Who wants a good looking whm shield with good stats?

[Mirage]

Enhancing magic isn't boosted by elemental staves, unfortunately. This is why I went with my original suggestion.

Ideally it'd be just "White magic potency +10%", but that seems like it's going a little too far.

Huh, you're right, it seems (just tested it myself). I thought barspells were the exception, but apparently, it only looks that way because equipping the staff alone gives you +15 to the same element while it's on. Well then, the shield wouldn't really need "enhancing magic +15" in that case, but it would still be pretty sweet.

[Economizer]

Def: 20
Shield of Awesome
Cure Potency +7%
Spell interruption rate -15%
Damage taken -13%

or

Shield of pretty damn good

Def:30
Refresh +1
enfeebling magic +15
Enhancing magic +15
Fast cast +5%

Neither of these would make me melee in a shield, they would just let me use a shield in parties instead of a Staff.

The main problem with a shield is that you can't dual wield while using it. Basically, unless you have a shield that gives more damage then having a multihitter massively boosting your TP gain.

You'd at least need to be close to or on par like. Extreme stats like Store TP 50, OR sizable amounts of double/triple/quadruple attack would help the TP generation. Or you'd at the very least need to be giving at least 10 STR, 20 Attack, and a boost to WS damage on par with the extra hit DW gives, for matching weapon skill damage.

Even extreme stats like that probably won't make White Mage more powerful then it already is though, since you can already do a lot of that with Dual Wield.

Well then, the shield wouldn't really need "enhancing magic +15" in that case, but it would still be pretty sweet.

Enhancing Magic +15 would give ~1-2 points of Barspell boost to the shield. Another option would be a Barspells +15 boost, but again, you are making a party oriented shield, not one for hitting things. That's not bad of course, since White Mages could use better Party shields since we're currently stuck on the Genbu's and Muse, but the stats for party roles and melee are much more different.

[Mirage]

It was my intention to make party oriented shields, so that's fine. I think making a shield that outdoes the boost you get from dualwielding is going to have to be maybe unrealistically strong. If I were to choose a shield over dualwielding though, it would probably have to be something like this:

Clobbering Shield
Defence 25, -5%PDT (optional, just because def doesn't really do much)
Club skill +25, Triple attack +5%
Str +15, dex+15, mnd+15
Critical hit damage +15%

Maybe haste +4% as well. It could free up a slot previously used for haste elsewhere.

Using a shield would also allow you to sub for example warrior, for Fencer (another 5% crit rate), another 10% DA, berserk and attack bonus. Also aggressor, but I doubt you would be meleeing something you didn't even have capped, or close to capped hit rate on.

The idea behind this shield is of course that the str will make up for whm's relatively low str, dex will help crit rate, which is futher boosted by the crit dmg stat, and the mnd will boost most (all?) of the relevant club WSes. Of course, it is also pretty obvious that this shield is more or less tailored for Hexa Strike.

Of course, I doubt a shield like this will actually be implemented, but at level 99, who knows?

[Economizer]

Until I got to the critical hit damage boost the shield looked pretty bad to me to be honest.

Triple attack +5% doesn't really do much for me outside of Abyssea, but I have the magian multihitter club to offhand.

[Daniel_Hatcher]

It was my intention to make party oriented shields, so that's fine. I think making a shield that outdoes the boost you get from dualwielding is going to have to be maybe unrealistically strong. If I were to choose a shield over dualwielding though, it would probably have to be something like this:

Clobbering Shield
Defence 25, -5%PDT (optional, just because def doesn't really do much)
Club skill +25, Triple attack +5%
Str +15, dex+15, mnd+15
Critical hit damage +15%

Maybe haste +4% as well. It could free up a slot previously used for haste elsewhere.

Using a shield would also allow you to sub for example warrior, for Fencer (another 5% crit rate), another 10% DA, berserk and attack bonus. Also aggressor, but I doubt you would be meleeing something you didn't even have capped, or close to capped hit rate on.

The idea behind this shield is of course that the str will make up for whm's relatively low str, dex will help crit rate, which is futher boosted by the crit dmg stat, and the mnd will boost most (all?) of the relevant club WSes. Of course, it is also pretty obvious that this shield is more or less tailored for Hexa Strike.

Of course, I doubt a shield like this will actually be implemented, but at level 99, who knows?

Even at 99 that shield be VERY powerful.

[Mirage]

Until I got to the critical hit damage boost the shield looked pretty bad to me to be honest.

Triple attack +5% doesn't really do much for me outside of Abyssea, but I have the magian multihitter club to offhand.

Yeah, I know. It is unlikely that this lets you outdamage a OA2-4 offhand weapon, but that could be remedied by giving whm access to more DA/TA gear. With this shield, they would have a total of 5% TA and 15% DA available to them, I think, with /war. I do not know more DA/TA gear that whm can use other than brutal earring, really. And this fictional shield.

I think this is enough of a boost from a single item though. If it's not sufficient, I would rather have other pieces of gear that synergized (is that a real word?) well with single-wielding and the stats on that shield. Such as idk, fencer +5 or +10 or something, which I hope would increase the crit bonus by another 5-10%, as well as adding an even bigger TP bonus. Having every 100TP hexa strike (or whatever WS you used) be performed as if with 200TP would surely help damage over time.

