THF 10-30 Help

[Lambs]

I know you've probably seen this a million times so thank you for any help in advanced. I just hit level 10 and was under the impression that dagger was what I should be leveling, my sub is war atm and others are arguing with me that it should be sword?

Any help on just basic armor / rings would be a lot of help also.

Thank you

[Taskmage]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

Dagger is thf's best weapon, but it doesn't get any good weaponskills until you're level 33. Until then you're better off using sword or hand-to-hand, since Combo and Fast Blade are good WS in their own right and work with Sneak Attack. You should keep a dagger on you to keep its skill up, but switch over to a better weapon once it turns blue.

War is a good sub and mnk is nice if you're using h2h, but nin is the preferred sub for thf once you get to level 20 or 24 and get dual wield and utsusemi, respectively.

Armor is whatever floats your boat, since there isn't anything amazing in that level range, short of Leaping/Bounding Boots and Emperor/Empress Hairpin. Royal Footman's Bandanna has agi+1, and the Royal Footman/Legionnaire's gloves have a nice attack +3 bonus. Other than that, stock up on bone, lizard, or beetle armor.

For rings, you can make use of strength, dexterity, and agility. I'd say dex > str > agi at those levels. Dex will increase the damage of your Fast Blade and Combo and also your Sneak Attack, while giving you a slightly better hit rate on normal swings to get TP faster.

[Lambs]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

That was exactly what I was looking for, thanks a lot.

[aegina]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

switch back to dagger every once in awhile, to keep it skilled up.

when you hit level 33 you'll want to switch to dagger full time for the dagger weaponskill "viper bite" so you'll want it to already be levelled up

[Kagerou]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

I don't want to discourage you here, but THF is truly one of the worst (if not the worst) job to lvl first.

Thfs are definetly below par until 30 (and some can argue till viper) and most of the time, you find yourself needing to skill two weapons that you probably don't have capped at the time, and without a subjob, you really trail behind even as a supporting role.

EDIT: nvm, you have a sub.

[Tirrock]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

If you have NIN sub, sub it at 20 and use a dagger in your offhand and a sword in your main hand. You'll get sword WS, but you can still skill dagger at the same time. It'll hurt your damage over time a little....but if you're a THF, you're there for sneak attack anyway (from 15 to 29).

I'd say not to worry about AGI unless you're soloing or tanking...or until level 60. It doesn't really boost damage on trick attack as much as DEX does on sneak attack. (Again, pre-assasin job trait.)

[bikkebakke]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

I would also like to mention at level 14 you can get Battle Gloves. Super awesome gloves imo if you can afford them or even get them from King Ranperre's Tomb.

[Muu Yi]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

If you have NIN sub, sub it at 20 and use a dagger in your offhand and a sword in your main hand. You'll get sword WS, but you can still skill dagger at the same time. It'll hurt your damage over time a little....but if you're a THF, you're there for sneak attack anyway (from 15 to 29).

I'd say not to worry about AGI unless you're soloing or tanking...or until level 60. It doesn't really boost damage on trick attack as much as DEX does on sneak attack. (Again, pre-assasin job trait.)

Personally, I'm against subbing Ninja before level 33. I am obviously biased towards Monk subjob, but it is the strongest subjob for you throughout those levels. You are still limited to Dual Wield I which doesn't speed up your attacks any, when you could be using Hand-to-Hand with Martial Arts I which takes 100 delay off. You can also get Dagger skillups off Counter, and if you sub Monk and stack Boost before Sneak Attack, you will take hate even with a Dagger in hand. I used to pull with Sneak Attack, and then Sneak Attack the mob again in camp when leveling from 15-29 and I still was nowhere near close to dying at the start of battle as a Mithra Thf/Mnk partly thanks to the defensive abilities of Counter and Max HP Boost. You can even use a Sword effectively as Thief/Monk: Boost, Sneak Attack, Fast Blade is a very effective Distortion closer until Viper Bite.

After Level 30 I equipped with Agility in mind as well as Dexterity (I think I'm one of the few Thief that ever bought and used the Mage Cuffs at level 38), being Mithra may have an advantage here but prior to Assassin, my Trick Attacks by themselves averaged 70 on Very Tough mobs, I had to do this in an exp party once with only 1 provoker. More than 70 extra damage off an NPC Adventuring Fellow while soloing a mob that's a lot weaker than that is not bad for soloing either, the only major down-side in splitting up Trick Attack is that there is a small chance it will miss prior to 60. However, I felt that training myself to Trick Attack by itself early on was worth it. I originally did it to offset lag and for the chance that I'm in a party without another provoke. It paid off when first the modification to Hide was made and then when Assassin was finally introduced. I know of many level 75 Thief who don't macro them separately at all. My SATA Viper Bite was not noticeably weaker than other Thiefs at that time, in fact it was usually higher because I ate attack food back then before sushi was introduced.

