Why Distortion?

[modnar]

Simple, newbe question, that someone asked me... I opened my mouth to answer (like this )... and then found out that I did not know the exact answer...

Was wondering what the answer is to this question: Why is "Distortion" such a frequent sought-after renkai?

[CarbonFibre]

Because it's level 2 and so many things you fight are weak against ice for so many levels.

[guyincorporated]

Because it is easy as hell to create. As a thief, I've been able to close distortion from level 3 through 65.

If you look at a renkei chart (and you should keep one at your desk if you're new) you'll notice the biggest box is the one that closes distortion. It is FILLED with all sorts of common weaponskills.

[tnt118]

I'm not sure if it's so much that everything is *weak* to distortion... but also a large part that few things are *resistant* to it. Beacuse of that, it makes for an easy, catch-all skillchain that is moderatly effective for 95% of the game. That being said... there are many instances depending on what you are fighting and what weapons are available to use something else can be better; sometimes signficantly so. Some people think using distortion all the time is lazy playing and I'm inclined to agree.

[Icemage]

Quite a lot of what you end up XPing on is weak to Ice damage. Crabs, Flies, Pugils, Lizards, Birds, Giant Birds, Mandragora, Crawlers, Beetles are all weak to Ice, making Distortion an attractive choice, but it really depends on what melee skills you have available in your party.

In general, if your party has a THF, you're going to want to do Distortion, since THF's biggest advantage is when they activate Sneak Attack/Trick Attack/Viper Bite at level 33+.

Monks, on the other hand, are basically locked into closing Fusion, since their two best early skills, Combo, and Raging Fists, close Fusion skillchains. Incidentally, smart THFs often use hand-to-hand for Combo prior to level 33, so you'll probably see a lot of Fusion in your parties in that level range.

The other melee jobs have a preference, too. Samurai are great at closing Distortion with either Tachi: Enpi or Tachi: Jinpu, and can open Distortion using Enpi. Rangers open for either Fusion or Distortion, but cannot close either one. Ninjas can close Distortion with Blade: Retsu, or open it with Blade: Rin or Blade: Chi. Dragoons... well.. mostly useful only for opening Distortion. Dark Knight can either open or close Distortion, depending on level and choice of weaponry (Hard Slash is a nice Great Sword Distortion opener, while Slice and Vorpal Scythe are good closers)

Making an effort to understand how the skillchains work has a dramatic impact on how effective your party turns out to be. In general, the JP players I run into are much more aware of this than NAs.

There's a reason why {In what order shall we do our weapon skills?} is in the auto-translator, and this is it.


Icemage

[Gman]

Originally posted by Icemage
. Dark Knight can either open or close Distortion, depending on level and choice of weaponry (Hard Slash is a nice Great Sword Distortion opener, while Slice and Vorpal Scythe are good closers)

Icemage

Hard Slash closes Distortion since it has Earth property. Power Slash is the one that opens it (light). I think Vorpal Scythe can open or close, same as Tachi: Enpi.

Worst part about a Scythe weilding DRK pre-Vorpal Scythe is that their weaponskills arent too hot. Slice can close distortion but it doesnt do much damage, so the renkei is kinda weak. Gotta rely heavily on MB for the extra damage.

As for the OP about Distortion, if you think about what you mostly fight (crabs, beetles, crawlers) they are all extremely weak to ice, so Distortion is easy and effective. Against something like bats in Garlaige, I'd much prefer Fragmentation or Detonation if the party can do it though. It's not written in stone that you use Distortion, its just the most popular.

[WishMaster3K]

Good correction. Either way, Distortion is so famomus because not only is the whole Mob-Less-Resistance-To-Ice thing, but because SATA-Viper Bite is so damn STRONG. The move alone does 400, 250+ on MB and a BLM (or RDM past 55) can Burst Blizzard II.

Chain 5 in the tunnel next to Valk real simple. Samurai voked, THF got behind PLD, Tachi: enpi to SATA-VB and with my MB of Blizzard, the mob was at 1/8 health in a few seconds. We did this every other fight and the chains were very easy.

Maybe the fact that we exp on certain types of mobs is because of how effective a THF can be at damage dealing and the fact that the japanese and importers who got this game when it first came out figured out much of the game's mechanics. Hence, they used THFs to hold hate cause they didnt know how good PLD was and all we had back then were WARs, and they found that SATA-VB was insanely powerful.

"Why Distortion?"

Because we're simply following a solid tradition.

Kaze-dono

[LadyPeorth]

I myself like Fragmentation. But yes...mostly every monster in the game is either weak to Ice or to Water. Distortion is also one of the easier ones to make:

Fusion (Fire elment is the problem)
Fragmentation (Ice element)
Gravitation (Wind and Dark)

Most of the time, those combinations also cause people to use their less powerful weapon skills. However...there are a few decent other ones.

