The Ninja Superthread

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Originally Posted by Houston009

Smoke Screen is a 20s buff on target. (seems to be Quelling Strikes)

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Just double checked the tooltip and you're right. That's odd, it hasn't *felt* like it works that way when I've used it. Normally I see someone's enmity drop visibly as soon as I use it. But good to know!

i had a ninja use smoke screen on me and i can guarentee you it works like quelling strikes, though looking at the enmity bars its maybe stronger than quelling as for how much it reduces it by, if i had to guess i'de say like 75% reduction.

also, i think your all forgetting that every tank is more than a 1-2-3 tank now, you can easily drop your enmity onto the tank so they can do more dps at a given point in time without having to worry much about loosing enmity

Leveling with a friend, I've found several uses for Shadewalker. Most of them have been situational and wouldn't easily apply in Alexander, but that's not to say there won't be uses for it there, too. The situation I've used it in most likely to be in Alexander (I think) is helping a tank pick up simultaneous adds if you want to single-tank and the adds spawn apart from each other but at the same time. Like, if you wanted to single-tank the adds at the beginning of Bismark Hard, for example. Other than that, it's been either just helping the tank solidify hate because they're having issues with it for whatever reason, or helping make sure all the adds are going to the tank if there's lots of AOE happening, and such. One use I've found while leveling that my friend has been positively thrilled with is using it to toss one of a pair of mobs his way so I don't nearly die to 2x mobs pounding my face in. >_>

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Originally Posted by Alahra

Armor Crush on longer fights (I don't tend to hit it until I have less than 15 seconds on Huton if I can help it, otherwise trying to get Aeolian Edges in).

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The biggest issue I'm running into when waiting to refresh Huton at such a low duration is that I tend to hit a point where Shadow Fang is falling off, with Mutilate a GCD falling off after, and Dancing Edge right after that AND my Mudras have just come up. And if we're prioritizing Huton (but using Crush over just straight casting it) we'll end up doing 3 GCDs for Crush, 5 for Shadow Fang, 6 to get Mutilate back up, and then a total of 9 to get Dancing Edge back up (If we did Crush > Shadow Fang Combo+Mutilate > Dancing Edge combo). That loses ~2 ticks of Shadow Fang and 3 of Mutilate plus all the GCDs without our Slashing debuff up.

Are you encountering any events like that when refreshing at such a low duration?

I haven't had an issue like that with armor crush personally. It's added a lot of freedom in regards to dungeons and dealing with situation for me.

Also after playing with the aggro moves more the first move is a straight aggro reduction on a party member. Meaning it takes there aggro and dumps it immediately.

The second and more interesting aggro moves allows you to put the hate your ninjas accumulate on another target. This means if you pop it on tank, pull a mob ahead of the tank by attacking, there will aggro straight to the tank instead of you. This would be a good move for instance if you wanted to maximize uptime on dps on a golem in t9 as soon as you see them without waiting on the tank to take aggro or have the tank move to position x and you attack the enemy making them aggro on the tank and move to him.

put shadewalker on the MT before a pull and he can pull easily with eye/path combo, gore blade, souleater/delirium etc

Unless you hit Armor Crush when Fuuton is 40s and over, you shouldn't realistically lose any dps.
Don't hit it over 30 because I can't see the precise seconds after it goes over a minute.

That's the difference between an extending and a refresh skill, you can 'bank' extra buff time as a buffer with no dps loss unless you go over the duration cap.
Then you can spend that extra time without refreshing according to the needs of the fight.
If you don't know the fight, the extra time functions as a safety net (like when waiting for an add spawn or phase change without using Mudra to refresh).

It's reasonably flexible to adapt to how your timers are, but the timing takes practice.
I do it around 20-25 at the start so it's comfortable to refresh the dots and debuffs without worrying that Fuuton may also fall off.
But yea, I let it dip lower than that quite a bit when I have extra things to fit in but then I extend back to a comfortable level.

Does anyone know if the original poster still plays or will be updating this at all?

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Originally Posted by Krissey

Does anyone know if the original poster still plays or will be updating this at all?

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If not, the next thread should be called "The Ninja Guiden"

What I can tell about the skills up to lvl 54 is:

Smoke Bomb: its quite underwhelming at first glance, but its surprisingly handy.
The skill itself is a Queling Strikes on a party member, not yourself.
It does NOT affect your party member's current aggro pool, but it reduces conciderably the aggro generated by said party member in the duration of the skill.

