Relic reforged +1 inaccessability of materials

[Nyarlko]

Cells boost lights and bypass need for TH and/or procs for the most part (other than white for KIs, which is easily done during campaigns.)
Displacers neuter the mobs and make every fight other than Provenance ones {Easy Prey}, plus they now stack to 99.
Prep work = profit. Just like most of this game, and any other RPG.
Increased drop rates would be nice, mainly to allow for soloer's to get their own reforge mats, but I honestly don't think we can expect any sort of genuine adjustments to VW.. And honestly, the amount of content that the vast majority of 119relic would be useful for as more than a macro piece is pitifully small and out of date to begin with, so you should be looking at them as only macro pieces to begin with. Even Escha-Zi'tah T1 armor sets tend to have better stats for general use than reforges.

[Shiyo]

Yes, which furthers my point of the content is dead and irrelevant outside of HMP's/riftcinders and relic reforge materials.

Which is why the ability to obtain your relic +1 reforge materials should be re-evaluated to match current design of the game and the power levels the geat has(very low) compared to most other much easier to obtain gear.

[Nyarlko]

Yes, which furthers my point of the content is dead and irrelevant outside of HMP's/riftcinders and relic reforge materials.

Which is why the ability to obtain your relic +1 reforge materials should be re-evaluated to match current design of the game and the power levels the geat has(very low) compared to most other much easier to obtain gear.

That applies to the vast majority of pre-SoA content though. For instance, no one bothers farming sky gods for the gear now. If someone's killing Seiryu, its for the seal to turn into tatters to pop the Escha-Ru'aun version. When was the last time you were excited about a weapon drop in Abyssea? XD No functional difference there in comparison. Reforges were not meant to be full-timed, they are placeholders to give you the ilvl until you get something better and/or macro pieces for their unique traits. Many of the macro pieces are for abilities that aren't used frequently during combat as well, so you can often times get away w/ leaving them at the 109 stage if gil/mats are hard to come by. If that's not enough benefit for you, then don't worry about 'em. ^^

People need to stop telling others that reforges are a good starter path for 119 IMO. The amount of time, effort and gil required to get them is not a small investment, and there are a lot of other options for starter 119 gear at this point which require less prep work to obtain. Lots of reforges are great and worth getting, but should probably be back-burner'ed for a bit if it puts you in the position of halting progression otherwise in order to get them.

[PristineChicken]

There are others which are must-have pieces, though. Dancer AF Body Reforge is a just under a 20% increase in your Waltz Potency, assuming you have no other Waltz Potency gear. Relic Body Reforge at 119 is ACC+21, and MACC+37 for Violent Flourish. Empyrean Reforge, despite the lack of accuracy, is +10% Dual Wield at 109, and losing 10 to 15% hit rate can more than be made up by the increase in number of attacks, and on "easier" content, where you don't need 1200/+ accuracy to cap hit rate, can be an amazing DPS increase.

[Nyarlko]

There are others which are must-have pieces, though. Dancer AF Body Reforge is a just under a 20% increase in your Waltz Potency, assuming you have no other Waltz Potency gear. Relic Body Reforge at 119 is ACC+21, and MACC+37 for Violent Flourish. Empyrean Reforge, despite the lack of accuracy, is +10% Dual Wield at 109, and losing 10 to 15% hit rate can more than be made up by the increase in number of attacks, and on "easier" content, where you don't need 1200/+ accuracy to cap hit rate, can be an amazing DPS increase.

Out of your examples, only the AF body sounds like a "must have" (macro) piece. The relic body is replaceable with several pieces, notably the "free" Ambuscade set, as well as stuff like Herculean gear. There is also a mere macc+2 gain over the 109 version (which is quite affordable), so 119'ing it doesn't seem like that great a deal until you are in content with higher risk of death if caught mid-macro due to lowered ilvl. The empy body would actually hurt your TP return as you only need DW+36% to cap delay along with gear/magic haste, DNC gets DW+30% natively plus another 5% from the 550 JP Gift, and we're not even taking Haste Samba into account. Samba actually pushes you pretty far past cap (even w/o merits), so DW from gear will primarily result in lower tp/hit gained and increased tp feed to your target, neither of which is actually a "good thing". Still worth 109'ing for a macro piece for Striking Flourish maybe, but I'd personally hesitate on investing in the 119.

In contrast, using BST for example, there are extremely limited justifications for 119'ing the relic body and legs since AF are provide a nearly identical benefit for Reward, the head is a super niche macro piece, and the feet are replaceable by the Ambuscade cape. Only the hands are a must-have due to the wonky way that jug pet levels work, and even then, you can get away w/ only 109 for all of them for quite a while.

If all you need relic for are the augments for macro pieces, then weigh in that there is no increase in effect between 109>119. If you are only using an ability every 5-10min and you are able to pre-buff with it, then I would decline to upgrade and spend my time/effort/gil elsewhere. I'm sure there are other jobs with similar poor prospects for reforges if hoping to full-time any of them.

