Bard Detail

[Judai]

ok, so no point in even thinking about whats best for now then

[Majidah]

Only reason to wear DL Hands is IF you NEED the Acc. Meaning you aren't fully geared yet(no DL Accs) or you picked up AF2 Pants and are missing Acc somewhere else, or you just have the worst luck in the world and Tox Legs/Hands don't exist.

If you don't need the acc, it's 8DET vs 11Crit. Then again, we also use Tox Ring and Neck, right? People keep saying, crit is over valued and listing the next piece of gear they didn't bother with, with crit on it. How much crit are you dropping because "DL gear is higher, therefore better" or "Tox Acces. are fine"?

What are you wearing?

Tox Ring? -10 crit
Tox Neck or DL Neck? -11 crit
Tox Ears? -12 crit
DL Hands? -11 to 14crit(AF is decent and you get 10acc back, -4Dex hurts though)
DL Legs? -24 crit

Someone has asked about all of these items at some point and people defend each one because, "crit isn't the most amazing thing ever omg".

-68 crit isn't a big deal?

If it's not your main job, or you don't do coil, or you don't really care, then there was no need to really ask about one item. If some things just never drop for you, ok, but some stuff is clearly the best piece on your way to BIS items and you should aim for it until you get the BIS.

You should look at your gear and say;

Do I have enough Acc? Yes?
Is there a major discrepancy between Dex on the items? No?
Does one have crit? Yes?
Use it.

I'm sorry but -2 dex -8 det -16 acc -3 vit isn't worth +11 crit. I have had out damaged countless of bards with higher crit rate.

Is crit good? Yes.
Is it better than a considerable boost in base damage, accuracy and some max hp? No.

[Judai]

As I said, if you don't need the acc. Which makes the acc pointless and therefore means it's 2dex, lol8det vs 11crit, lolSkillSpd. 3 vit isn't going to make or break anything. The second point was, how many pieces with crit do we keep dropping because w/e man it's AK who cares lol.

Pointless comment to validate my claims with no evidence that might possibly be true. I've out parsed plenty of FULL DL RELIC BRDs when I had freaken AF hands and Garuda Bow.

It's cool though, do w/e you want.

[Viar]

If you're going in coil you're going to want some acc over crit anyways, so DL hands are not exactly gimp/rubbish, and most coil brds are going to have AF2 hands anyways. I could see making a big deal out of some lvl 45 shit or something, but whatever yo, get those AK crits lmao.

It's easy to get enough acc without using DL hands though, when I did my first coil, I had 470+ acc with no food and no mythology/philosophy accessory and I was using Tox hands.

[Day]

It depends of rest of gear, that's why I'm saying you can't make blanket statements like use tox until AF2. I had BRD AF2 Pants and Ring when I first went in, and wasn't enough acc using Tox. Once you get AF2 the whole debate is null.

My main point is that difference is mostly minimal, and that you're still debating two items that aren't best in slot so I don't really see why it matters.

I'm still not even sure +11 crit is worth all the shit you give up on DL hands to be honest. I'm yet to see any real math or extended parse testing. Mostly I just see word of mouth that crit is top dog.

[Majidah]

As I said, if you don't need the acc. Which makes the acc pointless and therefore means it's 2dex, lol8det vs 11crit, lolSkillSpd. 3 vit isn't going to make or break anything. The second point was, how many pieces with crit do we keep dropping because w/e man it's AK who cares lol.

Uhm. You can't honestly believe 8 det and 2 det is worse than 11 crit. Not to mention 3 vit actually adds up in a good setup... As I said before, giving up that much dex, det, acc, vit isn't worth that amount of crit. And not only that, there are always better available options.

As I said before, replacing DL with Tox equals -2 dex, -8 det, -16 acc, -3 vit, +11 crit which impact your overall damage as:
WS Absolute Increase: -0.33
% WS Increase: -0.25 %
WS DPS Abs Increase: -0.14
% WS DPS Increase: -0.25 %
AA Absolute Increase: -0.96
% AA Increase: -0.65 %
AA DPS Abs Increase: -0.29
% AA DPS Increase: -0.65 %

Meanwhile, replacing a DL choker with a fully melded HQ imp op choker (capping vit, acc and det) net dex -2 det +1 crit +11 acc -1 vit +7 which translates to

WS Absolute Increase: 0.01
% WS Increase: 0.01 %
WS DPS Abs Increase: 0.00
% WS DPS Increase: 0.01 %
AA Absolute Increase: 0.10
% AA Increase: 0.07 %
AA DPS Abs Increase: 0.03
% AA DPS Increase: 0.07 %

As you can see, you can net the same crit rate than the hands by exchanging your neck piece. The gain in base damage will be, albeit minimal, positive. Meanwhile replacing DL hands with Tox gives you the same amount of crit, plus a considerable decrease of base damage.

