Relic Bow V. Relic Gun

So, i know the gun may have more DPS but is the bow really that far behind? I know there is also alot to factor in here with weapon + ammo, tp gain, and all that but would i be really far behind if i decided on going with a relic bow over the gun?

Yes, due to Last Stand.

Basicly, as far as DMG goes, Last Stand is the strongest ranged weaponskill.
And Coronach gives less hate than Namas arrow, which is the most important part of those weaponskills.
Racc aftermath is kind of useless (atleast for RNG) from Yoichi, while the -enm aftermath from Anni can be useful in situations where you dont wanna pull hate.

Edit:
Only real reason to make Yoichi these days is "I want everything I can get for my job"

make the gun or Helel will haunt you forever

Haha k well i am glad i got that answered so fast, thanks xD

We love Helel. He gets lots of naked galka hugging from me. Also, I'm drinking.

Pretty much what they said. Besides Last Stand itself, the difference is Adaman bullets. Bullets have gotten a lot stronger since 75 and arrows have only crept up a bit. That being said I'm building the bow myself. Don't haunt me though, I have 99 Anni in MH. :P

Taking Last Stand out of the question, is Annihilator still far superior damage to Yoichi? Or is it pretty close?

Virtually the only place I'd use them is the occasional Legion run and Odin V2.

I can't really decide between the two atm. Is Anni that much better that it should be done even if you have an Armageddon? (I don't but I do have all the mats just rotting there)

Annihilator has always been superior to yoichi even back at 75 (for RNG anyway). I'm not sure I'd say it's "far" superior but it's superior enough that the bow is essentially worthless for RNG, relatively speaking of course.

I'm not sure I completely understand your situation though. You seem to be hesitant about upgrading an annihilator because you may upgrade an armageddon, thus you're wondering whether to upgrade the bow instead? It doesn't make sense to me to even consider the bow unless you want it for SAM. If you do want the bow for SAM, and you have an armageddon, I would probably go for the bow. Armageddon with last stand is, under the right circumstances, the most powerful weapon for RNG (@99 anyway). Then you can swap to the bow if you need it for odin/legion.

However, if you don't want the bow for SAM, you should go for the annihilator no question.

Yes, Anni is way better, specially in low-enmity situations.
Coronach is like half the enmity of namas, and Anni aftermath is -20 enm.
Coronach is also a stronger weaponskill than Namas I belive, so you get to both deal more dmg AND get less hate at the same time ;)

Without Last Stand, Namas Arrow and Coronach are very comparable in damage. The only reason I pull so far ahead in damage versus a Yoichi user in Legion is because I sneak in last stands towards the end of a mob's HP bar.

In Legion the enmity thing is pretty negligible if you ask me, especially with the existence of the -20 enmity legion earring. Regular RNG TP builds with the earring are gonna have -45 enmity ish. And I don't think Coronach aftermath brings you over the cap so meh. You're not gonna pull hate with just namas arrow, it's just not going to happen in Legion.

I haven't fought Odin v2 personally, but I would imagine that Coronach's lower static enmity, and aftermath is gonna give Annihilator the edge in this fight.

I also believe that any Ranger with Annihilator or Yoichi, should get their hands on an Armageddon for the utility of Wildfire.


*Edit* Every Ranger should have Armageddon.

based on parses, Namas arrow and Coronach are like Hotsoups said, pretty close, however Anni's white damage is significantly better

You should never disqualify Last Stand from any comparisons of Ranger damage. It is hands down the best weapon skill; not having Last Stand is like a Ragnarok DRK not having Resolution. It's just unthinkable.

A direct comparison of both weapons will almost always favour Annihilator because it has a higher raw damage per shot. Whilst a Yoichi is still an acceptable and decent weapon for Ranger it is weaker than the gun. Namas Arrow is not powerful enough to make up for the lost DPS between Yoichi and Anni and Coronach has a better enmity effect, rendering the hate issue moot.

As Helel said, a bow is more a Samurai thing. If it's between Annihilator and Yoichi a Ranger's first choice should always be Annihilator. Now if you use your Samurai as much as you use your Ranger you might prefer bow. Your Ranger will not be as strong, but you'll be getting a very powerful weapon for two of your favourite jobs so it logically is the better choice.

And I would also agree with Armageddon. I'm using my 90 Armageddon until I finish my Annihilator and it's a decent weapon. It's got the same delay, a nice base damage and the bonus of + Agility. Having Wildfire for those high defense situations is a really good thing. :)

Armageddon is also considerably easier to get than a relic.

Technically, 99 Arma is/can be argued as a better investment outside of e-peen barrage's and hate control events.

Would just like to add that Yoichi for SAM lost a lot of its Aura after the lvl cap was raised. Shoha,Fudo etc are too good of WSs.

Which is just another tic in Anni's favor.

