How much does Haste lower your delay by?

[Lone Dragon]

As a melee, I'd like to know.
There are a few Haste + items and one must wonder if they're worth the cash.

[Issaac]

I also want to know if the spell is worth the money and, more importand, the mana?

[Ghostraven]

Man I didnt think it was a big deal at first, but after being in a Kick ass PT last night and being constantly hasted I love it ^^ For two hand weapon users it's a godsend. The difference in delay isn't MASSIVE but you will notice it and i was able to skillchain with the PLD every fight, with the fights lasting about 2 mins each.

Not sure on the MP usage but if you have a rdm with refresh, haste as much as possible!

[Calianeri]

I don't know the exact percentage of speed increase, but I'd guess it's around 10-15%. I've only had Haste for 4 levels. After being apprehensive about buying it (20k gil in Selbina, and 40mp to cast... big investment), I think it's worth it. I use it sparingly though, unless MPs aren't a big issue for the party (and I love those parties!). I give it to 2-hander melees first, especially if they've been slowed by crawlers. Haste completely removes the slow effect.

One other use for it I've found... if a caster gets slowed, especially myself or a RDM, I'll haste them unless the fight is nearly over or I'm low on MPs. Having Cure take longer to cast is something I don't mess around with.

I can't speak about other uses for Haste, or how helpful it is at higher levels.

[Icemage]

I'm not a big fan of Haste. It's a feel-good spell, and is useful if you have a lot of MP to burn, but it really limits your XP chaining ability due to the high MP cost.

Haste: WHM 40, RDM48
MP cost: 40
Duration: 3 minutes
Effect: Decreases weapon delay by ~33% (approx).

Melee players love it because it boosts their damage output (hence my "feel-good" comment), but I pretty much swore off of using Haste in XP parties back in beta and haven't looked back since. The only time I find it is notably useful for skillchains is if one player is lagging behind the others for TP... but now you're caught in the catch-22:

Do you Haste the person who is hitting least often for the least damage so that they can activate the skillchain for bonus damage?

Do you Haste the person who is hitting hardest/most often so that you get maximum effectiveness from the spell?

Or do you save the 40MP to cast Regen II or Cure III and allow your party to inflict more damage over time?

Overall, it doesn't seem to do a lot to affect your net XP over time. Things may die slightly faster, but you also run out of MP faster, which means less chains. If you're in a party with a Bard and a Red Mage... sure, knock yourself out. Otherwise, I personally think it is probably best to reserve the MP for an emergency.


Icemage

[bakasan]

In my set PT we use haste quite a bit actually--

Between the red mage and I we basically split Haste duties. The 40MP is a bit of an investment, but it gets offset greatly since the red mage has refresh.

For us, we typically XP in a VT-IT zone for us, with a goal of 150-240 XP per kill, including chain bonuses; our general goal for picking a spot to camp is that we should be able to consistently sustain 4-6 chains in between longer periods of rest.

With that difficulty range as a target, generally the chains break down such as:

* red mage focuses first on getting refresh up and running on the WHM and the BLM. Refreshes to himself is a 2ndary priority as he has the option to convert typically once per chain.

* whm (me) gets haste up and running on our primary damage dealer (DRG/WAR) as well as the tank (PAL/WAR). For the dmg dealer, it's a matter of getting mo' damage. For the tank, it's a matter of assisting him w/ keeping hate.

* red mage picks up haste on the 2ndary damage dealer, a THF/NIN (who also assists in hate control). Optionally, he'll haste himself and join melee--depends on how things are going.


Because of the diffculty of mob we aim after as well as the benefit of refresh (3 mp approx every 3 seconds), the overall cost of the casting of Haste has been mostly negated. In fact, Haste will typically last somewhere into the 2nd mob, where we'll again repeat the process. While there is that obvious 40 mp drop and a window of about 15 seconds before refresh can recover that mp cast, the cost to us, is more than worth it.

Obviously in cases where we're toward the end of a chain we'll use more sparingly as MP will be more precious, but if we're anywhere above say, ~150 MP we'll go ahead and keep haste maintained best we can--the hardest part being tracking who still has haste up since the wearing off messages are hard to pick up sometimes.

