[dakpluto]

Actually bahamut's staff is still excellent even if capped merits and great gear. It gives you more freedom on your other gear to make more effective use of slots.

Example, gives you the chance to swap out Summoning Torque for Nodawa, as being able to keep a tick of regen going with an avatar out during favor is far more favorable than other options. (Unless you are using a fay with accuracy on it, but then that means you are not using a Attack/M.att fay. And you can't swap them as discussed earlier.)

So yes, to the well playing SMN that is observing all his options, B.staff isn't "lol b.staff" but instead another tool to maximize being the best you can be.

[Tikki]

enilanerda, on 20 February 2010 - 08:35 PM, said:

And find a use for Avatars Favor...
While still excluding Carby...
And Diabolos...

Well. In a pure manaburn situation where MP is not the first concern but getting it dead fast is, such as dyna lord or fairy ring, you can dump a dream shroud on blms then fire up Shiva's favor.

In a lowman limbus where we had a grand total of 2 physical DDs and maybe 1 blm and I was roped into healer (but also had a gjallarhorn brd) I whipped up ifrit's favor for the two DD and of course had Ifrit just assist the tank and melee.

Limbus again, getting Fenrir out for Proto Ultima during citadel buster is decent help. If we ever hit the tonberries or avatars again I'll give it a try there too.

And hey, debate is good! Sub-optimal seems to happen more often these days.

[enilanerda]

@ Tikki all of the situations you explained fall under sub-standard.
Using a Smn to fill a Rdm or Whm's role in Limbus is not an optimal situation.
We can do it, sure, but this falls under trying to optimize a sub standard situation, which was the stipulation I mentioned last post.
Even so, Nothing you mentioned couldn't have be done without Bahamut staff, unless the first 2 stipulations still applied, lack of gear or merits.

But I fully support Smn's trying to maximize their job and abilities to fill any role needed. It's a good thing, don't get me wrong, but we play in a time where maximizing is key.

@ Dak
I'm curious to know of what situation you find yourself in, where you are using Favor, and needing 1 hp/tic regen?
While I'm not doubting there may be some, I'm curious what you have in mind, as I can think of none off the top of my head.

[dakpluto]

enilanerda, on 21 February 2010 - 12:51 AM, said:

@ Tikki all of the situations you explained fall under sub-standard.
Using a Smn to fill a Rdm or Whm's role in Limbus is not an optimal situation.
We can do it, sure, but this falls under trying to optimize a sub standard situation, which was the stipulation I mentioned last post.
Even so, Nothing you mentioned couldn't have be done without Bahamut staff, unless the first 2 stipulations still applied, lack of gear or merits.

But I fully support Smn's trying to maximize their job and abilities to fill any role needed. It's a good thing, don't get me wrong, but we play in a time where maximizing is key.

@ Dak
I'm curious to know of what situation you find yourself in, where you are using Favor, and needing 1 hp/tic regen?
While I'm not doubting there may be some, I'm curious what you have in mind, as I can think of none off the top of my head.

There is ALWAYS a good time for regen But for a good example that jumps right out at me, for the Galka Fomor NM in Garliage Crapadel in the past, we keep up a massive refresh party for the tanks since curing is about the only way for them to hold hate in that fight. And with the AoE spam it likes to do, the regen is a god send keeping diabolos near the tanks. I've even used my Marduk hands in conjunction with it for +3 Regen (neck, hands, /whm) for that fight.

[enilanerda]

dakpluto, on 21 February 2010 - 05:52 AM, said:

There is ALWAYS a good time for regen But for a good example that jumps right out at me, for the Galka Fomor NM in Garliage Crapadel in the past, we keep up a massive refresh party for the tanks since curing is about the only way for them to hold hate in that fight. And with the AoE spam it likes to do, the regen is a god send keeping diabolos near the tanks. I've even used my Marduk hands in conjunction with it for +3 Regen (neck, hands, /whm) for that fight.

I'll entertain you, because I'm bored farming subligars.

