Vanya vs. Darklight vs. AF2?

Just wondering if anyone had done any comparing for the healing jobs to see if vanya especially is woth the 9 potash (125 tombstones each x 9 = 1125) needed to make the silk. Also do we have the stats on the AF2 to compare yet?

The way I see it, it's...

Darklight first. While you're getting tomestones of mythology for Artifact +1, you can use your excess philosophy to buy ingredients for Vanya. Give it to a trusted crafter, go for the HQ. HQ version of the Vanya with materia looks statistically better than Darklight, but statistically worse than AF+1.

http://puu.sh/45PtR.jpg

http://puu.sh/45PDV.jpg

http://puu.sh/45WDF.jpg

http://puu.sh/45WrZ.jpg

Basically: ONLY go for Vanya with the intent of HQing the entire set. Vanya and Darklight are equal if you slot the Vanya

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Originally Posted by NintenPyjak64

http://puu.sh/45PtR.jpg

http://puu.sh/45PDV.jpg

http://puu.sh/45WDF.jpg

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Basically: ONLY go for Vanya with the intent of HQing the entire set. Vanya and Darklight are equal if you slot the Vanya

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The DL body is under no circumstances a good option.

It is really interesting that you bring this up as it is something I have been doing some research on the past couple of days. The two sets differ actually in stat optimization and you have to ask yourself what is more important to you or the class as a whole. The Darklight set does not have any spell speed on it but has determination, the vanya set does not have the determination BUT IS meldable. So ultimately even a NQ set of vanya you could push out more stat optimization than a Darklight set of gear.

Cowls in my opinion are never a good thing, especially if it is a meldable piece of gear. You are losing potentially 10 materia slots by chosing that piece of armor. I think once some more theory crafting is done and we know what levels of spell speed/determination/MND to hit before heavy diminishing returns (I am starting to believe there is some after having spell speed on every piece of gear) we will have a better idea of what to go for.

Kurumu Kurono (WHM Gear)

Also, NintenPyjak64 keep in mind that the new astral jewlery is not optimized (in my opinion) for healers, it is a damn good set if you are trying to push out some extra DPS as a healer, but it is more optimal for a ACN/THM/SMN/BLM. I use the Darklight jewlery for this reason.

The ilevel 90 AF+1 and drops from the Binding Coil of Bahamut will of course outclass any of this above mentioned gear (though its debatable a HQ Penta melded set of Vanya might outclass even some pieces of the ilevel 90 gear)

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Originally Posted by Majidah

The DL body is under no circumstances a good option.

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If you look at the stats when compared to 2 pieces it's still a good choice for how easy it is to grind out, better than any sub lv70 gear and on par with NQ Vanya set no matter how much materia of questionable usefulness you can cram onto it. It's all a matter of stat caps and D/L body has VIT/MND/PIE/DET, the 4 useful ones.

HQ Vanya head/body combination is better (once melded) but it's expensive atm and difficult to make.

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Originally Posted by Alkimi

If you look at the stats when compared to 2 pieces it's still a good choice for how easy it is to grind out, better than any sub lv70 gear and on par with NQ Vanya set no matter how much materia of questionable usefulness you can cram onto it. It's all a matter of stat caps and D/L body has VIT/MND/PIE/DET, the 4 useful ones.

HQ Vanya head/body combination is better (once melded) but it's expensive atm and difficult to make.

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You lose out on two items that can have spell speed, PIE is a questionable stat, which you can meld into vanya if you really wanted it. The Darklight Cowl comes out 6 vitality higher and 4 mind higher, which you can easily pick up in the 4th or 5th meld with tier 2 matiera, yet you will end up with a tremendous amount of spell speed, crit and comparable determination.

I would say save the 1300 some Tomestones and just live in strategos gear (ilevel 60 Amdapor Keep drops) until you can make your NQ/HQ Vanya/Rose Gold Circlet

Any chance of you guys posting separate items for SCH also ?

Great responses! Exactly what I was looking for. I'm pretty iffy myself on using DL body. Especially when I start getting AF2 pieces and would have to choose between cowl or 1 piece of AF2 + a less useful piece.