If your party member had 100 aggro points on an oponent, and did a 1000 aggro points worth of skills under its 20 seconds of effect, the skill should have at least halved that to 500 and they would end up with 600 points. The original 100 are not affected.

This skill proves its worth in duns when there are waves of enemies which are often in reach of the ranged players or catch sight of the healer much faster than the tank. Allowing the Tank to stabilize aggro in an easier manner and not waste sources on aggro generating skills alone.


Armor Crush: tho at first I believed this skill would have been better suited after Shadow Fang, having it branch after Gust Slash made it for a subtle and gentle change in the rotation rather than a complete GCD addition. Which would have on the long (or short) term ended up making the fall of Shadow Fang, Mutilate or Dancing Edge more often than one would desire to.

Armor Crush adds but another layer of priorities in the already priority ridden class of NIN. Should be used instead of Aeolian Edge at a chance that occurs once in the rotation every 18 seconds.
As in, if the rotation was MU > SF > DE > AE. At a point it would become MU > SF > DE > AC.
Keeping an eye on the Huton timer and dividing it in multiples of 18 should ease this up. You will need a minimal of 6 seconds for its use, but 'tis needless to say that if you excecute it at any moment that was not originally designed for AE, will bring about the fall of either of the buffs or debuffs.

There is also no need to use it before the 40 seconds timer, and actually, doing the rotation cycle as AE, AE, AE, AC,(AE, AC, AC, AE, AE, AC) does work just fine.


I have some theories about the other skills, but for now I will leave it here (or it will become an excesively long post)

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Originally Posted by Krolja

Are you encountering any events like that when refreshing at such a low duration?

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I do occasionally if I'm not keeping careful track of things, yeah. I'm still trying to figure out if it's best to wait and try to cram everything in at the end or to use Armor Crush earlier, and keep Huton's timer around the 1 minute mark as much as possible.

What are everyone's thoughts on this:
New Possible Opener:

Blood for Blood >Spinning Edge+Internal Release >Gust Slash+Pot > Dancing Edge > Suiton > Spinning Edge > Kassatsu+Trick > Shadow Fang + Fuma/Raiton > Mutilate+Mug+Jug> Spinning Edge + Dream Within a Dream> Gust Slash + Duality > Aeolian Edge

My only gripe with this rotation is (Mutilate+Mug+Jug), because if you have bad latency it'll cut into the next GCD and your AE wont fall in the TA window. I'm only at lvl59 right now so I cant test since I dont have DWOD but just wanted to get thoughts on this.

Also, when would be the best time to use armor crush? at 17-18 sec before huton runs out just like how we reset it before? or when there are 8sec left in Huton?

that's basically the same 2.x opener, except with combining oGCDs to make room for DWAD and duality. i think it's fine yeah, dont think theres any other realistic way to fit those two skills in otherwise. you'll likely have to use fuma probably since you'll clip slightly with jug+mug

you should definitely do trick>kassatsu though, because if you weaponskill right after trick attack, it doesn't actually take effect (unless this was fixed).

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Originally Posted by AnMex

Blood for Blood >Spinning Edge+Internal Release >Gust Slash+Pot > Dancing Edge > Suiton > Spinning Edge > Kassatsu+Trick > Shadow Fang + Fuma/Raiton > Mutilate+Mug+Jug> Spinning Edge + Dream Within a Dream> Gust Slash + Duality > Aeolian Edge

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I've only got as far as lvl 56 so Im also in the dark about Dream.
But supposing it doesnt have an animation lock that wont let you do anything else...

As I see it, neither of your buffs will reach Aeolian Edge. 'Tis true that Mug and Jug doesn't have much of an animation lock so they can go pretty quickly, but they are 140 and 80 potency respectively, even if you add them up they wont get as much of a bonus as an unbuffed Aeolian Edge...
I think we should give the priority order of Ninjutsu > Dream > Mug > Jugulate and Duality always before Aeolian.

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Originally Posted by Aiurily

that's basically the same 2.x opener, except with combining oGCDs to make room for DWAD and duality. i think it's fine yeah, dont think theres any other realistic way to fit those two skills in otherwise. you'll likely have to use

you should definitely do trick>kassatsu though, because if you weaponskill right after trick attack, it doesn't actually take effect (unless this was fixed).

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Correct. Everything takes a moment to "apply" on a target, this can be seen with SMNs fester not accounting for bio if you smack it too quickly.

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Originally Posted by Arkenne

I've only got as far as lvl 56 so Im also in the dark about Dream.
But supposing it doesnt have an animation lock that wont let you do anything else...

