Yoshi P talks about Warriors- from Producer Letter Live @ TGS

[HiirNoivl]

Your dps isn't actually much higher than a paladins as has been calculated. Honestly all a warrior gives is a more intensive healing requirement. Where careful timing of things like eye for an eye and virus can make a world of difference.

I can't take statements like this seriously any more. Sorry, not after parse results.

I'd like to see some of your parses.

I'm going to guess any difference between you and PLD's is explained by the fact that you tend to run some STR accessories and have 20-30 points in STR in addition to having a bunch of crit materia, whereas a PLD will be running 30 vit, and all tanking accessories.



From my experience comparing myself to other PLD tanks we're within about 10 dps of each other, and I'm heavily invested in STR. If I shifted all of that to VIT the difference would nearly vanish entirely.

Go back a few pages.

Please keep in mind that I wear the exact same gear sometime on my PLD and still Parse way lower. There's no way my PLD even with my WAR gear can keep up.

For the record I parsed my crit rate without Wrath V or Internal Release with just 30 extra crit rate and got 7.22% which matches the Valk-Dancing Mad calculator. As far as crit rate from the actual stat goes it's accurate. The only thing that remains to be seen is whether % Crit Boost from abilities is a flat bonus or a multiplier. Judging by the fact that other abilities that increase a stat by a % (Berserk/DivineSeal/Foresight/etc.) actually update the character screen to show the new stat I would argue that the % Crit Boosts are a flat boost which is why the calculator is wrong when you add those in. Of course it's all just conjecture until someone parses it properly.

Don't look at me. I just hit the button, slam on some mobs, and then screen shot the results. If you can "parse properly" go ahead and post.

I don't think I am making myself clear.

I am not saying that keeping Wrath stacks is bad. I am saying that it still doesn't compete with Paladin even if you stack Crit. And I can see Crit being THAT good for you only if you use Inner Beast. Every time you don't use the new and improved Critting Inner Beast (TM) you are not doing better than Paladin. And we don't know if by using Inner Beast we are doing better anyhow.

Also Blood Bath doesn't benefit from Wrath. Your raised crit will benefit Blood Bath however.

Please show me numbers of your self healing with crit and the sources of that self healing and post them here. I would like to see a parse from Titan and what your parser says about your crit rate during the encounter.

I checked my parser and noticed that the average heal tick from Blood Bath is about 25 with my current gear and Ifrit weapon. Every 90 seconds, with your alleged 33ish% crit, I would get 12.5 HP heal on top of it. So one every three Blood Bath ticks I get that extra. I still don't see that making much difference.

Vengeance reflects 50 every time you get attacked. I don't know if that can crit. Can you show me a parse that shows that it can crit? Blood Bath, applied to Vengeance will heal for 25% of that damage, and considering that's small damage, it's also a small heal.

Steel Cyclone: you advocate keeping Wrath stacks but then you drop them for Storm Cyclone. I guess you use it only when Infuriate is up, otherwise you are dropping your Wrath and receiving less healing from others while AOEing, and Overpower could do the job instead. It's also spammable. I never felt the need to kill targets one by one, I felt overpower + Bloodbath kept me alive, but this is not something I can honestly say will be true for adds on hard battles because I haven't done hard modes that have adds.

In the mean time Strength has buffed every single of those Blood Bath ticks, as well as Steel Cyclone, as well as Inner Beast, as well as Second Wind etc.

I still don't see how stacking crit is king vs stacking strength.

If you are capped on an item and can't meld any more strength into it, by ALL MEANS go crit. Otherwise strength.

Vengeance

Compete with PLD in what regard? With DPS, there's no question that it assists. If you're talking about percentage of HP healed, with Wrath V that is upped 15% and PLD's Shield Oath reduces Damage Dealt 20%. Which is plenty to "compete with PLD" for mitigation and that's without your even actively doing anything. That's why it's important that if you lose that buff there has to be a really good reason. You should not use your Inner Beast just because its up.

Wrath V benefits your Bloodbath because it's raises your over all Crit Rate. You will Crit more on all the damage you deal meaning that you will heal more with Bloodbath active. So it does benefit from Wrath.

