+Weapon Skill > +Magic Accuracy

[Yeager]

Test a freshly burned mage with next to no magic skill but capped melee skill and check resist rates?

Its POSSIBLE se fked up and removed magic skill as part of the macc formula lol

My Leathercraft mule has Lv. 1 RDM and no Staff skill. I can level it using Sword exclusively to 30, then burn it to 99. I'll still only use sword, and get it capped at 99. I can send over a Soothsayer Staff and a Buramenk'ah and do some testing that way. Just bear in mind it would take some time to pull it off, considering my work schedule and all.

[Ascadia]

From FFXIAH:


That says to me "Subjob spells are now viable against anything but top tier endgame content" - as long as he wasn't testing with Stun.

Correct. I cycled through all of the Absorb- spells, including Ab-TP, on pretty much all of the easily accessible mob families in those zones. About to go pop Mata for some higher-level tests.

[Darkmagi]

I went out to yorcia vs T mobs with soothsayer+naked rdm and didn't experience resist issues, so idk

[cdgreg]

What is your staff skill?

[Yeager]

I went out to yorcia vs T mobs with soothsayer+naked rdm and didn't experience resist issues, so idk

It may also depend on what sub you were using. If you subbed something that has Staff skill, it will show up on the list when you check out your combat skills.

If you really wanted to test it, use a sub that has no Staff skill, like RNG or something.

[Yeager]

What is your staff skill?

Just checked. 214.

[dasva]

So tried landed songs on stuff right outside adoulin as a rdm/brd with 414 swd skill and Bura but only 16 singing skill... as expected almost all resists. So pretty much say with confidence they didn't just do something really weird like substitute weapon for magic skill especially since I can land enfeebles naked with a little under 400 enfeeble easy.

[Sechs]

So you're saying it's only the +skill on the weapon that's getting converted into +macc?
Not sure if BRD was the best thing to test though given how differently it works from enfeebling

[CDF]

Did this on an Arboreal Bastion in Yorcia Weald using Aero in various combinations of Dark Arts (DA) and Kiji.

Full Aero damage is 14, half is 7, one-quarter is 3 and one-eighth is 1.

NIN 99/SCH 49 (Tarutaru; INT 107). Kiji has item level 113, katana skill +153. Base katana skill is 433 (417+16). I didn't have a negative control katana.

386 elemental skill; Kiji 
Full: 27/30
 1/2:  3/30
 1/4:  0/30
 1/8:  0/30

386 elemental skill; no katana
Full:  1/30
 1/2:  1/30
 1/4:  4/30
 1/8: 24/30

149 elemental skill; Kiji
Full:  3/30
 1/2:  0/30
 1/4:  1/30
 1/8: 26/30

149 elemental skill; no katana
Full:  2/30
 1/2:  5/30
 1/4:  3/30
 1/8: 20/30

Raw data:

Spoiler: show

DA+Kiji		Nothing		DA+Kiji		DA only
7		3		1		14
14		1		1		1
14		7		1		3
14		1		1		7
14		7		1		1
14		7		14		1
14		1		1		1
14		1		1		1
14		3		1		1
14		14		1		1
14		1		1		1
14		1		1		1
14		1		1		1
14		7		1		1
14		1		1		1
14		1		1		3
14		1		1		1
7		1		1		1
14		1		1		1
14		14		14		1
14		1		1		1
7		1		1		1
14		1		14		1
14		1		1		1
14		3		1		3
14		1		3		1
14		1		1		1
14		1		1		3
14		7		1		1
14		1		1		1

So "hit" rate is bad until Kiji is added on top of 386 elemental skill (from active Dark Arts) so this is consistent with the idea that additional magic accuracy comes only from the item level weapon and native weapon skill contributes nothing. (Note: Hit rate is bad with Kiji and capped katana skill with 149 elemental skill, suggesting native or base skill has nothing to do with magic accuracy. Ok, so I don't have a negative control with no katana skill whatsoever but I'm not getting on the test server to check that.)

