Prime WS Information, Testing, Discussion

In terms of DPS:
If a weapon does 5k DPS, but it does it 2k -> 5k -> 8k
Second weapon does 5k DPS, 4k -> 5k -> 6k, it's a sidegrade
Third weapon does 5010 DPS, it's an upgrade, not a sidegrade.

This doesn't matter cause there's a Unity shield with the same (or better? idr if it's 155 or 160) for protect. Personally don't care though, Srivatsa is enough



Then many weapons are upgrades in myriad situations due to skillchain properties, potency of the weaponskills, and potentially the power of the weapons themselves (I don't see anyone factoring in the ODD that isn't tied to aftermath when comparing to empyreans for example which takes some of empy's advantage away)

Compared to ochain it definitely is, you could swap in aeonic shield though for that since its only a 5 def difference at stage 5

Forfend is the highest unity shield at 142 def, still much quicker to grab for a protect swap, or alluvion shield at 145(augmented). May be some other shields that close the gap more

Ah for some reason I thought Forfend got a DEF augment from Wings

I agree, most are clear upgrades. If something is better than the alternative, it is an upgrade. But when if in this instance nothing - is it better? Yes? Upgrade.

Everything will always be situational and even the weapons that are clearly stronger will be swapped out in some cases - want to make opposite element SC that the weapon makes for example.

Also atleast according to bgwiki duban is also a size 6 shield like ochain, so would that not make it a straight upgrade minus the minute dmg > mp since dmg on blocks is typically in the low double digits

Only reason I still play this game, there's almost never a "right" answer that works for every situation ^^

Duban is a great shield and I would consider it an upgrade but in all it’s likely ideal situations over other shields I would bring a RUN.

GS for WAR is a clear upgrade for zergs and darkness SCa. It’s SC properties align well with DRK and SAM unlike the GA.

Fimb > Mumei back and forth is extremely potent.

Mumei is easier to all-9 w/ Yaeg than Fudo, too. Means something in zergs.

Also didn't think about it til now but the most "clear upgrade" of all of them is probably the staff and somehow that's on the side grade list too. With the shield you can argue when and where its additional stats will and won't make any defensive difference. For the staff it is always doing a calculable amount of more dmg against anything you use it on.

Let's look at it from the other end of the scale. Staff is still "worse" in situations where you can't put am3 up, and probably worse in any case for physical BPs on SMN. Shield is never going to be worse and can be better in a lot of cases.
(EDIT: If we are talking about physical/melee damage with the staff you're right ofc. Nothing is really even close probably. Just didn't even cross my mind :P)

For the record I still think most of the weapons (except h2h and sword probably) look like they'd be your no. 1 pick for weapons if you had to choose one weapon only too though. All comes down to personal definitions of sidegrade vs upgrade I guess...

For anyone yet to make any shields for PLD though I'd say there's absolutely 0 reason to make an Ochain now with how easily you can pick up a stage2 Duban

That's not necessarily true though. Stage 5 Opashoro is statistically better than any other staff even without AM, assuming conditions are the same and Laev also can't get AM up (and even then I think it beats Laev w/AM a lot of the time thanks to that INT and extra mdmg but that'd be specific and not always).

Bunzi r30+Ammurapi wins on Macc and a little bit on MAB but gets ***on for INT and Mdmg, then again how often is BLM using club+shield over staff these days.

It's not Duban vs OChain, it's Duban vs Priwen + Reprisal and I think Duban generally wins. OChain is a terrible shield now.

Yeah, but Gaxe match well with Torcleaver, Cross Reaper, Rudra or Expiacion.

Terrible is a bit of a stretch that MP return has been nice in v25s. I do swap back to Duban/Aegis but Ochain still has some use when spamming Cures.

The reason for this, at least for stage 4 it's only double damage and like on Relic weapons, so only for first hit in the round, while empyreans (beside h2h) are all hits and triple damage.

