Dragoon Thread, help discussions and more.

[CherryCream]

I personally think skill speed is a must for Dragoon. In my experience so far, I've been able to output more damage as the cool downs are much shorter. Does this scale well at endgame?

[Layenem]

I personally think skill speed is a must for Dragoon. In my experience so far, I've been able to output more damage as the cool downs are much shorter. Does this scale well at endgame?

You'll find skill speed will just help you run out of TP faster. Might as well make the hits hit harder vs faster imo. Only at 45 atm but everytime I've picked up skill speed vs acc/crit I've always had to mitigate my TP usage. I found it was much easier to use acc/crit and just hit harder vs faster.

[CherryCream]

I now see what you mean. I ran out of tp real fast xD Looking for crit and determination now.

[MalcolmReynolds]

I now see what you mean. I ran out of tp real fast xD Looking for crit and determination now.

Invigorate as soon as you drop to 500 TP (600 if you don't have the level 36 Exhilarate trait) for best TP management. That way you'll be at full TP while waiting on Invigorate's cooldown to run out. I've yet to run out of TP this way even in long fights (granted I'm level 38 at the moment).

Another issue being Heavy Thrust buff being absolutely pointless.

I don't think it's pointless. A 10% damage increase for 20 seconds is pretty damn nice IMO.

Am I the only one who thinks our Jump abilities should also give us 100% evasion for the duration of the ability?

This is my biggest peeve with the way they designed Dragoon. Damage evasion was a key trait of Jump in several FF games and it logically makes sense since you're up in the air during the animation. It's kind of nuts that they haven't made it like this. And because the animation is fairly long, you have to be careful when you use it because if you hit it at the wrong time and an enemy starts charging an attack, chances are you're not getting out of the way in time. It really needs to be changed.

[CherryCream]

Invigorate as soon as you drop to 500 TP (600 if you don't have the level 36 Exhilarate trait) for best TP management. That way you'll be at full TP while waiting on Invigorate's cooldown to run out. I've yet to run out of TP this way even in long fights (granted I'm level 38 at the moment).

I see what you mean, Invigorate does help a lot. I'll see how it all goes when I reach 50, though.

[Dervy]

I don't think it's pointless. A 10% damage increase for 20 seconds is pretty damn nice IMO.

It "seems" nice. In all honesty, it's weak. Yeah, you can agree it's 20 seconds and its on the GDC so you can instant pop-it. I guess that's how they balanced it, but it's CRAP. Now let's do some math. For this example, we'll use Valkkys Damage Calculator (http://valk.dancing-mad.com/?page_id=202)

So, let's make a 10s combo. We can use 4 GDC skills. One will be with Heavy Thrust. The other will be replaced with another True thrust. We're basing this off 363 Strength, 238 Determination, with a Gae Bolg (44 WD)

Without Heavy thrust

True Thrust - 207.93
Vorpal Thrust - 277.24
Full Thrust - 415.86
True Thrust - 207.93

Total = 1108.96


WITH Heavy Thrust

You have to remember that the 10% from Heavy Thrust applies AFTER you've used the skill. So, let's do the math (Note I'm only adding avg. dmg)

Heavy Thrust - 138.28 DMG
(*now buff applies*)
True Thrust - 228.72
Vorpal Thrust - 304.96
Full Thrust - 457.44

Total = 1129.4

This is way less than a 10% increase in damage in 10 seconds. Yes, that 20 damage could very well be a very killing factor, which does add-up over the course of a lengthy fight; If the fight is 15 minutes long, that's an extra 1800 damage in a fight.

Now of course, this is an unrealistic scenario, as we can use our Jumps in between our Rotations. But one is only every 40 seconds (300 potency), a 250 potency every 3 minutes, and a 170 potency every 90 seconds. This does add-up, but is Heavy Thrust even "worthy" of a buff? No. Maybe in longer fights like Primals. But for doing dungeons where the boss only takes 5 minutes of your time? Wouldn't even bother, the buff is so tiny.

15% would actually be much better.