This can explain previous observations. For example, Soothsayer Staff is ilvl 113 with 162 staff skill whereas Izhiikoh is ilvl 119 with 242 dagger skill. Whatever the magic accuracy difference is between the two, taking SE at its word it's not surprising to me that there were fewer resists with the dagger independent of differences in base/native combat skill between the two weapon types, as previously weapons with higher ilevel tended to have more macc than those with lower ilevel (Tamaxchi being one notable exception). (We need some evidence to determine that magic accuracy increases only from the item level weapon. Technically I haven't shown that affirmatively but if I were to get on the test server and zero out katana skill, I'm confident I would get mostly unresisted nukes with Kiji and Dark Arts. If I get around to it)

[Sechs]

Keep in mind that EVEN if it turns out that the whole skill (basic + the one on weapon) gets converted into Macc, this only happens when you have an ilevel weapon equipped.
Just like many other things in SoA, for instance the pet level on BST.

I don't think they changed the previous rules for magic damage. The new Skill>Macc thing is only an *additional* source of Magic Accuracy, and this conversion is only calculated when you have an ilevel weapon equipped.


So from this point of view doing test without any weapon equipped doesn't really make sense, should have compared Kiji with something else where you have minor overall skill.
Like for instance if your dagger skill is noticeably far below your Katana skill, you could have performed the same test with an aphotic Kukri.
With similar numbers to Kiji ==> conclusion would be that only the skill on the weapon gets converted
With lower numbers to Kiji ==> overall skill gets converted and not just the one on the weapon

Needs the difference between your Dagger and Katana skill to be above a certain amount though. If they're both capped or too close to each other it might ruin the test.

[CDF]

Keep in mind that EVEN if it turns out that the whole skill (basic + the one on weapon) gets converted into Macc, this only happens when you have an ilevel weapon equipped.
Just like many other things in SoA, for instance the pet level on BST.

I don't think they changed the previous rules for magic damage. The new Skill>Macc thing is only an *additional* source of Magic Accuracy, and this conversion is only calculated when you have an ilevel weapon equipped.


So from this point of view doing test without any weapon equipped doesn't really make sense, should have compared Kiji with something else where you have minor overall skill.
Like for instance if your dagger skill is noticeably far below your Katana skill, you could have performed the same test with an aphotic Kukri.
With similar numbers to Kiji ==> conclusion would be that only the skill on the weapon gets converted
With lower numbers to Kiji ==> overall skill gets converted and not just the one on the weapon

Needs the difference between your Dagger and Katana skill to be above a certain amount though. If they're both capped or too close to each other it might ruin the test.

You do realize the update notes said nothing about combat skill, right?
Combat skill is likely to correlate with magic accuracy but only in the sense that magic accuracy is some function of item level (or maybe not given they slapped on seemingly random values of magic accuracy on weapons that had no apparent relation to item level before the version update, like Tamaxchi vs Soothsayer Staff). At least this makes more sense that magic accuracy being a direct function of the combat skill on the weapon (example, Aphotic Kukri has 9 more combat skill than Kiji but really why would anyone expect the Kukri to have more magic accuracy without any evidence... same item level).

I'm about to check Kiji with zero katana skill don't need to bring in dagger (inb4 test server not being representative of the actual game)

[Sechs]

You do realize the update notes said nothing about combat skill, right?

Yes this has been discussed already in the previous posts and in the other thread as well.

(inb4 test server not being representative of the actual game)

Don't see why it shouldn't be representative, if it's up to date with the changes brought in by the latest live server patch.

[CDF]

The point is that there's nothing more logical about this "total skill theory" than item level weapons just having some magic accuracy bonus as a function of the skill on the weapon or ilvl or whatever since you can't really infer either of those mechanisms from the version update notes.

Anyway just did this on the test server. With 0 katana skill, Dark Arts, and Kiji, 29/30 full damage Aero (an initial run of 24 consecutive full-damage nukes followed by a half-resist.

As I showed previously, the total combat skill (native skill + weapon combat skill) hypothesis doesn't seem to apply as my "hit" rate was more or less floored with Kiji and 149 elemental magic skill (no Dark Arts), and I had capped hit rate with both Kiji/0 base katana skill and Kiji/capped katana skill (given 386 elemental magic skill).

It appears more likely that there is just some magic accuracy bonus from item level weapons, based on the literal statement from the update notes (not trying to infer things based on nothing) and anecdotally higher ilevel weapons seem to have more magic accuracy than lower ilevel weapons.

