Thief Treasure Hunter [Archive] - FINAL FANTASY XI Forum

Vold

08-15-2013, 11:42 PM

I do see your point though that there should and most likely will be a soa dagger with high dmg and TH+2 or something. But the low dmg on thfs knife makes no diffference at all if you macro it in for th the mob.
As I said before, if you don't full time TH gear (and to a much lesser extent full timing THF knife because I am NOT about to drop my mandau)then you are wasting your time caring about TH at all.

THF should not be giving up DPS perks for TH effect as TH is a trait, and it's time they kick the design habit out the door. They then need to form a hard cap and replace the knife for good with TH on other gear so we can stop being gimped once we attain the sure fire new upgrades for TH gear that will kick THF knife out the door for good. This is the only way to go about it unless you want to deliver a very clear FU message to THFs everywhere by remaining with the tired low DPS TH dagger + no haste/att/str hand and feet TH gear system. No other trait has such harsh tradeoffs to exist on gear. I know I'm being alittle harsh here as stats on TH gear are not entirely useless, but still. I'd like for new hands/feet versions with DPS themed stats so I can switch between the two differing sets depending on need. As a side note, I'd like to see TH+ on most slots so I have options in a hard cap environment. Fast cast, DA, TA. You name it. They don't exist on just 3 slots. They exist EVERYWHERE. And it wouldn't be the end of the world if other jobs got the TH+ treatment because at the end of the day when you want TH, you go THF. But for the most part when I say put TH + everywhere, I mean on the THF JSE kind of stuff.

With all that said it appears they are not ignoring this problem and acknowledge it as a problem, but I don't believe there is anything to date to suggest they are working on fixing the problem.

Vold

08-15-2013, 11:47 PM

I think they should make a new knife w/ TH+1 andthen giv it a latent of TH-1. latent active if Thief's knife is equipped if they worried about two daggers being used.That's not a bad idea, actually. I could live with it assuming the replacement dagger wasn't tailor made to troll us with 50 base damage. Still, I kind of like my ideas better just 'cause I want to get rid of TH daggers period due to the requirement of full timing TH gear to max it's effect. But your idea is definitely better for SE and is likely they'd go with it.

FaeQueenCory

08-16-2013, 12:18 AM

iirc, I think Matsui said that there will be new TH gear... So... theoretically....
There might be enough TH in the new equipment that makes the +1 from the Thief Knife not needed.
I wonder if they'd release another dagger with it...
I'd prefer them to release another piece... somewhere else. A ring maybe? That way, ppl who don't main THF (or even gear it super well... I know my THF is just for the TH, so this would be my category) can get max TH (since they don't care about THF as anything except TH) and ppl who DO main/care about THF can loose the Thief Knife for an optimal dagger while maintaining (or exceeding) current TH.
(by exceeding, I'm talking about... say a ring or whatever that's not a boot or an glove... with TH+2 or even +3. TH-THF ppl will just equip that along with the Thief's Knife, Assassin Armlets+2 and Raider's Poulaines+2 to get a max TH with little effort at the cost of dmg.... because they are just being THF for the TH. "Real" -ie main/cares-about-the-job- THFs can then drop the dagger and come out +1 more than the current +4.)

Firebert_Lakshmi

08-16-2013, 12:31 AM

You know how you can augment Relic +2 and it still keeps the Relic +2 name rather than +3? What about a Magian Trial for the knife as well? Do some sort of quest and the augmented Thief Knife offers better damage, maybe another nice perk like Triple Attack +X%

Stompa

08-16-2013, 02:12 AM

As I said before, if you don't full time TH gear (and to a much lesser extent full timing THF knife because I am NOT about to drop my mandau)then you are wasting your time caring about TH at all.

Well my normal THF game is approach the mob, SA, hit my TH macro which slots in thf knife(sub) hands and feet for TH+4, then hit the mob, and the macro /wait command slots my normal melee hands, feet and sub knife back into place. Then as I melee with zero TH+ gear equipped, I get the first TH spark/tick which announces the mob now has TH8 on it, despite the fact that I'm meleeing with zero TH gear. I don't understand why people melee fulltime with TH gear on, you just need that first hit and then continue to build ticks in your best gear. The TP I normally lose if I use the macro during battle, is usually around 50tp or so, which is unimportant in my game at least.
But I do think they should add a current dagger with powerful stats and TH, so people who wanted to offhand it and not use macro swapouts, could do so. I use the magian storeTP dagger in offhand, I don't think I'd change it for a fulltime HQ thf knife anyway, but the option should be there for ppl that want it.

Sapphire

08-16-2013, 02:20 AM

You full time because one of the few things about TH that SE has ever revealed is that your chances of getting a TH increase is related to your base TH. The greater the difference between your base TH and the current TH on the mob, the less a chance you'll get another increase. So you start with TH7 base, proc TH8, switch to no TH gear (base TH3) - less chance you will ever hit TH9+.

Is this logical? *shrug* But that is how it is.

Stompa

08-16-2013, 02:57 AM

I'm not sure about that, I brewed Shinryu a lot on solo thf, open with SA feint bully and TH+4 gear which I swap out immediately after the first hit. Most times the opening SA/feint/bully doesnt trigger a spark despite the TH7 base, but then when I swap to haste gear and magian offhander, I will typically get two sparks in the three minute brew (with no TH gear on at all.) Using this strat I can't remember a time I haven't got TH9, and frequently higher than that. I also see similar TH sparks on other NM's, with the TH7 at start and then TH3base for the rest of the fight with frequent ticks/sparks. As I understood it, the ticks are percentile rolls and random luck, I've never noticed any decrease when I swap the TH gear out. But thats just my experience, and it mirrors what other THFs have told me over the years.

Daemon

08-16-2013, 03:15 AM

A hard cap would be nice but whose to say what that cap will be if Thief knife continues to exist? People regardless will use knife on top of what's added onto gear. Also through Atma Thief can proc 10+ so as long as atma exist I don't know how can TH be hard capped.

I'm just hoping that all other TH will be combined into 1 piece on to the new AF4.

I also don't have high hopes for TH to be increased higher than it already is.

In the meantime, DMG 28 does suck, and having to Macro in Theif knife is not a great solution due to TP. I'd hate to have extra macros for 1 task. Maybe it works for doing bosses and bigger things but I use my Thief for farming and losing TP for switching weapons between each kill wouldn't be good on mobs you kill quickly.

It seems SE is trying to improve ourselves with ilvl gear and hopefully heading in the direction of implementing gear so we don't have to carry so much for our sets
So unless SE removes Thief knife and atma all together, I think adding in a new dagger would be good with better stats.

Infidi

08-16-2013, 03:26 AM

Is any TH worth getting over TH3 anyway? XD J/k j/k. I was always hard grained by people that any TH gained over TH3 is so negligible ,in helping with drops, its pointless anyway, lol. Maybe I should stop listening to people. :X

Daemon

08-16-2013, 03:28 AM

Rustic

08-16-2013, 03:43 AM

Daemon

08-16-2013, 03:49 AM

Infidi

08-16-2013, 03:52 AM

Uh.. yeah... huge difference especially if you are using Atma in Abyssea.

That reminded me of another question! :D Does TH effect empy weapon item drops, or just the equipment and random items NMs drop?

Daemon

08-16-2013, 03:55 AM

That reminded me of another question! :D Does TH effect empy weapon item drops, or just the equipment and random items NMs drop?

It depends. If you are hunting items like Sobek skins, Kukulkan fangs. Yes.

But not Voidwatch HMP. That's a different Proc system.

Infidi

08-16-2013, 03:58 AM

It depends. If you are hunting items like Sobek skins, Kukulkan fangs. Yes.

But not Voidwatch HMP. That's a different Proc system.

Yeah meant items like Sobek Skins. Really? I was always told that it didnt XD. All lies! :(

Daemon

08-16-2013, 04:02 AM

Yeah meant items like Sobek Skins. Really? I was always told that it didnt XD. All lies! :(

One myth I was told, TH Sash from Abyssea La Theine Plateua is good for Sobek.

Sobek Skin Discussion
http://trainedprofessional.guildwork.com/forum/threads/4f22ea1a205cb2542b009d66-sobek-skins?page=1#4f2bdad6205cb268f001b132

Briarius Discussion
http://www.ffxivpro.com/forum/topic/39503/soloing-briareus-help/
Its briarus, BLU/WAR, set defensive traits and use a mild evasion build. Stun all his TP moves, delta thrust and heavy stike make it a fairly quick fight even without CDC. If he does manage to get off a mercurial strike for 1111 dmg, turn and kite him through the stones. Not much else to it. Set TH if you can afford the set points and TH+1 Tarutaru sash if you have it macrod to tag him to TH2, should get 2 helms more often than not.

For best results have Max TH from gear + Atma of Dread.

Atma of the Dread
http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100911175128/ffxi/images/c/ce/Atma_of_Dread.jpg
Magic Evasion+:Minor
Treasure Hunter+:Minor (+1)
Samba Duration:Minor

Daemon

08-16-2013, 05:44 AM

The only way I see making hard cap possible is if SE releases an item that has all TH combined with the condition that says Thief knife does not stack upon wearing such gear.

Which would be good because those who don't have that piece of gear could still use thief knife. More for Casuals that don't have the new item yet. And those who do have the combine piece could leave out thief knife and equip something else.

But then they would have to modify the low damage condition. I think Critical hit rate should be the condition for Procing TH though, I mean we do have plenty of gear to support this. Between critical hit rate and Double/triple/quadruple attack plus haste it would work.

OmnysValefor

08-16-2013, 05:51 AM

tbh, it's easy

Adjust thief's knife to be latent effect: offhand only, and make a new knife with the same properties.

It would stop people for thief's knifing things to death as well.

Daemon

08-16-2013, 05:58 AM

tbh, it's easy

Adjust thief's knife to be latent effect: offhand only, and make a new knife with the same properties.

It would stop people for thief's knifing things to death as well.

Wouldn't it be better not to have another dagger and just have all TH on 1 gear piece? You mean make TH only work offhand? Certainly would stop people from main handing it.

Might be inconvenient in quick situations for those that don't have macro set though.

OmnysValefor

08-16-2013, 06:05 AM

They're just not big on removing things from the game, or heavily altering them. There's also nothing wrong with losing a little dps for the sake of utility. But when one dagger hits for 150 and the other for 30, thats a little old.

Daemon

08-16-2013, 06:09 AM

I wish SE added stronger debuff daggers. That way thief can actually be useful in parties than be stricted to SATA and TH. but they would have to remove condition of full timing TH Dagger which is why I made that suggesstion about combining TH into gear and changing proc to be crit based.

Lower level TH would have to be by chance due to not having enough crit gear options. I think add on TH above TH3 should give % of Procing based on Crit.

Would be cool to see thieves constantly cycling through different debuff daggers throughout the fight is what I'm saying.

I also think SE should change the lose TP upon changing weapons already =p never understood why have that limit.

Not like there is much to abuse removing such a limit. Just strict Kraken club to it.

Even so kraken club only feeds TP to mobs and puts entire party at risk so I still don't understand why the limit is there. Not like we can go past 300 TP

If they still think its still Over Powered, they could just add more drain TP abilities on bosses. And no I'm not suggesting to add reduce TP to 0 like Chloris =p

Unless the limit was placed there due to memory issues from PS2.

Gee SE ditch PS2 and recode FFXI already D: offer a 3 month free subscription service to all PS2 players that move over to PC and then discontinue support. Everyone will win.

Daemon

08-16-2013, 06:40 AM

Although if Lose TP upon changing weapon was implemented based on PS2 limitations, I mean hundreds of people TPing at the same time I'm sure has effect to why the limit was there.

Why not reduce the 300% TP down to 200% or 100% and increase the power of all WS? If Matsui is really serious about taking FFXI into a new direction, removing lose TP upon changing weapon would be a big improvement over a system that has been unaltered 11 years.

Not off topic btw as TP does tie into Thiefs ability to have existence in events.

Stompa

08-16-2013, 09:49 AM

Basically, the reason you fulltime TH gear is that not only gives you the highest "base" TH when starting, but the highest chance to proc further TH bonuses as you fight.

Ironically, the lower DPS also means more chances to proc your TH bonuses as you end up having to get more hits in on the mob to kill it. Updating it is a huge problem- it has to be in some fashion that makes using Thief's Knife with the new +TH weapon impossible, or else we're just going to be asked to dual wield the new and old weapon together for maximum TH instead.

I sort of half-agree, if I'm fighting some old-areas NM I will always fulltime heart-snatcher+thf's knife because they are puny, so I can get ticks before its health is gone.
But my original point is that on stronger NM's you macro out the TH4 build after the first hit, replacing it with haste & triple-attack gear. The reason this is logical is that if every hit by a thf has a base percentile chance of sparking a TH tick, so wearing nothing but haste and triple-attack gear or a multi-hit knife gives you faster and more numerous hits, therefore more rolls on the percentile TH roll, than if you were wearing clunky slow TH+gear.

Karbuncle

08-16-2013, 10:18 AM

Treasure Hunter procs can only proc on the Main hand first hit, not offhand hits nor Triple Attack hits... Only the first main hand hit.

Second, unless you're fighting something like Fafnir or whatever and just need every ounce of TH for the sake of it, Never fulltime TH Gear, and don't even bother equipping your Thiefs Knife, and in Abyssea? Atma of the Dread is deadweight. Killspeed gained from a DD Atma will vastly outweigh any difference that TH1 will have for a Thief. now if you're not on THF, do whatever you feel with it.

Third, TH Past 3/4 is so vastly underwhelming its basically a placebo, so unless you plan on parsing 1,000~2,000 kills you'll never eyeball the difference in TH4 and TH5+. If you think you have? you're wrong, wrongo, wrongsies, wrongomatic, pick your favorite interpretation or made up "wrong" word from the list but you're it.

TH is by far the least remarkable Job Trait(past TH3/4) in FFXI and the most annoying to break the stigma from. Everyone has their "buts" and "ifs" when it comes to superstitions about TH. most of them are wrong. Mainhanding THF's knife was a thing, "THF Gets last hit" was a thing, everytime we learn more people create more wild theories to fill in the blanks.

