Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

[Celeal]

I am just wondering your opinion for the following:
Post SAM's update, level 60 DRG/SAM

Hasso (from /SAM): acc +10, STR+, attack speed up 10%
Acc. Bonus (from DRG): acc +10
Life Belt: acc +10

That is already acc +30

Sniper/Wood. ring x2: acc +10

It becomes acc +40

S.H (acc +10) or J. Peti (acc +5, atk +5) + Battle gloves (acc +3) + any neck/ear/head/weapon gear that adds acc...

We can push acc. over +50

Food: Meat or other +attack food!!!!!!!

Additional TP gain tools:
Jump, High Jump, Mediate (60 TP every 3 min from /SAM), Zanshin, Store TP, Attack speed up from Hasso

Defense:
Third Eye, Super Jump

Finally, combine DRG's pet damage.

Even if the DRG is not able to afford S.H or Sniper Rings, there are other cheaper gears that can push acc+ close to 50 (with Hasso + Acc. Bonus Job Trait). With +attack food, DRG/SAM's DoT should be very hard hitting and accurate. Plus Jump, High Jump, Mediate (60 TP only), Zanshin, Store TP, Attack speed up from Hasso..... this is insane

[Dryhus]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

All that stuff sounds great, but the thing is...half of it was there before, and the other half is available to a number of other jobs. While DRG and DRK got some love, I think WAR and SAM got some real boosts that allow them to edge out other jobs in situations where they may not have otherwise done previously. For example, if a DRG/WAR was getting overwhelmed in the damage department by a DRK/WAR, then the proposed DRG/SAM could be overwhelmed by the same DRK/SAM.

This is all objective, of course. I think MNK and DRG are the two top-tier DDs for most of the game with regard to XP PT damage. I can't say for endgame, especially 74-75 TP burn.

[Vyuru]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

Really, the only reservation that I have about drg/sam is the tp gain issue. Yes, Meditate and tp store is all well and good, however I am a firm believer in SC+MB parties. Unless I can consistantly get to 100%+ tp and use a WS, and then get another 100%+ tp to do a SC with my SC partner, the tp benefits are worthless to me.

The flat out +10acc from Hasso is nice, the +str IMO, is negliable since by level 50 I had about +16 str give or take some in gear, with the option for more. Haste is always a good thing and at the very least now you wouldn't need haste from a mage, though it would be an added bonus.

I dunno, it sounds nice, but I think /warrior might still be the best sub, I haven't tried out drg/sam yet, but I will when I have more time to level samurai.

Bleh, have to run so I'll post the rest of what I was going to say later, which is mostly about hate issues.

[Lmnop]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

What Celeal is getting at is how well all this seems to mesh together. Whether or not it was mostly all there yesterday, today it has been forged perfectly to compliment each other.

level 60:
-GK lance(7)
-Merman's Gorget(5)
-lifebelt(10
-jaridah peti(5)
-battle gloves/jaridah(3)
-hasso(10)
-trait(10)

Nice, even 50 acc with +STR/attack rings and meat dishes.

thing is, drg has always been able to get 150+ tp in the time their partners get 100 (except for SAM main). This is a mechanic that already existed but... with meditate and 2 jumps, you can use a WS outside of SC and still be on schedule with your partner. What's changed is that Hasso and Zanshin create a means of easing the loss of Double Attack and Berserk.

However, the loss is only eased. /sam used to come close to /war, it prolly now comes closer. 10% DA gets you more tp than 10% haste, and you can get enough acc to be comfortable with a Meat build in addition to Berserk for some rad fun times.

70+, /sam should allow you to tp burn like any other. Killing is priority #1, not hate control, so you make liberal use of WSs right off the bat. So while you're at it, you may as well up the number of WSs you're doing right off the bat because - look mom! - you can now survive the mob when it looks at you. Sure, you decrease your stats for a bit while you toss up Seigan -> Third Eye, but now you also have a chance to up your DMG output via Counter.

[Celeal]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

But please don't forget this is a attack food setup, not a sushi setup.

[Karinya]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

I think the combination of hasso, store tp and zanshin will probably outperform Double Attack for tp gain, all else being equal (i.e. same gear and food). That's *without* counting meditate (meaning it works in the 50s too).

