Evisceration vs Exenterator

[noodles355]

This came up today, I've been told by someone in game that Evisceration is now stronger than Exenterator. Or at least for Brd and Dnc. And if it is for Dnc, it probably would be for Thf too right?

But I don't see how logically with all the stat vomit. I mean there's so little difference between an Exenterator and Evisceration sets now. For example mine, completely unbuffed has:
Exenterator: 196 Str 232 Agi 996 Attack
Evisceration: 201 Str 227 Dex 986 Attack

Dagger base DMG isn't very high either, 108 on Izhii, 91 on Mandau. So you're looking at very similar Attack/fStr/+WSC stat, but one WS with 6ftp 30%WSC 10% crit chance and one with 5ftp 100%WSC.

The WSC adds like just under 200 base damage to exen and just under 60 base damage to evisceration. I'm struggling to see how one extra hit and a 10% crit chance offsets than 140ish loss to base damage through WSC.

I miss the RQT, this doesn't feel like it deserves it's own topic but idk where to post >.>

[Darkmagi]

My 1/5 exenterator is beating my evisceration, no idea on spreadsheet stuff though.

[noodles355]

Is that on Thf Brd or Dnc? I know my 5/5 Exen whips my Evis on Thf.

[Darkmagi]

THF sorry

[dasva]

Maybe he was assuming crit rate augments on your skirmish gear? So maybe get up to almost 50% crit rate. Maybe they were counting dnc jas to up crit rate idk?

[Ihina]

Maybe they were eye-balling it and saw some high spikes?

[noodles355]

He said he'd put it in the spreadsheets and had Evisceration winning ("maybe not against high-lvl stuff like delve bosses, but who uses dnc on that").

The replies to this topic seem to suggest that Exenterator is still, as I had assumed, the stronger WS in general. I'd be curious to know whether unstacked it is still better than Mercy Stroke (including 5% crit AM) or if whatever changes "made Evisceration better" made Mercy better to the point of beating Exen. I doubt it but would be nice to know for sure.

Also as we lack a what's better thread any more and as this topic is fairly thiefy, am I right in assuming Thaumas is still the best TP body? We had a bit of a chat about head/hands options in new AF thread, but never got a confirmation about Thaumas staying #1, or if a R15 Manibozho might beat it. So does it ever? At the moment I'm only TPing in MAnibozho in my hybrid-eva set, but as I have both would be keen to know which I should be using in normal TP set.

[Ihina]

Thaumas unless you need accuracy.

[Motenten]

I spent yesterday rebuilding all my thf gear sets, making sure things were good after all the accumulated gear changes. What I found regarding weaponskills (primarily using Izhiikoh/Aphotic):

Exenterator (note: ran most these numbers with 4/5 Exenterator) is still the best possible solo weaponskill under pretty much any circumstances, aside from getting extra damage from a skillchain. After that is Dancing Edge, followed by Evisceration, each a fair bit behind the next. Mandau 119's Mercy Stroke is further behind those. Even adding the 5% crit rate aftermath won't cause solo Mercy Stroke total DPS to catch up to Exenterator's total solo damage (though the difference will be very small at 1/5 Exenterator).

Mercy Stroke is the best weaponskill when stacked (either SA or TA, though the SA gap is larger) and using 119 Mandau.

Rudra's Storm has the potential to be second best when stacked with SA (slightly outdoing Exenterator), if you have Pillager's gear and other specializations like +4 stat earrings; otherwise it's tied with SA+Exenterator. TA+Exenterator slightly outdoes Rudra's Storm when both are maximized; as maximization drops, the gap widens in favor of Exenterator.

Dancing Edge (stacked or solo) is a small bit below Exenterator (is basically tied with 1/5 Exenterator), Evisceration is further behind (and not likely to bridge the gap outside Abyssea), and then you have Shark Bite and Mandalic Stab trailing way behind at the end.

If you were considering the value of Evisceration's crits, or Mandalic's attack boost, SA+Evisceration and SA+Mandalic only barely manage to beat SA+Exenterator (barely more than a tie) when run unbuffed against the Tojil target.


While Evisceration got a bit of a boost after the introduction of the very high damage weapons (which favored various low-mod weaponskills), the statvomit gear has made it so that merit weaponskills get a pretty strong boost as well, and generally remain at the top of each weapon's options.

Overall summary:

119 Mandau: Stack Mercy Stroke
Lacking Mandau, if you have Rudra's Storm it can be used in place of stacked Exenterator
Lacking either of those, use Exenterator if you have it merited, or Dancing Edge if you don't
For unstacked, Exenterator or Dancing Edge
Evisceration is generally behind the rest of the weaponskills for pure damage.

