RDM AF+1 upgrades

[sekaran]

Honestly, I don't think I'll waste my acient beastcoins on upgrading any RDM AF unless I get some freelot Limbus items. And if I do, it'll be body+1. I have that equipped more than any other piece of AF. I usually use Duelist Chapeau+Dalm for everything but HNMs.

[OctavoGilgamesh]

ok silly question. Did I miss where they said Stoneskin cap had been raised or removed? I was under the impression it was set. I can already hit the cap with other gear I carry, so for me pants aren't a worry. (unless I missed the cap change)

They are pretty worthless imo since the 5 mind is never used at the same time as enhancing skill. And you can get more mind out of nq or hq errant slops. From what I remember, you will cap stoneskin with base enhancing skill and base mnd for a 75 rdm.

[Zosi]

They are pretty worthless imo since the 5 mind is never used at the same time as enhancing skill. And you can get more mind out of nq or hq errant slops. From what I remember, you will cap stoneskin with base enhancing skill and base mnd for a 75 rdm.

Wrong, wrong and wrong. Thanks for playing though. The stoneskin formula is as follows:

    * X = ([Enhancing Magic Skill] / 3) + MND
    * F is the the amount of damage reduced. 

        * F = X (if X < 80)
        * F = X * 2 - 60 (if 80 <= X <= 130)
        * F = X * 3 - 190 (if X > 130)

As you can see, damage absorbed is the value X (which is 1/3 of enhancing skill + total MND) multiplied by a constant (1, 2 or 3) and lowered by another constant, depending on the value of X. Let's put in the base values for an Elvaan 75RDM/WHM, which should be the highest base MND possible. RDM's cap for Enhancing magic is 256 naturally.

 X = 256 / 3 + 75
 X = 160.333... (which is greater than 130, therefore we're using the last formula)
 F = 160.333 * 3 - 190
 F = 481 - 190 = 291

Admirably close for zero gear at all, but definitely not capped. What would said Elvaan need to reach the cap? Working backwards, 350 + 190 = 540, 540/3 = 180, so his MND + 1/3 Enhancing skill would have to total 180. That's obtainable by swapping in two pieces of gear, Errant body and AF+1 pants, which would raise his Enhancing to 271 and his MND to 90. Plugging in the formula again...

 X = 271 (+15 skill from AF+1 pants) / 3 + 90 (+10 from Errant, +5 from AF+1 pants)
 X = 180.333... (which is greater than 130, therefore we're using the last formula)
 F = 180.333 * 3 - 190
 F = 541 - 190 = 351, which gets clamped to 350

Capped. There's certainly some truth to the idea that AF+1 pants are unnecessary, because any RDM worth his weight in Rock Salt will be carrying enough +MND gear to hit the cap, however, as Septimus said, they're one of the MOST efficient items to get Stoneskin improvement from, meaning you need to macro in less pieces to reach the cap, which means losing less MP and having less complex macros. NQ AF1 is equal (for Stoneskin purposes) to Mahatma Slops, and AF+1 is superior, giving the equivalent of 10 MND, which is matched only by Morrigan's Slops. If you're wondering about different race/subs than above, a Taru RDM/DRK (which should be about the lowest for practical subs) has 60 MND, meaning they'd need the equivalent of 15 more +MND than an Elvaan RDM/WHM to cap Stoneskin.

Edited, because closing code tags with /quote doesn't work very well...

[OctavoGilgamesh]

They are pretty worthless imo since the 5 mind is never used at the same time as enhancing skill. And you can get more mind out of nq or hq errant slops. From what I remember, you will cap stoneskin with base enhancing skill and base mnd for a 75 rdm.

Wrong, wrong and wrong. Thanks for playing though. The stoneskin formula is as follows:

    * X = ([Enhancing Magic Skill] / 3) + MND
    * F is the the amount of damage reduced. 

        * F = X (if X < 80)
        * F = X * 2 - 60 (if 80 <= X <= 130)
        * F = X * 3 - 190 (if X > 130)

As you can see, damage absorbed is the value X (which is 1/3 of enhancing skill + total MND) multiplied by a constant (1, 2 or 3) and lowered by another constant, depending on the value of X. Let's put in the base values for an Elvaan 75RDM/WHM, which should be the highest base MND possible. RDM's cap for Enhancing magic is 256 naturally.

 X = 256 / 3 + 75
 X = 160.333... (which is greater than 130, therefore we're using the last formula)
 F = 160.333 * 3 - 190
 F = 481 - 190 = 291

Admirably close for zero gear at all, but definitely not capped. What would said Elvaan need to reach the cap? Working backwards, 350 + 190 = 540, 540/3 = 180, so his MND + 1/3 Enhancing skill would have to total 180. That's obtainable by swapping in two pieces of gear, Errant body and AF+1 pants, which would raise his Enhancing to 271 and his MND to 90. Plugging in the formula again...