Right now, As per SE's telling us, Your base TH Gear determines your upgrade rate upon landing the hit. Meaning if you keep on you TH7 Gear, you'll have an easier time hitting 8+ than you would if you dequipped it. Which i personally find blasphemously retarded especially since they still haven't replaced Thiefs Knife but what can you do... Furthermore, While TH5+ Does effect drop rate, the % in which it effects it is so small its within the realm of reasonable doubt unless you have a 2,000+ sample size, even then you might see variables favoring TH4 over TH6 because the % increase is so small...

Long story short unless you absolutely need TH8 for whatever comforting reason it might give you, its pretty pointless to keep on TH Gear after the first hit.

Thief's Knife should never be in your hand unless you're doing a single fight and want to TH as high as possible because you can (Behemoth, etc)... As any good Thief will tell you if you're fighting many enemies, Like Dynamis or something, Killspeed gained through a superior offhand >>>>>>>>>>> TH+1 for average drops/hr.

Oh, and my post isn't directed at anyone posting in this thread, just simply something i know about TH from being the job for 11 years and reading up on every bit of information i can find regarding TH and the THF job.

Stompa

08-16-2013, 10:27 AM

TH is by far the least remarkable Job Trait(past TH3/4) in FFXI and the most annoying to break the stigma from. Everyone has their "buts" and "ifs" when it comes to superstitions about TH. most of them are wrong. Mainhanding THF's knife was a thing, "THF Gets last hit" was a thing, everytime we learn more people create more wild theories to fill in the blanks.

'Mandalic Stab killshot' as a TH+1 was another of those myths, and some people were totally sure about it back then.

lllen

08-16-2013, 11:48 AM

Murphy's Law...it seemed to me that the more TH I got onto Glavoid the drop was only one...it seemed that anytime it got over 8..one. At 8 I got 2. TH seems to be a little over rated. I helped thru 4 weapons...we all noticed it a lot, and laughed.

FrankReynolds

08-16-2013, 11:36 PM

Wouldn't it be great if they just made a permanent KI from a NM fight that gave TH+8 and didn't stack with gear so that once you had it, you didn't need to swap in TH gear any more?

Or, made an ammo item with +8 that didn't stack with other TH+ from gear?

Wouldn't that be nice? I mean I know they want us to have to choose, but isn't just bringing a thief at all a big enough sacrifice to DPS as it is?

On a related note, you will now be able to dual wield apothic kukris. Weeee!

Rustic

08-17-2013, 02:54 AM

tbh, it's easy

Adjust thief's knife to be latent effect: offhand only, and make a new knife with the same properties.

It would stop people for thief's knifing things to death as well.

Nope. We'd then be told to offhand TK (like I do now) and mainhand the new one.

TK is so omnipresent because it carries a unique effect on it as a weapon. Said effect, if duplicated on a dual-wieldable weapon will result in people simply wielding both to get the maximum TH possible.

I've said it before- the best way to fix it is to simply render any better weapon with a TH bonus so blatantly NOT for dealing damage that we can just be the droprate generator they want us to be and can't even try to whine about us not hurting the mob. If S-E gave us, say "Golden Gloves" with relatively low DMG, Treasure Hunter +3, and bonuses to proccing TH+, I can guarantee you they'd become required THF gear just for the TH bonus alone. That's how important drop rates are to people. We'd become the characters that literally punch the mob until all the good candy comes out.

Or, if something negates Thief's Knife by wielding it to get better TH, we'd be stuck wielding THAT instead. Because loot is the biggest reason you want a Thief in there. Not damage, not anything else. Loot.

Daemon

08-17-2013, 02:58 AM

Nope. We'd then be told to offhand TK (like I do now) and mainhand the new one.

That can't happen if SE made both unstackable.

OmnysValefor

08-17-2013, 03:36 AM

Nope. We'd then be told to offhand TK (like I do now) and mainhand the new one.

You should have read what I said when you replied to what I said.

Daemon

08-17-2013, 03:42 AM

You should have read what I said when you replied to what I said.

Yeah he did say it but its ok at first I was confused too.

Adjust thief's knife to be latent effect: offhand only

Karbuncle

08-17-2013, 06:46 AM

Add a Piece of ARMOR (Visible or not, Something other than weapon) That has something like...:

Thief's Band
(ring)
Fluffstat(Or not)
Latent Effect: Treasure Hunter +1
Lv.90~+?

Latent Active when Thief's Knife is not equipped. This removes the need to wear a weapon that will nerf us, and will be as convenient as Gloves/Feet currently are (Easily equipped/removed without hurting out DPS so badly)

Best solution. Period.

Short of a permanent Key Item.

Daemon

08-17-2013, 06:59 AM

Best solution. Period.

Short of a permanent Key Item.

Sacrificing ring slot to make it happen? I dunno which one, eponas or Rajas? Unless it makes no difference equipping TH full time.

Daemon

08-17-2013, 07:18 AM

TH Past 3/4 is so vastly underwhelming its basically a placebo, so unless you plan on parsing 1,000~2,000 kills you'll never eyeball the difference in TH4 and TH5+. If you think you have? you're wrong, wrongo, wrongsies, wrongomatic, pick your favorite interpretation or made up "wrong" word from the list but you're it.

Well I'm sorry but I do have to disagree even though you say I am wrong but I've spent hours trying to farm gorget quest items in SEA and from having Theif sub plus Tarutaru sash with TH1 VS Max TH on thief. I've noticed drops were better as Thief than using it as a sub.

I've done SEA endless hours enough to puke and never go back for a good while that although the difference isn't as massive as TH1 and Max TH, over time I could tell there is a difference from TH3/4 vs Max TH.

Karbuncle

08-17-2013, 08:03 AM

Sacrificing ring slot to make it happen? I dunno which one, eponas or Rajas? Unless it makes no difference equipping TH full time.

It'd be a Macro swap piece that doesn't involve wasting your TP away. If you're mass farming for an extended period, any good THF would tell you the DPS Gained from throwing your Thief's Knife off the nearest window would far outweigh its TH+1, and fulltiming TH Gear at all for more than "1 big kill" like say, Behemoth or something where max TH wouldn't hurt is nothing short of unreasonable siding on insane.

I will stick by that 10,000%. Putting on Max TH Gear (Minus THF knife) for the first hit then switching to your DPS gear will always give you better drops per hour than fulltiming TH Gear or a Thief's Knife.

I should note, I'm saying this not knowing if you Fulltime TH Gear so its not meaning a direct insult to you... If you happen to fulltime TH Gear then it comes off as an indirect insult and i apologize, But you should never fulltime TH gear, ever. If you're on THF, TH6 is more than enough, TH7+ while nice, is not worth the DPS lost, it just simply isn't,

Again there are some extenuating circumstanced, but for the common farming situation, Its not wise to Fulltime it.

Well I'm sorry but I do have to disagree even though you say I am wrong but I've spent hours trying to farm gorget quest items in SEA and from having Theif sub plus Tarutaru sash with TH1 VS Max TH on thief. I've noticed drops were better as Thief than using it as a sub.

I've done SEA endless hours enough to puke and never go back for a good while that although the difference isn't as massive as TH1 and Max TH, over time I could tell there is a difference from TH3/4 vs Max TH.

On items like Sea pieces where they have a noticeably high drop rate already, the drop % increase would be a tad more noticeable i suppose. But TH3/4 (mostly 4.) and TH7+ the drop rate you notice on those isn't as high as you may suspect, if your parsed yourself you'd see they're probably within 5% of eachother or less, and in the long run fulltiming TH Gear is hindering your kills/hr, I explained it above.

Edit: PS if you do Fulltime TH Gear, do me a favor and stop. You're better than that.

Daemon

08-17-2013, 08:48 AM

It'd be a Macro swap piece that doesn't involve wasting your TP away. If you're mass farming for an extended period, any good THF would tell you the DPS Gained from throwing your Thief's Knife off the nearest window would far outweigh its TH+1, and fulltiming TH Gear at all for more than "1 big kill" like say, Behemoth or something where max TH wouldn't hurt is nothing short of unreasonable siding on insane.

I will stick by that 10,000%. Putting on Max TH Gear (Minus THF knife) for the first hit then switching to your DPS gear will always give you better drops per hour than fulltiming TH Gear or a Thief's Knife.

I should note, I'm saying this not knowing if you Fulltime TH Gear so its not meaning a direct insult to you... If you happen to fulltime TH Gear then it comes off as an indirect insult and i apologize, But you should never fulltime TH gear, ever. If you're on THF, TH6 is more than enough, TH7+ while nice, is not worth the DPS lost, it just simply isn't,

Again there are some extenuating circumstanced, but for the common farming situation, Its not wise to Fulltime it.

On items like Sea pieces where they have a noticeably high drop rate already, the drop % increase would be a tad more noticeable i suppose. But TH3/4 (mostly 4.) and TH7+ the drop rate you notice on those isn't as high as you may suspect, if your parsed yourself you'd see they're probably within 5% of eachother or less, and in the long run fulltiming TH Gear is hindering your kills/hr, I explained it above.

Edit: PS if you do Fulltime TH Gear, do me a favor and stop. You're better than that.

I've never full timed TH gear unless I'm lazy to hit macros on stuff that doesn't require changing multiple gears for mobs that die fast and items that drop too quick to make a difference.

The point is, if SE does intend to upgrade thief, I'm just sharing ideas to give us better things than asking us to use several pieces to do 1 task thats is no longer efficient since inventory is an issue.

OmnysValefor

08-17-2013, 09:24 AM

Daemon

08-17-2013, 09:57 AM

Tbh, I don't come thf to anything serious, because who brings thf to anything serious, but when I'm on thf, I know why I'm on thf. I fulltime TH gear, not knife, for that.

I'm on thief because someone wants a drop. It'd be one thing if it was a competitive DD, but it's not.

I agree with you. But as Matsui is adding new things in the new direction he is taking all of us. I'm hoping he doesn't leave out details on every job such as Thief, and as we continue to make suggestions, I also hope he can use them to make better adjustment for these jobs that we play at heart.

FrankReynolds

08-18-2013, 09:41 PM

Best solution is a KI or an ammo item that gives the max equipment value of TH+ and does no require / allow you to wear the other gear.

Anything else is a sacrifice that thieves don't need to make. They are already unused and generally unwanted without having to sacrifice damage or other utility.

Falseliberty

08-19-2013, 12:43 AM

detlef

08-19-2013, 12:47 AM

Gonna be more blunt about it than most, just by you equipping thf's knife ur auto gimp and ur doing it wrong
Kill speed > placebo. Ur get more drops over time by killing faster. When dynamis was a thing a lot of thfs was like "How come I can only get 100-120 coins? For Christs sake take off that evasion gear, and eat att food would ya?That logic pretty much applies only to Dynamis. For anything where the THF will not be the primary source of damage, it's probably more logical to full time your TH gear. What other reason could there be for you to be there if not to provide TH?

Falseliberty

08-19-2013, 01:27 AM

That logic pretty much applies only to Dynamis. For anything where the THF will not be the primary source of damage, it's probably more logical to full time your TH gear. What other reason could there be for you to be there if not to provide TH?

What zone doesn't benefit from killing crap faster? salvage 2.0? me and my dnc buddy clear the whole dam zone, ain't doing that by equipping some TK. NNI? linen pouch and gear drop is 100% + plat strat.. again kill speed
VW? procs, use a real dagger to speed up the zzzz so you can get ur logs and get out already
Adoulin content? skirmish, nope nothing to do with TH, delve? You think that 1% is gonna make it rain airlixers that are worth a whopping 9k, hell even delve boss drops are even 100%.
In short TK = gimp

But maybe ur right! maybe I should just tag the mob with TH and go afk like every other thf and watch old family guy episodes on netflix or w/e

FrankReynolds

08-19-2013, 07:40 PM

Karbuncle

08-19-2013, 08:54 PM

Daemon

08-19-2013, 09:10 PM

FrankReynolds

08-19-2013, 10:47 PM

IDK, I think they got it. I don't think they're saying we shouldn't get a replacement for it, just that in its current state of affairs its quite worthless to even have on you.

Oh and that pretty much every THF Adapts the "IF IM DERE I SHUD TRESUR HUNTR OKY?" and uses that as an excuse to completely half ass the job to the point they're gimper than sin and try to justify it with "I'm only here to TH". So yah, I hate Thief's who say that kind of crap like it means they got a free ride to being gimp and useless outside of hitting the mob then AFK Netflix.

Just because you're invited to get drops doesn't mean you should be stupid about it. "Max TH" is the truest form of a big fat placebo pill. As a THF Main, Anything past 6 is doing next to nothing. While the Law of Probability may mean that it doesn't do absolutely nothing, That law also means you might open your dryer and find your clothes already folded from tumbling... Which the odds of happening are so infinitely low that.. well, incidentally is probably the same odds that you'd of got the drop if your TH was just one more higher.

I really don't mean to be harsh about it but too many a Thief adapt the "Its okay I'm gimp" mindset and use Treasure hunter as a Justification. Theres a good Thief on FFXIAH who's parsed just 0.5% Behind an Oatix MNK on tojil runs and even above another simply from playing right and they TH'd the mobs just fine and likely contributing more to the success of the run than your average Pick up DD ever could.

here:

here: http://www.ffxiah.com/forum/topic/36654/for-the-shinies-a-guide-for-thief/16/#reply

Thief can be good and TH Too, You just have to not suck, not be lazy, and not use TH as an excuse to fulltime a sh*t stain of a dagger.

There's another side to that coin. All the effort and awesome sauce in the world isn't going to change the fact that you are in the mage / tank party and you're not getting the cool buffs like everyone else. I've won lots of parses on thief simply because if the fight lasts more than ten seconds, the Warriors and Sams and Monks usually spend half of it in -PDT gear trying not to die, while I happily plug away and shed hate on them. But let's be honest. Most groups aren't giving the thief any buffs. That guy got lucky to be in a group / LS that gives two craps about what the thief is up to.