[noodles355]

One thing to add I found is that if you're sat at 300%TP for whatever reason, SA Rudra's does come out ahead of SA Mercy.

I haven't got any knowledge of brd/dnc. Do you know if the above is still true for them, and how Kleos and Rime stand up against Exen/Evis for them?

[Byrthnoth]

Last time I looked, enhanced Kleos stomps Exenterator.

[noodles355]

You mean Mythic Kleos? Or Kleos boosted by Flourish?

[Ihina]

Mercy does about the same as a 200% Rudra's storm, properly geared for both.

[Byrthnoth]

You mean Mythic Kleos? Or Kleos boosted by Flourish?

Yeah, mythic.

I find that Rudra's fares somewhat poorly even with Climactic.

[Sechs]

Oh just noticed this.
I'm one of the people who said that to Noodles.
And I said that because it's what I was told in the RQ/WB threads long time ago. After that I tested in spreadsheets and confirmed the results.
Did the spreadsheet test again today and got different results, probably back then I had worse gear (we're talking about pre-skirmish, and no stuff like Nahtirah legs etc) or more simply I was testing around 3/5 Exen because I think that's the max I could afford at the time.
Either way, some further comment about today's tests.

DNC
Saber Dance active, Haste Samba active, no other buffs/food, no flourishes.
DC Nightmare Mobs => Huge difference favouring Exenterator, even at 1/5 Exen is better (barely)
Chapuli (102) => Turning point here seems to be 3-4 merits in Exen for it to be better. At 5/5 there's ~100 damage difference.

BRD
Marchx2+Minu5 active, no food or other buffs. Honestly I use Mordant Rime on BRD, don't think Evis does better.
DC Nightmare Mobs => Turning point at 3-4. ~130 damage difference at 5/5
Chapuli (102) => As above, turning point is around 3-4 merits into Exen. ~70 damage difference at 5/5


5/5 Exenterator is always the best for DNC and BRD (at least with my gear, which is not BiS but it's pretty good)
On DNC the difference on DC mobs between 5/5 Exen and Evis is huge. Like >400 or something like that.
On Chapuli (102) is not that big, but still it's there.
Two things you might need to consider gor DNC though are:
1) Feather Step (that's at least 3% Crit Rate, more often 4%, up to 7%)
2) Over TP (Evisceration does more damage with TP above 100, which doesn't happen for Exenterator)

Now in Dynamis Feather Step is practically always up, I barely played DNC in Adoulin (WKR, Reives, stuff like that) but I think I use Feather Step pretty often out of habit, this might be an error I should correct maybe.
As for overTP, in Dynamis it's always like that lol, but even in Adoulin I often get over 100% TP with Reverse Flourish and other stuff (No Foot Rise gives me >20TP etc)
Now to be honest these two things won't make Evis better than Exen, not even close, but they help making the gap a bit smaller (but still very noticeable on DC mobs at least)

I would like to hear more from other people, but for this kind of playstyle (soloplay, easy stuff etc) Exenterator is totally worth it if you go 5/5, but if you can only go 3/5 (especially if you're struggling with how to spend WS merit points) you might want to reconsider and see if it's really worth it or not compared to the other available options.
I have no clue at all about THF of course.

[Sechs]

Oh and since we're there, a question to Byrth or othe competent DNC players.
How do you handle Reverse Flourish?
Up to now I grew used to do Pyrrhic > Evis for Darkness, but I'm starting to wonder if it's worth it? I don't have Mythic so Pyrrhic is not really that spetacular damage to me.
Also, there are often situations where I can't use Reverse Flourish because it's on cooldown, but I have plenty Finishing Moves to use. In those situations I usually use a Flourish3, specifically Ternary Flourish which seems to really bump up Evis damage according to the spreadsheet.
Climatic Flourish is the one that does the least (of course, Evis can already crit by itself after all), but Climatic Flourish would last more than just WS (and with AF3+2 head it's a nice damage boost, do you have to keep it on to receive the 20%? Or just when you activate Climatic Flourish?) and has a reduced cooldown compared to Ternary

[Byrthnoth]

Reverse Flourish is always going to be a better return for your FMs than a Tier 3 Flourish. Even Wild Flourish is generally better.

Blasphemy incoming, but you don't need to use Reverse Flourish to skillchain. You can just use it and do two Exenterators in a row.