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Originally Posted by Kurumu1787

You lose out on two items that can have spell speed, PIE is a questionable stat, which you can meld into vanya if you really wanted it. The Darklight Cowl comes out 6 vitality higher and 4 mind higher, which you can easily pick up in the 4th or 5th meld with tier 2 matiera, yet you will end up with a tremendous amount of spell speed, crit and comparable determination.

I would say save the 1300 some Tomestones and just live in strategos gear (ilevel 60 Amdapor Keep drops) until you can make your NQ/HQ Vanya/Rose Gold Circlet

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The spell speed would be highly useful for whm, but for scholar less so seeing as a scholars healing is "split" between 3 things, pet, shields and direct healing. And one of the direct healing spells is unaffected by spell speed (lustrate).

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Originally Posted by Sadness

Great responses! Exactly what I was looking for. I'm pretty iffy myself on using DL body. Especially when I start getting AF2 pieces and would have to choose between cowl or 1 piece of AF2 + a less useful piece.

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AF2 body + strat cap from AK, or crafted hat, or if you get lucky AF2 hat as a drop. But until then DL cowl is good for scholar.

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Originally Posted by Rillifane

The spell speed would be highly useful for whm, but for scholar less so seeing as a scholars healing is "split" between 3 things, pet, shields and direct healing. And one of the direct healing spells is unaffected by spell speed (lustrate).



AF2 body + strat cap from AK, or crafted hat, or if you get lucky AF2 hat as a drop. But until then DL cowl is good for scholar.

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I cannot deny that spell spead may be less useful for scholar vs white mage, however spell speed reduces global cool down and as a healer a shorter global cool down is a very important thing which both healers can benefit from, even when using instant cast spells like lustrate and benediction, in my opinion.

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Originally Posted by gigi_frana

Any chance of you guys posting separate items for SCH also ?

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Gigi, the gear you would use for scholar and white mage is largely identical. I think for scholar you may want to prioritize crit a little bit more than white mage because Adloquium's shield is doubled when the heal is a critical heal. MND will still be the priority stat for both healers, then it breaks down to crit, spell speed, and determination. Until further testing is done it is really hard to say what is most important and what stats have heavy diminishing returns at what skill level. Until then I personally am enjoying close to .2 seconds off of my GCD on both WHM and SCH ^.^

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Originally Posted by Kurumu1787

I cannot deny that spell spead may be less useful for scholar vs white mage, however spell speed reduces global cool down and as a healer a shorter global cool down is a very important thing which both healers can benefit from, even when using instant cast spells like lustrate and benediction, in my opinion.

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Still spell speed has no effect on the GCD when lustrate is used as it has a 1.0 sec cooldown and when used all abilities can be used 1.0 seconds after it. And for a scholar getting more out of your heals, especially with the shield proc being double your heal value on a crit, it makes spell speed even less worth while for a scholar than it is for a white mage as to pick up enough spell speed to make a difference you are going to sacrifice crit and determination.

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Originally Posted by Rillifane

Still spell speed has no effect on the GCD when lustrate is used as it has a 1.0 sec cooldown and when used all abilities can be used 1.0 seconds after it. And for a scholar getting more out of your heals, especially with the shield proc being double your heal value on a crit, it makes spell speed even less worth while for a scholar than it is for a white mage as to pick up enough spell speed to make a difference you are going to sacrifice crit and determination.

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Don't get me wrong I agree ^.^ spells like Lustrate and Benediction though are kind of like your oh shit buttons for spike damage, the rest of the time you will be casting Adloquium and Physick and the reduced GCD and cast time will effect those. I personally cast Bio/Bio2/Miasma/Virus in between heals on many boss fights, its just another area that spell speed helps me cut down fractions of time to weave stuff in.

MND>Crit>Det/Spell Speed would probably be how I would optimally stat a scholar where as a white mage would be MND>Spell Speed>Det>Crit which of course brings us back to items of the same ilevel that can be melded versus non-meldables!

A rose gold circlet has crit and determination on it already, you can pump a tier 3 of each of those into it to reach the maximum crit and determination for said item which leaves you with 3 extra slots to add spell speed, piety, one more extra mind/vit/int ect. you just cant simply get that kind of optimization with non meldable gear.

