Dodge does... nothing?

[Taskmage]

Re: Dodge does... nothing?

Everything in the game IS based on a random factor. But just because a coin flip has a random result doesn't mean you can't predict its behavior over time.

It sounds like what you guys are saying is, if I'm playing blackjack and I'm sitting on 14, it doesn't matter whether I get another card or not because it might not help me. The next draw is based 100% on luck, so if I make any conclusion about what I should do, would that conclusion be obsolete? Worthless? That's ridiculous.

Why don't you just stop drawing your weapons because you might not hit?

[LadyPeorth]

Re: Dodge does... nothing?

Edit: Removed for redundancy

[Aeni]

Re: Dodge does... nothing?

+evasion hurts counterstance ><

Why? Counterstance has a lower rate of success than evasion. What I was saying is that to simply add to your evasion success, you automatically make counterstance that much more successful. It's hard to explain this in terms where everyone here can understand this, but you need to look at it more than just a series of linear steps and instead, look at it on a much broader level of staggered or interwoven steps.

This is why he was so successful with counterstance. To be able to counterstance on abraxas with only a WHM in duo and effectively give back more than he was receiving is something you need to experience rather than mathematically derive on.

Everything in the game IS based on a random factor. But just because a coin flip has a random result doesn't mean you can't predict its behavior over time.

It sounds like what you guys are saying is, if I'm playing blackjack and I'm sitting on 14, it doesn't matter whether I get another card or not because it might not help me. The next draw is based 100% on luck, so if I make any conclusion about what I should do, would that conclusion be obsolete? Worthless? That's ridiculous.

Why don't you just stop drawing your weapons because you might not hit?

I think, what he is saying is basically this: If it is a sheer impossibility of a german cockroach (about 1" in length) being able to levy enough force to strike against your skull and thereby crushing it, then the odds that a level 20 monster being able to strike against a level 75 PC even once in a 5 minute span should also be within the same parameters. Yet, a monster can strike more than just once in that session. In other words, there is no logical function in place to guard against this impossibility and therefore none of the game's logic system renders effective judgement on each action taken by, for or against any player.

[little ninja]

Re: Dodge does... nothing?

Everything in the game IS based on a random factor. But just because a coin flip has a random result doesn't mean you can't predict its behavior over time.

It sounds like what you guys are saying is, if I'm playing blackjack and I'm sitting on 14, it doesn't matter whether I get another card or not because it might not help me. The next draw is based 100% on luck, so if I make any conclusion about what I should do, would that conclusion be obsolete? Worthless? That's ridiculous.

Why don't you just stop drawing your weapons because you might not hit?

everything in this game is based on a random system. an like in Vegas, it always leans towards the house. things like how can my 100+ chr with an apollo's staff miss a charm on an EP 2 times in a row. there just is no logic to it i see tests all the time in here. but they dont factor the same thing amonst all the test. there will always be the random factor. even if all things cap out vs a mob you still talking insane numbers. if the mob becomes worthwhile at 30, that means i most likely will cap against it at lets say lvl 50. so your looking at a cap eva for a nin of 200+, parry skill capped at 200+.both with an "A" rating, now add in eva bonus of the subed thf. an all logic points to that mob having no chance in hell of landing anymore then 1 hit, if even that. yet we still see the mob hit me 2-5 times a fight.

an you still have hidden factors an most of all logic. first if your sitting on 14, you factor in every move the players to your left made, an to your right. then you factor in the card the dealer has. then you factor in the odds you will get a card that is 7 or lower. then you have to factor in the % that because you drew that card, yo may infact have helped the dealer in the very end. the trick is to limit the oustside factors as best possible. if everyone took a card with no 9 or better comming up. that means the odds are that the next card will be 9 or better.

[Armando]

Re: Dodge does... nothing?

im shocked to see that others are posting the same thing ive been saying for 3 years now.. there is nothing like a lvl 32 mob hitting a 75ninja even when he has parry capped an eva capped. this only makes me believe that everything in this game is based on a random factor..

There appears to be a cap on evasion at 20%. I was at Gustaberg on my 50 PLD and let a level 1 bee attack me 100 times. Out of those 100 attempts, 21 hit, and with startling consistency at that (I'd get hit around once every 5 hits, or if I didn't, I'd get hit twice in quick succession in the next 5-hit set.)

The way Counter works in FFXI is more akin to Hamedo in FF:T. If a melee attack was attempted on you, it would be canceled and you would return one of your own.

This is true, but many people claim they can't Counter with shadows up, which implies the hit would have had to be successful. Plus, Hamedo in FFT was ruled by the Brave stat, and would kick in from any direction. You can only Counter from the front in FFXI. The end-result is similar, but I don't think it's a good parallel to draw when talking about how it works on FFXI.

If shield does take priority over Counter then {That's too bad.} It doesn't really make sense to have the less effective damage prevention take priority. Could it be that you blocked more than countered as pld/mnk simply because your shield skill was very high and the proc rate of your counter very low? If that were the case it'd be difficult to tell which is taking precedence over which.

Shield is more efficient than Counter because it can go off more often. On my WAR/MNK with Axe + Shield (sorely underlevelled as I hadn't touched it since just before the shield patch) I seemed to Counter 9-12% of all attacks. I can easily shield one out of four attacks, and that's worst-case scenario...I block more than that on my PLD, I'd say around 1/3. With my Kite Shield I'd say I block around 50% of a hit's damage, definetely no less than 40%. If shield takes precedence over Counter, I'd have to give up ten Shield blocks to Counter one more time at the rate I was Countering, and those 10 shield blocks would've neglected the damage of 4-5 hits, while the Counter would've only neglected once.

