The Sealed Dagger: A Ninja Guide

At low buffs they might, at high I dunno, maybe.
It's quite an expensive piece for a minimal gain over other "free" options though.
I'd focus on optimize other slots with bigger gains before getting to the legs slot and decide if you wanna get Relic+3.

I mean not just for Hi relic legs should be pretty damn high priority

For what else? They're not that good for Shun last time I checked, they're awesome for Ten and I assume Metsu. Point is there's Hizamaru+2 which has good acc, some att and 7% WSD.
The difference is small and Hizamaru+2 are guaranteed and free, you don't have to depend on 30+ mils stuff or incredibly rare augments.

Which is why I said that while Relic legs are very good, it's easier to get better options in the other slots, and while you do that Hizamaru+2 is a fantastic placeholder.


The logic is:
before spending 20 mils for an upgrade in the leg slot that will give you 200 more DPS, I'd focus on other slots where you can easily get 600+ DPS gains, maybe for less gil too.

I never meant to say that Relic legs are bad and that you shouldn't get them.

Sechs and I live in different worlds. I bought a Fudo the other day, haven't played NIN in months, still haven't played NIN since buying it.

Hi.

Recently finished to master my NIN.

What is the current hierarchy of NIN WS? Plus whats the current good weapon combinations?

Thanks in advance

metsu is bestu

BiS for Ten, Byakkos 119 still win for metsu

edit: mochi +3 wins by exactly 80dps for metsu in this set
10% body hands 7% feet
kanaria 14DEX 15att18acc 2wsd
ItemSet 355713

20641(byakko) 20721(mochi)

-all- of luna's herc is ~9-10 wsd and I made his sets for him.

realistically,
NIN has -one- great piece of relic for melee dps. Can't get 1 piece done vs like 3-4 for other jobs (also only 1 piece of af)

Dynamis has been out for over a year, how many ppl in your group even lot ninja stuff.

I have no idea what buffs and target you're choosing, but I do not get similar results even with 3/5 DEX/WSD+10% Herc. I pretty much always still get Mochi+3 winning, often by a significant margin. Plus,you're discounting that fact that Mochi+3 also have significantly more Acc/Atk for uncapped situations. It wouldn't totally shock me to see some particular scenario where Jokushu wins by a small amount, but that's gonna be the exception to the rule.

I also get Hizamaru+2 beating Jokushu a good bit of the time, and those two are very close even when Jokushu pulls slightly ahead.

Also, change that Demonry Core for a Jukukik Feather already :P


;P they were great for Shun for a couple months (RIP WSD on all hits)

I do think Mochi+3 legs are absolutely worth it for Ten/Hi/Metsu, especially since relic+3 prices are now far lower than they were nearer to Divergence release (at the prices for the first few months I would have said they weren't worth that much gil).

However, Sechs makes a good point that we do still have an easy/free option that's a very good placeholder. If you're short on gil and working on other improvements to your NIN, there may be other purchases to prioritize that would impact your overall DPS more. JSE +1 or +2 neck, AF+3 head, Kendatsuba +1 (body>legs>feet), Adhe+1 head/hands, etc. Mochizuki Hakama +3 are definitely worth getting eventually for the serious NIN, but maybe not priority #1.

WS choice is very weapon dependent, there's lots of discussion in previous posts in this thread. But, the streamlined cheat-sheet:

Mainhands:
Heishi Shorinken
- Always good, generally best choice if getting a lot of buffs, easy to use
- Blade: Ten is your default WS when decently buffed, it gets a ton out of TP Bonus so will perform significantly worse when using other mainhand katanas. Blade: Shun when you are not getting strong buffs or for SC purposes (including Radiance). Hybrid WS (Chi/Teki/To/etc.) with TPBonus+WSD+MAB are also good, especially with magic buffs.

Kannagi
- BiS mainhand when getting low-mid amount of offensive buffs (say, a single buffer, or more buffs on very hard enemies where you're still uncapped); assumes you can maintain Empy aftermath (which is not hard in the vast majority of situations, but requires more attention than Aeonic/Relic/non-RMEA)
- Blade: Hi is your go-to WS. Shun is also used frequently for SC purposes.

