what will be the main stat for Rogue/Ninja?

[Alistaire]

MNK: competes with no one for armor, competes with DRG for jewelry
DRG: competes with no one for armor, competes with MNK for jewelry

Let's not forget those offtank builds.

[Exstal]

That's the basic argument I'm going with.

All loot has an equal chance to drop, regardless of how many classes can/should use it. As such, the

WAR: competes with PLD
PLD: competes with WAR
SMN: competes with BLM
BLM: competes with SMN
WHM: competes with SCH
SCH: competes with WHM
BRD: competes with no one
MNK: competes with no one for armor, competes with DRG for jewelry
DRG: competes with no one for armor, competes with MNK for jewelry

I think they may make it Monk armour, Dex accessories but that seems silly. On top of the fact that the Gun class is probably full on Dex so it's a hard guess to make.

Let's not forget those offtank builds.

Tanks can't roll <NEED> on STR accessories so that isn't a factor in the loot pooling.

[Kitru]

I doubt it will be Dex, that is most likely for the gun class they were withholding information about.

They've said that the next 2 classes we're going to get are going to be a tank and a healer. Yoshi has also said that the gun class would be more like a caster (stand there and do cast times) than BRD (everything instant), which wouldn't really work for a tank (casting in melee is just fail, especially as a tank when you need to be able to dodge). As such, if we're going to be getting the gun class any time soon, I would expect it to be a healer, wherein I doubt it's going to be using DEX (it's possible, but unlikely).

Of course, the devs might've just decided not to add the gun using class for a good long while (or even add it ever). Arguing about what mainstat it would have based upon the current loot distribution is ignoring the fact that the loot distribution could be entirely different (from the devs adding even more classes before or alongside it).

I think they may make it Monk armour, Dex accessories but that seems silly.

I would seriously have to wonder how they would implement that, mainly because the loot that a class/job can roll need on is assigned arbitrarily but the gear that a class/job actually wears is based upon what the mainstat is set as.

I can think of only 2 ways they'd be able to have ROG/NIN use MNK gear while having DEX as some kind of mainstat: ROG/NIN benefits from both (which would end up screwing with balance because endgame gear is mono-stat whereas crafted and leveling gear is dual stat) or they change MNK gear so that it has DEX in addition to STR (it wouldn't really buff MNK all that much because all get is a tiny bit of parry rate out of it).

The other option would be for ROG/NIN to be DEX based but get its own set of armor similar to how DRG and MNK have different armor sets. Unless the devs plan on limiting ROG/NIN endgame gear pretty heavily around the time they're released (or putting in a lot of effort to create models for gear that will only ever exist for glamour for a single class/job), that's the only real solution that I can imagine since the CT2 DEX gear is explicitly BRD.

Of course, all of this could be entirely wrong. The devs might've played around with having ROG/NIN use DEX and abandoned it (since the stuff we've got for traits is artefactual, and it's entirely possible that it's not what they're using internally).

[Lawson_Grey]

Didn't Yoshi say in an interview to specifically hold onto the Str based gear you already have?

[kiraan]

Everything is possible right now, if you read the bluegartr interview here:
http://www.bluegartr.com/threads/122...edia-Interview

What will the main stat be?
I can’t discuss it yet. It’s also possible we’ll change it from what we’ve already planned (laughs).

[Lucke]

Can't be DEX. They'd have to change the way DEX works then. DEX is for ranged dmg according to it's tooltip (bows/guns). STR is for melee. ROG and NIN are melees, so they'll use STR.

[Kitru]

Can't be DEX. They'd have to change the way DEX works then.

Whether STR or DEX determines your attack power is assigned arbitrarily. There is no "ranged attack power" and "melee attack power"; there is simply "attack power", and the stat that determines it could be whatever the devs feel like.

Furthermore, there is no difference between a "melee" attack used at 4y and one used at 15y (e.g. Piercing Talon is, from the point of view of your attributes, a melee attack even though it has a 15y range), just like there is no difference between a "ranged" attack with melee range (i.e. Repelling Shot) and a ranged attack with a 20y range. The attack types are basically assigned arbitrarily based upon the class itself (e.g. every attack used by a melee attacker is categorized as a melee attack even if it's not used in melee or if it has more in common with a magical ability than a physical ability, like Circle of Scorn or Flash) which is assigned entirely separately from what stat is used to determine the attack power of a given class.

