New Thf :(

thnx alot for the help guys well for start i got Loki's body and i'll try to get the other gears again i lvled thf for solo so 99% of time i'll be daulboxing rdm and thf and that's about it wont be even using it in events :3

so anyone can confirm the daggers thingy ? and explain to me which is the best type of dagger for thf :o and why

Agreed. I simply believe that 95% or so of mobs don't require shadows.

Mobs you need shadows on ....Rani, because he likes to steal buffs and ga4's hurt without shell. Solo tanking Ule's Omega, because this fight -will- drag on for awhile, you -will- take a lot of damage and he -will- occasionally use hate reset on you. Bukhis, to minimize the chance of having your cruor buffs wiped. Resheph, because he likes to sneak in a quick hit after he slams you to 1hp. Any mob with en-doom(Adze, Azdaja, etc). Then there's the quick Ni to block tier5 spells.


This quote puzzles me in so many ways....I just don't know where to start or what direction to approach it from.



Also.

Your WHM does know he/she can cure5 themselves and it hardly creates any hate, right? A WHM should be able to hold nearly every mob indefinitely without outside support.

Don't you think Aias Bonnet is better than Maat's Cap? And maybe Thundersoul Ring instead of Iota? And for the Evasion set prolly better off going for a decent augmented set of Spry Tights from Dominion notes, have gotten EVA+12 on a set myself ^

Most of his post shows he doesn't have a clue what he's talking about. I'd completely ignore him.

by tiers, or w/e he described it to you as, i'm sure he meant different levels of usefulness, or situations. Nothing more, think of it as THF's version of Elemental Staves, Each have their use and in most cases can be interchangeable depending on the (spell/Situation).

For instance.

Twilight Knife: Solid DPS, Quad-Attack bonus, (Damage)Drains HP/MP/TP from target >>> *Damage-Drain means it deals damage to the drained stat, not like DNC Samba. This adds to your DPS slightly (HP:Drain) but not much.

Triplus Dagger: Great DPS, More triple Attack for set Bonus too, Increase Triple Attack Damage by (assumed) 3%. Great weapon to offhand, especially if you're 4/5 5/5 +2 Armor.

Auric Dagger: Good DPS, Subtle Blow +10 is magnificent for situations where you want to keep TP spam low as possible. Outside of that, a good Offhand(Or mainhand with Triplus) Dagger, But can be replaced for more general purposes.

Rapidus Sax: Decent DPS, Great Delay, Offers large boost too Acc, and some Haste. I don't really use mine anymore, But it has its spots in a speed situation, I suppose this would be good for hitting quicker, better chance to interrupt a mobs casting, outside of that i can think of little.

Kila+2: Generally the strongest main-hand weapons, a STR Kila will likely be your best bet unless you're having Acc issues, then a DEX Kila serves you well. I truthfully never bothered with AGI Kilas as on well... Everything, I can cap Evasion simply with a little gear and Gnarled Horn... Most times i can full-time my TP Set and still do just fine =.=;

Mandau/Twast: Magnificent Weapons in their own right, Own your Mainhand, Nothing further to say.

IDK If I'm forgetting anything, If you're out to get an "Easy" weapon, try Angr Harpe, DMG:46 makes it rather strong for your main-hand, but it has poor DPS compared to other weapons, still simple to come by.





Now, OPINIONS AHEAD, My current Favorite combo is Twilight/Triplus, I wouldn't change it outside of THF knife for initial hit and possible Auric for when im fighting annoying mobs. Im omw to my Twasthar now, and I'll probably switch to Twatwasher/Triplus. As far as gear goes, I think its already been explained well. Still, You should check out a thread i made earlier on full THF+2 armor/situations, I still think 5/5THF+2 (inAbyssea, at least with AoA) with 24% Haste (Gear listed in my thread) will beat a 25.4% Haste build due to the possibility (and nearly proven) Assumption the set bonus will jump from 3% with 4/5 to 6% with 5/5 (doubling proc rate).

Either way, The best has already been said, I'm not looking entirely over the thread but I'd listen to Ihina, Seems to know what they're talking about.

I know i will probably get flamed or trolled but this is what i use and it works for me. Ive solo tanked isgebind smok azdaja among other things~ of course this is something i only do when i have one of two specific white mages that i trust.

TP
Missing love torque QQ


WS
I adjust my belt and neck according to appropriate WS...also i am 0/5 for nfeet for +1 heca QQ


Evasion
I fulltime twashtar in mainhand now and offhand eva kila +2 if needed, usually keep raider's boomerang but if the kila +2 isnt enough i use ungur. Second evasion dagger kind of doesn't get used anymore.