I can understand Icemage's perspective on it being more of a "feel good" spell, but used in a pt setup that you trust, it can be of enormous benefit. (My set pt experimented some with saving the MP for curative/enhance/debuff and the MP saved generally ended up being needed anyhow in extra Cure II or III uses anyhow)

[murmur]

I've been wondering about the worth of haste also. I usually only haste the tank, especially WAR tanks, towards the purpose that they be able to keep hate better -- I've partied with a lot of crappy tanks though. I personally wouldn't haste the biggest damage dealer, because they have to hold back normally anyways, and manage their hate. This is RNG and DRK and I heard, later MNKs also. Not sure about others. In regards to who to haste besides the tank, I'm not sure.

If they're slowed or if they're lagging in TP, those sound good also, although I'm still working on paying better attention in battles ><. Also if someone uses their two hour, it's good to haste them. But I can completely understand swearing off on haste though, it does take a lot of MP and melee are spoiled by it. Many are purely selfish and bent on being macho and do not understand nor care about cast time and MP. I had a WAR last night ask for a haste every damn pull. It was the equivalent of "cure now please". I thought he'd stop after the first 6 times. :mad: *Casts first spell Regen II on ta..* "please haste" *..nk*

[Baradak]

Haste doesn't help 2h melee anymore than it does 1h melee. Ratio ratio ratio.

[Falconi]

maybe a n00b question but Haste is only to lower meelee delay, not for casting purposes, correct ?

[Issaac]

I think ill investigate the money once i got all my other spells. I dont think its realy worth it from what i heard now. If the time it holds whould be longer or there where a grouphaste version of the spell, that would be much better.

Grouphaste
Hold time: 10 minutes
Mana: 150

*dream*

[hageshiku]

i partially agree with what icemage said.

i play an elvaan whm and one 40mp cast will not kill my pts' chains. with a rdm or brd, i often cast haste on 2 of the melees. with refresh, i often get the mp right back before the puller even brings the mob back, if i haste another melee as soon as the puller flashes an 'inc' message.

the only time i feel that haste is a total waste is on a sam. unless the only 2 melees are a sam and a pld, i will not cast haste on a sam. i would much rather have the other melee catch up to the sam in terms of tp.

i form most of my pts and try to always have a rdm or a brd, but if for whatever reason i dont, i still find that i have plenty of mp to cast haste on at least one member.

[Synbios]

Originally posted by Issaac
I think ill investigate the money once i got all my other spells. I dont think its realy worth it from what i heard now. If the time it holds whould be longer or there where a grouphaste version of the spell, that would be much better.

Grouphaste
Hold time: 10 minutes
Mana: 150

*dream*

Garuda gets Hastega, at 48 I believe.

[AlthornCS]

Originally posted by hageshiku
the only time i feel that haste is a total waste is on a sam. unless the only 2 melees are a sam and a pld, i will not cast haste on a sam. i would much rather have the other melee catch up to the sam in terms of tp.

I'm in complete disagreement with this, for a couple of reasons.

First is because of the enmity issue. Haste boosts damage, which makes it more likely that the hasted class will get aggro. Its been my experience that Samurai make decent secondary tanks, whereas dragoons and dark knights just plain disintegrate the moment a monster looks cross-eyed at them.

Second is that samurai can do some fairly spectacular things even with non-hasted tp build-up. With haste going, they get even scarier. If you've got a samurai and two other melee characters, instead of having one long chain, you can set up two completely different chains at different points in the fight, which means that your casters get more opportunities to burst.

[Linaaa]

My set PT line-up is: WHM/BLM/BRD/PLD/RNG/THF

I always haste THF as soon as possible, and haste RNG also when I have more time. It's faster TP building. :sweat:

[Klumps]

Haste is probably balanced so that it won't allow your xp chains to get much, if any longer. However, you should finish those xp chains quicker (kill same amount of mobs with same MP expenditure in a shorter amount of time), which, in a place where your pulls are NOT limited, is a very good thing.

Now, in Crawler's Nest or say, Garlaige basement, there wouldn't be much point to haste, as there's always tons of competion for the spawns there, so there's not much point to killing your spawns quicker when you'll probably end up waiting for more spawns after you regain MP anyway.

At least, that's the way I see it. I may be wrong.