SS from test server providing some cover that I'm not just trying to troll/make shit up:

Spoiler: show

Finally, this does NOT let you say that the magic accuracy bonus is a function of ("converted") combat skill on the weapon because combat skill differences will be confounded with item level differences (at least with currently available options), at least to the extent that no one is going to collect enough data to overcome the confounding or do a thousand casts to figure out whether Aphotic Kukri has more macc than Kiji.

[Sechs]

Wether it's a fixed value proportional to the weapon ilevel or a converted value from the +skill present on the weapon (as you said, would be really hard to pinpoint given the fact that there are no big differences available between weapons of the same ilevel and their +skill bonuses) I guess your test at least shows that it has NOTHING to do with overall skill, but just the skill on the weapon.
RDMs shouldn't worry about staff nuking being dead then :D

On the other hand BRDs should probably use an Izhiikoh rather than a Soothsayer Staff.
Soothsayer can get an additional +10 macc in theory but I doubt that's gonna be enough to offset the differences in ilevel/skill with the dagger.

Ungh... gonna feel strange debuffing stuff while mainhanding an Izhiikoh lol

[Damane]

Wether it's a fixed value proportional to the weapon ilevel or a converted value from the +skill present on the weapon (as you said, would be really hard to pinpoint given the fact that there are no big differences available between weapons of the same ilevel and their +skill bonuses) I guess your test at least shows that it has NOTHING to do with overall skill, but just the skill on the weapon.
RDMs shouldn't worry about staff nuking being dead then :D

On the other hand BRDs should probably use an Izhiikoh rather than a Soothsayer Staff.
Soothsayer can get an additional +10 macc in theory but I doubt that's gonna be enough to offset the differences in ilevel/skill with the dagger.

Ungh... gonna feel strange debuffing stuff while mainhanding an Izhiikoh lol

if mythic or generally REM update slaps equal or more skill on the weapons they will be superior, especially considering blm brd rdm sch whm mythic considering their macc stuff doesnt get removed. with aftermath they would be defintly better if haveing the same skill. i wonder how much magic dmg + the blm and sch mythic end up haveing. count 60 mab on top of that from the blm mythic...

november update will show lets hope they surprise us with an additional geo and run mythic

[dasva]

So you're saying it's only the +skill on the weapon that's getting converted into +macc?
Not sure if BRD was the best thing to test though given how differently it works from enfeebling

Yes I'm saying that what the update notes said is correct and not some random idea. And it's the only offensive magic I don't have leveled. And even if you account for halving of the skill due to combined nature of brd I should've still had a decent hit rate with 656 combined swd skill. And even that idea doesn't make sense considering if they did substitute skill like that it would mean they destroyed brds macc completely

[Sechs]

So, judging from THIS post on the official forums:

• +Macc bonus is not directly related to the ilevel (Iztaasu+1 and Lehbrahig+1 both are ilevel 113 but have different amounts of +macc)
• +Macc bonus is not a 1:1 conversion from +skill (Atinian Staff has +215 skill and gives +203 Macc)

Wonder what kind of formula they used. Makes me think if it's even an automatic conversion that uses a certain formula or if it's just a manually set value, different for each weapon.
Also their sentence "Fundamentally, we’ve given a higher value of "magic accuracy skill +" to weapons used by backline jobs". Dunno if I can say that it does make sense, but I like this approach.
Now going back to the Izhiikoh vs Soothsayer for BRD, from this sentence you'd be leaning to think that Soothsayer should still be better, but then there's another sentence: "Also, higher values of "magic accuracy skill +" will be applied to higher item level equipment."
So while this is understandable, it also is confusing, up to the point it makes me wonder why they had to hide the stat. I mean, if it was a 1:1 conversion from skill or 1:X conversion rate, you'd be able to know the approximate value and understand if item X is better or wose than item Y. But now it's just gonna be a guessing game...
Take Izhiikoh vs Soothsayer again.
If they were the same iLevel soothsayer should win, but they're not since Soothsayer is 113 and Izhiikoh is 119.
Is the amount of additional +macc Izhiikoh gets thanks to the higher ilevel enough to offset and eventually trump Soothsayer's? Which should have an additional bonus thanks to it being a "backline job" weapon?

