The Beast Within -- A Guide To Blue Mage

Unless, again, you are suffering for acc, its really only second to an assimilator+3 jubbah, and some crazy herc vest dark matter augs ive seen. I still use it since haven't made af +3 yet.

That's interesting. I have Assimilator +3 but have still been using Abnoba since there's no Attack on Assimilator and WSD only affects the first hit. Guess I'll try it out and see how it feels.

I don't know where a lot of the info today has been coming from, but the big one I need to address is AF+3 body for CDC. Do not do that. WSD is crap for CDC.

Abnoba is great and a really well-augmented Herc vest (10+ DEX, 4 CDMG) is best. Abnoba is perfectly fine if you don't want to play Oseem's Wild Ride.

I don't see how Abnoba *doesn't* beat assimilator +3. Every time I try to get assimilator +3 to beat it, Abnoba is ~2-3% more WS damage than assimilator +3 (using the gear calculator). At low attack, and at attack cap. The only thing assimilator has going for it is the accuracy and a bit more DEX. But (non-DM) augmented herc gear approaches assimilator +3's accuracy, plus crit rate and crit damage. A decent non-DM herc body beats assimilator+3 with crit damage +4%, 5+ DEX and ~20 attack. Which is relatively easy to get. But even that doesn't add as much damage as abnoba.
Though I will say that assimilator +3 is easy to get. It's linear progress instead of random drop. While it may cost more in the long run, people actually do Omen card farms. I can't remember the last time I've seen a shout for Vir'ava.
Edit: a perfect 10 DEX, 25 attack, 5% crit damage Herc body seems to *barely* outdo Abnoba. More attack, the better. Though I'd rather do Vir'ava 1000 times than give Oseem that many stones.

assimilator +3 beating Abnoba for CDC is misinformation or facts I don't like.

However, what about Adhemar Jacket +1 vs. Abnoba ?

Adhemar +1:
Acc 55
Atk 35
TA 4%
DEX 45

Abnoba:
Acc 22
Atk 22
TA 0
DEX 38
Crit Rate 5%
Crit Dmg 5%

Are these 5% Crit Rate/Dmg enough to beat the +13 atk / +7 DEX / + 4% TA ?

Also, it's interesting to have high CDC dmg on high content mob, so having more acc & atk in order to cap it might be a wise option ?

Yes. Abnoba still beats Adhemar +1 (B), even with the set bonus from Adhemar +1 head/hands (B). It's much closer than Abnoba vs. Assimilators +3 though.
Edit: I'd take Adhemar +1 over Assimilators +3 where accuracy is important. (If I had adhemar +1, rip my bank account)

Where would the Herc Vest I listed that started this discussion rank in Abnoba, Adhemar +1, Assimilator +3 hierarchy?

DEX+15 Attack+30 Crit Dmg +4.

I was totally content with that and was gonna leave it alone but you guys got me doubting it now >.>

Don't mess with that, it's sexy. low accuracy though.

Ok, thanks. I thought Assimilator +3 was strange, but I was willing to test for myself. I mostly asked because every time I see a Blu CDC discussions, people's sets always have herc body. I'm glad to know I've been doing it right all along.

For Adhemar Jacket +1 vs Abnoba Kaftan, the jacket is a nice higher accuracy alternative. Abnoba and Cdmg Herc Vest are still at the top, but if you really need accuracy, the jacket is a nice compromise.

Lunafreya, that vest is exceptional. Outside of accuracy, it is basically perfect. It should stay in your CDC sets unless you really need the accuracy.

worth noting there may be more efficient swaps for accuracy concerns, though

Assimilator +3 < Adhemar +1 < Abnoba < Herc DEX10,ATK30,CDMG5 < Herc DEX15,ATK30,CDMG4

That's a great Herc body piece.

Got any candidates better than Adhemar Jacket +1 (A)?

That is absolutely something to consider. Herc Vest has decent base accuracy, anyways, so it's not a terribly large concern.I wouldn't drop the vest quickly at all.

it's not limited to the body slot.

In terms of accuracy swaps, we have a lot of considerations.

Jukukik Feather to Falcon Eye, Brutal/Moonshade to 2x Mache, Thereoid (if using them) to Cdmg Herc or Ayanmo +2, Epona's to Ramuh +1. There are other options, but those are just a few. Dropping high-profile items, specifically Adhemar Bonnet, Cdmg Herc Vest, and Samnuha tights, should be some of your more desperate swaps.

Outside of solo or very lowman scenarios, though, accuracy should not be a concern. BLU has access to exceptional accuracy through traits alone. If you're finding you need higher accuracy in endgame situations, then you should instead focus on shifting buffs from your BRD, COR, and/or GEO.

So..... anyone on Asura wanna go farm Abnoba?

Im not sure but this is what the most current spreadsheet shows me. Using idris frailty over torpor at least on 140 content

That looks a lot more like a savage blade set than a CDC set

Kinda in the middle of both.

Well the hat ear and ammo are wrong, but when i change those to adh hq,mache+1 the diff b/w ***+3 and abn actually gets a bit larger.
For trash sets its a lot different, but i dont know if anyone does t1 or n ambu still.

Obviously anything you put in a "needs high acc, but not using high acc set" is going to be weird.

How are you going to have frailty and not be capping acc. if it's "no bard" obviously torpor. If it's "damn its too evasive", obviously torpor.

Kind of creating a sceanario that doesn't exist.

We didnt have anyone who wanted to burn gil to deck out a brd mule sadly, so most t3/t4 done with 2 dd/tank/whm/geo and/or cor. That seems to be a pretty normal setup outside of smn burns anyways.
Changing to torpor, the ws dmg is 6383 abnoba and 6384 ***+3 (i also changed hands to adh hq) i may be missing something else, but it doesnt really seem that big of a difference.

On solo stuff like t1 Reisen its 500+ dmg in favor of Abnoba for sure, but I just dont know how important it is when you are doing 30k per ws already

You're going to need to share the parameters you're using to test, here, because it currently sounds like you just have low hitrate and solely the higher accuracy on Assimilator's is making it appear supperior.

You can set:
Target: anything over cl135
aggressor/ natures med / flutter / anvil
sublime +1
bouncing between torpor or frailty
you saw the set, and the change to adh hq head and hands, mache+1
There are other slots i can get more acc in like legs) to get from ~95% fhr back up to 99%~ but every other change ive tried is a lesser amount of ws dmg.

*edit: sorry i deleted the pic here is the gearset
ItemSet 358314

herc feet are ta+4 acc+36 att+33 dex+8

and just to note, im just going on what the SS tells me, it may be bad in which case head math may be more accurate.

13 shadows with 650skill for anyone wondering.

Does regal earring have any place in Savage Blade WS sets? Just saw the set bonus would activate with af+3 body and STR/MND are both modifiers for Savage Blade, Regal Earring has MND+10 which might outdo Ishvara?

2nd earring for max tp savage (in place of moonshade), if attack is capped.
Attack uncapped: Kuwunga or Tati+1 depending if madrigal is on.

working on my blu sim some, any ws besides cdc, savage, expiacion, req for sword? and what club ws? magic ones like sanguine will come later since they're not a huge priority

Judgment sticks out the most since it's basically just club's Savage Blade. Realmrazer is decent, too.

probably skip out on req for now, need to find a good way to scale the attack penalty. probably get clubs sometime later this week. as far as augments, what do people want? I don't care to add DM only augments and would rather keep the ones I add reasonably obtainable as well.