Monk Gear / Questions / Advice

[Zhronne]

After checking a lot of comparisons inside and outside Abyssea, it looks like:

Neck order:
Rancor > Calcitrant > Faith

Earring order:
Moonshade > Aesir > Tantra > Bruiser, except for Faith where Moonshade > Bruiser > Aesir > Tantra

Which moonshade? Regain one or TPbonus one? I assume the regain one since we're talking about melee sets and not WS ones?
And also really? Tantra? o.O
Are you saying that we, like expected, got "Kick Attacks III" job trait at level 91? But still, I find it difficult to believe Tantra is in front of the rest.

And did you try a combination of faith + Tantra gloves + Bruiser + Ring? 412+7+7+3+5, assuming 8 merits. That bring us to 434.
Ehr... actually earring isn't necessary, you break tier with just the ring. So you could put moonshade or aesir there I guess.
But it depends on the gear you have equipped and wether or not Bruiser brings you up a tier or not, if for some reason it does then it's a nice ear option imho, certainly better than Aesir (altough probably not much) and probably inferior to Regain Moonshade, just like you said.

Still I wonder, would the ring be worth equipping over Rajas? Because I doubt you could swap your Epona for it, but Rajas... not like we really need Rajas that much, we don't have X-hit builds which need the Stp, the Subtle Blow is welcome but unnecessary, and STR+5/DEX+5 are nice but give a lower return on 1hand jobs. So I think it might be worth getting that ring for a bit of acc, a bit of att (more than Rajas would provide) and +1 base damage.

[Monchat]

store tp is equally usefull for mnk or 2hander, just so you know. For today's MNK its a bit less interresting because you will often "over TP" thanks to all the multi hit gear, but still good. too many people think rajas is good because of the str/dex, while the #1 reason it is good is due to 5stp .

[Zhronne]

store tp is equally usefull for mnk or 2hander, just so you know.

I never meant to say it's bad or useless, just wanted to say that it's not "necessary" since we're not bound to X-hit builds typically. Damage-wise having more att and more acc will probably be better than having STP in that slot.
Just an impression, haven't mathed it out yet.

too many people think rajas is good because of the str/dex, while the #1 reason it is good is due to 5stp .

I quite agree with that, but then again if you don't need those STP for an X-hit build they're not necessarily better than other stats in the same slot.

[Monchat]

well ok, but for MNK, 5 STP always changes your TP/hit, therefore it's always useful. On the other hand, 1 or 2 STP does not necessarilly change it.

[Motenten]

what gear sets / merits are factoring in and can you post the ACC levels of all along with the dps etc.

Full H2H merits, 5 KA merits, full Tantra+2/Black Belt/Rajas/Epona (though I was also messing a bit with Hagneia Stone, as it seems to beat Thew), Vere/Smite, measured with capped accuracy.

Assumed capped accuracy because if you're really hurting for accuracy you can switch to pizza, and if the results are only a tiny bit shy of capped accuracy (eg: ~93%) then it becomes a question of nitpicking about the exact mob stats chosen.

I can build another target that can keep the standard setup in the upper 80's for hit rate and see how things compare with that as well.

Or a link to an Alla thread, if it was posted there.

No, haven't posted it elsewhere. Made dozens of little fiddling comparisons, but in the end it seemed overly troublesome to detail all the values out. If you'd like to recommend a particular 'standard' gear config and want all the numbers, I can do that.

I'll have to reevaluate anyway, since I verified the increased kick dmg on the neckpiece as +5. Shouldn't shift things much, but Calcitrant will be only barely ahead of Faith instead of well ahead.

Which moonshade? Regain one or TPbonus one?

Regain.

And also really? Tantra? o.O

Since the verification of the effect of the full set bonus, +KA gear gets a tiny boost over previous estimations. It also increases total DPS due to added TP gain, whereas the others only increase melee DPS. In the end it comes out as a half-decent option.

Are you saying that we, like expected, got "Kick Attacks III" job trait at level 91?

I'm pretty sure this was verified on the test server, though the exact value isn't known. I'm assuming +5% KA for now, though an argument could be made to expect it to be +7% for a total of 20% base KA rate, since we were at 13% from the lvl 71 trait. Needs to be tested.

Still I wonder, would the ring be worth equipping over Rajas?

Even when combined with Faith to guarantee the +1 base damage (combining with just Bruiser's isn't sufficient), and Rajas's 5 str not adding to fStr, no, it's not. The 5 Store TP shaves about a quarter round off the time to weaponskill, which adds up to more net damage.

