For The Shinies! A Guide For Thief

Empy aftermaths were handled by manually putting a percentage proc rate for ODD (right above Mythic AM).

Thanks, I figured that's what it was but I didn't look into it at all, beyond noticing that it didn't seem to automatically update. Should be easy enough to adjust from there.

So guessing the new Mandau and Jugo Kukri +1 are the best options for delay/dmg overall or is Thwashtar king? Haven't played in months but nice to see Relics/Mythics/Empyreals got their deserved upgrade.

If you're looking at strictly dmg and delay, jugo has a dps of 34.6 while the new re+a has 42, m has 37.5. It's unfortunate that jugo+1 wasn't more useful since it was such a neat dagger.

Between Mandau, Vajra, Twashtar, and Aeneas, there's actually a really good balance going on. The "best" will vary depending on the situation, such as what WS or SC you may want to do, how frequently you can WS (especially with SA/TA), buffs, etc. Short answer: pick your favorite! You'll do best based on your playstyle, which is something a spreadsheet can't entirely consider.

For mainhand daggers, there are the big 4:
Mandau: Outstanding melee damage, great all around even without AM going. Great for content where you're constantly moving, though WSs don't have the same potential as the other 3.
Vajra: Highest WS damage, as well as WS frequency (with AM), and Mandalic can overtake with Rudra's. Best for closing skillchains, but falters if you can't coordinate or use SA/TA.
Twashtar: Highest melee damage if you can maintain AM (from Rudra's, and each tier makes a notable difference), but it falls behind the other 3 by quite a bit without any AM.
Aeneas: Great for WSs, particularly at lower TP values, but the AM (from Exenterator, ugh) sucks, though it holds up even without it. Consistently great if you're WSing frequently, but worst melee damage overall.

For offhand daggers:
Twashtar: The DEX+50 and extra skill tops everything else. Only weakness is the lack of TA found on most other daggers, but offers the highest acc too.
Taming Sari: A maxed out Taming Sari is probably your best choice unless you feel like making a Twashtar, and even still it's not considerably far behind (there seems to be a bigger jump from base Sari to perfect than from perfect Sari to Twashtar, disregarding accuracy). Also, TH. Without any augments, it's still better than other Adoulin daggers.
Shijo: Path D easily trumps the other paths. This weapon is about as good as a moderately well augmented Sari, unless you need the Dual Wield, in which case it can pull ahead. Not bad at all, and it isn't too hard to get.
Skinflayer: Depending on your augments, you're likely to see something on par or lagging behind a perfect Sari. Inconclusive as to how good the augments can get, but it's probably going to require insane levels of luck and a ton of spending to get. Better off aiming for a perfect Sari for now.
Jugo Kukri +1: Still holds up great, more so with a weapon like Mandau or Twashtar mainhanded (improving your attack speed). Its weakness is the lack of strengthening WS damage like the ones listed above it, and no extra accuracy. Easier to get, but don't bother using the NQ unless it's your only 119 dagger.
Sandung: Now with augments! In actuality, on weaker content, it's not that much better than it was. However, 50 Accuracy is pretty notable, and the effort involved to get one isn't too demanding.
Odium: 2nd best Adoulin dagger, pulls ahead of augmented Sandung except when accuracy is an issue. Generally not as effective as Jugo +1.
Ipetam: Great, if you're willing to spend money on skirmish stones, otherwise just skip it.
Izhiikoh: A little below Odium.

Well, depends on your luck. I've done countless SR, have max or barely below max on every piece I care about except Sari... of which I have two mid-range augmented daggers.

Got a Skinflayer (that I can head out with friends and target the specific mob which drops it at a pretty high rate), and within 15 minutes of heading back to Norg and using stones I had from my last Reisen NM farming session, had myself a dagger that's comparable to a pretty good Sari (DMG+17 DEX+7 Acc+15 Crit dmg+4%).

Compare that to my last, oh, 20 runs of SR where I've seen 3rd round Arciela maybe 5 times with zero Saris. Not zero good Saris, ANY Sari. I'm literally wasting my time for 0.6 AMAN vouchers per entry.

I'm going to start making a Twashtar, and probably do Twash/Taming. Might eventually upgrade my Mandau, and Twash/Mandau will probably be best for DPS on easy content. Twash/Taming for content you need accuracy on.

I'm finding myself switching back to Vajra even though I haven't upped it yet. Still trying to figure out if I can even make this work. In the world of massive skillchains, I don't think the Mandau's white damage can keep up with the bonus to SA/TA.

Closed darkness with a 23k Rudra + 50k double darkness last night against VD Tenzen, didn't even have all buffs/debuffs on. Mercy Stroke won't go over 12k.