Sadly, I can't find a Parser that accurately measures the healing I get from "You absorb" messages. The "You absrob" messages are mushed in with the healing I receive from WHMs and from Second Wind. Sometimes it doesn't show up at all. I can only get a feel for how much I'm healing myself for unless I go through the log with calculator, which I may just have to do at this point. But if you're curious maybe you can do it too and we'll share results.

Regarding Steel Cyclone: I'm not sure if you read that part, but when you're in a situation where you're dealing with a large group of trash mobs, Steel Cyclone can A) Heal you just as much as Inner Beast and B) kill the mobs faster before you melt like a snowflake. I'm not sure if you read that part or you're just taking it out of context. I'm not advocating using it on Titan or any other primal. OverPower takes TP and you can use it, but it's better to keep your TP for other things and use Steel Cyclone instead.

You can Crit Second Wind. My highest Crit for second Wind was 1035. It was pretty nice. (I had Berserk active). So you benefit from Crit Rate in this way as well.

Please keep in mind that there are always ways to get around the hits you take when you use Wrath V.

If you want your Crit Buff, you can use Internal Release AFTER you use your Wrath instead of stacking it with Wrath V to keep your Crit Buff. If you want to keep your self healing buff after you use your Wrath, you can use Convalecence or Mantra so that you keep your Self healing buff after using your Wrath.

And of course there's always Infuriate.

I think this is what Yoshi P was referring to when he said you need "additionals" to make WAR really strong.

[Xariann]

Thank you for your Detailed Reply.

For a better explanation let's look at what a Critical Hit actually is.



When you hit a Critical you'll see it say Critical! You hit Xmob for XXX damage (50%).

A critical hit is 50% more than a normal hit. Now, As a WAR, your mitigation depends highly on how much damage you deal. So you say you don't care, you'd better care. Inner Beast, Bloodbath, and even the cross class Second Wind are actually offensive skills because they scale with attack power and your ability to do damage.

The more damage you do, the more damage you can take. It's that simple.

When I first started stacking Critical Rate Materia, the goal was to increase the amount of times I used Critical Inner Beast to a level where I was comfortable using it. The result was a host more benefits that actually allowed me to use Inner Beast less.

For example. Before I started stacking Crit, when I was pulling multiple monsters, I would single target DPS one monster because I wanted to kill it faster as well as use Inner Beast to mitigate all the damage I was taking. There so no way I could use Bloodbath effectively because Bloodbath was ineffective in handling all the damage I was taking to any meaningfull extent. Why? Because my damage was so low.

After I raised my Crit Rate Considerably, I suddenly realized that using Vengeance and Bloodbath allong with Steel Cyclone healed me more than an Inner beast could while at the same time, dealing AoE damage and killing the enemies faster. It was a win win.

But I wasn't using Inner Beast. In this case, Steel Cyclone had more benefits.

So there are cases where Inner Beast will not be your heal of choice.

In the case of Titan, you still want to stack Crit so that when you use your Vengeance and Bloodbath Combo, you can gain more HP after Rock Busters and Stomps. And when you use Inner Beast you have a greater chance of Crit. But when you get Mountain Bustered in the face, and your Healer is distracted/out of commission you need more than a "chance" of crit. You need a Guaranteed Crit.

That's what takes me to Berserk, Berserk is raising your attack power 50%, Berserk is a guaranteed Critical hit. You want to use Berserk when you use Inner Beast in this case because if you do, you get enough Healing to over come the threshold of negative HP healed Guaranteed.. And if you crit that you get 50 percent more than that.

But again, this is when you're in a pinch or a bind. You dont' do this for every Mountain Buster. If you're not in a serious need of healing (such as the death/gaoling of your mages) your 15% heal buff will always be better ALWAYS. It took me a while to get this too. But you'll get it really quickly when you see how much Wrath V actually increase your HP regen and decreases the strain on your healers. You'll really get it more when you see how much Wrath V actually increases your damage dealt, which increases your HP regained from Bloodbath.

Do you understand why Wrath V is such a powerful mitigation and DPS tool?

What stacking Critical hit does, besides raising your DPS to crazy levels, you start unlocking the strength of the cooldowns you rarely, barely, and never-ly used before this allowing to regen more HP and closes that gap between PLD and WAR when it comes to EHP.

