Sublimation vs refresh.Follow

This may have been brought up before, but I cant find it on the first three pages so...

Pretty much I want to know everyone's opinion. What would you rather have? Sublimation or refresh.

Lets compare the pros and cons of each.

Refresh

Pro - Refresh is always on. (For the duration of the spell at least.) And with it we gain mp constantly. The normal duration is 2:30. With this we gain 150 mp. Does not need to wear off before reapplying. Potentially can be up forever if the rdm can keep up.

Con - Refresh does absolutely nothing when we are at full mp. It can be dispelled. Does not stack with sublimation. Requires a rdm to be in the party with you.

Sublimation

Pro - Provides us with 200-300 mp every 5-7ish minutes. Can wake us up from sleep spell. Does not require another person, just sch subjob. Will still store mp into a charge even when we are at full mp.

Con - Is a waste if not used for the full amount of the charge. IE: Using a full charge that usually restores 250 mp when you only were down 100 mp. If hit by an aoe, your charge reads as full and you get a gimped return. Requires a wait time between uses. While not really a con cause its negated by stoneskin, it constantly drains your hp for no immediate return. A charging, or full charge can be dispelled causing no mp return. Does not stack with refresh.


Me personally I prefer refresh over sublimation. I mean it just makes more sense. A good rdm can keep refresh on you indefinitely, and do so without running out of mp. Granted there are some times I will use sublimation over refresh, but those times are more for a free poison pot than for the mp return.



Edit: Side note, I do not care about the times you only have a brd or cor. Obviously you would use sublimation at those times. I am ONLY talking about the times when you have a rdm in your party.

Edited, Dec 24th 2009 11:46pm by lightningcount

I'm a Hume with full MP merits.

Whats the charge time for each race with average hp?

With 800ish hp on taru it takes about 5:00 - 5:15.

As a hume with no HP merits, it takes somewhere around 6:20 to charge in my normal idle gear. Longer if things aren't intense and I'm charging in max HP gear.

I swear Sublimation has a special tag on on it that reads "Dispel First". Every freaking time I'm fighting a mob that dispels, the one time that I'll be hit with it? It'll take sublimation. Even when I have two full rows of buffs.

Especially a fully charged one. It seems impossible to NOT dispel a fully charged sublimation first <_<

Thats why I listed it in the sublimation con section...

Unless your mp is full, or gets filled by something like an mp statue on dynamis, refresh wins.

But you have to have a decent enough RDM to keep refresh on you full time. Half the time I stick to sublimation after I go like 4 minutes at a time without refresh. A pretty good chunk of red mages do this.

So my general rule of thumb is:

If you have a rdm that doesn't suck, that has enough time to actually refresh you (ie they're not off kiting or something) then stick with refresh.

If you have a rdm that sucks that doesn't keep refresh on you, or one that is too busy doing other things, stick to sublimation.

You need to find some new RDMs to hang around with.

This.

Also, we tend to have our good RDM's do more important things. Tanking, keeping a party alive on their own (I'm like the only other WHM of the shell), or specific tasks like kiting adds. They're all part of our good RDM's regular routine. Just as being self-sufficient is part of our good WHM's routine.

I think maybe you don't quite understand how notions of "pro" and "con" work in comparisons.

But, the whole thing is really situational to the point of not even being worth talking about. Any time you're confident in having a constant Refresh and not worrying about being slept, Refresh will always win. Sublimation just gets increasingly better the farther you stray from that. So, there's no way to compare them in isolation, and the circumstances in between "Always have a RDM refreshing me reliably" and "I'm naked and alone and need more mp" are so varied as to make any concrete discussion pointless.

If you want to throw out a particularly tricky or interesting situation and then ask, "Refresh or Sublimation," then that might make for an interesting discussion. But, a flat, "Which do you prefer?" just isn't a useful question.

I almost always prefer Refresh. Sublimation is a great backup for when there's no RDM, or they are super busy (which does happen), but unless I'm worried about getting slept I will almost always prefer Refresh. In a 30-minute event, the difference between Refresh & Sublimation is 540 MP, and that's without even calculating the loss from every 30 seconds you go without Sublimation.

However, I will sometimes buffer a huge Sublimation before an event, and tell my RDM "I'm buffing a Sublimation, don't bother Refreshing me until after I /tell you." Then as soon as my MP is low enough to use the Sublimation, I'll do so and ask for the RDM to start Refreshing me. Einherjar is the most common place for me to do that, because every bit of MP counts there.