If I see a thief in a DD party, fully song/haste/rolled rocking TK the whole fight, yeah... he's a douche. But most of the time, that guy has no buffs and his damage is doing nothing to help the group either way.

Personally I'd like to remove TH from the game entirely. Or at least make it strictly passive so that people don't have to gear around it.

Spectreman

08-20-2013, 03:28 AM

Instead of worrying with Thief's Knife dmg Square could just change their TH formula so we can land TH+8 on a mob with TH set and then switch to DD set without losing that TH bonus.

Sapphire

08-20-2013, 03:34 AM

Instead of worrying with Thief's Knife dmg Square could just change their TH formula so we can land TH+8 on a mob with TH set and then switch to DD set without losing that TH bonus.

You don't lose the bonus. TH8 is still there. It just apparently becomes less likely that you will proc TH9+.

Spectreman

08-20-2013, 03:49 AM

You don't lose the bonus. TH8 is still there. It just apparently becomes less likely that you will proc TH9+.

Yea i meant the bonus to keep procing +9 etc.

OmnysValefor

08-20-2013, 03:50 AM

When you, or anyone, says "next to nothing", all you mean is "I don't want to say it does nothing because sometimes it is the difference between getting the drop and having to farm another popset".

When I, and most decent thieves say we fulltime TH gear, I mean that I switch for WSs. I don't WS in Armlets +2, for instance, even though they're the strongest TH piece.

Yeah so what, my modest damage-per-second isn't haste capped, it's pretty near what with 7% head, belt, 4-5% on bodies, and 6% on legs (24-25%, 25% is haste capped with Ionis, but who brings thf to much in adoulin?). I'm not using TH knife for anything but the first hit. My damage isn't suffering as much as you want people to think it is. The only crippling blow TH kits bring to thief's damage is TH knife, and for almost everything, you should offhand a real dagger after the first hit.

And of course, if I wanted to buy a Pya'ekue Belt, I could be haste-capped in all situations.

I'd love to see them make TH knife a ring or neck instead, just literally edit the item, but that's never been their style.

FrankReynolds

08-20-2013, 04:25 AM

It's low enough.

And again, moving it to another slot besides ammo or a ki and removing the need for the other pieces is just like changing seats on the titanic.

OmnysValefor

08-20-2013, 04:28 AM

Not remotely true, any other slot besides weapon doesn't contribute/cost as much damage as weapon slot, and not only because you lose TP when you swap.

Even on something like behemoth, one dagger hits for 170, the other dagger hits for 30. I love rajas ring, and eponas, but neither contribute/cost as much as the value of the offhand weapon.

Karbuncle

08-20-2013, 05:17 AM

When you, or anyone, says "next to nothing", all you mean is "I don't want to say it does nothing because sometimes it is the difference between getting the drop and having to farm another popset".

Next to nothing is actually the closest literal interpretation of it. After about TH7 or so Its less than 1% on many drops, though it does change if the drop rate on said item is over a certain value since it is based on the Base drop rate to some degree... But yah, so low in fact even with thousands of recorded deaths some Lower TH values still show higher drop rates than higher TH values. FFXIDB Used to keep track of Treasure Hunter levels but it doesn't seem to anymore so I can't link you to the basic stuff, I think they took it down for a reason however. :|

There's a thread here on Official forums though with TH Information. Its quite handy.

There's no hidden meaning to "next to nothing", it means exactly what the phrase says. While it does in fact do something, The % Difference between the increased drop rate and the % Difference you'd gain from Killspeed weighs heavily in favor of Killspeed. I do mention clearly that In case of events where you're only killing say 1 Monsters or time is of no importance,(Behemoth, Outside Delve, Something like that) That it may favor use of the Knife.

Regardless of such, Coupled with the low values of TH past baseline, Upgrading TH Through normal hits gets incredibly low after 1-2 Upgrades, making the fulltime of TH Gear even more of a liability, as TH Receives a much larger upgrade chance on SATA, so if your goal was TH upgrading, You'd be better served making a THUpgrade SA and TA set that incorporate maximum damage with the use of TH hands/Feet... I have one, do you?

So, we say it does "Next to nothing" because all credible tests show it does next to nothing, fractions of a %, so low thousands of kills can with certainty determine a notable drop rate increase between TH8/TH9, Even the Official test required 2000 kills and still was within margin of error for variable drop rates so it could swing either way.

Yes, It does help, Whats being argued is it helps such a small fraction of a % Its entirely illogical to Fulltime TH Gear for just about any event, Especially with the mindset is used as a means or reason to remain as mediocre as possible on the job. Even if you're stuck in the Mage party, You can out DD the plethora of Subpar DD That make up this game right now, even if they get buffs, mostly because buffs don't fix stupid, and if you're real good and are lucky enough to be in a DD party for whatever event, you can perform at or around the level of the best DD.

The mediocre mindset does not apply to everyone, But it applies to enough THF's that its becoming common place and a plethora of gimps who couldn't damage their way out of a paper bag hurts this job way more than Treasure Hunter, especially when evidence of Thief's power is readily available.

detlef

08-20-2013, 05:34 AM

What zone doesn't benefit from killing crap faster? salvage 2.0? me and my dnc buddy clear the whole dam zone, ain't doing that by equipping some TK. NNI? linen pouch and gear drop is 100% + plat strat.. again kill speed
VW? procs, use a real dagger to speed up the zzzz so you can get ur logs and get out already
Adoulin content? skirmish, nope nothing to do with TH, delve? You think that 1% is gonna make it rain airlixers that are worth a whopping 9k, hell even delve boss drops are even 100%.
In short TK = gimp

But maybe ur right! maybe I should just tag the mob with TH and go afk like every other thf and watch old family guy episodes on netflix or w/eAre you saying you can't decimate a Salvage zone with TK? Why are you THF in Nyzul? Why are you THF for VW? In a Delve plasm farming situation, things die so fast you really are just tagging them in full TH gear while the DDs with real buffs destroy them.

Look, if THF is the only job you have that is geared well, then that changes things. My statement was for people who have multiple options. If THF is your only job, then by all means go all out DD if the situation calls for it.

My larger point is that if you're on THF and your role is to provide TH, shouldn't you focus on bringing as much TH as you can to the table? If your role is not to provide TH, then wouldn't it make more sense to change jobs?

Spectreman

08-20-2013, 07:57 AM

I think TH 6 drops more stuff than TH 8.

Let the flame war begin.

Xantavia

08-20-2013, 09:06 AM

My larger point is that if you're on THF and your role is to provide TH, shouldn't you focus on bringing as much TH as you can to the table? If your role is not to provide TH, then wouldn't it make more sense to change jobs?
This is the idea that people who enjoy playing thf hate. THF provides more than TH, but when people have the mindset that that is all its good for, we suffer. I've been told to put TK in my main hand, stop dual-wieldiing and don't engage except to do a SA or feint. The more swings I get in, the better the chances of raising TH level, instead of strictly relying on an ability with a 60 second cooldown. (yes, I decided to cap flee recast instead of SA/TA times since I play 95% solo)

Stompa

08-20-2013, 09:15 AM

I'm not THF main job at all its just a utility-job for helping LS ppl get their stuff, so I for example didn't even know about the TH ticks being main hand / first hit only.

What I do know is I routinely hit th10 wearing TH0 gear, having landed TH7 on the opening hit. I'm not arguing with anyone or saying SE lied about about the TH gear spikes the %chance of further TH ticks, just saying you can use your regular melee/ws set and still build 10~ it happens to me all the time. If as I believe the TH ticks are percentile base chance, then haste gear gives you more hits including mainhand/first hits in shorter time, so I will stick with my haste set for THF and just use the TH macro at the start.
To be honest, rogue class, thief job, etc. were always about sleight of hand and deft touches, same as how on Earth a pickpocket will brush against you in the street, you wont see them and you wont feel anything except the merest nudge as they pass you, but when you get home your purse/wallet is gone. That always chimed for me with the TH gear that you swap in for one hit, it just seems more like the real world where truly pro thiefs will touch you just once briefly.

OmnysValefor

08-20-2013, 09:47 AM

There are only a few other uses I can think of for thf, and none are about damage.

TA/SATA = But honestly, this isn't going to help tanks tank for more than few second more. At hate cap, all a TA might benefit a player is one more single swing at the tank.

Accomplice/Collaborator on a white mage. I can't tell you the number of times at WKR I've wished there was a thief present so he could join and Collab my whm on cooldown. His hate should dissipate enough that he'd never actually pull with collabs, and if he were to and were to die, it's better for the group if a dps died vs the tank or tank-healer.

It's not a great damage dealer, it just isn't. Solo it's even worse, because you have SA once every 3 minutes and no TA (unless you're dualboxing/have an npc, but neither is technically solo). Of course, in dynamis, you can proc and run around behind and SA, but that doesn't apply anywhere else really, since thf/dnc's red proc options are very few for aby.

There's no such thing as hate management anymore so the biggest utility thf had is almost useless.

Yeah, yeah, I'm not a THF main, but I am a PLD main, so I know what it's like when SE has carved us down to niche purposes. Please don't be offended.

Nebo

08-20-2013, 11:19 AM

Honestly, this whole "Upgrade Thief's Knife" thing is pointless in the greater landscape. Adjusting Thief's knife to be the strongest dagger in the game (or any other combination of TH gear/KI upgrade) is still going to leave Thief in a useless spot.

The real issue with Thief is that Treasure Hunter is the only thing of value that the Thief job offers to a group.

That's a problem - Treasure Hunter is not particularly valuable...certainly not enough for it to be a "job role."

I don't believe SE intended it to be this way. They just designed the job very badly, took lots of good things away, and never adjusted THF to keep up with the times because they were mad at RMTs. (They fear the past)

Anything else that the Thief job can do, another job can do much better - without retarded positional restrictions and devoid of unreasonable timer bottlenecks.

Having said that, I agree that it is pretty ridiculous that TH is still tied to this stupid knife...but at this point...of all the things that really NEED to be fixed about THF....having the devs spend limited update resources on making it more convenient to get 0.01% more TH placebo effect is not one of them.

But most likely, meaningless things like separation of despoil/steal + some new mediocre (but not quite as horrid as Thief Knife) dagger or some such TH gear band aid will be all the "fixing" Thief gets.

TLDR: /Toss the useless dagger and don't look back. The only thing it has been relevant for in he past few years is to single wield while killing Kings. That time has passed. It is not worth the inventory it costs to carry around. Anyone that insists you use it is most likely uninformed about what raising TH past a certain point actually accomplishes, about the Thief job in general , or both.

Stompa

08-20-2013, 02:35 PM

I don't believe SE intended it to be this way. They just designed the job very badly

They didn't design the job anyway. They lifted AD&D "Rogue" class which has existed since 1980~ it was a decades-old job before SE copied it. The steal and backstab and general flightyness of rogues was copied 100% and so were their favoured weapons. SE also borrowed more from Ad&d ; other job classes like pld, attributes like Str Vit etc. and random dice-rolls on to-hit and everything else that is /random in ffxi which is most of it. Many Ad&d players like myself (I been a d&d fan since 1981~) saw Stormreach Online (fail) was an attempt by Ad&d to respond to FFxi, but honestly the last good Ad&d games were the Baldur's Gate series which rocked hard, and were pre FFxi anyway.

Infidi

08-20-2013, 10:06 PM

Calatilla

08-21-2013, 03:30 AM

They didn't design the job anyway. They lifted AD&D "Rogue" class which has existed since 1980~ it was a decades-old job before SE copied it. The steal and backstab and general flightyness of rogues was copied 100% and so were their favoured weapons. SE also borrowed more from Ad&d ; other job classes like pld, attributes like Str Vit etc. and random dice-rolls on to-hit and everything else that is /random in ffxi which is most of it. Many Ad&d players like myself (I been a d&d fan since 1981~) saw Stormreach Online (fail) was an attempt by Ad&d to respond to FFxi, but honestly the last good Ad&d games were the Baldur's Gate series which rocked hard, and were pre FFxi anyway.

Except the rogue class in other AD+D games was a devastating damage dealer, hitting hard and very fast. The rogue in NVN-online is this kind of DD, fast and strong, and can also deal damage from distance.

All D+D rogue classes have had dual-wield from the onset, THF only got it because SE decided to give it to DNC.

I don't think SE based their THF design on Rogue, I think that's more ninja than thief.

Daemon

08-21-2013, 04:58 AM

Except the rogue class in other AD+D games was a devastating damage dealer, hitting hard and very fast. The rogue in NVN-online is this kind of DD, fast and strong, and can also deal damage from distance.

All D+D rogue classes have had dual-wield from the onset, THF only got it because SE decided to give it to DNC.

I don't think SE based their THF design on Rogue, I think that's more ninja than thief.

I think the way the DEV team implements jobs, make it only useful for 1 or 2 things to prevent people hopping on to only 1 job the entire game.

Which I think if SE made all jobs useful, eventually it won't matter what job anyone plays because not everybody likes playing 1 job.

Personally I only play Thief for farming, good for doing favors for others when they need TH. Other than that I find the job boring.

Calatilla

08-21-2013, 05:34 AM

That's because, thanks to poor design, Treasure Hunter is the only use THF has. If you don't need Treasure Hunter you don't need a THF. It isn't difficult to make THF into a DD, not on the scale of a 2-hander but not a million miles behind them, SE just doesn't want to.

