WAR as DPS?

[Vecayse]

So I don't really like tanking but I like the whole 2h axe wielding thing. I wanted to know how viable is it to gear for DPS/skillspeed etc and not be in your tanking stance? Will the DPS be viable? Do your skills still generate extra threat when not in that stance?

I'm not entirely sure how the skills for Warrior work yet, just wanted to know if this will ever be viable. Oh and this is more towards viability for coil.

[Sapphidia]

You'll hear mixed feelings on this. Most people will say "no, absolutely not".

Some people though have parsed Marauders (without the Job, so they have 10 crossclass DPS skills) doing about equal dps to similar geared DPS classes on fights like Titan Hard. It varies, it seems it IS possible to crank out certaily Acceptable DPS as a Marauder if required. You can do it as a Warrior too but you lose access to a lot of nice DPS crossclass skills like blood for blood and raging strikes.

However, it comes with three major issues.
1 - Your threat will be skyhigh as you still need to use Butchers Block combos to max your dps. Depends on your tank of course, but there's a good chance you wont be able to do your maximum dps without pulling aggro. Your skills still have bonus enmity on. It wont be as high as a Warrior in Defiance but it'll still be dangerously close to the tank's level.
2 - You wont ever be able to queue as DPS via the Duty Finder, so you HAVE to tank most content.
3 - To truly max your DPS you have to play as Marauder, not Warrior, which means you can't use AF2 gear or a Relic Weapon.

I'm sure that if you have a Warrior, you play well, and you gear appropriately with DPS jewellery, you'll be able to be a fairly valid contribution to a team as DPS (it's worth doing this if you're in an 8man team for fights that need only 1 tank anyway). But the difficulties in doing so really make this viable purely for a Side Project for someone that already likes the tanking aspect of a Warrior and wants to have some fun with some alternative gear sets.

I certainly would NEVER recommend rolling a warrior if you don't like tanking.

[SpookyGhost]

It's under any other normal DPS and every role for dungeons until 8 man raids you'll only be able to fill the tank role. In 2.1 they could add an alternate job for MRD that works as DPS, but until then you're better off playing a different class if you don't want to tank.

Also, in Coil you'll mainly be tanking as well. An example would be Turn 1 where an add spawns for the entrance node and when the snakes split.

[Vecayse]

I did not know that you can't equip a relic as a Marauder that kinda sucks. My main class is Scholar anyway so I just wanted a class on the side to have some fun with. My 8 man group is on turn 2 at the moment anyway and from what I've seen in coil so far Warriors take waaaaaaay to much damage. I might try it anyway, cos I do like 2H axe wielders (played Warrior in WoW) And I guess I could also tank if I have to sometimes

[Dhex]

Your strongest combo (Butcher's Block) directly generates enmity.

Putting on my Peltast/Hetairos equipment mixed with Darklight gives high STR.

Warrior's combos have relatively high potency being 150 - (190/200) - (250/270/280) <- Dragoon's highest potency combo Disembowel is only (220)


Where we lack tools -> how do we increase damage output? - MNK stacks Skill Speed/Critical Hit/+DMG%/DOTs, DRG has supplemental Jumps and +DMG %, BRD has +DMG% Bloodletter 0 TP cost, SMN DOT/Pet/Spikes, BLM Spell Stack/Steady High DMG

Warrior's only damage increasing tools are - Maim +20% DMG, Storm's Eye -10% Slash Resist, Berserk +50% ATK, Internal Release (cross-classed) +20% Critical Rate

MRD loses out on roughly (10?) STR I believe, but you lose AF/AF2 (not really a loss if you're wearing Darklight/Hetairos/Peltast) Losing Bravura is catastrophic if you're playing with DPS that have their relic. As MRD you can access ARC's kit - Raging Strikes +20% DMG, Hawk Eye +20% Phys. Acc, and Straight Shot (140) Potency +10% Crit Rate

In short MRD might be able to put out semi-decent DMG - but it will never be considered a go-to pick for DPS because it's toolkit is too limited when compared with MNK/DRG/BLM/BRD/SMN and that gap only widens as those jobs gather AF2 or unlock their Relic weapon.

[Kaalan]

When I'm not tanking with my WAR, but still using my "tank" gear which is far from being optimal atm, I'm doing ~170 DPS, I'd say that you can reach at least 200 with propper accessories. This is decent, more than a lot of so called DPS you find in this game even, but it's far from being enough to be competitive.
BUT, sooner or later, we will get a DPS job so... Might aswell level MRD and see for yourself ?

[Corkafish]

One benefit of having a MRD DD is that we provide a slashing debuff which also improves the PLD tank's damage output and emnity. And since we would be running without a Soul Stone, we have access to some good utility that the job types don't. But, as others have said, you can't equip the relic weapon, so the best you can do is a HQ 70 2-star piece made by a BSM.

I can understand the thematic preference as I love my Arms Warrior in WoW. And right now, the MRD in FFXIV is in pretty much the same place as Arms was in Vanilla WoW - built to be a tank, can do OK damage wearing mail or leather but not really optimized for the role.

[Ninjiitstu]

But, as others have said, you can't equip the relic weapon, so the best you can do is a HQ 70 2-star piece made by a BSM..

Incorrect. You can ear the allagan great axe.

[Hachiko]

Incorrect. You can ear the allagan great axe.

Correction: You can't wear the Allagan Great Axe because no one has downed Twintania and so exactly zero exist across all servers.

[Ninjiitstu]

Correction: You can't wear the Allagan Great Axe because no one has downed Twintania and so exactly zero exist across all servers.

Also incorrect. There was atleast one kill of Twintania, and since the information surroudning how the bug happened was released, it would shock me if it has not been killed since then as well, using the same method.

That being said, not exactly the best way to go about things, but it is entirely possible. If your planning on MRD DPS, your probably planning for the long road as you need a LOT of coils drops to begin with, so waiting on a twintania kill isn't the worst thing in the world.