Manipulation

[Simaril]

I'm confused by this ability. "Restores 10 points of durability after each step for the next three steps." What counts as a step, what does not?

To use manipulation and steady hand, do you "waste" a step of one or the other? Is it even worth it then?

[HEC]

Step is anything that deduct (in normal situation) 10 points from durability and you'll not "waste" Manipulation if used before Steady hand as it counts as step as well. Basically using Manipulation will grant you additional 3 steps. Alternatives are (with various CP cost) Waste Not and Master's Mend (plus their II variations) so you need to calculate the cost per step gained versus how much CP you can spend on "extra steps" / durability increasing commands to find the optimum for the current situation.

[Neoflux]

A step is ANY ability you use during a craft. You only waste manipulation if at the end of any of the next 3 steps the item durability is at maximum.

For example, if you use Manipulation at 20/40, then you use steady hand (30/40), great strides (40/40), ingenuity (40/40). The last 10 durability that manipulation would have restored after the last skill is wasted because you did not use any abilities that cost durability.

If instead you use Manipulation at 20/40, then steady hands (30/40), great strides (40/40), advanced touch (40/40), nothing is wasted. The advanced touch cost 10 durability, but that is then immediately restored by manipulation.

Note that if you use Manipulation at 10/40, then use advance touch, you will FAIL the synth, because the advanced touch will have taken your durability to 0/40, and when that happens your synth fails (even though Manipulation would have restored it back to 10/40).

[Simaril]

If instead you use Manipulation at 20/40, then steady hands (30/40), great strides (40/40), advanced touch (40/40), nothing is wasted.

Steady hands gives 5 turns of increased success rate. You wasted a turn of steady hands on great strides. Wouldn't you rather use all 5 turns of steady hands on touch skills (or at least 4 turns anyway)???

[Conradus]

Steady hands gives 5 turns of increased success rate. You wasted a turn of steady hands on great strides. Wouldn't you rather use all 5 turns of steady hands on touch skills (or at least 4 turns anyway)???

While Great Strides with Steady Hands up is not a waste if you can't avoid doing it that way, in this case Manipulation, Great Strides, Steady Hands, Advanced Touch is the superior rotation as it's exactly the same except your Steady Hands lasts one more action. Remember, you've got three actions to get around to using that Great Strides, and it really doesn't matter at which point you wind up using it.

[Bufkus]

Steady hands gives 5 turns of increased success rate. You wasted a turn of steady hands on great strides. Wouldn't you rather use all 5 turns of steady hands on touch skills (or at least 4 turns anyway)???

Not at all. Steady hands turns aren't so valuable that you have to use touch each time. Especially when you only need one great strides+advanced touch/byregots to max quality. You just want Steady hands up to ensure success.

[Conradus]

Not at all. Steady hands turns aren't so valuable that you have to use touch each time. Especially when you only need one great strides+advanced touch/byregots to max quality. You just want Steady hands up to ensure success.

This is very true. However, it's also true that in this case reordering the rotation gets you another turn out of Steady Hands without giving anything up.

[Ed_N_Ants]

Steady hands gives 5 turns of increased success rate. You wasted a turn of steady hands on great strides. Wouldn't you rather use all 5 turns of steady hands on touch skills (or at least 4 turns anyway)???

You should be using great strides before you initiate steady hands... You have three tries to use great stride and it only works once... So when you initiate great strides then choose steady hands you still have 2 more attempts on great strides and 5 attempts with steady hands... This allows you to choose great strides 3 times and use steady hands 3 times giving you 3 maximum qualities attemps with no failure rate... I do use manipulate once in a while but I usually use that with the waste not ability and only on 70 crafts...

[Conradus]

I'm confused by this ability. "Restores 10 points of durability after each step for the next three steps." What counts as a step, what does not?

To use manipulation and steady hand, do you "waste" a step of one or the other? Is it even worth it then?

A step is whenever you do any crafting action. If you use Manipulation, and then do Steady Hand, you will have ten points more of Durability when the Steady Hand finishes, as the Steady Hand didn't consume any Durability. Unless, of course, you're at full Durability. Since you can't go above full Durability, in that case the ten points will be lost. For this reason, you generally don't want to use Manipulation until you're at least twenty points below full Durability. Also, the system checks for whether your synth breaks *before* Manipulation adds ten points. If you're at ten points Durability with Manipulation up, and you do a Basic Touch, your synth will break.

[Blindheart]

I basically replace masters mend 1 with manipulation. It's cheaper CP wise and as long as duribility is not max or at 10 it's pretty easy to get max benefit. If used at 10 the combine will fail as it does not add the ten until start of next step it seems