unlocking WSs

[Protey]

so with this talk of unlocking WoE weaponskills and raising R/E/Ms, what do you guys think of using Chant du Cygne on Excalibur? or would you just stick with KoR?

[Demon6324236]

I will have to check the spreadsheets to be absolutely sure but I am almost positive that CDC beats KoR, the only reason that Almace does not beat Excalibur is because Excalibur has a ton of attack with its higher damage. A 99 Almace using CDC is barely weaker than a 99 Excalibur using KoR, so CDC should come out on top even with our limited gear for it. Now, if they add even more WS damage for KoR on Excalibur, that would change things a bit, depending on the +% it could push KoR ahead again, but for now as things stands I am 99% sure that CDC wins.

[saevel]

It depends on the base damage of the "new" 99 weapons. You can't just throw CDC onto excal and call it a day, the AM effect on Almace is pretty potent. 99 Excal barely etched out 99 Almace and only due to lack of good DEX WS gear and the abundance of STR / MND WS gear. If the gear situation ever gets solved then expect Almace to hit the top again.

[ManaKing]

I would stick with Uriel Blade since we are talking about unlocking WSs.

Since it's better than both by a long shot.

[Demon6324236]

It depends on the base damage of the "new" 99 weapons.I went with the stats they showed us from their examples, which I assume are what we are getting or fairly close.


You can't just throw CDC onto excal and call it a day, the AM effect on Almace is pretty potent.Yeah AM is great, but when you have to choose between that and the massive 40 Attack on Excalibur, along with its higher DMG and its 2.5x that is always on, Excalibur should normally win on RDM.


99 Excal barely etched out 99 Almace and only due to lack of good DEX WS gear and the abundance of STR / MND WS gear. If the gear situation ever gets solved then expect Almace to hit the top again.Why would gear have anything to do with that? You are saying Almace would win because CDC would win, but that's not true, as you said before, it depends on the DMG of the new weapons. So far as base weapons go Excalibur is better, so far as WSs go Almace is better, if you can learn CDC and use it on Excalibur it wins, Excalibur's biggest drawback was that KoR is still weaker than CDC even with all of our gear and the DMG boost, using CDC with it eliminates that flaw and puts it at the top.


I would stick with Uriel Blade since we are talking about unlocking WSs.

Since it's better than both by a long shot.Well seeing as that is only in Campaign and we are not talking about unlocking any extra WSs in this thread, only the RME WSs which SE talked about, that seems like a baseless statement.

[saevel]

Huh... what the ...

Ok stop for a moment. There are two WS's in question. CDC and Req (KoTR is weaker then both). CDC is a 3+1 hit critical hit WS with 60% DEX mod. Req is a 5+1 hit WS that has a -20% attack penalty and a 100% MND mod. CDC is 5.25 fTP while Req is 7.2. The primary difference between them is attack, crits give a +1.0 ratio with a cap that we won't be seeing on anything worth a damn. Req on the other hand has a crippling -20% attack penalty. As a WS CDC piss's all over Req in damage, provided you have sufficient access to DEX gear, kinda of like BLU. If instead you have access to tons of MND/STR gear but little DEX gear then Req will be better. @100 TP the AM effect of CDC + Almace is 30% proc of a 2x damage multiplier, at 300% (starting a big fight) it's 50% proc. This is much better then the bonus damage and the 40 attack on Excal put together.

As of right now 99 Excal + Req barely beats 99 Almace + CDC, even with RDM's crippled DEX selection. Also the higher your weapons base DMG the more powerful CDC becomes vs Req due to effect of Req's superior WSC being diluted. This is what I mean by "depending on the weapons new DMG values". If their large enough then Almace + CDC wins even with current poor gear options due to CDC gaining a greater damage percentage then Req. If tomorrow SE snapped their finger and put RDM on all the light melee gear BLU is on (I know it's a pipe dream) then Almace + CDC would instantly become the best option.

The -20% attack on Req is absolutely crippling on anything that's not trash. This is only compounded by RDM's lack of a native attack boost ability.

Finally just giving Xcal CDC won't fix the issue as it immediately loses 30% of it's melee damage vs Almace, 50% if you have time to prepare for the fight. Those AM values are really important, don't ever forget about them. Almace also has a decent size accuracy bonus from it's 20 DEX, that also translates into a dDEX crit bonus.

