Weapons and Jobs

[Lucky and Elizabeth]

From what i heard so far.

A Great Axe is best for a Warrior.

Dagger is Best for Thief

Sword and Shield is best for Paladin.

Hand to Hand is best for Monk.

Are these are right? And what are the other best weapons for each Job.

Also should a Black Mage or White Mage even have a weapon later on since I don't think they use it? But I might be wrong.

[Murphie]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

Best weapon is generally determined by what skill level a particular job has in that weapon or skill. For instance, WHM's highest rated skill is Healing. RDM is Enfeebling. So those are really their "best" skills. Melee jobs obviously generally have highest skills in a weapon of some kind.

So yeah, WAR is Axe and GAXE, PLD is Sword, THF is Dagger, MNK is H2H and so on.

Here's a good point of reference for that sort of thing.

[Taskmage]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

Everything is situational. In general what you listed is right in that those jobs have the highest skill in those weapons. But for example, dagger doesn't get any good weaponskills until level 32, so up to that point a thf is better off using a sword or hand to hand most of the time even though their skill level isn't as high with those weapons.

Purely by skill, the best weapon for each job is:
WAR — Great Axe
MNK — Hand to Hand
THF — Dagger
RDM — Dagger/Sword (equal)
WHM — Club
BLM — Staff
PLD — Sword
DRK — Scythe
RNG — Bow/Gun (equal) or for melee Axe/Dagger (equal)
BRD — Dagger
BST — Axe
SAM — Great Katana
DRG — Polearm
NIN — Katana
SMN — Staff
BLU — Sword
PUP — Hand to Hand
COR — Uhh don't know about that one

Black mages and white mages shouldn't be hitting things in an experience party, so for that they should choose a weapon like a wand with large bonuses to int and mnd, and after level 51 use the appropriate elemental staff for whichever spell they're casting. In a soloing situation, whms deal the most damage with hammers and blms hit best with staves, but both can use either club or staff depending on which WS you want to use.

[Ellipses]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

The job's rating in a given weapon is only part of the picture, though. For example, with THF, Dagger is in fact their highest-rated weapon. But daggers do very low damage per swing. At lower levels, when you don't have good Dagger weaponskills or Sneak Attack/Trick Attack to pull big spike damage, a sword or some good knuckles (with MNK subjob) would probably be better for a THF.

Weaponskills and Skillchains are a factor, too. Dark Knights, for example, should have both Scythe and Greatsword skilled up (along with possible others), and the decision for which one to use in any given party will likely be based on Weaponskills and/or Skillchains.

For mages, up to level 51, usually wands (under the Club category) are the weapon of choice. (Red Mages and Blue Mages can use swords effectively, so sword vs. club will depend on the mage and the party.) Even though WHM and BLM generally aren't meleeing, wands give good stat boosts, such as +INT, +MND, and/or -Spell Interruption Rate. At level 51, elemental staves become available, which give impressive boosts to their respective element, as well as other benefits (Cure spell potency up, resting MP up, physical damage taken down, etc.).

[Tyros]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

The link posted above is excellent as it shows which jobs are good with which weapons.

As for your comment about mages and not equipping weapons, They absolutely should use weapons at all levels. From a mage standpoint, you won't be looking at getting a weapon for it's damage, but for it's stat modifiers.

Early on, mage weapons increase MND, INT, HP, and MP. At 51, most mages will get their "Final" weapons of the game (As far as partying goes at least). Elemental Staves all have hidden effects that they increase the potentcy of that element by 10%. For Example, a Fire Staff makes your fire based spells 10% better. A light staff makes your cures better. And a Dark Staff makes you recover MP faster when healing.

[Drive]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

Actually you should also say that Paladin has the highest in Club(A-) while white mage has a B+. Same with Staff as well, i forgot to add.

edit: nevermind you said "best weapon for each job"

[Dryhus]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

Since 1 level of skill is equal to 1 Atk and 1 Acc, it's usually the convention to use the weapon in which you have the highest skill. WARs can use swords, but because they have lower skill in Sword than Axe or Great Axe, they suffer an Accuracy and Attack penalty when they use them. Sometimes a lower skill weapon will have benefits that outweigh the drawbacks (A WAR/NIN offhanding a sword with Attack +10, which will apply to the offhand sword AND the mainhand axe).

As an additional exception, DRKs have an A+ in Scythe but often use Great Swords because the damage/delay ratio is better (allegedly...haven't checked myself) and the WSs are more damaging.

[Murphie]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

Plus, for a long time, DRK can't SC Distortion with Scythe. I recall that being an issue with DRKs we would invite to my static once upon a time. They almost never had both leveled.

[Lucky and Elizabeth]

Weapons and Jobs

Thanks. This was very helpful.

[Lucky and Elizabeth]

Bee Stinger

Someone told me to get a Bee Stinger for my Thief.

Should I listen and get it?

[Ellipses]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

What level is your thief?

In my opinion, thieves are better off using swords or hand-to-hand weapons until they have SATA (level 15 for SA, 25 for TA) and the Viper Bite weaponskill (level 32? 33?). The damage-over-time for daggers is horrible compared to swords and hand-to-hand weapons, and the pre-viper-bite weaponskills don't make up for it. (SATA+Viper Bite does make up for it). Combo is one of the strongest weaponskills early on, and the sword weaponskills are generally more useful for trying to set up a skillchain. At lower levels, weapon ratings don't make as much of a difference, and THF is rate high enough in both swords and H2H to make them viable (H2H, especially with MNK as subjob).

Double Post Edited:
That being said, Beestinger is a good dagger for a few levels. But it gets replaced pretty quickly (Dagger at level 12 is better, IMO). To me it wouldn't be worth the money, but if you can afford it, there's no harm. You can always just sell it again.

[Murphie]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

People constantly treat me like I'm retarded for using H2H on my THF. It makes me crazy. I'm like "Well, when I'm doing more damage than anyone else save maybe the BLM, you'll change your tune!"

And they are all "Lets get a DRK instead."

I wish people realized that the "best" weapon is fluid, and not always the one that you have the highest rating in 100% of the time.

[Taskmage]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

Yup. People need to learn the meaning of the word situational. Some weapons and subjobs that might be seriously gimp for most a job's career are hands-down superior in certain level ranges.

I used thf/mnk until Flame Sword. Nobody ever called me gimp, but if they had I'd have pointed out that a taru thf kept stealing hate from elvaan and galka DDs, and the number of bomb tosses I stopped with Shoulder Tackle.

[Lucky and Elizabeth]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

My thief is curently lv 30.

What level is your thief?


Double Post Edited:
That being said, Beestinger is a good dagger for a few levels. But it gets replaced pretty quickly (Dagger at level 12 is better, IMO). To me it wouldn't be worth the money, but if you can afford it, there's no harm. You can always just sell it again.

[Taskmage]

Re: Weapons and Jobs

Uhh for a level 30 thf beestinger would be useless for dealing damage. If your dagger skill is behind, it would help you skillup faster since it has the fastest swing speed and wouldn't kill your target nearly as fast.