Salvage Gears anyone?

[RKenshin]

FWIW I disagree with Ruke re: fulltime usukane on monk.
...
Clearly the full set is gonna outperform the full pre-salvage cookie cutter. The real question is whether we can acheive a mix-and-match build that is stronger.

Actually that was my point at the end of that post. I don't really question whether the full set will outperform a set of pre-salvage gear, but what I'm unsure about is if a full set of usukane is stronger than a mix-and-match build of usukane/other gear. I was unclear on this part in looking over my last post so that's my mistake.

Deciding between Shura/Bando/Byakko vs Usukane Togi/Gote/Haidate and any mixes of those choices is what I'm mostly up in the air about after a little further consideration. Oh and note: I do all 2 STR > 1 attack and 2 DEX > 1 acc conversions for my comparisons as I feel it is a more accurate way to compare them. With that in mind, comparing the trio to eachother it looks like this:

Shura/Bando/Byakko:
+0 STR
+15 DEX
+43 Att
+17.5 Acc

Usukane Togi/Gote/Haidate:
+13 STR
+13 DEX
+16.5 Att
+22 Acc

Difference:
+13 STR
-2 DEX
-26.5 Att
+4.5 Acc

Now the question to ask is if the loss of 26.5 Att and 2 DEX really worth +4.5 Acc and +13 STR? IMO I'd have to say no, especially considering STR's rather miniscuel roll in your overall damage/per hit average vs attack. But, I wouldn't go as far to say my opinion is the cut and dry correct answer either as I believe it can easily be debatable, which again is why I'm unsure about full usukane for MNK.

And, this is without considering the option of mixing up those three choices to make other combinations which could be more promising than this one, and give different results for the comparison. I haven't attempted to study further into other combinations at this time though.

Oh, and I purposely didn't include the haste because whether it's 5% or higher doesn't matter, as both sets you mentioned would hit the haste cap. Same for the Store TP for reasons I mentioned before.

Maybe you guys are misunderstanding "all-around" gear. At least, my definition. You guys are thinking all-around gear as in never macroing in anything else. My definition of all-around gear is versatility. Name of the game for NIN. The ability to evasion tank, while maintaining good-to-great haste build,and, most importantly, taking almost zero hit to your DD potential. Pre-salvage, this was possible, but at the cost of one or the other. You COULD evasion tank, but then you'd wear Ohat over Turban, you'd wear SH+1 over Koga/Ninja Chainmail/Haub+1, etc. Yes, you can macro for your WS, but you can't deny that while TPing and tanking in this set, your DoT takes a huge hit due to lack of haste/attack, which most of the time leads to problem holding hate.

That's where you and I are different though. I don't look for a happy medium in gear, I look for the best possible gear for a specific situation. In the case where I'm a DD/tank NIN, I'm wearing the gear with the best possible damage potential because I know I can shadow tank without much trouble if I evade at a 0% rate, and I'd rather ensure I have hate as much as possible by going with the set with the most damage output. This tends to be the frame of mind I have for everything, which is why I'm not wearing defense gear over enmity gear while tanking. And is why I have like 10+ sets of NIN gear. D:

But for the most part in the case of this gear, as I said, I'm not sure what I'd do yet. The evasion could just as easily equate to higher damage output from less time casting shadows, but as to whether it would be significant enough to make that much of a difference on exp mobs... I'm not sure, because evasion tends to be rather unreliable in small amounts for most mobs (having spent a LOT of time trying different mixes of evasion on farming/tanking NIN and often playing a 75THF). This ties to what Wizerd mentioned as well. I'm also not even sure whether or not mixes of usukane could be better than full usukane. Which again, is why I'm unsure on what I'd do. As I said before I'd need to:

1) Find out what % haste it gives.
2) Try it out for myself, because while numbers and factual comparisons are nice on paper they don't mean much until they're taken into real scenarios when the numbers are this close.

I'm also in agreement with Aurik: full Usukane is amazing for MNk as well. Hell, if anything, I'd think SAM gets the least out of this set up compared to NIN and MNK.

Well, as the information I just posted suggested, how amazing it is for MNK is still debatable IMO. I do think it's a fantastic set of gear for any job that can equip but, as to whether it's better is where it gets cloudy at the moment.

