Saboteur and Dia III

[saevel]

Saevel, I will ask you point blank. You believe Saboteur actually works with Dia 3 and that you get more out of it by 5/5 because it makes the duration long enough on the spell to last until you need to Saboteur again?

I go with 5/5 Phallanx; 1/5 Slow, Blind, Par 2; and 2/5 Bio 3. I use Bio 3 in Dynamis to pull TEs. That is honestly why I have it instead of Dia 3.

I can pull them and throw Poison 2 at the same time. If I have to run away to get clear of surrounding mobs, the TEs are 1/2 dead by the time they waddle over to me.

Hmm I made a post and it vanished.

I currently do believe that Sab boost Dia III's base effusiveness due to how light shot works and my own observation of a damage jump on higher defense targets. This is of course subject to change should someone retest FP's original tests. I prefer 5/5 Dia III because out of all our merited enfeebles it's the strongest and most potent.

I'm currently
5/5 Dia III
2/5 Slow II
1/5 Para II
1/5 Blind II
1/5 Bio III

The last two I have for VWNM procs. I have 1/5 in Para II because currently anything that would remotely be considered difficult is immune to its effects. I'm 2/5 in Slow II because while it's not very potent and scales horribly, its still better then Slow and not many things are immune to it. I don't even both with Phalanx II because without full merits it's useless, and even with full merits its mostly useless on anything difficult. This is due to it scaling at 25 points per 1 damage mitigation vs Phalanx 1's 10 until 28 then 29 after.

Now onto Dia III and why it destroys every other enfeeble in the game. Defense down is handled as a subtraction of a percentage of a monsters defense. This is exactly how haste works, subtraction of a percentage of your delay. Because this effect is on the target, anything that does attack/defense calculations will get this effect, including Blue Magic spells, Pets and every alliance member.

Dia III is -15% defense, because attack and defense are part of the same fraction, they become interchangeable. 100/85 = 1.1764, or 17.64% boost to the top number. Thus a 17.64% boost to attack could be wrote as 117.64/100 = 1.1764. In short 15% defense down is +17.64% attack up to every alliance member, every pet, and on all Blue Magic spells. 17.64% attack is a very significant chunk of attack. At 600 attack you would receive 600 * 0.1764 = 105.84, so +105 attack. I'd be hitting as though I had 705 attack. Someone with 750 attack would get 750 * 0.1764 = 132.3, or +132 attack, they'd be hitting as though they had 882 attack.

So now you can see, +17.64% attack to every single alliance member, every WAR, every DRG, every PLD, THF, SAM, RNG, BLU, Summon, and yes even myself the RDM. It's only down side is that it's only applicable to that one monster, only people hitting that monster would get the bonus. Anyone who doesn't have at least two merits in Dia III (because spamming it every 30s is going to get old fast) is doing a great disservice not only to themselves but to whomever they play with.

And while there is an argument for Dia II, it's only 10% or 11.11% attack bonus. It's also negated by our Bio II spamming BLM and DRK friends. Dia III won't be negated by those spells. Over the course of a fight that 6.53% attack difference adds up into a pretty big number.

[Daniel_Hatcher]

Could you not just use PvP to test if it works, or is it gimped there?

[saevel]

Could you not just use PvP to test if it works, or is it gimped there?

Things work differently in PVP vs PVE, would be a good place to see but ultimately need to do the defense /check method to be positive. I'd say use the demons in xarc, they have ridiculously high defense, something like 500~600. Way higher then any other regular monster I've seen, and higher then pretty much every non-turtle NM I've seen.

[Economizer]

Over the course of a fight that 6.53% attack difference adds up into a pretty big number.

The question is, if the 6.53% difference adds up, then wouldn't it be best to sub /DNC and do Box Step for the additional ~5-13% defense down over /NIN (in situations where you are solo, or are the only person who can Box Step)?

[Hayward]

Point taken. I stand corrected. Bio just had to be classified as Dark Magic. I guess that brings up the question of why Dia wasn't classified as Divine Magic.

[Economizer]

why Dia wasn't classified as Divine Magic.

Used to be, was reclassified back when Red Mage was retooled as an enfeebler. This is part of the reason Red Mage has native Divine Magic skill but no Divine Magic.

[saevel]

The question is, if the 6.53% difference adds up, then wouldn't it be best to sub /DNC and do Box Step for the additional ~5-13% defense down over /NIN (in situations where you are solo, or are the only person who can Box Step)?

Yep, this is a very valid setup. Earlier I mentioned RDM/DNC for when you need melee capable but with more party support options. You will take an overall damage hit from both lack of DW3 and spending time using JA's, but overall it's a very good sub, especially if your using haste samba.

[Greatguardian]

Things work differently in PVP vs PVE, would be a good place to see but ultimately need to do the defense /check method to be positive. I'd say use the demons in xarc, they have ridiculously high defense, something like 500~600. Way higher then any other regular monster I've seen, and higher then pretty much every non-turtle NM I've seen.

It would be nice if you could go out and do this, seeing as you're the one claiming that all pertinent testing on the subject is wrong based on eyeballing and "common sense" (lol applying sense to SE).

[Daniel_Hatcher]

Things work differently in PVP vs PVE, would be a good place to see but ultimately need to do the defense /check method to be positive. I'd say use the demons in xarc, they have ridiculously high defense, something like 500~600. Way higher then any other regular monster I've seen, and higher then pretty much every non-turtle NM I've seen.

Bleh, tried this method, if I tried H2H it was always High Defense obviously due to no skill, but using a /BLM with a staff I then received low regardless of whether Dia III was on.

Do you mean Xarcabard (S), Dynamis or just Normal.

[saevel]

Bleh, tried this method, if I tried H2H it was always High Defense obviously due to no skill, but using a /BLM with a staff I then received low regardless of whether Dia III was on.

Do you mean Xarcabard (S), Dynamis or just Normal.

Inside Dynamis Xarc, the newer Demons they sprinkled around have ridiculous defense.