Now of course there's also berserk, but berserk has hate issues. Hasso can easily be activated before the pull and last the whole fight, and doesn't seem to have the same monster-magnet effect berserk does. (This is based on my experience with it on SAM).

I'm currently DRG36 (taking time out from it to level SAM, as a matter of fact) and I'll probably stay /WAR until at least 40, maybe 50, but after that, I may wind up going /SAM any time I don't need to voke for SATA.

[Vyuru]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

For a +acc build, it is very nice, and it would let me get insane amounts of +acc well before the Pahluwan assault set.

Now first off I should say that I am very anti gear swapping in parties, so any stance I have on gear is that it stays on unless you swap out to your "pretty" armor between pulls

Str wise, I think all meat foods have +str/+att stat increases, so if a dragoon uses either the lvl 40 Ogygos's Bracelets (str+5), or the lvl 50 Enkelados's Bracelets (str+7), that should be enough +str in +str gear added with meat foods for WS damage in parties.

I think this setup could compare to drg/war, but to be really sure I would need to compare a lvl 50 drg/war who uses berserk, and a war/sam who uses a +att food like yellow curry maybe and just see who has the higher attack, and if that higher attack really makes a difference in the party.

This is well worth testing at any rate, and it sounds like a good job combo, my post may be more biased towards drg/war though since I am closing in on level 70 and a ton of +acc gear there.

When does samurai get meditate? Level 30? And Hasso is level 25 right? So it sounds like most of the benefits of this combo come into play in the level 50-60 range.

[Liquidedust]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

I am just wondering your opinion for the following:
Post SAM's update, level 60 DRG/SAM
Hasso (from /SAM): acc +10, STR+, attack speed up 10%
Acc. Bonus (from DRG): acc +10
Life Belt: acc +10
That is already acc +30
Sniper/Wood. ring x2: acc +10
It becomes acc +40
S.H (acc +10) or J. Peti (acc +5, atk +5) + Battle gloves (acc +3) + any neck/ear/head/weapon gear that adds acc...
We can push acc. over +50
Food: Meat or other +attack food!!!!!!!
Additional TP gain tools:
Jump, High Jump, Mediate (60 TP every 3 min from /SAM), Zanshin, Store TP, Attack speed up from Hasso
Defense:
Third Eye, Super Jump
Finally, combine DRG's pet damage.
Even if the DRG is not able to afford S.H or Sniper Rings, there are other cheaper gears that can push acc+ close to 50 (with Hasso + Acc. Bonus Job Trait). With +attack food, DRG/SAM's DoT should be very hard hitting and accurate. Plus Jump, High Jump, Mediate (60 TP only), Zanshin, Store TP, Attack speed up from Hasso..... this is insane

This is a nice acc setup for meat build, but lets compare it for a few with a sushi DRG/WAR with atk setup shall we (just for comparison).
DRG60/WAR
Accuracy Items / Traits / Food

• Acc. Bonus: +10 (DRG)
• Sniper/Wood Ringsx2: +10
• Scorpion Harness: +10
• Sole Sushi: +33 acc
• Total: +63 acc

Attack Items / Traits

• Atk. Bonus: +10
• Swordbelt+1: +12
• Spiked Finger Gauntlets: +12
• Sole Sushi: +2 (from STR)
• Total: +36 Atk (+120 Berserked)

DRG60/SAM
Accuracy Items / Traits / Food

• Acc. Bonus: +10 (DRG)
• Sniper/Wood Ringsx2: +10
• Scorpion Harness: +10
• Life Belt: +10 acc
• Battle Gloves: +3 acc
• Hasso: +10 acc
• Total: +53 acc