[Demon6324236]

Finally just giving Xcal CDC won't fix the issue as it immediately loses 30% of it's melee damage vs Almace, 50% if you have time to prepare for the fight. Those AM values are really important, don't ever forget about them. Almace also has a decent size accuracy bonus from it's 20 DEX, that also translates into a dDEX crit bonus.I know all of this, but just by this comparison alone right here, you are talking about being 30 or 50% better, what about Excalibur's 2.5x? So far as I know its a 10~15% rate or so, not exactly sure, you probably know that so you can fill that gap. Now if it has a 10% proc rate it would be the same amount of damage as roughly 15% ODD I would assume, add on that Attack on each hit and WS as well as Excalibur's higher damage and I would assume it wins. As I said, I put the info all into the spreadsheet and Excalibur came out on top easily, all of the numbers were put in from SE's post which gave these examples.


Excalibur

DMG: 73 Delay: 233 Attack+40 "Knights of Round" Additional effect: Damage varies with HP
↓
DMG: 121 Delay: 233 Attack+60 Accuracy+20 "Knights of Round" Additional effect: Damage varies with HP



Almace

DMG: 70 Delay: 224 DEX+20 "Chant du Cygne" Aftermath: Occ. deals double damage
↓
DMG: 114 Delay: 224 Attack+20 Accuracy+20 DEX+20 "Chant du Cygne" Aftermath: Occ. deals double damage

If you could use CDC with Excalibur right now, Excalibur would still be the best weapon, and the gap would be bigger because what we lose from using Excalibur is CDC, KoR does not live up to that WS, so if they let us use CDC on Excalibur then Excalibur would gain Almace's greatest advantage. After this update, the spreadsheet says its basically going to be the same way, unless there are some new hidden stats, that seems unlikely to change. I just woke up so I hope this is getting across well.

[Kitkat]

I know all of this, but just by this comparison alone right here, you are talking about being 30 or 50% better, what about Excalibur's 2.5x? So far as I know its a 10~15% rate or so, not exactly sure, you probably know that so you can fill that gap. Now if it has a 10% proc rate it would be the same amount of damage as roughly 15% ODD I would assume.......

This is an incorrect assumption given this simple fact: Hidden effect of relic weapons only proc on first strike of every attack round with the weapon where as ODD can activate on every strike of an attack round with the weapon.

This means if you have a decent DA/TA/QA rate mixup you're not seeing the same outcome in damage with 15% 2.5x dmg compared to 15% 2x dmg aftermath. If no DA/TA/QA is factored in then your assumption is correct, but it has been proven time and time again that hidden effects on relic weapons cannot proc on any strike beyond initial hit, meaning the more DA/TA/QA the person wears the more it becomes diminished over extended periods. The only real saving grace of the x2.5 dmg is that it is always there regardless compared to Aftermath ODD which relies on WS use to be active. It is more or less their way of "balancing" relics with other weapons or something to that effect.

This is more likely the reason why Saveal is fighting your comparison so hard. The aftermath effect is a huge increase in DoT considering Capped Temper and gear effects in comparison to mainhanding Excal. While with Excal you have Hidden+additional, the additional follows the same rules I believe and only activates on first strike of the weapon, but can activate at the same time as Hidden (though hidden doesn't increase additional in this case). These are just a few of the considerations you need to take into account when making out your spread sheet (aka remove all attacks that would be due to DA/TA/QA activation then figure out your 2.5x damage activation rate and compare to ODD).

[saevel]

The 2.5x activate rate is known and can easily be accounted for, once BG is back up I'll post it. Also I'm shocked you didn't know the bonus damage on relics only applies to the first hit. This is one of the reasons Almace beats Excal in actual DPS. The only reason Excal + Req is slightly (seriously check the difference) ahead of Almace + CDC is the gear situation, it won't take much to push the pendulum the other way. With the respective RME's having their base damage boosted, Almace + CDC gets a bigger percentage boost then Excal + Req or a hypothetical Excal + CDC and that boost could very well put it ahead.

[Demon6324236]

So far as gear goes, unless a miracle happens I doubt we will see any change, now if they did change it for us so we had light DD gear then yes, things might change up a bit.

[saevel]

That's exactly what I said. Excal is where it's at because we lack the gear to take full advantage of Almace. They ~could~ change but I doubt it. Will have to re-examine after the dust settles.

[Demon6324236]

Exactly, all I was trying to point out before was that for now, it looks like with what we have currently that after the RME update Excalibur will still be on top, and will be spamming CDC instead of KoR or Req.

[ManaKing]

So you guys just circle jerked over how RDM can remain unimpressive with subpar WSs on Sword instead of looking to the only good Sword WS that RDM could use to push it out of it's rut. Good to know.

