Quote Originally Posted by Gamemako View Post
With respect to bonus points, there's no way you can catch up -- you should put those points into STR or VIT. Secondary stats are not nearly as valuable as primary stats -- if you choose between +5 STR and +10 DTR, you'd be a damn fool to take the latter. If 1 DEX is worth 1 Parry, then you're still effectively comparing secondary to primary stats because you don't care about the primary portion. However, Gryphonskin or Rose Gold will both have the same VIT, either by melds or natively.
But with Gryphonskin you pick up a ton of str and dex, while maintaining VIT and only losing a few parry.