[doctorugh]

Oh and since we're there, a question to Byrth or othe competent DNC players.
How do you handle Reverse Flourish?
Up to now I grew used to do Pyrrhic > Evis for Darkness, but I'm starting to wonder if it's worth it? I don't have Mythic so Pyrrhic is not really that spetacular damage to me.
Also, there are often situations where I can't use Reverse Flourish because it's on cooldown, but I have plenty Finishing Moves to use. In those situations I usually use a Flourish3, specifically Ternary Flourish which seems to really bump up Evis damage according to the spreadsheet.
Climatic Flourish is the one that does the least (of course, Evis can already crit by itself after all), but Climatic Flourish would last more than just WS (and with AF3+2 head it's a nice damage boost, do you have to keep it on to receive the 20%? Or just when you activate Climatic Flourish?) and has a reduced cooldown compared to Ternary

PK -> EVIS for darkness will typically beat EVIS -> EXEN due to the 33% skillchain bonus, but not by any appreciable amount. Its about a 3% difference in total.

[Motenten]

With the usual YMMV caveat with respect to the gear used for these comparisons...

For Dnc, comparing Exenterator with Evisceration using level 2 Feather Step with Charis +2 feet (added Feather Step to the spreadsheet for easy use):

With mainhand at 2.25 cRatio, Exenterator wins handily at 1/5.
With mainhand at 1.90 cRatio, Exenterator ties at 3/5.
With mainhand at 1.65 cRatio, Exenterator ties at 5/5.

Below that, Evisceration should generally win, particularly since average pDif on non-crits below 1.5 start to get penalized relative to wRatio, while crits above 2.25 get a bonus relative to wRatio.

Note that these all assume capped dDex for crit rate; since it's not hard to hit 230+ dex, that seems generally likely.

On a higher tier mob like Tojil, assuming cRatio can get to something approaching 2.0 (at least), but that dDex is lower (say ~25), Exenterator is significantly ahead at even 1/5.

For higher TP values, if I start at the 2.25 cRatio level:

Evisceration ties 1/5 Exen at 175 TP
Evisceration ties 2/5 Exen at 200 TP
Evisceration ties 3/5 Exen at 225 TP
Evisceration ties 4/5 Exen at 250 TP
Evisceration almost ties 5/5 Exen at 300 TP, plus swapping out Moonshade Earring; not much room for improvement at this point, though.

If I start at the 1.9 cRatio level:

Evisceration ties 4/5 Exen at 120 TP
Evisceration ties 5/5 Exen at 160 TP


And the other alternatives:

Dancing Edge, is roughly equivalent to 3/5 Exenterator at all cRatio levels.

Exenterator should outdo Pyrrhic Kleos by around 20% with 4/5 merits, from what I can tell.


Looking at the Reverse Flourish options with 5/5 Exen and 2.25 mainhand cRatio:

At 2.25 cRatio level:

Exen + Exen: 4007 + 4007 = 8014
DE + Exen + Scission: 3704 + 3954 + 2629 = 10,287
Evis + Exen + Fragmentation: 3508 + 3872 + 3321 = 10,701
Kleos + Evis + Dark: 3215 + 3350 + 4790 = 11,355

Exen closing Scission uses Charis +2 hands
Exen closing Frag and Evis closing Dark use Charis +2 hands and Maxixi pants (assuming pants are also +10%).


This is worst case for Evis (capped attack), so doing self-Dark should always be a decent option, though the other skillchain options are pretty close as well. For mobs with less than 10k HP (eg: Dynamis), just spamming Exen is fine, of course.

[Sechs]

Reverse Flourish is always going to be a better return for your FMs than a Tier 3 Flourish. Even Wild Flourish is generally better.

Of course it is, but as I mentioned above sometimes Flourishes2 are on cooldowns and I have Finishing Moves rotting. In those situations I use a Flourish3 and I was asking if, for those situations, what I do is correct.

Blasphemy incoming, but you don't need to use Reverse Flourish to skillchain. You can just use it and do two Exenterators in a row.

That's exactely why I asked about it. Would using 2x WS without SC be a better option? or a different SC? (can SC with Evis and Exen too if I recall, but it's a level 2)
But considering I don't have Exenterator and that's not an option? What should I do? On the targets I usually fight the L3 Darkness SC tipically does more damage than Evis itself.



Tnx Motenten and doctorugh for the other input
The reason why with my test situation Evis is performing "better" on Chapuli (102) than DC Nightmare mobs ("better"= while still inferior to Exen, the difference is much smaller) is because I'm capped on attack (or very close to it) on the DC target?