And those 7 vit translate into 104 HP. Which would mean off top of my head (I'm not logged in to check atm) that the 3 vit you lol'd at would be about 48 hp, which when worn with this neck piece would be a 148 HP increment with better base stats.



IMO tox hands will never be better than DL hands. Under no situation. It isn't a matter of what pants are you wearing.

[Deadgye]

It'd be cool if you sourced your math numbers, since without it they're the same to me as made up numbers. :/

[Majidah]

It'd be cool if you sourced your math numbers, since without it they're the same to me as made up numbers. :/

Calculations done using http://valk.dancing-mad.com/?page_id=260
Base stats and such using my profile http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodest...racter/156279/

And I don't want to hear people giving me shit about +1, it glows, it sparkles, and when I got it basically no one had +1s making it extremely eye catching so I don't regret getting it as first piece (I get my body on monday). lol

[ejact]

And I don't want to hear people giving me shit about +1, it glows, it sparkles, and when I got it basically no one had +1s making it extremely eye catching so I don't regret getting it as first piece (I get my body on monday). lol

It also technically helps with damage limit break.

[Ksandra]

Honestly, i think people bitching about other's upgrade order is just silly unless they were like...specifically trying to get gear with no accuracy on it or some shit.

Game is too new as is, and a lot of people started upgrading before math crunching happened.

And yes, glowy is always tempting.

[Majidah]

And yes, glowy is always tempting.

Sparks too!

It also technically helps with damage limit break.

What do you mean by this? Does the pooled party weapon damage have an effect on offensive limit breaks?

[Krandor]

Limit break damage is based off the weapon damage off the entire party.

[Judai]

final post on this shit. Two of you are taking it really personal that your DL Hands are not the best or most necessary item ever.

It depends of rest of gear, that's why I'm saying you can't make blanket statements like use tox until AF2. I had BRD AF2 Pants and Ring when I first went in, and wasn't enough acc using Tox. Once you get AF2 the whole debate is null.

I didn't make a blanket statement. I said IF YOU DON'T NEED THE ACCURACY. Caps because apparently you can't read. My point was specific to people who chose pants over body for AF2, like you. However, upgrading the Rings/Ears/Wrists to DL before Hands means you probably will never really need DL Hands. What's the harm in helping people upgrade better otw to BIS? Not everyone has all day to play or upgrade to every piece of DL, and some are upgrading multiple jobs. DL Hands should be a low priority, if ever needed, upgrade imo.

Uhm. You can't honestly believe 8 det and 2 det is worse than 11 crit. Not to mention 3 vit actually adds up in a good setup... As I said before, giving up that much dex, det, acc, vit isn't worth that amount of crit. And not only that, there are always better available options.

As you can see, you can net the same crit rate than the hands by exchanging your neck piece. The gain in base damage will be, albeit minimal, positive. Meanwhile replacing DL hands with Tox gives you the same amount of crit, plus a considerable decrease of base damage.

IMO tox hands will never be better than DL hands. Under no situation. It isn't a matter of what pants are you wearing.

Again, IF YOU DON'T NEED THE ACCURACY. Meaning, you don't add the Acc into your equations, as it's meaningless. How is that hard to understand? Also, you can't completely account for the 11 crit in the damage formulas. So you are losing almost nothing, for almost 1% extra crit. Sure, neither seems to be major but which is merely a slight dmg increase, and which is both a dmg increase and gives you extra BLs?

And if you wear BOTH, IMP choker and Tox hands, suddenly it's +22 crit you are losing for those weak numbers you posted. .33 is considerable ws damage increase? Did you try to sell me on 48hp as well? Really? I don't have either DL Neck or Hands, and somehow I still happened to have enough Accuracy to do everything I wanted to do.

lol

I wasn't bitching about people and their bad upgrades, I was trying to give people who are upgrading NOW, a better idea of how/what they should be upgrading. It's going to take months for people to get to BIS for everything, why would you want to gimp yourself along the way? and who knows what BIS will be when Crystal Tower comes out.

Make sure you have Accuracy for whatever you are doing.
Make sure there isn't a massive difference in DEX between the two items. (2 is not massive, 4+ is probably bad)
Use the item with Crit. (Because DET is pretty minor so far)

Don't take shit so personal people, I wasn't attacking your personal choices. I was trying to help out future BRDs so they aren't that BRD sitting there in full DL because they figured w/e, it's just AK, and occasionally Turn 1 and it's i70, so it must be better.