Kikoku
- Usually 3rd place mainhand, despite some of the weird chatter in this forum. Still a solid endgame weapon, but almost never beats Kannagi; in rare severely undercapped situations it can edge out Heishi (or reach sidegrade territory).
- Blade: Metsu is life. Shun for SC purposes, and Hi for more uncommon SC purposes (when Metsu doesn't also work to achieve Darkness).

Kanaria
- Generally best non-RMEA mainhand, shoot for DMG+15 or more (really important for mainhand) and additional augments like TA+3% (a priority), DEX or STR, Acc&Atk.
- Blade: Shun is usually going to be your best WS. Hi has some use for SC purposes.

Fudo Masamune would also be a solid offensive mainhand on A/B path (but below Aeonic/Empy/Relic). However, it works better as an offhand and if you have that kind of money to spend on a NIN weapon (and no Aeonic) you'd be better off making Empy or Relic. Fudo path C is a stellar tanking weapon on mainhand, but that's a pretty niche use - makes a good augment path if you have an offhand Fudo though (augments useless when offhanded, but can swap it to main if you need to do some tanking).

Offhands:
- Fudo Masamune is the king on hard content. Mega Atk/Racc/Atk on a strong skill/DMG weapon. Atk+15 per active shadow does work when offhanded (Atk+105 with full Utsu: San)
- Kanaria is a strong choice. DMG is less important on offhand (but not totally insignificant), shoot for TA+3% and whatever you can manage from attribute/acc/atk/racc.
- Ochu is also good, mostly as an offhand option to Heishi (although a well augmented Kanaria is still usually better, Ochu does a good job thanks in large part to STR/DEX for Ten and damage split skewing more toward WS with that setup, and Ochu can win in some situations). Ochu tends to a bit less useful for other mainhands, unless you're also magic bursting ninjutsu on a regular basis.
- Shigi (augmented) is helpful if you have no Fudo in situations where you need a lot of accuracy. Ninjutsu recast reduction is nice too.
- FYI, none of Relic/Empy/Aeonic make good offhands, they all lose vital aspects when not in the mainhand.

Reads like a lot of "I feel" in this post. Any math you'd like to provide? Are the REMAs base AG or R15?

R15 Kikou looks incredibly potent from an FTP, pDIF stand point

8.4 ftp at 1000tp with much better WSmods and SCprop than Ten.

Capu~san doesn't even have Heishi, but still makes posts about it lol

Brings up Fudo Masamune for tanking and disregards Nagi all together XD

No one should ever own a nagi...

Only slightly sarcastic.

I mean... I have one after glowed.... for lockstyle purposes.

On the offhand portion I've already tried everything and my kanaria is pretty close to perfect for Taupe I think (14DEX 15att 18 acc 2WSD) and a perfect ochu still beats it and basically every other option w/ heishi for ten, I think it's only barely behind that kanaria on metsu too.

Good option if you don't have access to Kanaria yet, the vagary katana Achuiblah blah. Head isnt too hard of a run and you could probably /sh for a group for it

There's a current spreadsheet on page 1 of this thread, feel free to check it yourself. I'm wordy enough already without having to justify every sentence with a detailed mathematical breakdown, and I'm not going to just spit out pages of DPS numbers out of context without noting that they're based on very specific examples of gear/buffs/target.

However... I will admit that on a closer look, Kikoku with R15 augments DOES perform a bit better than I may have been giving it credit for. I do not find that it changes the overall evaluations that much, but the augments did help Kikoku close the gap. Still, I appreciate the reminder that I need to be careful not to automatically state the pre-augment "general knowledge" in the NIN community that may have become slightly outdated with the past couple of FFXI updates.

All that being said... I still don't see any major changes that indicate we should all think Kikoku is #1. Even with augments, I'm still seeing Kannagi (augmented, with a good Hi set) beating Kikoku (augmented, with a good Metsu set) in almost any spreadsheet situation. And I still get Heishi (augmented) beating Kikoku (augmented) in most situations. It's closer now than it was pre-augments though.

