Another half-year in parses

While others hoard screenshots, I hoard parser files. Another six months, another excuse for a filler post based on parser "output." The point of this exercise is to show that parsing can be a useful summary of your activities and, in some cases, help to assess how well you are doing in aspects of the game other than mindless merit damage.

Edit (July 4): updated

An Affable Adamantking? (June 26)

Damage Summary
Player               Total Dmg   Damage %   Melee Dmg  WSkill Dmg   Spell Dmg
BLM (me)                     5     0.04 %           0           0           5
BLM                       1078     8.12 %           0           0        1078
DRK/DNC                   2109    15.88 %        1287         526         296
DRK/NIN                  10090    75.97 %        9756           0         334
Total                    13282   100.00 %       11043         526        1713

Melee Damage
Player            Melee Dmg   Melee %   Hit/Miss   M.Acc %  M.Low/Hi    M.Avg
DRK/DNC                1287   61.02 %       12/2   85.71 %    86/134   107.25
DRK/NIN                9756   96.69 %       83/6   93.26 %     5/187   120.43

Comments: I responded to a Whitegate shout for one of the "beastmen helm" quests that hardly anyone cares about. I had done this previously with NIN/WAR and the assistance of a RDM/WHM by zoning Diamond Quadav until it was isolated from its stooges, and I was interested if they would take a different tack. Actually, their approach called for a DRK-zerg of Diamond Quadav, leaving the BLMs to preoccupy (sleep) the others, which isn't a bad idea yet they still ran out of steam. As you can see, the damage output seemed to be decent enough to pull this off. (The DRK/DNC didn't 2-hour for some reason.) Diamond Quadav being a WHM, of course Benediction ruined this attempt, especially with no attempt to separate the boss from its minions.

Damage Summary
Player               Total Dmg   Damage %   Melee Dmg  WSkill Dmg   Spell Dmg
BLM (me)                  3347    19.23 %           0           0        3347
BLM                       5610    32.23 %           0           0        5583
DRK/DNC                    906     5.20 %         439           0         467
DRK/NIN                   7544    43.34 %        2843        2659        2042
Total                    17407   100.00 %        3282        2659       11439

Melee Damage
Player            Melee Dmg   Melee %   Hit/Miss   M.Acc %  M.Low/Hi    M.Avg
DRK/NIN                2843   37.69 %     198/74   72.79 %     0/167    13.44

Weaponskill Damage
Player                 WSkill Dmg   WSkill %  Hit/Miss   WS.Acc %   WS.Low/Hi   WS.Avg
DRK/NIN                      2659    35.25 %      12/0   100.00 %      38/525   221.58
- Vorpal Blade               2659   100.00 %      12/0   100.00 %      38/525   221.58

With Blood Weapon now unavailable, the only realistic tactic was to isolate Diamond Quadav and proceed to plink away at it with nukes and letting the DRK/NIN "tank." Unfortunately, the guy who wanted to "upgrade" the quadav barbut died without reraise and, in fact, Diamond Quadav is rather accurate for an easily-enfeebled NM, giving the DRK/NIN some trouble with shadows, so I just kited it with gravity and bind until the guy returned along with someone else on bard, making blink-tanking realistic. Meleeing was just terrible (not sure why there was a switch to 1-handed sword), but whatever gets the job done...

Farming Royal Jelly (May 7)

Experience Rates
Number of Fights : 234
Date             : 5/7/2009
Party Duration   : 14:14:40
Total Fight Time : 2:11:13
Avg Time/Fight   : 219.15 seconds
Avg Fight Length : 33.65 seconds

Item Drops
89 beehive chip
13 serving of royal jelly
22 insect wing
6 giant stinger

Comments: For those aspiring to level cooking to 100, it's either Red Curry or Cursed Soup, the latter requiring Royal Jelly, which was inexplicably flagged "exclusive" by some asshole on the "dev team." With a glut of 20 red curries languishing on a mule and sitting somewhere above 99 skill, I tried my hand at farming this shit.

Where do you farm Royal Jelly? You can risk dying to Final Sting while farming pephredos in Wajaom Woodlands (if you melee) or mow down all the Death Jackets, all on a 14-minute respawn timer in Crawler's Nest. 234 bees later, I got a 13th Royal Jelly and I still didn't get to 100 cooking.

More Aura Statues x58 (Jan 21)

Debuff     # Times   # Successful   # No Effect   % Successful
Aspir            2              2             0       100.00 %
Bind            60             43             0        71.67 %
Gravity        117            106             2        90.60 %
Sleep            5              4             0        80.00 %
Sleep II        17             17             0       100.00 %
Stun            37             37             0       100.00 %

Comments: Aura Statues are bothersome with relatively poor enfeebling skill as I showed last time. But at this point, I am pretty sure I had all the key enfeebling pieces, including Oracle's Gloves and Enfeebling Torque, but no Witch Sash, Enfeebling Earring, or corresponding elemental grip. Even so, Gravity outright resisted 9 of 115 times. I would imagine scholar with dark arts and the appropriate equipment and merits would have little trouble enfeebling statues.

