Best bow for ARC/BRD

[NoctisUmbra]

[QUOTE=Spider-Dan;699034]Oh, you can weigh Ifrit against Garuda. You can also weigh Ifrit vs. Crab Bow if you really want to. That doesn't say anything about the results.[/quest]

Are you even reading. The results are that they have comparable damage output and some even saying Ifrit's performs better. Instead of arguing here you're welcome to test the difference yourself and make up your own mind.

Sure there is: any situation in which you either don't want to spam WS (due to some other factor in the fight, e.g. LNC vs. Ifrit) or a situation in which you are spamming auto-attack fast enough to take advantage of the extra DPS. That's why it's a tradeoff, as opposed to the current situation where higher DPS weapons are simply better, period.

There are hundreds of examples in FFXI of making choices between faster weapons vs. harder hitting weapons; bow vs. gun vs. crossbow was an ongoing debate among XI RNGs for years, and the faster weapons were by no means disqualified just because they had lower WS damage. In this game, the fastest weapons also hit the hardest on WS... no thought necessary.

XI is a different game Spidey. From what I recall TP generation was in fact different based on the attack delay of weapons. That's a game changer. In XIV that is not the case. If TP generation changed with delay, then there would be a trade-off to speak of with WS damage being based on Damage. Since that is not the case, DPS makes sense.

Also your example use for it makes little sense to me. In Ifrit or whatever fight you are in for where AA damage or WS damage matters more you'd still want a high DPS weapon. DPS is important for AA damage just as much as for WS damage. That's the point. For WS it's a direct value to tell you how strong the base damage of your WS will be, whereas for AA it's a measure of how much damage you'll be doing over time. I wouldn't chose a low Damage weapon with low delay for Ifrit just because it has low delay. If the Damage value is shit each AA hits like a wet noodle anyway. I'd chose a weapon with the highest DPS so that over time I'm putting out more... you guessed it.. DPS.

[Spider-Dan]

Are you even reading. The results are that they have comparable damage output and some even saying Ifrit's performs better.

I have yet to see any actual data on the comparison.

Furthermore, I can post up plenty of parses of me beating Ifrit users with a melded Crab Bow+1 (back in 1.20). Does this mean that Crab+1 was arguably better than Ifrit back then?

From what I recall TP generation was in fact different based on the attack delay of weapons.

TP generation is different based on the attack delay of weapons in XIV, so I don't see your point.

You can argue that the curve is more linear in XIV than in XI (and that's true), but in no way does that mean that DPS was somehow devalued in XI; it just meant that certain weapon+gear builds needed to be optimized for the specific number of hits to reach 100 TP (for a WS). And when you get right down to it, XIV has the same issue: a weapon that returns 500 TP per hit is superior (from a TP generation standpoint) to one that returns 550 or 450, because you reach 1000 TP in exactly two rounds (instead of 3 rounds like a 450 TP weapon), and you do so more quickly than a 550 TP weapon (which has longer delay).

All of the above are nuanced factors that come into play when evaluating light/fast vs. heavy/slow weapons. However, in XIV, the light/fast weapons are also the heaviest when it comes to WS. That unbalances the comparison.

In Ifrit or whatever fight you are in for where AA damage or WS damage matters more you'd still want a high DPS weapon. DPS is important for AA damage just as much as for WS damage. That's the point.

Yes, that is the point: in a fight like LNC vs. Ifrit (even if WS is based on DMG), a high DPS weapon will be preferable because the vast majority of your damage is coming from autoattack. Again, that's a tradeoff that is not present in the current system. In the current system, if you need a weapon that has strong autoattack damage output, you find something with good DPS, and if you need a weapon that hits hard on WS, you find... the exact same weapon. The tradeoff doesn't exist.

[NoctisUmbra]

I have yet to see any actual data on the comparison.

Furthermore, I can post up plenty of parses of me beating Ifrit users with a melded Crab Bow+1 (back in 1.20). Does this mean that Crab+1 was arguably better than Ifrit back then?


TP generation is different based on the attack delay of weapons in XIV, so I don't see your point.

You can argue that the curve is more linear in XIV than in XI (and that's true), but in no way does that mean that DPS was somehow devalued in XI; it just meant that certain weapon+gear builds needed to be optimized for the specific number of hits to reach 100 TP (for a WS). And when you get right down to it, XIV has the same issue: a weapon that returns 500 TP per hit is superior (from a TP generation standpoint) to one that returns 550 or 450, because you reach 1000 TP in exactly two rounds (instead of 3 rounds like a 450 TP weapon), and you do so more quickly than a 550 TP weapon (which has longer delay).