One factor that might account for some variance is extraordinary WSD augments. If you're testing a Metsu set with multiple Dark Matter WSD+7~10% pieces, you should be sure to compare to Ten with similar STR/WSD pieces (or Hi with AGI/WSD). Anyway, I don't like to assume required WSD+10% random augments when giving guide advice as a general overview, so I tend to use the "WSD+" sets in the spreadsheet, which have attribute+10/WSD+5% (still pretty beastly augments, but not reliant on a limited-time and extraordinarily random Dark Matter campaign). If you have crazy augment gear, check the spreadsheets yourself with your own stats.

Really though, ANY of Heishi/Kannagi/Kikoku are very good weapons and perfectly suitable for high-end endgame use, and Kikoku lags behind less with the most recent updates. At least as far as NIN goes, the recent RMEA adjustments did seem to do a pretty good job of balancing NIN's weapons fairly well. They all require different WS and modifications to play style to get the most out of them though, which I actually find kind of fun.


EDIT: some additional thoughts I've had at work this afternoon...

There IS something to the argument that Kikoku might be worth using in a particular situation just based on Metsu's SC properties and the other WS being used by your party. Obviously extremely dependent on what WS others are using though.

Especially when you're in a party with a lot of WS spamming going on, it's nice to be spamming something that's going to result in a lot of incidental light/darkness chains. Metsu is fantastic at playing nice with others and slapping on a lot of extra light/darkness SCs without necessarily requiring players to rigidly follow a set multi-step order. I occasionally pull out my Kikoku for precisely this reason, even if it wouldn't necessarily spreadsheet the best without considering SC damage - I just let Metsu fly and try to time it within SC window as best I can.

I see the same thing sometimes on my Kannagi, since Hi also works rather well for chaining with so many frequently used WS to make Darkness. It's not quite as versatile as Metsu though.

Ten is less useful for SC purposes. However, if you do have a Heishi and you're in a WS-spammy situation like that, you might be able to just use more Shun (assuming you can make light with others and the mob isn't strongly resistant). It's not as if Shun is a BAD WS on Heishi in any case, and it even got a bit more of a boost with the recent WSDmg augments.

Haha! I'm slowly closing in on my own Nagi, should be done early 2019. But I'm just doing it cuz Ninja, and I agree with you that it's pretty bad.

I am dead serious, I'm only going to use the thing for:

(1) A tanking offhand to Fudo mainhand, assuming Nagi's enmity+ actually works when offhanded (since no one has ever been able to confirm that for me, I'm gonna have to test it my damn self with Libra comparisons once I finish it).

(2) A 45-minute timer Mijin/Reraise macro piece. >.< (yes, I will probably actually use it regularly)

It doesn't.


It's true use in my gearswap lua

That's because a TA+3% Kanaria will beat 2WSD Kanaria every time. I have a DEX+something/WSD+7% Kanaria (unfortunately without DMG or great acc/atk), and even that struggles to beat my best TA+3% Kanaria.

Perfect Ochu may be competitive and could even win in some situations against a good Kanaria, but usually a TA Kanaria is tops. Pretty sure Langly also put in some effort into testing those as offhands to Heishi (pre-RMEA augment, but otherwise relatively current info), and found it highly unlikely that Ochu would beat TA Kanaria.


Ouch. Well, FREE RERAISES!

Seriously though, I think Nagi's mainhand tanking niche was killed with C path Fudo Masamune. I'd rather have Fudo's significant ninjutsu recast reduction, variable enmity+, and better offensive performance than Nagi's static enmity+

It was dead long before Fudo Masamune.

So this has always been a huge pet peeve of mine. MA on ws on the spreadsheet.

3/100 "ws" is going to get that TA bonus. The increase when that happens THREE TIMES is -not- that great. it's always irritated me that things like windbuffet+1 are the gospel for ws (not so much anymore)

Lower lows and higher highs, that slot does literally nothing 97% of the time. In any other world that would be absolutely ludicrous to take as acceptable.