Damage mitigation on WAR/SAM with Greater Colibri

Damage Taken Summary
Player         Total Dmg   Damage %   Melee Dmg   Abil. Dmg
WAR/SAM (me)        7727    50.27 %        5660        2067
WAR/NIN             3687    23.99 %        1885        1802
DRG/SAM             1944    12.65 %        1304         640
RDM/WHM              145     0.94 %         145           0
BRD/NIN             1432     9.32 %        1432           0
BRD/WHM              437     2.84 %         437           0
Total              15372   100.00 %       10863        4509

Passive Defenses
Player   Evasion  Evasion %   Parry  Parry %   Counter  Counter %
WAR/SAM        4     3.13 %       7   5.65 %        17    15.18 %
WAR/NIN        3     3.41 %       7   8.24 %         0     0.00 %

Active Defenses
Player   Shadow  Shadow %   Anticipate  Anticipate %
WAR/SAM       0    0.00 %           62       52.99 %
WAR/NIN      56   71.79 %            0        0.00 %
DRG/SAM       0    0.00 %            3       23.08 %
BRD/NIN      54   85.71 %            0        0.00 %

Comments: Where Utsusemi is involved, in KParser the "blink" rate is the number of absorbed attacks over the total number of attacks that weren't evaded or parried. The total number includes TP moves (but not their individual hits). From experience with Greater Colibri, my rate has ranged from 82% to 90%, which seems acceptable if not a sign of hyper-vigilance in recasting Utsusemi.

Similarly, a "Seigan rate" can be calculated by substituting the sum of counters and anticipates for the number of blinked attacks. To the extent that the Seigan rate, as a measure of "active" defensive efficiency, can be maximized with judicious use of Third Eye, it could help identify room for improvement. I have yet to see any discussion about what an optimal Seigan rate might be, though.

Unfortunately, my personal insight on WAR/SAM damage mitigation consists solely of two pickup parties. The parser output above is a partial record of a short (approximately 30 minutes) March 13 merit party where I was actually allowed to sub /SAM. My Seigan rate was 79/128 = .617.

Damage Taken Summary
Player        Total Dmg   Damage %   Melee Dmg   Range Dmg   Abil. Dmg
WAR/SAM (me)      16069    45.15 %       13888           0        2181
BRD/NIN            4669    13.12 %        4669           0           0
DRG/NIN            2780     7.81 %        1576           0        1204
BRD/WHM             176     0.49 %         176           0           0
WAR/SAM           11527    32.39 %        9227           0        2300
WHM/SCH             372     1.05 %         372           0           0
Total             35593   100.00 %       29908           0        5685

Passive Defenses
Player        Evasion  Evasion %   Parry  Parry %   Counter  Counter %
WAR/SAM (me)       10     3.02 %      10   3.12 %        40    13.11 %
BRD/NIN             9     4.39 %       0   0.00 %         0     0.00 %
DRG/NIN             4     2.37 %      10   6.06 %         0     0.00 %
WAR/SAM             9     4.84 %       9   5.08 %        16     9.94 %

Active Defenses
Player        Shadow  Shadow %   Anticipate  Anticipate %
WAR/SAM (me)       0    0.00 %          166       53.38 %
BRD/NIN          164   83.67 %            0        0.00 %
DRG/NIN          134   86.45 %            0        0.00 %
BRD/WHM            3   60.00 %            0        0.00 %
WAR/SAM            0    0.00 %           85       50.60 %

This parser output summarizes defensive efficiency from a June 17 polearm-only (hey, I was curious) merit party (82 minutes) where I was also allowed to sub /SAM. My Seigan rate was 206/311 = .662, a sign of personal improvement but also an indication that I could be more efficient as I was being rather lazy with Seigan renewal. The other WAR/SAM had a Seigan rate of 101/168 = .601. In contrast, the DRG/NIN actually outparsed both of us (draw your own conclusions) and was much more efficient defensively.

Innin could've come in handy here (April 16)

Damage Summary
Player    Total Dmg   Damage %   Melee Dmg   WSkill Dmg
NIN/WAR        4454   100.00 %        2854         1600

Melee Damage
Player    Melee Dmg   Melee %   Hit/Miss   M.Acc %  M.Low/Hi    M.Avg
NIN/WAR        2854   64.08 %      87/62   58.39 %     11/43    30.64

Comments: The reaction to the upcoming (July 2009) Ninja job adjustments, particularly Innin, a new ninja ability that "lowers enmity in exchange for reduced evasion" while conferring bonuses to accuracy, critical hit rate, and ninjutsu damage "when striking your target from behind," has been mixed to put it charitably.