Attack Items / Traits

• Atk. Bonus: +10
• Arrabiatto: +68 Atk
• Total: +78 Atk

Basically if all other gear slots are occupied by similar gear (not much options for either subjob here) the DRG/WAR will have 10~ more acc all the time and 50~ more Atk 60% of the time.
If you get hasted the 10% Haste effect from Hasso as DRG/SAM will perform better then the 10% Double Attack as DRG/WAR.
If you don't get hasted (slap the RDMs and WHMs if you don't) Hasso and Double Attack are comparable in extra swings and additional damage (Double Attack comes up ahead in single fights while Hasso will show an improvement in overall stats).
Due to the delay of Lances Store TP wont give you 100% in swing less unless you achieve a total of +25 Store TP which today require Store TP II (+15), Rajas Ring (+5) and Arrabiatto (+5) for a total of exactly +25 which is why I included it in the above example.
Basically DRG/SAM with Arribiatto as food will gain 100% TP approx 20% faster compared to a DRG/WAR thanks to Haste effect from Hasso and Store TP setup and will have slighty higher weaponskill damage.
DRG/WAR will on the other hand hit harder 60% of the time and have slightly lower damage compared to a DRG/SAM 40% of the time depending on if Berserk is up or not.
Basically both jobs are a toss-up, if you are in a regular SC party and your skillchain partner is SAM main or /SAM sub I would say to sub SAM to keep up with TP gain to initiate WS earlier. In other cases where straight up damage is more important or you SC with someone that gains TP considerably slower then you /WAR si the way to go.

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

Minor correction, but attack bonus from /WAR won't stack with DRG's native attack bonus.

How did you calculate the base numbers for food effects on accuracy and attack?

[LilithAngel]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

Actually, Liquidedust, the Attack Bonus trait is Dragoon native, not from the Warrior sub (Dragoon gets Attack Bonus at level 10, the earliest it shows up in the game besides Dark Knight, who also gets it at level 10). DRG/SAM would have it as well. Just had to point that out.

And while this is signifigantly farther than 60, today I had a (rather short) party in Lufaise Meadows with some ls members, and I decided to give drg/sam a try today (had been leveling Samurai for a while, only level 36, but still close enough for 'prototype' purposes), and I must say, I was pleasantly surprised at how I performed. Here was my gear/food loadout:

Mezraq
Tiphia Sting
Homam Zucchetto
Chivalrous Chain
Assault Earring
Merman's Earring
Drachen Mail +1
Spike Finger Gauntlets
Flame Ring x2
Amemet Mantle +1
Swordbelt +1
Barone Cosciales
Rutter Sabatons

Jump: Drachen Greaves
High Jump: Wyrm Brais
Impulse Drive: Shadow Gorget
Angon: well... Angons

Food: Coeurl Subs

My skillchain partner was one of the Samurai in the ls, so I know TP was gonna be an issue if I couldn't keep up. It never was. Between Hasso, Meditate, and the additional Haste from the helm, my attack rate was plenty fast to grab TP, in addition to the Store TP traits, Store TP gear, and Meditate. My TP was rather even with the Samurai, and my damage output wasn't hurt in the least bit (even considering that we were fighting birds). It got to the point that we were popping off two Darkness skillchains per bird (the Paladin did his usual weapon swap/rest routine, so no Savage Blade for Light). I never missed DA, Berserk, or (rarely) my targets that party.

Unless I'm needed for some really 'out there' reason as another Provoke, I'm going /SAM from now on. Hasso, Meditate, Seigan/Third Eye, Store TP, and Zanshin > Double Attack, Berserk, Warcry, and Provoke in my book, easily. /WAR may look better on paper, but in practice, /SAM is the clear winner, by far.

[Liquidedust]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

Minor correction, but attack bonus from /WAR won't stack with DRG's native attack bonus.

How did you calculate the base numbers for food effects on accuracy and attack?

Opps forgot about that DRG has Atk bonus I as well, calculated Atk slightly high actually around 300 with gear on. Will edit it to reflect it properly.

Attack
Below 300 Atk /WAR will basically win out every time, this is due to Atk food caps and percentage increases. At 300-sih and above Atk /SAM and /WAR are on more equal footing thanks to higher caps on Atk food for an acc build.

This is the reason I used 300 Atk since anything below that really would show larger output for /WAR compared to /SAM (300 will not happen to around 62~63 though but is close enough).


Still the Attack I calculated on Arrabiatto in the following way based on a 300 Atk base with gear on.

