Let's talk about Ranger

[VZX]

Copy paste of my own post on Alla
Same method with I did to ranged delay testing:
Obow:
Start : frame 38
shoot: frame 134
(134 - 38)/30fps = 3.2s

Start : frame 274
shoot: frame 371
(371 - 274)/30fps = 3.233...s

Start : frame 493
shoot: frame 593
(593 - 493)/30fps = 3.333...s
--------------------------------
Start : frame 108
shoot: frame 597
(197 - 108)/30fps = 2.966...s
--------------------------------
Start : frame 39
shoot: frame 139
(39 - 139)/30fps = 3.333...s

Start : frame 291
shoot: frame 391
(391 - 291)/30fps = 3.333...s

about 15% haste

for melee delay :
I use kriegs/fransisca, no suppa, total delay = 479 (should be around 7.98s per round).
after velocity shot, delay increases to 9.4~9.5s, and one round I got 9.1666s
(about 15~18% slow)
----------------------------

[Damen]

Just did BRD RDM RNG/WAR DRK/SAM DRK74/WAR NIN party as RNG. I kept Velocity Shot up 100% of the time. Main songs were Madrigal and Minuet I believe. I kept food up, whereas the others didn't. Started out with two subs which birds ate very quickly, then switched to sushi (all i had left) for 95% of the mobs. Used gun. Wasn't exactly at the top of my game since I was exping with my USB keyboard which apparently causes framerates to drop to 5-9FPS. Was just a mess around linkshell party before people went to bed. Regardless, here's just some numbers to look at.

http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/5355/parsevs6.jpg

[Zellgadiss]

Can't wait to get home and try this out. I have relic body and rapid shot + snapshot merits. ^^ I started the update before i went to sleep. (around 12pm est) Woke up late ;.; tried out v. shot and it lasted 5 min. Went to work happy.

Now i can't wait. Wanna leave work now. ;.;


On another note, I've heard about this whole lag+usb keyboard issue. If you plug the usb keyboard into the ps/2 port with a converter does it solve the lag issue?

[Shaard]

niceeeeee

By just eyeballing, how much delay reduction for aiming delay?

Very roughly, it feels like firing with a crossbow (pre-patch) with a bow, now (well, maybe a little bit slower, but it's definitely noticeable)

Which bow and which crossbow?
If you refer to 524 delay HQ bow vs 280 delay HQ crossbow, that's ALOT

Sorry, went to bed before I saw your reply (it was quite late here), I was refering to S.Bow / O.Bow, but as I said, I just tried a couple of arrow before logging off. Anyway, you've got the exact answer now, I guess (I agree with the assessment that it's pretty like having Haste on) ^^

[VZX]

From small data sample only
about 20% pDIF bonus when it's active
Data vs robber crab on Kuftal tunnel

STR	85
ratk 	404

VC	
lv 60	78 VIT
138	272 def
143	fSTR2=6
170c	1.434 ~ 1.587 pDIF
143	
137	
132	
136	
133	
146	
135	
139	
	
	
no VC	
lv60	78 VIT
120	272 def
111	fSTR2=6
110	1.195~1.304 pDIF
114	
119	
119	
111	
114	
136c	
142c	
110	
140c	
137c	
119	
108	
110	

se q	
lv 63	82 VIT
102	288 def
102	fSTR2 = 5
112	1.087~1.241 pDIF
113	
141c	
100	
111	
102	
108	
106	
111	
108	
108	
102	
99	
108	
131c	
122c

[VZX]

On another note, I've heard about this whole lag+usb keyboard issue. If you plug the usb keyboard into the ps/2 port with a converter does it solve the lag issue?

Yeah, I'm using my old PS/2 keyboard now..

sticky... because I put it near kitchen the whole time =.=

[Zellgadiss]

Well looks like I'll be goin to staples when I get home to get two usb -> ps/2 adapters.

I know I've got one somewhere but I'm not sure where.

[Abel]

Done with RNG burn, took like 7hrs to get everybody tired, I'll post what results I found. I found a 20% increase in my attack, but obviously no change on capped attack mobs. Our pt had one relic bow rng, one really pimped rng, another very good but slightly less pimp (no osode af2feet and a few other things like capped arch) and a few selene bow users. I heard somebody asking about relic so I'll put this here.

We had a COR and a BRD in our PT, and a WHM(who did literally nothing, with all us subbing nin we literally had next to no dmg, if dnc was viable the endrain would of easily kept us all 100%), relic rng saw a few 1,000 *NORMAL* 3x dmg proc shots, he was not eating any food though, his normal 3x proc were more around 600-800 though, norm hits in the 250-270, WS around 1.5-1.8k. Pimped RNG was eating meat and full str setup with all viable merits, was seeing normal shots 320ish with WS from 2k - 2.4k, my own shots (lesser pimped rng) were around 270 sometimes up to 290 if i was eating meat, WS from 1.8-1.998 (couldn't break 2k) and barrages for aorund 1-1.2k. After I switched to war sub to see if it was a 45% atk increase (zerk stacks) i started to see numbers of 330~ per shot with demon arrow and ebow (pimped rng had same bow), 2-2.6k WS and 1.3-1.8k barrages. Please note all damages from above are *not* optimal distance. Once I moved to the optimal distance for ebow I started seeing 410~ per shot consistently, this was w/ eating coeurl sub, chaos roll, VS, zerk, and 2x min all of which aside from zerk were on constantly, w/o zerk it was around 370~ per shot, the highest I saw was 435 w/ perfect chaos roll. And I got a 2.85k sidewinder outta that, the pimp rng had d/ced by this point and relic rng was long since gone, it's my estimation that the relic rng had he geared himself for DD rather than being lazy on birds could of easily outparsed the pimped rng, and done upwards of 3k WS. Needless to say we were doing minimally 20k/hr it was likely 22-25k/hr, the biggest problem honestly was finding enough rngs to go, I'm most interested in seeing zerk+buffs+VS on hnms, but haven't had a chance to test yet due to thanksgiving holidays etc. Let me know if anybody has any other findings, and I apologize for the wall of text, but just to put things in clear perspective.