This combination of lower enmity (sounds like this will have the effect of lower rate of enmity increase with Innin active) and increased damage-dealing capability seems peculiar, especially since these new abilities are subject to decay per "development" team fetish. I can imagine the enmity change doesn't "decay" while the damage-dealing part does. But it could be of use in low-number activities where ninjas can still melee, provide enfeebling support, and don't have to worry about positioning, but basically concede "tanking" to a far superior DD (like monk), possibly in conjunction with thieves being unaccountable for the damage they inflict. (Oh, you call that hate control?)

The above output from an "arena-style" fight from the quest "Bonds That Never Die," is a partial picture of how feeble (my) ninja was even with sushi. Being totally outclassed by 2-handers (samurai) who ended up tanking the latter half of the fight, Innin could've helped to speed up the fight.

Okay, this is a really weak argument for Innin, but at least it's something.

An example of NW Apollyon soloing failure (May 10)

Fight #   Enemy               Start Time   End Time   Fight Length
1         Bardha                11:55 AM   11:57 AM       00:02:27
3         Mountain Buffalo      12:00 PM   12:05 PM       00:05:03
4         Mountain Buffalo      12:05 PM   12:13 PM       00:07:32
5         Apollyon Scavenger    12:15 PM   12:17 PM       00:01:40
7         Gorynich              12:20 PM   12:22 PM       00:02:14
8         Gorynich              12:22 PM   12:24 PM       00:01:32
9         Gorynich              12:26 PM   12:28 PM       00:01:42
10        Gorynich              12:31 PM   12:33 PM       00:01:54
11        Gorynich              12:36 PM   12:37 PM       00:01:38
12        Kronprinz Behemoth    12:43 PM   12:47 PM       00:04:16
13        Kronprinz Behemoth    12:50 PM   12:52 PM       00:02:26
14        Kronprinz Behemoth    12:55 PM   12:58 PM       00:02:46
15        Kaiser Behemoth        1:01 PM    1:32 PM       00:31:11

Player          Spell Dmg   Spell %  #Spells  S.Low/Hi     S.Avg
- Aero IV             629    7.47 %        1   629/629    629.00
- Bio                   5    0.06 %        1       5/5      5.00
- Bio II              434    5.15 %        8     16/69     54.25
- Blizzard IV        6345   75.33 %        8   770/853    793.13
- Drain              1010   11.99 %        9    35/165    112.22

Comments: This output represents a wasted opportunity to clear NW Apollyon with ease on my first legitimate attempt. You can see where I wasted a lot of time even with only two buffaloes to kill. Also, I lost valuable time by dying to Kaiser Behemoth somehow. Aspir accuracy is indeed a rate-limiting step (NW Apollyon motivated my earlier posts on Aspir), so to speak, and for some reason I managed to cast Aspir only three times in a half-hour (47, 91, 81). It seems Kaiser Behemoth can be killed in 20 minutes solo (unless the video from some jackoff hume BLM I saw was subtly sped up), so this was very disappointing to me. It's one thing to know what to do, and another to execute actually.

In later attempts, I also decided to cast three times in a "lap" around the fifth floor (Blizzard IV, Aspir, and Bio II or Drain where applicable) as opposed to the two times that others do, but this seemed counterproductive since I wasn't really inflicting damage at a faster rate with a "three-point" approach and I was exposing myself to higher risk.

Ninja, Marinara Pizza, and Temenos - Western Tower

Damage Summary
Player        Total Dmg   Damage %   Melee Dmg  WSkill Dmg   Spell Dmg  Other Dmg
PLD/NIN           32083    14.21 %       25625        5980           0        371
NIN/WAR (me)      79879    35.37 %       53089       26707           0         83
DRK/NIN           53584    23.73 %       28735       21994        1960        895
RDM/WHM            7327     3.24 %           0           0        7327          0
THF/NIN           51155    22.65 %       30764       19718           0        134
SC: Detonation      833     0.37 %           0           0           0          0
SC: Scission        965     0.43 %           0           0           0          0
Total            225826   100.00 %      138213       74399        9287       1483

Melee Damage
Player        Melee Dmg   Melee %   Hit/Miss   M.Acc %  M.Low/Hi    M.Avg  #Crit  C.Low/Hi   C.Avg     Crit%
PLD/NIN           25625   79.87 %    672/121   84.74 %      0/77    35.50     56    32/112   67.11    8.33 %
NIN/WAR (me)      53089   66.46 %   1069/145   88.06 %      0/90    43.69    181    32/139   78.98   16.93 %
DRK/NIN           28735   53.63 %     252/57   81.55 %     0/222   104.41     29   138/287  187.97   11.51 %
THF/NIN           30764   60.14 %     797/72   91.71 %      0/68    28.57    140    29/381   85.67   17.57 %

Weaponskill Damage
Player         WSkill Dmg   WSkill %  Hit/Miss   WS.Acc %   WS.Low/Hi   WS.Avg
NIN/WAR (me)        26707    33.43 %      46/0   100.00 %     159/901   580.59
- Blade: Jin        26078    97.64 %      44/0   100.00 %     268/901   592.68
- Blade: Kamu         629     2.36 %       2/0   100.00 %     159/470   314.50

