Determination vs spell speed and resetting stats at level 50 questions

A few ?s as I'm about to embark on my 1st mmo post-game content
1. In my newly acquired WHM blue gear I'm seeing determination show up, I don't recall seeing this on lower equip and because I'm a bit slow at times, I've always pushed for spell speed assuming that sped up my cure casts. Should I equip more det. gear over spell speed, does spell speed even do very much? I fell like it does, but it appears in some of my gear choices I have to sacrifice speed for det. vice versa - which is better
2. I read that I can buy a book that resets points, I think I found it at the flame hq and I can afford it - can I buy this more than once? Will this reset all of my other character as well or just the one I'm using when I activate it? Lastly, I read to pump every stat into mind, but I assumed that was for pre-level 50, now I'm reading I need vitality. Suggestions on where to put points?
Appreciate any feedback and apologies if this is rookie stuff, I did look but got further confused.

Secondary stats (det, crit, speed) are an issue of some debate. General wisdom in the past has said that det > speed > crit. Personally I see merit in all three and blend accordingly.

You can use the book multiple times and it will reset the points of the class you are on.

Putting 30 points into mind is a safe bet. Some WHM prefer to shift some points into vitality as to survive certain mechanics a little more reliably, with the reasoning that a few points over to vitality does not affect their healing output very much, while offering a buffer against certain mechanics like turn 5 fireballs. My own opinion is that the extra health is not needed and the always-useful bonus to healing that mind provides does the greater good.

Thank you for the reply, very much appreciated.

Being secondary stats, and with our gear choices being so limited currently, none of them will make a huge~ difference in your gameplay because per point they do very little. But if we could stack them much higher than what we can do now, I'd value Det over anything else as well, largely because we have quite a few over-time spells (HoTs like Regen and Medica 2; DoTs like Aero and Aero 2) which benefit from Det and Crit, but not so much from Speed.

Determination gives a consistent increase to any healing or damage you do. Assuming we could stack it higher, it's a safe go-to for any build, but the other two stats may be preferred depending on different players' personal playstyles.

Spell Speed will reduce your cast and recast times by a linear amount (but not for abilities that can be used off of global-cooldown, like Cleric Stance, Shroud, and Benediction). But for over-time skills, it doesn't reduce the time in between 'ticks'. Increasing my spell speed by 135 reduces my cast time for Cure by 0.1 sec, and recast time by 0.13 sec. So it's not much right now, but if you have to spam casting nonstop and don't need to dodge, it may be noticeable. I believe that right now, MNKs are the only ones who get any appreciable amount of skill speed; Greased Lightning stacks can push them past 1k speed, dropping their cooldown times to under 2 seconds instead of 2.5.

Crits are fun. They always are. Over-time skills have a chance to crit per tick as well, so there's no downside there. But chance is chance, and if I recall, around 14-15 crit increases your crit rate by 1%. There's probably a point where having more crit rate will do more for you in the long run than having more MND/Det, but I doubt we're anywhere close to that point yet. If I were to trust Valk's calculator, I currently only have around 7-8% crit rate. At best, I think I'd only be able to push it by another 5-8%, including PVP gear which require something like 1.3k victories. And I don't PVP, so that's not happening.


In the future, I'm sure we'll have a much broader range of equipment to choose from to suit everyone's personal playstyles. But right now, they're small enough where I'd say they're not worth sweating over.

edit : I should include a couple of notes about SCH as well, in case you or anyone else would be interested.
1) Your fairy's stats are based off of your own at the time that you summon it. So something like increasing your spell speed will increase your fairy's as well.
2) Crit rate has more value to SCHs than to WHMs because of Adloquium. Adloquium heals for less than Cure/Physick, but it applies a stoneskin-like magic-damage shield for the same amount healed. Crit'ing Adloquium -doubles- how much the shield would block, on top of already doing more because crit heals are 1.5x bigger. SCHs are great at strategically mitigating damage if they know it's coming, and this tidbit can be wonderful when it happens.

spell speed also increases animation speed. might affect when instants land, since theres a delay on that.

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Originally Posted by spaace

spell speed also increases animation speed. might affect when instants land, since theres a delay on that.

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I haven't seen anyone else say this. In contrast, I hear about plenty of people, including MNKs, complain about animation-locking, preventing them from using off-GCD instants sooner. So if you can give more detail or examples on why you say this, I know a lot of people who'd like to know as well.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by spaace

spell speed also increases animation speed. might affect when instants land, since theres a delay on that.

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This is incorrect. Spell Speed affects your cast time, your GCD, and influences your pet's cast time and GCD.

Nothing to do with animation.

For WHM, I recommend SS all the way:

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...2#post_1788139

BiS SS set is 3 posts above that one.

I'm actually going to mix SS and DET (and a little crit); ultimately...I don't think there is much difference between max DET and max SS builds, so mixing is fine

Its really up to personal preference...and how lucky you are with Coil drops...

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Originally Posted by dark494

For WHM, I recommend SS all the way:

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...2#post_1788139

BiS SS set is 3 posts above that one.

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I'm not going to spend time trying to pick apart the numbers there (they're at least forgetting to factor in casting and/or recast times at different points, so all of the "per second" figures are off), but the reasoning against Det for specifically Cures because of overhealing is practical and valid.


Some things I would keep in mind though:

• The more Magic Damage you have on your weapon, the more MND and Det will do, so the amount healed per point of each will increase as iLv gets higher in this game.
• Situation matters. You're generally not in a situation where you can stand there and spam heals 10 times in a row, or would even need to. But being able to cast 0.1-0.2 seconds faster here may let you get that one heal off against server latency or before you need to dodge. In the meantime, Regen is instant and can be used while running.
• Practical usage of HoTs (in any game) aren't to help top people off quickly. They're to gradually heal targets to ease how often or quickly you need to throw a Cure on them. If you have a feel for when a target may get hurt again, you may not even need to throw that Cure on them. So again, situation matters.