[dev1049] Petition - Make entropy stronger

[Natasha]

Alright, so there has been a lot of back and forth going on about this weapon skill. The general consensus from what I gather is that people, and of course dark knights in specific are greatly disappointed by it. It has been said by one of our own, Raelia (hope you don't mind) that great sword now does everything that scythe does better, it is hard to argue with this excepting of course catastrophe but I don't see that as being a a factor worth much consideration. Now I know there are a few out there who will see this and think, "So what? Just use GS and stop complaining" this is a silly statement because no weapon should become worthless and certainly our primary weapon should not be. There are many reasons why scythe is greatly in need of a better weapon skill.

This brings me to the purpose of this thread~ Entropy is a weaponskill that is currently in testing. This is why we test no? Let us have a show of support in improving this weaponskill! (Like!)


Notes: This is not a thread for debate, it is a petition not a poll so please try to avoid fighting. (I know that people will anyway, just in hopes that some in this community will still have some respect... im probably naieve)

Also, I am aware that drk is not the only job facing ws woe (not walk of echoes ) and if you happen to wander in here, make your own petition and I will likely support you! (Haha troll warriors... can see it now 'ukko's fury needs a buff')

Have a wonderful day guys~

Update #1 Well it looks like they made a change guys!

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/th...l=1#post239652

Victory? From their description it doesn't sound like it but we can always hope they changed the damage and just didn't tell us.

On the other hand it seems like they may fix up GS a lil bit... which is still a +

[Hextitan]

I'm a career DRK that definitely supports any potential boosts or buffs to the job.

However, I gotta be honest. There doesn't seem to be enough info on this WS to say how good or bad it is. People have said it does anywhere from 1k-3k, and I haven't really seen enough hard core testing on it anywhere. I've seen 2-3 people do a handful of WS and say "it's good" or "it's bad", nothing conclusive. Ironically we probably won't know how good/bad this WS is until it's off the Test Server and goes live.

[Raelia]

Entropy is a four hit WS. The only difference between it and Guillotine in simple damage terms is a 1.0 first hit instead of a 0.875.

The damage was well tested in Misareaux Coast on mobs strong enough to see the full damage but weak enough to see a 'maximum' damage. The result was far below spectacular. No special properties. No Critical compatibility. Just straight Guillotine damage. 1800 average, 2.2k on Double Attacks, 1500 with a miss... Go swing Guillotine at the same things and you'll be within 50 damage. There's a high and low of Resolution in that linked image too, which I shouldn't have to point out as 'holy crap' and illustrates what a difference a STR mod makes.

And for that matter with the pitfalls of being a multihit WS, that 100% INT mod doesn't even matter. Accuracy comes first, then Attack.

Entropy is a derpy Guillotine clone.

Solutions? I suggested two. I lean more towards the second currently. Firstly for either: Dump the 'Recovers MP' effect and/or add it to a different WS like Infernal Scythe. SE wants DRKs to cast their spells, but this is not because we're running out of MP; DRK's spells just tend to be counter intuitive to damage output! DRK doesn't need their level 99 WS dedicated to bolstering the weakest segment of their playstyle!

1. Make Entropy a 'Critical Hit varies with TP' WS. This isn't too great for DRK, jumping on the Crit bandwagon, and provides no practical performance increase outside of Abyssea nor particularly on HNM/Voidwatch mobs. Barring Entropy needing one thing or another, I actually suggest against this.

2. Make Entropy an Eight Hit weaponskill (hitting twice per swing of the existing animation). Seven or Six hits would be acceptable, but Double Attack or Triple Attack gear would then come into play. After accuracy considerations Entropy would then be well balanced against Torcleaver against soft targets, but fall off quickly in performance versus NM/HNM/VW mobs to allow Quietus to shine where it works best. Because it would require a healthy amount of Accuracy and Attack it would carry a much higher performance limit in terms of gearing (to say, decent gear will get decent performance, incredible gear and buffs will earn incredible performance on harder targets). Per old Asuran Fists testing, most of the time with capped accuracy an Eight Hit WS will only land six hits, and with a moderate INT mod such a high fTP is necessary to be competitive with Torcleaver's high single-hit fTP and Resolution's STR mod.