Passive Defenses
Player             Evasion  Evasion %   Parry  Parry %
BRD/WHM                  1    11.11 %       0   0.00 %
PLD/NIN                 13     8.28 %       3   2.08 %
NIN/WAR (me)            25    11.26 %       6   3.05 %
THF/NIN                  3    15.00 %       0   0.00 %

Active Defenses
Player             Shadow  Shadow %
PLD/NIN                76   53.90 %
NIN/WAR (me)          152   79.58 %
DRK/NIN                 3   27.27 %
THF/NIN                 5   29.41 %

Comments: I had a chance to do Temenos West as NIN/WAR, so I took this opportunity to see how well I could do with Marinara Pizza (+1), which is kind of a boon for 1-handed melee since it overcomes the accuracy deficit that 1-handers face compared to 2-handers and also provides an attack bonus.

Even 44+ accuracy (estimated) wasn't enough to achieve maximum hit rate, though.

Damage Summary
Player               Total Dmg   Damage %   Melee Dmg  WSkill Dmg
RDM/WHM                   4133     1.07 %           0           0
WHM/SCH                   1395     0.36 %           0           0
THF/NIN                  62995    16.29 %       35352       26928
NIN/WAR                 110655    28.61 %       78434       32156
WAR/NIN (me)            113930    29.45 %       72330       41287
PLD/NIN                  49607    12.82 %       29385       19984
Diabolos                   231     0.06 %         231           0
Garuda                   34906     9.02 %        5926           0
Leviathan                   72     0.02 %          72           0
Shiva                     1615     0.42 %         166           0
SC: Detonation            2272     0.59 %           0           0
SC: Impaction              307     0.08 %           0           0
SC: Light                 2034     0.53 %           0           0
SC: Reverberation         1676     0.43 %           0           0
SC: Scission               978     0.25 %           0           0
Total                   386806   100.00 %      221896      120355

Melee Damage
Player         Melee Dmg   Melee %   Hit/Miss   M.Acc %  M.Low/Hi    M.Avg  #Crit  C.Low/Hi   C.Avg     Crit%
THF/NIN            35352   56.12 %    897/104   89.61 %     10/65    30.99    178    28/290   73.42   19.84 %
NIN/WAR            78434   70.88 %    1510/99   93.85 %     0/103    45.94    231    27/150   85.17   15.30 %
WAR/NIN (me)       72330   63.49 %     458/25   94.82 %    50/247   143.30     67   135/306  243.28   14.63 %
PLD/NIN            29385   59.24 %    797/204   79.62 %      0/88    35.23     32    42/128   76.13    4.02 %

Weaponskill Damage
Player             WSkill Dmg   WSkill %  Hit/Miss   WS.Acc %   WS.Low/Hi   WS.Avg
NIN/WAR                 32156    29.06 %      55/0   100.00 %    220/1023   584.65
- Blade: Jin            30307    94.25 %      50/0   100.00 %    220/1023   606.14
- Blade: Kamu            1849     5.75 %       5/0   100.00 %     259/490   369.80
WAR/NIN (me)            41287    36.24 %      56/0   100.00 %    161/1615   737.27
- King's Justice        35740    86.56 %      50/0   100.00 %    161/1291   714.80

Passive Defenses
Player             Evasion  Evasion %   Parry  Parry %
RDM/WHM                  1     7.14 %       0   0.00 %
THF/NIN                  4    50.00 %       0   0.00 %
NIN/WAR                 42    17.00 %       4   1.95 %
WAR/NIN (me)             4     5.13 %       2   2.70 %
PLD/NIN                 16    11.76 %       5   4.17 %

Active Defenses
Player             Shadow  Shadow %
THF/NIN                 3   75.00 %
NIN/WAR               165   82.09 %
WAR/NIN (me)           56   77.78 %
PLD/NIN                77   66.96 %

This other (successful) attempt to clear Temenos West involved a different NIN/WAR using Dorado Sushi. It was really annoying to see average melee and WS damage similar to mine when using Marinara +1, but this could be explained by other factors (birds have low defense, Usukane, more katana merits, more consistent application of Dia II, etc.).

A half-year in parses

December 11: I now have the time to add some comments for all the parser output I posted last week.

Treasure and Tribulations BCNM, 1st attempt (July 11)

Melee Damage
Player            Melee Dmg   Hit/Miss  M.Low/Hi    M.Avg
NIN/WAR                 470      38/85      4/18    11.62


Spell Damage
Player                 Spell Dmg   Spell %  #Spells  S.Low/Hi     S.Avg
NIN/WAR                      914   64.55 %       29      4/44     31.52
- Doton: Ni                  164   17.94 %        4     40/44     41.00
- Huton: Ni                  140   15.32 %        4     20/40     35.00
- Hyoton: Ni                 200   21.88 %        6     20/40     33.33
- Katon: Ni                  110   12.04 %        5     10/40     22.00
- Raiton: Ni                 196   21.44 %        5     36/40     39.20
- Suiton: Ni                 104   11.38 %        5      4/40     20.80

Comments: it certainly is more palatable to fight a mimic (Small Box) straight up rather than hope you pick the right treasure chest. Comments on FFXIclopedia recommend sushi "except if you have really good gear," but melee accuracy against this mimic was a joke. I felt better off using the "wheel" lest the fight take 25 minutes.