Stompa

08-21-2013, 08:15 AM

Actually the Rogue class from 1978 D&D all the way through the following 3 decades, was not a damage dealer at all. Originally Rogues in AD&D avoided the battle area entirely and stood in the shadows away from the fight, using slingshots minibows and occasional backstab. The rogue was a support-dd, to help nudge up a few extra hits on the mob while the real DD's tanked and smashed it. The rogue's actual real jobs were lockpicking, ranged attacks (with slings), persuasion/scamming, pickpocketting/pilfering etc. The Rogue had high INT & CHR so he could talk to NPC's on behalf the party and persuade them. This chimes with the original FFxi THF weaponskill - Dancing Edge, which is mainly CHR based.
In any case the poster I was replying to said SE designed THF badly as a DD, and my point really is they just lifted the AD&D Rogue class entirely so SE aren't really to blame if it isnt DD enough or w/e, they were just copying an existing class and hoping ppl would like it. Rogues were feeble DD, they stood in the shadows and watched other people fight while using slingshots shortbows etc. Not DD at all. But Rogue was a cool class, and so is FFxi THF, if you are a roleplayer its a fun job to flesh-out. Also Rogue was useful for lockpicking, backstab ("Sneak-attack" 20 years before FFxi used it) and pilfering ("Steal").
Re; dual-wield, FFxi has subjobs, and since THF wears light armors (same as rogues do) and dies fast, SE had intended you to play the job Thf/Nin with dual-wield and shadows which everyone did since forever. And they did give Thf native DW eventually too.
As for NWN online, I never said FFxi copied that. NWN and some of the other AD&D franchises are not true to the AD&D game that has existed for 30+ years, at all. They are arcade games with an AD&D feel, they are not true AD&D roleplaying games and the rogue class in those games has zero in common with the Rogue ppl played for decades, which was a weak DD.

OmnysValefor

08-21-2013, 08:23 AM

Stompa

08-21-2013, 09:08 AM

I agree entirely with you. But my only point was the reason THF was the way it was in FFxi release, is they knew how popular Rogue was in the D&D dice/tabletop decades and they wanted to appeal to those millions of players and give them a FFxi version.
As a slight mini-edit to my last post, Ad&d Rogue could inflict catastrophic damage on certain mobs in special situations, but its was never about DPS, it was mainly used if there was an enemy spellcaster, the THF would Hide, creep up on the mage while it was casting its first nuke and try for a critical backstab, which could almost kill the mage if you were lucky. That was a centrepiece strategy. Against enemies wearing heavy armor this was far less effective, and since it relied on not being noticed and being basically a one-shot deal it was never DPS really. But I concede Rogue could inflict huge damage but only as a one-off and only if the enemy didn't see him coming.
SE need to revamp a lot of jobs in FFxi imo, THF, BST, DRG and PLD are the three I think of first. They need to make magian weapon/job more free too so f.ex WAR can use magian swords etc. and patch magians to bring them inline with 2013 weaps. Also in 2006~ (and much more in 2010) SE changed BST from a highly skilled specialised job where you had got Bst75 only if you could play the job inside-out and understood charm-chains and the enemy dynamics of different species. Bst used to be about living on your nerves and if you survived it meant you were highly proficient at Beastmaster. With the change from charm-chains to stoutservant jugpets and mulsums, it became seriously unskilled and you can FC bst 30-99 and step out of the FC with incredibly powerful jugpets without any skill involved. Pup and Smn have to skill their pets, Bst used to have to go into the wilderness and charm mobs for months or years to get high lvl pets, but SE changed Bst so its just an uber pet-job with zero effort involved which is why you see so many RMT bsts these days, they dont lvl Pup automaton skills coz it takes time and time is money right.
But will they fix the long overdue stuff, or correct some of the errors they made to existing jobs, I hope so.

Daemon

08-21-2013, 09:26 AM

It doesn't really matter where something is sourced from. The community perception now is that it needs to either heal well, stun well, dd well, or there's no point in bringing it. Since Delve bosses don't depend on TH to drop gear, there's not a lot of reason to bring thf.

Based on THAT alone, SE should tweak the job.

Yeah nothing in SoA for Thief, maybe they intended this job to miss out on all end game events lol. I mean eventually jobs do get singled out and left out of certain content.

OmnysValefor

08-21-2013, 09:53 AM

XD Like paladin :(. Supertanking doesn't count.

Nebo

08-21-2013, 10:05 AM

It's not a great damage dealer, it just isn't. Solo it's even worse, because you have SA once every 3 minutes and no TA (unless you're dualboxing/have an npc, but neither is technically solo).

Interestingly enough, when the game was first released, THF was the best DD in the game. I have seen a lot of people argue over the years that THF isn't designed or intended to be a DD (Not saying you were saying that).

But at the game's release making SATA lines and closing distortion skill chains was so much better than everything else, that most groups had at least two Thieves....for killspeed and DAMAGE. Damage that was so huge that there was no way another DD was going to rip hate off the tank before the monster died.

What has happened is that other DD's have made giant leaps forward - light years ahead. Addition of food/support, better melee/haste gear etc.

Thief has stayed relatively the same. Haste doesn't benefit THF as much as other DDs due to timer bottlenecks and positional requirements. THF is still tied to archaic party mechanics that no one uses, even though the devs like to pretend the game still works this way. SATA lines are no longer give such a huge damage payout so no one uses them.

Thief is a DD that has not been relevant for quite some time, but it was intended to be a tactical DD with large payouts. It was just never allowed to evolve with the game.

It is this process of neglect that has reduced the job to "TH only." Not because that's all the job was designed to bring to the table.

There are other issues too - like all the lock picking, steal...all the Thiefly type stuff that SE took away due to RMT abuse. I think that when the devs see Thief now...all they think is "RMT abuse"

I mean...why else could they think some garbage like Aura steal is "overpowered"

Daemon

08-21-2013, 11:04 AM

Interestingly enough, when the game was first released, THF was the best DD in the game. I have seen a lot of people argue over the years that THF isn't designed or intended to be a DD (Not saying you were saying that).

But at the game's release making SATA lines and closing distortion skill chains was so much better than everything else, that most groups had at least two Thieves....for killspeed and DAMAGE. Damage that was so huge that there was no way another DD was going to rip hate off the tank before the monster died.

What has happened is that other DD's have made giant leaps forward - light years ahead. Addition of food/support, better melee/haste gear etc.

Thief has stayed relatively the same. Haste doesn't benefit THF as much as other DDs due to timer bottlenecks and positional requirements. THF is still tied to archaic party mechanics that no one uses, even though the devs like to pretend the game still works this way. SATA lines are no longer give such a huge damage payout so no one uses them.

Thief is a DD that has not been relevant for quite some time, but it was intended to be a tactical DD with large payouts. It was just never allowed to evolve with the game.

It is this process of neglect that has reduced the job to "TH only." Not because that's all the job was designed to bring to the table.

There are other issues too - like all the lock picking, steal...all the Thiefly type stuff that SE took away due to RMT abuse. I think that when the devs see Thief now...all they think is "RMT abuse"

I mean...why else could they think some garbage like Aura steal is "overpowered"

Looks like its Thiefs turn to step off the stage. They did it to RDM, SMN, DRG, and other jobs. Guess they want the focus to be on Geomancer and Rune. Although If that's the case they need to implement better things to encourage us to play these jobs in SoA. I'm still not convinced enough to drop merits for Geo or Rune.

FrankReynolds

08-21-2013, 01:23 PM

Looks like its Thiefs turn to step off the stage. They did it to RDM, SMN, DRG, and other jobs. Guess they want the focus to be on Geomancer and Rune. Although If that's the case they need to implement better things to encourage us to play these jobs in SoA. I'm still not convinced enough to drop merits for Geo or Rune.

I don't remember DNC or PUP ever being especially popular. Can we have that changed too while their focusing on making the new jobs good? My DNC is aching to have a use and I've always wanted a reason to level pup.

Nebo

08-21-2013, 01:46 PM

Looks like its Thiefs turn to step off the stage.

Thief has been "Off the stage" for many many years now. Thief doesn't even remember what the stage smells like.

Daemon

08-21-2013, 01:49 PM

I don't remember DNC or PUP ever being especially popular. Can we have that changed too while their focusing on making the new jobs good? My DNC is aching to have a use and I've always wanted a reason to level pup.

Yeah all jobs need help. That's why I ranted out a topic 2 months ago. Inventory issues, job imbalances etc.

The thing you guys most likely wont want to hear me say this. But the problem does lie with the community around you when they decide not to invite you because they rather invite someone else with better gear.

Only time I ever saw JP parties ask me to play a specific job is when I joined event like VW and they needed job for proc. every other event I play in my JP LS, I always ask them what job they want me to play and the leaders always say anything I want, it doesn't matter, we only play event for fun.

In other words I've never been discriminated except in all NA parties, including LS. Which is probably why JPs don't understand our way of playing and complaining. I mean they don't create that problem like we do lol.

Daemon

08-21-2013, 01:51 PM

Thief has been "Off the stage" for many many years now. Thief doesn't even remember what the stage smells like.

Not really, Thief was very popular for Abyssea, Shin. It was since VW thief become useless, other than Bully for proc, then again BST was needed for Pet Procs yet no one wanted BST lol.

Nebo

08-21-2013, 02:07 PM

Yeah all jobs need help. That's why I ranted out a topic 2 months ago. Inventory issues, job imbalances etc.

The thing you guys most likely wont want to hear me say this. But the problem does lie with the community around you when they decide not to invite you because they rather invite someone else with better gear.

Only time I ever saw JP parties ask me to play a specific job is when I joined event like VW and they needed job for proc. every other event I play in my JP LS, I always ask them what job they want me to play and the leaders always say anything I want, it doesn't matter, we only play event for fun.

In other words I've never been discriminated except in all NA parties, including LS. Which is probably why JPs don't understand our way of playing and complaining. I mean they don't create that problem like we do lol.

That's not a JP vs NA thing. That's just your group. JP's are just as picky when it comes to jobs, skill and gear.

If they even invite you.

"JP Onry" is a very real and common thing. If anything, on average, they are MORE discriminatory.

Nebo

08-21-2013, 02:09 PM

Not really, Thief was very popular for Abyssea, Shin. It was since VW thief become useless, other than Bully for proc, then again BST was needed for Pet Procs yet no one wanted BST lol.

THF has been in this boat long before VW.

And Abyssea is Abyssea. That is not THF being on the stage, that is Abyssea allowing everyone to turn on God Mode with Atmas.

OmnysValefor

08-21-2013, 02:23 PM

I'm truly sorry to say this, but until a DNC can crank out numbers like a WAR, it makes sense that the group looks for wars.

To turn a similar phrase on myself: Until PLD can hold hate like a monk or war, it makes sense that the group doesn't want me on the boss.

Even PLD, as much as I love it, I know when it's impractical to bring it, and I'm not inclined to bring it to such things. It is not the community that imposes this on each other.

Some of the best geared topend players I know have soft spots for jobs they love like nin, dnc, pld, rdm, blm, run, thf, drg (pld gets to supertank, and drg gets to go sometimes for Angon) and most desire that SE would bring some of those jobs into the spotlight, but until they do, players know they're impractical.

I built an Aegis and Ochain during mid-late Abyssea, I know all about building gearsets that I never got to really use.

As for DNC, PUP, NIN, and BLU's uses... All 4, properly understood, should excel at being an independent killer in new skirmish.

Daemon

08-21-2013, 02:32 PM

THF has been in this boat long before VW.

And Abyssea is Abyssea. That is not THF being on the stage, that is Abyssea allowing everyone to turn on God Mode with Atmas.

Well I don't know about you but people always asked me to TH zone bosses, EMP trial NMs on top of +2's.

But when you say LONG, my main is RDM and well we've been under the bed tucked in a shoe box buried in the basement over the past several years too long to remember when we actually had any purpose.

Demon6324236

08-21-2013, 02:38 PM

XD Like paladin :(. Supertanking doesn't count.At least PLD has a use in WKs though. Nothing in Adoulin at all has called for a THF, I mean hell, when it came out they could not even be bothered to think of adding things for Steal, it took them like 2 months to even add things you could steal. Also, TH has had next to no effect on the content, the only things I think a THF would matter for is outside NMs, to help bead drops/gear drops, something no one does, and Airlixirs, which you get more of if you bring a proper DD of equal skill/gear. All in all, I have to say, PLD at least has something going for it, and its even required for an event, while THF sadly cant say the same.

Nebo

08-21-2013, 02:49 PM

Well I don't know about you but people always asked me to TH zone bosses, EMP trial NMs on top of +2's.

But when you say LONG, my main is RDM and well we've been under the bed tucked in a shoe box buried in the basement over the past several years too long to remember when we actually had any purpose.

That should give you a better idea then, becuase THF has been in this boat LONG before RDM was useless.

Daemon

08-21-2013, 04:18 PM

That should give you a better idea then, becuase THF has been in this boat LONG before RDM was useless.

Since when? Maybe you can enlighten me, Thief was always invited for exp groups back in the day. Sharkbite.

Always invited to Sky, HNM events, Abbysea, Salvage, Limbus, Dyna.. And whatever else I'm missing.

I don't even call VW a proper event because proc system made it easy. Then again who invited RDM over SCH and BLMs?

RDM became irrelevant in most events due to resist/completely resist enfeebling along with giving the majority of our unique spells to anyone subbing RDM =p.

And most mages subbed RDM making us worth less.

Other than Haste and heals as RDM, Thief was always included in events where TH, Feint, Collaberator, SATA needed to steal/direct hate.

In Abyssea THF could duo most NMs with a healer. I know I partied almost all my seals/+2s with 1 Thief as a BLM.

Definitely had one farming Emp trials.

It's different now because SoA requires more than what is being offered on the table for THF.

FrankReynolds

08-21-2013, 11:23 PM

Since when? Maybe you can enlighten me, Thief was always invited for exp groups back in the day. Sharkbite.

That was like 8 years ago.

Always invited to Sky, HNM events,

"Come on red mage and invite my mule. He will tag it with TH. Afterwards drop him and get the bard back in".

Abbysea,

If all the procs are covered

Salvage,

"You get cells last"

Limbus,

I'll give you that one.

Dyna..

the last three years, only to solo, but even then, if you have 2 people, one should just sub thf.

on't even call VW a proper event because proc system made it easy. Then again who invited RDM over SCH and BLMs?

RDM became irrelevant in most events due to resist/completely resist enfeebling along with giving the majority of our unique spells to anyone subbing RDM =p.

And most mages subbed RDM making us worth less.

Which is why I quit playing the job :/

Other than Haste and heals as RDM, Thief was always included in events where TH, Feint, Collaberator, SATA needed to steal/direct hate.