[Demon6324236]

So you guys just circle jerked over how RDM can remain unimpressive with subpar WSs on Sword instead of looking to the only good Sword WS that RDM could use to push it out of it's rut. Good to know.If by subpar you mean the WS we have no gear for really and yet it beats all other WSs we have access to because they are all made weaker than it, then yes. We do not have the gear for CDC and yet it still beats out KoR, DB, and Req, with Req only making a come back when our attack is to low compared to the mobs defense, then it changes to Req's advantage, but otherwise the WSs are just to weak to win even against our pathetically geared CDC, and that alone should speak numbers about Sword WSs.

[ManaKing]

So once again, we have a lot of which stats again? STR MND and MAB.

Stats we don't have. Attack and DEX.

So what again should we be looking for as a solution so that we can be the best at using? A magic attack bonus based WS that is has mods based on STR/MND and scales with TP. That's called Uriel Blade.

It's like Wildfire, but for Swords and it's inclusion wouldn't destabilize the game unless SE couldn't figure out that RDM and BLU would be the best at using it and balance it off those two jobs.

[Demon6324236]

Uriel Blade.I forgot where in this thread it was brought up by anyone except you, because its not on topic. This entire thread was about the best WS for Excalibur after the adjustment and CDC is unlocked. You insist on continuing on about a WS not even relevant to this because SE has never unlocked or stated they would unlock any Campaign WSs so far as I know, correct me if I'm wrong. If I'm not wrong, then your posts hold no relevance to this topic besides complaining that a WS we can not utilize well is actually going to end up being our best. Incase you forgot, they did say we would be able to use CDC with all weapons via the coin weapons, if so, base your posts of this fact and not simply saying we "circle jerked over how RDM can remain unimpressive with subpar WSs on Sword" when all you are talking about is the only WS which beats this one and at the same time has never been said by SE that we could unlock it with other weapons.

[ManaKing]

I forgot where in this thread it was brought up by anyone except you, because its not on topic. This entire thread was about the best WS for Excalibur after the adjustment and CDC is unlocked. You insist on continuing on about a WS not even relevant to this because SE has never unlocked or stated they would unlock any Campaign WSs so far as I know, correct me if I'm wrong. If I'm not wrong, then your posts hold no relevance to this topic besides complaining that a WS we can not utilize well is actually going to end up being our best. Incase you forgot, they did say we would be able to use CDC with all weapons via the coin weapons, if so, base your posts of this fact and not simply saying we "circle jerked over how RDM can remain unimpressive with subpar WSs on Sword" when all you are talking about is the only WS which beats this one and at the same time has never been said by SE that we could unlock it with other weapons.

You're wrong because you're still focusing on how RDM can be subpar. The topic doesn't belong in the RDM forums unless it was titled, "how can RDM continue to not thrive in the current incarnation of the game by focusing on it weaknesses". And then it should have been locked because it was a troll.

Channeling our mage gear into high powered WSs makes sense. Not getting over the fact that we aren't BLU or RUN or a light DD is getting pretty old. The idea that a RDM can contribute with physical WSs without the WSs themselves being broken ala CDC in Aby, is getting pretty old. The more you keep these stupid discussions up, the more wrong and irrelevant you make RDM forums become and the stupider you make RDMs look in general.

RDM is a mage, so it should have a mage WS. Especially if we are going to be on nothing but mage gear. Instead of prattling on about being on light DD gear (which you won't get), you could be asking for something that would easily compliment the direction the game is going, in general, and specifically where all of RDMs gear has gone for the last 3+ years.

If you're going to insist on taking RDM melee seriously, you could at least sound like a RDM instead of a light DD.

[Demon6324236]

You're wrong because you're still focusing on how RDM can be subpar. The topic doesn't belong in the RDM forums unless it was titled, "how can RDM continue to not thrive in the current incarnation of the game by focusing on it weaknesses". And then it should have been locked because it was a troll.Read the OP, tell me when he brought up any WS besides CDC and KoR, be my guest.
so with this talk of unlocking WoE weaponskills and raising R/E/Ms, what do you guys think of using Chant du Cygne on Excalibur? or would you just stick with KoR?So this topic has what to do with me, focusing on 'how RDM can be subpar' and why this does not belong in the RDM forums?