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Originally Posted by Kurumu1787

MND>Crit>Det/Spell Speed would probably be how I would optimally stat a scholar where as a white mage would be MND>Spell Speed>Det>Crit which of course brings us back to items of the same ilevel that can be melded versus non-meldables!

A rose gold circlet has crit and determination on it already, you can pump a tier 3 of each of those into it to reach the maximum crit and determination for said item which leaves you with 3 extra slots to add spell speed, piety, one more extra mind/vit/int ect. you just cant simply get that kind of optimization with non meldable gear.

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Not everyone will be able to afford the melds, the armor itself and what not. Wen it gets cheaper, maybe, but right now DL is the way to go & there isn't any content that requires you to have super melded vanya to complete AFAIK. DL is still good, but it will be inferior to melded options. Yet, easier to obtain, and will hold you off until AF+1 easily.

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Originally Posted by Arale

Not everyone will be able to afford the melds, the armor itself and what not. Wen it gets cheaper, maybe, but right now DL is the way to go & there isn't any content that requires you to have super melded vanya to complete AFAIK. DL is still good, but it will be inferior to melded options. Yet, easier to obtain, and will hold you off until AF+1 easily.

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Not to mention none legacy servers might not even have someone high enough to craft the items to begin with.

Ahh this is true! I am a legacy player and we are already collecting mats for HQ Vanya ^.^ We as healers do have the luxury of not needing super BiS gear (our true potency comes from how effective we are at playing our class), and you are absolutely right that DL will hold you over, but if you are a min/max junkie the vanya will be like the call of cthulu whispering sweet nothings in your ear while you sleep :P

I think it is safe to say that DL jewlery is definitely a solid priority, if you can afford Vanya and melds go for it, otherwise get a Stratego set from AK and work on some DL armor because at the end of the day even the Vanya will be outclassed by the ilevel 90 armors both AF+1 and the Allagan ^.^

Actually, aside from one or two pieces, I find Strategos Jewelry to be better then darklight. Has most spell speed, and only a bit less stats. Some pieces dont have spellspeed at all. I use 1 DL ring, and 1 DL bracelet, but the rest is strategos.

I have about 1k tomes saved and was going for DL body for my SCH, but after readying this thread I am unsure what to do. I have the AK body and choker, with the rest being a mix of AF and some old accessories. What order of items do you suggest I spend my tokens on? Here is a link to my lodestone character if it works: http://http://eu.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/character/466377/

Same here, I am a WHM saving for the DL body but not sure now :( Wondering if I should grab 2-3 other DL pieces instead of the DL body

Personally, I'm going to be in Darklight gear. Each Vanya piece requires 1125 tomes with the exception of the Breeches which require a whopping 3375 tomes. (Assuming the recipe on xivdb.com is correct!)

Add to the fact that it needs to be HQed and melded to equal the Darklight, but it does not match the defense that the Darklight offers. Even as a healer, the defense difference should be considered since you still take damage from unavoidable AoE attacks.

Vanya Hat of Healing
Vanya Robe of Healing
Vanya Sash of Healing
Vanya Gloves of Healing
Vanya Breeches of Healing
Spruce Pattens

I bought DL breeches, but now I'll only be saving up to synthesize the Vanya and go for HQ and melds..

Hi guys! First off I want to say thanks for this thread because this has been a debate for myself for a while now and I wasn't able to find any info or discussion about this very topic.

I was wondering if Kurumu1787 or anybody who has thus far posted in this thread could help me out a little to explain the melded stats priority that I should try to focus on for the Vanya set? I believe Kurumu1787 mentioned the MND>Spell Speed>Determination>Crit priority but I don't understand why spell speed is more important than the other two? Is the gain from building on the Spell Speed stat that significant? I would have thought it might be more important to up crit heals instead?

Please let me know your thoughts - I'm not trying to step on anybody's toes here, I'm just trying to understand this better since I'm new to melding in ARR even though I played in 1.0 lol ^^;

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Originally Posted by Arrietty

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Mind > Crit/Piety > Spellspeed/Determination.