Treasure and Tribulations BCNM, 2nd attempt (July 12)

Melee Damage
Player            Melee Dmg   Hit/Miss  M.Low/Hi    M.Avg
NIN/WAR                 214      20/78      5/13     8.47


Spell Damage
Player                 Spell Dmg   Spell %  #Spells  S.Low/Hi     S.Avg
NIN/WAR                     1008   80.45 %       36      4/44     28.00
- Doton: Ni                  115   11.41 %        5      5/40     23.00
- Huton: Ni                  190   18.85 %        6     10/40     31.67
- Hyoton: Ni                 220   21.83 %        7     20/40     31.43
- Katon: Ni                  164   16.27 %        7      4/40     23.43
- Raiton: Ni                 145   14.38 %        6      5/40     24.17
- Suiton: Ni                 174   17.26 %        5     10/44     34.80

Comments: more of the same (Small Box again), mainly to corroborate the hideous evasion of these mimics. I am curious whether there is any difference in hit rate targeting the larger boxes instead.

Evasion vs. Water Leaper (August 1)

Attacks Against:
Player           Total   Avoided   Avoid %
NIN/THF            253       247   97.63 %


Standard Defenses
Player           M.Evade  M.Evade %   Shadow  Shadow %   Parry  Parry %
NIN/THF              148    58.73 %       93   93.94 %       6   5.77 %

Comments: I trot out the thief support job to maximize my evasion. (I've seen "Evasion Bonus II" job trait from thief to be both +22 and +23 total.) This may be indispensable for something like Fenrir (I may try soloing it again now that Reraise effects can't be dispelled) but for mundane things not so much. Trading 12 or 13 evasion for all the abilities available to DNC37 (dancer also gets an Evasion Bonus trait) seems like a no-brainer for menial tasks, if I can ever bother to finishing leveling it.

Evasion vs. Goblin Slaughtermen, Temenos - Northern Tower (August 8)

Attacks Against:
Player           Total   Avoided   Avoid %
NIN/THF            241       234   97.10 %


Standard Defenses
Player           M.Evade  M.Evade %   Shadow  Shadow %   Parry  Parry %
NIN/THF              155    65.13 %       71   91.03 %       8   9.64 %

Comments: Ninja soloing for AF+1 in Temenos seems "common" enough for those who have the patience and adequate equipment. I've tended to err toward mixing both haste and evasion if only to speed up the process just a little, so even without maximum evasion, one can still evade a fair amount of attacks. (At least I assume that was the case for this, one of my last Temenos runs.) Sadly, in the past I have actually timed out mainly because of mediocre DD output, but it doesn't really matter to me whether I finish in 20 minutes or 28 minutes.

Enfeebling Despot (October 10)

BLM/RDM
Debuff      # Times   # Successful   # No Effect   % Successful
Bind             26             21             0        80.77 %
Gravity           8              8             0       100.00 %
Poison II        12             11             0        91.67 %

RDM
Debuff      # Times   # Successful   # No Effect   % Successful
Bind              3              2             0        66.67 %
Gravity           6              6             0       100.00 %

Comments: I had such extraordinary success (by my standards) binding Despot that I feel this is an anomaly. I am pretty sure my enfeebling magic skill a few months ago was 269, which isn't good for BLM. Although binding isn't necessary for soloing Despot as a black mage (yes, I didn't solo it here), it can give you a little slack.

Pahluwan Khazagand effect on crit rate (October 16)

Melee Damage
Player            Hit/Miss   M.Avg  #Crit     Crit%
WAR/NIN             459/39  143.43     40    8.71 %
SAM/WAR (Askar)    581/184  140.84     54    9.29 %
MNK72/WAR36       1270/283   52.96    148   11.65 %

Total Experience : 19012
Number of Fights : 100
Start Time       : 10:06:51 AM
End Time         : 11:07:50 AM
Party Duration   : 1:00:58
Total Fight Time : 1:35:08
Avg Time/Fight   : 36.59 seconds
Avg Fight Length : 57.08 seconds
XP/Fight         : 190.12
XP/Minute        : 311.77
XP/Hour          : 18706.50

Comments: I am no fan of the "Mamool Ja north" merit camp, but whatever it takes. I even included the experience summary to show that the exp rate was great (by my standards). Also, I noticed that the monk was wearing the Pahluwan body piece. I have seen bandied about the claim that the crit bonus on Pahluwan is "broken," and I believe this nonsense originated from this idiotic post from 2006. Such fuckers don't realize that the margin of error associated with the sample crit rate in question, even for 718 total hits, will be fairly wide. For example, a 95% Clopper-Pearson interval for the crit rate with Pahluwan body is (0.1366717, 0.1920368), so I wouldn't be talking shit about how the body makes the crit rate "worse."

