Corsair Job Adjustments - Answers To User Suggest.

@Artemicion

Again, I get what you're saying, but I think maybe you need to consider divorcing your ideas of magic and physical damage from the weapon itself.

I do all my damage through my gun. The type of damage is really irrelevant. Quick Draw, Wildfire, the occasional Slug Shot/Detonator. I fire off some normal rounds.

It's all via your weapon.

I've loved corsair since it came out. Had it to 75 really early compared to most people. I've always had a pirate thing since I was a little kid, and I was going to at least play it for the AF at the very least. I was ridiculously pleased to find out through playing it that it was a job I loved playing, too.

Now with Armageddon and the gear/ability/trait boosts we've received over the past year or two, I'm really happy with where it's at right now. It's a nice balance of everything. It could stand some improvements. All jobs could, really, but If we keep the status quo on balance between all our duties the way they are now, I find that to be the most agreeable for my own personal playstyle preferences of the job.

And maybe that's really all this conversation comes down to; but I really, really would be upset if they starting tinkering too far away form what we've currently got going.

Guess my nostalgia glasses weigh heavily on me.
I'm just disappointed shooting isn't as prolific as it used to be.
But for what was given in exchange for the modern (read: Abyssea) corsair, it seems like a reasonable compromise.
I just miss subbing ranger and actually shooting.
I miss that particular aspect of Corsair, which seems to have lost the limelight in abyssea in exchange for regain and quick draw.

It might have been worth mentioning that I never really bothered with Abyssea ever, aside from tinkering with it on a friend's account once or twice.
My mind seems to be stuck in 2007 or so.
My apologies for not "getting with the times".

I guess for me, I had ranger at 75 before ToAU ever dropped. To put it bluntly, if I wanted to play a gimp ranger...I'd have done it on ranger.

I also went /rng and used ranged attack a lot leveling corsair. Particularly in Caedarva Mire and Mt. Zhayolm parties. But honestly, that particular playstyle lost its luster a long time ago for me. Give this one a shot (no pun intended). I think you might find it more to your liking than you realize.

I guess the whole clusterfuck and claustrophobic nature of Abyssea turned me off to it since it's initial release, so I am doing a sort of "nostalgic static" for myself in which I remain at level 75 to get my fill of old content without jumping ahead to level 90 and making 90% of it all irrelevant outside of Synergy.

Perhaps once I'm done with that, the change in Corsair's new playstyle will grow on me. But for now I'm gonna be that silly level 75 that still shoots their gun as much as I can afford to.

But you're right. If shooting is the primary focus of function, then Ranger is the way to go. I should be embracing the support and magical roles (yay more puns) and utility Corsair takes on now. It's just difficult to swallow for the time being.

Add an additional effect to Quickdraw similar to Sambas(in addition to the boosts already prevalent to each elemental Shot), where the effect has to be maintained with firing off bullets. For example (and for simplicities sake let's use the Fire Shot/Addle example), Using Fire Shot adds Addle. Give the effect a moderate time to wear off, say 10-15 seconds, in which the only way to keep the effect is Ranged Attacks. There your thirst for making shooting relevant is quenched. Carry on.

I think the concept going around is that we dont shoot anymore.. while that isnt the case at all. Even with +2 body enhancing the regain roll, it caps at 5tp/tic. That isnt enough tp to be a top DD, but it is enough to give the COR a means to deal some damage while playing roll of a support. As far as shots giving TP, yes it helps, but with only 2 quick-draw charges, and having a 1 minute recast on each charge, it prevents that from being a sole means of gaining TP and being an active DD. Not only that, but if you are using a magic WS, then you'd be saving your quick-draws for use just before WS to gain the damage bonus.

If you are a support COR, we can use a regain roll to give us some damage and not be just fake BRDs; and I'm pretty sure that the DD would also love the TP gained while idle or even to alter their TP build enough to allow them to WS more often.

If you are a DD COR, you have 2 options: you can be cheap and melee for TP and then fire off WSs, which COR have been doing since long before abyssea (see Joyeuse and Mercurial Kris); or you can draw your gun and shoot the mob, nobody says you cant.

I have a 4 hit (which actually isnt that hard to get on COR), meaning if I draw my gun, I can WS fairly often; alot more often than if I'm just standing around waiting for my TP. If I'm /whm or otherwise just playing a support role, its fun to mix it up and throw out a WS between rolls and cures. If I want to DD I prefer /sam to keep a 4-hit, which revolves entirely around shooting mobs for TP.

It all depends on play style and personal preferences, much in the same way different jobs may prefer different weapons (i.e. SAMs going /rng and using bows, or /drg and using spears.. or even WARs choosing between 1 or 2 handed axes).

tldr version: If you want to shoot the mob to build TP, you have a gun, you have bullets, nobody's stopping you. If you dont have time to shoot between supporting your PT, you can still pull off punishing WSs using a regain roll, though less often than if you were to shoot for TP.

Random thought for update to corsair as I do VWNMs tonight.

Have fold reset Phantom Roll while it drops your bust so I'm not sitting with my digit up my posterior orifice for 30 seconds.

