Critical Attack Bonus caps at 100% (Critical Hit Damage) (Updated May 2011)

[Thorny]

It depends if you gain fSTR from VV, if STR is a WS mod, if your WS can crit, etc etc. For jobs with low weapon rank (Daggers, Katanas, H2H, etc), I can't imagine VV will pull ahead. (assuming 40STR from Furtherances, you're already ~fSTR+10, another 12 STR from food/gear in TP caps your fSTR up to a D53 weapon.)

20% critrate is going to be about
3*1.3*.75 + 2*.25 = 3.425
3*1.3*.55 + 2*.45 = 3.045
= 12.4% boost in global damage, slightly higher if you use more critrate enhancing gear(I know monk can tp in loki's, a few jobs can tp in their ammo or cavaros, etc).

If we were to assume the DA on violet is 10%, 1.15/1.05 = 9.5% boost in tp damage, with a 19.9% boost to ws damage through frequency. It doesn't even need the regain or STR to come out ahead of gnarled horn if you aren't using the AGI or counter. An argument for using GH over VV needs proof that VV's double attack rate is lower than the current assumption. There are a TON of variables involved:
1. Does your job have native DA? Do you TP in any DA gear besides brutal? (WAR)
2. Does your job have counter(drastically increasing returns)? Do you routinely cast shadows? Do you have enough hate to make use of the counter? (MNK has counter, DNC THF etc won't have hate enough to use it)
3. Do you cap FSTR without violet? If so, does your WS have a STR modifier? (It's still 30 attack, most 2h won't cap without it, and your assumption is that mob VIt is equal to your base STR.. pretty flawed)
4. Do you make any use of AGI? (Blade: Hi NIN, THF(to a lesser extent))
5. Does the regain have any impact on your tp cycle? Dual wielders will always benefit, properly geared single wielders would need to incorporate it into their 6hit. If so, does it free up any useful gear? (It's worth quite a bit comparatively. You need to include it)
6. How much critical damage+ gear do you tp in? Obviously, this only applies if it beats the other options. (Cerb+1 vs Cavaros depends on the job and their current fstr, loki's is a given for mnk but most other jobs that can equip it use some sort of haste body. Qirmiz/Charis feather is a given.)

The only jobs I can see GH being a clear winner for are NIN(with blade:hi) and mnk/war, and that's only because a 65-75% counter jump is taking out 28.6% of your melee damage taken.

[Byrthnoth]

Well, I can calculate my max damage normal hit and see it in parses, so my assumption of being fSTR capped isn't as flawed as you might think. Abyssea mobs don't seem to have crazy VITs. Also, I've never parsed VV as a 10% DA boost. It always ends up being 3-7% in parses where I don't get any triple attacks (I've been using it as my metric for combined attack rounds). It's pretty safe to say it's 5% imop.

[Neisan]

Backwards calculation on cocks in chasm came up with around 89 Vit, assuming the mob is War/War and level 92. Still working on finishing numbers for other mobs and makign a proper sample size but I have to agree, mobs don't have crazy vit values possibly barring certain NMs or something that's like pld or mnk (Bats in Vunk seem below this number but I couldn't figure exactly how much they were).

[Kirschy]

Update 5/2011

Lv90 Ranger now has the job trait Dead Aim. (+40% Critical Damage Bonus)
Combined with Brave Grip (+3%), Cavaros Mantle (3%), and Loki's Body (5%). Total 51% Critical Damage Bonus:

(Lightning Bow + Demon Arrow)
http://img263.imageshack.us/img263/6718/rngcrit1.png

273 * 1.25(Crit) = 341
341 * 1.51(Crit Bonus) = 514
514 * 1.24(Pierce Bonus) = 642 *Matches*

Next test in Abyssea. Added RR(+30%) and SS(+30%) for a total of 111% Crit Damage Bonus:
http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/2741/rngcrit2.png

273 * 1.25 = 341
341 * 2 = 682

Critical Attack Bonus seems to cap at 100% now from all sources. (Trait, Equip, Atma) I don't believe there's any breakdown for an individual cap, but if anyone sees anything to the contrary should post!

[Malacite]

^ Sweet Jesus it's +40%?

Hi2u Gandiva. I know a few RNG who are probably happier than a pig in shit right now.

What about today's emergency maint though? Is it still 100% or was that just a bug that they fixed in today's patch?

[pnavaja]

So if the new Crit dmg caps at 100% should expect higher weapon skill numbers from all the crit ws weapons, and the jobs whiout a good crit ws (Drk, Sam ) should get a bigger gap /sigh.

Wold like to see some Ukko's Fury, Blade Hi Numbers.

[Churchill]

I don't think it was "fixed", haven't got on the jobs I was on last night to test some of this, but while playing WAR today I was doing approx 100dmg more on zerked crits.

[Deader2818]

Would this mean SS/RR/GH are best now or SS/RR/AoA?

