I honestly cannot see the appeal of playing NIN. It's like a mix of MNK and THF, but excels in neither. Maybe I'm just not that kind of player. As DD they are sub-par, inside and outside of Abyssea. Even Kannagi 90 NINs don't come close to WAR and MNK without empyreans, possibly other DDs too (I honestly didn't see any other DDs in months, so it's a little hard to judge, I'm guessing DRG would also win easily).

From my experience weapon skills would rank like this:
1. Ukko's Fury
2. Victory Smite
3. Wildfire/Jishnu
4. Torcleaver, Blade: Hi, Chant du Cygne
5. Rudra's Storm, Tachi: Fudo
6. Quietus
7. (Didn't see many/any others yet)

Of course this could be just because of the players I've been seeing around (which, as I said before, wasn't a large number, since everyone is on MNK or WAR normally).

Rudra's Storm, however, has the advantage that was mentioned before. It can be stacked every 30s with either SA or TA, or every 60s with both. This doesn't eliminate the need for other WS on THF, but it doesn't make it quite as bad as similar WS due to that fact. Now, if Byrth's proposed TH system was in place, it would be very significant again, in its own right.