Guillotine -> Raging Rush/Sidewinder = Fragmentation (lvl 60+)
Spinning Axe -> Raging Fists = Fusion (lvl 49+)
Tachi:Jinpu -> Penta Thrust = Gravitation (lvl 49+)

But most of the time you'll fall back onto distortion. Just tough it out till later when fighting Bones. Then everyone will want Fragmentation or Fusion so you can ascend into the Light.

[Silkiv]

I believe Fragmentation is Thunder/Wind and Gravitation is Earth/Darkness actually. Fusion, Fire/Light is excellent on undead of course.

Wish more than coeurls were weak to earth, feeling like gravitation is only used for drain mb. Not that it's bad or anything.

edit: Hehe sorry, thanks for letting me know what you meant. :sweat:

[LadyPeorth]

Originally posted by Silkiv
I believe Fragmentation is Thunder/Wind and Gravitation is Earth/Darkness actually. Fusion, Fire/Light is excellent on undead of course.

I was listing the elemental parts of it that had difficult to find members. Like Ice to Water = Fragmentation, Wind to Dark = Gravitation, Fire to Thunder = Fusion, and Light to Earth = Distortion.

[SelfdestButton]

Going off elemental weaknesses is misleading. Crabs are weak to ice but they resist distortion like mad. Confusing since it's the renkei of choice for crabs, but probably for an unrelated reason: SATA Viper Bite is the only WS besides perhaps Slug/Sidewinder that can do a consistent high number to IT crabs.
Similarly, bats are strong to dark but gravitation closed by penta thrust is brutal against them. In fact it's one of the only instances where closing with penta thrust isn't a joke. That's not just because bats are piercing weak, Gravitation just doesnt get resisted much, and Stone III is a good enough MB for them.
Fragmentation and Fusion I have seen performed effectively as well, but not as often as distortion for a very obvious reason: VB is consistent and totally unsituational. It can be done effectively on anything, whereas penta thrust has to be done on something piercing weak, Raging Fists isn't be consistent on most things, and Sturmwind starts being shitty in the mid fifties (where you get Rampage anyways)... leaving you with RNG fragmentation which is nice, but volatile. Not as if you can TA a 700 damage Slug Shot.
Basically it's the nature of Thieves which makes distortion so great. Without a thf, there's usually no reason to do distortion, unless you've got people who mistake the greatness of distortion for the greatness of VB.

[Silkiv]

This is good to know though, as a mage I would just often just look for a good mb without considering the weapon skills themselves.

Would it be better to do fragmentation (Ice -> Water) on crawlers since distortion ends with earth? (Light -> Earth)

I'm using Aden's Renkei Chart v3, trying to figure out better formulas.

[Icemage]

Skillchain bonus damage is related to both the elements used, the elements the monster is weak to, and the base damage dealt by the closing weapon skill. Just as elemental offensive magic gets 0,1/2,1/4, etc resist, skillchain bonus damage often behaves in a similar way, based on the resulting resistance of the monster to the applied elements.

The reason why SATAVB distortion is so strong isn't because Distortion itself is all that good against crabs (it's ok, since they're weak to ice), but really because SATAVB does such huge base damage. If you closed that same Distortion with Wasp Sting, you'd still get horrible results because Wasp Sting does such low amounts of damage.

For instance, MNK and THF usually are like oil and water until level 60, but if you have a Bard who is using Earth Threnody, Backhand Blow to SATAVB quite often produces a very strong Scission, and is preferable to any other skillchain you could do with that combination until level 60 when Howling Fist > SATAVB reigns supreme for that combination.


Icemage

[LadyPeorth]

The main reason crabs resist the Distortion effect is because they are Water based. It's like casting Aero on Garuda...it's not gonna do much damage. However...it is usually not the Effect that does the damage, but rather the magic burst and the ender of the SC.

Strangely, using Fragmentation against Crawlers is like using Distortion against crabs (Crawlers are earth based, so they resist the thunder part, but are weak to the air part).

Actual damage done by the Effect of a Renkei is based on:
1) How many renkei are done before it
2) Monster resists it or not
3) Ending Skill damage

A two person skill chain will commonly do half the damage of the ending WS's damage. I'm not quite sure, but I believe a three person chain gives up to 100% damage on a level 2 renkei, and up to 150% damage on a level 3 renkei. I haven't been able to test that as of yet, so it's just theory.

Again...it's just theory for the 3 person skill chain, but I'm quite certain for the 2 person Skill chain.

[Icemage]

Actually, Crawlers are weak to ice and lightning. Fragmentation works fine on them.

As far as I can tell, if the monster is at least weak to one element in the skillchain, it can take as much damage as 1/2 of the damage done by the closing WS. If 2 or more more elements are weaknesses for that element, it can do full damage. I've seen Light skillchains on skeletons in King Ranperres Tomb do as much add damage as the Spinning Slash that triggered it.


Icemage