It's not a question of prefer it's a question of numbers... which was more than adequately explained above. If I have the choice? Refresh every time because it's more efficient and more immediate. However, I do love my sublimation and use it extensively when partying with CORs and/or BRDs but that tends to be in meripo.

Refresh is better, Sublimation is a useful thing to abuse in certain situations. In some situations I agree, it's handy to be self reliant but anything serious, take the refresh.

Sublimation is easily upset if you for any reason take damage I think that annoys me more than anything. Yes, I often have stoneskin up and wear huge amounts of -ENM etc but still sometimes you take damage. On SCH, with Sublimation gear, I never take fresh from a RDM but on WHM? As often as poss. The nice thing is having the choice - there have been times where I've just told the RDM not to bother but never at anything important. Oh and never rely on it to keep you awake, however handy it is - sod's law says it'll fill up just as it's needed...

Edited, Dec 31st 2009 12:22am by eldelphia

I don't tend to have MP issues usually, I'm quite happy with sublimination, toss the RDM to another pt and give me the bard :)

It's really no trouble. Afterall, you'll be main healing, we'll just be tossing on debuffs and buffs most likely, and in an alliance fight there'll probably be more than one of us so we may not even be doing our full range of debuffs.

Edit: I think the correct answer to which one is "both". Use sublimation, but if you need a refresh, just ask. That's what I tell my PT whm if they're /sch. "You using sub or need refresh?" "sub" "k, just ask if you want a refresh".

Edited, Jan 2nd 2010 3:50am by Noodles

It all depends on how fiercely you're using your MP at the time. If you're never going to be capping out then Refresh wins easily simply because its 1MP/tick better. If you are being given time to rest or mobs to aspir (dynamis, campaign, einherjar) then Sublimation comes into it's own.

The making you unsleepable is nice but with elshimo pachira fruit...

One refresh is not that difficult to keep up for a rdm. If your rdms are not keeping refresh up on you, then you can tell them to pay more attention or you'll start using sublimation. I'd rather give my mages more MP, but maybe other rdms don't like being optimal.

It isn't necessary but it is more efficient. While refresh and sublimation are mutually exclusive, there is a communication factor here. It has been mentioned to let sub charge and once its done tell the rdm to refresh. If the rdm is busy, use sub. If you're in a party alone, use sub. If you're not at full MP though, refresh is always more efficient. That's just fact. There is no need for a rule that you should always use one over another just because it's more convenient for you or because you don't trust your rdm. Although I guess if your communication sucks, or your rdm sucks then sublimation may be preferred.

If you are going to take that stance, then any form of refresh at all is trivial. I mean @#%^ it then. All WHM should sub WAR with no RDM and be hardcore!

Look, I think we're saying the same thing. But the bottom line is, if you are a whm and you are in my party, I am giving you refresh. If you buff sublimation, I will watch for when you activate it and I will give you refresh. It's 40 @#%^ing MP. If your MP bar is ANYWHERE between 0 and 100% MP, then you will be getting refresh, I don't give a @#%^. If you want to cancel my refresh and sublimation yourself, that's fine, But I am not letting my whm do something less efficient willingly.

Honestly, if you are spending so little MP that you don't need refresh, why are you even there whm at all? The whole argument is pointless. Refresh > Sublimation. Cap it at start, and then leave it to rdms once you actually have to, you know.... Cure.

If we're going to nitpick, refresh is 150 MP total. And once that charge is used up unless you use absolutely zero MP for the entire duration of sublimation until fully charged, you are wasting your time. It only takes a rdm a few seconds and a truly trivial amount of MP to cast refresh on you.

And if you look at my statement, I didn't use any insults at all. I am simply using profanity and stating fact. Sublimation is less efficient.


Edit: and this is beside the point. If you don't have a rdm, then sublimation is obviously superior. I was under the impression that this was discussing when you have both options available.

Edited, Feb 2nd 2010 9:25am by LordMnementh

Edited, Feb 2nd 2010 9:26am by LordMnementh

I've been able to make it through most Dynamis without a RDM supporting me. This is hasting my PT, throwing Reposes, enfeebling where appropriate, etc. It's not that I'm underachieving on WHM. It's that I'm overachieving and using Dark Arts and an Aspir set to keep my MP high.

On the other hand, there can be Xarcabards, Tavnazias, or DD heavy Cerb/Khims/Ixions where I have to heal a lot of people and then refresh is greatly appreciated.

Because that's stupid. Stop throwing a tantrum.