The Sealed Dagger: A Ninja Guide

Pretty confident the difference is big.
I was saying something different, that DEX/Acc/Attk/DA cape is still better than any non-ambuscade cape.
Maybe?
I dunno, arguably a 5% WSDmg Yokaze might perform good but I'm unconvinced about that.


Guess it depends how dedicated you are on this job... and how many other jobs you have.
I have 9 jobs geared up, I really need to draw lines somewhere and accept compromises, at least on most of them.
Anyway, sorry for the slight OT, was just looking for less "specific" valid options to use ;) I can post my current sets, but they are really lame!

So I must be doing something wrong.
Originally I wanted to make a STR/Att/DA Andartia's cape for TP, but then someone here wrote that DEX would've been better than STR for TP phase, I tested it on the spreadsheet and to my big surprise it was right.
Now, with different gear truth be said since I updated my TP sets, I'm getting STR winning over DEX again.
Wut? D:

(when acc doesn't matter of course!)


Did some small tests on WS as well, comparing a 5STR, 5DEX, 5% WSD Yokaze which is basically perfect, good luck getting one) with different andartias.
If you're wondering the utility of this small test, well, I had to draw the line at "two capes" for NIN, so I want one for TP and one for WS, I'm looking for the best compromise.

Blade: Hi

Blade: Shun

Blade: Ten

So from this, I dunno where to go.
DEX/DA could be a pretty nice TP cape (better than STR one? Worse?) and BiS for Shun.
At the same time STR/WSD would be BiS for Ten, while also being pretty nice for Hi as well (it's the second best after all).
Opinions welcome!

DEX most likely contributing to dDEX at a value that's increasing critical hit rate. Disregarding that, I'd still go DEX over STR if I had to choose one simply for the additional accuracy if I needed it.

... and DEX one is BiS for Shun too, whereas STR one is not (still decent though).

I will probably go with DEX/DA for TP and Shun, and STR/WSD for Ten and Hi.

I'm more amazed by the fact that you ended up with:

Yokaze => 11111

And got all 1's as the result. :D

I have also gone DEX/DA for TP+Shun, and STR/WSD for Blade: Ten/Hi.

Yeah that 11111 was pretty funny lol

What's the Katana Hierarchy at the moment? I have an 85 Kannagi which I can take further or maybe start a Kikoku? Advice please :3

Also, Is Blade: Shun worth Meriting?

could you run this test on metsu too? I went dex wsd and dex da, but now you have me wondering since I find i use ten quite a bit and would like to also have a better cape for hi than dex/wsd.

I find I like to use ten>metsu>shun a lot and so im at a loss lol. Hi is kinda dead for me nowadays, but every once in awhile I will use it to sc.

Re: Herculean/cape augments for various WS...

WSD is clearly fantastic for Ten, Hi, Metsu. If you have to pick one attribute to go with it, I personally prefer DEX as the only one that gives fairly strong benefit to all WS options:

* DEX helps accuracy in all cases

* For Ten, DEX is still a mod (DEX 30%/STR 30%), so even if STR may be better you are still getting significant benefit out of DEX.

* For Metsu, DEX is obviously the way to go.

* For Hi, DEX does help somewhat with crit rate and for accuracy on a notoriously inconsistent WS. To me, and probably to any Heishi or Kikoku user, Hi is something that's less of a priority but still worth keeping a set for its good Darkness SC applications so a non-optimal WSD piece is "good enough". Kannagi users may differ here though, and something like an AGI cape would probably be worth it.

Back to the Shun conversation, I wish I had kept better stats in my Ambuscade overaload... But of course, I didn't. I'm looking forward to next month's Ambuscade though, if it's melee friendly I do intend to farm away on NIN again and will track stats better! I kinda like Ambuscade for that reason, once you get it down you can really work on optimizing gear sets for a specific actual scenario and you have plenty of time to tweak and compare in RL situations :)

Yes to Shun, its a great ws. Now if your going to put 5/5 into it will depend on a few things.

If do decide to AG your kannagi then shun isnt as important, since you will probably just Hi spam, and occasionally use shun for sc properties only, so 1/5 is good enough unless you really love nin.

