Exenterator vs Evisceration.

[Kincard]

I however, Stick with Evisceration now. Generally using Mandau/Aluh... .

This is kinda removed from the topic, but on paper, I've had MS get really close to Exenterator if you have good gear plus the 30% bonus on the 99 weapon. Dunno if any THFs have played with it, but is it possible if you're riding the 5% crit rate you might actually do more overall damage just spamming Mercy Stroke?

I currently ride Exenterator outside Abyssea so I didn't look into it...but DE outdoes Evisceration, still? I remember back at 75 lots of people said to swap over to Evisceration if you had an X's Knife. With just the THF trait giving like 13% crit damage is DE still outdoing Evisceration nowadays? Guess it must've been just an eyeball'd thing back then.

[Arcon]

It's +40% damage at Lv.99, and it's still very noticeably behind Exenterator. Especially because the 5% critical hit rate will already be up for quite a bit because of SA/TA, for when you should use it over Exenterator regardless.

[Karbuncle]

Its not really THAT far behind Exenterator. I mean, Its noticeable, But not so significantly that they're in different ballparks. a Triple Attack'd Mercy is pretty potent, and With the right gear, It can come work up there nicely. That and Evisceration is still great.

Exenterator is the best dagger WS unstacked at the moment, Of that i have no doubt, I just got rid of it because I have too many other jobs and I'm never brought on THF to DD, so Evisc and Mercy suit me well.

[Motenten]

It'll depend on exact gear available, but doing some checking it seems that DE and Evisceration (unstacked) are nearly identical against DC Dynamis Mobs, using either Aluh + Oynos (DE: 1745, Evis: 1750) or Mandau 99 + Oynos (DE: 1797, Evis: 1795).

Exenterator is 22% ahead of DE with a top-end build (23% with Mandau 99).

Same gear against Pil with Stalwart's active, Exen is ~12% ahead of DE and 10% ahead of Evisceration, but that doesn't count the +crit rate from Champion's Drink. With Champion's Drink, Evisceration pulls decently ahead (~10%).

TA+Mercy Stroke beats TA+Exen by about 21% against Pil-level mobs, but only by 4% against Dynamis DC mobs.

Looks like unstacked DE is only about 2-3% ahead of unstacked MS when using Mandau 99. With the crit rate aftermath, overall DPS is just about tied.


So: Unstacked, Exen should be decently ahead of all other options on lower-level mobs. On higher level mobs it's still strongly competitive unless you have Champion's Drink (and aren't fighting mobs with -crit rate traits), in which case use Evisceration.

Stacked with TA, Mercy Stroke with Mandau 99 is decently ahead. With Mandau 95, though, the gap narrows considerably; MS wins on tougher content, Exenterator wins on lower level content.

Stacking with SA is less favorable for Exenterator, so the balance shifts a bit towards the other weaponskills, but overall recommendations are basically going to be the same.




In general you're going to be looking at a 10% to 20% gain in weaponskill damage using Exenterator over other non-relic options. If you have a 99 Mandau, there's very little case for Exenterator. If you have 95 Mandau, though, judicious use of Exenterator can still lead to it being better (but probably not better enough to justify the merit slot).

[Mirage]

Thanks for mathing it out, Motenten.

[Arcon]

Its not really THAT far behind Exenterator. I mean, Its noticeable, But not so significantly that they're in different ballparks. a Triple Attack'd Mercy is pretty potent, and With the right gear, It can come work up there nicely. That and Evisceration is still great.

I notice it quite a lot, eyeballing I'd say about 50% behind Exenterator on average. And this is not a "I WS'd twice and saw it" thing, but confirmed time and again in months of playing, because I always mix them up every now and then when some macros don't fire properly. However, I should say this is on lower level content, Salvage for the most part (I don't get to fight high end content on THF, so don't feel qualified to comment on that, but MS should be getting better against higher defense).

If you have a 99 Mandau, there's very little case for Exenterator.

Except for when SA/TA aren't up, which is a lot, especially when soloing, which is usually where you're interested in damage. I don't think you covered that in your post, but a bare Mercy Stroke is sadly not too impressive.

[Motenten]

Except for when SA/TA aren't up, which is a lot, especially when soloing, which is usually where you're interested in damage. I don't think you covered that in your post, but a bare Mercy Stroke is sadly not too impressive.

If not stacking, I assumed the comparison would fall back to Exen vs DE/Evis, though I'll grant that I did consider it from the perspective that stacking was a reasonable option at least a fair amount of the time. I do almost nothing in game as solo, since I find it an irritating hassle; I'm almost always at least in a duo.

So yes, in a situation where stacking is just not a viable option, Exen will go back to being a decently advantageous weaponskill over the alternatives even for a Mandau owner.