[Tirrock]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

Which would you rather have? A level 32, soon to be 33 THF/NIN with capped dagger skills and main-wielding a sword so they can actually do decent damage on their weapon skill... Or a level 32 THF/MNK with uncapped dagger (and therefor pretty much ineffective after 33)...or is using a dagger and is pretty poor on weapon skill/skill chain damage until 33?

I gave that suggestion because the DoT lost is for a THF is barely noticable. And if their dagger skill is underleveled...
"I just hit level 10 and was under the impression that dagger was what I should be leveling"
I'd much rather have a player skill their dagger and be able to participate in skillchains with sneak attack + fast blade than I would have them using dagger main pre-33. Or them using hand to hand or sword purely and not having dagger leveled anywhere close to viper bite level.

I can't help but disect some of this post...so much of it seems wrong to me.

if you sub Monk and stack Boost before Sneak Attack, you will take hate even with a Dagger in hand

Yeah... I did that as THF with any weapon after level 15. You don't need boost to steal hate with sneak attack at low levels.

I used to pull with Sneak Attack, and then Sneak Attack the mob again in camp

You pulled by running up and hitting it? Please...don't give that sort of advice to low level players. Not only is that slow pulling, but it results in getting hit needlessly... You manage to kill your exp per hour two ways there.

http://ffxi.somepage.com/itemdb/3206

Acid bolts are your friend.

Say it with me now...

Acid Bolts are my friend!

Just like that! Now you try!

A better method is to sneak attack (and later trick attack too...pre 60 again) before you actually pull... Try to time it so that when you get back to camp, you have about 10-15 seconds left on sneak/trick. That way, not only do you have a chance at giving it defense down (acid bolts are love), which helps the whole party, but you still get two sneak attacks off in quick succession. While making pulls take less time and making you lose less HP.

I'm just going to stop here... Now I know what Rones felt like when he tried replying to some of your posts.

Edit: Oh, and I'm not saying that THF/MNK sucks...at least before level 30/33. I just don't think it's as important as having dagger leveled up to cap so the THF is ready for viper bite either right when they hit 33, or a few fights after they hit 33.

[aegina]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

Personally, I'm against subbing Ninja before level 33.

i might agree, except that at level 25 most people xp in the first jungle, which has long pulls which can get you killed if you don't know what you're doing. /nin with its shadows are a serious lifesaver there.

with shadows, you can flee TO the mobs instead of being forced to flee AWAY from them, making more exp for the party by making faster xp chains. Also, flee isn't always up on every pull.

when i went there on my thief, it was my first job on this character, so i had to /war. i died at least 3-5 times on those pulls simply because they're long and tricky. it was also my first puller-type job.

after levelling ninja, i went back there as my ranger/ninja. i didn't have any problem with the pulls then. Of course, i was also a little more experienced as a puller at that time, too, but the shadows made a big difference.

in the second jungle, the pulls are shorter and shadows don't make a very noticable difference. I pulled there as my thief, my ranger AND my ninja (wasn't tanking in that party) and i didn't bother much with the shadows. the pulls are too short and mandys run slow in the second jungle, you can /war or /monk if you want, but i still prefered to stay /nin simply because it isn't worth making your party wait for you to run back to kahzam to switch jobs

there's also the point of leveling dagger, if you don't already have it capped. Main handing a sword and subbing a dagger is fine. it's only, what, three levels and you're at 30?

[Muu Yi]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

Which would you rather have? A level 32, soon to be 33 THF/NIN with capped dagger skills and main-wielding a sword so they can actually do decent damage on their weapon skill... Or a level 32 THF/MNK with uncapped dagger (and therefor pretty much ineffective after 33)...or is using a dagger and is pretty poor on weapon skill/skill chain damage until 33?