And, I have to strongly disagree with the 'SAM getting the least use out of this setup' statement. SAM is the only job that doesn't have any other debatable options available, and also is the only job to really benefit from the Store TP and not lose any attack from using the full set. It also doesn't lose any Haste (in the case of a 5% bonus), gains more Acc than any other job which tends to be more noticeable as a 2h weapon user than as a 1h weapon user, etc (as my earlier gear comparison showed).

The benefit from the evasion can be debated as if you're comparing decked out SAMs to decked out MNKs to decked out NINs, they all will do there fair share of tanking in different situations (of course some more than others but again, it depends). As a SAM I did even before getting GK, and now with GK I'm basically tanking more in any given situation than any of my jobs (with all of them qualifying as "fully equipped/meritted" IMO) aside from probably NIN/DRK on most HNMs.

However, all that evasion/tanking stuff aside, as I said from the start I'm talking strictly from a DD standpoint to begin with. So all that evasion talk is pointless in this conversation anyway as far as my specific point goes. And, considering that, IMO SAM would benefit from it the most.

Most importantly though, the primary reason why I believe this gives SAM the biggest jump in DD performance is that the improvements in this set of gear are focused primarly on faster TP gain; not so much for DoT. If it was focused in improvements on general DoT then it would excel in Attack and maybe Acc/DEX/Haste/Crit-Rate as well (depending) over comparable gear, and in which case I would probably argue that MNK and then NIN would benefit from it the most as their DoT is their strongpoint. However, this is not the case. This set excels more in Store TP/Acc/Haste improvements over the comparisons as shown in my own+Auriks numbers, which are the stats that effect how fast you gain TP the most; the primary strength that all your average SAM's equipment revolves around. This is why you don't see many SAMs pumping attack/DEX/STR builds or anything of the like with much success, because trying to focus on SAM's DoT isn't as effective.

Of course Haste/Acc do improve DoT on MNK and NIN a great deal as well but that's not what I'm arguing. DD MNK and NIN gear are more about balances of haste/acc/att/crit-rate/etc, aka your overall DoT, where SAM gear is more about haste/acc/store TP, aka your TP gain. Which are the exact stats this gear shines in as far as DD output goes.

[aurik]

FWIW I disagree with Ruke re: fulltime usukane on monk.

Clearly the full set is gonna outperform the full pre-salvage cookie cutter. The real question is whether we can acheive a mix-and-match build that is stronger.

Actually that was my point at the end of that post. I don't really doubt the full set will outperform a set of pre-salvage gear, but what I'm unsure about is if a full set of usukane is stronger than a mix-and-match build of usukane/other gear.

Deciding between Shura/Bando/Byakko vs Usukane Togi/Gote/Haidate and any mixes of those choices is what I'm mostly up in the air about after a little further consideration. Oh and note: I do all 2 STR > 1 attack and 2 DEX > 1 acc conversions for my comparisons as I feel it is a more accurate way to compare them. With that in mind, comparing the trio to eachother it looks like this:

Shura/Bando/Byakko:
+0 STR
+15 DEX
+43 Att
+17.5 Acc

Usukane Togi/Gote/Haidate:
+13 STR
+13 DEX
+16.5 Att
+22 Acc

Difference:
+13 STR
-2 DEX
-26.5 Att
+4.5 Acc

Now the question to ask is if the loss of 26.5 Att and 2 DEX really worth +4.5 Acc and +13 STR? IMO I'd have to say no, especially considering STR's rather miniscuel roll in your overall damage/per hit average vs attack. But, I wouldn't go as far to say my opinion is the cut and dry correct answer either as I believe it can easily be debatable, which again is why I'm unsure about full usukane for MNK.

And, this is without considering the option of mixing up those three choices to make other combinations which could be more promising than this one, and give different results for the comparison. I haven't attempted to study further into other combinations at this time though.

Oh, and I purposely didn't include the haste because whether it's 5% or higher doesn't matter, as both sets you mentioned would hit the haste cap.

Just a few quibbles:
Haste is slightly relevant, because without the extra few % from f.s-a and turban, somen+u.s-a+bb+byakkos is only 22 haste, versus 25 from full usu + bb + 5% or more bonus from the full set. And of course we haven't yet seen that the set effect haste is "equipment" haste type--I expect it to be, but if not that's another benefit.