If you're going to insist on taking RDM melee seriously, you could at least sound like a RDM instead of a light DD.When my Fast Cast makes my TP go up faster let me know, till that day, the mage and melee parts of the job are separated, and without gear to enhance the melee side we can have the best WS ever and our white damage will still suck enough to make us to weak still. You make it sound like our mage stats effect us, or if they let us use this WS it would change our melee amazingly, no, it would make us stronger and let us use some more mage stats in our gear for our melee, yes, but it would only do it for WS. TPing would still suck, our biggest more glaring flaw is our TP above everything else, and that's the one thing that you never offer a solution for, only light DD gear would be a solution because mage gear at most gets 1 melee worthy piece every set which is pathetic for RDM.

[Muse]

*tosses his Chapeau into the mix*


Channeling our mage gear into high powered WSs makes sense. Not getting over the fact that we aren't BLU or RUN or a light DD is getting pretty old. The idea that a RDM can contribute with physical WSs without the WSs themselves being broken ala CDC in Aby, is getting pretty old.

RDM is a Hybrid, and not strictly a mage. The only reason it went pure mage is because of SE removing the old system for the armor and slapping us on mage onry. Maybe you missed that? Maybe not. Also remember that those other jobs you listed are ALSO on most mage and light DD gear.

RDM's can contribute with Physical WS's and still do. Hell I do it all the time with my current LS. It always gives me a good laugh when I bust out some decent (not great) numbers with KoR. I've actually outparsed DD's before too.



RDM is a mage, so it should have a mage WS. Especially if we are going to be on nothing but mage gear.

There is a WS that uses STR and MND and... oh MAB... RDM isn't on it though unless you use certain SJ's to unlock it. It's called Sanguine Blade. There was a thread about it a while back as RDM's were asking for some of the WS's to be unlocked to them. Don't recall if the DEV's replied to it or not.


Uriel Blade

Won't happen... Ochain PLD's are the reason this won't happen along with the other campagin sword WS. Just because it would end up with them doing AoE Flash/Stun spamming mobs.




Back onto the topic of Excalibur using CDC...


I'm intrigued by this idea and think it would indeed boost Excalibur RDM's some. Whether or not it would increase our actual DPS would be hard to tell until the actual WS was released onto other weapons, along with the true stats of the new 99 REM's.

The only reason I say it would be hard to tell is because we just don't know, even with the DPS calcs, EXACTLY the WS will work 100% of the time on a different weapon. With CDC on Excal we would lose the DEX+ from Almace, yet gain ATT+ and a permanent x2.5 damage boost. Yes, I know the weapon does not proc all the time etc. Just saying that we wouldn't be restricted to keeping aftermath up if we needed to use another ws for something.

[saevel]

So once again, we have a lot of which stats again? STR MND and MAB.

Stats we don't have. Attack and DEX.

So what again should we be looking for as a solution so that we can be the best at using? A magic attack bonus based WS that is has mods based on STR/MND and scales with TP. That's called Uriel Blade.

It's like Wildfire, but for Swords and it's inclusion wouldn't destabilize the game unless SE couldn't figure out that RDM and BLU would be the best at using it and balance it off those two jobs.

Did you fall down and hit your head or something? Or are you going full blown pchan here?

You do know that Uriel Blade sucks hard core right? Magic WS in general suck with WF only being an exception due to SE giving it a unique damage formula and it not relying on main hand weapons.

Damage = (( Lv+2+WSC ) * fTP + fINT ) * Resist * Elemental Staves * Weather * MDIF * Magic Damage Adjustment

See that Elemental Staves part, yeah that's where they really abuse the damage on. WF also use's AGI instead of INT for it's fINT component while also getting to multiply the result by 2, so the RNG/COR gets to double dip by stacking AGI for WSC and for the fINT bonus.

Your base "DMG" value is limited to your level and not your weapon. Also it can't be buffed via attack or defense down (Dia III is a +17.6% attack bonus mathematically).

UB on the other hand has a nice fTP bonus but it's mods are too low and neither apply to it's fINT formula. It also doesn't get the x2 bonus that Sang Blade, WF and PR get.

Anyhow if your stacking MND and STR you might as well go with Req which sh1ts all over UB even with the attack penalty. A 5+1 hit WS with a 1.2 fTP per hit gives you a 7.2 fTP WS before DA is counted. 100% MND, 7.2 fTP non-elemental magic damage that use's a physical formula. The -20% attack penalty is it's only problem, it cripples it vs critical hit WS's on things that actually matter. CDC on the other hand is a 3+1 hit WS for a total fTP of 5.25, 60% DEX WSC and can crit. It's nice because DEX effects crit hit rate so it becomes similar to STR based WS's that get to use their STR for the fSTR bonus.