Regarding STR: You cannot "stack STR" in this game. STR is capped according to item level. I quite literally can add no more strength to my gear.

I've noticed that even the expert Websites are underestimating the gains to Crit Rate granted by abilities like Internal Release when they are used in connection with Wrath V. On the Psychflayer yesterday, I managed to achieve a sustained 33.3 Crit Rate, that fight is not a short one.

According to people's calculations I should have only been able to achieve 22.something percent before dropping off again to a 12.something percent.

There has got to be something else happening. I'm not sure what it is. But my DPS has gone up by 40 since I stacked Crit. And a good portion of that gets translated into mitigation.

One more EDIT: When you use Crit Rate you really increase your damage dealt far more than with STR on WAR. (It doesn't work that way on other classes.)

I don't think I am making myself clear.

I am not saying that keeping Wrath stacks is bad. I am saying that it still doesn't compete with Paladin even if you stack Crit. And I can see Crit being THAT good for you only if you use Inner Beast. Every time you don't use the new and improved Critting Inner Beast (TM) you are not doing better than Paladin. And we don't know if by using Inner Beast we are doing better anyhow.

Also Blood Bath doesn't benefit from Wrath. Your raised crit will benefit Blood Bath however.

Please show me numbers of your self healing with crit and the sources of that self healing and post them here. I would like to see a parse from Titan and what your parser says about your crit rate during the encounter.

I checked my parser and noticed that the average heal tick from Blood Bath is about 25 with my current gear and Ifrit weapon. Every 90 seconds, with your alleged 33ish% crit, I would get 12.5 HP heal on top of it. So one every three Blood Bath ticks I get that extra. I still don't see that making much difference.

Vengeance reflects 50 every time you get attacked. I don't know if that can crit. Can you show me a parse that shows that it can crit? Blood Bath, applied to Vengeance will heal for 25% of that damage, and considering that's small damage, it's also a small heal.

Steel Cyclone: you advocate keeping Wrath stacks but then you drop them for Storm Cyclone. I guess you use it only when Infuriate is up, otherwise you are dropping your Wrath and receiving less healing from others while AOEing, and Overpower could do the job instead. It's also spammable. I never felt the need to kill targets one by one, I felt overpower + Bloodbath kept me alive, but this is not something I can honestly say will be true for adds on hard battles because I haven't done hard modes that have adds.

In the mean time Strength has buffed every single of those Blood Bath ticks, as well as Steel Cyclone, as well as Inner Beast, as well as Second Wind etc.

I still don't see how stacking crit is king vs stacking strength.

If you are capped on an item and can't meld any more strength into it, by ALL MEANS go crit. Otherwise strength.

Vengeance

[Hachiko]

I can't take statements like this seriously any more. Sorry, not after parse results.

I'd like to see some of your parses.

I'm going to guess any difference between you and PLD's is explained by the fact that you tend to run some STR accessories and have 20-30 points in STR in addition to having a bunch of crit materia, whereas a PLD will be running 30 vit, and all tanking accessories.

From my experience comparing myself to other PLD tanks we're within about 10 dps of each other, and I'm heavily invested in STR. If I shifted all of that to VIT the difference would nearly vanish entirely.

And other enemies whose facing is important too, maybe intelligent usage of Holmgang can be useful?

It COULD be useful, but the only boss after the WP slime that isn't immune to Bind is Garuda, and she's already a pushover as far as tanking goes.

And even if it could be used like that, being unable to move for 6 seconds is a huge risk if you time it improperly (miss it on Demon Wall for example and you will end up bound in the slime at the back).

[CurlyBruce]

...

Funny thing about data points is you can't just use 10 groups of 200 samples and call it 2000 samples. He keeps posting his Crit Rate and DPS against bosses which aren't alive for more than 10 min, but why doesn't he just go smack on a test dummy for a while. If he really wants an accurate sample of his average crit it needs to be in a controlled environment where no other factors come into play. Go to Coerthas, Whitebrim. Smack on a level 50 Test Dummy for 42 minutes (2.5GCD * 1000 = 2500s / 60s = 41.6min). You'll get at least one auto-attack between each ability so that will give you a sample size of around 2000. Initiate the fight with Infuriate and spam your butcher's block combo (this is to keep wrath at full and has the added benefit of testing whether the damage calculator is accurate by not diluting the test with Maim bonus or Storm's Eye). Spam Internal Release whenever it's up. Post parse results.

