MND and magic defense

[Beckwin]

I'm in the process of revamping pretty much all my macros, and I'm working on my Ninja stuff now. My question is: does MND do anything for reducing magic damage taken? I've seen setups in various blogs/forums where people will stack MND outside of mdb/magicdmg-% slots, but I've yet to find the numerical reasons for doing so. If anything it would appear stacking INT in (vain) attempt to create a -dINT situation would be more beneficial. Can anyone shed some light on this?

[Donsalieri]

If I remember correctly Ruk put MND gear in places he couldn't get M.def; However from my experiance, i have normally seen MND as the VIT of M.def; it just seems more valuable to stack HP.

And i've never found anything on +INT for m.def; i would be interested to hear about that aswell.

[Churchill]

Hmm good question. I do MND currently in slots where there's no MDB, -MDMG, or a good resist gear piece, but haven't really focused on it. With just Barfira at Tia I usually take 150 from Firagas assuming I'm not dumb and forget to swap or something. Carol makes it 0 very easily...the problem with NIN is their MND is really low, even me as an Elvaan, INT is 59 and MND 56 as NIN/DRK. I'd find it hard to bridge that gap in either category assuming you leave merman's rings on and stuff like that.

[Beckwin]

Yeah this is for more of a general purpose magic defense set; I have a decent fire resist set for specific stuff like that.

Osode is looking worthwhile to macro in (for the INT I guess) but I'm not sure about Suzy boots or Water/Neptune's Staff. I'm not sure how often it'd be realistic to force some sort of favorable dINT situation, but stuff like Yasha shoes and whatever staff has +int could be nice.

[Churchill]

Well general magic like BLM mobs I guess you could just try to find something near your level at a zone line and try MND, INT, and MND/INT gears to see what yields the best results. For the most part, I use Osode/Suzy boots no matter what anyway. Obvious for Ultima, again for Tia.

[Amiricle]

If you are looking to totally min/max a magic defense set with stat boosts you are best off stacking Int for a better -dint variable (honestly though you probably wont see much of a difference without huge amounts) vs most all black magics.

Stacking Mnd btw would create a better defense vs certain magics like banish & holy (white magics) only.

[Sylphet]

INT is what you want for straight magic damage mitigation. However the debate about MND is whether or not it has an effect on resists. Resists are not the same thing as damage reduction. However the problem is that there has never been any direct test of this (in part because ballista alters the magic damage equations I've been told). As a Elvaan WHM with relatively high standing MND and very high stacked MND I've personally noticed a higher than normal magic resist rate but once again this is completely anecdotal and I have NOT ever tested this in a scientific manner.

The reason Ruke used to stack MND in slots where he didn't have straight -magic damage or barfira (for Tiamat/Bahamut) was because of my observations with MND and magic resists and let's face it, INT on an Elvaan NIN is pretty damned abysmal. In a nutshell, he'll stack INT or MND if it's available in a slot.

[Churchill]

Mmm but MND on an Elvaan NIN is even more abysmal.

[Donsalieri]

Mmm but MND on an Elvaan NIN is even more abysmal.

i think MND on Elvaan is actually pretty decent; i think its the highest of all the races actually

[Churchill]

Mmm but MND on an Elvaan NIN is even more abysmal.

i think MND on Elvaan is actually pretty decent; i think its the highest of all the races actually

http://img266.imageshack.us/img266/2...1210909ip1.jpg

[Donsalieri]

yeah but your a NIN/DRK compare it to a Hume NIN/DRK

[LinktheDeme]

yeah but your a NIN/DRK compare it to a Hume NIN/DRK

lazy peoples do it yourself ;3

http://www.datasync.com/~dsmith/FFXIStats/

[Donsalieri]

yeah but your a NIN/DRK compare it to a Hume NIN/DRK

lazy peoples do it yourself ;3

http://www.datasync.com/~dsmith/FFXIStats/

man you beat me to it D:

[Nirokun!]

My other half says whmstuff I was thinking when I read this thread the first time~

do you like getting nuked with AM just to see it get resisted like shit? :D

[Suiram]

The question of boosting which stat to increase the number of resists of damage taken is tricky because, as Syphlet indicated, nobody has really done any real tests, and have only eyeballed it. Believe me when I say, if this topic goes on long enough we'll have an equal number of BLMs pop in saying "When I was levelling BLM, I got fewer resists after casting Shock on the mob" as we'd have saying the exact same thing about Burn. So assuming the person selecting their armor doesn't hold a strong opinion, or does but doesn't feel like risking being wrong, it's easier to move on to the next question, which is reducing the maximum unresisted damage. In the case of spells this is easy, since any spells a mob is going to cast on a player is one that players themselves can cast, or at least is from the same family of spells, so it's already known what stat to boost to lessen the damage, and 9 times out of 10 that's going to be INT.

The question gets a little trickier when you consider TP moves, since there's very little reason to suppose without trying different gear sets that one is affected by a particular attribute. For instance, the damage from most magic-based weaponskills by Archaic mobs in Salvage are a function of the target's INT; this is readily seen after doing a few runs if you pay attention to the damage a tank takes before they get velum cell compared to after. However there's no reason to assume that all TP moves use INT in the same way. The BLU spells Mind Blast and Magic Hammer's respective base damages are a function of MND, and Eyes on Me of CHR, so it seems reasonable to suppose, prior to any formal testing, that those TP moves have a 'target's MND/CHR' component to their base damage when used by monsters as well.

[Churchill]

yeah but your a NIN/DRK compare it to a Hume NIN/DRK

You said MND on elvaan was best and high. I said MND for Elvaan NIN was more abysmal than INT? What the hell are you even fucking talking about now?

That screen is of me. I am Elvaan. That is as a NIN/DRK. My INT is higher than my MND. I have no INT merits.

[Donsalieri]

yeah but your a NIN/DRK compare it to a Hume NIN/DRK

You said MND on elvaan was best and high. I said MND for Elvaan NIN was more abysmal than INT? What the hell are you even fucking talking about now?

That screen is of me. I am Elvaan. That is as a NIN/DRK. My INT is higher than my MND. I have no INT merits.

and i was just saying that out of all the races; an Elvaan NIN/DRK would have the best Chance of obtaining a satisfactory MND setup; obviously we mis-understood each other.

[Churchill]

Ah I get what you're saying, but I don't think it matters. The base stats are too low. Tests would be better done with a different job and then applied.

[Sylphet]

My other half says whmstuff I was thinking when I read this thread the first time~

do you like getting nuked with AM just to see it get resisted like shit? :D

yes ><

[SeraphusRagnarok]

From what I understand;INT affects the direct damage mitigation of elemental based magic attacks while MND affects the direct damage mitigation of light based magic effects and also affects the chance of 1/2, 1/4, 1/6 and 1/8th resists occuring.

Thus any elemental based magical attack on you checks the enemy's INT versus your INT i.e Fire,Thunder IV,Hurricane Wing,Sleet Blast etc... Just like how lowering a mob's INT a BLM's nukes will do slightly more damage (as if raising his own INT)

Holy,Banish and all other light based magical attacks that are MND based probably check versus the target's MND in calculating the end damage, but in addition to this, MND also governs the resistence of magic in general, so a greater chance of a 1/2,1/4,1/6,/1/8 resist.


This system doesn't make a whole lot of sense compared to the other final fantasy games. Previously there were 2 systems which made a ton of sense more:
1) Intelligence(Black Magic damage) and Wisdom(White Magic potency and magic defense)
2) Magic(Magic potency) Spirit(Magic defense)