There are a few small errors in your post.

The comparisons without att/acc conversions from stats for the 3-set are:
S/B/B:
42 att
10 acc
15 dex

Usu:
13 STR
13 DEX
10 att
22 acc

Subtracting common bonuses:
32 att, 2 dex vs 13 STR, 12 acc

Comping 2dex = 1 acc ...
32 att vs 13 STR, 11 acc

This is not a clear win for either side, but for a meat-eating monk I'd certainly recommend the latter. Compound that with the likelihood for greater haste and the little-things bonuses like storeTP, evasion, and counter, and I'd take the full set over S/B/B, and make it work by tweaking other gears as necessary.

Personally I balance the benefits from str and att at a 1:2 ratio, which would mean this is a 6 att vs 11 acc comparison, clearly a win for acc.

[RKenshin]

Just a few quibbles:
Haste is slightly relevant, because without the extra few % from f.s-a and turban, somen+u.s-a+bb+byakkos is only 22 haste, versus 25 from full usu + bb + 5% or more bonus from the full set. And of course we haven't yet seen that the set effect haste is "equipment" haste type--I expect it to be, but if not that's another benefit.

True, and yeah I didn't think of that. If this set haste isn't equipment haste then it's a whole new ball game. And in the error I mixed it up with the convential pre-salvage MNK setup (that does hit the haste cap).

There are a few small errors in your post.

The comparisons without att/acc conversions from stats for the 3-set are:
S/B/B:
42 att
10 acc
15 dex

Usu:
13 STR
13 DEX
10 att
22 acc

Subtracting common bonuses:
32 att, 2 dex vs 13 STR, 12 acc

Comping 2dex = 1 acc ...
32 att vs 13 STR, 11 acc

This is not a clear win for either side, but for a meat-eating monk I'd certainly recommend the latter. Compound that with the likelihood for greater haste and the little-things bonuses like storeTP, evasion, and counter, and I'd take the full set over S/B/B, and make it work by tweaking other gears as necessary.

I had to look at this for a bit to figure out what I did wrong, but yeah... I incorrectly added Bandos as +23 attack (when it's +22).

Then I forgot to translate the 13 DEX into accuracy, and add it to the total accuracy for the set of Usukane gear. In which case Usu has 28.5 acc, and as your math showed it gives it 11 acc over the other set which makes it much more debatable. Using Sushi I'd definitely go for the extra attack but I'm almost never using sushi on MNK, so I think I'd go for the extra acc as well unless Madrigal is present.

Thanks for pointing out the mistakes though.

[JeanClaudVanDamme]

Dude, you will not change my opinion, and neither will I yours. But, I completely fail to see how the whole salvage set is "medium" in anyway. Look at the Somen: how is this medium in gear? Had the stats on the somen be something like 4 acc, 2% haste, 4 evasion, then THAT would be a medium in gear. It would be your standard shitty all-in-one type gear. But as it is, this isn't the case. The somen provides a GREAT amount of acc, haste, and evasion. For the first time ever, SE actually made all-purpose gear that wasn't a complete let down. 7 acc, 7 evasion, 3% haste is amazing. The same can be said for the Bodypiece. How in the hell is this a medium in gear when it's basically a Haub+1 and SH+1 and THEN some, all rolled into one. The feet is a no brainer. It kills every other piece of feet gear NIN/SAM/MNK can wear. The gote, though weaker compared to the other 3, is still amazing for a meat build. It's a Noritsune Cote and Yasha Tekko in one. Two incredible piece of gear in one. Had it been something shitty like Aiming Braclet and something else equally stupid, THEN it'd be a "medium in gear". But it's not. And no amount of opinion is going to lead me to believe 10 acc and 10 evasion on the same piece is a "medium" in choice. Especially for a versatile job as NIN.

As it is, I believe 3 out of the 5 Usukane piece is the best gear in the game that NIN/MNK/SAM can wear for 90% of game. The other 2 pieces, though weaker in comparison to the big 3, all it needs from the set bonus is at least 5% to justify (not that I needed any in the first place) wearing it over dusk+1/bando + Haidate.

