Xeno's 3.0 Aggressive Style Warrior Guide

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUXck-0vh5k

Healer approved.

Dude I have your old vids bookmarked.


#manmode

Holy crap, can a roe get some gil??

Finally xeno yeet yeet ^_^ "man the **** up" warriors

Another reason why Warrior is OVERPOWERED - SE DO SOMETHING! NERF WAR!

Your pronunciation of 'Cooldown' makes me laugh, but there was some seriously good food for thought in there. I'm gonna make a concerted effort to pair up BB and Berserk more often, and to make use of Unchained. I think a long stretch of time with an aggro-trolling Black Mage put me in some bad habits. ;P

Xeno, what is this? Why do you have a tail now? Come on man, tails suck.

Thank you for highlighting mitigation and appropriate stance use. Almost every WAR I've run with since 3.0 thinks it's all damage and the rest is someone else's business.

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Originally Posted by Galgarion

Xeno, what is this? Why do you have a tail now? Come on man, tails suck.

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Wrong. Tails are awesome.

Good stuff and its great to know that the sks number. There are a ton of rotations for how to incorporate 3 Fell Cleaves in Berserk but you only really need one of either Vengeance/RW if you place Berserk in the right spot. I prefer to build the wrath stacks at the start instead of blowing Infuriate at the beginning when I'm OT since it allows me to set up SE and SP at the start. I then pop Berserk after HS to cap the stack at 5 and do 2 full FC's at the start and another to close the rotation. I only do this because I don't want to waste the free stack that Berserk gives but that's just me.

Really good guide as usual, Xeno.

In terms of the OT rotation, I think this one posted awhile ago is about as min/max as you can get:

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Originally Posted by Ippiki

(prepare Abandon with Infur + Veng extend before pull) > HS(Brutal) > Maim(IR) > Eye(Xpot) > Fract > HS(late Berserk) > Fell(Infur) > Fell(Raw) > Maim > Eye(Brutal) > Heavy > Maim > Eye > Fell > Fract(pac)

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IMO, move Brutal after Maim or Eye, but for the most part this gives you an IR + Pot + Maim + Eye buffed Fracture, 2 fully buffed FCs, and a Berserk buffed FC + Fracture at the end. I don't parse b/c PS4, but this seemed the most ideal to me, though I'd love to see numbers with your rotation vs this one.

Your MT rotation is exactly what I use, so I'm glad to get some confirmation from another WAR that that opener is ideal. I typically use Unchained after OP/Tomahawk, though, as I've yet to have any aggro issues (will probably need to make the switch eventually).

Also, I really like SW over Awareness to this day (except in the case of an auto-crit heavy fight like Shiva Bow phase), because:

1. It nearly negates any crit and isn't RNG dependant
2. You can use it as a pseudo-Equilibrium in Deliverance while maintaining Equilibrium's TP refresh

Ideally, though, in fights like AS1 or AS3 you just replace Flash with SW and keep Awareness.

Nice video. Like that he made a point in his own way that tanking comes first then DPS. Although im confused about a certain thing.

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Originally Posted by Twilite

Nice video. Like that he made a point in his own way that tanking comes first then DPS. Although im confused about a certain thing.

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Yeah, I feel like Xeno is one of the only aggressive tanks who say that and actually mean it rather than just giving people lip service.

That thing I was confused about was what he said about foresight. So I did some asking around and I can see why foresight isn't seen as very useful. I didn't understand the difference between damage reduction and defense increase, the latter having a smaller impact.

I'm probably going to be studying most of his videos.

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Originally Posted by Twilite

That thing I was confused about was what he said about foresight. So I did some asking around and I can see why foresight isn't seen as very useful. I didn't understand the difference between damage reduction and defense increase, the latter having a smaller impact.

I'm probably going to be studying most of his videos.

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+20% defense isn't the same as 20% flat damage reduction. I don't know the maths behind this but appearently 20% defense equals approximately 6-7% damage reduction.

Anyway, great guide Xeno, as always. Still having that horrible room tho

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Originally Posted by Freyyy

+20% defense isn't the same as 20% flat damage reduction. I don't know the maths behind this but appearently 20% defense equals approximately 6-7% damage reduction.

Anyway, great guide Xeno, as always. Still having that horrible room tho

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Defense is a very flat line function, and very shallow at that. Every point of defense reduces damage by a 0.0x%. It was ~0.035% per point of defense at level 50. So something like 915 defense (What tanks had at ilv130 with protect) is 40.53% (which is why tanks seem to take half the damage per hit compared other jobs), foresight increased damage reduction to 48.64%. Equaling 8.11% damage reduction.

Sources for calculations used can be found here.

Defense probably lost some value now that we are level 60. But it should still be as linear.