(This idea brought to you by bourbon. Because what's the point in playing a pirate if you're not going to drink like one while you paly it.)

It was actually comforting to read this. I suppose I took previous examples of how Abyssea corsairs and their lack of shooting for granted and rolled it out as a blanket statement.
Shooting is always relevant to a corsair of course, I simply misunderstood it for being more or less thrown out of the picture in comparison to subbing white mage and strictly relying on quick draw and regain for TP gain.

My apologies for the misunderstanding before.
Though I still think it'd be nifty to have some new and more readily available bullets for corsair. If not for shooting then specialty rare and perhaps high damage bullets specifically made for Quick Draw since they do not expend ammunition.

*shrugs*
Cor always had QD, it's just that many people didn't even notice before the aby-adjustments and only used it for sleep. That was such a waste, QD was always incredibly strong and I had my mab build long before aby and tp bonus came out. And Leaden was there too. Cor was always gunmage, and it's always been one of the things I like the most.

I understand that now, and it was difficult to come to terms with because honesetly the last time I played Corsair and loved it as much as I have was in 2008 or so.
I don't even think I saw the update that made Quick Draw skill up marksmanship or give it TP either.

After some further insight and input from fellow CORs, I can say I am quite satisfied with where Corsair stands now, and I am quite excited to get there at some point.

I sub /rdm for brewing. That's all. Rammie doesn't screw with weak cures and being an erase/-na ***.


Very much agree. I've been rocking the QD set for years. Always has been fun to play with, even before TP/etc.

There is no "art" in playing COR, just different play styles.

RDM and BLM both give the same MAB when subbed so either doesnt really matter.

Art is subjective so maybe you think your way is right and another things their way is right.

Nothing was ever wrong with meleeing on COR, but DWing on COR was always worse. Im sure its the same now.

Sadly, in computer games, there's not much art. Numbers win. And there is almost always an objective, specific way to attain the max numbers.

Dual wielding was never appropriate if you wanted those max numbers. Melee'ing for TP (single wield, mercurial kris) and then firing off slugshot/detonator ( depending on acc) was the best merit setup at 75. Shooting for TP was not superior or even close to even to this.

You can call something a "playstyle," and argue that there's no "right or wrong," and to an extent you are validated. Play the game as you desire stylistically.

But there is, generally speaking, only one way to put up the best numbers in any given situation. And ranged-attacking only for your TP has never been that method for corsair in the endgame environment.

Edit: also:
It was never about cheap. It was about being the best way to put up your best numbers.

Back on the subject of additions to the game that I would love to see for corsair, one of them is more gear-related than JA/JT/etc. related.

Give us a 4% haste hands/feet option that isn't dusk. It's 2011. Please stop making us live in gear that came out before our job existed.

Admittedly, melee as the primary source for TP is currently mothballed. But I do still do it from time to time and I'd like to ditch the damn dusk/dusk+1 already. There's no way to hit haste cap without the +1 at this point and boy does that burn my ***.

I do find /WHM very useful for VWNM in general. Magic def bonus and SS to help survive-ability when NM hate reset+drawn in+bind+stonega(And no, shadows from /NIN and Seigan+Third eye from /SAM will not help keeping you alive). Extra raise and free RR when ***happened, cursna spam when tank is doomed, erase spam when tank got multiple status aliment. Also it can be pretty self efficient to remove my own status aliment and don't have to spam /p chat and rely or wait for others to do it.

Although I do admit that cure is fairly useless since it consume too much MP. Other wise you can still shoot/WS/QD just fine with /WHM and doesn't suffer that much dmg decrease, while gaining way more useful tools from the SJ.

Extra spells from /WHM are just like tools, offers some advantages that main job and other SJ doesn't have. /SAM offers some tools, able to deal large amount of dmg in very short time, Seigan+third eye for defense etc, /BLM offers some unique spells and MABII, /WAR offers highest physical spike dmg for melee CORs, each SJ has its own use and they're just tools for different situation.

Whether ppl like it or not, it's useful when the time comes. Completely say no to it due to personal preference is just shutting down the chance to improve pt performance and get things done more efficiently by using appropriate tools.

Was dual wield inappropriate for corsair based on how delay combinations functioned together with multiple hit weapons like Joyeuse and M.Kris?

Also It's obvious why shooting for TP is ineffective vs the speed of meleeing for TP and running back for the WS. However, does it still hold a place in terms of incremental TP gain at a safe distance as to avoid AOE and whatnot? I remember shooting for TP in exp parties back in the day and it saved a lot of MP not being part of the damage equation for the healers depending on the mob of course. Hopefully this also applies to endgame to a degree.

Yes. I believe (it's been a while) the actual TP gain rate was M.Kris alone > M.Kris/Joyeuse > Joyeuse alone > everything else.

Dual-wielding anything with M.Kris slowed down its TP gain due to it being a fast multi-hit weapon. And if you had an M.Kris, dual wielding it with Joyeuse slowed it down, so the second-best TP option was actually not ever an appropriate option because if you had an M.Kris to dual wield, you could single wield it. I personally fell into the third category of Joyeuse-only because I've never been willing to drop the coin on an M.Kris.


