Novus Bow? Stats?

Almost done with my Alexandrite grind (thank God) and was wondering with the newer Demon gear and such what the best allocation would be. Also, any tips on the melding?

CRRIIITTTTTT!!!! lol, CRT-DET is the most common done by Bards, with a splash of accuracy if you need it, or if don't feel like spending a crap ton on materia

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Originally Posted by Tex_Mex

CRRIIITTTTTT!!!! lol, CRT-DET is the most common done by Bards, with a splash of accuracy if you need it, or if don't feel like spending a crap ton on materia

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Yep this exactly xD My yoichi has 10 accuracy and I need it. It ( along with lava toad legs accuracy food ) allows me to use WOD chest and not need melded kirimu coat for final coil. Even with some acc on bow it's still easy to break 600 crit before food.

Exactly how much are we talking Gil-wise? I have some materia stockpiled but is it certain types u need? Meaning, crit materia for crit?

Ok I started melding my scroll. Have 34 crit, 24 Det, 17 Acc. I just couldn't afford to do solely crit/Det. Anyway, once I change my bow to Novus someone said later I could redo those stats? It would involve getting another scroll but would I have to get 75 Alex all over again? I just want to get moving on farming Light and if I can try and gather Gil in the meantime or do some SBing to raise my crit and Det some more I would like to do that.

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Originally Posted by Caoihmin

Ok I started melding my scroll. Have 34 crit, 24 Det, 17 Acc. I just couldn't afford to do solely crit/Det. Anyway, once I change my bow to Novus someone said later I could redo those stats? It would involve getting another scroll but would I have to get 75 Alex all over again? I just want to get moving on farming Light and if I can try and gather Gil in the meantime or do some SBing to raise my crit and Det some more I would like to do that.

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You talk to an NPC and give him an empty sphere scroll and he gives you back a full scroll with all 75 slots filled. Then you can take it to another NPC who will offer to remove stats from your scroll 1 at a time for free. So, at a later date, you can get one of these scrolls and take it to the other NPC to remove 7 accuracy if you wanted to. Then you just complete the scroll like you did the first time. In this case you'd need 7 alexandrite to fill in the 7 stat points you removed. Hand over your scroll and your relic weapon (novus, nexus OR zodiac), and it will now have the new stats.

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Originally Posted by Giantbane

You talk to an NPC and give him an empty sphere scroll and he gives you back a full scroll with all 75 slots filled. Then you can take it to another NPC who will offer to remove stats from your scroll 1 at a time for free. So, at a later date, you can get one of these scrolls and take it to the other NPC to remove 7 accuracy if you wanted to. Then you just complete the scroll like you did the first time. In this case you'd need 7 alexandrite to fill in the 7 stat points you removed. Hand over your scroll and your relic weapon (novus, nexus OR zodiac), and it will now have the new stats.

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Spene Scroll you obtain again in Central Thanalan for the 3 Superior Enchanted Inks and I think same guy is the one to replce the melds.

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Originally Posted by Empty-handed

using 17 alex and might/aim materias IVs?

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Yeap ull need new alex' according to number of remelds. (Hate it wanna redo 39 melds on sch book and have 10 alex so far lol)

get new scroll from CT NPC. (3 inks)
go to NS copy your weapon stats to the new scroll.
go to CT again the goblin NPC to remove the materia that you dont want from the new scroll (point by point!). so if you want to remove all the 17ACC. you have to remove 1 by 1.
then you can infuse CRIT/DET (using 17 alex and might/aim materias IVs?) in the empty available slots in the new scroll. once its 75/75.
go to NS and apply it to your weapon.

Thx guys! Finished my scroll and now on to Light farming. Does anyone follow the Reddit Light Update sights? Or have suggestions on the quickest way to farm Light,

If you want to grind the reddit thingy is helpful and preferably join a PF.
Also daily roulettes alone give good pace.
I personally do atm my second Nexus while doing the dungeons for the Zodiak Braves' Quests with a friend (even if I get drop fast I run dungeons a lot as we both try be as far). Made in 1 week half the Nexus already with some farms of primals/coil :)

I went full crit and almost full det (missing around 10 det i think, added acc to finish it off)
Cost me over 1.5 million as have had no luck spirit binding and at the time DetIV's were over 650K on Leviathan, crit IV were around 530 or less.
Keep in mind after you have Nexus the next step does cost over 400K yet again. Just as a heads up for you to sb and save the gil.
But if i truly could have i would of went full crit/det

How did u go full crit and it only cost 1.5 million? With the materia costing 500k each?

