Trying this again.Follow

Because my other topic was sub-defaulted. Reason I ran from that topic because after the first rate down, I felt I was only going to be met with unreasonable hostility from posters. Its not a "pity-party" or a "feel bad for me" topic. I was merely expressing how that crap was making me feel. Keep your shirts on, I've done a lot of testing and a lot of research(a lot of reading) since then.

Anyway replying to posts from that topic:

I don't do HNMs. Never camped one. I was 100% dynamis but RDM only. I would be happy if I got over 1100. I've read about the 320/120 rule yesterday. With my current gear the very best I can get is 296 skill/126 int. The 296 being gained from merits.

I have 1 merit in elemental. I'm kicking myself for dumping so many into RDM. I wish I could take them off and then put them into elemental but you can't do that. So back to the uphill climb.

I got the slops. I accept that getting full damage on campaign mobs is pointless, I've seen BLMs with top gear get stupid resists on those mobs, so not going by that anymore. But going out and testing on regular exp mobs, and Thunder IV(dont have HQ though) = 1074, Blizzard IV = 1079.

Taking off the AF hat and putting on elite baret = these numbers decrease. I suppose what Im looking at is the numbers I can do when unresisted...so I should be going for more int in those cases.

I saw the gloves, I thought that was an assault item, but its bought from the AH too, so I'm gonna start saving to get those.


CoP related items are out of the question because Im stuck on the promies. Only excuse I have is too many bad parties. Most of which you have listed though can be bought and/or BC'd(and salvage?) so I should be able to get help with that.

Hmm, it seems SCH needs to have a lot or all of the top gear to match BLM. Im not really trying to match them though, I just don't like having all these resists. I try to avoid doing much of endgame because its time taxing, but I like SCH so much, that I just might make one last run for it.

Hopefully my next topic on this is of good results.

I don't blame ya there, however you'll jus have to get used to it. This site is plagued with thousands of elitist know it alls that think their word is god, and if you oppose it, well sh*t on you.



Actually you can do that. You have the option to "lower" any merit you put in. Sure it sux cuz you put the effort and time into getting them but.... if you want to better yourself in other areas, its pretty much what you'll have to do.




errant/mahatma slops > druids even in terms of resists.




Indeed it is quite pointless, so I'm glad you made that change. If you really wanna give your sch nuke sets some challenge and testing, go to sky and play with some Aura statues. You just might score a diorite (yay for gil!!) and you'll also know where you stand vs semi-resistant mobs. If you can get your nukes to land consistantly on those guy, im purtty sure you'll be quite alright with anything not HNM.



Actually I don't believe you're thinkin down the right track here. What you should really be looking for is a balance of both unresisted nukes + as much dmg as you can get into those unresisted nukes. Yes taking of gear with INT or MAB will reduce your numbers if swapped for ele skill, but your current problem of resists will also diminish, thus doing more damage in the long run.

Let's say that you got resisted 2 out of every 5 nukes (seems about right according to what im gettin from ya). and lets say since you were going for that max dmg you were talkin about, that the times you don't get resisted, you hit for 1100 dmg. yet when you get resisted, its like 250. so 1100, 250, 1100, 1100, 250, 1100. a total of 3,800 dmg.
Now if you dropped out some dmg, but stuck in a sh*t ton of ele skill and INT supporting gear, you're nukes would drop down to say something like 950 dmg only. So you're Q,Q about it cuz not over 1k anymore, etc. however, if you get no resists, 950 x5 is 4,750 dmg. And I think we can both see which number is REALLY the biggest.


Now better yet, lets say you found a happy medium, and you knew exactly how much ele skill gear it would take to cut out the resists, without being too much that its taking too much from your dmg, and could achieve say... 1020 dmg per nuke. Now you're toppin off at a /gleefully 6k dmg total.


