Bushido - The Way Of The Samurai (A Guide) V. 2.0

Oh damn, so then its
50% traits
5% merits
10% gifts
and then theres another 5% from hasso/seigan gifts, ***i've been overcap

overcap on what?

zanshin rate, i was revising my set and it has 112 total,

i could of been using ambu cape for PDT or JSE neck instead of moonlight nodowa

the 10% from hasso/seigan chance is different. that's the rate at which those two stats will activate without a missed hit or third eye

i've been using Koga, easier to keep multisteps going with AM3, even with hasso down while on DT set and still do pretty decent damage.

oh i see now, thank you Austar

I wasn't necessarily suggesting anything, I was inquiring.

tl;dr, just Sechs' 2 cents.
Flamma+2 is still nice for DPS. Basically the old pre-empy set, but with the additional Meva/DT granted by Kasuga+3 body/legs, which makes this set not perfect, but still much better than it used to be and pretty viable.

Kenda+1 should probably be used only in SB setups these days.

Mpaca head is still a decent and viable option, possibly your best dps hybrid option if you don't have the BiS dedicated Zanshin set.

Kasuga+3 is fantastic in the freedom it grants to your other slots. It's also an awesome DPS option if you have the BiS dedicated Zanshin setup.


What I'm personally gonna do, since I don't have a dedicated Zanshin set, is keep using Flamma+2 and swap to Kasuga+3 when I wanna raise my defensive stats.

Any idea why my Tachi:Kaegro damage sucks in Ody? Majority of the time its undead, sheeps i do about 50-60k, ziz i average 70k.

ammo="Knobkierrie",
head={ name="Nyame Helm", augments={'Path: B',}},
body="Nyame Mail",
hands={ name="Nyame Gauntlets", augments={'Path: B',}},
legs={ name="Nyame Flanchard", augments={'Path: B',}},
feet={ name="Nyame Sollerets", augments={'Path: B',}},
neck={ name="Sam. Nodowa +2", augments={'Path: A',}},
waist="Orpheus's Sash",
left_ear="Thrud Earring",
right_ear="Ishvara Earring",
left_ring="Epaminondas's Ring",
right_ring="Niqmaddu Ring",
back={ name="Smertrios's Mantle", augments={'STR+20','Mag. Acc+20 /Mag. Dmg.+20','Magic Damage +10','Weapon skill damage +10%','Phys. dmg. taken-10%',}},

Cause undead resist slashing

Edit: Also the 10 mdmg on cape should probably be STR

To do good hybrid damage on undead you need either banish sdt reduction or holy circle or both. If you don’t have either, you’re much better off switching to shining one

This makes sense because I swear I used to do good damage some time, this explains why.

skeletons resist piercing even more than slashing

Fudo > Fudo kills them.

Not inside Sheol. They get bonus slashing resist for being undead on top of their normal resist that makes piercing better from what I recall.

Not in Sheol C. Sheol C skeletons are -50% to piercing and either -62.5% or -56.25% to slashing depending on how the combined resistances are calculated.

Let the warrior handle those and move onto something you are more effective against

Forgot about species resistances in there. Regardless it still isn't really much better to switch to polearm anyway. Fudo->Fudo or Kagero->Koki will kill them just as fast (or faster) than Impulse->Impulse (floor 3 and 4 skeletons won't be easily one shotted by Impulse). Most of the time I don't even bother fighting the skeletons though. Leave them to the WAR and fight the pack next to them.

That's if... there's a war in your pt to begin with :D
I find most of the time my damage is slightly better with Shining One than lolDoji.

I guess Fudo from R15 Masa might close the gap? No clue.

It isn't the WS dmg itself for those, it's the skillchain dmg. If you mean for general use on hybrid resistant mobs then I can believe Shining One beating Doji for sure in pure physical damage. This is of course assuming you're waiting to 1shot; Doji will WS nearly twice as frequently as Shining One after considering lower TP threshold to WS (you really want 2000+ for Impulse Drive to boost crit rate, you can Fudo with Doji much lower)

typically I use

Doji for anything susceptible to magic damage (hybrids) (Imps, Clusters, Rams, etc.)

Masa for anything that isn't susceptible to magic damage (hybrids) due to AM3 and stronger Fudos (Ameretat, Treants, etc)

Shining One for piercing weak things or things susceptible to magic damage and weak to piercing but they have something that makes hybrids shitty like Guard (Apkallu, Mandragora, Rocs, etc)

In sheol, I'm pretty sure that skele's only reduce piercing by 25%, not 50%.

Certainly, if at all possible, I pick a different target. But, I also have a pld that always puts up holy circle and a whm that does banishga. So I generally just stay in Doji now a days for undead.

Trying to clean up my wardrobes and looking at Kenda+1, Is this set kind of phased out now? Outside of random niche scenarios like subtle blow when you don't have a whm?

In regards to sam and mnk, I see feet are maybe still useful in some Mnk WS sets.