Somethingsomething Necklace

DA +5
Single wielding: Weapon delay -15%
Fencer +5, Improves Fencer TP bonus (+50?)
Lv96 WAR WHM PLD RDM

Yes, reducing weapon delay will reduce TP per hit, but because the hits are coming faster, your TP gain over time should not decrease. Your damage over time will however definitely increase by a significant amount. Breaking x-hit builds shouldn't be much of an issue for 1h weapons anyway, like it is for 2h weapons. Furthermore, -delay isn't subject to the same cap as haste is, and will let you get down to a delay reduction of roughly -55% coupled with your own haste spell. If you have a dnc with you, you could get down to -65% :>. Of course, if you were /nin, you would be -75% delay at this point, so that is still potentially better.

The DA on it would also not be very beneficial for OA2-4 weapons (depends a bit on the distribution of multihits, but it will definitely be less beneficial than for normal weapons), so it will help close the gap (at least a bit) between single and dualwielding with OAX offhand weapons.

Even at 99 that shield be VERY powerful.

Is it really? In SE's eyes, maybe yes. In terms of this shield's performance vs the generally accepted "best" or "good" setup for a whm, not really. You have to remember that you're losing a *lot* of TP gain by not dualwielding. Lack of the dualwield delay reduction also robs you of a significant amount of dot even if you're not using a multihit offhand weapon because DW3 is like -25% combined delay. You're also losing shadows if you like to use those.

You also have to take into account that whm has a very limited selection of DD gear. This is probably going to be one very very few equipment pieces a whm melees in. The rest is probably going to be blessed, turban (or zelus if you have it) and possibly goliard saio to cap gear haste, and other than the haste on those pieces, they have close to 0 DD stats. No DA, no TA, no attack, no acc, no str, no dex.

[Economizer]

I do not know more DA/TA gear that whm can use other than brutal earring, really. And this fictional shield.

Royal Redingote augment (2%), and Aesir Mantle (1~2%). That's pretty much it though.

Dual Wield really shines when given stuff like a multihitter or double/triple/quadruple attack though, since you not only hit more often and give it more chances to proc, but have two chances per attack round too.

The only risk I can think of with giving sizable amounts of double/triple/quadruple attack on a shield to a White Mage is if it is a Relic White Mage, but at that point, you still have to compare the damage to a Relic White Mage carrying a KC in the offhand as well. While I don't see it happening any time soon either, an extreme amount of Store TP on a shield would also be an option with similar outcomes.

[Mirage]

Or an extreme amount of DA/TA, which not only increases TP gain, but also gives you a lot more damage, both in the TP phase and WS phase. Well, the amount of extra damage from DA/ is sort of gimped by the fact that Hexa Strike is a 6 hit WS, so a single TA proc on the first hit, or two DA procs in total, and you're at the 8-hit cap. You'll pretty much always be doing 8-hit Hexas though, which is kinda nice. I don't know how good the empyrean club WS is, or how many hits it has, but it could probably get a nice boost from DA/TA gear as well.

The way I understand it though, DA/TA/QA gear doesn't really get a bigger boost than any other stuff when DWing. If you have a 30% DA rate and 0% DW delay reduction, then go to a 25% DW delay reduction, using two identical weapons, your damage and TP gain over time will increase by the same percentage as if you had 0% DA and 0% DW delay reductuin, then going to 25% DW delay reduction. I think, anyway.

However, as delay gets lower, you get more "TP per delay" so to say, according to this graph:
http://gamerescape.com/wiki/images/3/3d/Tpgain.jpg
So if you have a single club at 300 delay, that is gonna get less TP per hit than two 300 delay clubs dualwielded with 25% DW, cutting it down to in practice around 200 delay per club. As you can see from that graph, this leads to more TP per hit. And in turn, more TP per hit from a multihit-proc.

[Economizer]

I don't know how good the empyrean club WS is, or how many hits it has, but it could probably get a nice boost from DA/TA gear as well.

I hate to be the one to break the news to you... but the Empyrean Club WS is a self-target move much like Moonlight. It restores HP and MP. It is probably the single worst WS on an Empyrean currently. The only way it will ever make sense is if SE starts to make White Mages the defacto tanks in the game, or gives the Empyrean Club to Paladin. And even then it would still not be very useful.

At least Mjollnir still gets to sit on its thrown as the single best one hander weapon in the game.

[MDenham]

You also have to take into account that whm has a very limited selection of DD gear. This is probably going to be one very very few equipment pieces a whm melees in. The rest is probably going to be blessed, turban (or zelus if you have it) and possibly goliard saio to cap gear haste, and other than the haste on those pieces, they have close to 0 DD stats. No DA, no TA, no attack, no acc, no str, no dex.

If your gear set can survive it (read: you're at least 1/3 HQ Blessed and a Ninurta's Sash, or at least 2/3 HQ Blessed and a Goading Belt) your head option should be a Khthonios Mask instead.

Granted, you're still only wearing ~20 attack in gear at best, aside from earrings/rings.

(Note: I'm not sure which of those is better right off the top of my head - sTP+4/Attack+20 or sTP+9/Attack+14 - but that's because I just woke up and don't feel like running the numbers myself. )