What materia should be used for Ninja?

[Scarletashe]

I can't find any guides for this and was wondering for Ninja lore and alex stuff what materia should I be using? Is it best to use crit and det or all crit or all det? I don't do any savage alex. The hardest thing I do are ex primals. What's the best stat to focus on?

[AskaRay]

Honestly if the hardest thing you do is EX primals...you don't need melds.

[Raminax]

Honestly if the hardest thing you do is EX primals...you don't need melds.

Not melding your stuff is doing your allies a disservice, even if you don't do Savage Alexander. You can get one free tier 5 materia of your choice through Void Ark every week, and tier 4s are cheap as chips, even if you can't do rank 3 ARR Beast Tribe quests yourself. With those kind of circumstances, not melding is just asking to be carried.

(Just for fun's sake, imagine two fully Lore/Midan geared persons, one of them not melded and the other fully so. Even with just tier 4 crit materia, the melded guy would have a 4% crit chance advantage over the other. That's nothing to sneeze at.)

[TheUltimateSeph]

not melding is just asking to be carried.

This is just so wrong

[Powercow]

Crit, if you can. If the equipment has a higher amount of crit than the other stat you won't be able to meld it, at which point determination. If you're using a grade IV materia the skillspeed one is fine too (since you get 9 of that compared to 6 of det) but really it's a wash in that regard and I think most people would rather just go for the det.

But yeah, crit if it can be slotted in it. Your gear has more than enough accuracy and vitality for EX primals and the like so you don't need to stress in that regard.

[Darkstride]

Depends on the gear piece. You can't do "all Crit" or "all DET" due to stat cap restrictions. What you're capable of melding is dependant on what stats are already present on the gear. Crit has the highest stat weight for secondary stats on NIN, but you won't always be able to meld more Crit.

The reason there's no guides is likely because there really isn't a lot of "choice" in melding. As long as your Accuracy is ok, you meld your best stat until it is capped on that piece of gear, and then move onto the next stat.

[MugenMugetsu]

I would suggest Quickarm Materia for the added Skill Speed. If Skill Speed is already on the piece of gear, but it has no Crit Rate + then go with Savage Aim. Determination (Savage Might) is also a good option, but of the three I would definitely choose Skill Speed first, but that's just my personal preference.

[Ashkendor]

(Just for fun's sake, imagine two fully Lore/Midan geared persons, one of them not melded and the other fully so. Even with just tier 4 crit materia, the melded guy would have a 4% crit chance advantage over the other. That's nothing to sneeze at.)

Is this based on the assumption that you can fully slot a set of armor with Crit IV materia, though? Stat caps are a thing.

I would suggest Quickarm Materia for the added Skill Speed. If Skill Speed is already on the piece of gear, but it has no Crit Rate + then go with Savage Aim. Determination (Savage Might) is also a good option, but of the three I would definitely choose Skill Speed first, but that's just my personal preference.

If you stack nothing but skill speed, all you do is make yourself zero out on TP faster.

[Raminax]

Is this based on the assumption that you can fully slot a set of armor with Crit IV materia, though? Stat caps are a thing.

Yerr, I wasn't being realistic, really. Just wanted to show that even Tier IV Materia does matter.

Edit: To illustrate my point.

If Dervy's weights for Ninjas are to be believed...

Splitting half of your materia into Det and Crit to account for random stat cap shenanigans -

Full Tier IVs would be worth 26.5 DPS
Full Tier Vs would be worth 41.4 DPS

A pair of Kannagi are worth 1105.6 DPS

Upgrading to Points of the Sephirot (worth 1135.8 DPS) from Kannagi nets you 30.2 DPS, worth slightly more than a full Tier IV setup, but a fair bit less than a full Tier V setup.

Upgrading to the Torrent Kris (worth 1178.4 DPS) from the Points of the Sephirot nets you 42.6 DPS, worth significantly more compared to a Tier IV setup, but just above a Tier V setup.

Upgrading to Augmented Torrent Kris (worth 1204.2 DPS) from the Torrent Kris nets you 25.8 DPS, worth less than both ranks of Materia setups.

Finally, upgrading to Midan Metal Daggers (worth 1216.2 DPS) from the Augmented Torrent Kris nets you 12 DPS, worth even less than the previous upgrade.

Essentially, not bothering to use Materia at all is akin to skipping weapon upgrades. And that's not even getting into the potential of crafted items holding up to five materia each.

[Kaze3434]

Yerr, I wasn't being realistic, really. Just wanted to show that even Tier IV Materia does matter.
Edit: To illustrate my point.

If Dervy's weights for Ninjas are to be believed...

Splitting half of your materia into Det and Crit to account for random stat cap shenanigans -

Full Tier IVs would be worth 26.5 DPS
Full Tier Vs would be worth 41.4 DPS

A pair of Kannagi are worth 1105.6 DPS

Upgrading to Points of the Sephirot (worth 1135.8 DPS) from Kannagi nets you 30.2 DPS, worth slightly more than a full Tier IV setup, but a fair bit less than a full Tier V setup.

Upgrading to the Torrent Kris (worth 1178.4 DPS) from the Points of the Sephirot nets you 42.6 DPS, worth significantly more compared to a Tier IV setup, but just above a Tier V setup.

Upgrading to Augmented Torrent Kris (worth 1204.2 DPS) from the Torrent Kris nets you 25.8 DPS, worth less than both ranks of Materia setups.

Finally, upgrading to Midan Metal Daggers (worth 1216.2 DPS) from the Augmented Torrent Kris nets you 12 DPS, worth even less than the previous upgrade.

Essentially, not bothering to use Materia at all is akin to skipping weapon upgrades. And that's not even getting into the potential of crafted items holding up to five materia each

.

edit, some info on crit, and how the game rounds number in general. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...#gid=810267486
first things first, your conversions are referring to the wrong thing. its not a dps difference but a main stat difference.
second, this has to be corrected; 4 crit is not 4% crit. just like the other stats, there are thresholds. if it was the way you were saying it, then as soon as anyone reached 100 crit, they will always crit. hell, on my nin, by your numbers i have 1000% chance to crit. someone melding a crit IV is just shy of being two more main stat.