My advice is to start researching all the available nuking gear (this includes INT, MAB, and ele skill), compare and contrast them, and write down a list of them to start crossin off. I'll try to do what i can while considering the things you said you couldn't get so that its semi-realistic for you to achieve:


Staves: NQ/HQ (this is a great start, get those HQ's!!)

strap/ammo: Wise Strap/bugard strap +1, phantom Tathlum, (theres more ammo that i see ppl with but i forget names, I jus use tathlum)

head: AF hat (dmg), Elite Beret (+1) (skill), Argute (though i realize this may be tough for you)

body: AF (skill), Errant/Mahatma (Dmg), Yigit (dmg) Royal Redingote (lil of both dmg and skill if you put mab and MACC on it), Morgana's Cotehardie (I don't recommend this for you though, given your situation, but once you have the skill/int to support it, it can perform better than i imagined.)

back: Rainbow/prism (dmg), Merciful (skill) (once you have sea access)

Neck: Elemental Torque (skill), Enlightened Chain (dmg), Uggy (procable dmg)

hands: errant (dmg) > yigit (dmg) > Goliard (dmg/skill), Mufflers (dmg), genie (skill), Master Caster Bracelets (skill) (windy conquest points)

Waist: here you're pretty limited, but you have Penitent's rope, and Argute

Ear: Elemental Earring (skill)(pretty expensive i know, but i dunno how fast/slow you make gil), Morion (+1) (dmg), Phantom (+1)(dmg), Moldy (dmg)

Ring: (all dmg) Diamond/omniscient, Snow

legs: Errant/Mahatma (dmg) that's really you're best choice

Feet: Highly recommend Yigit Crackows (dmg), Goliard (dmg/skill), Rostrum Pumps (dmg), Numerist Pumps (Skill) (absurdly easy to get from Tier 1 ZNM Lil Apkullu)
(though it requires a good bit of help from good players, and nearly a full alliance depending on skill levels)

* There may be things i left out, so feel free to fill in the blanks with anything you find during you're own research.

Then there's always you're good 'ol Cream Puffs. Don't forget your weather + klimaform also that you can use regularly, as well as Focalization should you choose to merit it. Also try to keep in mind that with all this gear, INT plays a big role in resist rates as well and can sometimes be just as helpful/potent as pure eleskill/MACC, depending on the INT to INT check of your opponent. So technically, all those INT pieces that I put (dmg) by are good potential candidates to help lower resists as well. Just weigh them out in comparison to your pur skill pieces to see what you favor.


In final noting, I hope this helped pave the way to a brighter future of unresisted nukes and satisfaction. Feel free to hit me up if you have any questions or would like to discuss other scenarios or options. ^,^

It should be noted that INT also provides magic accuracy in addition to raising damage. I could see swapping out a small amount of INT for large amounts of magic acc/elemental skill. But AF to Elite Beret isn't one of those cases.

296 skill with 126 INT really isn't terrible. I wonder what kind of resist rates the OP is actually seeing. I'm guessing he's not parsing (Kparser works well for calculating resist rates). Eyeballing resists isn't a good way to judge the situation. Resists are naturally going to draw your attention more, even if they're only happening once every 20 nukes.

This honestly wasn't his problem in the previous thread. His attitude really came off as having a pity-party. This time around, he has a much better attitude more worthy of receiving advice.

OP, I myself am close to reaching the pinnacle of SCH's INT. I'm doing this as an experiment on a few things. One thing I will say is, you do not need any elemental skill boosts to reach acceptable macc rates for anything EXP.

The others covered how re-arranging merits work so I'll skip past that. HQ your thunder, ice, and dark staves. Trust me... Wind is a good one to do as well but less needed. For EXP nuking, MAB will offer a lot in the damage dept. My 157 INT build is obviously a little lacking on MAB gear. For statues I land around 1300. For puddings, I land 1500ish.

Resists generally come into play for HNMs. This is where the 320/120 rule comes into play. Keep in mind that this is a minimum and not a magic number. This is generally the same as 80% acc rule for a melee job. Also keep in mind, while your INT is less than (Mob's INT + 10), 1 INT == 1 macc =~= 1 ele skill. For most HNMs that should be up until the 150 INT range.

I can give more info, but my pizza is here and typing on a blackberry takes a while.

Klimaform is indeed wonderful and let's you build for more damage. HOWEVER, unless you are partied with another SCH, the majority of the time you won't have klimaform up. In its downtime, you need to still hit acceptable rates.

Most LSs don't realize the benefit of 2 SCHs in the BLM PT. They think 1 can do the same as 2.

What are your RDM magic merits in if not enfeebling/elemental?

If they are anything else, I'd change them.

Glad you realized Campaign mobs have the typical SE "BLMs are not welcome here" Magic Defense Bonus

Didn't know eyeballing could get anyone such a good estimate for Klimaform's effect.