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Originally Posted by Phoenicia

Defense probably lost some value now that we are level 60. But it should still be as linear.

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Yeah, it probably lost some value. I remember some people complaining about how Level 50 duties were stomping on Tanks if they went in unlevelsynced, presumably because new Defense calculations started applying the second they left Level 50.

However, Defense values on gear are rising much faster in 3.0 than they were in 2.0 and i180 left side gear already gives over double the Defense that i130 gear did. Unless the per-point value of defense has been reduced by more than half, we may end up having comparatively more damage reduction from Defense in 3.0 than we had in 2.0 which would make Foresight more valuable due to the increased speed of gear scaling as we climb the raids.

Thanks for the guide xeno! The last one was very helpful and informative, and I look forward to updates for this one.

There was a reddit post that showed the new defensive scaling at 60 is .0001725 per point of defense. If that ends up being accurate it puts my i185 WAR's Foresight at 8.7% physical damage reduction. Assuming that the scaling remains linear if you were in full i210 gear it would be around 12%, which is actually pretty good.

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Originally Posted by SpookyGhost

Ideally, though, in fights like AS1 or AS3 you just replace Flash with SW and keep Awareness.

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I like to keep flash for pacification--rather than having my healers have to time esunas on me for those 2 gcds lost, can pop flash flash and keep my threat going before driving back in.

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Originally Posted by Faytte

I like to keep flash for pacification--rather than having my healers have to time esunas on me for those 2 gcds lost, can pop flash flash and keep my threat going before driving back in.

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Lol flash's threat is so low for single target, doing that is just useless. Especially when you're a WAR and you probably have a fucking high threat lead after a Berserk phase. You can just sit and auto attack during pacification. For fights where you don't need AoE threat flash is really forgettable and I think it's better to take both Awareness and Second Wind.

Flash for pacification is only useful when you don't know the fight yet. IE on Bismarck you usually ended up pacified before the dragons spawned if you used it during the burn phase, but once you knew that was a thing you could either just manually click off Berserk or time it sooner to prevent the bad timing from happening.

Flash is most useful in fights like AS2 where having a 360 0 TP/Wrath AOE can make certain phase's adds easier to pick up.

Otherwise, though, Awareness or Second Wind are better options.

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Originally Posted by SpookyGhost

Flash for pacification is only useful when you don't know the fight yet. IE on Bismarck you usually ended up pacified before the dragons spawned if you used it during the burn phase, but once you knew that was a thing you could either just manually click off Berserk or time it sooner to prevent the bad timing from happening.

Flash is most useful in fights like AS2 where having a 360 0 TP/Wrath AOE can make certain phase's adds easier to pick up.

Otherwise, though, Awareness or Second Wind are better options.

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Which would be best to drop tho? I tend to drop awareness first because I like the fact I know I get guaranteed return from second wind but feel awareness could have a better pay off.

Depends on the fight really. If it's a fight with no AoE threat needed then drop flash. If it's a fight where you'll need AoE threat, I'd drop second wind because awareness works really well with Raw Intuition. Not only to negate the flank and back crits but also because when you get hit, enemy crit chance is calculated before anything else, it means that even from front, if an enemy is gonna crit you, you're not gonna parry, even with Raw Intuition on. Awareness makes Raw Intuition more reliable and safe to use.

Ravana: SW + Awareness
Bismarck: SW + Awareness
A1S: SW + Awareness
A2S: Flash + Awareness (see: Freyyy's explanation)
A3S: SW + Awareness
A4S: No idea, but I imagine SW + Awareness unless they made the Quarantine full of mobs then maybe Flash + Awareness

Safest route if you're unsure of what you're getting yourself into is Flash + Awareness, though I usually opt for Flash + SW because I stance dance too much on new content. :V

i need to level a warrior now. badly.

Thanks for posting this! Just started playing WAR again and was about to call securrrity on this complicated order.

I appreciate this guide. I've always wanted to learn how to properly play WAR since PLD feels a little too bland for me. Now I'm having fun leveling my WAR.

Thanks!

Awareness prevents being critical hit.
Raw Intuition makes you get critical hit.

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Originally Posted by SpookyGhost

Ravana: SW + Awareness
Bismarck: SW + Awareness
A1S: SW + Awareness
A2S: Flash + Awareness (see: Freyyy's explanation)
A3S: SW + Awareness
A4S: No idea, but I imagine SW + Awareness unless they made the Quarantine full of mobs then maybe Flash + Awareness

Safest route if you're unsure of what you're getting yourself into is Flash + Awareness, though I usually opt for Flash + SW because I stance dance too much on new content. :V

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Just started leveling my warrior and just got deliverance the urge to stance dance is far more tempting then ever which is why I usually stick with second wind. But being able to pair it with raw intuition makes awareness much better I suppose. Thanks for the insight.