I never said don't cap dagger. Don't say I typed words I never did. I had the ability to keep Dagger, Sword, and Hand-to-Hand capped on Thf/Mnk and it was my very first job past 30. All three weapons are among the fastest weapons to cap, the old old Thief guide, which I think is still the prominent Thief guide on gamefaqs that I first read recommended using alternate weapons /after capping dagger/ because Dagger caps so fast anyways. My parties had no problem with me switching to hand-to-hand after I capped skills on Dagger and Sword first. There also wasn't this closed mind-set on 'You absolutely have to close Distortion' all the time.

I gave that suggestion because the DoT lost is for a THF is barely noticable. And if their dagger skill is underleveled...
I'd much rather have a player skill their dagger and be able to participate in skillchains with sneak attack + fast blade than I would have them using dagger main pre-33. Or them using hand to hand or sword purely and not having dagger leveled anywhere close to viper bite level.

I agree that DoT lost due to only being able to use weaker weapons at those levels isn't that noticeable but there is a little loss. My Damage Over Time was almost on par with a same level Mithra Monk around level 21, she just was able to attack slightly faster because of Purple Belt. But my Double Sneak Attack Damage put me way above her in the overall damage dealing department.

Thf/Mnk has a much greater skillchain ability than Thf/Nin. I mentioned it time and time again but this is an argument for Thf/Mnk not against. You can close Fusion with Combo, you can close Fragmentation with Shadowstitch or Shoulder Tackle, and you can close Distortion with Fast Blade or Wasp Sting. Noticeably more versatile than Thf/Nin. Heck, I even closed Gravitation with One Inch Punch after level 30. I was able to close any level 2 skillchain with virtually any other Damage Dealing job. You cannot say that with Thf/Nin.

You pulled by running up and hitting it? Please...don't give that sort of advice to low level players. Not only is that slow pulling, but it results in getting hit needlessly... You manage to kill your exp per hour two ways there.

http://ffxi.somepage.com/itemdb/3206

Acid bolts are your friend.

Let me tell you something, I started Thief back in 2003, so you probably didn't know this. But when I was leveling through lvl 1-33, there was NO STATUS BOLTS available to Thief. If you wanted to range pull as Thief it was with Darts or a Boomerang back then. And I probably was extraordinarily lucky but I hardly ever got hit while pulling. I countered an ridiculous number of times, my party was in complete disbelief when I ended up sub-tanking. Monster would turn away from main tank to me temporarily, get countered once or twice then went back to the tank after they Provoked it. I went 10 straight levels using lvl 15 Kingdom Armors without taking more than a few hits between levels. As for exp speed, I was making 5K exp/hour on average. Fights would not last longer than 45 seconds and chain 5s were coming in very consistently, mages had to tell me to slow the heck down sometimes as they weren't getting much time to rest for MP at all. In any case I will forgive you for your demeaning tone because you were not fully aware of my circumstances.

A better method is to sneak attack (and later trick attack too...pre 60 again) before you actually pull... Try to time it so that when you get back to camp, you have about 10-15 seconds left on sneak/trick. That way, not only do you have a chance at giving it defense down (acid bolts are love), which helps the whole party, but you still get two sneak attacks off in quick succession. While making pulls take less time and making you lose less HP.

That is what I do now, I adapted to the changes and was very glad of them. Leveling up Marksmanship was a major pain, but it paid off in the end.

Edit: Oh, and I'm not saying that THF/MNK sucks...at least before level 30/33. I just don't think it's as important as having dagger leveled up to cap so the THF is ready for viper bite either right when they hit 33, or a few fights after they hit 33.

Your argument is moot, THF/MNK doesn't keep you from capping Dagger at all. That is all.

[Lambs]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

I started a riot. This isnt my first job, its more of a stepping stone for my warrior till I get it high enough to sub nin. I only plan to get this to level 30.

Thanks though for all the advice ; >

[Tirrock]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

I'm not going to trust a word of that... You remembering how much exp an hour you made, how often you got hit, what chains you made in your parties, how fast fights were, how often you countered/dodged, and how much MP the mages had from two and a half years ago is...well...unbelievable. (By the way...counter doesn't help you when you're pulling...)

My major problem with your post was that your advice was incredibly close-minded. You didn't even seem to consider other options for more than a second. Not to mention you only gave your poor pulling method as pulling advice...

I considered the main choices. THF/WAR, THF/MNK, THF/RNG, and THF/NIN. With all of them except /NIN, the problem is that you have to switch to dagger main to get any dagger skill at all. There's a reason why THF use non-daggers. The weapon skills before level 33 THF are poor, and don't work as well with sneak attack as hand to hand or sword does.

