The Last Dance II: The Show Must Go On

I don't think we could be as I have no clue what the bug might be.

I've noticed that I'm getting the Waltz TP Conservation effect of the Contradance Job Point Category even without Contradance on.

500 TP -> Curing Waltz III leaves me with 150 TP (30% of 500)
1170 TP -> Curing Waltz V leaves me with 610 TP instead of the 370 I was expecting (800*.3 = 240. 240+370 = 610)

I just now noticed this leaving a WKR. Is this working as intended or should I file a bug report?

Hmm, I only have 2/10 but Waltz 3 is only costing 470tp rather than 500 (94% of 500)

It's been like that since release.
I never talked about it because I kinda didn't want to get attention on the thing, but it's clearly not working as intended.
So let's stop talking about it and pretend everything is fine! :P


On a side note, anybody bothered to make a tier list of alternative daggers for gimp people or crazy *** who don't want to spend a single penny on them? :D
I assume atm Nibiru x2 is the best (which paths?)
How do Odium and Rhadamantus place in the tier list? Last time I tested them they were pretty meh, but probably better than other options in the tier list (like Sabebus).

Blurred Dagger+1 maybe the best offhand? (but good luck finding one, and not cheap at all).
Otherwise aug Atoyac with OAT when you can afford the acc loss and Izhiikoh MH?

current tier list of Atoyac augs? Back during the Rudra reign WS DMG was the best, what's now? I think I have STP augment on it.


Also because I'm lazy, anybody mathed out TP body (for when you don't want DW in that slot) on Rawhide path A vs Rawhide path D vs Thaumas vs Taeon? When accuracy is not an issue.
I think I mathed it some time ago and it was something like:
1) Thaumas
2) Rawhide D = Taeon (Taeon was maybe a bit better but they were very close)
3) Rawhide A

Which is annoying because I'm doing my best to remove Thaumas from all my sets on all my jobs, but on DNC it was still ahead of the other options I listed by a fair margin.
Think I had a similar issue on PUP and MNK. Exception on MNK when Impetus is up.

Maybe if we sacrifice enough tarutaru in Ifrit's Cauldron we'll get ilvl Salvage gear.

SE said at least two times they have no intention to release ilevel Salvage gear.
Altough they might have changed their minds since then of course.

SE also said they didn't intend to increase DNC's healing ability after the introduction of Contradance to focus on DNC's role as a damage dealer. They then later said that people forget DNC is a support job.

Don't forget these are the same devs who don't play the game with any buffs when doing balance testing.

I think reality is somewhere in between.
They clearly have no clue about a lot of things, but at the same time they're not as clueless as many people think they are (which is something caused by their stupid PR-like messages, imho)

I'm not saying they couldn't have changed their mind on Salvo stuff.
It's just I don't really see it particularly likely. Imho they're focusing the little resources they have on Escha/RoV stuff, they have no time/intention to waste too much time on other forms of end content/farming, imho.

Glad to be proven wrong, would love Salvo+2 pieces.

http://www.ffxiah.com/forum/topic/45312/the-last-dance-ii-the-show-must-go-on/12#2915217

tl;dr: Nibiru C 2x, until accuracy issues kick in.

Blurred Dagger +1 is overrated. If you get one, try to sell it.


Rawhide D > Rawhide A ~ Taeon 7/7/20/20/2.

I can't reproduce your Rawhide D = Taeon claim. Also, stop using Thaumas. The lack of fSTR and Attack makes it worse for anything over... let's say level 110.

For some lulz, I just "buffed" the ***out of myself (virtually) to see when I'd actually get numbers good enough. I literally need almost capped fSTR in addition to capped ratio etc. to break even with Rawhide D. At capped ratio, it's somewhere between Rawhide A and Taeon 7/7/20/20/2. Especially the capped fSTR assumption makes for a setting where Thaumas Coat just isn't worth it anymore.

So, yeah... please don't use Thaumas. Especially when you can expect to be AoE slapped.

(On another note: What's with all the sudden Thaumas hype again today? I thought it had died out for good some time ago already...)

"muh thaumas"
"you don't understand, noob"
"muh qa muh ta muh da"

That's basically what it comes down to in every conversation I have with someone about it. Pretty much every time I see someone outside of town in Thaumas they're dead.

I literally just had this conversation with someone in my LS and it basically amounted to "some people don't understand that your theoretical damage output means nothing when you can't deal any damage because you're dead."

But people see those multiattack numbers and their brains stop working.

When I tested, granted that it was a very quick test some time ago, Rawhide D and perfect aug Taeon were pretty close to each other and one was winning over the other (slightly) in different situations.
Path A was always behind for me, but very close. Qaxxo further underneath.

Against average targets without acc issues, Thaumas was still being better than all of those options above, and it annoyed me pretty much. Wasn't a huge difference, but not a negligible one either.