Speaking of skillchains, I posted this in the RDM forums but nobody seemed to care. This is Inundation in action:

3 step SC: Last Stand > Blade: Hi > Rudra's (unstacked). No SC damage gear or bonuses beyond Inundation. While I know Cailimh takes extra damage from Earth-based damage (including SCs), I've done this fight a bajillion times with DRG + THF making multistep SCs that were never that proportionally high.

Err I think there's a bit more going on in there than just Inundation. It's a noticeable increase, but not several times over like that.

Oh, and the rdm forum doesn't seem to care about anything but melee rdm. Even the sticky guide is just glancing over general information for a little bit and then melee rdm discussion the rest of the way.

So after doing some adjustments, this is what I have right now:

Weapon 1: Sandung
Weapon 2: Ipetam (Augment: DEX+14, Accuracy+11, Dbl Atk+2)
Ammo: Honed tathlum

Head: Taeon chapeau (Augment: DEX+10, Accuracy+20 Attack+20, Haste+2%)
Body: Pillager's Vest+1
Hands: Plunderer's Armlet+1
Legs: Taeon tights: (Augment: HP+23, Accuracy+17,Crit hit rate+3%)
Feet: Taeon boots: (Augment: STR+3 DEX+3, Accuracy+12, Dual Wield+3)

Neck: Subtlety spectacles
Earring 1: Mouflon ring
Earrig 2: Epona's ring
Back: Canny cape (Augment: DEX+1, AGI+3, Dual Wield+4)
Waist: Anguinus belt

My base accuracy now is 1010 and I still have 31 more coming to me in job points. I'm still using Subline sushi as my food but I'm wondering if this is now good for high end game content. Some people say my base accuracy without buffs should be 1100, but that seems really high.

I really can't think of what else it would be though. I think I just need to do some more tests with it, but perhaps on a more neutral target.

You should be ok on most content going up til level 130. Basically, Escha T1/2, Reis T1, Sinister Reign. This kind of content is going to give you the gear that would be a step up from what you're using. Bear in mind that content like Sinister Reign, some T2s, etc will be a bit more dangerous, so I would recommend looking into how those enemies work before you go.

You might also want to go to Quetzalcoatl kills and rack up the Acc++ vorseal count while this event is going on. It'll make a massive difference.

Really sad that Mandau falls so short compared to Thwastar and Vajra. Mercy Stroke shouldn't be such a pathetic weapon skill. The fact that Rudra's Storm outparses better than Mandau's Mercy Stroke on any dagger including non-ultimate weapon ones is just a huge slap in the face.

I notice in the weapon ranking that sylph.Jeanpaul did there is no mention of Shijo.

Shijo is fantastic in both mainhand and offhand. If you don't have REM daggers then path B is great on the mainhand, and path D is great in the offhand. I'd use that before most of the other daggers on the list. A dual wield path B/path D shijo setup can be pretty amazing.

I forgot about it, sorry! But I recall very well that it performed about as well as a low-mid augment Sari. I'll check again later.

Mercy Stroke v Rudra's is a terribad comparison.
Like... No.
Rudra's v Mandalic Stab is an apt comparison.
Mercy Stroke v Evisceration is an apt comparison.
But an Xhit v a single hit WS... Just... No.

Given you trying to compare them.... Makes me wonder... Are you one of those Rudra's-Only THFs? Cause... Rudra's only really shines with SA/TA...
Cause it's a 1hit.

Evisceration at 1k spam will almost always wind up being more damage. (Assuming your evisceration set doesn't suck compared to your Rudra's.)
Namely because of how inundated with triple attack THF is.
Though stacking Rudra's is quite powerful, since the nerf, I've found evisceration to start performing better. (As in 1k evis v 3k Rudra's in terms of DPS)

Mercy Stroke being STR based means that you should be seeing good numbers from it. (Akin to Resolution. What with STR boosting the WS 3x)
I think due to crit mechanics Evisceration can pull ahead...
But the 40% from Mandau I believe pushes Mercy Stroke to comparable levels. (If not better in the 119 III)

Just... Don't be SA/TAing your Xhit WSs and expecting them to actually do anything damage wise.
SA/TA boosts damage on a single hit, which is a fraction of the damage on the Xhit WSs.
Multi-attack and elemental belt/gorgets are where those get the largest bang for your buck. (When ƒTP transfers, which iirc all the dagger ones do.)

So don't be comparing a SA/TA boosted 1hit to a SA/TA boosted Xhit.
They don't make damage the same way.

