Thief Job Ability Synergy: This is not 2005

[Atomic_Skull]

Surprise Attack: Your next weaponskill will deal additional damage when attacking from outside the target's sight.

Works when used from outside the target's cone of sight.

Forces the next WS to be a critical attack.

Adds a weaponskill secondary modifier of STR 50%.

Adds an fTP bonus of 0.01 for each point of STR your have.

Adds a cRatio Bonus like Spinning Slash, YGK, etc.

Cooloff is 25 seconds, effect lasts for 5 minutes or until the next WS.

Can be queued up to a maximum of 3. Each WS used will remove one effect.

Does not stack with Sneak Attack or Trick Attack. SATA takes priority over Surprise Attack.


Scapegoat: Gives 30% of your enmity to a fellow party member.

Works like Collaborator in reverse.

Can exceed the enmity cap by 20%

1 minute cooloff.



There, THF is fixed.

[RygaenYuui]

Most people who are idiotic enough to move out of the way of TA are usually pretty shitty players too, and not generally worth spending your time with (See point 2)

That would actually include more than 50% of the player base imho. None of them care about SA or TA enough to bother.
Though I do agree w/ the OP; The mechanics have definitely changed. They do give PLDs and NINs the necessities to perform with the change in PT mechanics years after the PT mechanic changes, but not necessarily to THF. Honestly, I would settle if they just widened the flanking range for sneak attack to make up for missing sneak attack if the mob should turn unfavorably; it makes sense at higher levels.

[Babekeke]

The whole [thf DD and support vs war DD and support] to determine which job was designed to be a DD or a support role makes me want to list all the RDM spells by DD (Nukes, DoTs, spikes and en-spells) and support/utility (other enfeebs, cures and enhancing). I won't show the full list, but of 90 spells that rdm has, 47 deal damage. The mathematically minded of you will notice that means only 43 do not deal damage.
That's settled then, RDM is a DD, not support.
Yes it's a stupid and unfair way to look at it, and so is comparing WAR's JAs/traits to THF's simply by listing them, and not deciding how much they help damage, how often they can be used etc. etc. etc.

(I'm aware that my spell list is flawed since no tier 2 enfeebs can be stacked with the tier 1 enfeebs, and bio/dias don't stack with each other, but it shows the point quite clearly I think).

If SE gave us the same amount of DD power as the other DDs, all of them will be then complaining that THF not only is as good at DDing as they are, but we also have A+ evasion, and TH3-6+procs.
If this happened, why would anyone ever invite another DD to a party?

Correct, if you solo, you can't use SA/TA; you get nothing from collab/accomp or conspirator. What you do have though, is the ability to solo the NM in the first place, AND you have a much higher chance of getting the drop that you want from your NM. If you want to get 1337 numbers on your parser in a party/alliance, go and level a 'pure DD' job. If you want to solo NMs for drops, stick with your thf and stop crying about it! It's not like you don't have the option to level more than 1 job and use thf for NMs and another job for parties FFS!

[Nebo]

The whole [thf DD and support vs war DD and support] to determine which job was designed to be a DD or a support role makes me want to list all the RDM spells by DD (Nukes, DoTs, spikes and en-spells) and support/utility (other enfeebs, cures and enhancing). I won't show the full list, but of 90 spells that rdm has, 47 deal damage. The mathematically minded of you will notice that means only 43 do not deal damage.
That's settled then, RDM is a DD, not support.
Yes it's a stupid and unfair way to look at it, and so is comparing WAR's JAs/traits to THF's simply by listing them, and not deciding how much they help damage, how often they can be used etc. etc. etc.

I agree that one needs to look at these things in context rather than just listing abilities and assigning them categories. But such comparisons can be helpful with determining the actual utility of these abilities.

In the case of RDM DD, I don't think anyone would argue that RDM is a DD job, not a mage . On the other hand, not many jobs (if any) can match their damage output with a Brew. One could also argue that a RDM's contribution to damage is so much more useful than that of a THF with things like Dia, Haste etc. But this is a situation where we start talking about ACTUAL utility versus just having abilities that can only be classified as utility (that aren't very "useful").

In the case of WAR vs THF (melee DD jobs), the context of such a comparison makes much more sense.

If SE gave us the same amount of DD power as the other DDs, all of them will be then complaining that THF not only is as good at DDing as they are, but we also have A+ evasion, and TH3-6+procs.
If this happened, why would anyone ever invite another DD to a party?

Again, no one asked for THF to be able to DD on the level of a WAR. No one asked to be given the same amount of DD power as other DD's. Even if the positional restrictions were eased on SA/TA this would be impossible. WAR can spam immensely powerful WS without restriction. The only way a THF can even come close to the WS damage of a WAR is to stack as timers allow.

This gap widens exponentially once you start to add haste/buffs while THF is still tied to SA/TA timers.

There are a ton of reasons to invite other DD's. Especially with a lot of battlefields (Like the new voidwatch system) where TH has zero effect. The new stagger system that SE seems to love to add to everything also makes TH less of a "must have" thing, and the fact they keep giving it to other jobs also makes having a THF there less necessary.

WAR also has access to a lot of weapon types for procing weaknesses, which is just as valuable, if not more so than Treasure Hunter.

Forgetting the fact that we weren't designed or intended to use Evasion and Perfect Dodge to tank or solo NM's like we do, A+ evasion really can't stand on its own due to the evasion cap, the lack of any other defensive abilities, and paper thin defense. Evasion requires support job abilities to be really useful for soloing, and even the is very limited by things like Mage Mobs and Aoe TP move spam.