I did a lot of stuff on thf. I shared parses with my LSs showing me in the top 3 DDs consistently at evens where they let me go thf. They still made me go RDM most of the time because it was that much more useful and you could usually use a few at an event. Luckily I liked that job, so it was a win/win.

In Abyssea THF could duo most NMs with a healer. I know I partied almost all my seals/+2s with 1 Thief as a BLM.

Definitely had one farming Emp trials.

I did most of my LS abyssea runs as BLM or BLU for procs. I did all my other stuff as NIN with my alt on WHM/THF. It worked well. I only went / brought a thief when all procs were covered and nobody minded because damage isn't an issue in abyssea.

It's different now because SoA requires more than what is being offered on the table for THF.

True story. They made the job all gimpy based on treasure hunter and then released an entire expansion that doesn't use treasure hunter.

Nebo

08-22-2013, 08:15 AM

Since when? Maybe you can enlighten me, Thief was always invited for exp groups back in the day. Sharkbite.

The only time SATAWS on THF was a relevant source of damage was during leveling up when Viper Bite was a competitive WS. By the time THF gets Sharkbite, people had already moved on to SATAWS with 2 Handers, which did more damage.

Until they moved on to TP spam and abandoned SATA lines altogether because they did less damage.

Always invited to Sky, HNM events, Abbysea, Salvage, Limbus, Dyna.. And whatever else I'm missing.

Which is the issue we are talking about. They were not invited for any other purpose than Treasure Hunter (damage, utility or otherwise).

I don't even call VW a proper event because proc system made it easy. Then again who invited RDM over SCH and BLMs?

The same can be said of Abyssea, which was 100X easier than Voidwatch.

RDM became irrelevant in most events due to resist/completely resist enfeebling along with giving the majority of our unique spells to anyone subbing RDM =p.

RDM for a very very long period of the game was one of the most in damand jobs. This didn;t change until the level cap raise, which is relatively recent in the game's history

Other than Haste and heals as RDM, Thief was always included in events where TH, Feint, Collaberator, SATA needed to steal/direct hate.

You are stating a lot of utility in that sentence that Thief simply does not have. TH is the only reason people bring a THF to anything. TH is a weak passive trait and feint really isn't relevant because Accuracy is accounted for with support setups. A dd slot would not be wasted to bring a THF for feint...which is why you don;t see groups bringing them for it.

No one brings THF to SATA or manage hate or any of that.

In Abyssea THF could duo most NMs with a healer. I know I partied almost all my seals/+2s with 1 Thief as a BLM.

Almost any job +whm could duo anything in Abyssea. Besides which, Treasure Hunter is a secondary concern to getting your weakness triggers in order. If you have a choice between bringing BLM and TH for +2 farming for example...you bring the BLM, not the THF (or just have the BLM/THF).

It's different now because SoA requires more than what is being offered on the table for THF

Yeah, there really isn;t much of anything in SoA for the Thief job

Daemon

08-22-2013, 08:51 AM

THF has been in this boat LONG before RDM was useless.

My point was THF was included in a variety of events than RDM. Since ToAu release RDM started on the path of becoming useless when SE implemented Mage Ballad for Bard. Evokers Roll for Corsair.

Resist / Completely resist was implement before cap was raised to 99. If i remember correctly this happened during 75 era. RDM was highly popular in a sense that we could enfeeble, Refresh and Phalanx Paladin Kiting HNM and step in to Kite giving fallen party members time to recover. Because SE added Resist and Completely resist, highly used spells such as Gravity, Bind, made the concept of kiting completely useless. Therefore RDM was unable to be useful and people started giving up on playing the job because other than being a secondary healer, RDM is not a primary DD that could hold hate and completely resist made it pointless for end game.

As for THF, yes I agree that the job is only used for Treasure hunter. Shark bite example was meant to be the example of how thief was popular 8 years ago, of course no one uses that now because this example was meant to take you back during the time 6 man groups were formed for exp. this was even before level sync was implemented.

At least throughout time THF was still included as a first priority to events that wanted rare items unlike RDM too many other jobs were invited that could replace us because RDM was never good at anything else other than a secondary healer, Refresh, Enfeebling.

As level cap rised, RDM became pointless when other jobs were allowed to carry most of our trademark spells such as Dispel, Gravity, Refresh, Phalanx.

Upon releasing Scholar, RDM was no longer invited for anything because Accession allowed the ability to share Enspells, Phalanx, Refresh. Also Convert encouraged jobs to sub RDM.

As for Thief duo in Abyssea, thief has the ability to be an evasion tanker by subbing Ninja for utsusemi and having 2 evasion Magian trial daggers with gear. (Which is why I said most people I partied with were THF)

Collaborator allowed THF to keep hate when tanking mobs. Or used in party to help mages when THF was invited for TH.

Feint was still used in Abyssea. Whether or not accuracy could be accounted for through support not every party brought the proper support which still made the ability still useful.

Maybe no one invited THF primarily for Feint but it was still used.

Anyways the main point of why I brought up this discussion is yes Thief is lacking the ability to be useful at Endgame. As the job deteriorated throughout the years, Now Treasure Hunter, which was the main reason THF was invited to all events, is being left out in SoA making Thief useless.

Also as I see the Devs are implementing all this iLvL gear, I'm hoping they haven't forgotten jobs such as THF.

As for Thief Knife example in my original post, this was meant to show the DEV Team how far behind THF is falling.

Nebo

08-22-2013, 02:06 PM

My point was THF was included in a variety of events than RDM. Since ToAu release RDM started on the path of becoming useless when SE implemented Mage Ballad for Bard. Evokers Roll for Corsair.

RDM was one of the most sought after jobs in the ToAU era. I remember having a VERY tough time getting into PUG groups on THF in ToAU. If memory serves, that's when I leveled BRD and learned to meripo pull.

Shark bite example was meant to be the example of how thief was popular 8 years ago, of course no one uses that now because this example was meant to take you back during the time 6 man groups were formed for exp. this was even before level sync was implemented.

SATA Shark Bite was never popular is my point. SATA Shark Bite was inferior to...SATA Spinning Slash for example. No one invited Thieves for SATA lines in exp parties back then at those levels. They invited 2 Handed DD/THF that could SATAWS for more damage. It was very hard to get invites on THF for exp. at those levels.

As for Thief duo in Abyssea, thief has the ability to be an evasion tanker by subbing Ninja for utsusemi and having 2 evasion Magian trial daggers with gear. (Which is why I said most people I partied with were THF)

THF is not the only (or even the best job) that can duo tank things in Abyssea though. Evasion gear was not needed, nor was /nin (but was useful sometimes for yellow procs, not specifically shadows). Almost every DD can do what you just described with a WHM/THF and produce identical results - Better if you are a NIN needing KI procs, a MNK or WAR needing Blue Procs, a BLM needed yellow procs etc.

Treasure Hunter is third string in Abyssea

Collaborator allowed THF to keep hate when tanking mobs. Or used in party to help mages when THF was invited for TH.

It might be useful for helping mages if not for the short range...and long/shared cool downs. Low man tanking is about all I find Collaborator to be useful for...but SE doesn't really want THF to be tanking...I digress.

Feint was still used in Abyssea. Whether or not accuracy could be accounted for through support not every party brought the proper support which still made the ability still useful.

Eh, I want to say that Feint had zero use in abyssea. But an argument can be made for low skill rated weapons for procs. Even then though, it's not really worth bringing a THF for that purpose...even at low skill, with atmas and cruor buffs, feint is hardly something I would consider valuable.

Anyways the main point of why I brought up this discussion is yes Thief is lacking the ability to be useful at Endgame. As the job deteriorated throughout the years, Now Treasure Hunter, which was the main reason THF was invited to all events, is being left out in SoA making Thief useless.

I can agree with that. But hey, at least they separated the timers for steal/despoil (and added some useless things for us to despoil form new monsters):rolleyes:

Nebo

08-22-2013, 02:08 PM

Also as I see the Devs are implementing all this iLvL gear, I'm hoping they haven't forgotten jobs such as THF.

I don't think they've forgotten about the job, but it certainly feels like they don't know what to do with it.

RMTs abused all the lock picking, item stealing etc stuff that made thief really unique so they took it away.

It was once a powerful (and tactical) damage dealer at a certain level and pace of the game. That is no longer the case. There was a high reward for the skill it took to play THF well...that reward no longer exists and almost everything the job has left is laughably weak.

They say enmity this and enmity that, but they don't know how to give THF enmity abilities that are worth anything.

I think Thief players now are just like drug addicts...chasing the feeling that was there the first time they played the job, but never getting it again. The first time they closed a SATAVB distortion Skill chain Magic Burst and watched a monster explode. The first time they pulled an astral ring out of a coffer, the first time they sold a stack of gold beast coins.

Now, it's just a weak damage dealer with unreasonable restrictions that has a weak, passive random number generator enhancing trait.

Daemon

08-22-2013, 02:18 PM

I don't think they've forgotten about the job, but it certainly feels like they don't know what to do with it.

RMTs abused all the lock picking, item stealing etc stuff that made thief really unique so they took it away.

It was once a powerful (and tactical) damage dealer at a certain level and pace of the game. That is no longer the case. There was a high reward for the skill it took to play THF well...that reward no longer exists and almost everything the job has left is laughably weak.

They say enmity this and enmity that, but they don't know how to give THF enmity abilities that are worth anything.

I think Thief players now are just like drug addicts...chasing the feeling that was there the first time they played the job, but never getting it again. The first time they closed a SATAVB distortion Skill chain Magic Burst and watched a monster explode. The first time they pulled an astral ring out of a coffer, the first time they sold a stack of gold beast coins.

Now, it's just a weak damage dealer with unreasonable restrictions that has a weak, passive random number generator enhancing trait.

Yeah I just think SE "Could" be much more creative in adding things to thief. I mean I made a TP topic about the fact that losing TP upon switching weapons prevent new ideas.

I think as a tactical way of participating in parties would be adding various Debuff daggers. Sort of like making thief a DD version of Redmage.

Since Thief can attack very fast multiple times. Stats can be shifted to balance thief power based on the debuff of the dagger being used.

Things like Drain TP, Drain MP, Reduce INT, Reduce STR, as dagger debuffs to help the party maintain control like RDM enfeebling magic.

Even adding dagger weapons like Curse, Doom, Death, Petrification would be cool except these weapons would have to be treated as Holy Grail weapons for serious players who play Thief as a main job.

Although we don't even have a spell that allows us to petrify monsters effectively I think it would be cool to follow a different concept than Break. The concept of Petrify should be like stoneskin but stronger. The amount of damage party hits petrified mob would break Petrification.

Or adding new things like grenades, bombs, traps, things to temporarily stop a mob or boss.

Then again Rocket Launchers would be nice too.

Nebo

08-23-2013, 07:07 AM

Lots of discussions on the Thief boards about job updates. I'm not really a fan of debuff things, only because there are already so many support options that it likely wouldn't give THF any competitive advantage

I'm more for the DD increase with enmity utility these days. My current favorite is my most recent revamp suggestion found here:

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/34913-SoA-and-the-future-Can-the-Thief-job-be-saved?p=449038&viewfull=1#post449038

Aside from the fact that THF has weaker overall potential for damage, even when able to meet its positional requirements 100% and ride SATA timers as they are available...

...the greater problem with the whole "positional requirements" shtick is that no other jobs HAVE to play by those rules to do well. Yeah, SAM has overwhelm, and NIN has Innin, but not fulfilling those requirements does not cause their WS to suck immensely. So you have THF, trying to run around and play the positional game solo.

It is a hassle for groups to try to accommodate THF's positional DD nature. THF DD is too weak to create a positional strategy around. So groups invite jobs with greater DD potential that they don't have to think about.

If they REALLY wanted to bring back tanking and tactical positioning they'd make it so that certain enemies have damage resistance and the only way to break it is to keep the monster still and not constantly changing enmity targets. They could even add a system similar to stagger in FF13 which granted a damage multiplier that was increased by magic damage and sustained by physical combat.

OR they could limit the types and amount of jobs that can be in a party. You want a challenge? Ok now you HAVE to fill party slots with one of: 1 Tank (PLD/NIN/RUN) , 1 Light DD (THF/PUP/BLU/BST/DNC), 1 Heavy DD(RNG/DRK/SAM/WAR/MNK/DRG) 1 Healer (WHM/SCH/RDM) 1 Support (BRD/COR/GEO) and 1 Magic Damage (BLM/SMN/SCH).

Create a situation where the most efficient way to deal damage is to coordinate skillchains and MB, control monsters positionally, etc.....but eh, that's a different topic.

I think all the THF mains I know have long since given up that SE is going to throw the job a meaningful bone.

I really don't think the problem is so much that THF deals less damage than other DD's. It's that we don't get to participate as a result. And short of a complete overhaul of current battle mechanics, I don't believe anything other than a DD boost is going to allow THF to participate. The best utility a melee can offer is to be able to make things deader faster with dramatic increases from proper support. THF gains a lot less from proper support than other jobs.

OmnysValefor

08-23-2013, 07:12 AM

People keep bringing up enmity.. Did I miss something or did SE say something new about enmity?

The enmity update in April had nothing to do with tanking, but that healers were just putting out way too much hate in the course of a battle. While it did temporarily make tanking feasible, at least for small groups, that was only a coincidental side-effect, delve weapons broke it the very next week.

- - -

On topic, yeah, I hate being on thf because the mob is usually spinning, you can't effectively SA or TA. The player in front of you fidgets, or you misjudge, and that dps is lost, as well as a chance at a proc for the reason the group invited you.

Nebo

08-24-2013, 10:40 AM

People keep bringing up enmity.. Did I miss something or did SE say something new about enmity?

Probably because enmity manipulation is one of the roles that SE keeps trying to tell the players that they should bring a THF along for.

They just can't seem to give us anything meaningful to manipulate enmity.

Calatilla

08-24-2013, 09:54 PM

If they REALLY wanted to bring back tanking and tactical positioning they'd make it so that certain enemies have damage resistance and the only way to break it is to keep the monster still and not constantly changing enmity targets. They could even add a system similar to stagger in FF13 which granted a damage multiplier that was increased by magic damage and sustained by physical combat.