Mind = Increases Healing
Piety = More Mana, Mana Regen = More Heals.
Crit = Chance of healing more = less MP, more heals.
Spellspeed = useless stat until we get access to way better gear that provides more + spellspeed. In full darklight + relic +1, I only have about a .1 reduction in casts, so my cures take 2.4 instead of 2.5...which is not a big deal.
Determination = more healing done TO YOU, not BY you.

I personally would favor Crit.

I agree with Azayne.
I would go for MND > Crit > Piety > Spell Speed > Determination
As a SCH, the crit hit rate is important for us due to Adloquium.

SE need to add armor that can buff your pet aswell. like Pet heal or pet fire dmg + 12 etc etc. even materia for pets. that will be put the whole system to be more fun and more versatile between whm and sch.. bossting the fairy Cure spell or HP would be great.

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Originally Posted by Azayne

Mind > Crit/Piety > Spellspeed/Determination.

Mind = Increases Healing
Piety = More Mana, Mana Regen = More Heals.
Crit = Chance of healing more = less MP, more heals.
Spellspeed = useless stat until we get access to way better gear that provides more + spellspeed. In full darklight + relic +1, I only have about a .1 reduction in casts, so my cures take 2.4 instead of 2.5...which is not a big deal.
Determination = more healing done TO YOU, not BY you.

I personally would favor Crit.

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Thanks for this! ^^

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Originally Posted by Azayne

Determination = more healing done TO YOU, not BY you.

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That's not true. I personally conducted tests on that, and Determination actually DOES increase healing done BY you, not TO YOU. I tried to cast Cure on people with different DET and I observed no differences in my healing potency. However, I still agree on the fact that Determination should get low priority as a stat, since it increases your cures, but not as much as Mind does.

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Originally Posted by Loam

That's not true. I personally conducted tests on that, and Determination actually DOES increase healing done BY you, not TO YOU. I tried to cast Cure on people with different DET and I observed no differences in my healing potency. However, I still agree on the fact that Determination should get low priority as a stat, since it increases your cures, but not as much as Mind does.

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There is something very odd about Det. There is such a dearth of the stat, and yet it has so little effect. One would expect a stat where you have to scrape and beg for every point to be worth a lot, but it just simply isn't. I greatly look forward to some more extensive - and documented - testing on the subject. I'm planning on running some Crit rate tests myself; but I fear the subject may be well studied by the time I can do it, as I do not play on my legacy server and do not play as often as many people to boot.

Gearing for spell speed is absolutely ridiculous. We're talking the difference of milliseconds - which is negated by your latency anyway.

Ridiculous telling people to gear Vanya for spell speed.

Folks, save your gil - get your DL set, it's very easy to obtain.

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Originally Posted by Maphyr

Folks, save your gil - get your DL set, it's very easy to obtain.

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Save it for what? Repairs? :-)

I just bought the HQ chest yesterday and loving it! Gonna try melting it later today. Not sure if I'm going to use my myth stones on the AF+1 head or get the HQ Vanya hat of healing. No matter what I do I firmly believe that either combo is superior to DL Cowl of Healing.

HQ vanya goes for 1 mil on my server.
Which is silly.

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Originally Posted by Sadness

Great responses! Exactly what I was looking for. I'm pretty iffy myself on using DL body. Especially when I start getting AF2 pieces and would have to choose between cowl or 1 piece of AF2 + a less useful piece.

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This is what I did (in part to save on farming time)

1. Farmed Castrum/AK for enough tomes for 9 Potash. And gathered all the needed crafting supplies. Handed to my favorite Crafter and he made me a lovely HQ Vanya Robe. Added Melds.
2. Spent my first set of Myth Tombs on the WHM +1 Circlet.

Now, I have the option of +1ing my Relic or going for the Healer Boots. Probably do Boots then Relic as it looks like my FC is still 1-2 weeks away from starting the Coil.