[Khajit]

AoA. Although you might want to double check vs Alpha and omega since for some reason it beat AoA according to the spreadsheets for a few jobs.

[Kirschy]

I should have added, but all testing was done post 5/10 maint. So based on that + patch notes, I'm fairly sure this new cap is here to stay~

[Malacite]

AoA. Although you might want to double check vs Alpha and omega since for some reason it beat AoA according to the spreadsheets for a few jobs.

Possibly from the +40 attack it gives?

Only thing I can think of. And that's good to hear Kirschy (well, for jobs with Crit WS anyway lol )

[Kaelan?]

It might be worth checking if this still applies on other jobs besides ranger. The update notes specifically said:

The following job traits and attributes will see their maximum level of effectiveness adjusted by equipment, magic, and/or job abilities.
Critical Hit Rate / Critical Hit Damage / Beast Killer / Plantoid Killer / Vermin Killer / Lizard Killer / Bird Killer / Amorph Killer / Aquan Killer / Undead Killer / Arcana Killer / Demon Killer / Dragon Killer / Fast Cast / Kick Attacks / Skillchain Bonus / Conserve MP / Magic Burst Bonus / Snap Shot / Recycle / Ninja Tool Expertise

Which you could take to imply that the cap is only raised if you have something like Dead Aim to push it higher than normal (though it's entirely possible you could get a similar effect with, say, Blood Rage, since it does mention job abilities). It would fit with the MDT change which also only applies to Aegis PLDs, rather than everyone. I'm also curious whether this means you can get more out of Fast Cast on RDM and Kicks on MNK now.

Edit: Cap seems to apply on WAR too. I'm getting a pretty obvious difference between :

Trait(5%) + AF3+2 Feet(10%) + SS(30%) + RR(30%) = 75%
http://i416.photobucket.com/albums/p...nbg/Crit_1.png

and

Trait(5%) + AF3+2 Feet(10%) + SS(30%) + RR(30%) + Blood Rage(20%) = 95%
http://i416.photobucket.com/albums/p...nbg/Crit_2.png

which roughly coincides with

390 * 1.75 = 682
390 * 1.95 = 760

If it wasn't just a global cap increase, the difference should otherwise either not be there at all (if the cap was still 50 for non-RNGs) or be bigger (if it got raised from 50 to 100 just because of Blood Rage). So yeah, I guess it does apply to everything now.

[Kirschy]

It might be worth checking if this still applies on other jobs besides ranger. The update notes specifically said:



Which you could take to imply that the cap is only raised if you have something like Dead Aim to push it higher than normal (though it's entirely possible you could get a similar effect with, say, Blood Rage, since it does mention job abilities). It would fit with the MDT change which also only applies to Aegis PLDs, rather than everyone. I'm also curious whether this means you can get more out of Fast Cast on RDM and Kicks on MNK now.

I considered this, but the trait is only +40%. If it capped at 90%, it might break down with individual caps, but it seems unlikely since 100% doesn't break down nicely between 40% trait, 11% eq, 60% atma. I will get a test in on a non-rng job when I get a chance, but I doubt we'll see a difference. Lots of people have reported seeing higher than usual damage on their normal melee jobs.

[Arthars]

great...just as i am doing gun for alternative....now bow is the king again haha

i hope its not a bug tho XD

this also means NIN can potentially get a 50% WS crit damage increase than before XD

inc 9-10k blade hi!

[Kirschy]

great...just as i am doing gun for alternative....now bow is the king again haha

i hope its not a bug tho XD

Doubt it, as Kaelan posted, the update notes make it seem this was intended

[Arthars]

now i gotta decide which atma for NIN..... RR and AoA prolly a must so its battle between GH and SS :X

WAR are more straight forward now!!! RR AOA SS!

[Mojo]

Honestly bow was somewhat borderline before Dead Aim. Only 3.75 total fTP on Jishnu's Radiance. Even with all crits (which is quite exceptional), it equated to only '4.6875 fTP.' It more or relied on critical attack bonus to pull ahead, and this stat was virtually inaccessible for RNG outside of Abyssea.

[Kirschy]

now i gotta decide which atma for NIN..... RR and AoA prolly a must so its battle between GH and SS :X

WAR are more straight forward now!!! RR AOA SS!

I've been hearing rumors about ddex cap being raised too, which is gonna change some things. Although for NIN GH is still a huge boost to your WS mods, so *shrug. Then you have the whole DA/TA canceling out crap. I'll leave it to the people who model to figure this stuff out once all the testing is done =x

[Karbuncle]

I've been hearing rumors about ddex cap being raised too, which is gonna change some things. Although for NIN GH is still a huge boost to your WS mods, so *shrug. Then you have the whole DA/TA canceling out crap. I'll leave it to the people who model to figure this stuff out once all the testing is done =x

Thought that was shown to just be a glitch with the Parser the person was using?

[Arthars]

yea NIN's atma(those with empyrean) really hard to decide now :X