Melee gearset at 55

[cidbahamut]

Holy Sword-chucking Mages Batman, a melee RDM thread!

First off, what I'm aiming for isn't a "I want to swing my sword in the party" setup. My goal is to be able to take on Dark Spark at level 55 as a RDM/BLU. While it's probably not my brightest idea, I want to see it through to the end properly which of course means completely overhauling my gear.

Now I've done enough poking around to know that for melee combat the primary stats to gun for are(in no particular order): Accuracy, Attack and Haste.

At my level Haste options are extremely limited, expensive or involve taking down NMs I can't be bothered camping.

So far my gear has been most constructed with partying in mind, so I need some advice with how to beef up my sword-chucking build and possibly some general theory for how to prioritize Accuracy, Attack, Haste and maybe Evasion when putting together a melee build for solo play. I know for playing with others Evasion isn't as important because there will hopefully be a tank or at least a designated MP sponge.

Let's start by tossing up the gearset I currently have and see what can be further fleshed out:

So this is what I've actually been meleeing in. Tragic, I know.

Sword: Knight's Sword
Shield: Hard Shield

Head: Crow Beret
Neck: Black Silk Neckerchief
Earring: Morion Earring x2
Body: Brigandine Armor
Hands: Guerilla Gloves
Ring: Knowledge Rings and Saintly Rings...+INT/+MND respectively
Back: Red Cape +1
Belt: Mercenary Captain's Belt
Legs: Magic Cuisses
Feet: Warlock's Boots or Rambler's Gaiters


Clearly there's room for improvement, but again I'm a little shaky on what to prioritize for a fight with a hard hitting NM. I've scoped out some potential upgrades to my current gearset and I'm hoping you guys can make some suggestions as to what works, doesn't work, and what I've overlooked.

Gear to acquire

Head
Valkyrie's Mask: This one seems like it'd be a solid investment, although it's a rather steep pricetag considering the availability(and price) of the Walkure Mask.

Walkure Mask: The discount version of above.

Shock Mask: I dig the Attack and Evasion on one piece, along with decent defense to feed Coccoon. The MP to HP is regrettable, but small enough that it doesn't really dissuade me from choosing this.

Precision Bandana: Yay for Accuracy, boo for 90k price-tag and lower defense. Still if this is the best choice I wouldn't be opposed to camping the NM to get the item rather than paying for it. Problem being I don't know whether the accuracy is worth overlooking the other options for head gear.


Body

Jaridah Peti: Aside from the -HP, this looks rock solid. I can't afford the HQ version but I'll probably drop the gil for this unless there's a better option someone can suggest.

Hands
This is where things start to get icky with balancing stats.

Battle Gloves: Pretty solid investment. Only downside would be less defense to feed Coccoon, but overall I wouldn't mind picking these up.

Combat Mittens +1: Yay, more accuracy, attack and defense. But is the lost evasion worth it? Probably, for as Callisto once told me: I have the evasion of a wet brick.

Combat Caster's Mitts: Or maybe straight up Attack would be the way to go?

Jaridah Bazubands: Something about this strikes me as less than ideal. Battle Gloves is better aside from the defense, but it is considerably more defense than the other options. My gut tells me to go with one of the first three options but let me know where this one sits, I just can't quite place it.

Pants

Republic Subligar: Augh! The fugly pants! But they make the enemy fall down so it's all good.

War Hose: I'm inclined to pick these up, just because they add a little bit of everything and are RDM-stylish.

Neck

Tiger Stole: I don't know of anything else to put in here.

Waist

Swordbelt: Looks solid, but it depends on how much accuracy I ought to be stacking.

Life Belt: The accuracy yin to Swordbelt's yang.

Headlong Belt: Probably the only Haste piece I could reasonably hope to obtain at the moment. So is this alone going to outweigh my other options?

Earring

Beetle Earring +1: Wet Brick theory rears its ugly head once again. Do I take the hit to evasion for the possibility of dealing more damage?

Tortoise Earring +1: This would be my preference if I'm going with -evasion earrings, but they're elusive and expensive so it's up in the air.