269 cap
16 merits
head 5
cape 5
ring 10
legs 5
belt 2
feet 3
ear 3
=318
No staff needed, without even counting duck feet or head, which is another +4, and still allows you to use your regen neck over smn torque.
Those without duck hands for your regen, would use nashira, for personal +1mp a tick.
Those without cape, could also use af2 for +10 smn skill (nashira to af2 will not effect perp, as breaking the 317 mark is 1 more mp a tick, negating the -1 perp on nashira, same cost) and keep their regen neck.
OR they could drop 1hp a tick in the neck, and gain 1mp a tick in the neck, to still break the 317 mark
Those without the cape, could still keep the regen neck on, by having Duck head and feet, instead of af horn and hobo feet, putting them right at 317
Those without merits: 302? meaning even with, staff's 5, duck head 2, duck feet 2, is 311. They still can't reach the 317 mark anyways, meaning staff still doesn't help them.
Unless of course your counter argument is, it's ok to sacrifice duck hands regen, for af2 hands skill to break the 317 mark...
But we both know that if you made that argument, you'd be arguing with yourself, since your entire justification of Bahamuts staff in the first place, was to gain 1hp a tic regen by sacrificing Smn torque.

The window of opportunity for Bahamut's staff to actually be the key to breaking the 317 mark, or allowing you to break it, so you can switch to a preferred item of choice, that you feel will somehow give you an advantage, is a small and rare one that will only occur under the effect of avatar favor, when maintaining a pet 100% is part of your purpose in the party, and your pet is not Carbuncle. And even after that, your options for gear has to be at a perfectly imperfect point, for bahamut staff to be the make or break item in your build. Even assuming, that bahamut staff was the make or break item, it would only be a temporary fix, until you made a single upgrade to any other piece of your Smn skill set, and then would return to obsolete. The window is in a small section between the top of the line gear, and the AH'able gear.

If Bahamut staff, is temporarily the item you need to break said tier, because you fall into the window described, then by all means, get it.
If Bahamut staff is simply an item you want, for stat quo, showing off, bragging rights, or town gear. That makes 100% sense to me.

If you want to pretend that Bahamut staff is a top of the line staff for Summoner, simply because it took you so much time/effort to get it, I'm going to disagree with you.
I view Bahamut Staff for my Smn, the same way I view Fortitude Torque for my War. It's a status item, that's nice to show off, but when applied to game mechanics requires the planets to all align, for it to mathematically out perform PCC or Kabura Beads, on either end of the scale. The window exists, but the chances of ending up in that situation are slim to none, and can be ignored assuming you don't refuse to ever upgrade your job from it's current state again.

afk forever

[dakpluto]

Let me entertain you with some things you haven't thought of:

There is dark weather: http://www.ffxiah.co...s.php?id=141174

You show me a set that doesn't use B.staff that still retains the maximum Perp cost reduction and includes the avatar accuracy. Or, take that same exact set and let's imagine we are using Garuda. Swap in Karura Hachigane. Welcome to your max Garuda set. Again, show me that without B.staff.

And lewl at having to include Marduk feet in your set above. Maybe you heard of these Evoker's Pigaches +1? I hear -1 Cost is pretty cool.

How about the maximum "OMG SAVE MY LIFE PLEASE" set: http://www.ffxiah.co...s.php?id=141176

You can try to justify life without B.staff, but fact is it gives you more chances to enhance your abilities as SMN than without. So if being "less than you can be" is ok with you, fine. It's just "lolsmn" anyways, right? But please leave your acceptance of mediocrity at the door so we can discuss how to be the best at the job.

[DarkRift]

I agree more with what Dak has to say. I dont know why people have to hate on B staff so much. ;_; I think its a great staff and holds lots of value. I see the other side of the argument, but at the end of the day just get it all. Every piece is needed, and there is no end all be all staff.

