Jump as a ranged attack

[Theiry]

(I'm just going to ignore all the arguing and what not, and post as if this topic didn't turn into a flame war.)

I have no idea if Jump's damage (or accuracy) is based on Agility or not, but I'm all for people trying to find out. The more we know about the code of the game, the better we will all play. If when the first people that got to level 30 Thief had just said 'Yeah, Sneak Attack and Trick Attack do damage! Cool, it must be based on Strength' you would never see Thieves with +Dex or +Agi gear. And since someone did the testing and figured out exactly what goes into damage, melee classes can now deck out the stats that they need to excel in.

Anyway, now that I've established the fact that I'm all for testing new theories like this, I'd like to suggest a way to study it. Equipping a Dragoon with a few Agi+ items will indeed help you to figure out if Ranged Attack (and Accuracy) help Jump. However, even it does help, you wouldn't notice much of a difference with only a few Agility added on. So my guess is it would be best to try the following test:

Get a high level Ranger (the higher the better, but anything over level 20 will work), and sub Dragoon on to that. Completely deck out the Ranger with Agi+ and Ranged Attack / Accuracy+ gear. This should give you quite a huge boost in all those stats. Now, find some spot with a good number of monsters all around the same level, and start jumping up and down on them =). Do as many jumps as you can, and mark down the damage of each one, and how many misses and criticals you get.

Next, take away every single +Agility or + Ranged Attack/Accuracy item you have equipped (and, if you can, equip things that lower those). Then do the same number of jumps on the exact same monsters, marking down the damage and accuracy of those.

Keep in mind that this will be completely thrown off and will be of absolutely no use if the formula for Jump is changed any when subbed. But it should be quite a bit easier to tell than by just adding a few Agility to a Dragoon. If you don't notice any difference, than either Jump is changed when Dragoon is subbed, or Jump isn't based on Ranged stats.

You could also try using Sharp Shot, and getting a bard to buff you with Ranged Attack / Accuracy songs. If Jump is based on Ranged Attack at all, having that much equipment and a Bard using Soul Voice with the proper songs should increase damage quite notably. You can also try doing the same test again, but this time decking your Ranger out with Dex+ and other melee gear, with the songs to go with, to see if those change the damage of Jump.

Anyway, I hope this was of some help. I'm sorry I can't help you test any of this, but I just recently got the retail version, so I'm not high enough level to get Dragoon or Ranger yet. Be sure to test it though! I'd love to know if it's true or not. Don't let anyone dissuade you from testing it. After all, people used to get completely bashed for thinking that Guns might be added someday, and now look at it. Either they put Guns in, or there's some major hacking going on =)

[Malefas]

One major flaw in your theory however, is that RNGs can't use polearms.

This creates a plethora of problems, seeing as you'd be forced to jumping around with daggers as a DRG and as a RNG/DRG, and DRG has low skill in them enough already. :sweat:

[Theiry]

Well, you could use the Pole Arms when trying this with Dragoon, and Dagger (or axe/sword/whatever) when Ranger. The only real problem I could see with Dagger is that it's such low damage anyway, adding 1% might not even change the damage. But anyway, if Ranged stats do change the damage, it should be much easier to tell with Ranger gear than Dragoon gear. You'd just have to not compare the attack / accuracy between your Ranger and Dragoon, just compare between the Ranged+ equipped Ranger, and the Ranged- or Dex+ equipped Ranger.

Anyway, like I said, I've never been a Dragoon or a Ranger... so there might be some stuff I don't know about that will make all this impossible. =l I hope not. By the way, how much damage would a Ranger do with Jump?

[Weezingpipes]

Easier test would be on exp level monsters as a DRG, high level that is. You can't really test too well on low level monsters, because with 0 accuracy equipment, you will hit/miss the same rate as with +5, 10, 50 etc, and besides, the largest selection is available at higher levels, so you'd have to fight higher monsters to get relevant results. Assuming you could get an exp group to let you use just ranged accuracy equipment in an exp setting, load up on Ranged acc gear (lots of it is all jobs and in slots you'd have normal accuracy equipment in) and parse jump hits/misses over say a few hours. Feel free to tack on ranged attack equipment too if thats your interest in testing.

As far as how much damage a RNG would do with jump...I subbed DRG when my warrior was 20 something just to dick around, jump (when it landed) did almost always the same damage as 1 swing. The damage is related to the weapon damage. Since most RNG use daggers/axes, the damage will likely be very low since I am just assuming here Jump won't make a check for Bow/ranged weapon damage, just primary weapon damage.