For the record I parsed my crit rate without Wrath V or Internal Release with just 30 extra crit rate and got 7.22% which matches the Valk-Dancing Mad calculator. As far as crit rate from the actual stat goes it's accurate. The only thing that remains to be seen is whether % Crit Boost from abilities is a flat bonus or a multiplier. Judging by the fact that other abilities that increase a stat by a % (Berserk/DivineSeal/Foresight/etc.) actually update the character screen to show the new stat I would argue that the % Crit Boosts are a flat boost which is why the calculator is wrong when you add those in. Of course it's all just conjecture until someone parses it properly.

[Ehayte]

When in tanking stance the enmity they cause is almost equal: 210x5 for BB and 208x5 for RoH, when taking into account dmg reductions.

Doesn't defiance do 3 things:
1 - increase HP for 25%
2 - Decrease damage by 25%
3 - DOUBLE Enmity generation?

So wouldn't it be 208x5 for RoH (1040 Units) and 210x5x2 (2100) for BB?

So, like, not 7%...or .9%...but like... 201.9%?

Correct me if I have it wrong.

PS I have been reading this page and participating where I can enough to the point where I am officially given up on my PLD, and I am working on leveling a WAR because it sounds like so much fun.

[Wangstrong]

The tank stances don't double enmity. That was disproven. I can't remember the exact factor.

[Ehayte]

The tank stances don't double enmity. That was disproven. I can't remember the exact factor.

Gotcha, I swear I heard somewhere that Shield Oath's was very very minimal and Defiance's was gigantic. I could be totally wrong or could have gotten horrible info.

[Xariann]

Quick note on holmgang: Use it when bosses use moves that make them run to other players and ignore hate stack. Also, use it immediately when they turn to do a move on someone (the kind where they turn right back after), because it gives you a big block of time where he cant hit you, to heal yourself and take a breather. I sometimes stun, run behind him, and Holmgang. This increases the stun duration, essentially.

Partially. STR increases parry mitigation percent. High dex is important too, it increases parry rate, along with parry stat direct.

At 50, aim for the following stats. See my above posts for more information.

405 STR(363 if you can't gear to 405: Don't go over 363 in that case, put it in Vit instead. There's no difference between 363 and 404)
211 Dex. This is where the parry rate hits a minimum of 12% on dex alone, before the Parry stat is taken into account. This also helps crits, which ALSO can make Thrill of battle and Second wind, and Inner Beast all crit, which is a GREAT thing to have happen - have mantra and convalescence up when you do these. It also helps accuracy, which can make sure that stuns land.

Blood Bath is 25% of total damage as health, and doing more damage means you get more back. It does not stack with Convalescence, but it does stack with Inner Beast.

To be clear: I don't use feather foot.

Butcher's Block is by far the highest hate generation in the game.(same as RoH, 5x damage Except war does more damage, so it's the best one in the game.) Because of that, you don't need to do it as often, and you combo it with sunder anyway (which is 3x damage on top) - so make sure you're doing DPS abilities and other things while you fight - don't get stuck doing the same combo over and over.

I combo Convalescence and Mantra with Second wind and Thrill of Battle, alternating. I combo Bloodbath with Vengeance exclusively unless I'm in a pinch. I do a heavy>maim>storm>fracture combo once every 30 seconds. I'll often use unchained for this if it's an easier fight/midboss, and Infurate right after. It comes up often, but I'll generally save Infuriate for self heals or finishing him off with SC. I use Foresite during the off times, or if I'm waiting to stun. I'll usually stun, then run behind and holmgamg.

Creating macros for all this makes it a lot easier.

Now that's what I was thinking before I even saw all the crit talk. Dexterity for parry chance.

Although the description doesn't say Dexterity helps crit, so you might be wrong there.