So while you're skilling up dagger as THF/(anything but NIN sub) you're hurting your damage over time more than subbing NIN and offhanding a dagger is.

As far as the comment on acid bolts... You're right on that. I wouldn't know. I didn't really get any melees past level 10 until early 2004. I was pretty much pure mage during beta and NA PC release. But I have absolutely no idea why you wouldn't mention acid bolts for pulling until somebody (me) called you on your bad advice. Or even a boomerang for that matter.

Your argument is moot, THF/MNK doesn't keep you from capping Dagger at all. That is all.

I can do that too. Your point is moot because THF/NIN gives you a good closing WS while allowing you to skill up dagger at the same time. Giving you both damage and dagger skill and not hurting your DoT (and from 30 to 32, your hate management abilities) by giving you only shadowstitch or gust slash as your best weapon skills.

Edit: I should probably point this out before it's used against me... I'm saying go with THF/NIN only if your dagger skill is not level 100+ already and you have ninja unlocked (or can get it unlocked). At level 20, THF/RNG would work pretty well for accuracy bonus, THF/WAR could act as a good hate keeping tank against VT/low IT, and THF/MNK for martial arts and hand to hand is a good option as well.

THF/NIN is largely useless if you're not using it for dagger skill in offhand weapon from level 20 to 24. At 24 it's still not all that attractive if you have any sort of pulling experience. Mandragoras double attack rips shadows off too fast to make them of much help. Although, /NIN can help when you're fighting against goblins in the jungle.

At 30 against beetles, it's sort of a toss-up for all of the subjobs. /NIN will pretty much prevent you from ever getting hit in altepa, due to beetles only having a single attack... /WAR gives you the lovely berserk ability. /RNG gives you accuracy bonus...still...which is handy if you don't have a way to dispel the beetles when they do rhino guard. And /MNK gives the delay decrease for hand to hand, boost for a few points of attack before a WS, and dodge to prevent you from getting hit while pulling. (At level 30, counter is pointless in a party.)

I'm going to stop replying to this thread. I don't want to carry on some arguement (especially since it's pretty much an open and shut case). Plus I feel more and more nerdy every time I argue the finer points of an MMO with someone.

[Muu Yi]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

I'm not going to trust a word of that... You remembering how much exp an hour you made, how often you got hit, what chains you made in your parties, how fast fights were, how often you countered/dodged, and how much MP the mages had from two and a half years ago is...well...unbelievable. (By the way...counter doesn't help you when you're pulling...)

My major problem with your post was that your advice was incredibly close-minded. You didn't even seem to consider other options for more than a second. Not to mention you only gave your poor pulling method as pulling advice...

I considered the main choices. THF/WAR, THF/MNK, THF/RNG, and THF/NIN. With all of them except /NIN, the problem is that you have to switch to dagger main to get any dagger skill at all. There's a reason why THF use non-daggers. The weapon skills before level 33 THF are poor, and don't work as well with sneak attack as hand to hand or sword does.

So while you're skilling up dagger as THF/(anything but NIN sub) you're hurting your damage over time more than subbing NIN and offhanding a dagger is.

As far as the comment on acid bolts... You're right on that. I wouldn't know. I didn't really get any melees past level 10 until early 2004. I was pretty much pure mage during beta and NA PC release. But I have absolutely no idea why you wouldn't mention acid bolts for pulling until somebody (me) called you on your bad advice. Or even a boomerang for that matter.


I can do that too. Your point is moot because THF/NIN gives you a good closing WS while allowing you to skill up dagger at the same time. Giving you both damage and dagger skill and not hurting your DoT (and from 30 to 32, your hate management abilities) by giving you only shadowstitch or gust slash as your best weapon skills.

I had the ability to keep Dagger, Sword, and Hand-to-Hand capped on Thf/Mnk and it was my very first job past 30.

I tried using one Dagger in my main hand as Thf/Mnk, and I can tell you that at level 20 I was using a Mercenary's Knife which I used my Windurst Conquest Points to purchase. I was still doing better damage than other damage dealers in my party with SA + Boost and did Gust Slash separately since it is an elemental weapon skill. Look at somepage's DPS comparisons, Mercenary's Knife has 3.47 DPS. The sword I had on me at 20 was the Small Sword mainly due to the +2 Dex it gives and it has DPS of 3.45. That 'weak' dagger is juuust slightly better in DoT than the sword I was using. Now granted Small Sword isn't great in DoT, but it's decent for me and the extra +2 Dex damage on Sneak Attack Boost Fast Blade made up for it. Unfortunately Somepage can't gauge the DPS of hand-to-hand weapons properly, because the base damage is an addition onto your base bare-handed damage which is directly related to your hand-to-hand skill. But I assure you that hand-to-hand beats both weapons in DoT and Weaponskill damage if kept at capped skill. There is no noticeable damage over time loss by not dual-wielding at level 20's. There is a noticeable Burst damage loss, however as you give up the ability to stack Boost onto Sneak Attack.

