Primal Loot Itemization

[Keftenk]

Sorry to tl;dr people, its probably not for you to read anyways.

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About two months ago, I started a thread about the Ifrit weapons and their lacking stats for some jobs. That thread can be found here.

One of the problems with the Ifrit weapons was that it was easily accessible to craft items which were better than Ifrit weapons with just 1-100% Materia slot. Mages suffered the most with this having nearly everything without materia being a better fit.

Another problem was that the Add Effect: Fire Damage was placed onto these mage weapons. To anyone who has played Final Fantasy XI this shouldn't be a real shocker. SE seems to enjoy battle mages, but to anyone who actually plays a mage you know you're never meleeing. It just doesn't make sense.

Lastly, all the weapons promoted DPS and nothing else. There wasn't anything for healing, enfeebling, enhancing, or tank mitigation (except for the 15 Fire Resistance). It was all straight DPS. A minor issue, but definitely a issue to be concerned with.

The thread received a response from Bayohne that adjustments were going to be made.

We have been hearing lots of feedback regarding the Disciple of Magic weapons from Ifrit, so we are planning to make adjustments based on your feedback to both current and future weapons, as well. Keep it coming!

As you can see, our feedback is what was vital for them to make the adjustments. Enter 1.20 and all the Ifrit weapons saw an increase of their Attack/Attack Magic Potency from 20 to 30. This not only increased all the melee weapons potential, but actually put Ifrit's Cudgel and Ifrit's Cane into perspective. Only a Lightning Brand with at least 1 INT (that pushed you over a AMP tier) would be a better fit over the Cudgel if you were soley focused to nuking with Thunder spells. You would have to double socket anything else (or a really high T4 value materia) to make it superior to the Cudgel and/or Cane otherwise.

However, the add effect of fire damage still remained on the mage weapons, which is still pointless and useless. It gets better though, SE removed Spirit Dart and Phantom Dart which the effect could proc off of, so mages are now forced to literally melee if they desire the effect. The fire effect seems to be somewhat based off of your normal hit, so I'm sure you can imagine what a melee mage would do with a Ifrit weapon proc. Not very much.

While all the other classes gain from this effect, mages only purpose with it was for "funsies". There is no real nor practical use. I asked this once in the other thread, but I'll ask it again, what is SE's obsession with making mages melee?

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In 1.20, we received a new set of weapons from Good King Moggle Mog XII. If you haven't compared, all of these weapons do less damage then the Ifrit weapons, grant +30 Accuracy/Magic Accuracy, +15 Crit Rate, and then a chance to restore HP/MP upon hit. HP for melee type jobs, MP for mages.

From a melee's perspective, these weapons are trash, the accuracy is virtually useless unless you aren't in a party. You simply do not miss on anything with the party buff. The crit rate increase is a welcomed addition, as is the HP restore. It essentially mirrors the proc rate and effect damage from the Ifrit weapons, just in HP. Which is good for survival. It comes in handy for a fight such as Good King Moggle Mog XII when you could potentially have many mobs hitting you at once. However, unless accuracy is changed or you simply do not possess a Ifrit weapon, these weapons are a DPS downgrade.

The weapons are attractive to tank users, simply because of the HP restore.

From a mage's perspective, these weapons give a bit more promise. The magic accuracy is actually quite appealing if you're trying to make nuking viable (which is actually worth trying in this patch). More testing would probably have to be done to really give a conclusive answer to which is better. The crit rate again is welcomed, but there is a problem with the MP restore. Just like the melee HP restore, it's on hit. So we have to melee to gain MP back, which just doesn't happen. If mages were pointed towards needing to be melee through spells, abilities, and other gear, it would make a bit more sense, but they aren't.

The add effect on not only the Ifrit weapons, but the Moggle weapons as well make sense for melee. It's what they do most, melee! However that same logic isn't applied to mages. Mages don't often melee, but they do cast spells frequently. A Conserve MP mechanic like from Final Fantasy XI probably would have been more suitable.

