The Beast Within -- A Guide To Blue Mage

Sharur clubs. Can be augmented with Acc and Attack, as well as Double Attack (mine has acc+8 att+8 dblt atk+3). They seriously hit like a truck, and all but makes my Anahera Saber cool to look at, since it already has Magic Damage on it. I'm liking playing around with Bura and Sharur for DA+6% in the weapons slots, but I'm sure dual wielding them (dat delay) is some pretty rock solid damage too.

I still like my sword though ^^

Dual Wield 2, STP and figure out the STP math, its very easy and I am loving my new clubs with Realmrazer......... just godly on new stuff

You got DW and STP augments on your clubs?

What setup are you using? Looking at the spreadsheet, Sharur/Sharur isn't looking too great versus things that wouldn't give it an abnormal advantage. However, Sharur/Bura is looking pretty decent, at least versus foddery things.

I'm trying to put in Flash Nova to see how that is, but apparently I'm too stupid to insert it into the table (it isn't built in already).

no lol DA6 Crit +5/6

With equal buffs, I have Sharur/Sharur (10acc/10att/6DA and 10acc/10att/6crit) w/ Realmrazer coming in at around 6% inferior to Uson/Bura and Sharur/Bura(10acc/10att/6DA) w/ Realmrazer coming in at 1.2% inferior to Uson/Bura.

When considering magic damage for Subduction and stuff, Sharur is better than sword. When considering highly evasive things, sword should easily be better than Sharur (lower natural and weaponbased skill). Flash Nova might pull Sharur farther forward too, but it isn't in the spreadsheet and adding it doesn't seem to do anything, and there doesn't seem to be magic damage+ support in here either, so can't test at this time without using my own simulation which has proven to be a problem in the past. I suspect Realmrazer averages higher though.

You need to work your STP and DW to arrive at a 6 hit + WS. There is more than one way to achieve this. You would use this in a physical (realmrazer) only situation. It will beat out dual swords, all things even AND actually have more acc. Your total white damage with the six hit will be small in comparison to the WS damage, so thats what this build hinges on.

If you intend on using flash nova as your WS, the build would be totally different, using at least Gab in the offhand (perhaps even dual gab.) I havent worked out the exact "ideal" details on that build.

Is Claidheamh Soluis top sword (other than mythic) for blue or does the delay kill it? If it is the best now - what are the best augments for it?

Sorry I didnt go back far enough - this was already answered: No its not top sword, Uso/Bura still #1 for swords other than mythic etc.

So what is the acc looking like with Sharur/ Sharur or Sharur/Bura. Is it something that is viable on high level content were acc counts or is it a good "for soloing Mata or easier" only type situation?

I have the sameish accuracy with those really.

They have high skill and base accuracy is decent, you can also augment accuracy on them to see some nice results.

Are there really no fragmentation BLU spells? That'd be cool to be able to make light with Realmrazer.

perhaps next update, theres a few new spells being announced.

Oh wait, Heavy Strike is fragmentation. Haven't used it in a while, not sure if it's any good on high level stuff. Hopefully Sinker Drill will be fragmentation :)

Good on Arcana and undead - so Especially useful on the Corse NM in the new Skirmish.

On highly evasive stuff, clubs (despite lower base skill) have much higher acc. +27 base each and another 10 minimum is +77 from the pair. On the speadsheet is it showing a 6-hit build? It matters quite a bit.

Minor nitpick but that's 74. Yeah, 3 attack rounds to weaponskill. Dual Wield IV increases the gap even more, too. You need to give up quite a lot to reach that 6hit is one of the major problems of the build. Even with both clubs @6STP (DA6 + STP6 comes out better anyway) and STP2 set, you need to drop a couple pieces of gear to reach the required amount of STP, and the pieces that need to be dropped are quite heavy. What gearset are you using?