This does not make RNG super-duper-overpowered like the 2h update. A good rng will do more, a crappy rng will still do crappy (still saw the crappy ones hitting sub 200 per shot) so there may be a good amount of rngs coming back that once sucked, but they'll quickly quit and whine about the update being crappy and what a waste of time it was for them, because to them it will of done little, but for rngs who know how to do their job and play the game this was a rather amazing update, with snapshot that's 29% delay reduction total which is fairly hefty considering rng weapons delay and how it's calculated. I have to say i'm very pleased, the only bad thing is it really does is make ammo go by quite a lot quicker. But I got a good chunk of merits outta this so I can't complain.

[supercoco]

Please note all damages from above are *not* optimal distance.

at what distance where you with those numbers and which is the "optimal" distance with bow, 14?

[Abel]

10.5 is the optimal distance I found for ebow, any more or less seems to lower dmg output, though I suppose ymmv. That's just what I've seen from using it.

[Zellgadiss]

That's all very hot and nice. There anyone with full snap and rapid shot merits as well as relic body? Wonder exactly how fast we can fling things out now. Almost thinkin of finishing up my rapid shot merits since i recently got the body piece.

[Abel]

I'd like to know the activation rate of full RS merits + relic body, but i'd wager pry around 30% tops, my first shot with VS was actually a rapid shot and I *freaked* because I thought that was the true speed, but then I did another and was less impressed (obviously) but still pleasantly surprised, it seems like a big bag of win for rngs who are good. Rngs who suck and are coming back, you'll still suck but just a bit less, for those career rngs like myself who've weathered the storms this allows us to shine more than we already do (for those of us who can) and we'll still put those bandwagon rngs to shame.

[Zellgadiss]

RNG was my first job :D THF if you wanna get technical, only lvl'd it to 30 then unlocked RNG and caught back up with my static pty I started with friends. ^^ <3 RNG always have and always will.

[Sasarai]

Looking and feeling really good so far, not enough to make RNG the kings again as they were in 03, but still a wonderful improvement. I'd say this is enough to compensate for the fact we cannot benefit from Haste spells and/or Double Attacks.

Now lets just hope this doesn't attract the bandwagoners.

[freddiepines]

Nerf incoming.

[Sasarai]

Nerf incoming.

Why?

Unless they are removing Haste (spell), Haste Gear, March and Hasso entirely...

[Aevis]

went out to do some ram farming as 75 rng / 25 thf. only str gear i've used were wyvern helm, fire staff, rajas. with sbow and demon arrows, i reached dmg cap without food nor velocity shot. did 414 on battering rams and hares. sidewinder 2505 everytime. with coeurl subs and velocity shot up same results. only changing to scorpion arrows made me miss the dmg cap and i was doing around 380 per hit.

idk what they did to the dmg formula and/or rng, but they boost the dmg somehow (without considering velocity shot). i can't remember to cap dmg on my ram farming sessions...or at least i have numbers with 320+ in mind, not 400+

[terraflarex]

terra, have you tried out using a -enmity build for rng? im curious about it myself, cuz i know already that we can do pretty decent dmg, but a WS and a barrage later etc we take hate. Is -enmity semi viable option and still keep dmg good?

I actually have tried a -enmity build on ranger. It's not bad tbh..but you really need a good paladin to keep hate off of you on any fight that's long (or another good DD w/provoke). I found TPing in -enmity on the lolAF2 is really not a completely bad thing in terms on keeping your hate low, you sac some dmg but that's obvious. I would say that -enmity on ranger is definetely an option because you're still going to do damage... especially with the patch now (<3 Velocity Shot). It's really absolutely essential to merit stealth shot at least once if you're serious about the job. Personally I merited 3 Snapshot, 2 Stealth Shot and 1 Flashy Shot in category 2. You're getting -10enmity on stealth shot per merit, so with 2 merits -20... that's huge on sidewinder. You can only use it once per 5 minutes but it is still a really big help. I would like to do a more thorough test on -enmity on ranger when I have the time, and I feel that i'm going to need to with velocity shot now. Thank god Namas Arrow is essentially hateless...

[Vertabreaker]

That's all very hot and nice. There anyone with full snap and rapid shot merits as well as relic body? Wonder exactly how fast we can fling things out now. Almost thinkin of finishing up my rapid shot merits since i recently got the body piece.

I have full snap/rapid merits and relic body. I can try when I get home from work with obow and ebow.

Figures I quit / retire from game and they start changing ranger

[shukuffxi]

This is owning in lower levels too. I have a average gear'd RNG57 (/NIN'd) I took for a spin this evening. Lesser Colibiri, Couerl Sub, COR with Chaos/Hunters. When the White Mage remembered to cast Dia II, I landed 1400~ Slug Shots, with very minimal STR. On an XI I hit 1600+ and then 1800 when I switch to Staff+Grip and put on a little bit more STR. I know it's weak to piercing, but last time I did this, my #s weren't any where near as high.

SCs were almost totally unresisted throughout the session, ranging from 400-500~ damage when I closed. Time to finish RNG I guess :D