[dakpluto]

God I can't wait to have that "OH SHIT" set. Stupid Marduk crown been cock-blocking me for 3 years now :\

[Shirai]

http://www.ffxiah.co...s.php?id=121492
My Favor set, including merits keeping me able to equip all non-situational perpetuation gear, returning me 2MP/tick on a full Diabolos' favor.
Need that non-existing Astute cape so I can also incorperate my situational perpetuation reducing gear, so that I too under the condition of dark weather can enjoy the full 4MP/tick for example.

Sure it can be reached without the staff too, but I would be sacrificing about 80MP in gear.
You may be one of those evil midgets with plenty of it, but I play a cat and Dak plays Galka so we kinda like to have a little extra of that in case we need to use it.
And as Midgard's current price on the summoning earring lies somewhere way beyond no, hell no and f*ck no! for me, let alone an average summoner...
What is your optimal favor set Enil?

Please include perpetuation gear and keeping other races in account with minimal sacrifice of MP.

This post has been edited by Shirai: 22 February 2010 - 04:29 PM

[Tikki]

Curse you all. I still need to use smn. bracers for my favor set for now if I want to hit over 317.

Soon, my nashira pretties.. soon.

[enilanerda]

Okay okay okay...

@ Dak...
Weather and Day...
I don't carry around head/body because I am not a fan of situation gear, because I refuse to use any avatar that isn't the one I actually need.
If you want me to add your stipulation of: "if day or weather match, and you don't care what avatar you have out, while still under the requirement of needed favor to be up" to the window of use for bahamut staff, then I'm more than willing to do that for you. Although I find it odd, to be in any situation where you're role as a summoner is to be at a top tier Favor effect for your party, while not caring about which avatar you use... Which makes the above statement even more specific... "If day or weather, happen to match the specific avatar, of the specific favor that your party needs"
We can definitely add that yo the window of use for B staff. Like I said, I'm not saying there isn't a window, I'm just pointing out how small it is.
Garuda's Favor and Karugane Headpiece... Lol@ Evasion Favor.

The maximum save my life gear set... For me is not gear at all. It's simply my sub job. Any situation where I expect to need a 'save my life' set... I'm using /nin.
Even further on this point, in the above situations that I've needed to use /nin because of what I was solo'ing or kiting, I personally found that Avatar Favor actually ended up hurting me. When I first started solo'ing some of these new mobs that came out, because I was hoping for new awesome drops (that I never ended up getting, just a ton of shitty aptants) there was a learning curve. My initial thought process was that with my (old set up) of -2 perp ACP body + Avatar Favor My Garuda was free, and I should be able to solo anything, as long as I could get out of range to recast, and even if I didn't my Pld and War experience gave me a lot of practice on how to ichi/ni tank until my pet took hate, giving me even more room for error in kiting situations. As well as shadows depleting hate, without actually having to take damage. Anyways, long story short, I ended up solo'ing HarvestMan about 20-30 times, and every time, It was more efficient and effective to just cycle Carby and Garuda back and forth and kill 15% faster, than it was to save 2mp a tick. Under the effect of favor, fights take longer, which means you Cast and BP more often, which means you're more likely to run into hate issues.
Know what the best part is? Since I'm not using Favor, Smn skill is no longer an issue, and I can still use The Regen Neck ;-)
Side note: I was surprised to see that your 'maximum safe my life set' doesn't include the ASA legs -dmg Taken augment.

@ Darkrift
I don't hate, in fact If one drops I'll waste my ls points and lot it, simply for completion sake. I just like to point out, that it isn't the staff it use to be anymore. Far too many people are still under the assumption that it's "the" staff to get. And it simply isn't. Nice staff with certain uses? No argument here.