Stop crushing my dreams!

I've actually argued that Nagi is in the running for the single worst RMEA... but I'm still making it XD

YOU TAKE THAT BACK! It looks the /coolest/~

I think everyone realizes this is about an average over time. You could lodge the same complaint about stuff like Crit rate, or Crit dmg (excluding forced crits like stacked with SA or Climactic Flourish). 5% crit rate means you aren't going to crit 95% of the time!

However, it's true that a lot of the time you aren't even taking full advantage of that excess damage when you get a MA/crit/whatever proc, since you might kill the mob outright and "waste" the proc, etc. (though the risk is less when you're grinding away on something that lives for 20 minutes and takes dozens of WS). So yeah, that does irritate me at times about people who feel that spreadsheets are gospel, and there's something to be said for the predictability approach at the expense of oohing and aahing over high end damage spikes. If the gap is very small between a piece with very consistent performance (say, attribute+x) versus a piece with far less consistent results that ends up with a slightly higher average over 100 WS (say, TA+x%), I'll usually go for the consistent option. Spreadsheet average over time is really more of a valuable comparison when you have two pieces which BOTH feature important variable stats. What's better: crit rate +5% or TA+2%, etc.

I still use Windbuffet+1 for Blade: Hi, but that's a rare case and really comes down to the lack of extremely competitive options. Perhaps Svelt+1's more consistent numbers would be worth it in practice at some times. But for that particular comparison, we're talking hundreds of difference in spreadsheet WS Dmg in favor of Windbuffet+1 and I'm OK with the added unpredictability; if it was a low double digit difference, I might be inclined to go for the more consistent option instead.

Also, don't discount that once you stack enough of a stat, it becomes more predictable. When you WS with 60% double attack, there's a high enough proc frequency that it becomes predictable enough to be tolerable for practical use. Can't just look at one DA+5% piece in a vacuum.

Yeah, I'm basically just talking about windbuffet and brutal for the most part. (maybe heteroi, i see that pop up a little too often)

Entire ws set focuses on "stat modifier +" and then that 5% DA is going to be so dramatically better than "stat modifier +4" that you're gimp if you dont use the brutal earring all the time always. It was always obnoxious as ***.

Literally 95% of the time that earring did absolutely nothing. (85 if sub war) ((back in the day))

It's different with actual gear with actual stats and some multiattack on it.

it has alwys been hard for ppl that can only analyses with average to understand two things with the same average can be highly different when you are working with treshold (like the mobs max hp)


let says you are fighting mobs with 100hp and you do 1000 dmg in average per wing
The lesser math educated would think ok im killing 1 mobs per swing
buts thet is not trues

Person A doings 900 dmg and 1100 dmg every other hit
He will use 3-4 ( dependng on what the starting hit is ) hits to kill 2 mobs he is in facts 50%-100 slower than a person just doing 1000dmg per every hit.

Even thoug the avarage is the same.



but in regards to DA and TA we cant just look at a single item and says %5 for peak is very unstable. we haveto look at the entire spectrum of DA
if you have more than 50% da then getting more DA will make your dmg more stables

lets try with extreme numbers

0% base da and you get 50% da from a gea
yes before you where 100% stable and now you have 50/50 split with the new gear

however
if you already have 50% DA and get an item with antoher 50% the revrese is happened
Before you had a split 50/50 but now you are at a 100% stable with the gear.


Just because something happens random does not mean it cant make the results more stable as a whole.



you case of not taking advantage of excessive damage can in the same way be that you are not getting the peak to kill it in on blow and have to do anothher round delaying you.

let do this exampel again
you killign mobs with 1000hp
you deal 800dmg and can boost ist 20% to 960
you sitll need two attacks to kill the mobs

or you can take a 20% chance to double you damge on a swing and now you actualyl kill the mobs 20% faster because 20% of your attacks will now kill it in first try

Average still the same



so in short:
You have to take in the full picture before complainging about unstable/randomness from thingsk like Crithit and DA/TA/QA.
just looking and one peice of gear is just as decieving as just looking at the average

Alternative conclussion":
Without takign the mobs into account you cant detemmine if you want random chance of peaks vs more stable output.
So without that it just a matter of personal placebo/prefferences

If a struggle NIN needs to downgrade that hard, Mijin Path B is much more accessible and is very similar (probably equal or better) to Achiuchikapu. The versatile stats help in the Daken/Sange department and a variety of WSs. A newer NIN would have issues finding good racc pieces to suit their needs. The small STR/DEX on it is useful as well.