[Chompers]

So, let's make a 10s combo.

The simplest way to tell you this is that you are wrong and you should stop doing math. A) The buff last 20 seconds not 10 seconds so a 10 second sample for parsing examples is retarded. If you were to do this shit combo example over a 20 second period of the time the difference is more like 200 damage. B) given that its 20 seconds you wouldn't be using just vanilla BS true thrust rotation over and over you have to take into account that you have rotations like Chaos Thrust with better potency AND armor pen debuffs and you have a crapload of off GCD damage buffs that would scale with this over the course of the 20 seconds as well AND DoTs that benefit.

[Spythe]

The simplest way to tell you this is that you are wrong and you should stop doing math..

Anyone that thinks a 20s buff for 10% dmg isn't worth using has some issues. I can kinda understand the dot arguments since they are relatively weak but +10% dmg is good especially post 40. The better gear you get the more useful it is. I figured it was bugged or something but making an argument about not using it because of GCD is just silly. There is a reason the melee classes have rotations filled with buffs/debuffs. The poster also didn't take into account having the scholar skill speed buff and possible skill speed gear. The scholar buff alone drops teh GCD to sub 2.3sec

[SKYeXile]

The simplest way to tell you this is that you are wrong and you should stop doing math. A) The buff last 20 seconds not 10 seconds so a 10 second sample for parsing examples is retarded. If you were to do this shit combo example over a 20 second period of the time the difference is more like 200 damage. B) given that its 20 seconds you wouldn't be using just vanilla BS true thrust rotation over and over you have to take into account that you have rotations like Chaos Thrust with better potency AND armor pen debuffs and you have a crapload of off GCD damage buffs that would scale with this over the course of the 20 seconds as well AND DoTs that benefit.

He still proved its worth using though...since you do more damage...

[Dervy]

SNIP

Hopefully you read this and understand the reasoning behind it.

Firstly, The Chaos Thrust Rotation isn't "powerful". I was basing this off the most powerful skill we could do. Secondly, the Dots ARE NOT AFFECTED by external buffs like Heavy Thrust and Blood for Blood. That's why I was using Thrust Combo as an example, because it's the hardest hitting rotation that a DRG has.

I even said at the bottom of my post that this isn't taking into count the off-CD skills (our jumps), and I even STATED that over the course of a long fight, these will add-up.

The point I'm trying to make is, Heavy Thrust makes 0 difference when you're killing smaller packs, solo, or bosses that take a few minutes of your time. Personally, I'd rather use that extra skill to add a utility skill like Feint during dungeon fights to support the Tank.

And I did the math including jumps for 20 seconds also, and the difference was only around 200 for the first 20 seconds (Cause of Jump), then went back down to a difference of around 50 or 60 if I remember correctly for the next 20 seconds (cause Cool Down). I'll have to redo the math because I lost the paper I did it on >_<

EDIT: Seeing as someone else has also asked for a 20 Second Rotation, I'll do it. Essentially, that's 8 GDC skills we can use, 1 of them has to be a Heavy Thrust, and will include a Power Surge > Jump. I'll only be using the Thrust Combo, like before, as this is the hardest hitting combo we can continuously do.

EDIT 2: Just for some MORE confirmation. In no way, shape or form am I saying it is completely useless. In no way am I saying we should NEVER use it, nor am I disregarding the skill. What I am saying is this. The Heavy Thrust buff doesn't warrant enough use during shorter fights. Against Primals, The Praetorium Dungeons against Ultima Weapon, Ampador Keep and Wanderer's Palace, if you don't use it you're insane and you need to stop playing a Dragoon.

Just to make it clear, I'm proving a point that during shorter fights, the buff is almost so small, you're better off using another GDC skill instead like a Utility or again, go back into your rotation, hence why I suggest for it to be buffed ever so slightly.

Someone needs to make sure that everything is working as intended, whether or not he/she gets hate for it, or whether he/she proves themselves wrong. Fact is, if no one creates these hypothesis' and test these mechanics, we'll never know.