EDIT:
Also, since I plan on also fully-leveling/equipping a SCH one day, I will still make use of my robe. Furthermore, the drops from Coil for Healers are a body and a headpiece, as is AF+1. So by going the Vanya robe route, you get to keep your 'best' stuff on until you replace it with better. You won't have to go back to a 'lesser' piece if you get a lucky drop in the coil or have the tombs to upgrade your AF body/head.

Oh and I think there's a big difference in 'how should I gear' based on whether or not you are actively gearing and maining WHM or not. If it's just a 'I play it when I have to' but currently, I'm working on gear for class x... you probably benefit most from Vanya Head/Body but could use DL for the rest....and if you really almost never play healer, but want gear for quick AK cues etc, Darklight gets the job done.

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Originally Posted by Maphyr

Gearing for spell speed is absolutely ridiculous. We're talking the difference of milliseconds

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I definitely prefer Spell Speed over Critical Hit Rating, and I'll tell you why: CHR is not a stat that can assure you a constant benefit, because its benefit is random and could potentially create issues such as overhealing and generating undesired enmity. It is a factor over you can't study your strategy and your spells' choice. During an "oh shit!" situation you can't think: "Now I'm gonna to cast Cure over Cure II because I'll do a crit", not matter what your CHR stat is. You'll definitely want to cast Cure II. Spell Speed could appear like a worthless stat, because of the difference of centiseconds, but if you gear for Spell Speed AND use food to increase it again, you could create an huge difference in your cast and recast times, and I assure you you'll definitely notice the difference. But the greatest quality of Spell Speed is that it is an ALWAYS ON stat, and you can benefit of that for each your actions. This is exactly what a WHM wants. It is important to healer to have a consistent and dependable amount of HP healed. You can increase average of your cure potency with CHR, but you'll decrease its consistency. Not a big deal when we talk of an healer class.

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Originally Posted by Maphyr

Gearing for spell speed is absolutely ridiculous. We're talking the difference of milliseconds - which is negated by your latency anyway.

Ridiculous telling people to gear Vanya for spell speed.

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1. Crit is worthless as a Healer...heck, sometimes Crit's can actually screw you over. Have 6 people in the party that need a heal of 300-500ish hp's? You think 'Medica', that'll do the trick and keep my hate in check expecting to not over-heal and end up crit-healing everyone...building up unecessary hate.
2. Spell Speed, your milliseconds add up over time...and it's not milliseconds of difference. It's hundreths of seconds. Over a long battle, I can get in way more skills/spells than you. My cooldowns AND cast times are lower. So I can land spells, when they need to land more often. It doesn't matter how much I heal the tank for, what matters most is that I keep the tank standing...even if he only has 1HP, 1HP=alive.

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Originally Posted by TunaTime

Save it for what? Repairs? :-)

I just bought the HQ chest yesterday and loving it! Gonna try melting it later today. Not sure if I'm going to use my myth stones on the AF+1 head or get the HQ Vanya hat of healing. No matter what I do I firmly believe that either combo is superior to DL Cowl of Healing.

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By all means, blow your gil on unnecessary purchases. All I'm saying is that DL will carry you fine thru current end game and it's not needed based on the reasons previously provided in this thread.

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Originally Posted by Kinseykinz

1. Crit is worthless as a Healer...heck, sometimes Crit's can actually screw you over. Have 6 people in the party that need a heal of 300-500ish hp's? You think 'Medica', that'll do the trick and keep my hate in check expecting to not over-heal and end up crit-healing everyone...building up unecessary hate.
2. Spell Speed, your milliseconds add up over time...and it's not milliseconds of difference. It's hundreths of seconds. Over a long battle, I can get in way more skills/spells than you. My cooldowns AND cast times are lower. So I can land spells, when they need to land more often. It doesn't matter how much I heal the tank for, what matters most is that I keep the tank standing...even if he only has 1HP, 1HP=alive.

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Player skill carries far more weight when it comes to healing than your precious spell speed stat. Reaction time and critical descion making are far more potent than a "hundredths of second" faster cast. Which I might add that hundreth of a second fast cast cost millions of gil... yeah.. not convincing me anytime soon.

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Originally Posted by Loam

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Unless you're shaving a whole second of cast time off, I really don't see benefits worth talking about.