I only mention it for completion. I know it's not as good as a max aug taming, but the effort required to get a shijo is far more simplistic and upgrading to rank 15 is next to free. The amount of effort to performance ratio on that weapon is very favorable.

Mercy Stroke is a 1hit WS.

Yeah, like every single other relic WS.

Don't gotta be mean about it... jeez...

Also returning..

I don't have rem... what daggers should I aim for just doodling around

Have odium and jugo +1 atm

I've returned for a couple of months now just to see what the game is like, and it looks like a rough spot for THF. Based on what I see most APEX groups aren't looking for a THF but I can't speak more to that as my gear is probably nowhere near acceptable for being anywhere near one. I've noticed a lot of NMs are just not THF-friendly, even with a full party of PCS or NPCS. As an example, I'd love to get my hands on a rawhide vest, but much to my dismay i'm basically useless in the actual fight. I see how other jobs can rake in millions of CP/hr while i'm still struggling to hit accuracy requirements and farm CP on my own hundreds of time slower. Sure, my gear is pretty laughable as i'm not even at 1000 acc base yet, but is there something to work towards? Is there a light at the end of the tunnel? What reason, and I don't ask this rhetorically as I am genuinely interested in hearing your answers, is there to play THF?

It'll help, but let's not go that crazy about how "massive" it is... it's Acc+5 per tier. The number of kills needed to obtain vorseal upgrades are: 1, 5, 10, 20, 40, 60, 80, 100, 160, 240, 360

Definitely get some kills in and get a few levels, and if you're not doing anything go add another to your kill count. More acc is more acc. But when it gets to the point where you're needing 20+ kills for another vorseal upgrade it's not really a terribly efficient use of time and would probably be better spent improving yourself via other means.

You should be able to round up a few Lunies and get either Shijo's or Skinflayers.

You play the job because you like it. If you're a long time THF, you should have spent much of your time learning how to make THF work in most any situation.

If you feel useless, that's because your gear is terrible. Fix that first and things will get better.

Apex parties aren't the only way to get job points I more or less solo'd all mine. Do it in one of the escha areas and get a nice amount of silt at the same time.

If you want a fast and easy way of bringing up your accuracy I suggest a Sandung. Currently upgrade stones for it are a little pricey, but I would put money on boulders crashing hard.

As for whether or not thf is worth playing, got to go with Ihina's answer play the job if you like it. Really it's some advice more people should follow. I was playing thf before the 1 hand update, and I still play it after the rudra nerf. It was my first and favorite job.

With the zone buff "Fortitude", which is active as long as people are killing the wyrms regularly, vorseal effects are doubled. In the end, you can potentially hit 11/11 for Acc (+2 per), DEX/AGI (+3 to each per), and Acc++ (+5 per). Doubling all of these means you'd have +154 accuracy, and +66 DEX, totaling +203.5 accuracy. Granted, it does take time to get that much, but so does everything else that earns you major boosts. I'd aim for at least 20 kills to start though.

Once I finish the spreadsheet (which depends on me having free time from work and stuff), there's nothing holding me back from making a new guide, which would have that kind of analysis.

Main thing is I feel that since Relic weapon skills are strictly exclusive to the weapon only (unlike Mythic and Empyreal) that they should be a bit stronger than what they are now. Not saying they have to have top damage but the damage they put out is mediocre compared to a weapon skill you can just unlock on a quest(ex: Rudra's Storm) and on a non-legendary weapon to boot.

On another note, the struggle with thief has always been real. I know the pain and I still stick with the job despite being alienated and told that I am not and never will be a real DD job in any regard. Been there and done that and I get sick of it. I still love my thief and will try my best to use it as optimal as possible regardless if the majority thinks it's total trash.

As mentioned, Mercy Stroke is 1hit. By your own definition, comparison is not apt.

Evis transfers fTP to all hits. Mercy Stroke does not. Comparison is, again, not apt.

Saving your TP to 3000 has never been ideal for overall DPS, even when Rudra's was first changed.

I have no idea what you mean by "boosting the WS 3x." Also, Resolution is a multi-hit fTP-transferred WS. Comparison is, again, not apt.

Source?


The only benefits to a STR-mod WS is the extra attack and fSTR that you gain from gearing for WSC, and while this might be appealing for low DMG weapons like daggers, it's not nearly as significant as when our WS base damage was something like only 100 total and our attack was lower than a current BRD idling in town.

The part that really kills Mercy is the 5.0 unscaled http://fTP. Even if you consider the 40% relic bonus, that can be equated to 7.0 fTP, around the same as a 1150TP Rudra's (with Moonshade).

Relic weapon skills are the weakest, and yet their aftermaths are still generally the worst.