Arrabiatto

• HP +15% (Cap: 150@1000 Base HP)
• Strength +5
• Vitality +2
• Intelligence -7
• Attack +22.5% (Cap: 120@533 Base Attack)
• Store TP +5

300*0.225 = 67.5

See now I rounded the numbers up for Atk caps but that still is only 1 Atk diff. This gives us a +68 Atk bonus when using food and acc setup.

For all you Atk food effect needs I recommend Food Compare 0.95 if you don't feel like doing all teh math yourself.

Accuracy
For accuracy I used the formula of NQ sushi 15% acc with a cap at around +35~ acc (the cap Studio Gobli managed to figure out).

based it on 203 skill (level 60 A+ cap)

Skill 1-200 = 1:1 skill:acc ratio
200 skill = 200 acc


Skill 201+ = 1:0.9 skill:acc ratio
3 skill = 2 acc (rounded down since most stuff in this game rounds down)


Since I weren't actually sure if sushi takes acc gear in account I exluded it from the calculation and just did:

( 200+(3*0.9) ) * 0,15 = 30.405

then added the 3 acc 6 DEX will give you for a total bonus of +33 acc rounded down.


If sushi takes gear acc into consideration we will hit the +35 acc cap from sushi still it is an issue of 2 acc extra so will not make much of a diffrence.

[Celeal]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

In practice, is acc +50 enough for exp. parties? Or we want acc +60?

I would borrow Liquidedust's level 60 DRG/SAM gear setup (see above post):

DRG60/SAM
Accuracy Items / Traits / Food

--- Acc. Bonus: +10 (DRG)
--- Sniper/Wood Ringsx2: +10
--- Scorpion Harness: +10
--- Life Belt: +10 acc
--- Battle Gloves: +3 acc
--- Hasso: +10 acc

Total: +53 acc

If we use the neck-slot Chivalrous Chain (Strength +3, Accuracy +5, Store TP +1), total becomes acc +58.

If we also add ammo-slot Tiphia Sting (HP -25, Accuracy +2, Attack +2, Evasion -4) or ear-slot Assault Earring (Accuracy +2, Attack +5, Evasion -2, Defense -3), we can push the total acc. over 60.


Acc +60 with attack food all time.


With Zanshin from /SAM, if the DRG/SAM has around 50 ~ 60 acc, in exp. party it is very unlike for Zanshin to miss.

Compare Double Attack and Mediate: The advantage of Mediate is the player has control when he wants to Mediate (if the timer is ready). On the other hand, Double Attack is random.

Jump, High Jump, and Mediate give DRG/SAM more control over his TP gain. If the player is smart and skillful, those JA are very useful. Double Attack is great without any doubt, but DRG/WAR has no control over when Double Attack will trigger.

[Lmnop]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

Now first off I should say that I am very anti gear swapping in parties, so any stance I have on gear is that it stays on unless you swap out to your "pretty" armor between pulls

This is likely from a roleplaying perspective, and it's admirable. Especially as unrealistic as gear-swapping is. But in many scenarios, it's a cheap way to increase performance and in all other scenarios, it's at least a guarenteed way to increase performance. Every little bit helps, and this goes triple for a melee job like DRG that has to strive to prove itself after a couple years of being so down-trodden. Stats for WSs and Jumps are nice, but I'm not going to be happy until every DD attends my parties with a macro ready that takes off the level 15 gloves and slaps on something with better defense, or especially takes off the -20 defense snipers and either empties the slot or fills them with some nice, cheap, phalanx rings. You will get hit, so be prepared for it.

----

I don't think anyone should aim for +60 acc in Exp parties. Honestly, I think a shade over 40 is enough to be comfortable. Though using a slow, 2-hander, you may as well push out a little extra where you can, I guess. Still, once you get over 50 don't expect much results.

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

Below 300 Atk /WAR will basically win out every time, this is due to Atk food caps and percentage increases. At 300-sih and above Atk /SAM and /WAR are on more equal footing thanks to higher caps on Atk food for an acc build.

I don't understand this statement; would you mind elaborating on this?

Let's say that including gears, a DRG40/WAR20 has 150 base attack, and a DRG40/SAM has 140 base attack.