Hmmm full crit(though I reinfused later) with as much det as I had available and 8 accuracy.

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Originally Posted by Caoihmin

How did u go full crit and it only cost 1.5 million? With the materia costing 500k each?

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I mentioned over 1.5 million, probably closer to 2.5 million actually. I have had a few IV materias from spirit binding also.
This next step for the Yoichi (sorry if i mispelled it) is stupid expensive also and just yeah.... stupid

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Originally Posted by Maero

I mentioned over 1.5 million, probably closer to 2.5 million actually. I have had a few IV materias from spirit binding also.
This next step for the Yoichi (sorry if i mispelled it) is stupid expensive also and just yeah.... stupid

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400k in gil straight up. The rest is market forces on the market board. I've probably spent ~400k for that as well but I've made enough from the 2 desynths I had and gathered other mats - crafted 5 items myself and the 3 by a friend. So not too much - I've spent more on the crit IV materia.

Do what you want for now, det+crit+acc is your best bet. With lvl cap going up in the expansion, my guess is t4 materia is going to be much more available and easy to get since you won't have to spend gillions on crafter gear/melds to make the gear required for t4 materia. Since you can remeld later anyway no need to break the bank a couple months beforehand.

I know Yoshi wants to involve crafters more but he involved them TOO much in these quests imo. And who's bright idea was it to make materia infusion fail when you need 75 of the buggers already? That's just redundant.

Anyway. Camp the MB for your zodiac items now, the prices swing so far between high and low that you will save yourself tons of gil in the long run if you don't have crafter friends or are one yourself.

All crit det. Or if you don't want to spend millions on IVs or spend hours SBing for IVs then put some acc on it. Ideally you want all crit det.

Also get used to melding because bard BIS has like 4 crafted pieces.

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Originally Posted by mahouyolo

All crit det. Or if you don't want to spend millions on IVs or spend hours SBing for IVs then put some acc on it. Ideally you want all crit det.

Also get used to melding because bard BIS has like 4 crafted pieces.

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Hmmm a friend of mine tried a full crit/det optimized and a full dex optimized build. The full dex one he had 460 skillspeed, he said needs a bit of resource management but the DPS increase was worth it apparently. I only got the pants myself and got the wod bard chest.

Skill speed and too much of it is just awful, reason why the ironworks chest is just a NO.
Last time i checked the Kimiru chest was still best and the pants are pretty awesome also, have not seen Demon Chest piece from wod however
Kimiru Coat cost me around 2.5 mil, and the pants thankfully was able to have a fc member craft it for me

Crit and det to what you can afford. Full the rest with acc to quickly move on to next steps. Slowly restat as needed pulling off excess acc that you don't need depending on your gearing. There are some nice i120 pieces in WoD for brds to round out a nice set especially if you can't afford the fully melded crafted pieces yet.

Oh and skill speed is the enemy!

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Originally Posted by ruskie

snip

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Skillspeed is awful and you want to minimize it as much as possible, less than 400 is ideal. Also the amount of dex you gain from full i130 is beat out by both the gain of crit and det and loss of skillspeed with crafted gear. At the bare minimum you need the crafted chest because there is just no way to meet the t13 acc cap with the wod chest without sacrificing good stats on other pieces and defeating the purpose of using it. Hat, earrings, and ring are kind of superfluous but if you meld them right they're marginally better than ironworks hat and dreadwyrm jewelry without sacrificing accuracy.

Det is 1, and I think crit and det are around .33 and .34? So even if you have 20 more dex on one set, if you have more than ~60 crit+det on another set it would be better to use it.

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Originally Posted by mahouyolo

Skillspeed is awful and you want to minimize it as much as possible, less than 400 is ideal.

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I'm just stating what they got meassured with(a crit optimized set vs a dex optimized set).