It's still nice additional damage, but if you take Gaxe as an example. 30% for ODD on one hit will be for 100%DA build an avg 15% increase in white damage. Now AM3 on Ukon will be an avg of +100% increase in white damage. The difference is massive. On something like COR or RNG it's probably even worse, because you would mostly care about white damage during double and triple shot. DS with 69% activation rate and 50% chance for triple shot will be on avg even more than 2 shots per round and on top of that DS/TS damage+ only work on extra shots, so not the one that gets ODD, so damage here will be even less than +15%
Another jobs that could care would be THF, but again with like 60% Triple attack rate, it would be maybe 13% increase on main hand.

If this will raise to like 40% chance of x3damage at stage 5, then it will be much more impactful even with first hit of the round limitation.

Yeah I'm not saying it erases the Empyrean AM, it just cuts into that advantage and it's weird not to include it in a comparison. For many (even most) empy the AM is the main selling point compared to Primes so any amount less that the AM has over Prime is worth considering. I'd still consider 13-15% white damage pretty good considering it has no cost attached (don't have to save up to 3000TP to activate it etc., which ultimately may not matter 90% of the time since you want PDL AM anyway however you won't always be able to make use of or care about that so it can matter sometimes)

Hmm ok I'll give you the whole MP return thing.

Bow/Polearm/Scythe/Staff are for sure upgrades.
Gaxe is also upgrade, because scenario when it's a clear bis is very common for WAR. Same for Gsword on WAR.
GKT/Dagger are imo also upgrades, even if they are not THAT much ahead.
Katana and Axe are upgrades for their weapon category, but a sidegrade/skillchain options for NIN or BST weapons in general (because of Naegling Savage).
Sword/h2h are sidegrades/skillchain options imo.
Gun is either upgrade in the same category as "GKT/Dagger" or sidegrade. I'm not sure.

Zesho nin/war
str 150
dex 179
vit 145
agi 179
int 139
mnd 130
chr 134

no ws dmg gear / pdl has 5% ws dmg job gift

1001 tp no fotia
5655
5666
5672
5679
5686
5687
5702
5704
5708
5715
5724
5731
5738
5751
5755
5762
5763
5775
5777
5821
5822
5822
5833
5835
5844
5847
5851
5862
5876
5877
5891
5901
5918
5922





1001 fotia neck
5764
5768
5769
5772
5775
5778
5789
5813
5821
5832
5845
5854
5866
5867
5872
5881
5885
5889
5889
5892
5902
5918
5928
5935
5939
5956
5959
5961
5968
5973
5974
5978
5981
5993
5997
6006
6016
6025
2928

add 111 agi
6538
add 111 dex
6487
chr no dmg add
str no dmg add
mnd no dmg add
int no dmg add
vit no dmg add

Well it's between ~4.65 and ~6.97
Need better spread or maybe start to work on WSC mods, so it would be possible to make some guess work. It's definitely not 60% DEX and AGI this time. Im assuming you was offhanding some lv1 weapon? Otherwise I wouldn't be able to explain that 2928 damage on what I assume was first hit miss.

or... is that simply a mistake and it suppose to be 5928? :D

only 1 weapon the WS is 4 hit
Oh I forgot the non fotia had a 2654 hit when first hit missed

that's a pretty clear 5 ftp which would give ~129 WSC, assuming the mod for DEX and AGI is the same that would be around 35% each, would be easy to use boost spell or gear to find out

This doesn't make sense, unless you fight something with more than 2k HP? I thought you was checking this on outside city mobs?

you weren't dual wielding at all? if you DW the second hit is always the offhand, then the other 3 hits of the WS are performed by the MH before any multi hit is factored in

Only had on prime and level ~1 mobs less then 100 hp

Actually I couldn't explain that 2928 even with dual wield. I assume you was fighting something with more than 2k HP and you did hit all 3 sub hits, but if 3.0 fTP is between 2654 and 2928, then it for sure isn't clear 5.0 on first hit. It also kinda doesn't make sense that 3hits can be both 2928 and 2654, because one is ~10% higher than other, while max difference should be 5% UNLESS it's some kind of super weird mechanic, where WS has high fTP on main hit and 1.0 on sub hits, but also has +fTP transfer from fotia on all hits.

This doesn't make sense then lol. It's like first hit is lets say 5fTP and sub hits are 3fTP? That would be the first case of something like that in the entire FFXI history.

maybe theres a WS dmg bonus like relics?