 X = 271 (+15 skill from AF+1 pants) / 3 + 90 (+10 from Errant, +5 from AF+1 pants)
 X = 180.333... (which is greater than 130, therefore we're using the last formula)
 F = 180.333 * 3 - 190
 F = 541 - 190 = 351, which gets clamped to 350

Capped. There's certainly some truth to the idea that AF+1 pants are unnecessary, because any RDM worth his weight in Rock Salt will be carrying enough +MND gear to hit the cap, however, as Septimus said, they're one of the MOST efficient items to get Stoneskin improvement from, meaning you need to macro in less pieces to reach the cap, which means losing less MP and having less complex macros. NQ AF1 is equal (for Stoneskin purposes) to Mahatma Slops, and AF+1 is superior, giving the equivalent of 10 MND, which is matched only by Morrigan's Slops. If you're wondering about different race/subs than above, a Taru RDM/DRK (which should be about the lowest for practical subs) has 60 MND, meaning they'd need the equivalent of 15 more +MND than an Elvaan RDM/WHM to cap Stoneskin.

Edited, because closing code tags with /quote doesn't work very well...

They are pretty worthless imo since the 5 mind is never used at the same time as enhancing skill. And you can get more mind out of nq or hq errant slops. From what I remember, you will cap stoneskin with base enhancing skill and base mnd for a 75 rdm.

Waste your time on a worthless item dude, I don't give a shit. Let's put it in more reasonable terms. How much mnd gear do you normally carry on you without upgrading the stupid pants? At least +30, normally much more, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. Run it through your formula again.

X = 256 / 3 + 70 + 30, hume rdm/whm for base
X = 185.333
F = 185.333 * 3 - 190
F = 556 - 190 = 366

So still, even after my wrong assumption that stoneskin was capped at 75, your point is still fucking stupid. Thank you come again.

Edit:

There's certainly some truth to the idea that AF+1 pants are unnecessary, because any RDM worth his weight in Rock Salt will be carrying enough +MND gear to hit the cap, however, as Septimus said, they're one of the MOST efficient items to get Stoneskin improvement from, meaning you need to macro in less pieces to reach the cap, which means losing less MP and having less complex macros.

You proved my point before I even wrote a reaction. If having complex macros is an issue for you, play something other than rdm.

[BRP]

They are pretty worthless imo since the 5 mind is never used at the same time as enhancing skill. And you can get more mind out of nq or hq errant slops. From what I remember, you will cap stoneskin with base enhancing skill and base mnd for a 75 rdm.

you highlighted the wrong thing. "Oh" works too.

[Zosi]

Waste your time on a worthless item dude, I don't give a shit. Let's put it in more reasonable terms. How much mnd gear do you normally carry on you without upgrading the stupid pants? At least +30, normally much more, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. Run it through your formula again.

X = 256 / 3 + 70 + 30, hume rdm/whm for base
X = 185.333
F = 185.333 * 3 - 190
F = 556 - 190 = 366

So still, even after my wrong assumption that stoneskin was capped at 75, your point is still fucking stupid. Thank you come again.

Edit: You proved my point before I even wrote a reaction. If having complex macros is an issue for you, play something other than rdm.

You said BASE MND, you said that enhancing and MND are never used at the same time. Neither of those are true, and now you're just making up bullshit about how you meant something else to cover for your ineptitude. About using "complex" macros, it's more about being efficient about swapping in and out gear. The less max MP and -enmity and other useful stats you sacrifice to get capped SS, the better, and not everyone plays on PC where they can use Windower macros with 14 gear swaps for every spell. Get the fuck back to Zam, they love your kind there.

Edit: Also, nice job pulling the "respect my opinion!" card while you're busy saying everyone else's opinions doesn't matter. I didn't post that post to insult you or question your ability to play RDM, just to get the correct info out there after you posted something inaccurate. I don't really care if you think the legs are worthless or not, in fact, I don't even have them upgraded personally, because they AREN'T worth it to me. However, that doesn't mean I should run around spewing incorrect shit about how bad they are. I laid out the benefits and downsides to upgrading and let people make their own decision based on the math, you shove it down our throats like disagreeing with you makes us shitty RDMs.

[Sylphet]

Sheesh folks.

Not everyone has the same gear to work with as everyone else and for the most part, AF+1 can be a relatively cheap way to buff up what you currently have (Actually in my linkshell it's completely free). So, naturally people will have different gear needs when choosing what to upgrade.

Personally, I don't need AF+1 legs to reach stoneskin cap hence they are very low priority for me. I mostly use RDM for duo/small man events and therefore RDM nuking is valuable. That's why I chose to upgrade hat first. If I chose to upgrade another piece for RDM it would be body since I have Crimson Mail for MND and INT and therefore, only use errant for hMP. However, I will usually pass materials to people who want to upgrade other pieces because whether or not I have AF+1 body is hardly going to make or break my RDM.

There's no such thing as what someone "should" upgrade first because everyone's needs are different. But in summation, unless you like to melee on RDM the 3 pieces worth upgrading are: hat, body, legs (in whatever order your current gear dictates).