on the parser, and see no reason Paladins (especially those with sword merits) do the same.

You're going to evade like a brick no matter what you put on, so the higher defense of the Haub would make it preferrable to wearing a SH for TPing.

My understanding is that Eva+10 means 5% better actual evade rate, and Eva-20 means getting hit 10% more, even before factoring in the AGI-. A brick with 10% less evasion will take roughly 10% more damage than a "normal" brick, and 15% more compared to the SH wearing "evasive" brick, right? Besides, the difference between Scorpion Harness' defense and that of Haubergeon's is... 2.

While it'd be silly to make a evasion build for Paladin, it's worth weighing the offensive capability of Haugergeon against its negatives for defensive attributes. If a critter's regular hits are 150+ damage without shield block and there's no WHM casting Regen III, I am not going to add Eva-20 to my build. >_>;

[Armando]

My understanding is that Eva+10 means 5% better actual evade rate, and Eva-20 means getting hit 10% more, even before factoring in the AGI-. A brick with 10% less evasion will take roughly 10% more damage than a "normal" brick, and 15% more compared to the SH wearing "evasive" brick, right? Besides, the difference between Scorpion Harness' defense and that of Haubergeon's is... 2.

Doesn't mean much when you only dodge a VT Lesser Colibri 9% of the time with Blind on, and that was without Woodsmans or Haub. And if you have Woodsman rings you better be using them, and mobs must have a hit rate cap too.

Point is, we can't evade. Not one bit, not against an EXP mob.

What if the OP is able to hit the accuracy cap without Haubergeon? I routinely see sushi using melee at Lv.75 hitting 93%~95% on the parser, and see no reason Paladins (especially those with sword merits) do the same.

Then with Haubergeon he might be able to eat Meat?

[IfritnoItazura]

Point is, we can't evade. Not one bit, not against an EXP mob.

Lv.69-70 PLD; started the night in full Gallant set, switched to Optical Hat and Scorpion Harness in the last 1/3-ish? Total of 65 fights, every Ephramadian Shade was VT, I think. (I have a /check <t> in my Provoke macro, so this "I think" should be pretty accurate.)

Avoidance: 28.29%; that's evade and parry together. WHM was using Flash relatively frequently, but often overlapped with mine. (Just couldn't seem to coordinate well. =/)

So, yes, we do evade on VT exp monsters' attacks. Not impressively, but it is significant part of our damage mitigation.

Then with Haubergeon he might be able to eat Meat?

Sure, as long as one can hit accuracy cap (at least on Vorpal Blade equipment sub-set). That said, nothing raises accuracy as efficiently as sushi, just like nothing raises attack like double Minute songs.

[Empedocles]

Thank you for your input guys, along the same lines as what I was thinking but it's good to have more than one viewpoint.

I was eating meat with both the setups, and as /NIN (unless there was a bard/corsair) I noticed that my acc was good, but not as high as I liked... (I don't use parsers so I go mainly from observation. I know it's nowhere near as reliable, but I just don't like using 3rd-party tools all that much.)

So I thought perhaps I could switch to +atk gear and eat sushi, see what happens.

LS member has a Byrnie lying around unused (semi-retired his Warrior long time ago but kept the Byrnie) so I'll be borrowing that for a while, try it out for free

[Empedocles]

Well it's been a fair while and I thought I'd update this.

Since switching to Byrnie, I ironically haven't been in any meripo
But from general experience, (solo'ing, Campaign Ops/battle random stuff) there doesn't seem to be any noticeable difference either way.

I'm keeping the Byrnie I bought (returned the one I borrowed) but the way I see it, it's more of a preference thing.

I swing with the consensus of "Get a Hauby" when someone first hits the appropriate level but at 75 it seems to really be more up to the player which one they want to use.

(On an additional note, because I don't want to make another thread, anyone found info on hidden/additional effects of Brave Blade yet?)