Researching THF and subs.

[Unholy Prince]

As always, great work Nny, I was leaning towards /war when i began exping my THF as well, these numbers only confirm the ideas I had already believed and known. Thank you

[Novac]

Originally posted by Spider-Dan
You probably imagined that you were throwing out flamebait here, and a month ago, you likely would have been. But with the introduction of Assassin, I actually think /SAM is potentially very good anyway.

As far as your Hornetneedle comments go, are we really going to compare melee hits between one dagger with miniscule base DMG and another dagger with slightly less miniscule (but still pathetic) base DMG? Even if you compare a puny D16 Hornetneedle to a "beefy, hard-hitting" Cermet Kukri (D22!), everyone else is still laughing at our tiny melee pinpricks.

This is the equivalent of blades of grass arguing about which one is taller, in the middle of a forest.

No wonder your damage sucks, you buy normal quality daggers.

Sorry friend, I buy Cermet Kukri +1 (D23!).

Time to farm and get some good gear.

Flamebait, sure. Because people have ego and won't admit they're wrong. Having an ego is not a problem when you're right; it's a problem when you're wrong.

In your sense, you're wrong and you have ego.

You have yet to argue why /nin is better than /sam other than two more dodged hits from utsu.

The reason I don't go /sam instead of /war? Because more than not, I am waiting for TP to SC from the rest of the PT (acc +40). At level 64, I get more TP than I need. Meditate for Sam MAIN is for skill chaining TWO times per fight normally. So for me, /sam is great TP gain, but TOO overdone and I miss out on pure damage from Berserk and +10 atk.

[neighbortaru]

OMGZ!!!111onesonesones you do 1 more damage now!

[Novac]

Originally posted by neighbortaru
OMGZ!!!111onesonesones you do 1 more damage now!

OMG!!!1eleven, someone tell this n00b +1 DAM on weapon is more than +1 damage on mobs!

[neighbortaru]

lol. what, in your infinite l33tness, makes you think that I don't know that.

I just found it funny that you decided to use +1 daggers as a defense in your arguement against Dan for low melee damage (when all daggers have low base damage compared to other melee weapons).

The way you worded your posts, it seemed like you think having a +1 dagger suddenly makes your damage uber. Um, it doesn't.

[Spider-Dan]

Originally posted by Novac
No wonder your damage sucks, you buy normal quality daggers.

Sorry friend, I buy Cermet Kukri +1 (D23!).

"Hey blade of grass #2, you underestimated my height by 0.3 millimeters! I am actually 3.58 centimeters tall, NOT 3.55! Suck it!"

Note to poster: D23 is still pathetically minute. I only chose NQ Cermet Kukri because in another thread, you said you used Cermet Kukri (not +1), and I figured I'd take you at your word.

You have yet to argue why /nin is better than /sam other than two more dodged hits from utsu.

I'm sorry, didn't I just say that post-Assassin patch, /SAM is good?

If you want me to explain why /SAM sucked pre-Assassin, that's easy. You can only SC once per minute, so Meditate is basically useless.

As far as 3rd Eye... please. 3rd Eye makes virtually no difference. Utsusemi stops magic and ranged, 3rd Eye does not. If the mob is close enough to actually take down your 3rd Eye "shadow," then you might as well be /WAR.

Finally, you seem to think that I have some sort of problem with /WAR. I think both /NIN and /WAR are good, and post-60, I think /SAM and /RNG are good also. (Since you brag so much about your 40 ACC, the extra 22 ACC that /RNG gets natively should certainly be of value).

[Spider-Dan]

Can't directly quote ZQM's post, so I'll just state my responses.

Regarding subjob stats/traits/abilities:
I doubt you can find many THFs that would take 2 STR over 1 DEX + 1 AGI on a permanent basis. DEX + AGI will make a bigger difference on SATA than STR, point for point.

I believe the first Attack Up trait for all jobs is ATK+10, not 30.

And since you later mention mob TP gain as a significant enough factor not to use Kraken Club, then I must point out that /NIN generates less mob TP per hit with Subtle Blow than /WAR.

Regarding offhand weapons:
There are obviously many more options for a /NIN than just HN or Lust Dagger.

ACC+5, ATK+5 from Bone Knife +1
AGI+3, ATK+7 from Garuda's Dagger
ACC+12! (daytime only) from Daylight Dagger

Furthermore, with the introduction of the higher-delay Harpes, TP gain from offhand is more of a factor. If you are single-wielding a 210 or 215 delay dagger, your TP gain will be affected.

Finally, /NIN has the option of wielding a club in main and a dagger in offhand, so as to be able to fight bones and still get decent TP gain. Like raptors, it's another situation where /NIN simply has more leveling options than the rest.