If you go for for AG kik, then shun will be very powerful and probably one of your most used ws, thus 5/5 is a must at that point.

Either weapon will serve you well and hierarchy isnt so clear cut, lucky for us all the rem weapons perform very close, but have huge play style differences. to me that is great! Look past last 10~ pages if you want more in depth, but with how screwed up spreadsheets had been, its hard to say. I am an AG kik user myself, I do no regret it because I dont like Hi spamming. With kik I can more freely ws and alternate between 3 quite frequently, and Hi as 4th when needed. With that said though, my good frined has both Kan and Kik ag, and swears by his Kannagi as best dps.

Probably a more important aspect, since it seems your not hardcore nin (shun Q leads me to believe), is how much do you want to spend?

1500 plates will run you 150m-200m
10k beitsu atm is 120m

thats 270-320m just there with nothing else added.

Kik atm is about 50mil on currency and marrows. Then your looking at 110m for plutons. 160m, or half the cost of kannagi. For me this was way clear which to go after.

No I have the file I used at work, sorry, can't do it now with the same exact gear/buffs/setup.
But Ten shouldn't really be your priority if you have Kikoku? (which is an awesome weapon btw).
It takes a certain threshold for Ten to be better than other option.
Such threshold varies according to buffs and target but I dubt it ever goes under 1750 TP.


Ten is the WS of choice for people mainhanding Heishi Shorinken, everybody else should use Ten only when they end up with additional TP or situatio like that.

Hi is the WS which arguably gains most from the capes. The boost from cape itself is unbelievably high.



@Azargath
You forgot to mention Heishi Shorinken!
Afaik all Katanas are pretty close to each other, shining in different situations/setup, hard to pick an overall winner.
Heishi, which I tought was the worst of them all, is performing much better than I gave it credit to on the spreadsheet.

yea I dont aim to use ten, it just happens thats i hit 1700 quite often due to high TA rate, or mob dying right when i get to 1000. In that case I will normally hold an extra round and try to 3 step for fun ;D

oh and I do plan to do aeonic someday. Maybe this month I will just make a 3rd cape, seems better.

Pretty much this.

Really hoping this months Ambuscade is DD friendly again. Dragon was melee friendly as well, but I hated those spikes >_<. I had a great time farming it with my nin buddy. Our setup was NINx2/PLD/BRD/GEO/WHM. closing lights doing Shun > Metsu with 11k-25kish Metsu's. Metsu is an unbelievable powerhouse when geared and buffed properly.

Anybody wants to discuss the Herculean bodies present in Langly's awesome spreadsheet? (I added a few with WSD btw).
I have one currently unused Herculean body and I'm wondering what to do with it, if anything. Leaning for acc/att/TA+4 for TP and maybe some WS.

The Herculean bodies in Langly's Spreadsheet are very good. REALLY good. Like... REALLY REALLY good.
They usually have capped Fern augment enhancement (Crit Damage, TA, Crit Rate etc) but also have 25 acc/att, and ALSO have stat +10 (which is the max with non Taupe stone).
That's of course possible but getting ALL of those 4 things TOGETHER with THOSE values is a bit... unlikely? Good for testing to see how they perform as a reference or a "whatif", but I just don't see them very realistic for the majority of people, kinda like HQ Adhemar.

So in light of that, I tested it a bit for some WSs, like versus Abnoba's for Hi and versus Rawhide A for Ten, but getting like it requires a lot of good luck for it to be even just equal to them. So struggling to get something that in the end would be "just a bit better" seems like a waste of my time.

On the other hand getting TA+4 and a decent amount of acc/att plus whatever stat you get, if at all, sounds more realistic and such a body should be a decent improvement over what I currently use.




tl;dr
blahblahblah, suggest me something to do with Herculean body! Possibly something that I can share with multiple melee jobs, not interested in NIN-only stuff, I got too many items already atm and my inv is a mess again.

if you play blu at all I am sure crit hit dmg is also a good aug, and good for nin on hi too. Honestly I just want one body!!!! give me!!!! :D

But for Crit Damage Abnoba already has 5% Cdamage AND 5% Crit rate (which is 2% more than Herc).
Sure Herc can get higher acc/att in theory, and even ONE higher stat, but sounds like a lot of work/gil/time/effort for what is just a load of "ifs".