I just started again after not playing since Jan/Feb can anyone summarize what's changed for blu since then?

magic got gud

assorted gear adjustments

haste 2 via erratic flutter

nothing else rly

DW CLUB TP build

Augment on Club needs total of 6STP (either on one or between the 2). You can only set DW2 with this setup (does allow for additional points for STP2 needed for 6 hit).

With this build you WS in 85% DW getting 9.0base tp x 1.24stp. Assuming realmrazer will hit offhand and at least 4 other times minimum = 26.2 TP return on WS. During TP phase you are at 80% DW or 8.5 TP x 1.47stp = 12.4.

In regard to the build and its best operation: Even though your delay is not capped (through loss of DW) you are at 25% delay and its very close to ideal sword/sword build when it is at capped delay (20%). I had club up by 1.35% on total build, but a tweak here or there can shift that a bit.

There are 3 things that give the club build the advantage are #1) Since delay is not capped it can grow another 20% (25%/20%) on damage with /haste samba, admittedly this would allow you to drop some DW on sword build but the impact is much less since the ratio of WS damage to white damage is much higher on 6 hit club build. #2) Club build actually has higher acc, allowing for more choices when acc becomes important. #3) Anything weak to blunt is going to take a beating (obvious)

What spells u setting? Why sacrifice DW3?

Is acc so much of an issue you would use letalis over atheling etc?

With that set (6DA + 6STP sharur, Qaaxo harness for both sword and club sets instead of thaumas), Chant du Cygne (5021avg) and Realmrazer (4206avg) DW2 STP2 TA ACCBns2 (Benthic+Magic Fruit) for club set and DW3 STP TA AccBns2 (Frightful Roar+White Wind) for Sword set, identical buffs (Haste+2x march, booststr, min5, chaos+fighter (which benefits clubs more than swords due to extra acc on the clubs), berserk, aggressor, nat. meditation, ionis, smouldering salisbury steak) and debuffs (dia II+2xlightshot, frightful roar) on Tojil, Sword set is coming in at 808.4DPS and club build is coming in at 608.1DPS.


this gearset for sword:

ItemSet 327746


Same gearset for realmrazer as the set in the OP for Req, except epona is switched out for a second lev+1 ring and both earrings are +mnd earrings, also ginsen for ammo came out better than aqua sachet. Gap decreases as buffs are lost, but sword remains ahead. For example, without COR rolls:

Sword - 567.0
Club - 428.9


Without Berserk/Aggressor:

Sword - 505.9
Club - 378.4


Without food:

Sword - 463.8
Club - 343.0



Somehow I don't see Flash Nova making up the difference when you have actually got support that didn't fall asleep earlier in the run, but may be wrong. At most I'd see it doing 6.5-7k, about 50-75% more damage than realmrazer under the worst conditions which makes it seem bigger than it is, and I'm not even sure that's reasonable since I haven't mathed Nova's max dmg potential. Since you were using dual sharurs in that set, I assume you meant to use Realmrazer anyway.

For fun, on a trash tier Kamihr Raaz with the same buffs/debuffs as above:

Sword - 1152.0
Club - 1025.4



More reasonable buffs/debuffs, nothing that can't be applied by a BLU/WAR by itself with trusts (single march only, but still caps haste), no food either:

Sword - 944.1
Club - 761.4




What are your results/buffs/debuffs/target? I can't get club setup to beat swords, even optimizing the club sets further. 6hit is nice, but when the weaponskills aren't much stronger than CDC/SB to begin with and it requires dropping attack speed, all you're really getting out of this is extra accuracy which ends up largely moot. Keep in mind that a lot of the +acc on those Sharurs is making up for BLU's gimp club skill and the fact that Sharur does not have 242 skill. Also worth noting that switching to /DNC and incorporating Haste Samba lowered Sharur's relative DPS even further. Even if I bump up Realmrazer's parameters to cause it to average 7.2k to faux simulate Flash Nova:


Above Raaz/buffs/debuffs
Sword - 944.1
Club - 838.0


Back to Tojil with all the buffs/debuffs
Sword - 816.5
Club - 808.4

No COR
Sword - 637.6
Club - 623.7

No food
Sword - 572.5
Club - 581.1


So it takes a pretty unrealistic scenario for clubs to overcome swords. Any ideas?