Going back to the parser output, it seems to confirm the notion that critical hit rate is minimized at 5% (9% with 4 merits). This is to be expected without a sufficient amount of dexterity at this camp. If the monk's base crit rate before equipment was indeed 9% (assuming the monk had all the merits), then there is strong evidence that Pahluwan body does have an effect (trivial conclusion since the item description explicitly states there is one). As for the magnitude of the effect, a 95% CI for the crit rate bonus is (0.00939805, 0.04546965), so I am 95% confident that the true bonus is somewhere in that interval. So much for crit rate being "broken" (not that the effect isn't weak).

Enfeebling Aura Statues

≥ 82 (October 23)

BLM/RDM
Debuff      # Times   # Successful   # No Effect   % Successful
Bind             92             52             0        56.52 %
Dispel            1              0             1         0.00 %
Gravity         234            184             1        78.63 %
Sleep            34             22             0        64.71 %
Sleep II        120             94             0        78.33 %
Sleepga II        1              1             0       100.00 %
Stun             40             39             0        97.50 %

≥ 25 (October 24)

BLM/RDM
Debuff      # Times   # Successful   # No Effect   % Successful
Bind             11              8             0        72.73 %
Gravity          80             62             0        77.50 %
Sleep            11              7             0        63.64 %
Sleep II         26             24             0        92.31 %
Stun             22             22             0       100.00 %

≥ 9 (November 13)

BLM/RDM
Debuff      # Times   # Successful   # No Effect   % Successful
Bind              6              4             0        66.67 %
Gravity          25             20             0        80.00 %
Sleep II          5              5             0       100.00 %
Stun              8              8             0       100.00 %

Comments: Now that I have some working hypothesis on the relationship between magic skill and magic "hit rate" (again, to make a distinction between a "lack of resist" rate and the magic accuracy attribute), I am going to put it to the test against Aura Statues once I reach 289 enfeebling magic skill. (Merciful Cape is absolutely out of the question as I am not that masochistic; Enfeebling Torque is overpriced and obtaining Wizard's Coat +1 is contingent on luck getting the materials.) Oddly, the resist rate estimates seem consistent only for gravity. I'll have to look into it. Again, I wouldn't be surprised that a level correction plays some role.

Direct magic damage to Genbu (October 26)

Bio II
    3:   17
   35:    1
Burst II
 1067:    1
Thundaga III
  532:    1
Thunder IV
   73:    1
   99:    3
  199:    1
  398:    3
  795:    1
  798:   12

Comments: I seemed to have pretty good success damaging Genbu this time.

Dancer (lv14-15) EXP/hour (November 7)

Total Experience : 5845
Number of Fights : 82
Start Time       : 3:07:05 PM
End Time         : 4:17:42 PM
Party Duration   : 1:10:37
Total Fight Time : 1:43:29
Avg Time/Fight   : 51.68 seconds
Avg Fight Length : 75.73 seconds
XP/Fight         : 71.28
XP/Minute        : 82.76
XP/Hour          : 4965.81

Mob Listing
Mob                        Base XP   Number   Avg Fight Time
Akbaba                         ---        1             0.00
Canyon Crawler                  80        1            35.00
Canyon Rarab                    60        2            24.50
Canyon Rarab                    65        5            29.01
Canyon Rarab                    70        9            40.56
Canyon Rarab                    75        4            49.29
Goblin Digger                   80        1          1:33.09
Goblin Thug                     60        1         37:07.29
Goblin Thug                     65        1            35.00
Goblin Tinkerer                 80        1            54.01
Goblin Tinkerer                 90        1          1:00.04
Killer Bee                      70        6            36.41
Killer Bee                      75        5            38.22
Killer Bee                      80        4          2:37.06
Pygmaioi                        65        3            34.68
Pygmaioi                        70        3            50.68
Pygmaioi                        75        7            45.59
Pygmaioi                        80        2          3:35.61
Strolling Sapling               65        8            33.02
Strolling Sapling               70       10            42.63
Strolling Sapling               75        1             6.00
Yagudo Acolyte                  60        2            19.51
Yagudo Persecutor               90        2            42.54
Yagudo Piper                    90        1          1:01.01
Yagudo Scribe                   60        1            13.01
Yagudo Scribe                   65        1            10.00

Comments: I've become progressively less patient with leveling subjobs even though the last few have been easy to solo (against goblin pets), from samurai to dark knight to red mage and, now, dancer. I just don't see myself leveling another job as my playing time wanes, especially considering no job other than dancer will let me spend 70 minutes mowing down every EP nonstop for almost 5k exp/hr.