And seriously, BRD with Full DL and Tox Ring and Relic has 513 Accuracy. FIVE HUNDRED AND THIRTEEN. Which seems to be above the accuracy cap for Turn 5 Coil. So which pieces of gear don't have crit, that we can sub out of other stuff?

Neck, Hands, Legs, Tox Ring.

Tox Legs give you Crit and acc. Brilliant.
Imp Choker give syou crit and you can meld Acc if you need it. Brilliant.
HQ Spinel gives you Crit and you can Meld Accuracy if you need it. Brilliant.
Tox Hands give you crit and omg, you shouldn't need the Accuracy since everything else gives it to you.

So let's see.

WAY over the accuracy cap BRD with +88 crit, +48 det
or
475 Accuracy BRD (before melds or food) with +144 crit, +13 DET. And you can still Meld VIT, Accuracy, DET and Skill Speed, if you want, on two items.

Probably a hard choice for two of you though. This is of course, all before spending any Mythos, which basically says, you only need DL Hands if you get AF2 Pants first, which could be remedied by getting AF2 Hands first anyways. My bad for figuring out I would never need DL hands if I upgraded properly and hell, I didn't even upgrade properly because I picked up AF2 hat first cause it looked better then the eye patch I never got. That's all I'll say on it though, because seriously, it's getting kinda stupid. I mean, 48 vit and .33 ws abs inc, really? Really?

[Shaano]

As much as I want to go through 34 pages... Anyone able to copy/paste their macros? Gonna hit 50 and finish relic by next weekend just want to see what other shave goin on to keep my dps up~

[Spider-Dan]

Where DL hands really loses vs Tox hands is opportunity cost. AF2 hands are a better first myth buy than AF2 legs and there's a lot of better philo buys than DL hands. So if philo has no value to you (or if you cannot spend myth on BRD), then sure, I guess DL hands are worth it? Otherwise, spending philo on a marginal upgrade in a slot that's first in line to be replaced by myth gear is a hard sell.

(Imp.Op choker vs. DL choker is a false dilemma as you should have had Imp. Op from jump)

[Niiro]

Sidenote: anyone bitching about the drop rate of any given Toxo piece.

Just get the damn Militia equivalent, HQs are 1 less DEX than toxo, they ALL have crit on them, and you can meld whatever the fuck you want in addition to the crit they already have.

(for head you can use Imp.Op. Tricorne or Militia)

[Seravi Edalborez]

I refuse on the grounds that using oven mitts to draw a bow is dumb.

(Technically I'm an idiot because my very first DL buys were hands and legs, but whatever)

[FeroXs]

I refuse on the grounds that using oven mitts to draw a bow is dumb.

(Technically I'm an idiot because my very first DL buys were hands and legs, but whatever)

Stats > aesthetics!

[Eleven19]

Gunna replace my Tox neck with Imp Op thinger. What materia do I need to buy to get the most out of it? Not sludging through the argument to pull that out, lol.

Edit: I'm at 492 acc right now, so.. I'm assuming not accuracy.

[chichicha]

As much as I want to go through 34 pages... Anyone able to copy/paste their macros? Gonna hit 50 and finish relic by next weekend just want to see what other shave goin on to keep my dps up~

My macros -

Heavy Shot

/ac "Mysery's End" <t>
/ac "Bloodletter" <t>
/ac "Heavy Shot" <t>

Straight Shot
Same as Heavy Shot but without Bloodletter.

DoT

/ac "Internal Release"
/ac "Wind Bite" <t>
/wait 1
/ac "Bloodletter" <t>
/ac "Blunt Arrow" <t>
/ac "Flame Arrow" <t>
/ac "Repelling Shot" <t>
/wait 1.55
/ac "Venomous Bite" <t>

Buff ( including Quelling Strike, which I have it at lowest line of macro)
All buff lines without /wait

My sequence
Straight Shot -> DoT -> Heavy Shot macro spam and between 3s wait, I'm buffing pressing

Or (not recommended, this is more like zerking for only short time)

Straight shot -> spam Buffs until all up -> DoT macro -> Heavy Shot macro spam until Straight shot and DoT need refresh.

At some event such as Bahamut Coil, you might want to take off Blunt Arrow off your DoT. Since BRDs are rotating silence.

At AK / Titan you may want to remove repelling shot, to avoid falling off at Wall fight.

I'm sure the way I played is not maximising the DPS BRD can do. People on this forum might have different suggestion