As I see it, neither of your buffs will reach Aeolian Edge. 'Tis true that Mug and Jug doesn't have much of an animation lock so they can go pretty quickly, but they are 140 and 80 potency respectively, even if you add them up they wont get as much of a bonus as an unbuffed Aeolian Edge...
I think we should give the priority order of Ninjutsu > Dream > Mug > Jugulate and Duality always before Aeolian.

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I agree DwD should be higher priority than Mug and Jugulate.
Also, I think BfB should start after Spinning Edge, and IR after Gust Slash so they'll up for the full opener, but not delayed further than that.

Duality always on Aeolian sounds great in theory, but if you're keeping up Dancing Edge yourself then you delay it too much in my opinion.
There have been a good few times it's just off cooldown but I need to do a full Dancing Edge combo and refresh the dots before I can do AE (which is at the end of its own combo).

If you can sync Duality with AE reasonably, that's great but if if you're gonna have to hold the cooldown for 10s+, I doubt it's a dps increase."
Maybe when pandabearcat finishes that simulator it'll be clearer what the most optimized will be though.

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Originally Posted by Allyrion

Duality conditions and priority relations between DE and AE

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You've presented a good point. 'Tis true I commented Duality being exclusively reserved for AE, but till now for some reason didn't bother about mathing the rotation 90 seconds later to see how available it might be to AE. Specially since by then there is a lot of things happening that might imply the lose of your combo by disconects at some point.

Giving it a priority of AE > AC > DE depending the situation might be an answer closer to reality. Altho exclusively speaking of the opener... yep, AE.

I have been doing alternating from the opener in full rotations (DE, SF, MU, AE/AC)

AE > AC > AE > AC > AE > AC > AC
The effect is diminishing over time however so there comes a point where you have to do two rotations that end with AC. But I'm trying to line up the intervals so that I can some continuity between my damage cool downs and aeolian. Ie set it up so that I'm on an aeolian rotation when damage buffs are up for it.

For some reason I thought the armor crush clipped the time away if you reapplied but it doesn't so that is lovely.

After playing around at 60, I'm really happy with the changes.
Though I called the Enmity abilities redundant, I've actually grown to be glad to have both.

Ironically, compared to monks, though it seemed like we weren't getting much before, our rotation developed a lot more with Armor Crush.
It's a new rotation, and it's even more desynced than it was before.
But that's a good thing. It's very active and takes a lot more adaptation, but it's engaging and fun.

It's a bit funny to see so many other classes complaining about the changes, while NIN got away with what was thought to be underwhelming changes and nerfs.
Well, maybe some still feel so but I think we got very positive changes.

My only qualm might be that though there is a place for AE in rotation still, it's completely dropped if you have to face the target.
I know that usually doesn't happen, only solo-ing and stuff before they invented mobs that activate positionals from all sides.
Still, I'd think it would be better if Dancing Edge got the back positional and AE would more free.

I think it would feel a lot better since it's used less now, the times it does get used it should feel less restricted, just raw damage.
And Dancing Edge is always going to be used for its debuff, but if Aeolian Edge can't perform the damage its meant to then it's worthless.
Again, yea that's still doesn't apply to most scenarios but I think design wise it'd be better that way.


On Duality and Dream Within a Dream:

Well, I really thought Duality would be for a duration. Guess I'll eat my words now.
It's too bad but since it does get the combo potency of the skill, it's pretty awesome.

DWD is awesome.
300 off-gcd potency, pretty sure that's the strongest single target oGCD in the game.
The animation is lovely and over the top.
Too bad I hardly ever see the full thing. That really bugs me actually.
It doesn't feel like an animation that's made to be clipped, but it almost always is.


Speaking of single target, we seem to be quite strong there.
Not speaking of single target, I actually feel like we fell off in AoE.
I actually always liked our AoE and it was pretty strong if you did it right.
We didn't lose that, but everyone else gained much more AoE potential.
Not really a complaint but I'm pretty sure we went from the upper half (at least) to likely the last, just because nothing we gained affects our AoE.

Lastly, I wish Shade Shift worked on magic too.
But overall, I'm really happy playing NIN right now. The new rotation is a lot of fun.

Wonder if we should remake this thread for HW.

So does everyone just keep using armor crush to keep Huton up or do they recast Huton every once in a while? Personally (I haven't really made a rotation yet just from playing) I'll use armor crush up to 3 times before I recast huton.

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Originally Posted by VitalSuit

So does everyone just keep using armor crush to keep Huton up or do they recast Huton every once in a while? Personally (I haven't really made a rotation yet just from playing) I'll use armor crush up to 3 times before I recast huton.