Moreover, following your reasoning that it doesn't make sense for Shield to take priority over Counter because Counter's effect - when it does occur - is more beneficial than the effect of shielding a single hit, then it doesn't make any sense for Evasion or Parry or Guard or Utsusemi to have priority over it either, because not only does Counter avoid a hit, it hits the enemy back every time, and thus is the ultimate defensive effect (with the exception of shadows, because you can't Counter magic, while Utsusemi can prevent single-target spells from landing.)

As for the arguments of randomness and probabilities - in the long run the game seems to follow the probabilities quite well. Various people have tested Double Attack to be 10% and it's always been consistent. Whenever I get lucky on my Double Attacks and do two in a row I also tend to slow down my Double Attacks before or after to compensate. Same can be said about Accuracy and Evasion. Hell, Shielding is a Paladin's main source of damage mitigation (aside from high Defense, but a WAR can achieve that almost as well as a Paladin can, and definetely well enough to perform similarly) and it's still subject to luck and probabilities. I'm not going to stop using my shield simply because it may not go off on a given attack round. And, like Taskmage said, I'm not going to stop drawing my weapons simply because there's a chance that I may miss that exists on every hit.

[Mithrael]

Re: Dodge does... nothing?

You're absolutely right. I knew that you could parry before shadows, yet I wrote the wrong thing... I should be more careful when I post too early in the morning...

The gist of it is that any defensive ability that completely negates damage takes precedence over a defensive ability that negates partial damage. as a result, counter is above shield block now, though it has always been above guard. You still, as far as I know, cannot while you have shadows up.

Dodge helps out a lot in counterstance. Or that's what a 75 MNK friend who was fully merited to cap said to me. All I know is anything (+eva) will help with counterstance. w

Why? Counterstance has a lower rate of success than evasion. What I was saying is that to simply add to your evasion success, you automatically make counterstance that much more successful

This is an example of you misunderstanding me misunderstanding you. From you said, you made it sound like higher evasion increases the chance of countering, which is incorrect. Instead, it seems you meant that you wand higher evasion since you get rocked so hard if a hit gets through.

i guess the "new" rules after the changes to shield blocking would be more like

1) evade
2) parry
3) shadows
4) counter
5) shield block / guard
6) you get hit for full damage

It should be noted that number of times you do any of these doesn't really have anything to do with which order they're checked, since skill plays a large roll. I.e. just because you parry less often than you counter doesn't mean that counter comes before parry.

[kuu]

Re: Dodge does... nothing?

I think, what he is saying is basically this: If it is a sheer impossibility of a german cockroach (about 1" in length) being able to levy enough force to strike against your skull and thereby crushing it, then the odds that a level 20 monster being able to strike against a level 75 PC even once in a 5 minute span should also be within the same parameters. Yet, a monster can strike more than just once in that session. In other words, there is no logical function in place to guard against this impossibility and therefore none of the game's logic system renders effective judgement on each action taken by, for or against any player.

That's a profoundly bad arguement.

A lvl 20 crab that looks like it weighs 250lbs is stil a crab that weighs enough to kill an adventurer.

Lvls is not size, nor is it that much of a power difference.

A boy with a knife aganist an army veteran with full equip should have no problem, but the boy can still kill the veterian.

It's the old D&D roll double crit, and instant kill, clause.

A lvl 75 ninja should be able to dodge most of what the crab can stick on him, but not all. And the level differences isn't that big.

And even using your weird comparison, that 1 inch bug flying at a speed of 10m/s and poke out your eye easily if you let it. That's worth 100damage right there, assuming medical science can heal eyes.

The human body is very fragile if you know how to work it, what do you think they teach you in self defense class.

[little ninja]

Re: Dodge does... nothing?

1) evade (capped at 75.) (A rating)
2) parry (capped at 75.) (A rating)

if you follow that order there is no way a mob at a considerable lower lvl should get thru any of my defences. once yes, twice maybe. but anymore is highly unlikely. yet in this game its more likely to hit the 4th an 5th time. an even adding in agi or vit. did nothing to improve the number of parrys,

an kuu just because a blackbelt becomes a master of the overhead block. doesnt mean a white belt should be able to come in, an hit the top of the blackbelts head 6 out of 10 times.

[Aeni]

Re: Dodge does... nothing?

That's a profoundly bad arguement.

I think your argument is even worse.

If you take into account how much difference even 2 levels can make in the performance of a player on exp mobs (For example, Player A could be missing a large amounts of his attacks on a particular monster at a particular level, but after 1 or 2 levels, that failure rate decreases by as much as two, three-fold) Now, translate that to over 50 levels... It's like trying to justify in a set condition how many times a chance can occur within a set number of circumstances. If the chance is suppose to be 1 in 1,000 and yet this chance has occured 1 in 10 in several set circumstances with everything else falling in between that and 1 in 1,000, something is VERY, very wrong. There is no law of averages nor equivalent exchange nor conservation of energy/matter. In other words, no logical process.

[Vidia]

Re: Dodge does... nothing?

Well, imo Dodge makes a good difference an even visable difference at 52+ with boots that enhance it (heard talk that it adds 25 evasion while enhanced) which is a decent amount especially when fighting VT T and lower Especially mixed with Enhanced Counterstance which is a completely different very frustrating long drawn out discussion ^^:

I use Dodge all the time, especially with counterstance.