Need help understanding BiS(best in slot)

[dughug]

A few questions: how are the values for stats such as crit, det, acc, etc, determined. Like how does one know what the highest and best value for each?

How do I use Ariyala's calculator, better yet help me understand how to use it. If I cant afford to buy and meld items such as the kirimu coat, how do I use the calculator to give me bis for things I cant afford and still be able to do fcob? Thanks.

[Cyrus-Wallace]

Basically, the starting point is to cap accuracy. Either with food or gear alone, you gotta meet the current acc cap for the current content. From there, it kinda depends. If you ask for my opinion, I've seen plenty of DPS that love to stack DET and CRIT, without a determinied cap, while having the needed accuracy. As for paladin, which is my case, we mostly agree that parry is a trash stat and we prefer to stack DET to increase the base damage, hence the emnity generation.

Other players prefer to take the path of the skillspeed/spellspeed. Depends on the content you're running and how much you care about it. BiS in this game is kind of bland, and even though there's a difference when you work on these sub-stats, unless you're doing end-game content, there's no risk of messing it up, in my opinion.

[Alberel]

For ariyala's calculator you want to first select your class and race, then click and drag the ilvl sliders at the top to indicate the ilvl range you have available to you. After that just use the 'BiS Solver' which comes preset with that job's stat weightings and accuracy cap to help find the best options (just hit 'solve', you don't need to mess with the numbers).

In case you don't know what stat weightings are they're essentially how big an impact a given stat has on your performance and has been calculated by the community through a great deal of testing. In the case of my Summoner, using Intelligence as the baseline with a value of 1, each point of weapon damage is worth 6.9 times more than a point of INT whilst Spell Speed is only worth a measly 0.098 (it's useless for SMNs). Unfortunately there's no resource in game for knowing these values.

It's worth noting that the difference in effectiveness between multiple pieces of the same ilvl is marginal for most jobs. There is a difference, but unless you need to squeeze every last drop of efficiency out of your equipment you're normally fine just meeting the accuracy cap for each turn and then just getting your ilvl as high as you can. The only real exceptions are skill/spell speed on BRDs and SMNs as the stat is essentially useless to them and a complete waste (in fact in SMNs case it hurts them as it causes them to burn MP quicker through Ruin spam).

[Malevicton]

A few questions: how are the values for stats such as crit, det, acc, etc, determined. Like how does one know what the highest and best value for each?

How do I use Ariyala's calculator, better yet help me understand how to use it. If I cant afford to buy and meld items such as the kirimu coat, how do I use the calculator to give me bis for things I cant afford and still be able to do fcob? Thanks.

For the first question, people determine stat weights by comparing their output while wearing different sets. Put on a det-heavy set, check dps. Put on a crit-heavy set, check dps, etc. It gets a bit more complicated when you try and really math it all out since there are a lot of different variables involved, but that's the gist. Crafted gear helps a lot since you can get more control over the stat distribution. Also, the more different sets you have to compare with, the better; just make sure the other testing conditions are static (aka, don't use procs and stuff. eliminate anything that might affect the result that isn't stats).

As for using ariyala, it's pretty easy once you play around with it a bit. Start by clicking the BiS solver near the top of the page. This will bring up a menu with some options. The numbers on the left are just the stat weights, and are generally kept up to date. You can raise or lower the accuracy amount depending on what lvl of content you plan to do. On the right side of the menu is a drop-down menu labelled "exclude items dropping in or after." You can use that to exclude fcob drops and get a pre-raid set that'll still meet acc cap. The default settings will include fcob gear, so if you're looking for an overall bis then just leave it as is.

I'm not 100% sure, but I think ariyala will not include crafted gear unless you specifically add it into your set. If you do want crafted gear, build the melds, then use "lock currently selected gear" to make ariyala fill in your other spots. If you're trying to avoid crafted gear, though, then just carry on doing things normally.

