What's Better?

[Chronosphere]

Its pretty much Wizards Gloves +1 and Moogle Hat vs Zenith Mitts and Sorcerer's Petasos.

Uh.. What situation are you looking at? You should optimally have an Elemental Skill and Pure DMG Build. Are you trying to combine the sets for some reason?

[Vendict]

Well I am still a little new to BLM, but I was told to aim for 320 Elemental Skill and I need to use one these to hit that. Maybe thats outdated info, but i figured even for pure damage build, its essential to have 320.

[Byrthnoth]

I was a taru with 8/8 elemental, but I ran around 300 skill and did perfectly fine. Screw both combinations. On anything short of Tiamat you'll be fine using:
INT+4, Macc+2, MAB+7, Conserve MP+3

I agree that AF2 hat is overused by most BLM and should really only be used in situations where you want both AF2 hat and AF1+1 hands though. Before it was INT+9 (or 10 if you had Maat's) and 5 more skill vs. MAB+5 (or 6 with Zenith+1). Now it's INT+7, MAB+2, and 5 more skill vs. MAB+5. It was situationally useful in a small number of cases before to use AF2 hat, but now it just doesn't make sense unless you're really dying from resists.

[FailureMidgard]

FM: My understanding of the WSC calculation after looking over VZX's page is that there is a flooring step after the two modifiers are added together, then another after multiplying by alpha.

In this case, WSC = floor(floor(STR*20%+MND*20%)*a)

When you do the math this way, Marduk's is always D+1 after both flooring steps. Marine F Boots cancels itself out in WSC and will only add D+1 if you get an fSTR boost, so 75% of the time. Thus, from a mods consideration only, Marduk's is the superior piece. Is this correct?

That said, it's also a 6-hit crit weaponskill. I'd use Marine for the accuracy and critrate increase from the DEX.

ok, sure, but that actually makes Marine even better on average, as we're now looking at 1D for Marduk vs .75D for Marine, making the difference only .25D, on average (unless you gear based on a specific mob's vitality, which seems like a hard thing to do outside of bird camps), while leaving the accuracy and attack the same.

With your math, there is virtually no reason to ever use Marduk.

[Vendict]

Hey thanks for the info

What about moogle hat for BLM?

INT+4 MagAcc+2 MagAtkBonus+2 HPh+3
or
INT+6 MagAcc+2 Fastcast+2%

[Byrthnoth]

Fast cast is pretty sweet, but if you're going to make a Fast Cast hat you should make 5%. INT+6 is just Demon Helm +1, which you can buy, and you don't really need Fast Cast and INT on the same hat.

[Nightfyre]

ok, sure, but that actually makes Marine even better on average, as we're now looking at 1D for Marduk vs .75D for Marine, making the difference only .25D, on average (unless you gear based on a specific mob's vitality, which seems like a hard thing to do outside of bird camps), while leaving the accuracy and attack the same.

With your math, there is virtually no reason to ever use Marduk.

Which is the same conclusion I arrived at. As Shinryuu said, Hydra destroys both when you can make full use of its accuracy, but Marine would be preferable in acc-capped situations.