[Onisake]

STR is primary on DPS classes. Adding STR increases DPS more than Crit does on those other classes. WAR is different, Not with the Crit Rate percentage buff which appears to result in a 20 fold crit rate increase instead of a 10 fold increase. I wonder if it's working as intended.

the data you provided doesn't support this, when put side-by-side the other data provided in this thread. It doesn't match my data. in fact i'm barely in full darklight and we put out similar DPS numbers. the major difference is i'm rarely not at 20% crit. I will occasionally spike up to 25% for certain bosses. but for the most part, i'm 20% for everything and very rarely, if ever, drop below that.

I can see no reason why I can hold a 30% Crit Rate on a boss when I shouldn't even hit that high ever in the fight ever. And when you're talking about dealing 50% more damage every 1 in 3 hits, that's a pretty substantial increase.

ehhhh. except you're forgetting that the Lunatic Priest is also half of that fight. you had a 20% crit rate on. you spiked on the flayer for 33. which means you really had a 27% crit rate for that fight. you have to consider the entire encounter.

your crit rate on Anta was 22.6%. where's your 30% crit rate?

Demonwall is a very short fight, so you had a 30% crit there too. so you're getting your crits in big burts. in the longer fights, anta, your crit rate is more stable and closer to what I would expect.

across those 3 fights your crit rate was really 26.4%. your crit rate for the entire dungeon was about 27%. so your numbers are more consistent than you think. Data never lies. you just have to know how to read it.

LOL That's I think one of the kinder responses since I joined this discussion. I have no issues holding hate from my fellow FFXIV'ers.

I don't have any issues holding hate against anyone with gear on par to mine. However I often run AK with a relic BLM and relic BRD. Given I'm rocking a scream i'm a bit outmatched. I was also capable of doing this to a more limited extent with AF.

so rock some AF with your scream and then tell me you have 'no issues holding hate' especially against the trash mobs in AK against fully geared DD.

I don't use my A+ gear when running AK. I use spiritbond gear. which usually consists of unmelded NQ cobalt mixed with 1 or 2 pieces of darklight and trash rings. and yes, I can still hold hate off of my relic/DL/AF2 BLM with NQ cobalt. it's sure as shit not easy. but it is doable.

My goal is to push the limits of my class, not use gear as a crutch. There is a difference. 100% of the time Gear makes me better. it doesn't make me good.

if you're using gear as an argument that WAR is fine, then that's the undeniable proof that war needs help. Skill>gear. if you have to push the absolute limit of your class to be on par with an average joe of another, you have a balance issue. why is that so hard to understand? is it that hard for you to go down to the level of an average player and look up for a change?

The issue isn't for us that are capable of pushing the absolute limits of the class. its for those that can't. do we have to tell them "oh, sorry. you have to play paladin. you're too average to play war /faceroll /faceroll" how is that fair? how is that good design? it's not.

If you want a Guaranteed Crit look no further than Berserk. Like I posted earlier, that's what Berserk IS. Every hit you deal is +50% damage which is essentially a Crit. So if you want burst healing there you go. Plus you can crit on top of that.

Berserk is actually a +50% to Attack Power. not to damage. there is a difference. it's not the same as criting constantly. that's like saying foresight decreases damage recieved by 20%.

defense =/= damage reduction. AP =/= damage dealt.

Holmgang is sometimes mitigation. Sometimes not. When a primal turns around (Like with Friction or Landslide or Weight of the Land) You can freeze them in place. they can't turn around to hit you more.

Also, when you use Holmgang on Demon Wall, you cannot be thrown by Repel and can continue dealing damage.

I've actually killed Demon Wall this way, if your team dies after the adds and the Wall is creeping close to the muck, if you don't get repelled you can hold on just long enough to finish it off.

i'll need to play with Holmgang more.

[Tronic]

Doesn't defiance do 3 things:
1 - increase HP for 25%
2 - Decrease damage by 25%
3 - DOUBLE Enmity generation?

So wouldn't it be 208x5 for RoH (1040 Units) and 210x5x2 (2100) for BB?

Yes.

So, like, not 7%...or .9%...but like... 201.9%?

The ~7% Kitru was referring to was how much stronger BB was to RoH out of tanking stance (280 vs 260).

PS I have been reading this page and participating where I can enough to the point where I am officially given up on my PLD, and I am working on leveling a WAR because it sounds like so much fun.

Wait until parties prefer PLDs over you for Titan/Coil :/