Of course this assuming the simulation you ran using a spreadsheet has no error's in it (which we know the SAM one has just been updated a few times due to some smaller errors).

Along with when you added the wrong stats / base damage on the JSE weapon as an offhand ~ and had it beating Uson / Bura combo.

Not saying you're wrong, but saying that DPS numbers from a spreadsheet isn't really enough "proof" for me to consider it correct when I can't see the maths behind every calculation to decide if your argument is correct or not (and no I don't expect you to show every calculation on this).

Docs more a do by hand maths and then test in game type of person, he has never relied on spreadsheets. Granted both methods have issues when determining whats "best" as real simulations in game have errors or chance of luck and require large sample sizes to determine an accurate baseline which is time consuming, which a spreadsheet does get around to some degree, but a spreadsheet uses large amounts of mathematical values that once made, are very rarely checked and there is some potential for either errors or calculations not working together correctly and throwing out erroneous results.

On a more personal note, I prefer swords to clubs ~ But this is more because I am stuck in my ways I guess.

The big issue here (skewing all the data), is how is your realmrazer doing less than Chant?

A Capped attack (and fSTR) senario with Club set at MND 240 and Chant set with DEX at 275, crit at 48% and DA 30)

Realm: 2.25 x 8 (184 + 28 + 204) = 7488

Chant: 2.68 x 5.95 (135 + 23 + 220) = 6027


So obiously that was quick napkin math, but under no situation other than crazy high defense does Chant beat realmrazer.

I'm guessing the spreadsheet has not been updated to show the bast for RR is 0.8 prior to gorget/belt.

An aside: the spreadsheet has many errors, I dont use it.

Ill go through more in depth maths later if i get time.

I updated my copy of it to have the correct 0.796875fTP. All other issues take it up with motenten, I don't use my own simulations for these discussions anymore because I can't be bothered to explain the intricacies and mathematics behind everything as people expect, but I have run these comparisons in the past and have had clubs coming out ahead in some cases, however they certainly haven't been wrecking swords and making me think that I'm severely inhibiting myself by not carrying club sets around with me. Motenten's are available in the public domain, so feel free to look over them yourself if you feel the need to.

At the end of the day, I'm not saying not to use clubs. If that's what you want to do, go for it. But for the effort required in a complete paradigm shift for the job and the minute increase you get (in some situations), it's less attractive as a "go out and gear for this now" type of thing. If increasing attack delay didn't directly work against weaponskill frequency by some strange quantum break, it'd probably be more valuable for the mainstream. I'll add clubs and club sets to the OP eventually though, it's an alternative option for the time being for those who want a change of pace.

DONE


I'll use my own gear for this comparison of DW club/DW sword. Gear can differ slightly, but changing a few attack here and there wont create profound differences. With the following, you can get a general approximation.
The DPS difference btw swords/clubs is small and wont matter in most cases, but here is where clubs will stand out significantly: Someone in party is DNC or /DNC. You are fighting Blunt weak mobs. You need every ounce of accuracy you can muster.