Fleeting fortitude

With no real occasion to use my ninja, having given up the filler activity that is Campaign, all my ninja equipment and tools have been collecting dust in storage for the past month. But in my fervor to realize my remaining modest goals before I limit my FFXI time-wasting mostly to chocobo racing, I turned to my ninja for yet another ridiculous hours-long soloing attempt.

Having sat on two stacks of virtue stone pouches for over a year, I've wanted a Fortitude Axe to play with for some time now, but I've never had any reliable connections to mine so that I could leech one, only BS promises based on a quid pro quo, but where I did all the giving and ended up getting nothing in return.

My interest in getting the axe was rekindled recently when I came across a thread on BG discussing various NMs for ninja to solo. Prior to that, I only vaguely remembered Jailer of Fortitude (JoF) as soloable by a black or red mage, but I wasn't familiar with the tactics involved, so I was surprised to hear that ninja could also solo JoF. Upon further investigation, I discovered that having some form of movement speed is important to maintain separation between yourself and the jailer so that you can actually have an opportunity to do damage to it, and that even a corsair with movement speed could kill JoF alone. But since I wasn't ever going to come across a pair of Herald's Gaiters for use on my black mage, ninja it was, but where to get ghrah chips?

The prospect of having to farm 12 ghrah M chips was really the only reason I didn't try Jailer of Fortitude sooner, but after several weeks of trying to find these chips in bazaars (I found none), I resigned myself to mind-numbing farming in Hux'Zoi. I managed to cobble together 12 chips from 60 ghrahs, including a nearly four-hour session when I got 7 chips from 36 ghrahs (38-40% waxing moon).

While the general approach to kiting Jailer of Fortitude is well-documented (if not widely documented), there are a few specific things that may be worth considering based on my observations:

After you find the ??? to which you trade the 12 ghrah chips, it's actually possible to trade the chips and run out of the room so that JoF and its assistants have neither hate nor aggro, as long as you open the door right before you trade the chips and immediately run outside (so you don't get impeded while opening the door on the way out). (I had both the quickening effect from Sprinter's Shoes along with the movement speed from Ninja Kyahan.) Thus, I don't know if JoF actually spawns claimed and whether what happened to me was merely a fluke.

For my attempt, I kited from the "elvaan tower," where the ??? was located, directly to the "hume tower" without any problems shaking JoF's assistants, so I think there isn't much need to go to such extremes as zoning. You could probably use the elevators as a safety net to shed aggro from ghrahs and possibly zdei, though.

As a ninja, I relied entirely on elemental ninjutsu spells ("the wheel") to deal 26,264 damage, broken down by spell as follows:

Spell                Spell Dmg  #Spells  S.Low/Hi     S.Avg
-----------------------------------------------------------
Doton: Ni                 3748       38    15/143     98.63
Huton: Ni                 4862       39    16/138    124.67
Hyoton: Ni                4644       41    17/143    113.27
Katon: Ni                 4577       42    15/143    108.98
Raiton: Ni                4466       39    16/138    114.51
Suiton: Ni                3967       42    14/143     94.45

After turning each corner, I would cast one ninjutsu given enough distance between me and JoF. Otherwise I would continue moving until I felt I was safe to cast. While JoF usually pauses movement to "reflect" magic back at you, the "reflect" move can be "overridden" by Actinic Burst (flash effect). I didn't feel like taking a chance that I would get sliced and diced by a Vorpal Blade instead of being hit with Actinic Burst.

The upside to soloing JoF as NIN as opposed to BLM is that your rate of damage output will be higher with ninjutsu than with Bio II alone. Using Bio II alone, a black mage should take at least 2 hours, 45 minutes, or 83 casts of Bio II (320 HP per 2 minutes), to take down JoF. (I assume JoF is immune to magic-based Poison, as opposed to Disseverment Poison, but I may be wrong.) It took me about 2:10 to kill JoF, and I have mediocre nuking gear for ninja (only Ninjutsu Torque and Ninja Hatsuburi, 72+25 INT with Cream Puffs, and a Moldavite). In fact, I had to wait out two daytime periods during this time (first nighttime period, ~32% damage, second nighttime period, ~43% damage).

(2 hours, 10 minutes? And to think I was complaining about Cheese Hoarder Gigiroon the other day...)

The downside to doing this as NIN is that for half the game day (at worst) you can't safely do any damage to JoF. Since you don't have movement speed in the daytime to help create distance between you and Jailer of Fortitude, it's not a good idea to let JoF close on you while casting ninjutsu. Unlike other mobs in the game that you might consider kiting to kill, JoF actually has good path movement around the circular ledge that you're supposed to kite along, so it can be troublesome to maintain distance. But even if JoF does catch up to you in the daytime, as long as you don't take wide turns around each corner it should never get close enough to hit you actually. (I have seen Powder Boots suggested as a safety net in case it's getting too close for comfort.)

