The Ninja Superthread

[Allyrion]

This easily gets rid of the button, if you adjust the dmg values into the positional, without making really any changes besides getting rid of the button.

This is a reasonable solution to reduce the ability bloat.
I'm fine with it because it still makes you have to track your timers and make a sort of branching choice with finisher.

My only issue with it is that AE will always do something for you.
Our rotation is very flexible and forgiving already. This change will make AE have little punishment unless you hit from the front.
Well, you'll still want to hit the positional when you intended to but you miss a rear attack and hit the flank....
Oh you extended Huton and did Armor Crush damage (which isn't bad).
That's a bit too forgiving for a Job that's already very forgiving.

I mean, it's not like we're nearly as bloated as MNK or DRG either, since our combo only branches at the finisher, and the second for Shadowfang.
The branching saves a lot of ability space already. If anything's bloated it's our off-gcd skills, not our weaponskills. But they make the rotation so much more active.

The Ninjutsu's very design also saves a lot of space as well.

And, quite frankly, I don't want to go back to 1-2-3 ARR rotation when there's a WAR around.
Armor Crush makes the NIN rotation feel more complete.
I'm not usually for button bloat. I agree it's a bad thing.
But our weaponskills are already very condensed since they branch off.

Adding one more finisher branch was a good thing, in my opinion.

So, I haven't read much of the thread about E.G. the NIN's new rotation with Armor Crush, but is anyone else getting the feeling that it just doesn't fit very well with the rest of the NIN's skills? The mere existence of Armor Crush basically means that you can only use Aeolian Edge about once per minute unless you have a warrior in the group, and I don't know about you, but it feels awful not being allowed to actually use my damage combo simply because of what tank I am with.

It really feels like the devs didn't playtest armor crush, and that DE should practically be merged into a new combo (such as before Shadow Fang) instead of being a combo finisher like it is now. There's too much competition in the rotation for a third finisher and it just makes the class a bit clunkier than it needs to be. Armor Crush is nice in and of itself, but I'd like to use Aeolian Edge more often than once a minute.

I thought it'd be better if it was off of Shadowfang, but I'm glad it's not.
If it was, it was just be used every 18s or every other Shadowfang (the extension would be adjusted accordingly).
All 3 finishers have a decent place in the rotation.
And each of them have to be tracked because they branch at the end.

You should be able to use AE twice a minute while keeping up DE yourself.
I don't see the problem with that. Being able to use AE a lot is a perk of having a WAR.
Honestly, we have it pretty good in that regard.

MNK, for example, will almost always have to keep up their own Dragon Kick, unless they have another MNK.
BLM, SMN, BRD and MCH have to rely on a different Job to get their own resistance lowering debuff.
DRG can do his own and it affects other jobs, but no one, save another DRG, will take the pressure off him.

We can do it ourselves, and if we get a WAR then they can do it for us.
We have it the best, by far.
I don't know, maybe it's because I don't find anything that special about doing AE.
It may be the highest potency finisher but Armor Crush feels more significant because its Huton extension translates into more damage than AE.

Then, when everything is upheld, you get to actually do AE and it's great.
Even when you keep up DE yourself, Armor Crush let's you 'bank' Huton time to add more AE into certain parts of the fight.
That is the best thing about the new rotation.