A good THF will have PDT/MDT gear sets to deal with these things, but at that level, so will any other DD job really.

Correct, if you solo, you can't use SA/TA; you get nothing from collab/accomp or conspirator. What you do have though, is the ability to solo the NM in the first place, AND you have a much higher chance of getting the drop that you want from your NM.

If you are soloing on THF, as it stands right now with the stagger systems, you have less of a chance at getting the drop than with a group that can stagger.

If you want to get 1337 numbers on your parser in a party/alliance, go and level a 'pure DD' job. If you want to solo NMs for drops, stick with your thf and stop crying about it! It's not like you don't have the option to level more than 1 job and use thf for NMs and another job for parties FFS!

No one in this thread that is asking for change is crying about wanting to get 1337 numbers on a parse. None of them said THF should be a "pure dd" or a "heavy DD" or the best DD or anything of the kind.

What I said was that the opportunities to land SA and TA are unreasonably limited in todays FFXI, and I would like to see them tweaked. Which, even if they were tweaked, THF would still have lower potential than "heavy DD's" but would make it easier to realise what a THF's potential can be (which is still weaker than "heavy DD's").

No one asked for THF to be king of the DD's or cried because we aren't. I just happen to think positional restrictions are fail in this game.

Saying that "THF is not a Heavy DD" and saying "THF is not a DD" are two different things. The first is true. The second is not. Given this, as a DD job, I think requesting adjustments (that would not raise damage potential at all) to address flawed funcionality and bad design is well within reason.

[Babygyrl]

love this! alos im not sure if oyu mentioned it but id love if thief could have some time of Voke ability now that evasion tanking is popular again.. i love tanking as thief and would love to have something like that added

[Catsby]

Sneak and trick definitely need to be updated. I cant tell you how many times I've missed despite correct positioning and the general pacing of fights renders the abilities worthless(or impossible if you are stuck tanking) after the first or 2nd use. Breaking them down into stances or reducing hide's timer might be the key.

[Nebo]

Sneak and trick definitely need to be updated. I cant tell you how many times I've missed despite correct positioning and the general pacing of fights renders the abilities worthless(or impossible if you are stuck tanking) after the first or 2nd use. Breaking them down into stances or reducing hide's timer might be the key.

I really like the idea of stances that would augment/enhance the positional dynamics of Sneak and Trick Attack somehow.

I mean, aside from treasure hunter, dealing damage is really the only useful thing we have to offer a group. There are so many situations where Treasure Hunter just doesn't apply....

KCNM,KSNM,BCNM,ENM, Voidwatch, ANY Mission/Expansion/Add-on/Boss Fight (This covers many many things), etc, etc.

...or is made less significant because the stagger system is what raises drop rates with real consequence.

This is really why I think being a relatively weak DD AND being tied down with positional restrictions is unreasonable (as well as unbalanced). I'd be happy with one or the other, but not both.

[Catsby]

Some stuff.

I agree. It doesn't bother me that thief is weak when compared to other DDs. It bothers me that any job that can pick up a sword or knife or whatever just got boiled down into a DD. If the hate system was rebuilt to fit level 90 play and THF was able to direct hate around more then it would be a blast to play. It doesn't need to be a crazy powerful damage dealer because it already has crazy evasion and the ability to make stuff drop more often (allegedly).

[Babekeke]

I mean, aside from treasure hunter, dealing damage is really the only useful thing we have to offer a group. There are so many situations where Treasure Hunter just doesn't apply....

KCNM,KSNM,BCNM,ENM, Voidwatch, ANY Mission/Expansion/Add-on/Boss Fight (This covers many many things), etc, etc.

If you don't need TH, don't take a thf to DD, take a war or sam... you wouldn't take a BLM to DD a mob weak to magic would you? Maybe you would.

Edit: Oops, I meant strong to magic, of course /blush

...or is made less significant because the stagger system is what raises drop rates with real consequence.

It is generally agreed that a yellow stagger without TH, or TH without a yellow stagger, will produce similar results. Stacking both gets the best results. I'm not too sure about how equal Blue and TH are.

This is really why I think being a relatively weak DD AND being tied down with positional restrictions is unreasonable (as well as unbalanced). I'd be happy with one or the other, but not both.

Agreed. You seem to be forgetting though, that before Abyssea we were simply TH whores, or a decent DD at bird camp. The only thing that has really changed, is that vs NMs now (or anything that you want increased drop rate from) people are (should be) splitting SA/TA/WS. And other people in the party are (should be) encouraging you to do so. This was a step in the right direction.
I agree with the points you wanted on the first post, but some of your reasoning in more recent posts is absurd.

[Covenant]

I'm not sure about your arguments, why screw around with SATA? Since we are nearing lvl 99, maybe it's time for a new thief "attack". My best (3) guesses of a likely contented would be "critical strike", "Painful strike", are least likely "Deathstrike".
"Critical Strike" is a basic SATA, but without the need for "positioning". Perhaps, treat it like a Monk's "boost", that is quick recast for critical hits. "Painful strike" I would say would be a hit that produces a mild-strong "bleed" DoT. This particular strike would in essence, but treated as an additional attack per tic. Think a strike that produces "Poison 2" or even "poison III" damage.
The final option is the "death strike". Let's face it people it's in game already whether we're talking "doom", twilight scythe, or Odin's astral flow. With a strict formula/game balance this could actually be amazing. Too weak-decent nearly X% chance of death, even-tough, tough-IT, and finally IT-NM all having different values.