But yeah my own set has 0 gear skillspeed(so I'm at 341 skillspeed) I detest skillspeed.

Yoichi bow(8 acc, 49 crit, 25 det), ironworks head, hands, belt, boots, neck(upgraded) and 2 rings(1 upgraded), and aural earrings and bracelet with demon chest and kirimu pants(not ideal but 5 crit III materia). I'm at 531 accuracy and atm that's enough for my needs. Will see how rng is helpful during fcob(t10 atm).

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Originally Posted by Maero

have not seen Demon Chest piece from wod however

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4 weeks it took me to see it drop. And I won it against the other bard with a roll of 42...

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Kimiru Coat cost me around 2.5 mil, and the pants thankfully was able to have a fc member craft it for me

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Pants I got the mats on my own then got it crafted for 100k by a friend of a friend.

My skillspeed is 380 atm, i feel like if you reach into the 400's it would just be too much.
My Yoichi Bow which hooray finally got a few days ago (god that last quest line sucks)
I have 11 acc, 28 det, crit 44. Did not go full det as was too darn expensive like i mentioned but i have Kimiru pants and chest melded.
The kimiru pants are actually very good until you can get Dreadwyrm, even then Kimiru still holds strong.
I have CritIV, DetIV, crit3 x 2 melded atm and will probably add a det2 for the last spot. Remember the first 2 melds are 100% so may as well go with 2 crit iv's or 1 crit IV and one detIV

As a side note, all i ever see in wod is Bard, Ninja and healer gear not once have i seen the darn Robe of Casting for my blm.... it's depressing

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Originally Posted by mahouyolo

Skillspeed is awful and you want to minimize it as much as possible, less than 400 is ideal. Also the amount of dex you gain from full i130 is beat out by both the gain of crit and det and loss of skillspeed with crafted gear. At the bare minimum you need the crafted chest because there is just no way to meet the t13 acc cap with the wod chest without sacrificing good stats on other pieces and defeating the purpose of using it. Hat, earrings, and ring are kind of superfluous but if you meld them right they're marginally better than ironworks hat and dreadwyrm jewelry without sacrificing accuracy.

Det is 1, and I think crit and det are around .33 and .34? So even if you have 20 more dex on one set, if you have more than ~60 crit+det on another set it would be better to use it.

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Actually with the addition of the WoD chest the preferred way to get accuracy as a bard is with the crafted belt and gloves.

This is basically the set im working with right now http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PSX4 with an effective dex of 1495.802

vs recalculated without WoD as an option http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PSX7 with effective dex of 1494.515

As you can see you can gain a pretty substantial amount of dex and hit acc cap and have less skillspeed if you use the WoD chest. Keep in mind this isnt a bis calculation, its just bis from the gear that I have or can easily obtain. I'm limited by the fact that I don't have dreadpants (through no fault of my own!)

If you throw in dreadpants u get http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PSXE with 1502.279 effective dex and you're basically BiS minus the bow where the only source of improvement available is more expensive melds.

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Originally Posted by MrYaah

If you throw in dreadpants u get http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PSXE with 1502.279 effective dex and you're basically BiS minus the bow where the only source of improvement available is more expensive melds.

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No, crafted hands and belt isn't BiS and neither is the Augmented Ironworks Ring.

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Originally Posted by Ooshima

No, crafted hands and belt isn't BiS and neither is the Augmented Ironworks Ring.

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-sigh-

I wasn't claiming that set specifically was BiS, just giving an example of an eminently obtainable build.

Absolute BiS

-http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PRIS

notice crafted gloves and belt

This build was proven by a bis solver i wrote that uses the equations used to calculate statweights as a comparison metric to account for interrelations of value between stats, in addition it brute forced the best build (took about an hour to do all the comparisons) from every possible version of melds that are viable (IV's only, every number of available accuracy (9, 18, 19, 25, etc), always maximizing damage otherwise and version of melds that involved capping acc and a stat rather than skillspeed because people like you)

All the work I've put into bis calculations can be found in this repo, well, theres some stuff I havnt pushed recently but all the stuff involved in finding the previously linked build are in the repo below. Its completely open if you wish to critique it yourself. I fully intend to further optimize it and hopefully make it the defacto standard of bard statweight and bis calculations.

https://github.com/jrlusby/xiv-bard-calc

If you want to disagree with this then show me math and explain why, dont use any subjective opinions like "I don't think skillspeed is worth anything" which i know is literally the only thing you think mister I'd rather quadrameld my gear and leave an empty slot than meld skillspeed.