[Rohelius]

I agree which is why I haven't even posted anything on the matter.
What's wrong with it in their minds is that it recovers mp and its mod is INT.
They made it clear they hate magic and won't even entertain the idea that it has its uses.
I can't help but feel they got on the dark knight boat back when the 93% haste zerg was the rage and then got pissed when it went away and left them with a relic they would have never unlocked otherwise.

[Raelia]

I got on the Dark Knight boat when Guillotine had a 68 TP return, just two swings to WS again, but Dragoon's 2-hour was a stupid pet that died if a mob sneezed at it.

DRK doesn't need this kind of MP recovery to make spellcasting usable, necessary, or even viable. It needs better spells. If Drain II was on a 30 second timer instead of two minutes, Dread Spikes on a 1 minute cooldown instead of 3 minutes, and we got something like Absorb-Haste, you'd be damn right DRK might be hurting for MP then and all of these would tend to be worth casting much, much more.

As it stands though: If you can outpace autorefresh gear when idle and Refresh from your support (they have /RDM outside of Abyssea, right?) then you're probably casting too much and your damage is suffering. Kill a mob 10% faster and you'll have taken 10% less damage overall, because a dead mob deals no damage!

I won't say spellcasting is misguided. It's just tends to be weak and counterproductive on anything but easy trash mobs. Absorb-Attri was a huge step in the right direction, but I still can't seem to apply it to enough situations to see my MP pool drop below 90% with Drain II and Dread Spikes casted 'as necessary'.

[Natasha]

Glad to finally see some replies, though i was hoping for a more positive showing :/

Im not going to assume I know best, maybe some people in the community have the right view IDK

BUT I want to make it very clear to SE the kind of ws that we want and should have had a long time ago. Hopefully this thread will get more support and they'll see to it that this ws does not suck..

[Raelia]

I'm sure as hell not gonna butter it up. Entropy is a crappy Guillotine clone, which we have already gotten one of those in the past (Insurgency), with a very gimmicky effect that doesn't do anything for the core issue of DRK's spellcasting: Long casting times, long recast times, 90% useless spells.

SE is killing Scythe completely now that Greatsword has a multihit WS to use with Souleater, and it's got an extra hit over Guillotine/Insurgency/Entropy even! Greatsword now boasts a 60% stronger Single-hit WS that scales at 300tp to being fully 110% stronger, and a five hit WS for Souleater usage that is also STR modded so really works out to being fully 50% stronger than Guillsurgentropy as well.

Scythe weaponskills have been stagnant since level 60!

Maybe I want my DRK to be more than a Stun bot that runs in to use Entropy so it can stand back and stun some more.

If Entropy stays the way it is: Using Scythe on Dark Knight, DRK's signature weapon, will be equivalent to using Polearm on Warrior. Sure they get Penta Thrust, but the availability of Rampage and Ukko's Fury just makes them look like a tard.

[Natasha]

Just going to note though, Raelia, that I fear it would be too late to go for 8 hit as that would mean changing the animation which I don't think they will do. I saw your other post about this and I agree to some extent but I feel a more realistic expectation would be a ftp increase or some other method of boosting the damage.

[Raelia]

Just going to note though, Raelia, that I fear it would be too late to go for 8 hit as that would mean changing the animation

Easy. Make each swing of the animation hit twice, or each swing hits again as the arc it leaves fades out. It'd actually be pretty neat looking.

Eight hits can be made to fit with the current animation, is regulated by accuracy on hard targets, negates the want for Double and Triple attack for WS, allows Scythe DRKs to make use of Stalwart Soul by dumping 80% of their HP in for damage but only dropping 40% while putting up impressive (but accuracy and Souleater recast regulated) spike/e-peen damage, and helps Scythe to remain impressively competitive and situational with Great Sword.

[Natasha]

Easy. Make each swing of the animation hit twice, or each swing hits again as the arc it leaves fades out. It'd actually be pretty neat looking.

Heh, I suppose they could ... you're just so tired of the 4 hit guillotine thing aren't you?