Whats better?

[Mayareira]

What's better to upgrade first AF to AF+1 wise for RNG:

It basically comes down to 1 extra shot on barrage, or a boost in AGI for the headpiece that I TP in.

At first I was all gungho about upgrading the hands for the extra barrage shot, then I realized how often I actually hit all shots on barrage....lol

I went with headpiece first, mainly because I use it more than Hands +1. This, however does not mean hands are bad. Barrage in AF +1 on mobs you've got capped accuracy and Seiryu for the rest.

It also depends on the rest of your gear. Do you have Archery/Marksmanship merits? Behe +1's? PCC/Sea Torque? Scout's Belt? Gear/Merits wise, if you aren't confident with your accuracy you might want to go with Beret first as you'll probably want to barrage in Seiryu's.

[Eldelphia]

shamans

I think this is bad advice tbh. At this point you're using your AF hands and they have +15 skill on. Once you get your AF hat the INT and MP part of Shamans is taken care of. I think once you have your af hat it shouldn't come off your head*, -4 EMN is small but a nice extra. Not wearing the cloak frees up your body slot for whatever else you need more of.

*until af+1/demon helm +1/situationally relic

[cdgreg]

I went with headpiece first, mainly because I use it more than Hands +1. This, however does not mean hands are bad. Barrage in AF +1 on mobs you've got capped accuracy and Seiryu for the rest.

It also depends on the rest of your gear. Do you have Archery/Marksmanship merits? Behe +1's? PCC/Sea Torque? Scout's Belt? Gear/Merits wise, if you aren't confident with your accuracy you might want to go with Beret first as you'll probably want to barrage in Seiryu's.

8/8 archery, HQ behes, Scouts belt, HQ dusk pants, etc top of the line gear other than no rajas. But I actually didn't realize I had to keep them on for the shots. I was planning on swapping in af hands in for barrage macro, then hit a full RACC set for the shot lol. Hmm, does that mean I need to keep AF pants on the whole time for the sharpshot enhancement?

[Veyron]

Maat's Cap vs Gnadbhod's Helm and Shura Haidate +1 vs Usukane Hizayaroi for Yuki, Gekko, and Kasha.

Max Str or tossing the Atk in there, basically. Bringing this back up due to G.Helm being recent-ish and the new testings on Y/G/K.

[VZX]

What's better to upgrade first AF to AF+1 wise for RNG:

Hands:

Hunter's Bracers
[Hands] All Races
DEF: 10 HP +10 DEX +3 Resist Vs. Dark +10
Enhances "Shadowbind" effect
Lv. 52 RNG
to
Hunter's Bracers +1
RareExclusive
[Hands] All Races
DEF: 14 HP +10 DEX +6 AGI +6
Enhances "Barrage" effect
Enhances "Shadowbind" effect
Lv. 74 RNG

OR

Head
Hunter's Beret
[Head] All Races
DEF: 21 HP +13 INT +3 Ranged Attack +5
Increases "Rapid Shot" activation rate
Lv. 54 RNG
to
Hunter's Beret +1
[Head] All Races
DEF: 24 HP +13 AGI +4 INT +4
Ranged Attack +5
Increases "Rapid Shot" activation rate
Lv. 74 RNG

It basically comes down to 1 extra shot on barrage, or a boost in AGI for the headpiece that I TP in.

At first I was all gungho about upgrading the hands for the extra barrage shot, then I realized how often I actually hit all shots on barrage....lol

I did beret first, then bracers.

Beret is good for Trueflight... lol

[Ferien]

I thought it was proven there weren't any "tiers" just increasing returns (to a point) the higher your DEX vs mob AGI was.

Unless I missed a thread, I'm pretty sure that the exact opposite was proven. The crit tiers do, however, depend on your DEX vs mob AGI. The numbers I remember seeing showed a jump of around 2~3% per 1 DEX once you hit like 115 or so against birds, leveling off again at like, 117.

Regardless though, like Max said, the Adaberk gives a 2-hander 2~3 more acc/atk than Hachiryu, with the fSTR boost and whatever crit bonus you get from the DEX (which obviously depends on the mob you're fighting and how much DEX you already have). What I meant was that if the Adaberk is going to give you a comparable crit boost, it's absolutely no contest, but they're closer if you don't have enough DEX to make it worthwhile, and they'd truly be sidegrades.

[Mayareira]

8/8 archery, HQ behes, Scouts belt, HQ dusk pants, etc top of the line gear other than no rajas. But I actually didn't realize I had to keep them on for the shots. I was planning on swapping in af hands in for barrage macro, then hit a full RACC set for the shot lol. Hmm, does that mean I need to keep AF pants on the whole time for the sharpshot enhancement?

Legs, no. I believe you can macro them for Sharpshot. But hands must be equipped during shots, which is the main reason why its not an awesome piece.

[Nefzen]

HNM level mobs (pure physical damage reduction):
M. Hands or Darksteel Mittens +1
M. Legs or Darksteel Subligar +1

[stewie]

Darksteel+1.

