Blue Mage gear

Ok I'm finally ready to write and publish this post.

Believe it or not, I get questions from people in game regarding my gear. Some have even asked me because of this blog - which means, yay outreach!

So here you go.

I will do this post in two parts. The first part is my current up to date TP set and numbers, a discussion on dual wield, what spells I set, my CDC set, and where I am hoping to make improvements.

Here is my current TP gear for standard situations. With sushi alone, my accuracy with this set is around 1200.

My current BLU TP gear

For purposes of this post, I removed all buffs that you can activate on the spreadsheet but kept Haste II (Erratic Flutter) and Mighty Guard related haste buffs, as I almost always have those active when on blue mage.

You can also see the current set of augments I have on my four Herculean pieces. Most notably is the +14% extra triple attack I have.

Why triple attack?

This seems to have an obvious answer. The more frequently you swing per attack round, the more TP you get, and the more CDCs you can get in. But from a DPS and attack round stand point, the extra augments on my Herculean actually account for a significant amount of DPS.

Here's my TP set without the extra augments from the Herculean set. I am fully aware that anybody who owns a herculean piece is gonna have it augmented with something, but still this is rather enlightening.

Same set with unaugmented Herculean gear

This means the Herculean gear amounts for a 900 DPS when augmented with my current augments. My 4 pieces' augments account for +14% TA, +17 DEX, +43 attack, and +90 acc.

Oh, and my rounds per WS with the augmented Herculean gear is 3.77, which means I am ready to weapon skill on average every 6 to 8 real life seconds.

Compare that to 6.38 without the augments.

Triple attack makes a HUGE difference in your TP set, and the only reason you should not go for it is if you own a Tizona and keep AM3 up all the time. In that case, Store TP is likely where it is at (although I have not investigated that as I do not have or plan to have a Tizona).

Why Adhemar path B?

The content I tend to do right now does not require significant accuracy. For those situations where more accuracy is needed and my BLU is, I do switch my three Adhemar pieces to path A for the extra +45 accuracy. I have a handful of accuracy swaps in other slots as well, such as Cacoethic Ring +1 and Sanctity Necklace. I currently lack a waist acc piece and do need to pick up one at some point.

Why only +10 dual wield?

I will discuss this at a later point.

Why are you TPing in your Ambuscade mantle?

After analysis, the extra critical hit rate, accuracy, and DEX you get with a typical CDC Ambuscade mantle is superior to the boost you get from the other typical back piece option Bleating Mantle (both have +20 attack). Using the CDC Ambuscade mantle increases your DPS by 80 points over Bleating Mantle.

My spell set

My standard DD spell set consists of the following spells.

Current spell set

Important DD traits are all included here and for the most part the spells that are set I do use, save the DW and most of the Store TP spells. I keep Subduction mostly for crowd control or when I am completing records of eminence tasks for magic damage kills, but I do swap this out when it is not going to be needed. I sometimes also remove one tier of Store TP if I need to say set Dream Flower or Tenebral Crush.

This spell set gives me a sufficient boost in many offensive areas, including +5% extra Triple Attack (I can get +10% Double Attack from /war), +35 accuracy, a +11% boost to critical damage, +28 MAB, and +30 Store TP. Attack bonus is not necessary almost all the time because Nature's Meditation and Berserk are significant enough boosts. Also note - only DWIII.

Ok now what gives - only 25% dual wield and +10 from your TP Gear? 

The below is a post I posted on Guildwork (where virtually nobody saw it) regarding Dual Wield.

DWIII reduces delay by 25%, but this is after all forms of haste have been taken into account.

Gear haste reduces delay by 25% (capped), or 256/1024

Erratic Flutter reduces delay by 30%, or 300/1024

Mighty Guard would reduce this by 15%, but the cap on magic haste is 43.75%, so that would make the haste reduction 448/1024. (The same would happen if you have two marches on you)…

This leaves you with 704/1024, or 68.75% delay reduction.

DWIII would reduce this number, which is now 320, by another 80 (25% of 320), giving you 784/1024 = 76.5% delay reduction.

If you have Suppanomimi and Adhemar Jacket, that's another 10% of DW.

DWIII + 10 DW from above stated gear would reduce the 704/1024 number by 112, giving you 79.7% delay reduction.

The cap is 80% no matter what. Further dual wield would reduce your TP/hit without giving you faster attack speed.

Ladies and gentlemen, there you have it. More is not necessarily better.

Weapon skill set

My current CDC set is as follows.

Surprising results

I am posting both of these sets to compare what I thought regarding Thereoid Greaves and Herculean Boots. I actually just made a post on the FFXIAH forums regarding this result.

Areas of improvement

I would like to get better augments on my Herculean Helm for the melee version. It only has +10 acc, but +4% Triple Attack. It will be a lot of stones before I see TA +4% again and hopefully it'll come with more accuracy when I do see it.

Obviously the work is still going on to afterglow the 119 Almace. That is going smoothly and I am about 16% done with that trial after 3 days. At this rate I should be done by next weekend.

Do you see improvements that could be made? Let me know!