Parry...

[subteraneanbird]

If those are the numbers that have been tested and proven, someone bring along parser data that supports it. Getting all haughty about "people not understanding parry" when no conclusive data has been brought forward to help us do so is rude. My issue was never that I thought those numbers were untrue. I DON'T know the numbers and even stated as such in my opening post. I think from what little both sides have offered it's a wash on who to believe, so I was gonna keep this all in mind for when I hit 50. What I had an issue with was outright dishonesty in the form of "Parry (an RNG stat) is just as effective as CDs, the backbone of tanking." and "You can stack parry to the point where you are parrying half your hits" because those are ludicrous with even the barest examination. If those are the numbers, show me the data to back it up instead of just yammering on about you having it. Data doesn't mean shit if no one can see it.

[Casper]

If those are the numbers that have been tested and proven, someone bring along parser data that supports it. Getting all haughty about "people not understanding parry" when no conclusive data has been brought forward to help us do so is rude. My issue was never that I thought those numbers were untrue. I DON'T know the numbers and even stated as such in my opening post. I think from what little both sides have offered it's a wash on who to believe, so I was gonna keep this all in mind for when I hit 50. What I had an issue with was outright dishonesty in the form of "Parry (an RNG stat) is just as effective as CDs, the backbone of tanking." and "You can stack parry to the point where you are parrying half your hits" because those are ludicrous with even the barest examination. If those are the numbers, show me the data to back it up instead of just yammering on about you having it. Data doesn't mean shit if no one can see it.

It literally would take you 10 minutes to test it out for yourself, removing any doubt you might have. Quite literally.

[Hulan]

It literally would take you 10 minutes to test it out for yourself, removing any doubt you might have. Quite literally.

I was with you until you said this, though I'm loath to come down on either side until I've seen some actual testing done. In what bizarre universe can you test a non-deterministic value with a low rate of occurrence in 10 minutes? The entire reason that this debate exists is because the shear amount of time and effort that would have to be put into finding the actual weights for parry. In the post referenced by the comment that you quoted, you mention two parry values: 52 and 302. And 3 fields: 10th level, 42nd level, and T6. That's 6 sets of samples, with each set needing to be in the ~1000 sample range for an error of +-3% (which isn't exactly stellar [it's 10,000 for 1% in case you were wondering]). And.... I'm going to stop now before the real statisticians come and haul me off. The point is, you cannot reliably test non-deterministic values like this briefly with any degree of confidence. If I had a weekend on my hands and a handful of cooperative players, I would love nothing more.... Okay I can't finish that statement... but I would be interested to try this out myself. Sadly, I do not have that kind of time to kick around - not to mention being a patently mediocre tank who has his hands plenty full just staying alive without taking data, but I do like theory.

[Edit in the hopes of making this at least a somewhat informative contribution]: For the moment, I am more convinced by the argument that mitigation from Parry is too limited to be a sure-fire solution. Rather, for anyone not on the bleeding edge of optimization, I think you are quite likely to pick up some parry here and there while just trying to get the best gear you can at that given moment. Damage is a known quantity, and in a world where sometimes you do content as an off tank, and sometimes you don't have to have hate on the boss, extra damage is going to serve you better in those situations than extra mitigation. Extra mitigation in Titan Hard on Trial Roulette does you nothing, extra damage might just help out a little. That being said, my gear is primarily Parry at the moment, though I may just change that. Only time will tell.

[Casper]

Snip

I tested this using hours. Of course you need time to confirm exact numbers. Now there is my side that say you need 13 parry to get 1% parry rate, and another that said at start you need 80 parry to get 1% parry rate. Go in low level zone, take 10 ennemies on you, with full parry gear, facing you, wait for 5 minutes, kill them go naked do it again for 5 minutes. Your parry will go from 28% (or a bit less if you don't have bis) to 10%. Of course those won't be exact on a 5 minutes test. You might go from 24% to 13% or something. Still, you will have 300 hits or so in both tests, and you will be able to confidently prove the 80 parrry per % guys are wrong, and i am most likely not lieing.

[ZDamned]

@Casper, your test throws Defense away. Ya know that stat that ARMOR gives? It also throws away all minimal parry numbers we do get. It's entirely possible that the stat itself suffers tremendous diminishing returns, or even what Kitru posted as a theory earlier in this thread. (Once at X Parry, you don't need anymore)

BTW, checking you on the Lodestone, shows your Abysmal 550 Parry rating. Why are you arguing in this thread when you are, by your own numbers, down by a 6% chance to parry? Isn't that 1% Damage Reduction? You are absolutely terrible how you terrorize your healers like that! SHAME ON YOU!
(See what I did there?)

I was in Turn 7 for 8 hours in the past 2 days,(16%! almost there.) and ran a ton of tests on both 494 Parry, and 627 Parry. Both times, I still had a very equal chance of parrying through the entire fight.
And if you want my anecdotal version of your test Casper, several of my runs with 494 Parry, I parryd more than half the time. So RNG can and always will be a huge factor.

The only meaningful change I had been able to see was swapping out my Noct Hoplon for my Leviathan Shield. Truth be told, adding in a Buckler is easily the most consistent RNG based mitigation we can ever use. I have a set of macros that use Shield Swipe before Fast Blade, Savage Blade and Rage of Halone. I averaged 1 Swipe per combo, with the Hoplon, but then I put on the Buckler, and instead was getting an average of 5. (I only ignored the Swipe when Halone's De-buff was about to fall off) This saved me a TON of TP, and boosted my damage by roughly 5% Since 3 Shield Swipe GCDs is more Potency than the full RoH combo. Testing like this has led me to consider skill speed, since it's TP cost, is quite efficient actually. I never fell below 400 TP, and all I do on Turn 7 is stand in the same damn spot with the Lamia boss...

Also, as to everyone again talking about this "glorious!" 2% number here, Please read! Over the duration of a 12 minute fight, 2% Damage is still only equating to at most 10,000 Damage taken. (Thats being very generous BTW) At worst, thats 5 GCDs, over 12 minutes. And my healers NEVER once knew about my gear swaps, even changing from the Hoplon to the Buckler. 2% is NOT huge people! 10% is Huge, 5% is useful, 2% is just unlucky, and statistically a wash.

It sounds like people here would rather sacrifice ilvl for parry, because of that 2% number, which baffles me.

[subteraneanbird]

It literally would take you 10 minutes to test it out for yourself, removing any doubt you might have. Quite literally.

I play on PS3 so I don't have parser access. If it literally takes 10 minutes, humor me.