Delay and TPFollow

Or you could just use a theoretical 21 hit build? Thief tp building is highly erratic and I almost never weaponskill right at 100%. Often I weaponskill at 110-125% just because triple attack and server lag happen which delay my recation (ever see a flurry of 8-12 swings in a row that raises tp by 30-50 in a split second... thats usually server lag), or because I'm casting utsusemi or getting hit and I get tp from taking damage, or because I'm thf/war and double attack, or because I need to wait for a cure, or because trick attack is 5-10 seconds away and I really want to throw the weaponskill onto my tank (I sometimes weaponskill at 170-180% or higher in this case because the fight calls for someone else holding hate and TA WSing the tank matters), or because I want to sneak attack a weaponskill and need to move a bit for positioning, or because... you get the idea.

Long story short, if you choose to NOT use the thief boomy just because of sTP tiers then you should reevaluate your tp priorities. Oh and btw, dual wield +5 makes you swing more often. You're going to be getting more tp per hour with it on, not less. More swings == more tp + more damage == good. We love our thief boomy; it's the best ranged accessory we can use. I would however choose to NOT use the rang if I think I can spam bolts (which admittedly is almost always nowadays).

Edited, Oct 5th 2010 1:06am by Melphina

I have acutally been giving this a lot of thought lately. I've always had a pretty solid RACC build and this update has only given us better options. Although I also have full marksmanship merits.

I have not had a situation yet in abyssea where I couldn't consistantly land acid/bloody bolts (eating pizza/meat) outside of mobs that are wind/dark resistant.

We're talking everything from leveled up exp mobs to NM's like Briarues. I wonder if maybe most of us just wrote them off because merit mobs were all wind resistant for eternity. As my RACC build gets more powerful, I find myself not wanting to take off my Ziska's for Bomlet/Core and have been seriously questioning other ranged options' worth.

Edited, Oct 4th 2010 4:32pm by ThiefKiller

Well I think we can all agree that bolt spamming is awesome!.

Acids have come back strong since abyssea. The main reason to not use is some exp in abyssea i guess, where mobs die to fast for it to matter. However, on thf i tend to only do the exp for the beginning light gathering, then go off and kill stuff while the main group gets more time/gold boxes.

Everyone seems to be assuming its 5% DW, i dont remember any boomerang tests, but would love to see them if they exist. As much as I like new gear, its becoming frustrating in the ranged/ammo areas. We are getting better options, but mutually exclusive ones. Crit ammo/bomb core-ish things, DW, or xbow. Wy couldnt they at least make the boomerang a stinking ammo piece. I really dont mind buying darts to have the option to swap around any ammo options -_-

I actually had a similar conundrum with my new AF+1 4% haste pants vs TP-ing in skadi, and the points melph has made are basically the same ones I used to make my decision to go for 2% more haste, -1/2acc, -5atk, 7stp. I too am finding myself holding TP to sata often for a number of reasons: crit boost trait making stacked WS more attractive, More Evis usage=holding a little more to land darkness, NOT killing with WS for junky ruby light is a BIG one, and the more "normal" stuff weve had for years like planting hate etc.

Cant wait to finish Daka+1 (still going painfully slow ><) which will be another BIG reason I will be holding TP by the sounds of it.

Edited, Oct 5th 2010 10:19am by Banalaty

@Mirax: before I forget you should really try the Rapidus Sax for your off-hand sometime. I have both daggers and the Sax feels a lot faster for tp (eyeballing).

I would also keep Raider's boomerang (if it actually is 5% dual-wield) and mirke (DW/acc) for that matter. The only evasive monster I have seen so far in abyssea was just one NM called: flame skimmer. I don't feel the need for Taranis's harness at this point. I would not worry about Stp too much either.

And for all who are going after Raider's boomerang: The pop condition for Kutharei is to kill Ironclad Severer first. It has been confirmed by Kirschy from BG. And Kirschy is known for his solid information.

The level cap increase has given us a fresh start and we're all more or less on even grounds if we pick a job to play. Almost everything from lvls 1-75 is easily replaced by a comparable or better item now and I have no doubt this will continue when the body/hand af3 comes out at level 90. My tp set is entirely rare/ex but it's one of the best you could ask for and most of my other swaps follow suit so when I sold my gear I didn't lose anything in performance except a few points of dex and agi on solo sa/ta and my sa set has been compensated for by adding haste. I'll have better choices soon when I finish my af feet anyway. I only use 5 or 6 pieces of sellable gear so I used the money to play other jobs. Of course the other jobs will be mostly rare/ex in time as well (totM staves for mage, goetia for blm, callers for smn, etc. The only accessory I don't have yet is the goetia chain so I use lemington medallion for now and I have several seals for each AF 3 on both jobs as well) and aside from a few low cost auction items which drop from the new nms or dirt cheap old items like errant and dark staves for hMP I won't have to bend over backwards to gear them well once they reach lvl 85. I've taken the stance that in the coming year I will just play FFXI to experience what s-e throws at us and I'll worry about end game when level 99 rolls around. For now we've been given a fun little playground where we can advance ourselves rapidly both in levels/merits as well as GOOD gear selections so I'm taking advantage of it and diversifying myself. That's not to say I don't still play to excel because It's quite the opposite (I always put my heart into the game). But I'm being faced with entertaining time sinks instead of frustrating ones this time around so I don't mind it too much. As far as thief related accomplishments my latest acquisitions would be

--Kila +1
--Raider's Culottes +1 finished
--3/8 feet seals and 1/8 head seals with a small group from my /flist set to take the worm and slug apart in the coming weeks. I'll low man --the feet boxes in abyssea with friends because farming af3 through pickup exp ally is a terrible idea and I just won't do it that way.
--lotsa misc stuff like arctier's torque and a rare/ex jupiter's ring and etc etc etc as well as belenos' and cavaros's mantles
--both abyssites of celerity (heck yeah to 12 hour traverser stone recast)

I also spawned my first Amhuluk today and we got a rapidus sax and a coin of balance. I chose to lot the coin and threw the dagger up for points because in the long run the sax will be easy to get whereas coins will not. There are 5 jobs which need 6 coins each for their AF3 +2 plus 5 more that need the jewels of balance and of those 10 jobs only one or two would make use of the sax (plus sax drops almost every time) whereas I saw ONE coin and no jewels on my kill. The bottleneck is definitely on the coins so I'll prioritize them over sax in a group event until I get sax just because everybody else already has one and it's free lot. That should take me... oh a week or two tops at the rate my shell is farming abyss mis since we haven't touched the other zones as a shell and farmed mis for 7 days straight . I guess we're knocking each zone out one at a time until people get legs +1 so sax won't be hard at all for me to get. So with that said... 1/6 on rogue's cullotes +2.

That aside, I'm enjoying the new content. Abyssea is just that awesome.

Edited, Oct 7th 2010 12:20am by Melphina