As is my wont, over the course of suffering this "game" I've found progressively more tedious things to solo--from firedrakes for giant scales to Promyvion mobs for white memospheres to rank missions (the infamous Bastok 9-1, for one), and so on--to the point that I've actually gone out and done things like soloing Genbu and killing JoF that really deserve a bit of ribbing. Sure, we all covet shit to some extent, but is it really necessary to go to such extremes? Ugh, I even started a blog partly to cover such things. I think I've finally reached the limit of what I can endure. Finally!

Parser-mony

As someone who participates in merit parties about twice a year (learn to allocate merit points efficiently according to your everyday needs instead of being a "fully merited" retard), I rely on log parsers to keep me interested when the action in itself is boring as hell. I find KParser a very useful diagnostic tool in alleviating the boredom of meriting.

Why would I use KParser instead of other parsers? Parsers that I have previously used tend to cater solely to people jacking off to how much damage they do in a parsing session; their output doesn't tell you anything about the proportion of the monster's attention that each damage-dealer commands, which might be worth considering before one makes ridiculous generalizations regarding the relative effectiveness of a job combination or equipment set. In contrast, the sophisticated KParser actually crunches detailed numbers for defensive statistics (among other things, too many to discuss briefly)! KParser is not only interesting enough to keep me from being bored to tears, but it's also a pretty neat diagnostic tool to help me delve deeper into a parsed situation.

I put KParser to the test during a pickup merit party at Tadjana Isle (Greater Colibri with the occasional Mamool Ja mixed in) with the following party configuration:

Myself as WAR/NIN #1: used Perdu Voulge exclusively; 12% Haste (Walahra Turban, Swift Belt, Dusk Gloves), mediocre WS equipment.

WAR/NIN #2: Used both Byakko's Axe and some dual-wield combo with main-hand axe, at least 17% haste probably.

WAR/NIN #3: Maneater/Ridill, Adaman Hauberk, at least 17% haste probably. (Kupo member.)

WAR/NIN #4: Maneater/Juggernaut, Ares's Cuirass, at least 17% haste probably.

RDM and BRD/NIN

Looking at the offensive numbers alone (102 monsters, 19,385 experience points over 1:09), I can't really conclude that any of the warriors is loafing; our damage proportions are within 5% of one another (this is just a rule of thumb of mine, not based on any statistical criterion):

Damage Summary
Player             Total Dmg   Damage %   Melee Dmg  WSkill Dmg
WAR/NIN #1            124488    26.17 %       74760       49728
WAR/NIN #2            108562    22.82 %       73771       34736
WAR/NIN #3            112252    23.60 %       77009       35242
RDM                     1080     0.23 %         926         153
WAR/NIN #4            128528    27.02 %       85934       42582
SC: Reverberation        776     0.16 %           0           0
Total                 475686   100.00 %      312400      162441

However, looking at the numbers for "attacks against," we see here that WAR/NIN #3 (Maneater/Ridill) took the fewest attacks of all the damage-dealers:

Attacks Against:
Player           Total   Attack# %   Avoided   Avoid %
WAR/NIN #1         174     24.58 %       145   83.33 %
WAR/NIN #2         118     16.67 %        85   72.03 %
WAR/NIN #3          83     11.72 %        54   65.06 %
RDM                  8      1.13 %         1   12.50 %
WAR/NIN #4         179     25.28 %       142   79.33 %
BRD/NIN            146     20.62 %       113   77.40 %

KParser even has a distinct category for Utsusemi casting. Notice that WAR/NIN #4 (Maneater/Juggernaut, Ares's Cuirass) cast Utsusemi: Ichi 25 times during the 1 hour, 9 minute session, which may have had a deleterious effect on his damage output:

Utsusemi

Player      Shadows Used   Ichi Cast  Ichi Fin  Ni Cast  Ni Fin
WAR/NIN #1           133          15        11       48      43
WAR/NIN #2            72           4         4       34      30
WAR/NIN #3            49           4         4       28      24
RDM                    1           0         0        0       0
WAR/NIN #4           130          25        19       44      42
BRD/NIN              112           4         4       43      40

The best feature of all is KParser's ability to filter types of chat, including Arena and NPC chat! Well, it can help when you want to review NPC dialogue by filtering out annoying /party and /shout crap. It could also be useful to revisit what someone said in /tell that you happened to gloss over hundreds of chat lines ago.

From a meriting standpoint, I don't use parsers to make sweeping, erroneous generalizations but as a diagnostic tool to help me fine-tune my own performance. There isn't much of a take-home message from a typical parse of a merit party; all I really care about is that the group as a whole is getting the job done and that I am pulling my own weight.

As far as soloing concerns go, of my outlandish, totally unrealistic "ninja solo" goals is to acquire the items chest on the second floor of SE Apollyon. KParser can help me determine the (lack of) effectiveness of my evasion setup and (poor) dagger accuracy when fighting the Adamantshells, and also the average time spent fighting each Adamantshell.

Note: parser output was truncated for clarity.