As far as off-handing Kraken and Ridill....not only is the likelyhood of getting these items being extremely slim, but a thing to remember is mob TP. Ridill doesn't give that much, but a Kraken does. Most mobs have dangerous specials or AOEs, and you wouldn't want them to spam it.

This argument is flawed. In order to get to 100% TP, I need to hit the mob x number of times. In the process of hitting the mob x number of times, I will generate (x *[my TP+3]) TP for the mob (excluding Subtle Blow, for the moment). Whether it takes me 30 seconds or 3 minutes to generate 100% TP, I will have generated the same TP for the mob.

Therefore, if the mob is able to spam specials because of AOE, I would also be able to spam WS. Now, provided that you have a SC partner that can keep up with you, relative mob TP is not changed. The entire fight is simply accelerated. The mob is gaining TP faster, but you're also using more WSes.

Furthermore, early in a fight (when mobs do not use specials at exactly 100% TP) Kraken Club can only be a benefit.

[guyincorporated]

Originally posted by Spider-Dan
Note to poster: D23 is still pathetically minute. I only chose NQ Cermet Kukri because in another thread, you said you used Cermet Kukri (not +1), and I figured I'd take you at your word.

...

(Since you brag so much about your 40 ACC, the extra 22 ACC that /RNG gets natively should certainly be of value).

1. I notice a pretty hefty damage jump from my (all-too-rare) damage bumps on new daggers, so I don't think another point of damage is anything to scoff at.

2. I've seen you quoting the "+10/+22 accuracy bonus from ranger" statistic for months now. I'm still waiting for some (any?) evidence to support those figures.

[Spider-Dan]

Originally posted by guyincorporated
1. I notice a pretty hefty damage jump from my (all-too-rare) damage bumps on new daggers, so I don't think another point of damage is anything to scoff at.

Are you talking about a damage boost with SATA, or from normal meleeing? Offhand dagger D won't affect SATA at all, so the low D of a HN isn't relevant.

2. I've seen you quoting the "+10/+22 accuracy bonus from ranger" statistic for months now. I'm still waiting for some (any?) evidence to support those figures.

http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=413546&highlight=#post413546

[Ixaera]

+22 acc of /rng is down to +17 if you offhand a bone knife +1.

As far as normal SATA goes, rng does nothing for that, anyway, and it's well-known that dual wield adds the offhand weapon hit to the attack, raising its damage based on offhand weapon's D and skill.

(+10/+22 acc/racc from /rng is pretty widely accepted, actually...)

Truly, the use of /rng is barrage tp (which is iffy 60+ due to hit rate with C+ weapons, +22 racc or not), status bolts (see last parenthetical remark), widescan + track (iffy usage in exp since you can't tell what's claimed, but yes, useful). The +acc is *nice* but...I don't even wear *that* much +acc and don't really have trouble on most exp mobs. That extra +22 would only come in handy enough against really high IT, IMO.

If racc equip sans sharpshot doesn't get you a 1/3 hit/proc rate....you should probably leave the rng sub in your MH. Sharpshot is a short-lived, 5-min ability that could only be used twice per chain, if that. You'd need a very decent hit rate with xbow to justify the severe lack of delay bonuses, multi-hits, berserk, offhand stats, warcry later...

Rng has some very interesting capacities for small hunting parties targetting VT and lower, seriously, and shouldn't be underestimated. But I've yet to see it really shine after 60. Stuff just gets too hard to hit with a bolt, even with all those boosts.

In short, with rng sub you gain:
-sharpshot
- 22 acc/racc
-barrage
-widescan

you lose:
offhand dagger stats
blink
15% better delay
OR
double attack
berserk
warcry

I dunno. Seriously, if you can land 1/3 bolt procs, it's worth considering. It's a very fine subjob from 1-50, for sure. I'm just not sold on its higher level capability. I can see it helping out a party easily...but given that a thf/rng would likely put out less damage than a thf/nin, which puts still less out than thf/war...one must consider whether the party setup would benefit more by increased damage from *you* or increased damage from *others*. I.e. if you're in a mage-heavy party, I don't see acids being worth the loss, AND if you're #1 or #2 in the party for damage dealing, I would certainly pick another sub for the time being.

[guyincorporated]

Originally posted by Spider-Dan
Are you talking about a damage boost with SATA, or from normal meleeing? Offhand dagger D won't affect SATA at all, so the low D of a HN isn't relevant.


http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/sho...ht=#post413546

I was talking about a damage boost with sata when your main-hand dagger gets a damage bump.