MDT
Currently have a 5%MDT/5%PDT + 4%MDT/4% spell interruption. Looking to get a shadow ring/6% breath+6% MDT ring. I also have MDB Kila+2 as well.


True Strike
When I am fighting pots/skeletons....yes i do use this over my twashtar.

hmmm thnx Karbuncle for explaining and thnx guys i think i got an idea for what gears i should aim for :) thx guys u been a gr8 help

what about proc TA and Dmg Ta of the Af3+2.. Where is the point to equip DA/QUA equip if they gimp the proc of TA.. I tryed w/o DA equip and my equip doing more tp and dmg... that why atm i use RR/GH/AeO..For me Twilight dagger and others equip like atheling mantle brutal just gimp set bonus of Thf af3+2.. that why i think is better to use this setup when you dont have or use full time af3+2..

You're going by what you think....and you're eyeballing...

kingx stfu and log on i need ur help :P

I do wanna make 1 thing clearer, Empyrean+2 Is really some of the best TP armor you can get on THF.

It requires good haste gear (Twilight Belt, etc) to maintain 4/5 or 5/5 While Capping or close-to capping haste, but if you can Its the best TP set option.

Triple Attacks take priority of Double Attack (If that testing still holds up), So Stacking Double Attack gear will have no impact on your Triple Attack proc rate. Twilight is another story, But it still means Items like Atheling and Twilight belt, Brutal, etc, are still the best for their slots.

i tried telling some of the thfs on LS about this they lol'ed @ me xD i said TA > DA they didnt agree with me most of them said DA > TA

its been a popular consensus for years DA > TA, but recently there were tests on Ala that showed TA > DA. So you'll just have to tell them to go read the Ala thread on it.

But I assure you, so long as that testing remains, TA > DA in priority!

Some people need to be shown by example.

man is like to say TA> DA for a warrior... Make nosense.. I just use dusk gloves(missing af3+2 hand) twilight belt suppa and it is ok add also the 1% haste of the dagger and you can see nice dmg+spam. just want to be sure on the tp equip set up cuz i see alot of people still using Brutal atheling Twilight on full af3+2.. and for me this just damage the proc of Triple attack.

believe what you want, I prove through accomplishments.

My testing as well as others has shown double attack being overwritten by triple attack. Double attack will only proc if your Triple attack does not, meaning it will not hurt your set bonus if you use double attack gear. Brutal/Atheling/Twilight remain the best options available for thf TP.

ya one more thing ... am missing like 50 eva skill any idea where to skill up :3 ? chigos pulling will get me the last 50 in 1 pull or 3 ? or i should stick soloing in abyssea tahrongi ?

The way i Did it is either find a MNK mob, or a Chigoe family (Abyssea Attohwa or Abyssea Misar(Apkallu=MNKs) is where i skilled up mine. Get Phalanx II, Full PDT Gear, And let them kick your *** until about ~300 HP left, Pop Flee and go to a Conflux, Rince and repeat.

Wont need a Fanatics Drink, but it couldn't hurt in emergencies.

Only time I use the fiull evasion is solo. If I have a good healer, its full DD all the way.

They miss a Thf with good evasion almost all the time lol.

<Shaula> Hello DeathScissor you can have this!

shaula is a joke, i like to play with Hedjedjet :3

Ihina......Avatar.....Creepy.....Mesmerizing.....Can't stop watching.....Yes Master

on duo you can do it?:3 <HellScissor> NP I can Oneshot!

If OP's friend really meant "weapon rank" that refers to a specific way that your weapon interacts with your fSTR caps.

(Weapon Damage/9) rounded down gives you your weapon rank. Your floored fSTR is -(Weapon Rank). Your fSTR ceiling is (Weapon Rank)+8.

Take Mandau (90), DMG 49. This is a weapon rank of 5 (49/9=5.4444, rounded down). This means that your fSTR floor penalty is a -5 and your fSTR ceiling bonus is 13 (8+5). Given that it takes 4~6 STR for a fSTR tier, to guarantee that you cap your fSTR with Mandau you need to melee in 80STR over the monster's VIT.

This is part of the reason why the superior 2H damage formulas are so imbalanced. With a weapon like Ukonvasara you have a weapon rank of 14 which makes your fSTR cap at 22. That higher cap means more STR can be translated into actual damage which generally means radically higher damage caps. Also because other jobs equip STR for their WS they increase their fSTR bonus when they put on WS gear. We don't get to do that when we put on DEX gear. This imbalance translates even in Abyssea where fSTR is effectively capped. Outside of Abyssea capping a 22 fSTR bonus would be ridiculous but inside all that STR from cruor buffs actually goes to fSTR bonus. But we don't get the same benefit as Thieves because we cap fSTR very fast and anything leftover is overkill that doesn't help us at all.