Ring

Assailant's Ring: This looks like an affordable boost to attack, but it's contingent upon people tossing it on the AH since I can't camp the NM myself.

Venerer Ring: I like questable alternatives to spending a small fortune on accuracy rings +1.

Woodsman Ring: I don't understand the price difference between these and sniper rings, but I'll go for the one that's less than 100k if I have to choose.

Ecphoria Ring: I think I'd go for this over woodsman just to retain evasion. Also it comes with Store TP, which wouldn't be such a terrible thing sometime down the road on another job.

Back

Jaguar Mantle: Yay, evasion and attack?

Bellicose Mantle: Better attack than Jaguar Mantle, but it offers less defensively. I'm leaning toward the Jaguar Mantle.

Swords

This is probably my biggest dilema. There are two options and I want both of them

Wise Wizard's Anelace: That's a huge chunk of attack to work with. Also the sword looks cool and there aren't many like it.

Royal Guard's Fleuret: This one is also pretty stylish and is probably about as good as the other one. This one's a bit more defensive and helps with accuracy, but I don't know which one would be the better option.

I may very well end up purchasing both.

Shields are something I haven't really looked into. I know there's Viking Shield, but I'm not sure I want to drop 100k on that just yet. Feel free to point me towards other options that I should be aware of.

So there it is. My list of stuff I think will help me to turtle up with Coccoon as I beat up Dark Spark. Help?

[Yellow Mage]

Re: Melee gearset at 55

Precision Bandana: Yay for Accuracy, boo for 90k price-tag

O_O

I had no idea anything that I just nabbed off an NM one day was anywhere near worth that much!

Tiger Stole: I don't know of anything else to put in here.

Focus Collar. Heck, I even have the HQ for that, considering it wasn't as disproportionately overpriced in comparison to the NQ as most crafted items are. At least from where I was standing at the time. I'd use at least that over Tiger Stole.

My two gil.

[cidbahamut]

Re: Melee gearset at 55

Ooh, I missed Focus Collar. Thank you for pointing that out. I'll definitely try to pick one up as gil permits.

I went ahead and picked up War Hose last night. They're stylish, they have +accuracy, and they only show up on the AH once in a blue moon. Dropping the gil for them is what it took to get me rolling I guess. I spent the rest of the night camping NMs for gear/gil and landed myself a Beseiger Mantle. Not top of the line, but it'll do for now.

[Mhurron]

Re: Melee gearset at 55

lvl57 but whatever
Scorpion Harness - FFXIclopedia, the Final Fantasy XI wiki - Characters, items, jobs, and more - You'd be keeping it for next to forever

or if you can get a little bit of help, which should be easier now -
Brygid the Stylist Returns - FFXIclopedia, the Final Fantasy XI wiki - Characters, items, jobs, and more
Cerise Doublet - FFXIclopedia, the Final Fantasy XI wiki - Characters, items, jobs, and more

[MrMageo]

Re: Melee gearset at 55

Sword: Royal Guard Fluret
Offhand: Sentinel Shield if you can, if not, Master Shield (Royal Guard Fluret see note)
Head: Empress hairpin if you can, if not pretty well anything
Neck: PCC if you can, if not Spike Necklace.
Ears: Fangx2
Body: Jaridah (or the +1) or Brigadine are best bets
Rings: Woodsmans x2
Back: Accura mantle, or anything with STR or ATK
Waist: Headlong Belt
Pants: Republic Subligar
Feet: Anything really
Hands: Jaridah, or Battle Gloves.

*Note, IMO at 55 you may be better of going as /DNC over /BLU. This will allow you to keep on aspir samba or drain samba, as well as a +10 to ACC, Cocoon just wont cut it I don't think in terms of all the "free" HP and MP you can get, not to mention this will give you more ACC. However the trade off is losing vorpal blade.

An alternative could be to go in an ACC + MP build and use ceremonial daggers, if you can get an - ATK or -STR gear you can get your D done to 0 and just kill the target with enspells and dots, while feeding 0 TP.

So for outright melee, you want ACC>Haste>ATK>STR, for a tickle (cdagger) you want ACC>Haste>-ATK>-STR