Thief Treasure Hunter

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 >.>

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Originally Posted by Calatilla

This mindset is what is keeping THF out of Adoulin events

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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?

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Originally Posted by Nebo

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?

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

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Originally Posted by Calatilla

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.

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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.

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.

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Originally Posted by OmnysValefor

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.

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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.

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.

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Originally Posted by Danita

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.

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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.

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.

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Originally Posted by OmnysValefor

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.

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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.

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.

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Originally Posted by OmnysValefor

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

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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.

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.

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.

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!

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Originally Posted by Danita

Main Job
WAR lv. 99

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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.

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Originally Posted by SpankWustler

Spanks Response!

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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.

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.

Another Shameless Plug for Great Justice

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

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Originally Posted by Daemon

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

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

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Originally Posted by Daemon

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

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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.

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Originally Posted by Nebo

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.

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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.