The TA body for melee (and arguably some WS) is much more realistic to obtain, I already have multiple Herc item with TA+4 and some decent acc/att values so I know I could totally get the same with Herc Body.

I keep getting them in my personal pools. Keep getting straight poop on them though.

1)TA +4/ACC +27/ATT +25

2)DEX +15/ACC +28/ATT +20

3)STR +8/ACC +25/Att +17 Crit Rate+3

other two bodies aren't worth mentioning. I'm planning on burning through a bunch of stones tomorrow and see if I can get anything else on the other two.

I finally got a decent "Blade: Hi acc set" on herc head. AGI +8/ACC +35/ATT +25/ WSD +3.

#1 is a nice TP body, #2 should be slightly better than Rawhide for Shun, not sure about Ten, probably not? Maybe good for Metsu?
#3 seems kinda meh, for NIN at least. Rawhide should be better for Ten.

The aug on head is pretty *** hot for Hi too.

My first body had DEX+12/Acc+28/ATT+24 TA +3....got greedy and wasn't paying attention when asked to keep new shitty augment or that one ; ;

Yeah, #3 really isn't a NIN piece, but decent for MNK!

Ha ha ha. Yeah I looked at the what if's when I built those. Given enough stones (which are not difficult to farm whatsoever) you would expect that your augments would tend towards the values in the spreadsheet.

I wanted to see the potential of that gear. So I could use it as a reference. I feel no remorse! HA HA HA!

I finally got myself some STR + WSDMG5 (which isn't cap as I've gotten 6% on fern before... at least I'm fairly sure >.>) herculean pieces for my Blade: Ten extravaganza.

Need. More. Stones...

Enmity head/leg/feet for NIN?

Halitus Helm, Tenryu Sune-ate +1 (only 1 more enmity than various free Enmity+7 feet), and either Ocelot Trousers or Zoar Subligar +1.

Blade: Kamu

Can we get some set postings please and thank you in advance!

Kamu is STR60%/INT60% and fTP of 1.0, without actually testing it, something akin to:

ItemSet 344236
Herc with STR+8 or higher, Acc/Attk20+, WSD4+.
Andartia's STR20,Acc/Attk,WSDMG10

It'll look a lot like our other single hit WS's, but focus on the STR + WSDmg augments. It gets a nice boost to Attack... so it's got that goin for it... but uhh.

Mix and match as you can I suppose.

I am not understanding the use of Epona's ring in the WS sets? Are you just hoping for the triple attack proc?

Since it's single hit I'd drop fotia and use lacono necklace +1 and something like caudata belt or prosilio belt +1 or metalsinger belt or wanion belt instead. I know I don't nin but just trying to help :) I agree also drop the epona for an Ifrit +1 looks great otherwise tho! (Since the fTP is locked at 1.0 tho, fotia prob still a significant increase).

If Kamu's fTP is really still 1.0, that's much lower than just about any other relevant one hit weaponskill these days (and only then for skillchains and Nagi AM3). Fotia would definitely be the way to go. Even on higher fTP weaponskills Fotia is potentially a winning option for overall DPS thanks to the chance at retaining TP, but that's very situational. Probably better utilized via a toggle if anything.

I'd favor Ifrit +1 over Spiral Ring. The attack may not do anything given the attack bonus on Kamu, but it's equal or better from a base damage standpoint as long as you're getting an fSTR boost out of it. Herc TA augments should be pretty close to WSD given the awful fTP (not sure which is actually better here), but you may have STR/WSD augs for other WS.

Can someone explain why Epona's ring would be used in a Weapon Skill set? I have seen it in more than one set now and I don't understand why.

I'm not getting what surprises you, almost as if those da/ta bonuses wouldn't work on ws.
For some ws it's a nice choice, you can see it yourself on the speeadsheet.

This is a good place to start and it and the following articles will answer you more in depth than we can here: https://www.bg-wiki.com/bg/TP_Multiplier read the part about additional attacks.