I can see Thaumas falling behind on high level targets, but I wouldn't use Thaumas regardless on those (because of acc). Thaumas isn't an option when you're fighting something with dangerous AoEs either of course.
Is the threshold only ~110? I was imagining it being higher than that.



tl;dr
When I did some quick tests some time ago I was getting excited for small increases of DPSs in several slots and changing stuff accordingly in my LUA.
Then I tested Thaumas and noticed that in certain situations the DPS difference with other options was bigger than anything else I had been working until then.
So it kinda didn't make much sense to work so much in other slots for minimal increases and then leave Thaumas outside when it can give me even bigger benefits (in those situations where I can make use of it of course)

As to the "in different situations" part, I've recently been looking over DNC gear myself, and I'm having the amusing situation where perfectly augmented Taeon fails to win out over gear I already have.

We're talking differences in DPS of roughly 1 or 2 percent, in both directions, depending on what the target is, what TP set I'm comparing, what buffs, etc, etc, etc.

Rawhide, on the other hand, seems like it's a definite improvement almost across the board. Especially for Kleos. But unfortunately I do not play BST.

I spent so much gil augmenting other sets I didn't have gil left to augment Taeon, so I'm not exactely bitter about Rawhide being better :'D

Saying it because I don't really want to give the wrong impression.

So I shouldn't have said anything, huh?

Well, you're a better man than me!

BST really is not needed for T1s. Simple melee strategies or PLD + mages can easily clear early Escha NMs. Rawhide pieces are great, so don't exclude yourself from them just because you don't have BST.

Is it just DNCs lack of native attack that hurts Thaumas so much for them? I still find it to be the best by a fair margin for BLU, so that would be the only big difference between the two jobs I can see.

Yes, actually. If you hadn't mentioned there was a bug I wouldn't have even stopped to ask myself why I was coming out of waltzes with extra TP.

And don't worry, I've already started to receive some angry communications over this.

What are you fighting on BLU, though?

What it ultimately comes down to is there is a certain point where the lack of effective level from Thaumas not being ilvl119 combined with the lack of stats you get from it not having massive stat vomit will cause your accuracy and attack to drop to the point where you're not doing more damage, or that you're doing so much damage that the lack of defensive stats causes you to die so quickly and easily that you can't stay alive to do damage, or both.

I very much appreciate the existence of the spreadsheets, and they are a very useful tool, but ultimately actual practical experience is what I use to judge things, and my experience with people using Thaumas in SoA/high level content is "Oh hey this person does slightly more damage than me for about thirty seconds and then they die and I spent the rest of the fight tanking on their corpse."

The problem with glass cannons is that far too people understand why they're called glass cannons.

I've used Thaumas and BLU in basically everything. High incursion levels, Vagary, Escha, pretty much any content in the game right now. I do understand the lack of defensive quality to the body to be an issue, but the only times I've ever had it be an issue would be high Incursions against bosses with MS up. And I don't think I'll be living through 2.7k+ no matter what I do.

My main curiosity is why it's found to be such lower DPS for DNC, not even considering the defensive standpoint.

Real Talk: people doing this are ***cowards and you did the right thing.

Okay.

DNC with 0 QA/TA/DA is gonna get 2.00 attacks per attack round.
DNC with Thaumas Coat on, with no other source of multiattack is gonna get 2.35 attacks per attack round.
DNC with Saber Dance up (at minimum DA) with no other multiattack is gonna get 2.40 attacks per attack round.
DNC with Saber Dance up (at minimum DA) with Thaumas Coat is gonna get 2.73 attacks per attack round.

Now look at what you're giving up. If you're switching from Horos Casaque +1 to Thaumas Coat, you're losing 70 Defense, 59 HP, 24 Strength, 29 Dexterity, 24 Vitality, 21 Attack, 9 Accuracy, 49 Evasion, 64 Magic Evasion. Both of those bodies have 4% haste.

Now enemies have up to a 24.5% higher hit rate, you're dealing less damage per hit because you've lost a total of 33 Attack, you're hitting less because you lost 27 Accuracy between DEX stat vomit and straight accuracy, so while you're getting up to 17% more attacks per attack round you're also losing up to 13.5% hit rate, and that's before taking into account any level difference that arises because of the sudden loss of 20 levels from your body slot, which if you're going from full 119 to all 119 minus that body slot, you've just lost two effective levels, which is 4% hit rate. So now you've gained 17% more attacks, but have lost 17.5% hit rate. For things where you were well over cap on hit rate, this isn't an issue. For things where you were just at hit rate cap, you go from getting X attacks to .95X attacks. So you actually just lost attacks per round, in addition to a huge amount of offensive and defensive stats. It's even worse if you weren't hit rate capped. If you had a 50% hit rate, you've gone from X attacks to .76X attacks. The drop in accuracy is not made up for by the gain in attacks because they're multiplicative with each other. If you were already at minimum hit rate, or very close to it, you're gaining attacks, but, again, you're still losing a huge chunk of stats which control how much damage you deal.

All of that is based on what target? What stats? Assuming you NEED the accuracy or are taking hits you had a hope of avoiding? If you are worried about losing the accuracy, the extra evasion isn't doing jack for you. Thaumas belongs in a max build, and it's the best if you can cap accuracy and delay reduction with it on.

