What to focus melds on? How about anima weapon?

[Lyraele]

I'm finally getting a reasonably steady stream of ilvl 260 to 270 gear, thanks to Dun Scathe and Scripture gear. Which makes me wonder what the right things to meld are? It looks like I'm already capped on VIT, so wondering what the next best thing(s) are? I don't know that I'll ever have the 270 Alex gear, so I'm assuming full augmented Shire gear plus the Anima (Paladin, if that matters) is the best I can get pre-Stormblood. What should I be melding and why? Thanks in adavance!

[TallonOverworld]

If you're not raiding, there's no real issue on what to meld. In my opinion, paladin melds should be Crit-Det-SkS for armor, since there is no need for accuracy, and str for your accessories.

[BorisDaBlade]

Crit det on left side. All strength on right side. Skill speed is terrible on tanks. Since str and vit are almost 1=1 it's a win since accessories are capped on vit, but not str. So it's a direct damage increase.

[Lyraele]

Well, I'll be trying to raid Alex and Ex trials, but since we are just starting out I'm assuming we won't be stocked up on raid gear for a while, so I'd rather plan based on what I know I can get (Shire plus Anima). Does that change the melding picture at all? From what I can see and find, I think I'm already at ACC cap (700? 715?) and know my gear won't take VIT.

[TallonOverworld]

Raiding or not is up to you. Keep in mind that both the alex and scripture gear will undoubtedly get you safely to Stormblood.
If i were you, i wouldn't bother with Zurvan Ex at all if i had the i260 or i270 relic and maybe manage some savage content (provided i got the acc cap) although i never did any raiding since first coil, only because the tome gear is so reliable and lets just say i am... lazy. But in my opinion i would prefer to level up a dol/doh class rather than raid at the present time.

Regarding the influence of relic weapons in melding that you say, there's just nothing into it simple as that maybe only that it boosts your secondary stats since you decide about them and nothing more. As i said before, you should not worry about melds at all besides the safe ones that you can get (crit-det for left side and str for right side) and try to get as much higher ilvl as you can.