@ Shirai
Like you admitted, you can obtain the same thing without the staff.
Sacrificing 80mp... I thought Smn's stopped caring about MP gear 3 years ago?
I'm a firm believe that Smn (or any mage job really) is not about maximum MP, it's about the ability to efficiently spend and regain mp in a certain amount of time.
If 80mp in your gear set is going to have any noticeable effect on your ability to be a Summoner, then we have bigger issues to discuss.
I'm not a Taru, I am a Hume, and I use HP gear on my Smn to survive the things my Smn is prone to, like large AOE's at tiamat, or Khim, or even my survivability when solo'ing.
I dropped MP gear for Gigant Mantle and Bomb Queen ring, because for me, that much HP on a squishy job like Smn, has been 10 times more helpful than any amount of MP.

As for MY favor build...
It's non existent honestly. I have the gear to break the tier as most of you know, because I'm the one who FOUND the 317 tier and posted it on BG in the first place.
But I've yet to find any situation where my Smn was needed for Favors. This will all fall back into sub optimal situations, because I have Corsair. And I'm trying to think of a single Avatar favor that, not only can I provide on Cor, but I can provide TWO of, and I can separate my buffs giving front line and back line members, each what benefits them most. My rolls are at full effect within 1-2 double ups, last for 6minutes (5 un merited), can be applied at a range of 14.0, without having to stay within that 14.0 range (Rng party at Dark Ixion comes to mind, as well as Sleep Duty Blm's anywhere), allows me to drop parties, and split buffs up for parties, or swap with a Brd for Double Buffing melees, costs me nothing, and in no way shape or form limits or hinders my ability to perform any other actions.

I understand it's frustrating, back in the NegativePositive vs Craftermath days, I was partially on CM's side because I never thought "Changing Jobs" should be the correct answer. Personally it still annoys me as a player, that it has become the right answer. I love Smn, it was my first job, and I still use it very often. And anytime I say "I'm gunna try something crazy" Smn is always the job i gear up. I'm just as disappointed that SE has left us behind of all other jobs. Merit pacts, Smn Skill Update, Elemental Siphon, Avatars Favor... We were slowly catching up, and we're still a strong versatile job, but there's no denying that we simply aren't 'on level' with the ability and potential of other jobs in this game yet. Maybe new avatars, and some more tweaks can help us out, and I REALLY hope they do. But unfortunately until then, in my Current HNM shell, it'll be the day hell freezes over that they say "we need a support job" and they let me show up Smn instead of Cor, and they're 100% right. Earthen Ward and Cure 3 took a dive when SE introduced Sch with better cures, more mp efficiency than any job in the game, awesome DoT's and AoE buffs. Especially when Sch can provide all the things the Smn could, while still being OUTSIDE the party. It sucks, but it's the reality of the game.

This will be the final post I make in this thread. If you have ANY reason to justify Bahamut's Staff, then by all means, use it and be proud you have it. I'm not going to ridicule anyone for having it, or chase you around to tell you urdoinitwrng. If we do B2 and the staff drops, I'm gunna lot the f*cker to have it too. So, if you have B staff, Congrats to you, seriously. If you don't have it, and want it, then don't let my posts discourage you from getting what you want in the game. Just because it's a limited use item, doesn't mean it's obsolete or junk by any means. Get your gear, wear it proud, use it to the best of your ability to do whatever it is you need to do, to be of most benefit to your party/alliance/linkshell. Feel free to further argue with me, I'm not here to argue, I simply wanted to post my opinion. I've done so, A few have returned the favor in a respectable and civil way. I'm more impressed with the ability to actually carry on a civil discussion on a Smn forum, without it blowing up into a flame war, so Kudo's to you all. Happy Summoning.
-Kenny Grinols

[dakpluto]

enilanerda, on 23 February 2010 - 07:42 AM, said:

Okay okay okay...

@ Dak...
Weather and Day...
I don't carry around head/body because I am not a fan of situation gear, because I refuse to use any avatar that isn't the one I actually need.
If you want me to add your stipulation of: "if day or weather match, and you don't care what avatar you have out, while still under the requirement of needed favor to be up" to the window of use for bahamut staff, then I'm more than willing to do that for you. Although I find it odd, to be in any situation where you're role as a summoner is to be at a top tier Favor effect for your party, while not caring about which avatar you use... Which makes the above statement even more specific... "If day or weather, happen to match the specific avatar, of the specific favor that your party needs"
We can definitely add that yo the window of use for B staff. Like I said, I'm not saying there isn't a window, I'm just pointing out how small it is.
Garuda's Favor and Karugane Headpiece... Lol@ Evasion Favor.