[Gokku]

standard gear
full hth merits
Full af3+2
atheling mantle
thew bomblet
Raja's / Eponas
Brutal + * tested earriing*
Tested neck
Verethragna 90

also can you explain to me
1% ka * earring even with +5 dmg neck and
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/th...l=1#post185285
that info your looking at a max of 32-33% kick attacks *give or take 1 -2 %*

in any avg parse for me on monk about 25-30% of my dmg is from WS the other 60-70% is from melee
if you factor in the 30% KA rate we should have now , that means about 18% of your melee dmg * give or take a few %* is from kicks , the other 42% is from punch's not counting ODD all which get a +1 dmg bouns.

[Motenten]

also can you explain to me
1% ka * earring even with +5 dmg neck and
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/th...l=1#post185285
that info your looking at a max of 32-33% kick attacks *give or take 1 -2 %*

in any avg parse for me on monk about 25-30% of my dmg is from WS the other 60-70% is from melee
if you factor in the 30% KA rate we should have now , that means about 18% of your melee dmg * give or take a few %* is from kicks , the other 42% is from punch's not counting ODD all which get a +1 dmg bouns.

I'm not entirely sure I understand what you're asking, as it kind of rambles along. You ask me to explain something, but then don't actually ask a question.

For the specified gear set and, for the sake of comparison numbers (what you seem to be running into in the latter half of the above quote), Faith+Bruiser vs Calcitrant+Tantra (also, /war with Berserk up in Abyssea, and accounting for ODD):

F+B melee/ws split: 57.4/42.6
C+T melee/ws split: 57.2/42.8

F+B melee punch/kick split: 90.9/9.1
C+T melee punch/kick split: 90.2/9.8

So, more damage from weaponskill than you estimated favors that which increases total damage (Tantra) over just melee damage (Bruiser's). On the other hand, less damage from kicks favors Bruiser's over Tantra.


Varied DPS comparisons:

Set 1: Abyssea (capped acc)

            Ear                                             
Neck        None        Tantra      Bruiser     Aesir       Moonshade
None        431.206     432.302     432.166     433.367     439.183
Agasaya     433.607     434.71      434.568     435.769     441.569
Calcitrant  435.223     436.364     435.946     437.153     443.179
Faith       433.367     434.469     436.981     435.528     441.33
Rancor      442.207     443.332     443.189     444.417     450.138

Set 2: Outside, 90% hit rate without neck/ear

            Ear                                             
Neck        None        Tantra      Bruiser     Aesir       Moonshade
None        160.615     161.125     162.585     161.769     163.66
Agasaya     168.223     168.755     170.208     169.205     171.102
Calcitrant  162.792     163.325     164.933     164.072     165.803
Faith       166.391     166.756     170.256     167.565     169.312
Rancor      168.987     169.482     170.954     170.136     172.014
Ziel        168.239     168.77      168.694     169.343     171.251

Inside Abyssea, Rancor wins by a wide margin, as does Moonshade (att/regain version, btw). The next best options are Calc/Aesir, Faith/Bruiser, and Calc/Tantra. Agasaya is on the weaker end of things, along with Faith without Bruiser.

Ouside Abyssea, where accuracy matters at least a little, Rancor is brought back into line with the rest of the options, being only barely ahead of Ziel and Agasaya. Moonshade is also a relatively weaker option since weaponskills don't get quite as much of a boost.

Calcitrant is far weaker due to the lack of accuracy. Faith is also on the weaker side unless paired with a Bruiser, at which point it's on par with the other top contenders.

Obviously, the best choice depends on both the situation and what gear you actually have available to you. Inside Abyssea, top choice is obviously Rancor Collar; lacking that (or not wanting the +damage taken), I'd go with Calcitrant. Outside Abyssea (and needing acc), I'd probably just stick with Agasaya for solid, all-around performance, assuming that if accuracy is an issue I probably don't want the +damage taken of the Rancor. Though if base hit rate dropped to 85% or so I'd switch over to the Ziel (which doesn't show its full benefit here, as you only need 10 acc to reach cap).

Outside Abyssea on older content you'll be capping accuracy, so it would revert more to the Abyssea set in terms of relative standings, though the margin that Rancor wins by will still be closer to the second set (ie: very narrow advantage).

[Zhronne]

Thanks for data Motenten
Two less items (earring/ring) to be looking for! \o/

[Diasetsu]

I'm pretty sure this was verified on the test server, though the exact value isn't known. I'm assuming +5% KA for now, though an argument could be made to expect it to be +7% for a total of 20% base KA rate, since we were at 13% from the lvl 71 trait. Needs to be tested.

That guy was a dope with a small enough sample size after confidence interval that even showing 22% with merits, he could have easily been in the 18% after KAII+merits range. Like literally his test was showing a 14% KA to 30% KA rate swing because it was only 100 attack rounds IIRC.

[Motenten]

Meh. Needs a real test then.