All of the above are nuanced factors that come into play when evaluating light/fast vs. heavy/slow weapons. However, in XIV, the light/fast weapons are also the heaviest when it comes to WS. That unbalances the comparison.


Yes, that is the point: in a fight like LNC vs. Ifrit (even if WS is based on DMG), a high DPS weapon will be preferable because the vast majority of your damage is coming from autoattack. Again, that's a tradeoff that is not present in the current system. In the current system, if you need a weapon that has strong autoattack damage output, you find something with good DPS, and if you need a weapon that hits hard on WS, you find... the exact same weapon. The tradeoff doesn't exist.

It's not whether you beat others using ifrits bow while you use crab bow. That's not a controlled test and is irrelevant as it brings player skill differences into question, which is a variable you cannot control. The question is what kind of damage do you put out with the Spine and what kind of damage do you put out with ifrits. Simple as that.

Also in XIV TP generation is ultimately the same regardless of DPS or attack delay. Lower delay hits generate less TP and higher delay hits generate more TP, and yes it is very linear meaning that as far as TP is concerned delay is irrelevant.

A higher DPS weapon almost always being superior is perfectly fine so long as they don't throw DPS values of weapons all over the place for same level weapons. Some weapons will always be superior. The difference is one can chose the delay of their weapon among similar DPS weapons based on their style and what works best for them. If WS damage was based on the Damage stat higher Damage would be the superior choice for every scenario. Period. No choice at all. Lower damage weapon would always translate to lower numbers on the parse at the end. WS are not kept in check by anything other than TP generation and their own cooldowns, neither of which are based on DPS or delay. So higher damage would always win, which again offers less flexibility than higher DPS always winning.

That all being said, in the case of archer it seems higher DPS doesn't always win. It increases the difficulty in maintaining cooldowns.

[Spider-Dan]

It's not whether you beat others using ifrits bow while you use crab bow. That's not a controlled test and is irrelevant as it brings player skill differences into question, which is a variable you cannot control.

Once more: I'm still waiting on controlled tests comparing Garuda's and Ifrit's.

Also in XIV TP generation is ultimately the same regardless of DPS or attack delay. Lower delay hits generate less TP and higher delay hits generate more TP, and yes it is very linear meaning that as far as TP is concerned delay is irrelevant.

In XI, lower delay hits generate less TP and higher delay hits generate more TP. The curve is not as linear as XIV, but as I just explained, even though a 499TP/hit weapon and a 500TP/hit weapon are superficially identical in TP/time, the 500TP/hit weapon has a huge advantage in WS/time. This is still true, regardless of the flatness of the TP/time curve.

A higher DPS weapon almost always being superior is perfectly fine so long as they don't throw DPS values of weapons all over the place for same level weapons.

Please explain why it's "perfectly fine" for higher DPS weapons to be clearly superior, but bad and wrong for higher DMG weapons to be clearly superior.

The point that I'm getting at is that in the current system, a low DPS (but high DMG) weapon is practically useless. In the old system (where WS damage is based on DMG), a high DPS (but low DMG) weapon is still probably not going to be as good as a high DMG weapon... but it will still have a wider variety of situational uses than a low DPS weapon does in this system.

If WS damage was based on the Damage stat higher Damage would be the superior choice for every scenario. Period. No choice at all.

False. I already gave you already existing scenarios in this game where that was not true (melees vs. Ifrit), as well as giving you other possible scenarios in which that would not be true (ones like those that occurred in XI).

Lower damage weapon would always translate to lower numbers on the parse at the end. WS are not kept in check by anything other than TP generation and their own cooldowns, neither of which are based on DPS or delay. So higher damage would always win, which again offers less flexibility than higher DPS always winning.

I'm sorry, you're just wrong. I've offered historical examples (in a TP/weaponskill-based game, like this one) that show exactly how and why you are wrong, but it just doesn't seem like you get it.

Under the old system, higher autoattack output (read: high DPS) can legitimately outdamage higher WS output (read: high DMG) when the ratio of AA damage:WS damage for a given job/fight skews towards AA. However, in the current system, higher autoattack output necessarily means higher WS output. The competition is rigged.