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You lose 40 potency using Armor Crush over Aeolian Edge.
But you lose 360 potency casting Huton instead of Raiton (240 if you use Fuma Shrunken).
More loss if your 3-mudra Huton eats into your GCD.

So I don't think it's ever worth it to favor recasting Huton over extending it with Armor Crush when you're actually fighting.
There are certain lulls in a fight where you recast it because there's nothing to attack and a full refresh might be more beneficial than waiting for a last second extension.

Armor Crush does enough damage (more than Dancing Edge, less than AE) with the added Huton extension to make it always worth using.
Not extending Huton would have to give you 6 extra Aeolian Edges to make up for one Fuma Shuriken you lose each time you refreshed manually.
But that's not possible, and it's much worse with Raiton.

I'm only at lvl 56, -so I don't have Duality or DWD- so I know what I say wont hold much weight, but I like to refresh Huton with AC at 40 seconds, I notice at my level that I'm able to do so with out too many problems. My rotation goes like this, Huton as I run up to boss then SE>B4B>GS>IR>AE>Jug>Mut>Mug>SE>SF>SE>GS>AE>SE>Suiton>GS>TA>AE>Kassatsu>SE>Raiton>SF>SE>GS>AC>Mut. From there I refresh Mut, and SF as needed and AC at 40 secs. I Raiton when up, Suiton when TA is up, and Kassatsu Raiton when both available, and of course use Invigorate when appropriate. I use Huton as I'm running up to the boss because I don't expect the tank to wait around for me, so I learned to adapt my rotation.

So whats the news on skillspeed v crit v det on Ninja?

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Originally Posted by Venom

So whats the news on skillspeed v crit v det on Ninja?

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Same as it is on every other class. If you want to know how they compare, we first need to know how they scale. We don't yet, because we all have a divided focus.

I don't think the parsers have updated for those changes yet either.

Ohh, the NIN thread is alive again. Guess we have not much to complain about other than Mug and its life vamp properties, which I remembered by reading the skills again now in Heavensward (seriously, I totally forgot Mug can do that).

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Originally Posted by AzureZenorag13

Where is DE??

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I suppose that rotation is with a fellow NIN in DE duty or a WAR, right?

Im still at 57 because Im stubbornly lvling solely through MSQ, Hunting bill marks and Sidequests. But I can already see that Duality and DwD wont do much to change our rotations, specially because they clearly meant to enhance our already existing rotation.

Armor Crush is the core of our change and I gotta admit I feel it HARD when I lose this skill because of a level synch. Its amazing, to say the least. I know I said refreshing Huton is possible within a minimum of 18 seconds, but I suggest against. You'll feel hardpressed. So Im trying to keep it at 30 seconds as the "next-finisher-to-do".

Otherwise you also risk losing Huton because the boss went away at last moment and felt like doing flashy cool things... looking at you, Ravana ¬__¬

Or the mob died too quickly and next one was a tad too far away. Also there is a risk muscle memory will strike in and end up throwing a DE or AE instead by accident :|

The best part about Armor Crush is its flexibility.
There's no loss of dps if you use it under 40s left of Fuuton.

Like I said before, it's good to keep that buffer of 20-30s for fight mechanics or any mess-ups.
You can also let it drain a bit more and get AE in if you're in a burn phase or you know the fight well enough to be sure you'll have time to extend it.

So I don't think we should make hard and fast rules about when to extend Fuuton.
That doesn't give value to Armor Crush's excellent flexibility.
Anytime after the 40s mark is acceptable, and you can adjust based on the fight and even more importantly - buffs.

Obviously, if you do it over 40s then you won't get the full 30s it's meant to give you.
So I guess it goes without saying not to do it if you have over 40s left. But I said it anyway!

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Originally Posted by Allyrion

Armor Crush Flexibility

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Yup, gotta agree with that, it is a very flexible skill. No real need to use it over 40s Huton (unless mob is dying right there).

Looking at MNK, DRG, BLM and BRD. We really got lucky in the flexibility department, huh?

aaa i wish i could hit dummies to practice, but mudra lag in open world is like 500x worse atm

I feel physical pain when I have to do anything without Armor Crush now. That move is the game changer for Ninjas, it feels like it should have been there in the first place.

Any i190 NINs out there testing on dummies? I think I have a general feel for what most classes put out except NIN (and AST but whatever). NIN's looking so strong right now, with how easy they convert into real fights over almost everyone, and if they're putting out numbers like ARR NIN then look out other melee.