Blah, Almalexia needs to finish the set so we can find the bonus already =D

[Godlywargod]

Just a little note, Ace's helm > Usukane Somen.

[RKenshin]

@JeanClaudVanDamme

Two mistakes:

1) I'm not trying to change your's or anyone else's opinion. At this point my goal is simply to compare the possible sets of gear accurately for all three jobs, to find out what gear set has the highest potential DD output. You are also mistaken if you assume I have some sort of bias in this conversation as I have all three jobs leveled, and can confidently say those three are by far my most active jobs in FF over the others. I probably play any single job between MNK, NIN, and SAM more often than all three of my other jobs combined. I'm not saying you assumed this, but I'm just putting the information out there.

2) At no point ever in this post did I say that Usukane gear was not great, and in fact I have said several times that I believe it to be the best set of melee salvage gear by far. In addition I've also said that it has great pieces of individual gear, several times, that triumph over many alternatives (if not being the best piece all together). Nothing, no where, ever at any point, did I call the set crap or bad or anything less than fantastic. However, what I am debating is whether or not wearing the entire set will result in higher damage output as opposed to wearing other possible combinations of old gear/usu gear that would not include the entire set. And that has nothing to do with whether or not three of the pieces of Usu gear are better than any other alternatives, nor how great/bad any piece of the set is, it has to do with the entire set as a whole vs a non-complete set of Usu.


EDIT: After Aurik's last post and a little more thought I think I'd have to agree, and it seems that full Usukane will triumph other possible gear combinations in the average situation for MNK. Although I don't think it'd be full time gear. However I haven't weighed all the possible gear combinations, so there's still room for much more debate.

As for NIN, I'm still unsure.

And again, speaking strictly for possible damage output.

[Francisco II]

However, what I am debating is whether or not wearing the entire set will result in higher damage output as opposed to wearing other possible combinations of old gear/usu gear that would not include the entire set.

As far as monk goes, the difference between Shura Togi, Bandomusha Kote and Byakko's Haidate vs Usukane Body, Gote and Hizayoroi is... (assuming Usu. Somen and Sune-ate for both builds).

STR+14 Haste+??% ACC+12 EVA+32

vs

DEX+2 Haste+2% ATK+32

I'd take the full Usukane build... the haste bonus is almost certainly at least 2%, the STR negates a good chunk of that 32 Attack, the evasion is a pretty huge bonus.

Furthermore, I find it's better to equip yourself for accuracy (and obviously haste), more so than attack. It's easier to get attack in huge chunks from food and songs than it is for accuracy.

This argument almost seems like comparing Haubergeon vs Byrnie... and how often do you see people using a Byrnie?

[Arthars]

TP build: haste + acc + some attack is enough

u dont have to like squeeze att out of something, then miss on mamools then get a parse of 85% acc, and cry

i'll take the set and wear lol

[Wizerd]

TP build: haste + acc + some attack is enough

u dont have to like squeeze att out of something, then miss on mamools then get a parse of 85% acc, and cry

i'll take the set and wear lol

I don't think anyone is gonna cry about 85% accuracy on Mamools with a meat build...

[Arthars]

yea and the set supports meat build too!

:D :D

[Lordwafik]

I have a question Arthars, are you mentally retarded or is english just not your first language? Curious.

Forever yours, LW

XOXOXO

[Kaylia]

He is from Taiwan or something, and english is not his first (or second) language
...there is nicer way to ask question.

[Lordwafik]

Yeah there is but that's no fun.

That and i'm sick of LOL after every sentence that has no comedic value LOL OLOLOL.

[Kaylia]

If that's how you define "fun", then go for it. But that's off the point, back to Salvage gears.

[Arthars]

a retard singaporean

u wanna hear some singlish?

[Almalexia]

More Taru WAR!

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...s/img_0189.jpg

[Blackice]

Ay beibei...

[Vistani]

moar flanchard
http://img339.imageshack.us/img339/8660/areslegsnc4.jpg

[Lordwafik]

Upgrade #23 and #24, Morri Cuffs and Ares Flanchard.

http://img408.imageshack.us/img408/4...ade2324xj6.jpg

[Francisco II]

Congrats...

...and why is there something funny about the way the bearded hume NPC is just there in the background of the picture?