[Docent]

"Best in Slot" generally implies focusing on the items that gives you:
1) The lowest possible accuracy that still beats the minimum required for the content you're doing (anything above is wasted budget points)
2) The highest possible of CRIT and DET (with a bigger focus on Crit or Det based on your job).
2-BLM) Alternatively, Spell Speed goes here if you're BLM.

For most melee, that means having the lowest possible Skill Speed, although some jobs have "favoured" breakpoints to make their rotations work better, or to squeeze an extra hit during your most powerful buffs (warrior being the prime example). Parry is rather worthless for tanks, so is often not even considered.

That said, Best in Slot is something you should only really pursue once you're at the horizontal progression level (ergo, you're in full 130, you're looking to better yourself). For the most part, the raw stats on ilevel 130 are high enough that it will beat (or match) better itemized but lower-level items. It certainly helps to know that a piece or another of ironworks ends up in the "official best in slot" set for fully-geared people, but if that set REQUIRES you to beat T13 AND get the drop so you have enough accuracy to run T13... Then you're in a problematic situation.

Also, Best in Slot varies based on content. Most people don't care to optimize for non-raids, but when you're doing most High level dungeons (All but Sastasha HM, Qarn HM and Snowcloak), you get capped at ilevel 110. This means that crafted + pentamelded gear is almost universally the best gear ever here.

When you run WoD, ST, LotA, most HM primal and such, accuracy cap is so ridiculously low, you could conceivably have a different gear set where you pick all your "damage gear" (skill speed, crit, det) over your normal set (accuracy, crit, det) as the extra accuracy does nothing to you.

More than often, people use somebody else's "best in slot" gear to determine their own goals ("So I need pants from T___, and I can use Twines on boots and body..."), without realizing that you actually need to fiddle around your gearset a lot more than that if you want to be the best you can be at every moment during the journey (rather than striving for an ideal, but being totally broken as you try to make your way there)

[Makado]

Best in slot is totally up to you. Get your accuracy cap for the content your doing, which is most important and then just put on gear that adds other damage increasing stats.

Overall though the only thing that you will really notice a differencr if you really stack completely in one stat. Otherwise, as long as you have a high Ilvl you won't really see much difference in anything changing around 15-25 points of secondary stats.

[Sapphic]

Basically, the starting point is to cap accuracy.

If you really want to maximise BiS.

Using FCoB as an example. Each turn has a different accuracy cap and thus BiS would be having different gear layouts for each turn, as obviously you don't need turn 13 accuracy for turn 10.

Also with 3.0 and the raised stats, stat weights may change. As for example, if what I've read will be implemented in regards to SMN and Spell Speed. Weight on that stat will increase.

[Zaft]

Best in slot is totally up to you.

No, it's not. Best in slot means the best item for that item slot for that class. There is really no arguing what is the best in slot. If item1 is worth 400 points and item2 is worth 430 points, item2 is the clear BiS. Even if the outcome is a tiny increase in DPS, it is still the superior option.

Does that mean you have to play that way? No, not necessarily. But don't try to change what BiS means.

[Docent]

If item1 is worth 400 points and item2 is worth 430 points, item2 is the clear BiS.

Everything is situational. We used to hate having to repeat that over and over and FFXI, but it's still true here.

Sometimes the choices are obvious..
Let's say:
A) hypothetical ilevel 130 body with Crit (Major) + Det (Minor)
B) hypothetical ilevel 130 body with Det (Major) + Skill Speed (Minor)

Most of the classes will end up with a "higher score" for Item (A), and will build their best in slot around that item

But if the options are:
A) hypothetical ilevel 130 body with Accuracy (Major) + Crit (Minor)
B) hypothetical ilevel 130 body with Crit (Major) + Skill speed (Minor)

You may end up with piece (A) as the best in slot, because that's the best place to get Accuracy to the amount you need, given the rest of the gear that exist / that you own.
It doesn't even take stats weight, however, to understand that item (B) will outperform item (A) in any situations where you don't need that accuracy.

"Best in slot" is nice and all, but you need to specify what it's going to be used for.

[Makado]

Exactly, one fight may favor a skill speed build where another favors a crit det build. Having a static set for all content is for the nubs.