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Originally Posted by Sleigh

Any i190 NINs out there testing on dummies? I think I have a general feel for what most classes put out except NIN (and AST but whatever). NIN's looking so strong right now, with how easy they convert into real fights over almost everyone, and if they're putting out numbers like ARR NIN then look out other melee.

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I can't find anyone putting up test damage of fully geared NINs anywhere. Like you see it for literally every other class but none of the geared NINs seem to do the same.

So what's the latest opening burst rotation for non. 2nd how or when do use AC? And 3rd mudra lag still exist, so does AC lowers that a bit since we can pretty much doing ninjutsu and just focus on suiton and fuma/raiton.

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Originally Posted by Sleigh

Any i190 NINs out there testing on dummies? I think I have a general feel for what most classes put out except NIN (and AST but whatever). NIN's looking so strong right now, with how easy they convert into real fights over almost everyone, and if they're putting out numbers like ARR NIN then look out other melee.

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around 1150+ on a 3m ish parse is what i got. so the lowest of the three melee in sustain, but low maintenance in comparison

their dps should increase a bit more than drg/mnk when skillspeed changes to dots are recorded, since nins have the most potency from their dots (unless you're comparing vs fracture monk).

i'm the only bothered by the high skill level the ninja ask for be mastered now? between the unsynch cycle, the mudra lag, positional.... it become quite hard to pull a very good dps without put all you have into it. and i'm not talking of dummy fight, but real fight, with the stuff to avoid, the positional, the mudra (and it lag), the combo system that is a mess.... it become hard to not be tired mentaly after a long fight. and more important, it feel more like a chores like a fun activity.

don't get me wrong i like challenge and such, but there, the ninja have nothing really aligned... everything fall a part and you can't keep the buff/debuff all the time. you spend a lot of time to check your buff, the monster debuff, the stuff to avoid and with this you have ninjutsu every 20 second. if the combo system was more fluid and less a mess, we will not spend this much time to check our buff or debuff on the monster since it will come inside the cycle.

i still feel that the jobs ask us to jungle with knife while jumping on one feet with a blindfold! it's nice to try to add complexity, but when this complexity is all over the place is stupid!

another point that begin to anger me a lot, the TA positional, why it wasn't changed yet? i means all other jobs using positional had them positional recquirement reduced... only us can loose 60 second of CD because of a positional. maybe time to change this, no?

ps; i don't say we can't pull high dps, simply it will ask way too much work... and i'm a bit worried that even with all this work, ninja don't end with the top dps. if they want to keep the ninja with this level of skill recquire, they need to be top dps.

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Originally Posted by Butcherboy

latest opening burst rotation for NIN

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With BFB, IR, DE, Suiton and Kassatsu active,
After an SE use TA right before throwing SF.
Make sure you wind in a Ninjutsu, DwD, Mug and a Duality AE,
You should also have right about enough time to wind in a mutilate, and if you can also, a Jugulate.

Figuring out how to do this is yet another layer of problems for the NIN
but 'twould be best to mind make it happen before your Huton falls below 20
If you opened with Huton as your starter (at 0 Huton seconds wait time) start up with an MU -> DE -> SF -> AE as your filler to make time for Ninjutsu to refresh.

With current skill speeds I found that the latest you can begin a combo for Huton Extend is 8-7s, for some reason unlike dots if you apply when the timer ticks from 1-0 it doesn't re-apply (gotta be server lag atm).

So i tend to treat Huton like a dot on myself now, 14s left means i have time for a fang combo and an armor crush comfrotably, or a AE or DE combo and armor crush so long as the add wont die (fucking bismark) or a mechanic isn't incoming (please stop making yourself untargeted ravana).

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Originally Posted by AMagicRake

With current skill speeds I found that the latest you can begin a combo for Huton Extend is 8-7s, for some reason unlike dots if you apply when the timer ticks from 1-0 it doesn't re-apply (gotta be server lag atm).

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i had no problem extending at 1 sec but the time said 30 seconds instead of 31, it seems that 1 second was lost most like due to server

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Originally Posted by AzureZenorag13

i had no problem extending at 1 sec but the time said 30 seconds instead of 31, it seems that 1 second was lost most like due to server

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He is talking about attempting to refresh huton at the very last second and it falling off before the Armor Crush animation ends. If huton falls before the end of the animation its gone.

Its much different for lets say MNK, in which (in the past) you could hit Demolish at the last second the stacks would fall off, drop them, but retain GL3.