/shrugs

[CDF]

For now, it seems the only difference between magic accuracy from ilevel weapons and normal magic accuracy is that "magic accuracy will now increase when wielding a weapon with a displayed item level in the main hand" and that increase does not apply to ilevel weapons equipped in the off-hand or ranged slots (which they attempted to make explicit but something was lost in the "official" translation of Matsui's comments).

And all Matsui is saying (I hope) is that the effective magic accuracy bonus derived from ilevel weapons will differ in value from the "magic accuracy skill+" (for ilevel weapons) to be displayed to the item help text next update, not that the example values are the real macc bonuses today (I assume they are real so it's something to go off) and that they will be adjusted in November.

Makes you wonder why it can't just be a 1:1 equivalence between "magic accuracy skill+" and "effective/equivalent magic accuracy" conditional on the weapon being equipped in the main-hand slot. WTF?

From yesterday:

Matsui: Magic Accuracy Skill

Hello, it's Matsui.

I received some questions and wanted to provide a few responses.

How the hell are you supposed to know how much the magic accuracy rises from the weapons without any indication?

Unlike other forms of magic accuracy, because the impact of magic accuracy from these weapons only applies when the weapon is equipped as the main weapon, to avoid confusion, it is not currently shown on the description. However,
the development team is thinking that some indication of the value is needed, so in the November version update we will be adding a new item to the help text called "Magic Accuracy skill +." In the meanwhile, I apologize for the inconvenience and thank you for your patience.

...

※We have described these values as magic accuracy equivalent. The values are different from the magic accuracy skill values which will later be displayed in the item help text.

Compared to the translation on the official forums (link):

Matsui here.

I would like to answer a couple of questions that we've received.

Exactly what weapons will increase magic accuracy? It's not listed on the item so can we have some kind of guide?

As the effects given to magical accuracy from equipping a weapon in your main hand are different from the existing "magic accuracy+" stat, we decided not to list them on items to prevent confusion. However, the development team feels that there should be some kind of indication, and in the November version update we will be adding the new "magic accuracy skill+" stat to the item help text for easy confirmation (stat name is subject to change).

I apologize for the confusion in the meantime.

...

*The "magic accuracy +" value listed in the table is the value when "magic accuracy skill +" is converted into "magic accuracy +." The value will be different than that which will be listed in the item help text.

[Sechs]

Maybe it's a matter of bad translations, too much politeness hindering the real meaning they try to convey to us through words... or something else.
But the result is that this new system, while really interesting, seems very convoluted and confusing.
Or am I the only one feeling confused here?


Like in november they are gonna put an additional text in the item description concerning magic accuracy.
What will this value represent? A bonus specific to that weapon? Or a value summarizing the amount of macc you get from the Skill>Macc conversion?
Because from Matsui's description (talking about two different bonuses/values etc) I'm kinda leaning for the first, but... it doesn't make sense with many other sentences they said (like the conversion rate being different for backlinejobs weapons compared to the others)

[CDF]

Since we have nothing else to go off but what Matsui has said and the examples he has given, one set of reasonable interpretations is as follows:

- It is straightforward from the official translation that "magic accuracy skill+" is an item attribute that is going to show up in the item help text.

- A given value of the "magic accuracy skill+" attribute will be specific for the weapon that displays it.

- There is no reason to conflate this "magic accuracy skill+" attribute with combat skill. (Ex: Lehbrailg +1 and Iztaasu +1 have 162 combat skill but have different "magic accuracy skill+")

- The "Magic accuracy skill+" attribute will tend to be higher for weapons with higher item level vs. lower item level (Lehbrailg +1 vs Atinian Staff)

- The "magic accuracy skill+" attribute will tend to be higher for weapons for backline jobs vs frontline jobs (again Lehbrailg +1 vs Iztaasu +1)

Shelve any previous notions about direct "conversion" of combat skill/ilevel etc. They are muddying the waters right now. There will be correlation obviously though.

The only issue I have is why exactly "magic accuracy skill+" can't be 1:1 with effective/equivalent magic accuracy. It just opens the door for b.s. and unhelpful misinterpretations for what it's actually supposed to be.