So Req: 7.2 fTP 100% MND -20% Attack (18.75% in WS gear)
CDC: 5.25fTP 60% DEX Crit
UB: 4.5 (4.875 in WS gear) fTP 32% MND 32% STR magic based

BTW RDM will always have a good amount of DA due to Temper being +20%. That favors physical WS greatly.

Yeah it's a no brainer that CDC and Req absolutely crush it. Hell I'd want to have Sang Blade over UB, at least Sang has a utility function.

[ManaKing]

Yeah add MAB on to your UB calcs and stop trolling me. 100+ MAB isn't hard to accumulate so double that damage at very least.

Also add in that it scales with TP, unlike WF or Sang or most current WSs for that matter.

I get that you're attached to your Almace, but your Almace does nothing to make RDM any good. What possible world could a RDM with only 80 inventory spaces possibly be well equipped for a WS that was clearly not made for it?

@ Demon: Occult Accumen. I've said it like 20 times. Fixes our TP problem so long as we get more than level 2 of it. Easy Fix.

Better TP phase damage is a combination of nukes and better enspells.

But hey keep asking for light DD gear instead of making your job it's own entity. Just find what other jobs you like and just copy them.

[Demon6324236]

But hey keep asking for light DD gear instead of making your job it's own entity. Just find what other jobs you like and just copy them.See I like how you keep acting like I am just trying to make us BLU or something, your talking about me taking something I like on other jobs and copying it, are you telling me your solution, Occult Accumen, is something new and unique? No, something you took from another job and saw a use here, your not doing much different, its just my suggestion makes us more melee efficient and you want to try reinventing how magic works in this game so we can fight better.

Even if they did it, say we had T5, you would need 4 T4s and a T3 in order to get 100% for a single WS, killing our MP and depending on the actual damage potential of magic on the mob we could end up doing even less. So with your idea, even if we had T5, the highest current level, we would be doing potentially less damage and killing our MP vital to almost everything our job would be doing since you do not want better TP gear to actually hit things. Also keep in mind that unless something changes with Occult Accumen, we will need even more spells after the Elemental Magic changes because we would gain less TP for the lower MP costs we will have.

[saevel]

*Slams head on desk*

It doesn't scale that way. No where close. Unless your drinking a brew UB is FAR behind both CDC and Req.

Really ... don't know what else to say. I can prove that 1+1=2 but if your absolutely positive that it equals 3 then there's nothing else to this discussion.

[Protey]

so i am comparing max DEX for CDC (using excalibur) vs espial set. with max DEX on armor (not including accessories) i have 136 DEX on those 5 slots. with espial set it is 102 DEX + 10% crit rate. so which is better? 102 DEX + 10% crit rate.... or 136 DEX?

[Demonjustin]

Since RDM isn't able to really boost Crit Rate like other jobs our Crit Rate on anything difficult at all is probably not going much higher than 25~50% Crit Rate between base, merits, and the WS itself. Assuming you're at 100% TP while using Rancors you're looking at a 30% Crit Rate which means 10% Crit DMG becomes equal to 3% DMG, is 34 DEX equal to roughly 3% DMG? I would honestly think so because not only is it a mod but helps our Crit Rate as well anyways, but I can't say for sure unless I go update Motenten's sheet for RDM since it's fallen behind.

[Martel]

The 10% crit damage set bonus on espial was found to actually be +10% Crit RATE. iirc, SE acknowledged the issue, but hasn't fixed the item description yet. So you'll need to be comparing 10% crit rate to 34 dex, like Protey was asking.

EDIT:I'd thought I had seen the espial set issue in a knows issues note in one of the updates, but I can't seem to find it again. Well, there's a thread about it in the localization forum. But there wasn't an SE reply there.

[Demonjustin]

Oh~... well then, totally different, still don't know which is better but it may be situational based in that case because depending on that 34 DEX's influence on the crit rate we could get more or less, and either way the DMG factor... I really hate the idea of updating that sheet, but looks like I'm going to have to break down and do it after this upcoming update, after I do I'll get back to ya on the answer if I remember.

[Protey]

thanks, would appreciate it.

[Demonjustin]

Ok, so, been a while sadly but the good news is that high DEX amounts will beat out the Crit Rate on Espial. If you're adding only DEX and nothing else, 25ish DEX more than Espial is the tipping point between full Espial and DEX stacking. Thanks to Aetosaur/+1, Vanir Boots, and a number of other high DEX pieces it's entirely reasonable for RDM to pull this off especially when you include our Reforged Legs with their 12 DEX we can't get in any other slot.

So, verdict is in Protey, do your DEX set!

[Protey]

thanks demonjustin, will go with that.