If they did that then you'd just bring back PLD tanking with DD/THF SA+WS for hate holding, wouldn't change anything for THF.

OR they could limit the types and amount of jobs that can be in a party. You want a challenge? Ok now you HAVE to fill party slots with one of: 1 Tank (PLD/NIN/RUN) , 1 Light DD (THF/PUP/BLU/BST/DNC), 1 Heavy DD(RNG/DRK/SAM/WAR/MNK/DRG) 1 Healer (WHM/SCH/RDM) 1 Support (BRD/COR/GEO) and 1 Magic Damage (BLM/SMN/SCH).

PLD, BLU, WAR, WHM, BRD, SCH depending on mob weakness etc you`d maybe swap PLD for RUN and WAR for DRG or SAM but you won't ever add a THF in there unless you needed TH simple as....

Probably because enmity manipulation is one of the roles that SE keeps trying to tell the players that they should bring a THF along for.

They just can't seem to give us anything meaningful to manipulate enmity.

SE keep saying THF is an enmity manipulator, which job was it that was getting a new enmity SP? oh yea, thats right SCH, well played SE well played

Karbuncle

08-25-2013, 02:32 AM

This is another example of the stigma THF Gets, people still can't comprehend that a good THF can out DD many a folk, I'm not going to bother reposting it but you can find the link in a previous post in this thread that shows a THF no less within 1~2% below and above Oatix MNKs in Tojil runs... All the credibility is there and no amount of strawmen will change THF's potential.

The DD were good, the MNKs were good, the THF was good. Having a D:108~ Dagger really does help. THF is just screwed on weaponskills, I can say with certainty if that THF Could have used Mercy Stroke with the Delve MB Dagger, they'd of done much better in the parse.

THF isn't above and beyond a Terrible DD, Its just most if not all people play it with incredible mediocrity so you have a hard time convincing anyone of letting you in the DD Party, and its much more gear and competency controlled than ay other mindless DD job... but equally buffed and extremely well geared, a THF Will provide substantial DD potential as well as being able to contribute whatever meaning TH has.

Its not to say the job isn't in serious need of a rehaul, but a lot of our woes could be solved by more people playing the job well, which unfortunately doesn't happen because its a very very hard job to play well and its extremely gear reliant.

OmnysValefor

08-25-2013, 03:09 AM

I'd love to see the thread if you could give me a hint as key phrases to search for.

Because honestly, take away SA, TA, because those are more frustrating than useful in zergs, and thf is a "DD" without native DD enhancement besides Triple Attack II (6% supposedly), and Assassin's Charge. The new daggers hit harder, but dagger is still, by design, a weapon that doesn't hit hard. I would say that I never see thf really competitive for damage, but it's also true that thf isn't in the DD parties so I agree it has the potential for more than it usually does.

Of course, a thf competing for damage would also likely sub war, just like all the other DDs, but in a practical environment, thf should sub dnc in lieu of a real dnc for stutter step and the benefit that gives to the group, samba, and sure, even the ability to waltz himself.

Of course, stutter step isn't as necessary anymore, right now, but new delve may bring back its usefulness.

Nebo

08-25-2013, 05:09 AM

If they did that then you'd just bring back PLD tanking with DD/THF SA+WS for hate holding, wouldn't change anything for THF...

..PLD, BLU, WAR, WHM, BRD, SCH depending on mob weakness etc you`d maybe swap PLD for RUN and WAR for DRG or SAM but you won't ever add a THF in there unless you needed TH.

I agree none of those things would specifically help THF without adjustment to the job. That was more in the context of party variety and group mechanics that could be more inclusive to the various types of jobs the game has.

It was intended more of an example to illustrate that there are things they could do to change the paradigm away from Melee + Support Zerg all the things.

People do it because it's the most efficient way to do it. Change the most efficient way to do it and people will do it differently.

Demon6324236

08-25-2013, 07:29 AM

If they want THF to be good for enmity they could simply change Trick Attack so that it gives all of the enmity the THF has to the person in front of them rather than only the enmity for a single attack. That alone would mean a THF could rip hate off of other people with their current JAs and then throw a large chunk of enmity at a tank with Trick Attack.

Demon6324236

08-25-2013, 07:32 AM

People do it because it's the most efficient way to do it. Change the most efficient way to do it and people will do it differently.People also do it because its the only way to get it done. If you tried to go slowish on a Tojil run, let a PLD tank and bring support jobs to allow the PLD to tank rather than zerg it, you would never reach Tojil. It would take you to long to get to him.

Karbuncle

08-25-2013, 07:32 AM

I'd love to see the thread if you could give me a hint as key phrases to search for.

Technically we have Triple Attack+11% As if you're a THF and dont merit Triple Attack you deserve your THF Badge taken away :P.

Still, First report, a tad doom and gloom, but see below for the final.

I took my THF into Tojil run last weekend, was not happy with the results. Against Tojil, I did 13% while the SAM was 21%, MNKs were 19%, 16% and 13%(died). DRG was 15%. Mercy was doing 1.5k the first 25%, about 8k the second 25% when it's weak to piercing and 4k the rest of the time. Don't think I got chaos rolls though, though I did pop RCB and berserk. Exenterator was doing laughable damage the whole way through, doing about 1/3 to 1/2 the damage of Mercy Stroke.

Not to say that THF DD was ever amazing, but the further we're forced to go on without upgrading Mercy Stroke, the further behind we'll fall.

Second report

After people started leaving, I jumped my THF to the main DD party and the results weren't bad. First run had me at 14%, drg 15%, mnks 16%/16%/18%/18%. Second run had me at 17.5%, mnks at 16%/17.8%/18%/18% and one pickup mnk at 10%; my damage picked up a bit because I wasn't sharing piercing weak with the drg anymore. Third run we wiped because being a DD, main curing and being the only stunner is a bad idea. Seems alt+tab'ing can only do so much. I don't run a bot, so people died, stun resisted and we wiped.

And also, the core members of my group are all top tier players, have mostly capped gear and everyone has mega boss weapons, and know how to play their job well, so I'm not parsing against a bunch of gimps.

Both made by the same person, a very reputable person, and a THF i look up too. I believe they've posted here before. If so, Sorry for draggin' ya into this :D

detlef

08-25-2013, 08:40 AM

Dunno man, the guy was on stun duty, main curing, AND playing a DD job but was still able to be competitive? Just seems too good to be true.

Karbuncle

08-25-2013, 09:21 AM

I imagine it must seem that way, but personally I believe they're a well known and respected THF who knows their sh*t. I trust them as they have no real reason to lie. People just fail to believe the potential THF has because theres so many mediocre gimps that the mediocrity has become the norm and expected.

Demon6324236

08-25-2013, 09:51 AM

People just fail to believe the potential THF has because theres so many mediocre gimps that the mediocrity has become the norm and expected.It was not till I read this that I fully understood how similar RDM & THF are so far as their place in this game goes, as I feel the same way for RDM.

OmnysValefor

08-25-2013, 09:52 AM

Yep, /shame, I forgot about the merit lol.

A mandau thf competing with Oatixur mnks seems to be good to be true. I mean honestly, people wouldn't expect a mandau thf to keep pace with a Vere or Spharai Mnk.

Karbuncle

08-25-2013, 10:03 AM

They didn't use Mandau on the second parse as far as i know, But instead used the Megaboss Dagger/Aphotic.

Mandau was only one the first run where you can see they fell behind a strong amount.

Nebo

08-25-2013, 03:33 PM

They didn't use Mandau on the second parse as far as i know, But instead used the Megaboss Dagger/Aphotic.

Mandau was only one the first run where you can see they fell behind a strong amount.

my damage picked up a bit because I wasn't sharing piercing weak with the drg anymore.

I'm sure he did fine, but in my opinion, there too many factors at play that could account for his % that have nothing to do with The THF job being a competitive DD at tojil.

It's a nice parse, but it doesn't specifically prove much.

Karbuncle

08-25-2013, 03:46 PM

Proves at the very least THF can perform competently if they gear right and aren't terrible. The fact he was able to even get 17.5% regardless of having 25% Piercing bonus window means its pretty decent.

Kincard

08-25-2013, 07:55 PM

I've read similar threads to this one several times so excuse me if I skip over the debate and just drop in:

They should just detect anybody who wears Thief's Knife + Asn Armlets + Raid. Poulaines for more than 30 seconds straight and autoban them.

That is all. Carry on.

OmnysValefor

08-26-2013, 01:11 AM

Witty and cute, except that they advise players to do it.

I can understand max TH gear being necessary for a hit (it's still flawed design that a very weak weapon is part of that), but the amount of TH you have shouldn't affect the upgrade rate.

If anything, if they really feel gear should be part of that, make it part of armlets +2. "Increases the upgrade rate of treasure hunter.".

Kincard

08-26-2013, 10:05 PM

They also advise players to use Ninjas as tanks. SE puts things in their games without consulting how the players view the mechanics, or in cases like this, plain common sense. If you anything more than put on your TH gear for the initial tag and opt to spend 5x the amount of time slowly white-hitting something to death using your Thief's Knife you have a very distorted concept of opportunity cost. The testing that has been done for TH past level 2 suggests that each level comes out to being an extra pair of trousers from a monster every 100 trousers.

Even if you want to argue that that's one more than you would've gotten, think about that from a "how often/long am I playing this game" perspective- you are going on 100 runs to kill 100 hellbeasts and unless you are a obsessive person that runs 5 times a day, this means you're getting maybe 1 extra pair of trousers every year or something. The initial tag of TH7 is worth it because it only takes a couple seconds of your time and it's an increase of 4-5% over what you would've had otherwise. Spending 10 minutes hitting something hoping to go above lv8 or 9 (even getting to 9 requires like 100 rounds in TH7 gear on average) is insane. Keep in mind the evidence suggests that it's not an absolute increase of 1% otherwise it would certainly be worth it for low-drop items. Before Adoulin came along I might've accepted people meleeing in the armlets and the boots because it was the knife that really hurt your DPS, but with the massive power creep in armor stats coming too the armlets and the boots are also problems now.

The fact that some guy at the SE headquarters who probably doesn't even play the game came up with this mechanic and made it so worthless nearly makes me have an aneurysm every time I think about it. It's so stupid that the only way it would make sense to me is that they realized how obsessive their playerbase is and thought of it as a diabolical plan to artificially increase your playtime while making you think you're actually getting something done when you see those feathers fly out of your dagger.

(Yes I know I sound cranky, but srsly actively trying to increase your TH is a waste of time)

OmnysValefor

08-27-2013, 12:55 AM

I never said a thing about white-hitting something to death. I hate people that do that at Behemoth. I especially hate people that do that single-wielding a thief's knife.

It's already achievable with the 9% belt, or a 7% belt and Ionis, but it won't be long before haste-capping with TH gear on is commonplace. I can't imagine that hands and boots being on are a huge dps loss when you're switching them for ws, as you should be.

Maybe I'd feel different if thf was being invited to things where the speed of the kill was vital, or even worth concern. Certainly, if they change the mechanics of the class, it would be time to rethink things. As for solo farming, like dynamis, I can't help but kill too fast Izi and Apho melt everything solo.

Kincard

08-27-2013, 01:52 AM

I can't imagine that hands and boots being on are a huge dps loss when you're switching them for ws, as you should be.

It was already a pretty big drop in DPS in old pre-Adoulin sets, in the ballpark of 5% or so (This is without losing any haste btw, I used to swap out Raiders Armlets +2 and Asn. Poulaines +2 for the TH stuff before Salvage 2 came along), basically the only time I bothered meleeing in it, like you, was in Dynamis before I had procced anything because I usually just kill them before I am able to proc them, so might as well get some chances at some extra TH. Other than that I can think of one situation where the increased THF damage doesn't matter- places where THF is taken to poke monster for TH and then run back. In these cases you can just full time the TH and maybe plant random sneak attacks and hope for the best.

If hands and feet weren't ilevel slots it wouldn't be as big a deal, but now you're losing like 40-50 base stats etc from swapping the two out, it can make a really big difference (not to mention now those slots DO have haste now). I wouldn't be surprised by a 15+% drop in DPS simply by wearing the TH stuff. THF gets a lot of its damage from TP phase.

But you are right that there's a lot of other things they could fix for the job. Personally I think they should just remove the stupid TH level up mechanic though, because players that don't know any better think it actually does something. I'll take the 10 less bills a week from Dynamis, I can handle it.

(In b4 their solution is to make AF1+2 all have TH+5 on it so THFs only ever wear that anymore, "we want you to assess the situation and see when you should be wearing full Rogue's+2 or gear 10 levels higher")

Karbuncle

08-27-2013, 11:13 AM

It's already achievable with the 9% belt, or a 7% belt and Ionis, but it won't be long before haste-capping with TH gear on is commonplace. I can't imagine that hands and boots being on are a huge dps loss when you're switching them for ws, as you should be.

Maybe I'd feel different if thf was being invited to things where the speed of the kill was vital, or even worth concern. Certainly, if they change the mechanics of the class, it would be time to rethink things. As for solo farming, like dynamis, I can't help but kill too fast Izi and Apho melt everything solo.

I think i see your logic. You think THF is a useless job and its just not accepted in endgame, and therefor you care so little about it its difficult for you to comprehend that people who truly love the job hate the idea of TH and the failed logic of keeping said gear on and the "Im hr 4 th imma th" mindset that makes normally logical people play like mediocre retards half-a**ing their way to high levels of PlaceboHunter.

That's not to say that's your playstyle, but its the playstle of many-a-thief. Regardless, back before I.lv gear, Hands/Feet being swapped meant that you were, for an example lets say you were using EMp+2 Hands and Relic+2 Feet. Here's the differences.

Treasure Hunter Fulltime TP:

Useful Armor:

Loss from Fulltime TH Gear:

Gains:

I.E Massiv Differences... Even before I.lv Gear. After Item level gear? Well use Iuitl Hands and Iuitl Feet, which will take you like an hour or less worth of effort to obtain. We'll not add Augments (Which would likely be Double Attack+2% each). But here...

