Explorer's Tabard (Why?)

[Velhart]

I think you've forgotten how important it is. Let me remind you.

True Thrust -> Leg Sweep -> Doom spike: True Thrust does crap damage, Leg sweep does crap damage, and doom spike is the only good skill. Problem with this combo is that its executed from the front, meaning it is very dangerous to do against bosses.



Feint -> Disembowel: Great damage, but Disembowel has a pretty lengthy cooldown. So if you miss a lot, you spend more time using Feint than anything else, and it just doesn't do good dmg.

Vorpal Thrust -> Impulse Drive -> Chaos Thrust: Awesome damage, but both Vorpal Thrust AND Impulse Drive have very low accuracy. I have about 398 acc total so far, and even with "hawks eye" i still can't hit the broad side of a barn with these skills against higher level bosses.

Vorpal Thrust -> Impulsve Drive -> Ring of Talons: Another awesome damage combo, but this one is aoe..and a high damage aoe on top of that. You miss either of those low-acc skills you aren't aoe'ing anything.


If you take out those two combos you are left with very sub-par dps. At that point someone might as well take a bard, a monk, or even a war over you because you aren't doing enough damage to justify taking up a party slot. On top of that your aoe reliability is almost 0, as leg sweep does loldamage...and you're likely to die many many many times on bosses due to trying to execute frontal combos. All in all acc is a DRG's bread and butter, without it he is pretty gimp.

This, very much this.

Devs have said DRG is getting a damage increase. What it will be is still a mystery. Our original intent was to be consistent in weapon skills and critical hits. But a lot of people (and I am on the same boat) is to worry about hitting in the first place, then stacking STR/PIE/ATK afterwards. I say if your combos miss, you're a poor DRG. Will take accuracy over a little more potency as it is right now.

[Lux_Rayna]

Personally, I think the Drachenmail is likely superior at the moment. Oh wait, I completely forgot about the Poison Resistance on the tabard! Yeah, tabard wins easily.

I actually don't play DRG much nowadays, but I find people's obsession with ACC way overblown. Sure, Impulse Drive sucks but in trying to make it 99% accurate you significantly overshoot on everything else.

If impulse drive misses your dps is trash. If you played DRG nowadays on things like Garuda, you'd find that you can almost never have enough acc. You need to make Impulse drive as accurate as the dps skills of other classes like monk, arc, and war. If you don't, then your dps will never be able to compete with their combos, because you wont be completing combos at all..in some cases wont even be able to start them.

Yes. Explorer's Tabard is the better choice than Drachenmail end-game wise. While the enhance invigorate is nice, without gearswap you're only hurting yourself unless you have a triple melded acc hart guisarme laying around somewhere. Unless you're hitting the 460+ without food and buffs I would definitely pick explorer's or a double-triple melded cobalt hauby (red).

^ that. Acc is way more important than a measly 7 pie and enhanced invigorate. TP is pointless if you waste it missing impulse drive. Plus Drachen Mail is a pretty sub par piece of gear, almost anything is better than it these days.

[Zyph]

Is there a gear set I should be going for ideally (short of Darklight)? Right now I've replaced my Drachen Mail with an Explorer's Tabard and my Drachen Greaves with Explorer's Moccasins. I was thinking of getting an Explorer's belt but I'm curious if there's a better melded option? Haven't really thought about replacing my legs, I like the Jump recast reduction cause it's free DPS/TP.

Already these gear choices put me on the path towards high crit rate and high crit damage, and if I get the Garuda lance then that's just icing on the cake. Hopefully the DRG balances will push it down the road to being a crit based job, in which case, I'm set.

I was looking at that new GC gear, looks pretty sweet.

[Silvano]

^ Darklight is pretty sweet.

To the naysayers and acc-hoarders...my hit % on primals/hamlet/CC/AV is above 90% (usually 92-96%) without food....with the following gear:

Drachen AF
Felt Gloves w/ 2x STR (III and IV)
Ifrit's Harpoon
Str and Pie rings (NQ)
Pie bracelet (NQ)
Electrum Gorget (NQ)

with stuffed cabbage (which grants up to 34 accuracy), I am well into 95+%...so I'm not sure what you all are doing, but my ACC is pretty okay as is right now. I plan on going for a Tort double or triple meld, but for the moment, base-line gear, I'd have to say AF wins out (for me at least). I was more curious on legit number data with AF vs Tabard ^^;

[Cascade]

the new limsa body is a good piece too.... if you combin that with the braclet and the pants its not a bad gear setup to work off

[Geo]

BLM>DRG

/10char

[Silvano]

I actually just started using a Tortoiseshell because I double-PIE'd it.

Haubergeon's are for ACC hoarders. Stuffed Cabbage is all you need.

[Frein]

I actually just started using a Tortoiseshell because I double-PIE'd it.

Haubergeon's are for ACC hoarders. Stuffed Cabbage is all you need.

The haubergeon would probably be better even if you took out the accuracy.

[Silvano]

The haubergeon would probably be better even if you took out the accuracy.

Tortoiseshell Scale Mail :: Dex : +6, Attack Power : +8 (HQ:9), Pty : +7
Cobalt Haubergeon :: Str : +6, Attack Power : +6, Accuracy : +6 (HQ:7)

[Mister-Wonderful]

Tortoiseshell Scale Mail :: Dex : +6, Attack Power : +8 (HQ:9), Pty : +7
Cobalt Haubergeon :: Str : +6, Attack Power : +6, Accuracy : +6 (HQ:7)

So 3 beneficial stats on hauby and 2 on tortoise, 1 of which (piety) you'll more than likely meld to cap on this body anyway.

Hauby > scale mail