Many HNMs have nowhere near 145 INT. "Land kings" have around 85 INT (Aspid, King Behemoth), while CoP wyrms have around 120 INT (including Tiamat). Even AV is estimated to have less than 100 INT. As for ToAU HNMs, I doubt they have INT exceeding 120 INT. The only generally accepted case of a NM with extreme INT is Kirin (149 INT, no magic defense bonus). If you assume Suzaku and Genbu have +12 MDB, then their INT values are 132 and 140, respectively.

That is not to imply that amassing large amounts of INT is a bad thing unless it crowds out better improvements to magic accuracy and damage. With 170 INT, you almost definitely are.

From all the number crunching and in game testing I've done for the gear SCH has access to, its always INT > MAB except for a Novio Earring. If I remember right its something like 3-4MAB to beat out 1 INT.

Maybe it's due to my build, but I came up with 2 MAB to beat out 1 INT.

While eyeballing anything is never a good idea when creating justification for a fact, there is a supreme difference between a SCH who sees other SCHs claim on a forum that they nuke for 1700 and through "eyeballing" concludes that his damage on campaign mobs sucks, and a SCH who has played BLM for years, has an inherent empyrical knowledge base to build on, and understands the mechanics inside and out "eyeballing" to see resistance levels while under the effect of Klimaform or not. The average FFXI player doesn't get the difference.

And "eyeballing" from "experts" has allowed misleading claims (some easily refuted with KParser) to persist for years like

• "1-hit WS need accuracy in general" (First hit of a WS receives a large accuracy bonus in general)
• "INT has no effect on Drain and Aspir" (Accuracy is different from potency)
• "Elemental resist sets for wyrms should be all-or-nothing. I get mad damage under 300 fire resist but hardly any above 300 fire resist!" (This concept of "tiers" is a joke pending something more substantive than ancedotes.)
• Anything about "tiers" in general (320/120, 120 CHR soft cap, whatever)

No statistics needed to notice Klimaform provides a easily detected accuracy bonus (given the point of Klimaform, you'd be looking for one) but I'm not going to go around and say it's "around" 50 macc.

Yeah, for Helix spells. For Tier IVs, the ratio is the reverse: 1 MAB beats out ~2.5 INT.

I used this magic damage calculator. The results are consistent with the magic damage formula on wiki. Helix spells have base damage of 46. 1/46 = 2.17%. As your INT goes up, 1 INT would increase D by less than that (assuming you have more INT than the target).

In my current helix build, I have 126 INT and +5 MAB (from Moldavite). And I was making my calculations based on /RDM (which would chip in +20 MAB), with targets being Ebony Puddings. I was trying to decide whether to switch my Moldavite to Morion, or perhaps buy a Morion +1. The calculator indicated Moldavite was better than even Morion +1 in that situation.

Perhaps you came up with needing twice as much MAB to outperform 1 INT because of the target you were basing your calculations on. If I had set the target's INT to something higher (like an HNM, for example), 1 INT would likely be a higher percentage of the D value.

That site actually calculates Helix damage lower than it really is.
For my build and merits it gives me:
With 123 INT(edit: using Morrion+1), 89 TargetINT, /RDM, +2MAB(Merit), NQ Staff, Day + Weather, Flan, Ebullience = 138
With 121 INT, 89 Target INT, /RDM, +7MAB(Merit/Moldy), NQ Staff, Day + Weather, Flan, Ebullience = 138

Last night I was getting 141-145 Ionhelix (Lightning Day + Thunderstorm), so its a bit off but not by much.

Using this forumla: [(yourINT-targetINT)+25]*Staff*Day/Weather*(yourMAB/targetMDB)*Damage Adjustment*Ebullience
My Build w/ Moldy: [(121 - 89) + 25] * 1.1 * 1.2 * 1.27 * 1.25 * 1.2 = 143
My Build w/ Morr.+1: [(123 - 89) + 25] * 1.1 * 1.2 * 1.22 * 1.25 * 1.2 = 142.5

Edited, Jun 17th 2009 4:48pm by Zagen

Edited, Sep 3rd 2009 4:22pm by Zagen

Has to be lower since I use 25 as the base in my calculations and they are within 1-3 damage from what I do in game. I'm not sure how the number 46 was derived honestly since it makes the damage a lot higher than it actually is.

Enfeebling and Convert. I'm not done with enfeebling, but the some that I have on it, I wish I put into elemental first lol. I'm one of those 7:20 convert RDMs LOL.

Naobix - that's been very helpful!

