Slotting iLvl70 Crafting Gear - Which Materia?

[Ramsey]

Curious for those using iLvl70 crafted gear what they've slotted and why?

Trolling around on the Coil thread and then stalking people on Lodestone the only FC I could find using crafted gear heavily was BG, and they were all loading crit into their tank's armor.

I'm assuming this was not necessary for threat, but that they simply discerned that downing encounters faster from crit would be more beneficial? Most of these tanks were also Paladins I might add.

I have a hard time justifying crit myself, but I'd love to have people present their cases for slotting different materia.

I myself am leaning towards DEX, math on Dancing Mad seems to indicate about a 2% mitigation gain on 15 DEX (through parry and block rate increases), I could easily slot over 100 DEX over an entire set, or over 15% mitigation.

The other arguments are of course, crit, or (on eligible pieces) parry & determination.

Edit: Math indicates 4.7 Tier 4 acc materias will be needed to hit ACC cap of 470 for the coil. But that still leaves over a dozen unaccounted for open slots and forbidden meld opportunities.

[Faction]

100 dex even with the stat caps?

[Ramsey]

Most tanking gear is devoid of DEX, so the cap should be pretty high, I haven't tested exactly what it is, but I should be able to squeeze quite a lot of DEX into the armor, regardless of the number though, it seems to be the most worthwhile stat at the moment, I'm curious what for other perspectives though.

[Scytale]

Consider ACC as well. Tanks can miss combos in Coil. Missing a RoH is a huge amount of enmity missed.

[Ramsey]

Yeah, in the OP I mentioned 4.7 Tier 4 acc materia would be required to hit the cap, assuming the cap is 470 as I have read.

[Ramsey]

Surprised so few people have an opinion on the topic.

I threw together a comparison chart of Darklight vs. Darksteel, with the melds I intend to go with, no forbidden melds are included, as I'm not 100% on caps, but I will of course be forbidden melding. (Melds = Purple)

Set	                        DEF	STR	VIT	DEX	ACC	PRY	DET	SPD	CRT
Base Stats	                0	203	264	190	341	359	202	341	341
Darksteel Tanking Gear	733	356	424	290	461	427	256	432	371
Darklight Tanking Gear	733	312	432	190	453	527	212	371	401

I lose 8 VIT (which I can probably forbidden meld in somewhere, but I'll have to check caps) and 100 parry (about 2.8% parry). However, I gain 100 DEX which = +8.6% block rate, and the additional 44 STR puts me over the next 2 thresholds increasing damage blocked by 2%. I also sacrifice 30 crit, but gain 50 skill speed and 44 determination.

I think the 13% increase in mitigation from DEX alone is worth the 2.8% parry rate sacrifice. The other stats should lead to significantly higher overall damage with a slightly reduced crit rate. Sacrificing the 8 VIT if I can't manage to meld any more VIT, it's tough but it shouldn't be a deal breaker.

The crafted set seems to be the clear winner, relying on an itemization gimmick, but still. A nice added bonus is all these accessories will work great for any physical DPS as well. Although you might get marginally less DPS performance out of them compared to darklight, you'll gain a lot of extra HP.