It's even worse when you look at it with Saber Dance up. The tl;dr of it is that when you are far above accuracy cap, Thaumas Coat might be beneficial, and when you're already below accuracy cap, Thaumas Coat might be beneficial. In other situations you are most likely going to be losing total attacks because of the loss in accuracy, and even if you don't come out landing fewer total attacks you have lost offensive stats which mean your few hits you do make above what you would without the Thaumas Coat are going to be hitting for less.

And then on top of this you're much squishier now.

There is a category of items which seem very attractive upon first examination because of certain stats that they have. Upon closer inspection, the 'benefit' of those stats is not outweighed by the rest of the stats on the item.

There's a suit of DRK usable armor from pre-abyssea, iirc, that has +50% Damage Taken on it. Would you go into a Delve or an AA or Vagary run wearing a +50% damage taken armor set in exchange for 17 Quadruple attack? Keep in mind that you lose all DA/TA/QA you have in those five slots. +50% damage taken in exchange for 51% more attacks (assuming no other multiattack)? Maybe you would. I wouldn't. I wouldn't go near that. I would not go near anyone who was using it, either, because when people are already getting one-hit-KO'd by TP moves, and some standard auto attacks from mobs can deal hundreds of damage and you are going to die before you are capable of dealing any damage or, possibly worse, you will stay alive but the WHM will burn through so much of their MP keeping you alive that the entire party suffers from you needing so much healing constantly.

Did you even read that? Or did you just see someone insulting your Thaumas coat?

Literally no one is saying use Thaumas in situations that attack or accuracy is of concern. The whole point is that the body is good in certain situations, capped attack/accuracy where you don't have to worry about dying. As every item it is situational.

There are very few mobs in the game that the defensive stats of Thaumas should actually cause a problem, if your healer is bad of course don't use it.

The point is there are people who riding Thaumas Coat's *** like it was the last *** in existence and refuse to admit that there are any situations in which it's a bad item. The whole point of this is that it is bad in some situations, someone asks where it's bad, I say where it's bad, and then immediatley someone rushes into the thread to completely ignore what I actually wrote which literally says things like 'up to' when describing probalities because the thought that someone is disparaging their sacred Thaumas Coat cannot be accepted.

I understand that reasoning when it comes to accuracy. Obviously if you're not hitting it doesn't matter how often you attack, I get that. I was curious about accuracy capped situations why Thaumas is so much further behind for DNC when it's a good margin ahead for BLU. That's all. It seems that the big difference really just comes down to the disparity in attack. That answers my question, thank you.

You can mention people who ride Thaumas' *** all you'd like, but you also have to agree that there is a good portion who look at it like some disease-infested vagina (since we're doing genitalia metaphors) that should never be even considered under any circumstances. I agree that there are people who give it too much credit, but it should also be noted that there are those who don't give it enough.

I'm Ivlilla's usual healer and I would much, much rather be able to spam Cure 3 on someone to keep them alive than Cure 5, especially when the DPS difference between the two situations for that individual is maybe 10% at best.

I mean, just looking at this thread I see you and Skudo arguing aggressively against Thaumas. While Oraeon, Sechs, and I saying it has a time and a place to be optimal. I see the exact opposite of what you are saying is happening in this thread basically.

I don't see anyone saying "Thaumas should always be used" but I certainly see "So, yeah... please don't use Thaumas."

That's because having capped hit rate _and_ capped ratio does not let Thaumas Coat pull ahead, when put against anything with STR on it. Due to the low DMG of daggers, increasing fSTR actually is a strong way to increase damage output and lacking 7+ fSTR makes Thaumas Coat fall behind.

If you have close to capped fSTR, more power to Thaumas. It's just that you don't realistically get close for most things. Thaumas Coat might be good for MNK and BLU, maybe even THF, but it is not that useful for DNC. That doesn't have anything to do with "arguing aggressively", in my opinion.

The time and place to be optimal is absolute, complete, utter fodder, where your other body piece does not get to add 5 or more fSTR. Or when you can't use Saber Dance, because... maybe permanent Dispels.

I'm not some Anti-Thaumas Evangelist who's arguing against Thaumas for the sake of arguing against Thaumas. I'm arguing against Thaumas because I genuinely believe it is worse more often than not, due to the reason outlined above.

As far as the lack of defence goes, that actually is a minor issue in my world. The lack of 80 DEF and 26 VIT does not make for the difference between C3 and C5 and AoE stuff really is the only reason to be hit these days. The recent enmity updates allow capable tanks to actually hold hate. I can go apeshit on Escha T3/HELM without anything ever turning my way. So while defence is something you might consider when it's a close toss, it's not much to worry about in a party situation with a good tank.

I really did not mean to bring up such a polarizing issue. I was just legitimately curious about the discrepancy in usage between BLU and DNC. The low damage of daggers and the lack of native attack boosts were my first thoughts, but I was interested to see if there were other reasons. Thank you for your explanation as to why you don't recommend it.