I've been doing dynamis since this past sunday. Other than the 58dmg Thunder IV on an NM, I've been doing 700 IV's on regular dynamis mobs which is sorta..relieving lol. This is my first step towards bettering myself! I hope for some AF relics. I might pass out if I get the body and hat. This dyna shell just started, so I don't have a long line, and I'm the only SCH that comes to dynamis. They even consider me as a nuker more so than anything else. Which I don't mind.

and I'm a fail SCH since I don't have obis. ;o

On a good note, my helices don't resist much at all :).

While that may or may not be true, most people can say they've encountered more problems with WSs like Wheeling Thrust or most SAM WSs getting a whiff when you really needed it to land than with almost any other WS. I know I have, and I know most SAMs have and hate this problem too, which is why /THF is so prevalent for them especially if they are part of a skillchain.

Edited, Jun 18th 2009 2:59pm by Fynlar

Regarding the WS accuracy comment, that was a bad attempt at making a concise statement of the prevailing wisdom before people finally accepted that first hits of a WS receive a large accuracy bonus.

So it's almost February 2008, and someone asks an innocuous question about whether a single hit from a WS has more accuracy than a normal melee attack. The wrong modes of thought presented were

(1) Weapon skills were generally not any more or less accurate than a normal melee attack, barring TP modifiers. So weapon skills would require accuracy to the extent that your auto-attack would also require accuracy to achieve a desirable hit rate.

(2) Y/G/K actually was thought to incur accuracy penalties such that they made misses allegedly "too common" relative to normal melee attacks. So weapon skills would require accuracy to overcome these alleged penalties. (Maybe the existence of Hachiman armor influenced this thinking.)

I don't know how pervasive these wrong modes of thought really are. In any case, it took until early 2008 for people, after being presented with repeated, statistically significant evidence of an accuracy bonus on Y/G/K and for the first hit of Fast Blade, to accept as "conventional wisdom" that generally the first hit of a melee WS receives a large accuracy bonus. As such, there is no particular need to gear for 1-hit WS accuracy to gear for garden-variety things (unless for some reason you care about double attacks on WS or Chigre).

Even with tools like parsers it took until 2008 to figure this out, which kinda goes to show how unproductive claims based on "eyeballing" are even for things that are incredibly easy to check.

Edit: I realized I should probably make some comments pertinent to the thread.

Regarding the effect of Klimaform, anyone would be hard-pressed to believe that an 8-point difference in overall magic accuracy between 330/120 and 306/130 (+6 macc) manifests in profoundly more resists unless your sample size is sufficient, which you did not report. (I stated earlier that I estimated Suzaku's INT to be 132 based on back calculation and assumption of 12 MDB.)

What is a known estimate of "resist rate" on Suzaku for a 330/120 build anyway, taking into account that levels of resist follow a multinomial distribution (four levels)? Are you sure tier 1/tier 2 spells aren't more (or less) accurate than higher-tier spells? Why even cast ice spells on Suzaku anyway? 10 elemental skill from an ice staff isn't going to overcome Suzaku's lack of susceptibility to anything other than water (as a practical matter of going out and dealing damage "efficiently" as a mage).

Sure, these questions and comments may be obnoxious, but stated or implicit assumptions and conditions should also be considered before making numerical estimates about the effect of Klimaform that theoretically can be verified under less onerous conditions.

Edited, Jun 18th 2009 5:48pm by Glamrawkus

That site counts ebullience as MAB, which it isn't.

I found that out the hard way trying to nuke worms in Eron for 1337 DMG.... none of it came out right with ebullience.

Edited, Jul 13th 2009 10:00am by AlexKrycek

Not what I said.

The point was that it's a characteristic of 1-hit WSs. They get noticeably more outright whiffs, naturally. The point that it happens when you really don't want it to happen is just a side note, like when you're trying to skillchain. Kinda looks bad to be one of the jobs that's most prone to whiffing a SC due to 1-hitter WS when your job is supposed to be the master of skillchains, isn't it?

Anyone who's worked on a WS point latent using a 1-hitter WS can most likely claim that he missed out on several points/chains due to whiffs.

Point is whether or not you get an accuracy boost on the first hit, you're still dealing with an accuracy ceiling.

Your leader is just uninformed. So where mine.

It took a lot of time for my leaders to realize just how important was to have at least 1 SCH around for Dynamis/Einherjar. I had to go in there and "Show off" my abilities.

Graviga is the real Tide-turner tho. It takes a few casts of this for all the mages in your LS to love you. Except the RDM's; they tend to get jealous :3