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It has peaked my interest to whom is actually allocating the stats to these weapons. I have a hunch that the people who are creating these weapons are people who don't actually play the game and/or who created the terrible Final Fantasy XI itemization trend. I'm just going to assume both.

It perplexes me even further when Yoshida says he's a mage player. I question if he actually plays this game and/or understands the game from a players perspective, because unless he is a battle mage, I highly doubt he is up front whacking at Ifrit's leg while taking pulse damage.

In fact, I know he must not do this if he is indeed a old school EQ player.

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I'm not sure what I'm exactly trying to get from this thread, heh. I didn't receive a weapon of use from Ifrit, but still did Ifrit over 300 times, I won't receive anything of use from Moggle, but I'm sure I'll still do it a bunch of times, probably not as much as Ifrit since the time sink is pathetically awful.

I suppose I'm more concerned with the trend, Final Fantasy XI's model is dated, I'm not sure why Final Fantasy XIV is adopting it when it has tried to be so different (and continues to be different). Perhaps if they were a bit more practical it would justify the time sink and grind /shrug

Maybe if concerns are voiced again, like they once were, we will get yet another round of revisions. These weapons aren't super terrible, but a lot of them leave you scratching your head thinking "WTF?". Hopefully though, if we got another round of revisions, we wouldn't be forced to wait 2 months like we did with the Ifrit weapons.

[Anon]

Sorry to be the bearer of bad new but they aren't going to fix the weapons; the moogle weapons are proof they didn't learn anything from the ifrit weapons at all.

[Synthesis]

And people will be always unhapy until they have got weapon which oneshots everyone and everything.

[Keftenk]

Maybe the larger issue at hand is the trend, because soon we will have our AF in the next patch. Do you really want to be sporting the Warrior Axe, which gives something dumb like +10 INT? It would be better to stamp this kind of trend/behavior out now opposed to later, no?

[Jinko]

Its sad that the people who make the game have no clue.

Why a CNJ needs magic accuracy as a major stat is beyond me or can I miss heal someone now ?

The crit is nice, but the magic accuracy should be changed to healing potency.

No Mind or Piety either which is dissapointing.

[Keftenk]

Yup, especially with how Conjurer will become White Mage. Makes no sense. I suppose for Sleep? Sure they have nukes..but again, they become White Mage next patch.

[Answa]

Yup, especially with how Conjurer will become White Mage. Makes no sense. I suppose for Sleep? Sure they have nukes..but again, they become White Mage next patch.

They don't get substituted by WHM, they're enhanced by the job when equipped. I nuke with CNJ every once in a while. Even in parties. They're actually useful.

[EdenArchangel]

Its sad that the people who make the game have no clue.

Why a CNJ needs magic accuracy as a major stat is beyond me or can I miss heal someone now ?

The crit is nice, but the magic accuracy should be changed to healing potency.

Imagine, 30 healing potency on a moogle weapon.
How do we get you in charge of this stuff?

You can single meld better weapons than that shiz, lol. (the current stats)

[Kiara]

Hi Keftenk,

Great thread and totally agreed.

Yoshida-san and the Battle Team need to really re-assess these Primal Mage Drops. Giving Mages an "Add Effect: Fire Damage" that only procs when you *melee* with the weapon is silly. Same for the new Moogle "MP Restore" effect which also requires mages to melee the mob.

If they made the Moogle Mage Weapons "MP Restore (based on Spell Damage)" that would be a different story.

Or as you say, actual useful stats for a Mage on these weapons like "Bonus Enhancing Magic" or "Bonus Curing Potency" or +MND, INT, etc.

I hope this gets re-evaluated soon.

[Tano]

they should simply make primal weapons stronger then double melded weapons. that's all.
as gc weapons, they're almost useless now, since most of them are weaker then a single melded weapon. i just like how they made the axe from lominsa and the shield and the fists from gridania.

they should reform weapons from DH too. some ppl worked hard for them before materia system was out.


probably they should simply allow to SINGLE meld untradable objects (+42 crit ifrit's harpoon :Q_).