Unfortunately, skill speed is shit. Face it. In long fights like Coil, how many more shots can you fire with that +91 Skill speed to justify for the TP drain in which would imply that you have to Paeon longer and eat that 20% for more?

Everyone who uses a gear calculator would know that Skill Speed is given a certain weightage. But does everyone knows that stat weights are technically not absolute, but just as a guideline on how much main stat and secondary stat you can try to exchange, within a reasonable band?

Do you actually believe that by say, swapping 100 DEX with 313 DET, you can effectively parse the same DPS range over say 5 mins or longer?

The current, widely used and accepted stat weights doesn't even account for extreme stacking builds like 2.5 BRDs which can carry them to the extremes of 700 CRIT. If you blindly follow the stat weights which you probably do, you would say the Augmented Magitek > CRIT-DET Yoichi Bow but unfortunately I don't think it is. My CRIT-DET Yoichi outparses the Augmented Magitek 80% of the time. I'm not even talking about a couple of parses. I'm talking about over 50 parses and upwards and days after days of testing. Do you bring your builds out to test and justify your builds or you simply follow a calculator?

And since we are talking about Skill Speed - if you are running on CRIT-DET Yoichi Bow and cutting down on your Skill Speed you will probably realize that you don't need to play any Paeon in T13 for P1 and P2 at all (and of course, your team DPS hard enough to push these 2 phases fast enough) but given the same team with your Augmented Magitek you will run dry before you hit divebomb. Which means you have to Paeon, eat that 3 seconds cast time +20% penalty.

I have published my findings about my 2.5 build (albeit still missing 3 items but the idea is there) with the relevant parse data in another thread while in discussion with another BRD (who clearly knows his shit and part of the top 10 teams for T13). Unfortunately SE doesn't like the idea, the posts were cleaned up and I ate a 10 days ban + infraction points. So I won't have things to show here.

And since you wondered why I quadmeld IV instead of pentameld IV with Skill Speed IV: because I intend to quadmeld IV with Vit IV but prices are insane on Tonberry right now. Why Vit IV? Yes, Skill Speed is shit, I'd say that again. If you even recall, crafted gear in Patch 2.2 progression comes naturally with shit load of Skill Speed. I have full set crafted gear for 2.2 progression and my GCD was at 2.30s at that point in time. What's the benefit? 2-3 more shots over an entire coil turn, but running out of TP nearly as fast as your DRG/MNK in T8? Nah I'm not going to be bothered with Skill Speed, really.

I'm not going to blindly follow some numbers - I'm a person who brings a build out to thoroughly test them for effectiveness. Experience and data from 2.2 until now says it.

It hurts my eyes to read so much swearing.
I'm BLM all right, but I still don't understand why some BRD want to play like archers and avoid singing? To measure their e-penis? Probably.

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Originally Posted by Kraktur

It hurts my eyes to read so much swearing.
I'm BLM all right, but I still don't understand why some BRD want to play like archers and avoid singing? To measure their e-penis? Probably.

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Because those are just bad players is all.

On another note would any of you have suggestions for earrings? Still using soldiery ones for the fact that the ironworks do not seem very good at all to me

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Originally Posted by Ooshima

"skill speed is shit"

"Everyone who uses a gear calculator would know" "everyone knows" "technically not absolute" "just as a guideline" on how much main stat and secondary stat you can try to exchange, within a reasonable band?

"believe"

The current, widely used and accepted stat weights doesn't even account for extreme stacking builds like 2.5 BRDs which can carry them to the extremes of 700 CRIT.

"unfortunately I don't think it is".

My CRIT-DET Yoichi outparses the Augmented Magitek 80% of the time. I'm not even talking about a couple of parses. I'm talking about over 50 parses and upwards and days after days of testing. Do you bring your builds out to test and justify your builds or you simply follow a calculator?