As such, it's entirely possible for the devs to make it so that ROG/NIN uses DEX rather than STR without changing anything on the back end.

On top of all this, using the tooltips as an argument as to why ROG/NIN is going to use STR rather than DEX is confusing correlation for causation. It would make absolutely no sense for the devs to have the tooltip for DEX refer to increasing the attack power of some melee attackers if there are no melee attackers that use DEX in game currently even if they planned on adding a class that used DEX using melee class later on since it would just confuse people.

If anything, it makes more sense for the devs to make ROG/NIN use DEX instead of STR: the fundamental thing that a class's mainstat assignment determines (the assignment itself, not the mainstat) is who you share gear with. If ROG/NIN were to use STR, it would share STR gear with 2 other class/jobs while DEX gear would be the sole providence of ARC/BRDs.

As an aside, people like to bring up the whole "2 tanks, 2 healers, 2 melee DPS, 2 casters, 1 ranged" set up for the job spread largely because that's how the class/jobs are spread out according to the Limit Break system. A better way to look at the spread (from a design/composition standpoint) is "2 tanks, 2 healers, 2 melee DPS, 3 ranged DPS" (since BRD, SMN, and BLM all do DPS from range) and see the ROG/NIN as the class that evens out the melee/ranged disparity.

[Kuroyasha]

Yoshi be like Hey guys save your melee gear for Ninja. People be like "But it's Dex based!" So basically ignore what is coming directly out of Yoshi's mouth,"First off, because the class is going to be a melee DPS-type class, that gear that you have for other melee DPS classes and jobs is probably something that you'll want to hold on to."

I understand a datamine whipped out some dex, but i think yoshi would know about what's currently going on with something as major as a new class/job, especially what gear it's going to use. Now if yoshi was like hey we're doing something a little different with ninja then i could see, but he told everyone clear as day to save the melee gear.

In the end...i dont care 'cause ill be maining it either way \(^_^)/.

[Kanti]

It baffles me how people can think that ROG/NIN competing with MNK and DRG for STR gear is unfair or corrupts the balance of gear pools. Does everyone just choose to forget that there is already another ranged class in the making? We haven't heard much on it because it isn't ready to be talked about yet, or as much has been stated. What happens if you make NIN a DEX class and then your other ranged class comes out? That would put DEX classes at 3 rather than STR classes at 3. Do you think they'll make that class INT or some other ridiculous work around? No, it will be DEX, because it's a ranged class.

This "problem" with having too many classes lotting on certain stats isn't even a reasonable argument. Every fight in this game is balanced so that you can clear it with 2 tanks, 4 dps, and 2 healers. In the duty finder you have a limited amount of DPS classes, but there is always the chance you could get 4 mnks, or 4 drg, or 3 mnks and 1 brd, etc etc for however many combinations lotting on the same type of gear. So adding NIN to the pool of STR doesn't change anything. You still have the same chance of competing with other jobs for gear. If you're making pre-made groups you can further limit what jobs you want to join, so I feel this is a moot point. As this game gets older, with more and more classes coming out, it's inevitable that you will see more jobs competing for certain stats, all that can be changed is the order in which it happens.

I highly doubt they will add yet another set of STR gear to be used solely by NIN, because that WOULD throw off the balance of gear pools even further. If anything, it will share MNK gear. As more sets come out there appears to be the trend of MNK wearing lighter armor while DRG has heavier plate sets. I don't see NIN fitting aesthetically with DRG but it fits just fine with MNK, which already has the eastern style Fuma set to boot, and seemingly more like it in the future.

But what about the traits, you ask? Hell if I know. Do you know how many traits are in the database in Japanese spread out all over the place? For all we know they could be already existing traits that were touched in an update and mixed around in the database as a result, or they could be related to the long awaited second ranged class that they refuse to talk about yet. Why would the development team go out of their way to complicate their own stats by giving an obviously melee class DEX, which by definition is suited for ranged classes?

[Alistaire]

I think they may make it Monk armour, Dex accessories but that seems silly. On top of the fact that the Gun class is probably full on Dex so it's a hard guess to make.

Tanks can't roll <NEED> on STR accessories so that isn't a factor in the loot pooling.

If you're going by that then the MNK/DRG competition point is invalid as well. So assuming that's not the case, Kitru is talking primarily about non-need parties and then my point stands.

Anyway, as it's come out in the recent interview, even SE is undecided at this point, which means they're considering both options.