Warrior Merits

[Neisan_Quetz]

What is with this out of sync nonsense no it isn't going to magically lower your damage by not having timers lined up. Adjust gearsets on WS for berserk being up or down, not that difficult.

[Arcon]

What is with this out of sync nonsense no it isn't going to magically lower your damage by not having timers lined up. Adjust gearsets on WS for berserk being up or down, not that difficult.

It's not magic, it's math. Higher numbers profit more from higher values (assume 400 vs 600 WS when considering a 20% bonus, 400*1.2 = 480, 600*1.2 = 720, so the higher WS gets an additional 40 points of damage). Since it's not evenly distributed, it makes more sense to push your higher values.

Also, what kinda gear would you change for Berserk being down? It's not difficult, but I don't see the point in it, you'd still wanna stack up on STR/Attack/Damage as much as possible.

[Byrth]

It's not magic, it's math. Higher numbers profit more from higher values (assume 400 vs 600 WS when considering a 20% bonus, 400*1.2 = 480, 600*1.2 = 720, so the higher WS gets an additional 40 points of damage). Since it's not evenly distributed, it makes more sense to push your higher values.

Also, what kinda gear would you change for Berserk being down? It's not difficult, but I don't see the point in it, you'd still wanna stack up on STR/Attack/Damage as much as possible.

Errr... If you actually do the math, you realize that you need an absurdly low hit rate before this argument makes sense. There was a write-up on this a few years ago when people still used 3/3/4 builds, but I can't be bothered to find it. Try to work out the math for yourself and figure out what level you'd need to be at before it's better to have timers in sync as opposed to timers out of sync. The two cases are:
(Hit rate with Aggressor)*(Damage/hit with Berserk) + (Hit rate without Aggressor)*(Damage/hit without Berserk) = Damage total with even timers
(Average Hit rate)*(Average Damage/Hit) = Damage total without even timers

You don't need to worry about an Aggressor up set really, as the maximum value of such a set is the value of the accuracy it replaces. If it was worth more than the accuracy it replaces, then you should have used it before you had Aggressor up.

Also, realistically the only time I use Aggressor is when I'm trying to Red or Blue proc with a 1H weapon. So no, it isn't worth the 2 seconds of activation time in the vast majority of cases, let alone sacrificing a superior merit build for it.

[Arcon]

ok ukko's destroys RR inside and outside abyssea its not "close" its shits all over it. 2nd that "200" ws dmg boost you lost is transferred to your TP so if im hitting "20%" harder on melee hits i make up for the 200 damage i lost. you obviously have no idea how to play war, in a zerg as war you'd start off with 300% sekki ws x2 then med then ws again and your ZERGING why in gods name would you hold waste 50 tp in a zerg for a very minimal increase in either dmg if your using kings justice or in your already capped crit rate with 2 hour up? so either way your reasoning is wrong. Also any war worth anything outside of red proc SHOULD have ukko's the hardest part is just the VNM's. Also you do realized when i say a war should only have over 100% for sekki thats so you can ws twice right.... not ws once then tp to 250% and ws again no, you solo light a mob and wreck face.

I never said any of these things, I just said there are situations when you don't WS at 100% TP, nothing else. And I've given examples for that, the rest is just what you read into it. Whether or not I'm a WAR "worth a damn" I won't judge, but judging by your posts, neither can you.

Errr... If you actually do the math, you realize that you need an absurdly low hit rate before this argument makes sense. [..]

Cap your acc without aggressor so you don't need to use it at all

First of all, I wasn't only talking about Aggressor (which actually is still beneficial, especially in Abyssea to lower evasion for Retaliation) but also about Warcry/Blood Rage, Warrior's Charge and consequently the SC damage from Sekkanoki. All those things wouldn't receive the bonus from Berserk occasionally, if used out of sync.

Secondly, I actually did the math in this thread:
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/th...der#post_12069

There I calculated 4% Attack increase, but this time let's calculate it over a longer period of time, until the timers match up again, to get an accurate result (A = Attack in TP gear):

5/5 Berserk merits
180s Berserk followed by 70s without until it is up, so one cycle is 250s.

0/5 Berserk merits
180s Berserk followed by 120s without until it is up, so one cycle is 300s.

lcm(250, 300) = 1500, meaning after 1500s they will sync up again, so that's our testing period.

5/5 Berserk merits
1500s/250s = 6 cycles.
Each cycle: 180/250 * 1.25A + 70/250 * 1.00A = 0.9A + 0.28A = 1.18A
Result: on average 18% Attack increase.