I think we were focusing on issues regarding relic reforges specifically, since AF is pretty cheap/easy to 119 and empys have the additional roadblock of Vagary clears being required. Relic is the only set that has to depend on VW for mats, which I can see being an issue on a low-pop server. I definitely would not complain if drop rates for reforge items was increased, but since I remember the devs saying even that much was too hard to do at this point, I rather doubt that any sort of actual changes to the content like the OP mentioned has a greater-than-zero chance of happening. I think the biggest/best change we can hope for would be if they could allow trust tanks to /fume. ^^;;

[detlef]

Correct, this thread is specifically about ilvl 119 Relic armor. But the focus shouldn't be about how 109 armor is easy to make and often provides the same enhancements as 119 armor. Rather, the focus should be on how generally weak the pieces are outside of job abilities and job-specific spells and therefore the ease of acquisition should be adjusted accordingly. We're generally not using them for melee/TP/nuking anymore so figure out a way to make them easier to get for all players.

[Shiyo]

That's exactly my point, thank you!

The 119 relic armor is not very good outside of macro pieces, and since they're kinda a direct upgrade to af reforge in some jobs cases(Some paladin/dark relic reforge is basically just a slightly better dt/tp piece per slot than af reforge is) they should be much, much more accessible for a new player who isn't ready for escha yet, but wants to work towards something they can easily upgrade for a small stat increase to help them progress through end game, assuming ambuscade is not giving you gear for job(s) you want to play.

Right now, relic IS that gear but it's completely inaccessible. You are better off just skipping it entirely and having someone merc you higher tier gear which is not only cheaper, but TONS better! This feels bad and is lame, though imo.

I want the VW drop rates to be substantially increased or the materials required for the +1 reforge to be changed entirely to something more balanced around the stats that the relics give. a 3-4m item per relic(not even counting the other stuff, it ends up being like 4-5m per relic piece) is not right for the power these items give.

Please re-evaluate the required materials for these old, outdated armors to match their current power SE. That is what I'm asking.

[Zhronne]

And honestly, the amount of content that the vast majority of 119relic would be useful for as more than a macro piece is pitifully small and out of date to begin with

Not really. Granted there are hardly many Relic pieces you'd fulltime, but there are several useful pieces still.
Saying "they're just macro pieces" as if they were completely unrelevant items is a bit ungrateful imho.
Also, things are likely going to change soon when the likely +2/+3 reforged relics will be released.

I don't expect adjustments to VW either, but it's sad to see how SE thinks the availability of mats has been fixed thanks to "monthly campaigns" =/

[Shiyo]

I don't expect adjustments to VW either, but it's sad to see how SE thinks the availability of mats has been fixed thanks to "monthly campaigns" =/

Campaigns have done more harm than good and if they are not adjusted or re-evaluated soon they will cause unfixable long term problems to the game.

[Nyarlko]

Not really. Granted there are hardly many Relic pieces you'd fulltime, but there are several useful pieces still.
Saying "they're just macro pieces" as if they were completely unrelevant items is a bit ungrateful imho.
Also, things are likely going to change soon when the likely +2/+3 reforged relics will be released.

I don't expect adjustments to VW either, but it's sad to see how SE thinks the availability of mats has been fixed thanks to "monthly campaigns" =/

Saying that relic armor reforges are primarily useful only as macro pieces does not in any way declare them to be irrelevant. Lots and lots of reforges from all three classes offer unique improvements, BIS for their related JA's, etc. but how many of them are going to be useful outside of their macroed-in uses? I'm not being ungrateful since I do see plenty of use out of mine, and I do recommend to others to get theirs for macros, but I'm also going to be realistic about how much use we're going to get out of any of them.

I don't support the idea of encouraging new/returning players to prioritize obtaining reforges before other more useful gear options. Don't forget there are more than a few not-simple pre-requisites to unlocking reforging to begin with. ^^;; It's not only the availability or cost of upgrade mats that need to be considered when making recommendations. There are other paths to 119 that are still viable after all.
The only issue being that *shock* you might need to play with others in order to get them. XD

There also hasn't been a peep about further upgrades to relic or empyrean armors, only artifact so far. Personally, not really expecting further stages for relic/empy any time soon, and maybe not ever. I would honestly prefer brand new gear rather than further upgrades to the existing sets, mainly because there is already a lengthy process to 119 them and really would rather not have to deal with that process getting even longer.

I'm betting we're gonna see some significant acc/macc on the new AF +2/+3 stuff and new augs, but nothing spectacular otherwise. Basically bring them up to Ambuscade gear level "stat vomit", plus augs. There are plenty of JAs/spells that have no macro pieces, notably the lv96 SP abilities, so this could be a way to get augs out for those so AF matches up closer to relic/empy sets. This would allow them to fill the role of "starter gear" that some are asking for, and new augs for JA/spells that don't have any other options would make them desirable for non-newbies who are leaning more towards the min/max mindset of endgamers.