And since you wondered why I quadmeld IV instead of pentameld IV with Skill Speed IV: because I intend to quadmeld IV with Vit IV but prices are insane on Tonberry right now. Why Vit IV? Yes, Skill Speed is shit, I'd say that again. If you even recall, crafted gear in Patch 2.2 progression comes naturally with shit load of Skill Speed. I have full set crafted gear for 2.2 progression and my GCD was at 2.30s at that point in time. What's the benefit? 2-3 more shots over an entire coil turn, but running out of TP nearly as fast as your DRG/MNK in T8? Nah I'm not going to be bothered with Skill Speed, really.

I'm not going to blindly follow some numbers - I'm a person who brings a build out to thoroughly test them for effectiveness. Experience and data from 2.2 until now says it.

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Look at all those opinions! believe, think, everyone knows, guidelines. blah blah blah. Ok.

As for stat weights not accounting for extreme stacking, did no not real my post at all!? this wasn't fking calculated with statweights, the value of bloodletter was calculated based on the current crit number which then gave a valid relative value of stacking crit like crazy (which by the way goes down not up as you stack it). Same thing for skillspeed where the lower it gets each new point is valued more, but a stat weight calculation values all the same. I agree with you that statweights arn't a good way to calculate this shit.

I'd love to see the results of this 50+ tests on which build is better, send me a message through reddit my username is /u/MrYaah.

As for the empty melds, You're gonna meld a vit IV on your hat are you? Really?

Here, I forgot I actually did the math so insane people like you can have your glorious ss free builds

http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PT8V

This isn't a proven 0 Skillspeed BiS, I cannot guaruntee that there are no better meld sets with 0 skillspeed because I didn't put the time into calculating this that I put into the other absolute BiS. the post explaning the logic I used to calculate it is here

http://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/commen...rd_bis/corv8ij

You will notice WoD chest and crafted gloves. When I get to work I'm going to take the time to make a proven no skillspeed bis to prove one way or the other, even by your, in my opinion, illogical standards, whether or not WoD chest is BiS

Checked the math, turns out that the set I linked is infact exactly the 0 skillspeed bis set, proven according to math, which we all know you believe is hogwash and black magic that must for the sake of progress be disregarded in favor of inconsistent parses and inadequate subjective analysis.

I wish you the best.

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Originally Posted by MrYaah

I'd love to see the results of this 50+ tests on which build is better, send me a message through reddit my username is /u/MrYaah.

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To make things clear - with reference to my previous post I am referring to Augmented Magitek VS Yoichi itself. I would love to test your build but that requires me the very least, to re-meld my accessories + obtain a crafted hands+belt with your specified meld. It is not a cheap to do so at current prices.

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Originally Posted by MrYaah

As for the empty melds, You're gonna meld a vit IV on your hat are you? Really?

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I'd agree that you do have valid point out there whilst I do not understand the program you wrote (I am not good with those stuff, in fact it took me some time to understand the basic functions and mechanics behind ACT itself). You obviously knew that I am referring to the right-hand-side stuffs. Who on earth at does crafting, pentamelding, endgame raiding plus some theorycrafting doesn't know a HQ'd left-hand-side cannot accept any more main stat and vitality melds?

If you are wondering about my crafted hat so much: it was made and melded on day-1. No one knew the stat caps and the only way you could know is to actually do it. And probably you have to dump every IV you can so that you max out stat per slot. That was how it ended up with, and as you would have guessed, other pieces such as the belt and shoes are all ended up quad IV melds if ignoring Skill Speed. And of course I'd end out with shit ton of accuracy, but again no one knows what is the accuracy requirements as well. No one knows on day one which piece drops from which turn, and certain drops are without accuracy, and without knowing acc caps further down the turns, maxing acc on each piece if possible is just a play-safe measure.

By preference and by cost, I've chosen not to meld in Skill Speed.
(for some reason or another, even Quickarm IV went out of stock and whenever it was replenished, it commands in the 200k range. It was simply cost inefficient and too expensive to meld it on the 5th slot)


In any case we have derailed. My original reply to you was saying that the crafted hands, belt and augmented ironworks ring isn't BiS. Specifically referring to this 3 items, I did not say that the link you have provided is actually a BiS set. Simple.

