What? Look, I didn't say it would be better, because if you read my post you would see that I think Sange is still crap in its current form. I even agree with you that it's not worth using in its current form, I was simply saying I don't understand why people use it the way they do.

But hell, I have some time, I'll play numbers a bit. Unless my info is outdated, you made a small mistake with the fSTR on the shuriken. fSTR is calculated totally differently for ranged attacks.

Using 63/192 Manji Shuriken assuming perfect conditions (Pretty much impossible, but we're theorycrafting arn't we?):
Base Damage: D + fSTR2 = 63 + (63/9 + 8)*2 = 93
pDIF: 3
93 * 3 = 279
Assuming you throw and land the entire Sange:
279 * 6 = 1674

Now do it with the 146 DMG "relic shuriken" (I agree that a "relic shuriken" should be better than that, but I think your estimate of it needing to be 400 DMG is absurd).

(146 + (146/9 + 8)*2)*3*6 = 3492 damage.

It is, of course, unreasonable to assume the numbers will consistently hit that, which is why I said I agree with you that Sange is currently shit.

Let's assume dSTR is 0, pDIF is 2, and you hit with 3 shuriken.
146*2*3 = 876
If they end up making those 102 DMG shurikens for 99s, the same fSTR2, pDIF and number of shuriken hitting would get you 612 damage.

With the delay, here's where I run into a bit of confusion- like I said above, the sweet spot for throwing is melee range anyway, why would you bother counting the final 1.1s? Count it if you want, I suppose, but there's no reason you wouldn't just swap back into your melee gear right afterwards and just fall into playing melee NIN the rest of the fight. If you remove that (feel free to argue your side on this one), you get ~1.73 katana rounds for every throw you do, which comes out to 523 damage based on the gimp katanas you listed earlier.

Look, I know this doesn't prove Sange is worth anything at the moment, all I'm saying is that your estimate of a shuriken needing to have 400 DMG for it to be useful, even under the current system, is absurd. If they end up adjusting ranged delay so that it isn't pants-on-head retarded I'm not sure it's not worth it to use Sange as a combat opener at all.