0/5 Berserk merits
1500s/300s = 5 cycles.
Each cycle: 180/300 * 1.25A + 120/300 * 1.00A = 0.75A + 0.4A = 1.15A
Result: on average 15% Attack increase.

So on average you would get a 3% extra Attack over unmerited Berserk (my previous calculation only considered the best case, which was ~4%, this however is accurate). Meaning if you TP in 500 Attack gear, unmerited Berserk would give you an average of 575 Attack, fully merited would give you 590 Attack, 15 more.

And again, 3% in Attack increase does not mean a 3% in damage increase. You probably wouldn't notice the difference at all without a parser.

However, WS damage is different. As I demonstrated before, higher numbers gain a more significant boost from bonuses than lower numbers. And WS numbers being up to 10 times the normal TP hit number, the difference will show significantly, even with only 15 more Attack. However, it doesn't stay at 15 Attack, because for WS you equip STR/Attack gear. Here's a detailed calculation, assuming even WS distribution, 600 base Attack from gear and 40s Warcry duration.

Attack: 600
Warcry: 653, extra 53 Attack
Berserk: 750, extra 150 Attack
Both: 803 (600+53+150)

5/5 Berserk merits
5*40/1500 = 13.3% of WS under Warcry
6*180/1500 = 72% of WS under Berserk
Interlaps:
Berserk: [0,180], [250, 430], [500, 680], [750, 930], [1000, 1180], [1250, 1430]
Warcry: [0, 40], [300, 340], [600, 640], [900, 940], [1200, 1240]

=> 75% of Warcry WS under Berserk

=> 0.75*0.133 = 10% of WS under both

=> 10% both, 3.3% Warcry only, 62% Berserk only, 24.7% neither

Average Attack on WS: 0.1*803 + 0.033*653 + 0.62*750 + 0.247*600
= 715 = 600 * 1.192
= 19.2% average Attack bonus

0/5 Berserk merits
5*40/1500 = 13.3% of WS under Warcry
5*180/1500 = 60% of WS under Berserk
Interlaps:
Berserk: [0,180], [300, 480], [600, 780], [900, 1080], [1200, 1380]
Warcry: [0, 40], [300, 340], [600, 640], [900, 940], [1200, 1240]

=> 100% of Warcry WS under Berserk

=> 13.3% of WS under both

=> 13.3% both, 0% Warcry only, 50% Berserk only, 36.7% neither

Average Attack on WS: 0.133*803 + 0*653 + 0.5*750 + 0.367*600
= 702 = 600 * 1.17
= 17% average Attack bonus

Note that fully merited Berserk has 12% more WS under Berserk than the unmerited option. Yet the result is only a 2.2% extra average Attack. This is just an example of how even a little increases for big numbers can influence the result heavily.

And this again illustrates my point. Before you try to point out that the first option has on average higher Attack, note that it is just that, an average, with minimal difference at that. However the latter option places the important bits where it matters. And just now you've seen an example of how increasing large numbers yields proportionally more rewards.

This is still disregarding Warrior's Charge, which increases a single WS damage greatly, making the extra Attack matter even more, and Blood Rage, which increases damage directly, affecting the results even more, and of course Sekkanoki and the resulting skillchain damage, which would boost the Attack bonus even further. And yes, as mentioned before, Aggressor still helps, not just with Accuracy (and there still are a few mobs that require some extra accuracy) but also with lowering Evasion, thus making Retaliation proc more often (which is also affected by Attack).

In the end, the average Attack is the only thing that speaks for meriting Berserk, but that bonus is just marginal. However strategically placing the Attack values can achieve greater effects in the end. If you don't believe the math, test it on Fortifications, merits are easy to come by these days anyway. Just purge Berserk merits and have at it, Fortifications take a flat 90% reduced damage, so the qualitative results will be the same.

[wish12oz]

It's not magic, it's math. Higher numbers profit more from higher values (assume 400 vs 600 WS when considering a 20% bonus, 400*1.2 = 480, 600*1.2 = 720, so the higher WS gets an additional 40 points of damage). Since it's not evenly distributed, it makes more sense to push your higher values.

Know what makes more sense and would mathematically do more damage?
Cap your acc without aggressor so you don't need to use it at all, (which anyone who isn't gimp has done since 75, and you can do now inside and outside abyssea on anything without much effort) then cap berserk recast merits, and keep berserk up more of the time.