Net Gains from Iuitl Gear

This isn't mentioning PDT-8% and Dbl Atk+4% from both pieces with perfect augments, and I'm leaving out some of the more useless stuff (Snapshot, MDB), and i'm not mentioning the gigantic DEF Gain, honestly if you don't see how this stuff would vastly, VASTLY impact your melee DPS and survivability i don't think you're looking hard enough. The DEX alone is enough to make your dDEX capped on many a thing... It has more of everything except Accuracy, which is made up for in spades through the large DEX bonuses.

Even if the haste doesn't apply because you cap it elsewhere, you're going to be losing significant amounts of DPS fulltiming TH Gear even if only during the TP phase.

OmnysValefor

08-27-2013, 12:25 PM

Genuinely, thank you for a serious and informative reply.

It truly is tragic that the job has fallen to bits when there are players that truly love it. The same for RDM, PLD, SMN and a few others.

I think i see your logic. You think THF is a useless job and its just not accepted in endgame, and therefor you care so little about it its difficult for you to comprehend that people who truly love the job hate the idea of TH and the failed logic of keeping said gear on and the "Im hr 4 th imma th" mindset that makes normally logical people play like mediocre retards half-a**ing their way to high levels of PlaceboHunter.

More or less, yeah. That's the case. Except no, it's not difficult for me to comprehend people wanting the job to be more. I am, after all, a paladin. Like you thieves, I still play the job to my very best but I know that the enmity set and the ws set and the different TP sets I carry, depending on whether or not I think my enemy can kill me, are mostly useless. I know that if I showed up in merely my supertanking gear and 40 or 50 free spaces, noone would notice.

In many situations, if I showed up in any gear and just twilight-zombied, noone would notice.

Still, for what meager place PLD has, I am the best pld I can be. ^^

That's not to say that's your playstyle, but its the playstle of many-a-thief. Regardless, back before I.lv gear, Hands/Feet being swapped meant that you were, for an example lets say you were using EMp+2 Hands and Relic+2 Feet. Here's the differences.

Treasure Hunter Fulltime TP:

Useful Armor:

Loss from Fulltime TH Gear:

Gains:

I.E Massiv Differences... Even before I.lv Gear. After Item level gear? Well use Iuitl Hands and Iuitl Feet, which will take you like an hour or less worth of effort to obtain. We'll not add Augments (Which would likely be Double Attack+2% each). But here...

Net Gains from Iuitl Gear

Okay, and if I was thief playing in that content, I'd definitely be doing that, but nobody is a thief playing in that content. There's no reason to bring a thief to that level of content. In most the places I farm, because I don't farm in adoulin, because there's just not real money drops, Maybe I'm not capped on the potency of stats (ddex, etc), but I'm pretty close--I'm probably attack-capped, and in that situation, all I'm losing is 4 DA since the stuff usually isn't hitting me harder than drain samba can take care of.

Even if the haste doesn't apply because you cap it elsewhere, you're going to be losing significant amounts of DPS fulltiming TH Gear even if only during the TP phase.

In the content thieves are doing... they don't lose that much dps. The only major hit to DPS is that stupid dagger.

I am all for buffing thieves, and buffing the desire to have them there. I'm all for getting rid of that stupid dagger, but until they do either, I'm happy with my thief optimized for where it's at.

Like my paladin, I respect that some thieves want to take it to the very limit but I have no logic reason to hate on a paladin who has accepted what paladin is, and I think it's not a bad thing that some people have accepted the "value" (I don't like that word, but couldn't think of a better one) of TP'ing in TH gear. It's basically kill speed vs the quality of TH. In trivial content, neither one greatly outshines the other. Sometimes TH7, or TH9, or whatever may just be the reason the 100 piece dropped. We simply can't know why something dropped, merely that it did, or it didn't.

Karbuncle

08-27-2013, 12:52 PM

To me, Its not about "Accepting what Thief is". For all intents and purpose I'm rarely invited to a party on Thief to "TH and gtfo", my goal is Treasure Hunter and Damage, and most thieves fail to understand the "Damage" Part which is the issue. I propose Thief's who fulltime TH Gear for any phase (TP or otherwise) have forgotten their role in a party all together as they are more than just TH whores, they have the potential for aiding in the fight in more than just the Placebo pill Job Trait. The fact that Thieves have forgotten how to damage and not simply accept "I'm a TH" is the core reason why the job is fallen to such a dismal state. There's not an event in existence right now that would be made or broke based on a Thief being in a DD party.

So, I hate Thieves who use "Treasure Hunter" as an excuse to be gimp... Let me try to explain it best i can. Paladin is a great defensive job, Magical and Physical. Imagine an alternate universe where PLDs all have Aegis in the form of a Job trait. 50% MDT, breaks cap... Now, imagine because of this they are invited a good deal for said Job trait to tank magical enemies, but still able to easily use Ochain to tank Physically... But over time people just adopt "Aegis" as their key role, and the ability for PLDs to tank Physically heavy enemies become harder because PLDs adopt the mindset "I'm only here for Aegis" and fail to gear the job properly for its other roles, in this case, taking physical damage.

Now, imagine you are a PLD who utilize Ochain and know you can tank Physically as well as magically, but due to the incompetence of your peers over the course of time, you are not wanted for it because no one believes you are capable to any degree due to the stigma the job now holds.

Ergo you are now considered useless for something you know you are capable of because your peers have ruined the jobs image. You cannot play your job because of the incompetence, laziness and excuses for mediocrity that other of your job have spewed for years to the point it is both the logical norm and accepted status quot. Now if you can honestly say you would not grow to hate or look in disgust at the type of PLDs who put your job into the sad state it is, You're lying.

This is the situation Thief is currently in. Due to the mindset of "I'm just here for TH", the job has a stigma of being just plain awful, when in the reality of it they can perform competently and contribute at the very least a solid amount of damage to current endgame fights as well as the benefit of TH, an that a good Thief can in fact out-perform the majority of Pick up DD's, and just because the WAR has an Ukon (Or in this age, a Ixtab) does not mean he's going to win the parse in his Twilight Helm/Body 3/5 Karieyh set.

Point for Point a True 2-handed DD > THF if performing well, but Thief is actually so far down the sh*t hole that people can't even imagine a GREAT thief outparsing a sh*t DD. Even when i had 99 Mandau back when it was good, it was rare I'd get into the BRD party despite me outparsing half the DD in it with me unbuffed.

So its not that i hate Thieves for "knowing their place", its that I hate the Thieves who used "Their place" as an excuse for their poor damage, mediocrity, and over-all discrediting the entire job as a whole. I know the Potential Thief has, and while it has room to grow as a DD or in many fields, Its not nearly as bad as the stigma the job holds. This is why i hate those types of thieves and their logic of "TH onry".

OmnysValefor

08-27-2013, 01:17 PM

Well said Karbuncle.

I wish SE would buff these jobs so that they weren't in a position where people expected one task out of them. I'm not one of the mediocre thieves you talk about (and you even said you weren't saying that I necessarily was), but I certainly don't play it at your level (and never will), but we both have capped TH, I'm sure, good ws's sets, and probably have access to the same gear (besides relic, af+1, etc) and groups would expect exactly the same from our thieves.

A real shame.

(In a real group setting, where you desire to bring your thief, I wouldn't TP in TH gear lol^^). They need updated for new skirmish freebies, but I do have non TH TP macros.

Nebo

08-28-2013, 12:47 AM

It's not ALL doom and gloom for THF DD:

The ability to dual wield two delve daggers before shark dagger is a nice change.

1 hand stat buffs and Att cap raise helped close the gap.

But there are a couple of glaring reasons THF still can't compete (as a job):

Positionality - THF is the only DD running the "I have to be in position to use my abilities" gambit. Monsters constantly change directions. Other players constantly move, fidgit, etc.

Recast Timers - 60 seconds recast time on Sneak Attack and Trick Attack is far too long. This means our WS spam gains significantly less than proper DD's that do not rely on timed abilities for respectable WS.

Generally weaker WS Options - Exenterator is pretty "meh" in the DD ratrace with its super cool AGI mod :rolleyes:. REM WS are dead till updates (but even these are still tied to SATA timers).

Even at a perfect hypothetical 100% land rate of SA/TA, and perfect riding of timers each time they are up, THF DD is still weaker than other DD's that don't have to work as hard. Add in the things from my list and THF starts falling behind even more. A certain portion of your DD potential is just at the mercy (no pun intended) of your group.

The things from this list also mean that THF gains significantly less than other DD's from stacking Haste buffs. All that lead time trying to get into position, the less than perfect land rate with SATA, the timer restrictions, the generally weaker WS options, etc.

It's never been that a THF CAN'T DD. It's that it's more work for less damage payout than a more accepted DD. It's also a pain in the ass for the group to try and cater to your positional needs (they just won't).

Realistically, why would anyone take a Pick up THF to DD when there are more than enough MNK DRK WAR SAM waiting on shouts.

I think it can be saved with a tweak or two to SA/TA. I'd be more than happy to wipe the floor with 95% of the playerbase while DDing on THF.

Calatilla

08-28-2013, 01:02 AM

The main problem is the mindset of the playerbase, nobody is going to invite a THF to DD over a WAR, MNK, DRK, DRG or SAM unless they're a good friend or placebohunter is needed, it doesn't matter how good you are.

Look how many threads there are of thieves saying they've out parsed real DD`s on THF, the response is always the same, "if you out parsed a DRK on THF then that DRK sucked" it's never, wow you're a good THF that knows how to DD, it's always the other DD`s suck.

This mindset is what is keeping THF out of Adoulin events more than the job itself. A lot of thieves just play the job for TH because they don't see a reason to be the very best THF on the server because it still won't get you into events.

Falseliberty

08-28-2013, 01:25 AM

TH is one of the last problems I see with thf, Its more the fact we have to be on total point just to get close to the other DD + an other big problem facing thf is we are so goddam squishy as hell that A+ evasion is totally worthless against big targets we have no def, we have prob the lowest HP pool of any melee, our vit sucks.
Mobs just look at me in delve and I die (subbing /war and using berserk just compounds the squishy problem).

Perfect dodge is anything but perfect due to the fact that all the big NMs WS are AoE + magical. I have yet to face a NM in Delve where I came close to dying used perfect dodge and lived. Its a nonstop mess of magical AoE.

dnc and nin have far more survivability than thf atm. give all those dam bandwagon mnks the hp a thf has and lets see how long they last >.>

Nebo

08-28-2013, 01:29 AM

This mindset is what is keeping THF out of Adoulin events

This certainly a part of it, but that perception is also based on real job limitations I listed above.

True statement: Job vs Job - MNK DRK WAR DD > THF DD. That's not a matter of mindset. It's probably not as large a gap as it was when SoA was first released, but the job is still lagging behind for reasons stated above.

It's also a supply and demand issue. Why would you take a more complicated, inferior DD job when lots of better DD jobs are waiting for invites?

Calatilla

08-28-2013, 02:14 AM

It's also a supply and demand issue. Why would you take a more complicated, inferior DD job when lots of better DD jobs are waiting for invites?

Exactly, why would you take a THF unless you wanted treasure hunter over a real DD? No matter how good that THF was.

Demon6324236

08-28-2013, 04:52 AM

Look how many threads there are of thieves saying they've out parsed real DD`s on THF, the response is always the same, "if you out parsed a DRK on THF then that DRK sucked" it's never, wow you're a good THF that knows how to DD, it's always the other DD`s suck.While I know your right about this, and agree, I just want to point out that its not only a THF issue either, its a general issue with all jobs which are outside of the norm for DDing.

I have had the same issue with my RDM, though I had out DDed many people in VW, and out DD many people in Delve Plasm farms now, its always a group I have to either build myself or as a friend to let me join because its their group. At the same time, even though I do better than many other DDs, for instance, a DRK & MNK about a week ago I out DDed, I am always told this same excuse... 'RDM cant DD, if you out DDed that DRK & MNK they were just bad DDs, its impossible for RDM to come close to good DDs'.

I have seen the same from friends who play DRG, PUP, BST, and BLU in the past. Its a real community issue, and the sad part is even if they changed things around, it wouldn't matter, I mean even now, BLM, SCH, and RDM are the best DDs in Skirmish, easily better than any melee job, yet still, Oat MNK shouts left and right for it, offer a BLM or RDM & people only ignore you or down talk you. If all of a sudden THF was given changes that allowed it to DD 20% better than now, even if it were on par with DRK or MNK in DPS, I doubt it would be some massive turnaround for THF, people would probably be ignorant to it, and still ignore THFs just as much for a few months.

OmnysValefor

08-28-2013, 06:11 AM

Demon6324236

08-28-2013, 07:06 AM

Outdd'ing people in VW doesn't count, especially on jobs with access to limited weapons. That rag war might be trying to get a staff proc while you're happily CDC/Req'ing away.

As for out'dding other jobs in content like Delve.. Just because they can't dd as well as their jobs should doesn't make rdm a better dd. You're obviously a very serious RDM, Demon, but the same percentage of people that half-bake monk will half-bake rdm. I have nearly the best possible DD set a pld can have at the moment, and I would still never try to take PLD as a DD, GS or Sword, because it simply isn't. I might outdd subpar dragoons and dancers. I might even outdd a bad/badly-geared monk. It still doesn't justify that a proper player, like you or me, does better on a job for the task.

IE, my warrior is an incomparably better DD than my paladin because I put the same effort into a solid DD set for him, he swaps for WS, I play war like I'm supposed to. No PLD or RDM is going to outdd my warrior.

There are other factors too, like how good the mages are and what kind of temps access DDs have. If mages in delve are leaving the DD slowed, while you can erase, haste, and barstone for chance to resist, that's a large factor. Now, if you're doing that as a melee-rdm, it's because you're taking the role seriously, which is good, but of course a lot of people wont.I know, but THF is not much different in that fact, a good THF can do a good job at DDing, if you take an optimum THF and an optimum DRK side by side with equal skills, buffs, and mages, the DRK will be the stronger DD, the same can be said of RDM, but just because a THF does better than a DRK doesn't mean that the DRK sucked, it means the THF was good. Both may be contributing factors, but the fact everyone just says that the norm DD job sucked and that's why you did better, that degrades someone who puts the proper work and effort into their job that allowed them to do better in the first place. I am sure the MNK & DRK I out did in Delve were not the best, they were probably ok, but needed work, at the same time, I think I did exceptional as a RDM, that's why I did as well as I did, however if you ask people, 9 times out of 10, it seems like they would say I got lucky or had bad DDs, never complimenting my abilities themselves, but rather putting it on the other DDs simply being bad.