I do remember my old party because that was one of the best parties I ever had at those levels, it was almost a semi-static party we were with each other for enough hours to start feeling like family. And for your information I have tried subbing /War, /Nin, and /Rng on my 2nd character which I am raising up as a Samurai. When I was leveling it's Thief subjob on it and I still ended up preferring Thf/Mnk overall. Don't assume I haven't tested these alternatives.

And let me make this absolutely clear since you persist in jumping to false assumptions about me personally.

I DID NOT SUGGEST ANYONE TO PULL WITH SNEAK ATTACK

I'm not suggesting ANYONE to do that, understood? I simply stated that is what I did way in the day. Back when nobody knew there was any better way to pull at all. And I got away with it. I admit that I was pretty lucky and I quickly learned an effective technique for dragging mobs through key obstacles to slow them down while keeping ahead of them or I often chose to pull the mobs very close to camp because camps weren't as crowded back then. It trained me to be a very fast puller, that's partly why the exp chains were fast and prevented mobs from hitting me even though I pulled with Sneak Attack at close-range.

Acid Bolts are great, did you not read that I mentioned I changed to them after they were implemented? Please do pull with Acid Bolts if you have access to them. Let me re-highlight what I said for you:

That is what I do now, I adapted to the changes and was very glad of them. Leveling up Marksmanship was a major pain, but it paid off in the end.

At levels 29-33 I was in a party with a Mithra Thf/War I think. Her name was Thebutter, I remember that. I was the Party leader, we had 2 tanks, 2 thief, a whm, and a blm. Party members were skeptical and it took us a little while for me to figure out an effective strategy to utilize with 2 Thief in the party but once I did we were getting faster kills than any party around us. I remember making 3 levels in 1 hour only. We were doing SA swap and then SATA swaps behind the 2 tanks. We alternated it every 30 seconds and I was able to gauge that my Damage was slightly higher than hers - that SATA Boost Combo was stronger than her SATA Fast Blade which is what we were doing to close skillchains. I would plant more damage on my tank than she would. It made for a pretty effective comparison.

Now you talk about me being close-minded, but have you ever tried Hand-to-Hand at these levels? The TP gain per hit is high compared to dagger's TP numbers with dual wield and you are almost as fast as a main job Monk. If you don't miss, you are doing great damage over time. The real major downside to the E rating Thief has in hand-to-hand is in accuracy, not damage. I have subbed monk to every job from levels 1-10, and used bare hands as a weapon, even on Summoner which has very low strength and no hand-to-hand skill at all. Hand-to-hand is fast with just Martial Arts I, and it is the most damaging low-level weapon barring poor accuracy. Everyone in my linkshell except the couple of people I've managed to convince to actually try it thinks I'm crazy for doing this. But those individuals I convinced are highly supportive of this technique for quick low-leveling. I'm just letting you know I am typing from actual personal experience here.

I didn't counter during pulls, you are ASSUMING I'm typing words I did not type again. Every one of the arguments you posted was void. And you obviously can't accept that. I'm quite the opposite of someone who can only accept one subjob. Look at all the subjob threads at the top of each job forum, I've posted many suggestions for subjobs that people don't realize can be effective over the past couple of weeks. If you wanted to point out one flaw in my response post, which I now recognize I made a mistake on when I initially posted because I was tired when I first posted my reply was that Dual Wield I doesn't increase your attack speed. Because it does a little, it makes your attack speed the combined delay of your weapons multiplied by 0.9. Not as much as Martial Arts I speeds up hand-to-hand attacks, but it is noticeable and I forgot about that. Every other statement I've made however is true. You can choose not to believe it, but I and those old party members whom my tactics benefitted, if they're still around they know it really happened. And that's what really matters.

[Taskmage]

Re: THF 10-30 Help

I think those reading the thread have probably recognized the merit of both viewpoints by now, so you can stop sparring with eachother. There's no need for one of you to "win."