And there after you started with your sarcasms which I think it is a shame. You tried to reason with math but you ended them with attacks with every of your reply. Not that I am angry or offended, I don't have a reddit account but I've read your reddit posts since you have invited with your username, but I don't think it does justice to the debate here. I'm trying to debate reasonably without calling you with terms like "which i know is literally the only thing you think mister", "which we all know you believe is hogwash and black magic", "Here, I forgot I actually did the math so insane people like you can have your glorious ss free builds (you impling those bards which you have had a discussion with who preferred to shun Skill Speed are insane too?)", whatsoever, but you are doing otherwise.

If you'd like to present your high level work and research which you are very much proud of (and a good reason to) but to only end it with personal attacks then I don't think it is very much a convincing effort to win differing views over.

Again, I've derailed. Apologies for that but I just have to say it. Nonetheless I would admit that I don't have a clue how your repo/calculator works but at least in conclusion till here that we agreed that stat weights itself isn't a good way to evaluate the value of a gear set.

And maybe, at least from your various reddit posts, you seem to be able to agree that Skill Speed eventually boils down to preference. Which I preferred not to. Which in your discussion with Rinchan, whom personally choose to value Skill Speed itself at 0. But your reaction to the same view from me right here was ridiculously strong:

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If you want to disagree with this then show me math and explain why, dont use any subjective opinions like "I don't think skillspeed is worth anything" which i know is literally the only thing you think mister I'd rather quadrameld my gear and leave an empty slot than meld skillspeed.

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I didn't even mentioned anything about Skill Speed if you bothered to read again. All I said was the 3 pieces of item there was not BiS itself?

Like Rinchan and other bards in your reddit discussion thread have said, they have considerations about TP issues with regards to having excessive Skill Speed itself, in which you mentioned that the trade off is minimal. Since you have stated that you do have the intention to obtain the set you have calculated (or was it close to it), and since I do not have the intention to to get any skill speed, maybe you actually do have the means to do long parses (by singing paeon to recover your own TP) to actually determine if there is really any, or how much benefits that 91 (or whatever Skill Speed you may have) is.

Or maybe you are much better at song timing and TP management itself that actually made the difference.

I would be all ears to your findings, if you would do it (or is going to get the BiS or anything close to it that you have calculated).


EDIT: BTW I'd agree with your no SS build - http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PT8V

I apologize for being rude, was immature.

We should probably throw aside the skill speed discussion but I'll give you the logic that I use to justify why I think skillspeed isn't as bad as many people make it out to be.

As I see it skillspeed has one advantage and two disadvantages.

The advantage is that it increases your dps, how much it increases it by is very well understood and its ~.15-.16 effective dex per skillspeed point using dex as an approximate reference to make it easier to compare for people who dont want to calculate how it modifies potency per second. All the math I do to compare bard sets does do that math so its pretty accurate in this regard.

The first disadvantage, increased tp usage per second, is fairly well understood and frequently discussed so I'll gloss over it. The second that nobody talks about is how it affects dot clipping. As you increase your skillspeed you're gcds will come out quicker but your dot duration remains the same, this results in you getting less uptime per application and decreases the effective potency of your dot skills, at 0 ss as a bard you clip your dots by .5 seconds assuming no lag or delayed gcds. It still remains optimal to clip the dot up until ~480ish skillspeed where your rotation duration becomes something like 16.1 seconds and if you add an extra heavy shot your dots get reapplied at 18.5 seconds and the potency per second of that rotation is a little higher, as you get more ss it continues to grow, the optimal point is when a 5 heavy shot rotation is exactly 18 seconds long.

Both these factors devalue skillspeed, the question is how much? this isn't easy to calculate. It depends on a lot of things, the fight (downtime and length), how efficiently you insert paeon into your rotation, if you have a ninja, selene, etc. Its my opinion that in t9 skillspeed is worth its full stat weight and in t13 its pretty close to full stat weight.