Danita

08-28-2013, 03:57 PM

Google "ffxi dps spreadsheet" and compare a well-geared thief to a well-geared MNK (or DRK or SAM, etc); find out why THF is a wasted spot. Understand that if you care about Treasure Hunter, then THF needs to main hand TH knife, remove any multi-attack gear, off hand nothing, put TH hands and feet on, and fight like that until you cap TH12...

The above gear I listed is what thief is good for on a tiny few NM's (Behemoth, KB, etc), and otherwise THF is good for dynamis/limbus style farming - in other words, 99 and below content that offers no challenge. And that's it. It's a wasted spot everywhere else. Enmity control is meaningless because enmity is meaningless, TH is useless if you don't have the DPS to support it (or the battlefield drops items like in VW), and THF offers no way to deal element-less damage (Requiscat, Formless Strikes, Masamune, Twilight Scythe.. oops, nvm, DRK lost it's trick). :(

Good DD's don't exist. There are DD's who meet the level of DPS and flexibility to get the job done, and there are the ones who time out/die/fail to get the win. There is no middle ground. There is only: good enough to win, and not good enough to win. There is no good. (It's meaningless.)

If your RDM / THF / PUP / Insert weaker DD job here outdoes somebody's MNK or what have you, then the only thing you should take from that is that they simply aren't up to par. Since that result is flat-out mathematically impossible when both players are properly geared and played, don't take it to mean that your superior (whatever) can do the impossible, take it to mean what it implies: the guy playing his DD job next to you is substandard, and the proof is you out-did him.

Nebo

08-28-2013, 11:08 PM

Google "ffxi dps spreadsheet" and compare a well-geared thief to a well-geared MNK (or DRK or SAM, etc); find out why THF is a wasted spot...

Good DD's don't exist. There are DD's who meet the level of DPS and flexibility to get the job done, and there are the ones who time out/die/fail to get the win.

This is the mentality that Karb is talking about. And it's false.

It's perfectly possible to bring many Thieves...scratch that, you could replace an entire DD party with only THFs and still kill Tojil.

The reason people don't do that is not because it's impossible to do content with THF, it's because other DD's can get it done better/faster/easier. That, coupled with the fact that there are a lot of better DD's around to choose from is why not many people bring a THF to DD.

Having said that, new gear + ability to dual wield Aphotics + stat changes + attack cap raise have all made significant steps forward for your Joe average THF since SoA release. Shark Dagger/Aphotics is pretty beastly atm.

A lot of scrubs walk around with their Oat MNK comparing that to a TH mule with some random combination of Magian + Thief's knife in delve and base these mindless opinions off of that. For those of us that DO use the spreadsheets and play THF competently, we know where we are behind and why. But the gap is not quite as large as it's being made out to be in this post anymore.

I'd be happy with a few tweaks to our DD job abilities (possibly some WS changes too, depending on how crap REM turn out to be in the end). It's not fair that THF has to be the only DD playing the position/timer restriction game when everyone else is playing "spam the TP every 100% and top the parse."

We can't be the only one playing that game and expect everyone else to help us play it. Especially when the damage payout is worth less than other DD's that don't have to play the position game.

The deck is just stacked against us.

OmnysValefor

08-29-2013, 01:10 AM

Aye, you could do that now, but could you have done it before the 200 skill was added to weapons? That's really the point.

Nebo

08-29-2013, 03:52 AM

Aye, you could do that now, but could you have done it before the 200 skill was added to weapons? That's really the point.

Yes.

What's that skill giving you? ACC? ATT? All that was being accounted for, Pre-ilevel buffs, with support using MNK (1-hander) strats when Tojil was actually hard to kill.

MNKs aren't any more accurate than a THF (quite a bit less actually if you account for the fact that a group of Thieves could use a feint/conspirator rotation).

All the major base stat disparities between DD's were adjusted with the attack cap raise and the STR/DEX=>ACC/ATT adjustments that also predated ilevel additions.

So yeah, given the same requirements of skill and gear (delve/Boss weapon), I'd say it was definitely possible before the ilevel adjustments.

OmnysValefor

08-29-2013, 04:49 AM

Maybe the best linkshells could do it, maybe.

However most linkshells were struggling to kill him with optimized setups and good people playing support. I don't see 4 thieves keeping up with 4 of the typically stronger DD.

Also remember that Tojil dropped the weapon that made killing Tojil easier so while the first kill was rough, the second+ kills became much easier, especially if monks who didn't get oats as drops were willing to go and get them. I see the fight going on too long, stacked with thieves, and Tojil becoming very resistant to stun, but who knows. Could work.

Nebo

08-29-2013, 05:19 AM

I don't see 4 thieves keeping up with 4 of the typically stronger DD.

They wouldn't.

But the arguement is not whether or not they would keep up with MNKs, DRKS , etc. The argument is whether or not the current "best" DD Jobs are necessary to complete the content - to the point where it's impossible to complete content with a THF.

The other issue was touched upon earlier. Not many players gear THF to DD on that level. If they are going to ready up a DD, it's going to be one with more potential. The result of which is a lot of mediocre (being generous) Thieves walking around shitting up the water for the rest of us.

A THF strategy would certainly be more difficult, take longer and be less flexible to mistakes...which is generally why people use better jobs. But it is/was certainly possible.

But again, why would you do it? Lots of easier, better designed DD jobs with more damage potential are just waiting around the city for shouts to join groups.

There's no reason to even think of inviting a PUG Thief, because the job itself, does not offer anything of value relative to other jobs.

Flip that on its head though - Duty Finder gets implemented into FFXI. All of a sudden other DD's start getting to go into delve on PUGs. Groups would still complete content.

OmnysValefor

08-29-2013, 05:51 AM

At the point the content was released, they were, and that's what matters. New Delve is coming, and it will be the same situation again. You will need the ideal setups.

I think people underestimate just how good 200 accuracy and attack is, it's like having a Bard on your fists.

Danita

08-29-2013, 05:52 AM

Scenario:
You want to buy something at auction which you know retails around 400 dollars.
You can take one and only one of the following with you to the auction:
4 x 100 dollar bills (THF)
6 x 100 dollar bills (MNK)

So maybe it can be done with THF, but it's a better bet to take MNK. Now lets say you don't know how good your people are, now it looks like:
2-4 x 100 dollar bills (THF)
4-6 x 100 dollar bills (MNK)

So the perfect THF can get it done, but the less than perfect MNK can get it done. But now let's say you have multiple people, the auction item retails at 32, but you don't know how they are, so assuming 8 DD's, it looks a bit like:
16-32 x 100 dollar bills (THF)
32-48 x 100 dollar bills (MNK)

So do you want to take 8 people who all have to be perfect, or the maximum number of people who don't, because if five of those monks are perfect, 2 of them suck, and 1 of them DC's, you still can win. So yeah, you can replace that DC guy with a THF and still win, but how do you know which MNK is going to DC, and what if you get it wrong?

This is why good DD isn't good the vast majority of the time. You can't know who is reliable, but you can know which jobs have the greatest potential, and successful people build based on what they know takes the fewest risks when the rewards are equal. The only way THF gets to go is if the risks are outweighed by the rewards (ie: Treasure Hunter matters), and even then it's only ever going to be the one.

SpankWustler

08-29-2013, 12:08 PM

If I had to boil Thief's plight down to one thing, it would be this: When Treasure Hunter doesn't matter, Thief offers less damage as well as less utility compared to almost anything else.

Monk is an expert at punching stuff in the junk, and also brings Mantra and Formless Strikes to the table. Blue Mage is really good at poking stuff in the junk with a sword, has access to Requiescat, and has all kinds of weird magic that might or might not help given the situation. Dragoon leaps into the air and drives polearms deep into the crotch of all wickedness, and has Angon which is freaking awesome. Even Warrior, which has a PHD in burying great axes in the giant crotches of villainy, has Tomahawk and Warcry.

Thief has Feint, which is about 576% less useful than it was in 2009. If a group has low accuracy in modern content, they're going to need a more permanent solution such as Madrigals or Hunter's Roll in order to kill a bunch of different monsters before being defeated by a time limit. Collaborator would be pretty decent if it were alliance-wide and could be used on a Geomancer who got carried away casting Thunder II on Kurma or some awful crab, but no such luck there, it's party-only!

Even if Thief did exactly the same damage as Monk, it's hard to make an argument for a job with lower max HP and utility abilities that have been outdated.

I'd love to see a Puppetmaster/Scholar type reworking of Thief, given how differently FFXI plays now compared to that distant era when Sneak Attack and Treasure Hunter were huge boons. Heck, the game even works differently now than the relatively recent "attack giant enemy crotch and kill it or die in 60 seconds" period when Feint was amazing!

Karbuncle

08-29-2013, 12:35 PM

Main Job
WAR lv. 99

Gotcha

I kid i kid... I don't argue your points, you seem to fully understand FFXI is a matter of variables, your MNK can be gimp, your THF can be gimp, THF can be > MNK, etc... I don't debate that but the problem is deeper, not everyone seems to comprehend this like you do.

Most of the population believes, that a Great THF wouldn't even be able to out DD a mediocre DD. The stigma is the gap is too huge that in all scenarios even a Mediocre DD > THF. I can tell you, even while PROC'ing in Voidwatch in a scrub party, with my 99 Mandau I've out-DD'd many a Ukon/Vereth MNK who were receiving buffs.

Why? They sucked. This is the reality of FFXI. your job does not mean you'll do better. You can suck. You can fail. No job is exempt from this. My problem is when a group shouts for an unspecified DD, almost literally trying to fill a spot, I can't even get in on THF Despite it being more than fully capable of fullfilling the role because the stigma behind the job is so bad. When a group looking for a last filler-DD who they probably won't even screen if they say "WAR" or "SAM" won't even think about considering a THF, gear checking it, etc... this is the state of the job I'm speaking most toward.

Do we argue a THF Is better than a normal DD? No.
Do we argue that PUG's should accept THF regardless? No.

The only point I'm truly trying to drive at is THF is not as horrible as the majority make it to be, Vacuum math is bad, and that the jobs current situation is due in equal parts to THF being from an era of FFXI heavy on slow battles, and THF getting a bad stigma from the waves of people shitting up the water with their mediocrity.

(OH!) and before i forget. I mention above a few times DDs can suck and THF can do better, but I should note i do not blame PUG people for going with WARs/MNKs/SAMs etc because their margin for error can be considerably better than a THF. for example say a THF is between 10-1000, a MNK might be 100-1200. So you gamble on the MNK being better than a THF as it has more tools to remove the "Idiot" from the equation... They're banking on probability and as I've explained above, them odds favor a more heavy DD, as THF's get sh*t rep from the countless idiots who play the job poorly because of its "not a DD" stigma which adds to the stigma in a vicious cycle.

Spanks Response!

You rustled my jimmy card... But, I can't rebut because your argument is 10 levels of valid. THF does really bring very little to the table.

Steal/Mug/Despoil/Hide/Flee are all useless on any endgame event.
Bully/SA/TA/AC are DD Abilities that are necessary to even perform decent WS numbers
Collab/Accomp are all but worthless.
Feint, while being the most useful party ability, is as you said infinitely less useful today.
Conspirator, same boat as feint, if acc is a problem your DD need to be replaced or you need Mad's/Hunters.

THF is just a disappointment to "Rogue" classes everywhere and SE is content with making it both obsolete and useless as systematically a possible. By removing the need for TH on all new content, and making it so THF's low HP is a heavier liability. The game at this state is designed against THF which is part of the overall problem.

Babekeke

08-29-2013, 02:45 PM

One of the biggest issues that THF has always, and always will have, is that even THE #1 THF across all servers will still put out less damage if the mob turns when using Sneak Attack when bully is not on, or if the person in front of you moves when using Trick Attack.

Even taking enough THFs to full-time Bully doesn't help the TA issue.

Another is that with max haste and decent acc, you'll over-spill on TP if you wait for SA/TA timers before you WS every time.

Nebo

08-30-2013, 02:00 AM

Another Shameless Plug for Great Justice (http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/34913-SoA-and-the-future-Can-the-Thief-job-be-saved)

Daemon

08-31-2013, 05:22 PM

Does Aurasteal even work on anything in SoA? >.>

FrankReynolds

09-01-2013, 01:11 AM

Does Aurasteal even work on anything in SoA? >.>

No, it can't steal "Auras". /sigh

Nebo

09-04-2013, 03:59 AM

Does Aurasteal even work on anything in SoA? >.>

Yeah, it works on most dispel-able buffs. I used to spam it in delve - cocoon and whatever that evasion buff beetles use.

But cocoon only lasts for about 5 seconds even when you steal it immediately (That would just be over powered I guess). The evasion one was nice for pulling if you could snag one after a large group pull...but it was often not worth it to try.

Outside of pulling, defensive buffs for THF in delve, especially at release, were pretty redundant. I can't think of too many other applications in SoA for the life of me.

Rustic

09-10-2013, 02:55 AM

Yeah, it works on most dispel-able buffs. I used to spam it in delve - cocoon and whatever that evasion buff beetles use.

But cocoon only lasts for about 5 seconds even when you steal it immediately (That would just be over powered I guess). The evasion one was nice for pulling if you could snag one after a large group pull...but it was often not worth it to try.

Outside of pulling, defensive buffs for THF in delve, especially at release, were pretty redundant. I can't think of too many other applications in SoA for the life of me.

It'd be nice if we could yoink stuff like Nature's Meditation, for that matter. But I seem to get jack-diddly to Aura Steal off most monsters in Adoulin, much less actual ITEMS to steal.