Back on the subject of daggers, higher damage daggers, like Harpes, have better weapon ranks because ranks are based solely off straight damage. Also it is worth noting that weapon rank is based off flat base damage. If something has base damage 1 and a latent effect of DMG+300, the weapon rank is still based off 1 base damage. This used to be a big factor in why Blau didn't perform as expected in the main hand.

This doesn't make Harpes necessarily the best dagger. Weapon Rank is merely one factor that can make a dagger superior damage-wise.

To answer OP's question, imo the best dagger is a damage dagger.

Every DD job's primary goal is damage; any specialization is there for variety and complimentary bonuses. I view Thief as a Rogue/Assassin style DD -- a fighter whose deals their damage with speed and uses special attacks that utilize surprise (sneak attack, trick attack) to cripple opponents. Certain skills may augment your ability to solo (Evasion Bonus) or your appeal to groups (Treasure Hunter) but those are your bonuses not your core purpose. Your core purpose is damage. Therefore your primary weapons should be daggers that deal the most damage. That doesn't mean the dagger with the highest damage (Harpes), just the dagger that, all things considered, hurts the most.

Mandau and Twashtar would sit atop the totem pole according to my view. After that you should roll with either a DEX Kila+2 or Twilight. Right now I think Triplus is the best offhand to any of those as a mainhand.

However if you aren't going to live up to your potential as a DD and just want to dual box, you're fine with AGI Kila +2 daggers

I think Kingx Might be his friend (They seem to know eachother). Somehow i do not think he was refering to fSTR Rank.

If they were, I'll be shocked. But wonderful explanation of it :o

Are you implying fSTR favors 2H weapons? You forget that realistically DW daggers will hit 4 times in between a 2H weapon swing. In the case of mandau/Twash, this translates to a total +52 more damage to compare with ukon's 22.

And just like a positive fSTR favors daggers more, a negative fSTR will damage them more as well. Anyway, i wouldn't call this imbalanced.

Hey, my Avatar's mentioned again.

Here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzEUeWnV73U

One of us, one of us, one of us....

Also, according to my numbers, Twilight/Triplus is currently the best combination of daggers outside of Mandau and Twashtar in common situations and it pleases me to see people use it. I swear almost every day, I see a THF main handing and full timing THF knife(STILL) and offhanding the Angr Harpe -_-

I said said fSTR was part of the reason 2H damage formulas were imbalanced -- not that fSTR itself was imbalanced. I'm specifically referring to the pDIF, modified TP formulas, and higher Attack/Defense ratios. Combined with higher fSTR caps, 2H has a pretty harsh mathematical advantage since the 2007 patch. Remember Pre-Abyssea it was pretty much taken for granted that 2H jobs spanked DW, even /nin. With Hasso it was no contest. Ninja was pretty much dead before Abyssea and Blade: Hi came along.

Since Abyssea the playing field has shifted due to DWs benefiting more than (most) 2Hs from a capped critical world. But you leave Abyssea, those formulas will start to be an issue again since we lose our relative Abyssea-specific advantages.

You're right that swinging faster generally allows you to maximize gains from fSTR bonuses... from melee. What I was pointing out with "the potential for radically higher damage caps" was basically the ridiculous WS numbers that 2H gets in Abyssea. This is where we see the potential advantage of higher fSTR ceilings play out, when Abyssea atma and cruor buffs makes it possible to hit the ~120 over the mob's VIT to maximize a 20+ fSTR bonus. So Abyssea actually helps 2H because they can realize the full potential of the advantages of their higher fSTR ceilings. The effect is multiplicative because the fSTR bonus goes on to get multiplied by pDIF and fTP. It's simply the other advantages of Abyssea for DW overwhelm this WS boost.

...except for WAR. WAR is the favored son who gets to combine the benefits of critical hit rate with superior 2H formulas. And that is why kept pace at the top while the other 2H jobs got outstripped by THF and NIN. Ukko's Fury is just such a HELP I AM TRAPPED IN 2006 PLEASE SEND A TIME MACHINE WS -- a critical WS with a 60% mod on a 2.0 fTP... and it double attacks. In Abyssea where you're actually capping fSTR bonus that means 4-5k WS going off constantly, even on high tier NMs.