Yes but the SC damage isn't gonna make or break if the WS dmg is ***, since they're related.
Which is why I said that Shining One usually gets me slightly better results.
With Shining One I can usually kill skellies on floor 3/4 with 2 WSs, rarely with 3.
With Doji I don't think I remember ever killing them with 2 WS (including Light SC).
Most of the time it takes me 3 WSs if not more, seldom.
For a time I even tried to 3 step (Shoha > Kasha > Fudo) on them, but decided it was't worth it and ultimately just decided to use Shining One.

I'm not factoring stuff like Konzen Ittai, Hagakure and Sengikori of course because those have considerable CDs for a single pack.

I don't own an R15 Fudo but I imagine the boost to WS damage might make it worth enough to make so you can kill skellies reliably with 2x WSs (including SC damge of course).
It's just a wild guess from me of course.


Ehr no, I meant specifically on Skellies.
On other targets that resist hybrid but take decent Slashing damage usually Doji's Fudo wins for me, over Shining One.

I can rarely oneshot stuff with Doji using Fudo anyway.
Well on floor1 and 2 it's usually np but on floor 3/4 it's hard for me to oneshot stuff even if I wait for a decent amount of overTP.
It happens, but rarely. Depends on many factors, including the buffs I get which are not always ideal.

I can still get >6k DPS and >10k segs easily most of the time in PUGs so I guess it's not too bad.
My record is >14500 segs but it happened only twice iir and both were... full clears I think?


Btw I'm not even remotely suggesting people to use lolDoji. It's just what I use because I own an R15 one and I don't have a Masa.
If I did I would alternate them using Doji for Hybrids and Masa for physical, of course.

Earlier we discussed Kenda+1 for the head slot, but I think it pretty much applies to all slots now.

It's still "nice", you shouldn't feel bad to use it if you lack better options but the thing is that yes, now there are better options.
It keeps a clear spot for SB niche builds, and that's it.

For NIN and MNK it's in a slightly better position compared to SAM if you ask me (especially for some slots), but even for them it lost a bit of relevance compared to, say, >1 year ago.

Yeah, for me Kendatsuba on SAM is basically only for Subtle Blow these days. Empy for body/legs is clearly preferable for a default TP set, Empy head is probably the better call due to defensive perks (as discussed above), and I'll normally use Tatenashi or Mpaca hands/feet (or Ryuo feet).

I also no longer use Kendatsuba gear with any regularity on MNK. I pretty much do Mpaca or Malignance TP sets, depending on defensive needs - and Empy body if Impetus is up.

I do still use Kendatsuba frequently on NIN, I'm usually in that as my default TP set. Better TA and crit rate than Mpaca, Ken has Racc that Mpaca lacks (for Daken throws), similar acc. Mpaca's one significant edge is that it has Atk that Kendatsuba lacks - but I don't think that outweighs Kendatsuba's TA/crit/Racc. With Utsusemi and Migawari as extra layers of protection, I also tend to prefer Kendatsuba's Meva over Mpaca's superior PDT from a defensive perspective. And if I'm really concerned about taking AoE damage (or if I'm doing a STP build, like I do with Nagi) I'll switch to Malignance anyway.

Can use Kendatsuba hands/feet on SAM when you want some extra MEVA. For SAM the set is mostly used for niche stuff, ranged, crit etc

Oh yeah, ranged is another niche use case (/em looks at lonely 75 Yoichi, just waiting on me to do some trials to get its arrows for SAM lol)

For Meva, usually when I care enough that I'm actively gearing for Meva I find myself going with Nyame over Ken+1. More Meva, and I tend to care about having Nyame's DT in that kind of situation. But yeah, I could see it for a situation where you aren't so much in danger of taking damage as you are just trying to stack Meva to avoid enfeebles while also optimizing TP speed.

Feel like only pieces I ever consider using on my sam these days is hands and feet.

Emp+3 helm/body/legs is 20Meva total less than Kenda helm/body/legs on top of of offering considerable DT gains, STP and in the case of legs delay reduction.

You don't need helm, body or legs in subtle blow sets as you generally have a whm in situations you would actually have to rely on them.

Hands/feet however are like +117 Meva over Tatenashi/ryou, Those still feel like good swaps (feet being a good acc swap as well which with master levels is less and less neded it feels like)

Honestly was just looking for some justification in giving 3 wardrobe slots to helm/body/legs. Archery sam is not it.

Anybody bothered to math Nyame hands R25 vs Kasuga Kote +3 for Hybrid WSs?
It's basically 30mab/DA+4% vs 2%WSD/slightlyhighermods

On a hunch I would say that no, Nyame R25 is better.
But Kasuga might win with Sekkanoki up thanks to the additional TP bonus? Maybe...

Yes even R20 should be better

Of course

Barring Sekkanoki, Nyame is better due to it's physical + magical stats.

Edit: to be fair I haven't "mathed" it, but I've done a lot of practical use.