DRG40/WAR20: (on sushi; no attack boost)
base Attack (w/gear) = 150
w/out Berkserk: attack = 150
with Berkserk(25% boost): attack = 187 (150+37)
average Attack (w/Berserk full time) = 174 (150 * 2 + 187 *3) / 5

DRG40/SAM20: (on Dhalmel Pie; +25% attack, cap:45@180)
base Attack (w/gear) = 140
average Attack (with food)= 175 (140+35)


Unless my assumption of 150 and 140 base attack numbers are utterly unrealistic, I seem to be able to find a case where DRG40/SAM20 on attack food will have slightly better attack on average than DRG40/WAR20 on sushi.

And, 150 is clearly lower than 300... Why do you claim 300 such a barrier for base attack when it comes to judging effectiveness of attack food?


Instead, I would argue just the opposite of what you've stated; higher the base attack, more advantage Berserk would give, since it's uncapped, and always gives 25%. (Attack food with higher level cap have lower percentage boost.)

If sushi takes gear acc into consideration we will hit the +35 acc cap from sushi still it is an issue of 2 acc extra so will not make much of a diffrence.

I've never came across information on accuracy cap from sushi before; do you have a reference for it?

Also, according to http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/Accuracy

[code]Accuracy = ( 200+ (Combat Skill-200)*0.92 + DEX/2 + (+accuracy from gear) + (+accuracy from trait/ability) ) * (1+ percentage from food effect)[/code]
* * *
Going to derail the topic for a bit...

Slightly different way of looking at accuracy; how is much is haste worth vs. effective accuracy? (Effective accuracy is always measured, not calculated from food/gear/traits--and is always expressed as a percentage, or the ratio of connected hits / swings taken.)

Well, how much the haste effect is worth actually depends on the effective accuracy.

Let's say your accuracy is 70%. A 10% hastemeans you attack 10% more than when you are not using that haste.

Taking a concrete example, instead of 100 swings over a set period of time, you'd make 110 swings. But, how many of those swings would you expect to connect?

Well, your accuracy is 70%, so you'd expect 7 out of 10 of the extra swings to connect, for a grand total of 77 hits. Compare that to not having the haste, which you would expect to connect 70 hits only.

So, the 10% additional haste for someone with 70% accuracy is just as good as no haste but 77% accuracy! Or, that haste is worth 7% additional accuracy. For someone with 80% accuracy, however, that same 10% haste would be worth 8% addtitional accuracy instead!

Accuracy makes Haste more effective, you might say, and vice versa. Perhaps the best way to use DRG/SAM is to gulp down sushi, to make best use of that 10% haste effect from Hasso. Maybe.

The only way to find out is to pack both food and use a parser; human observation alone is rarely reliable enough for tweaking gear/food setup.

[Vyuru]

Re: Level 60+ DRG/SAM, the ultimate DD?

Slighty off topic:

I agree with Lmnop, and I should clarify my stance a little bit. I don't really consider swapping out rings for melee or elemental staffs for mages and other things of that nature to be gear swapping, when I think of gear swapping I think of the people who have an entire set of gear for weapon skills, an entire set of gear for when they melee, and another set for whatever else, and they are constantly swapping between all 3 sets of gear for maximum benefits. I know it's beneficial for some jobs like thiefs to do this, but I'm just not comfortable doing it.

Back on topic:

I'm not sure how the delay works, some people say that every 60 delay is a second, and some say that for a weapon with delay 480, it's 4 and 8/10s of a second delay.

So my question is, you get in hits a little bit faster with haste, but how long does it take you to get that extra hit in with haste that you wouldn't have otherwise? If the fight is over before that happens, is it really beneficial?

Sure we all love haste, but I normally don't notice a big difference in the speed that my parties kill things in with people hasted, the biggest difference I've ever seen is normally if the thf/nin (my SC partner) is constantly kept hasted and I do not get any haste and then he winds up waiting for me to catchup to him and SC.

Note I do not know how powerful a normal haste spell is, so I don't really have anything to compare +10% haste to.


Also a question for LilithAngel.

Since you are a merited dragoon and using Angon in parties, do you think that Angon is a suitable substitute for Berserk when you have a sub other than warrior? I'm just wondering if having Angon might have eased the difference between drg/sam and drg/war.