And secondly, thanks for the link. One of these days I need to just read every post Apple Pie has ever made =)

[Spider-Dan]

Originally posted by Ixaera
As far as normal SATA goes, rng does nothing for that, anyway, and it's well-known that dual wield adds the offhand weapon hit to the attack, raising its damage based on offhand weapon's D and skill.

In the case of normal SATA, while SATA does guarantee the offhand attack (which is presumably still under the effect of TA, even though the mob has turned by the time you strike), that's an attack that wouldn't even be there if you were single wielding. In other words, with regard to the point I was addressing (low D of offhand weapon), it's not really relevant, since any single-wield THF would only be wielding one weapon to begin with.

Furthermore, the offhand hit (while guaranteed) gets no damage bonus at all, so either way, we're right back to comparing the tiny damage output of a normal melee attack from one dagger to the slightly less tiny damage output of a normal melee attack from another dagger.

[Ixaera]

That was a mis-wording on my part. By attack, I *meant* weaponskill attack. -.- Sorry about that. But about that: I lean towards believing the offhand weapon hit *does* get the ws damage modifier. Why?

Fighting a mob that was ep one level ago with hoplites harpe + garuda's dagger. Full hit DE (no sata or anything, was just fighting crap) did a range of 480-650. Deciding after an hour that the delay wasn't that much better and my sword seemed to do better anyway, I switched back. My full hit DE's started ranging from 570-750. Now, my normal sword hit on said mob was averaging 45. That is not a 45 damage difference, I'm sorry to tell you. I wish I had screen shots and detailed records, but alas. Seriously, just go farm as /nin with a few different damage weapons and see what you end up with. (This is also the reason I don't offhand a hornetneedle unless it's necessary for some reason...I stick to higher D offhand daggers with semi-decent delay/stats.)

Besides that, Dual Wield II is -15% delay. It doesn't seem significant just by looking at a 210+183=393 -15% = 334...it's when you do the tp per minute calculations that the advantage appears. -15% delay or double attack is many times the difference between having 147% tp when you ready sharkbite (thus missing the 150% modifier) and 165% (thus receiving it).

Also, on ws -- thf/any has a chance of triple attacking first hit in multi-hitters like DE and SB. (Unless this changed with last patch, which is possible since I haven't multi-hitted since then on a ws!) thf/war has an extra chance of getting a multi-strike JT proc on first hit of ws. That's hardly a small bonus.

Anyway, I've made multiple posts on my opinion of thf/rng post-60. I won't bother to restate myself on that. I've already said where I think its strengths are -- but this, IMO, is one of its weaknesses. Where both thf/nin and thf/war get bonuses to ws -- rng only gets +acc...which is nice, but nothing good gear can't cover.

Edit: stray apostrophe -.-

[Spider-Dan]

Originally posted by Ixaera
That was a mis-wording on my part. By attack, I *meant* weaponskill attack. -.- Sorry about that. But about that: I lean towards believing the offhand weapon hit *does* get the ws damage modifier.

I don't necessarily disagree with that. Still, there's no point in disparaging /NIN for offhanding HN (as Novac was) because that extra offhand hit is better than nothing, which is what the other THF subs get.

I suppose the rest of your post is just your case against /RNG, which I wasn't really arguing for to begin with, but I'll respond as well as I can.

Besides that, Dual Wield II is -15% delay. It doesn't seem significant just by looking at a 210+183=393 -15% = 334...it's when you do the tp per minute calculations that the advantage appears. -15% delay or double attack is many times the difference between having 147% tp when you ready sharkbite (thus missing the 150% modifier) and 165% (thus receiving it).

Extra accuracy = more TP generated. Unless you can definitively prove which one is more effective in generating TP, this could go either way.

Also, on ws -- thf/any has a chance of triple attacking first hit in multi-hitters like DE and SB. (Unless this changed with last patch, which is possible since I haven't multi-hitted since then on a ws!) thf/war has an extra chance of getting a multi-strike JT proc on first hit of ws. That's hardly a small bonus.

Still, with the extra accuracy from /RNG, you're more likely to land the hits you already get by default, so unless you land all your hits every time already, we can't say what difference /RNG will make.

Where both thf/nin and thf/war get bonuses to ws -- rng only gets +acc...which is nice, but nothing good gear can't cover.

As I understand it, many THFs elect to keep Life Belt and Snipers equipped during SATADE because landing as many hits as you can makes that much difference.

/RNG would allow your SATADE to have better accuracy than another THF wearing dual Snipers and a Life Belt, at the same time you're wearing +DEX Rings and an RK belt.

When it comes to DE, I'm not so sure that /RNG is at a disadvantage.

[Ljarin]

Don't forget items like the Dual Wield earring that further increase the DW delay bonus so it's more effective than the base DW2 that a thf/nin would have meaning more tp etc etc