I only have the augmented ironworks bow so I personally don't have any comparative parses from me against myself with two different bows to compare them, all I have is math and other peoples parses. I don't want to sound like a bragger but what I'm about to say is true and is important to the topic, my best parses with the augmented ironworks bow are better than most other bards best parses with the dreadwyrm bow, particularly on t13. I can think of 3 bards that I know parse higher than me and all of them have dreadwyrm bow, one of them is rinchan nau, I have a lot of respect for that guy, there are probably plenty more bards that beat me but I don't have there parses to compare against, the best resource I have is DnT's leaderboards and I'm 4 totaldps in fcob behind sartigan, and 32 above the next place person.

I've always used this to infer that skillspeed probably isn't hurting my dps and still has a value that is pretty close to the calculated stat weight. This is a pretty shitty way to decide whether skillspeed is useful or not but its what I got, I'm grinding the shit out of my relic any chance I get so hopefully once I get that or if the damned dreadbow will drop I can do some relevant comparisons myself.

Overall, given two equal builds where one has more skillspeed, I'd choose the set with less skillspeed, but the issue is how far do you go? skillspeed is in my opinion pretty obviously not value less, clipping your dots slightly quicker doesnt decrease your pps by more than decreasing your gcd increases it, as such I choose to still give skillspeed a decent amount of value and when you're doing these set comparisons, you're rarely dealing with sets that are equal in value, the ones with more skillspeed have more total stats because you're generally trading 1 det for 9 skillspeed, I have trouble believing that this isn't a winning trade. you'd have to say that you lose > 75% of the value of skillspeed for this not to be worth, and in the case of hat and gloves you're tradeing 0 stats for 9 skillspeed.

I hope that gives some more insight into the source of my opinions and preference.

I do however still want to convince you that the augmented gloves combo + ironworks ring is bis over the massive crafted set. I don't know what set you're planning on making but I'm assuming it looks something like this

http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PTBE

effective dex on that set is 1526.524

vs the set I linked earlier

http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PT8V

with an effective dex of 1528.395

some of this difference is accounted for by the fact that your melds leave your accessories short by 1 crit/det, but that only makes up for 1.2 dex, so the demon chest + crafted gloves + augmented ring build is still better while maintaining 0 skillspeed. It also has the advantage of being much cheaper since you dont have to pentameld a crit det chest all you need is 1 accuracy IV overmeld on the hat and gloves, and 2 for each of the 3 accessories. It also has one fewer crafted accessory since you're using an augmented ring, that extra 3 accuracy on the ring is what makes the build and allows you to get away with everything the way it is.

Valid arguments there. I think the reason why the DoT clipping wasn't really particular mentioned is that, in my personal opinion, less impact over the concerns of extra TP consumption. TBH I don't really notice where and when the DoTs exactly tick, and as you said, the timing of playing of songs, and taking into account of various mechanics that may throw your ideal continuous pewpewpew off (such as switching targets, being stunned etc), I think it isn't that bad. Unless it is an extended dummy style fight like T8, then maybe the effect of DoT clipping may be more pronounced.

And yes, Rinchan is one of the BRDs around that I follow around too (he posts around here as well). But that aside, I guess that doesn't matter because in order to make an objective comparison we have to keep the player status quo, I think you understand that. You can use the IL90 Elfin Bow and probably still beat the crap out of shit tons of Bards there (I've seen bards that is at 400, yes 400 dps during P1 of T13, I'm not sure how do they even clear) but you can't say that the Elfin is better than the Dreadwyrm.

The most painstaking question that we always ask ourselves at the end of the day is - is that skill speed worth the extra effort? This is because crit and det will definitely take precedence over skill speed any day, and even before skill speed is melded in, meeting accuracy cap will come first before that quickarm materia. That would usually make the quickarm the bottom of the melding chain, which means high failure. Depending on server, even quickarm can cost a ridiculous sum of gil. And with skill speed isn't a clear cut beneficial stat like crit/det does (which is the more the merrier), I guess it is natural that a large population of end game bards decides to completely ignore it if the cost is not justifiable.

I guess that is where the difference between you and I come about. If we were to look at it mathematically, I guess you are right about it. Theoretically under the right conditions, under the right player who knows when to play the songs and reapplying of DoTs in split seconds accuracy. But I guess as of now no bard dares to claim perfection (or even near) in execution, and thus the more "real-world" considerations comes in.