The maximum save my life gear set... For me is not gear at all. It's simply my sub job. Any situation where I expect to need a 'save my life' set... I'm using /nin.
Even further on this point, in the above situations that I've needed to use /nin because of what I was solo'ing or kiting, I personally found that Avatar Favor actually ended up hurting me. When I first started solo'ing some of these new mobs that came out, because I was hoping for new awesome drops (that I never ended up getting, just a ton of shitty aptants) there was a learning curve. My initial thought process was that with my (old set up) of -2 perp ACP body + Avatar Favor My Garuda was free, and I should be able to solo anything, as long as I could get out of range to recast, and even if I didn't my Pld and War experience gave me a lot of practice on how to ichi/ni tank until my pet took hate, giving me even more room for error in kiting situations. As well as shadows depleting hate, without actually having to take damage. Anyways, long story short, I ended up solo'ing HarvestMan about 20-30 times, and every time, It was more efficient and effective to just cycle Carby and Garuda back and forth and kill 15% faster, than it was to save 2mp a tick. Under the effect of favor, fights take longer, which means you Cast and BP more often, which means you're more likely to run into hate issues.
Know what the best part is? Since I'm not using Favor, Smn skill is no longer an issue, and I can still use The Regen Neck ;-)
Side note: I was surprised to see that your 'maximum safe my life set' doesn't include the ASA legs -dmg Taken augment.

Wow....

you seriously don't get SMN soloing with Garuda, do you? You do understand that one of the best parts of Favor is the perp cost reduction, right?

and with /NIN, the "Save my life" set is even MORE valuable as your only cure at that point becomes Carby! Nothing more valuable then being able to regen 40 HP a minute while still keeping a non-carby avatar out.

I haven't finished ASA yet but I'm getting siphon and M.Acc btw.

[Tikki]

uhm... I carry around af2 head and body not just for weather and day situations (and I sure as hell do not let weather and day dictate what I summon either) but the head is slapped on before issuing pact commands for the reduction and body slapped on in the pause between command and execution if I'm doing a phsyical pact for the 3% crit.

And yeah, garuda soloing. That shit is awesome. :3 Pred claws doesn't really feel the sting of favor.

[dakpluto]

Tikki, on 23 February 2010 - 05:17 PM, said:

uhm... I carry around af2 head and body not just for weather and day situations (and I sure as hell do not let weather and day dictate what I summon either) but the head is slapped on before issuing pact commands for the reduction and body slapped on in the pause between command and execution if I'm doing a phsyical pact for the 3% crit.

And yeah, garuda soloing. That shit is awesome. :3 Pred claws doesn't really feel the sting of favor.

It does a little, since there is an element of attack down to favor, but nothing as drastic as what happens to the magical BPs, and the Long term DoT is better to solo with Favor than without.

[Sakka_Valefor]

dakpluto, on 23 February 2010 - 05:58 PM, said:

It does a little, since there is an element of attack down to favor, but nothing as drastic as what happens to the magical BPs, and the Long term DoT is better to solo with Favor than without.

This.

Playing on a friend's character, I was eyeballing less than 100dmg on my "avg" pred claws with favor.

[Sakka_Valefor]

dakpluto, on 23 February 2010 - 05:58 PM, said:

It does a little, since there is an element of attack down to favor, but nothing as drastic as what happens to the magical BPs, and the Long term DoT is better to solo with Favor than without.

This.

Playing on a friend's character, I was eyeballing less than 100dmg on my "avg" pred claws with favor.

[Tikki]

Sorry, that's what I mean by sting. The reduction is hardly enough to be worth considering on 'do I use favor or not'