I still fail to see how testing this has any validity to the job. If it did affect it, you wouldn't wear ranged accuracy/atk equipment full time or you'd severely gimp your output. If you really would want to take up 2-4 extra equipment slots (guesstimation) and macro slots on a 90 second ability (a weak one at that) possibly being better, well, I wouldn't want to do that. I'm very sure Jump accuracy is the same as melee hit accuracy, and is affected by those relevant stats, because I've seen a difference trying out different equipment set ups, none of which were ranged accuracy equipment of course.

[Taodyn]

Weezing, I'd just like to say that that was a great post. As for the equipment issue, I agree with you that this type of activity should never detract from our first job as a melee damage dealer. I was simply thinking (and not thinking simply ^^) that if you can raise these stats without sacrificing the most important stats (ACC, DEX, ATT, STR) it could be beneficial. I have no idea that even if this did work, would it improve our effectiveness, but if it improved us at all, it would be worth the effort.

I plan to test this in a level 40 exp party using the IM Gambison I have mentioned. It is only 1 DEF point less than my current armor (meaning I would not be putting myself or my pt at risk) and offers a boost of +3 ranged accuracy, +3 ranged attack. With some other +ranged accuracy gear I feel this should show some difference even if it is a small one. Given that these are relatively small boosts though, it may take a great deal of testing to actually see any significant correlation between improved ranged attack and jump.

[Jaggywaggy]

Hope you don't forget about this post, tell your results to us.

[Weezingpipes]

I plan to test this in a level 40 exp party using the IM Gambison I have mentioned. It is only 1 DEF point less than my current armor (meaning I would not be putting myself or my pt at risk) and offers a boost of +3 ranged accuracy, +3 ranged attack. With some other +ranged accuracy gear I feel this should show some difference even if it is a small one. Given that these are relatively small boosts though, it may take a great deal of testing to actually see any significant correlation between improved ranged attack and jump.

Er, you won't notice a difference with 3 ranged acc/ranged atk. The value is simply too small, in parses it would show up in margin of error range. The stuff to use in the tests would be like Scorpion Rings, etc (can't think of any other ranged acc/atk gear at the moment). Around 20-30, assuming it does work, would likely be very noticeable.

The best test would be what I mentioned above...assuming an exp party could tolerate that. You also have to account for other factors too (do you have a brd, rdm etc).

[Taodyn]

This is the only reason the whole exp issue doesn't appeal to me. If we have a BRD using accuracy songs, it will affect the results. I'm a science teacher and I know when you experiment, you want to adjust only one variable at a time. Still, I'm sure I can figure out some adequate test of this even if I have to enlist DRG from every level I know.

[Weezingpipes]

The reason you'd have to do it in an exp setting is the results are only relevant *to* an exp setting. Also if you try it vs lower level monsters, your accuracy is already high due to level/skill differences, which also would make the test pointless. Seriously, I might miss 3% of the time vs mobs that are 10-20-30 levels lower than me, and maybe miss 6-10% of the time vs T without a bard/rdm. Therefore the only reliable test would be vs minimum VT to IT+.

[Taodyn]

I'll see what equipment I can put together at my level and give it a shot.

[csBahamut]

This would be awsome if it's true. Could have an equipment changing macro if it does improve Jump dmg/acc. That way you wouldn't have to hurt your regular dmg/acc. I'll ask my brother to try this the next time we go lvling. I may have to supply the gear though, his 2 snipers and Valk mask(which I lent him gil to get) has drained all his resources. We're at lvl 45, so it probably won't be much different results than what Taodyn get's.

Can anybody visit a JP forum to ask about this? It would be incredible if this was something that was true, and the JP never found:spin:

[GSDragoon]

Originally posted by csBahamut
This would be awsome if it's true. Could have an equipment changing macro if it does improve Jump dmg/acc. That way you wouldn't have to hurt your regular dmg/acc. I'll ask my brother to try this the next time we go lvling. I may have to supply the gear though, his 2 snipers and Valk mask(which I lent him gil to get) has drained all his resources. We're at lvl 45, so it probably won't be much different results than what Taodyn get's.

Can anybody visit a JP forum to ask about this? It would be incredible if this was something that was true, and the JP never found:spin:

Sniper's add to regular accuracy too. That would mess things up. What might be better is if I use my WAR and sub DRG. Iron Musketeer's feet and gloves add +5 ranged acc each. That might be a better way to check. I could also pickup some cheap +ranged acc rings.

[csBahamut]

You know that I can just buy some +ranged acc for you, and you can macro switch your equipment. We can test it this Sat. You'll just have to use different rings so that you don't have +acc for melee.

Does anything give -ranged acc? Could also try using those things, and see how that affects jump acc. Would be easier for testing ranged acc effects. Try for a while with -ranged acc, then try for a while with +ranged acc. The differences in jump acc might be more noticable, if it affects it at all.