This was while I was testing the upper limits to our theoretical output. It took a perfect storm of Kanaria Augments to beat Ochu. By that I mean, DMG+18 or higher (caps at 20), TA3, and DEX11+.

Without those the Ochu won by a tiny margin, anything less and the Ochu just walked away with it. The Kanaria's contribution to white dmg is what surprised me. It was enough to push it over Ochu in capped scenarios.

Totally forgot about Mijins, I guess now too the ambuscade katana(s)? But I dont think they've said anything about augments yet.

Making me want to try to roll a TA 3 kanaria again lol

Note that these are all pre-augment, however augments in general seem to emphasize the strength of these weapons so I am pretty sure they don't change the general thought and usage behind these weapons much.

Heishi:

Heishi will generally be the best weapon to use in groups, radiance/light and fusion when most other WS are going to be frag or light makes you accidentally add free damage. 500 TP bonus makes Blade: Ten very competitive in fully buffed situations if you do not need shun's additional attack bonus, shun also caps out at about 15k dmg(+10% with augment) while you can hit 20k+ tens if pdif capped. Would consider this the default weapon of choice in groups/zergs.

Kikoku:
Kikoku is going to win in any situation you're not pdif capped as AM + weapon itself gives nearly 200 attack. This is also by far the best weapon when you're the solo DD and skillchaining does decent damage - metsu gives you amazing SC properties and is a fantastic weapon skill that does great damage. Can easily solo light or double darkness with this weapon skill, and not have to rely on Blade: Hi or Kamu which do awful(kamu) and meh(Blade: Hi) damage. If I do lowman stuff as NIN as the tank + solo DD with supports I find this weapon increases my kill speed by a LOT.

Kannagi:
Outside of niche situations like qutrub ambu or lots of amnesia/amnesia aura, I don't see the appeal to this weapon. 50 Agi isn't very useful, you could say it lets you tp in different gear with lower racc and more acc/store tp/multihit but those options aren't really there currently, so the 50 agi is pretty wasted. Blade: Hi is a very unimpressive WS and emp AM doesn't make up for the nearly 200 attack power lost(kikoku) or radiance/umbra and 500 TP bonus(Heishi).

Nagi:
The aftermath is pretty weak with all the multihit gear NIN has access to now. Kamu is a absolutely atrocious weapon skill and ever having to use it at 3k TP is really crappy. Outclassed by the new divergance weapon as the tank weapon of choice as well(unless the +enmity works offhand). Overall, a very, very, very niche weapon that won't see much use.

Divergance Katana(Fudo):
BIS offhand when you need accuracy. Potentially BIS for tanking on path C. Overall a good weapon to have around for multiple situations but pretty pricy - the +1 works fine and consider picking one up.

Offhands:
Kanaria with TA 2-3% and acc/attack or Taka should serve you well in most situations. Otherwise consider a Divergance +1/+2 weapon for accuracy needs.

For weapon skills, Shun, Blade: Ten and Metsu will be your most powerful weapon skills and ones most commonly used. Shun gets an attack bonus which is VERY nice on an attack starved job - however shun caps out at about 15k dmg in BIS gear(+10% from augment on heishi) which is pretty low compared to higher end weapon skills. Blade: Ten will be your best WS in big zergs, even though it's sc properties suck; with Heishi it can do 20k+ dmg per WS which is respectable. Metsu is a consistent 15k+ dmg, gives you ~100 attack from AM and has pretty good SC properties for SCing. Blade: Hi and Kamu's only real uses are for their SC properties if you need them, Kamu is a very bad WS and Hi is subpar.