Yoichi SAM is more or less just for completion these days for sure.
Back in the day soboro + yoichi were actually good, it made sense to make it for SAM for raw damage. It really does'nt anymore =/

I figured nowadays yoichi woul only be good if you were sam/rng using a quin spear in a cruor party, but now that selling blunkers took a ***, make annihilator, and before you do that, play another dd role unless you know you have the funds to cover 5 marrows. 95-99 has a 5 base dmg jump

I think it was harder to gear for Annihilator than Yoichi back in the day. Yoichi has the slight edge of having STR and AGI for Namas mod instead of DEX and AGI for Coronach.

But, utility-wise, I think Coronach is the thing that makes you possible to go /WAR without much worry for endgame events. There weren't many -enmity gear to use for RNG.

In both cases you will cap hate fast enough with your normal shots, assuming you mean events like Odin2 and not 30s fights such as in Legion. I've beaten several Anni RNGs with Yoichi(all 99) in Legion, and it was very close. Namas had a higher average than Coronach, while Last stand was obviously the highest damage option, although it was way closer to Namas than people are making it out to be. It's really not much different from a well geared Yoichi RNG Namas.

That being said, Anni is in theory the better weapon, but by no means does it always and forever win at everything. Upgrade what you like most, Bow or Gun, they both are very powerful.

Edit: Don't underestimate Yoichi SAM with a lot of buffs, especially on things where Shoha/Kaiten/Fudo won't shine, again that's mainly in Legion. You can push your average of Namas on SAM to ~2.5k even in Mul with 2 BRDs and 1 COR, and you can always swap to Shoha or whatever for the Naraka. If you have the Uptala gkt that's just a bonus for Botulus, and if you do, other DD will have a hard time getting close to you(using Amano99+Yoichi99+Mura as a reference/personal experience).

I'm pretty sure, the way we play now, (2 brd 2 cor in legion) 4min chaos roll dia II light shot every mob, Namas arrow should outdmg any sam ws for lvl 120+stuff.

At 75 it was good for fodder, now it's seems good for hard stuff(unless piercing resistant) since it suffer less from level correction and pdif cap higher than 2h.

Maybe it's just asura, but I always have 4-7 song / 2-4 roll on me(for legion ect).

Thanks for the input guys, greatly appreciated. 99% certain I'm doing Anni as a result, just need to go get the Relic Gun when I get home from work.

Just in response to a few queries. The without Last Stand part was because I'm not certain if I can shift my merits. I probably will, but just wanted a comparison without it.

My SAM I never use (nor is it geared) so Yoichi for SAM never played into it (apart from maybe easier trials). The question was basically about performance difference because if it was nominal I'd do Yoichi (Prefer the looks/battle stances plus Arma could have covered my Marks needs). Since it seems to be substantial-ish, then I'll overlook aesthetics/weapon type versatility.

I had an inkling Anni was slightly ahead (without Last Stand) as I'd done some rough maths. However since I'm not up on my RNG gear, I wasn't sure if Yoichi's slightly faster TP cycle made up for it.



Money is a non-factor but I already have the Marrows anyway. I already have another DD too (99 Ragna/Apoc). This was purely about increasing utility for LS events, if I did what I actually wanted to do it would have been Bravura.

Fair enough. But consider this piece of hyperbole: without Last Stand, you might as well get a different relic for a different job altogether. It's just that good for Annihilator users!

Another thing worth considering is Yoichi is cheaper than an Annihilator - at least going by average prices for currency on servers. It's also cheaper to use considering the price of Adaman Bullets. This might be a factor worth mentioning to some people reading this thread.

Yeah I know how good it is and I probably will get it anyway.

I understand the sentiment but a different job/relic has to compete with 'Why not just throw Ragna at it' whereas even without Last Stand, Anni has reasons to use it over Ragnarok.

Never tried Legion/Odin v2. Does it have relatively longer battle than VW?
I still think Coronach itself is already a superior WS to Namas just by the virtue of enmity-suppressing effect. Both of them may have a low enmity value for WS, but Coronach AM will keep your enmity at low value for your after shots/barrage/last stand.

Legion is comprised of short fights back to back. But even if it wasn't, it's a zerg and enmity really wouldn't be an issue anyway. As long as you pay attention and don't drop Last Stands or Barrages into the enemy when it crowd controls your DDs with Sleep/Break/Terror etc.

I haven't done Odin, but from notes and testimonials it cannot be zerged and is a much longer fight, and the low enmity weaponskill and aftermath is definitely useful here.

Factoring in regain + human response time between shots + double shot I don't think annihilator has a slower TP cycle than yoichi. In fact, it may be faster depending on how much TP you're getting per regain tick. I usually only have to shoot twice if I've got tact + embrava (or once if double shot procs), or once if I'm in provenance, whereas bow might have to shoot more to keep up. There is still ~1s delay between shots and after.

*Speculation Warning*

With the proposed Recycle update, the TPCycle gap will probably be even narrower as well due to Scout's Beret +2 kicking in that much more often.