With regards to the sets - as mentioned in previous post I agree with your zero skill speed build. Your combination will indeed produce some 1.something (lower end) effective DEX over what I plan to use (actually what you see is what I already planned - I'm just missing the dread wrist and dread pants now, which after months of farming... still doesn't drop for me). I have no disagreement with that, and of course I could make the hands with the specified meld quite cheaply (maybe 1m-2m gil depending on meld RNG). A little gain, at the cost of some gil, and 1 pdef/mdef and 2 vitality lost. I'll probably give some thoughts about it.

Sidetrack - since you mentioned about my accessories where there are always missing 1 acc/1 crit/1 det from the cap: as you noticed this is because they are all IV melds instead of IV + III melds that would instead cap it properly. This in turn would allow me a free 5th slot for a Vit IV materia. You may be curious why I am so insistent in being fat, I guess it's just a safety measure. I'm in quite a bad luck since 2.3 until right now - I've been to 4 different statics, all of them broke, I've pugged here and there as well while trying to find a stable group and all I can say is that it is tough to find healers that can ensure that I don't die while eating Earthshaker with BfB on. I hate to hold BfB or cancel it just for Earthshaker, especially at this point in time where we are already so geared. I should be able to BfB without holding back - of cos with good healers it was never an issue, but yeah, they are not easy to come by.

This would probably answer your question on "given two equal builds where one has more skillspeed, I'd choose the set with less skillspeed, but the issue is how far do you go?". That is how far would I go about it. Unfortunately of all great healers I've met, I've never really managed to be in their team. And even if I do, it was just temporary. As such things like pdef/mdef and vitality would probably hold more value to me than skillspeed itself, I guess I can sacrifice that skill speed if I can get more pdef/mdef vitality. Conservative thinking yes, but maybe one day I am that good enough to end up in a very competitive team where I do not need to give too much thoughts about survival, then maybe going all out with damage would become a higher priority.

In any case, if I were to adjust according to your recommendation, this would be the set:

http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PTDV

Effective DEX improvement: 1.215

Yea I don't have that healer problem I'm rocking 6.3k hp at ilvl120 levels of mdef and def, I just pop keen flurry during earthshakers+b4b and im always fine, if its going to be up during tempest wings ill cancel it but proper timing makes it so that doesn't happen.

I used this build last night with over 700 crit: http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PTBF

I wouldn't mind adding skill speed too, but honestly, I just don't have the gil currently. This build, however, is cheap enough that I may get it for my alt too.

Results seem positive even if not a significant leap. It's hard to tell also because I had a DRG last night.. Which 90% of the time I don't have. But I was able to surpass my previous t11 and t12 highs. I think I would have come close on t10 if I didn't die to a charge. t13 our group just had way more DPS than usual last night so I didn't even come close to my high due to so much down time.

Basically the same build with much more cost efficient melds.

Also @Rinchan

For that set you should try swapping out the crafted gloves for augmented ironworks on t10-11, I just tried out using lower accuracy sets for t10 and 11 and got really good results (read: improvement)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by RinchanNau

I used this build last night with over 700 crit: http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PTBF

I wouldn't mind adding skill speed too, but honestly, I just don't have the gil currently. This build, however, is cheap enough that I may get it for my alt too.

Results seem positive even if not a significant leap. It's hard to tell also because I had a DRG last night.. Which 90% of the time I don't have. But I was able to surpass my previous t11 and t12 highs. I think I would have come close on t10 if I didn't die to a charge. t13 our group just had way more DPS than usual last night so I didn't even come close to my high due to so much down time.

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Would be curious on your T10 new high :D

Just finished T10 this week with the Zeta bow, still missing the pants/wrist for a complete set. 8mins run time without dragoon for 495DPS, if adjusted for dragoon (is it around 7.5%?) maybe 53X ish?

mine was 513.47 with a ninja and no dragoon, using this set, http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PTEH, note ironworks bow, crafted pants, dread wrists, encounter duration of 8:33, scholar used selene, there were no deaths, I don't think I got any wildcharges. My current highest with a dragoon and no ninja is 517 with this less optimized set http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PMA7 but im pretty sure I can top that given the no dragoon parse. Sadly I have no Dragoon + Ninja parses :(