[Jakson]

I rarely Barrage without SS, so even if you ignore main/sub/range/ammo, you should still be able to cap r.acc on it without hands. Add in the acc from Selene's/Ebow/Kabura/demon and axes if you use them and anything you miss is probably capped or the 4 agi. would probably not make a difference anyway. The legs aren't a bad way to go either, though with dusk+1 is nice. Also, I believe starting with 0 tp, a 7 shot barrage gives you enough tp in just a few seconds to immediately Side.

[Bakthi]

I think this is bad advice tbh. At this point you're using your AF hands and they have +15 skill on. Once you get your AF hat the INT and MP part of Shamans is taken care of. I think once you have your af hat it shouldn't come off your head*, -4 EMN is small but a nice extra. Not wearing the cloak frees up your body slot for whatever else you need more of.

For me, at least, -enmity was a relevant BLM stat approximately 0% of the time until I started duoing Aerns with friends at 72. Even then it didn't matter, as they were 75 with merits and I wasn't going to take hate from them without serious effort. Even if you're getting manaburn party invites (and you accept them), -enmity isn't really the reason I went with the justaucorps + hat combo ASAP.

Of course, -enmity is cool in events and blah blah, but we're talking about level 60 here.

[Eldelphia]

For me, at least, -enmity was a relevant BLM stat approximately 0% of the time until I started duoing Aerns with friends at 72. Even then it didn't matter, as they were 75 with merits and I wasn't going to take hate from them without serious effort. Even if you're getting manaburn party invites (and you accept them), -enmity isn't really the reason I went with the justaucorps + hat combo ASAP.

Of course, -enmity is cool in events and blah blah, but we're talking about level 60 here.

Oh I agree totally, as a BLM at that level it doesn't figure really. My point was really more about the skill/stats. If using BLM af hands the loss of 5 skill won't really be noticed if your skill is reasonable and you might as well jam in some more INT/MP, especially if soloing.

I prolly had a bit of a retro glitch back to that imaginary world where BLMs were welcome in real parties. Even though I soloed most of mine from 40-70 lol...

[ringthree]

Unless I missed a thread, I'm pretty sure that the exact opposite was proven. The crit tiers do, however, depend on your DEX vs mob AGI. The numbers I remember seeing showed a jump of around 2~3% per 1 DEX once you hit like 115 or so against birds, leveling off again at like, 117.

Regardless though, like Max said, the Adaberk gives a 2-hander 2~3 more acc/atk than Hachiryu, with the fSTR boost and whatever crit bonus you get from the DEX (which obviously depends on the mob you're fighting and how much DEX you already have). What I meant was that if the Adaberk is going to give you a comparable crit boost, it's absolutely no contest, but they're closer if you don't have enough DEX to make it worthwhile, and they'd truly be sidegrades.

There were "tiers" because of the wide difference in DEX level, that's all. There is the potential for three "tiers" like any of the other melee calculations (like pDIF and hypothesized for accuracy).

What really needs to happen is that people need to test it more.

This is what I put together from the one available data set: http://i236.photobucket.com/albums/f...t_theories.jpg

The notion that there are "tiers" may just be the point at which the function changes like pDIF or any other function. If that is the case there would only be three "tiers" which I think is reasonable, but there are no more than that.

[Sup3rB4d]

I have been seeing a lot of BLM healing in the full yigit set. So my question is. Is it worth it to get the full yigit set just for the Refresh and couple pieces of +hmp

[Mayareira]

I have been seeing a lot of BLM healing in the full yigit set. So my question is. Is it worth it to get the full yigit set just for the Refresh and couple pieces of +hmp

Full yigit was the ultimate hMP set until SE released Oracle's/Avocat. Worth? I suppose. Its not as important as before though.

[Isiolia]

Yigit is a good HMP set, but you can piece together better. Whether or not it's worth getting for that would probably depend on what else you have, or can reasonably get.

For the Refresh, eh, not really, since BLM can just use a Black Cloak for idle, if nothing else, and those are dirt cheap these days.

IMO, the bigger factor is inventory space. As a multi-job set, for people with a lot of jobs, having one "good" set to share among them may be better than a "great" set that not all of them can utilize. The Assault armor sets are also NPC storable, which a mix-n'-match set wouldn't be.

[Omniyoji]

The Yigit Gomlek set is only good for short /heal periods. Now that Oracle's was introduced I believe it's likely any BLM/WHM/SMN out there will use one, but for RDMs it's still a decent option (no oracle's for them).

[Magnus5557]

STR merits vs. DEX merits for DDs. And if "shit's situational," give me some specifics on some situations :D

[matix]

STR or go home :E

[Isiolia]

Nearly universally would be STR, I would say. It's helpful for any race/job/gear/etc if you're hitting something of reasonable level in comparison to you. 5 STR will effectively raise your fSTR by 1 (or very nearly, depends on weapon rank) for every melee hit and WS.

While DEX is good as well, it's more limited in scope. Accuracy can be capped or raised in other ways. Crits scale up slowly outside of the jumps observed, but those will vary according to mob/level, so merit may not be needed, or may not be enough. It's only sometimes a mod on WS, etc.

Makes more sense to go with STR.