For me personally this is how I still play corsair, but it’s not a “stand and shoot non-stop” type deal. Quick Draw resets every 50 45 seconds with merits + Mirke Wardecors augment. I end up keeping 2-4 rolls up fulltime (I end up being tank party corsair a lot, so I generally do evoker’s, caster’s (or other mob-appropriate rolls) for the tanks/mages and get regain on myself). So among rolls, quick draw, meditate and other assorted things, I end up shooting to pickup slack on TP if I’m trying to proc a marksmanship or dagger weaponskill on the mob. Otherwise I rely on QD/regain/meditate. This is contingent on subbing samurai, obviously. There are times where I’m the only person who’s available to /nin since we’re a small group, so often I end up spamming elemental ninjutsu too. So it all just depends, really.

In Dynamis I still melee. It may or may not be the best course of action, but I keep my rolls up on folks and it’s generally easier for a long activity like Dynamis; it’s a bit more auto-pilot than trying to roll melee, roll mages, find a place to shoot before a mob dies, etc.

In Abyssea I’m almost always solo/duo/trio if I’m on corsair because any ls runs we do in Abyssea really don’t require the services of a corsair over one of my other jobs. In these instances I’ve got a Vulcan’s staff on in most cases so if I need a bit of extra TP I shoot because…well, I don’t melee well with a Vulcan’s. Sometimes I’ll have Aceinaces on and stab something in the face, though.

But the bottom line is (especially once you get Wildfire) doing the majority of your damage through magic damage means (“gunmage” if you must, I actually despise that term a lot) is the best way to play. You’re still shooting or swinging when appropriate, you’re not ONLY doing quick draw and meditate/regain (though in Abyssea, for me at least, it comes close to only doing those with the occasional random shots).

QD is 45 seconds with max merits + Mirke augment. Augmented Blood Mask can get another -5 QDD for a 40 second delay, which would be amazing.

^would be so delicious.

I get the feeling that the community reps aren't the most knowledgeable people about the game, exhibit A being that they find Galant's Roll to be good. I mean really?

I Personally prefer shooting for TP for multiple reasons:

1- As a 4-hit build is incredibly easy for COR with any gun of 582 delay+ (i.e. Suppressor Gun/Mayhem+2/Armageddon)I'm fairly confident I can shoot 4x for 100tp faster and dealing more damage than using a Joyeuse or M.Kris. (I don't /nin or /dnc, too many benefits to /sam to make them useful).

2- If you were to use a form of dual-wield, I would assume that it would be giving the mob too much TP in return. Joyeuse(delay224) requires 17 hits, 9 attack rounds if all proc, to gain 100tp. M.Kris(delay192) requires 20 hits, 7 attack rounds if all proc, to gain 100tp. If you dual-wield them both, it requires 21 hits, or 5 attack rounds if all proc, to gain 100tp.
(Number crunching fun time): with that delay, if you dual-wield Joyeuse and M.Kris, you have a 5.20s delay for attack rounds, which equals about 26.0 seconds if you have all hits proc to the max to gain 100tp. If shooting, there is a 7.47s delay for attack rounds, which equals 29.88 seconds for 100tp. While melee has the opportunity to gain 100tp at 3.88 seconds faster than a ranged attack, you're hoping that all hits proc to the max while also hitting the mob 21 times, and that can be some unwelcome TP given to the mob. If all hits don't proc, shooting for TP even using a high-delay gun will pull in 100tp faster than dual-wielding Joyeuse and M.Kris, while at the same time only hitting the mob for 4 times which is alot less TP given to the mob.

3- Being out of range of standard attacks will not only help you survive longer and deal more damage, it will lessen the cure bombing from that poor WHM who could be focusing on another party member.

tldr version: If all hits on Joyeuse and M.Kris proc, there still isn't enough of a noticeable time difference over shooting for 100tp, while giving the mob alot more TP. If all hits don't proc, you would gain TP faster using a high-delay gun.

Err...it is. Sorry. This is what happens when you post from work writing in snippits. It's also why it's pissing me off so much that I can't find anyone to sell me dragon masks. I've got an abjuration rotting waiting for me to synth the -1. >:(

These are the reasons I pretty much only melee in Dynamis. Running around too far gets irritating and shadows from /nin do help when you're doing Jeuno/Sandy or DL. Any other situation and you're greatly increasing your usefulness and efficiency (and damage) by not getting up in the mob's face.

I can understand situational use of melee on COR, I just didn't understand that comment I read "Also It's obvious why shooting for TP is ineffective vs the speed of meleeing for TP and running back for the WS" when I dont think that meleeing for TP makes shooting ineffective at all.

where do u guys find all these "job adjustments" at!?!?!?

The official forums?

for the first time in like 3 pages, someone asking something relevant to the threads title :x

Hate when information like this is only on BG >_>. If I was better at Editing/creating tables I'd add it to the others as it took me forever to find it. I do have a new aspiration now though, thanks. Perfect for light and dark shots where damage doesn't matter.