This comparison will be against a mob with 800 defense, 150 VIT, 150 AGI . Red curry and zerk will be on, but no rolls. Capped MAGIC delay will be assumed (via bard or w/e)

Sharur(6TP+15 acc)/Sharur(6DA/+15 acc):


Melee (6hit): ItemSet 327706

STR: 199 (fSTR 13)
DEX: 217 (25% crit)
Att: 1241
Acc (just for reference assuming 100% for both for ez maths): 966
Effective Ratio (after Crit): 1.8
Avg hit damage: 1.8 (184+13) = 354.6
White damage per WS round: x6 = 2127.6

Realmrazer WS set: ItemSet 327763

STR: 222 (fSTR 19)
MND: 232 (mod = 197)
Att: 1407
Effective Ratio: 1.75
WS damage: 1.756 x 7.975 (184+19+197) = 5600

Time in WS round: DW 80%, Magic Haste 43.75, Gear Haste 25%
Effective Multiattack per round (4 QA, 13 TA, 32 DA) = 1.5872
Delay per swing: 352/60 x [0.8x0.3125] / 1.6393 = 0.924sec
Time for WS round (including WS animation which Ive always understood as 2 secs): (0.924 x 6)+2 = 7.37sec

Club DPS = (5600+2127) / 7.37sec = 1048

Sword DW: 12 hitItemSet 154810

STR: 206 (fSTR:15)
DEX: 234 (crit25)
Att: 1352
Acc: 934
Effective Ratio after crit: 2.19
Avg Hit damage: 2.19 (132.5 + 15) = 301.1
Avg White damage per round: 12x301.1 = 3613

Chant ItemSet 323202

STR: 242 (fSTR: 23)
DEX: 282 (mod: 225) (Crit 25+15+3+5 = 48)
Att: 1416
Effective Ratio after crit: 2.25
Effective fTP after MultiAtt: (23DA, 8TA) 5.95
Chant avg damage: 5.95 x 2.25 (135+23+225) = 5127

Time in WS round: Capped delay: (231+240)/2 x 0.2/60 = 0.785
Effect multiattacks per round (3QA,8TA,24DA) = 1.4588
Time per WS round: (0.785 x 12)/1.4588 +2 = 8.457sec

DPS Sword = (5127+3613) / 8.457 = 1033 DPS

As you can see its very tight in a normal situation (the last time I ran, I likely had a roll on which skews to club).

The important take aways to notice:

1) Theres not much difference in a typical situation
2) Higher Ratio (rolls/songs,defense down on mob) Skews to CLUB. Lower Ratio (lack of this stuff) Skews to SWORD
3) If you have a DNC or /dnc in grp. Club smashes sword by alot (20%)
4) If mob is blunt weak. Club smashes sword by alot (25%)
5) IF you are worried for acc, or it allows you to move from sushi or curry. Club wins by alot: (966 to 934 in this example, can vary with club augments) = effectively 16% hit rate
6) Quicker WS allows for more skillchains
7) Double club allows for higher magic damage if it is needed on the fly due to changing resistances or w/e: Flash Nova and casting from spellset

Does this mean CLUB always > Sword: NO

Obviously sword vs tree or anything with very high defense or lack of buffing/debuffing.

In theory you could /dnc and force a win for CLUB, but it wont be be by a crazy amount (since loss of DA and zerk) , best to talk to your MNK friend prior to event and tell him the healer sucks and he needs to /DNC :P

will read the rest of your post after it's done when I'm home from work, but already going to say I agree with this. specific circumstances will make clubs better than swords by a decent margin (however other things, like Wopket's weakness to slashing, work inversely). The biggest thing to it all is this: having a DNC or /DNC who actually uses Haste Samba is very rare, and that's a big part of club's dps lead lost. It's why I'm not willing to tell people to absolutely go out and spend resources on this unless it's something they want to do.

type like this to show your set

Just noticing something that I've not paid attention to which will make it easier for hit builds. Apparently additional hits on WS (which I've always just added 1 TP for) get STP bonus also, making them 1.2 with 20stp. So you wont need perfect augments for build, +4 STP will suffice.

Now that im seeing this. IF you had 2 +6 STP clubs you could drop to 75% DW (DW3) at the effective cost of 4 DA (losing 6 on club and 5 on brutal, but getting 7 on ears). This also adds 8 att/acc. This should push club ahead but a decent amount

PS (doing alot of thinking and reposting <<): Dont even need perfect or near perfect augments to hit this