After the day 54 progress report, I entered my chocobo in the "Survival Race" yet again, this time with "a bit deficient" discernment, and to my relief it finally eked out a victory after three attempts. On this successful run, it used a speed apple at the appropriate time during the final leg of the race (as opposed to the middle of the race the first time, when it finished second) on a final spurt directive, allowing it to pull ahead of Sakura at the end. This confirms to me the benefit of a sufficient level of discernment (when I actually get there).
However, it seems that due to the "random variability" that this skeleton crew of "developers" think is fucking cool in the form of "accidents" and cheap-fuck abilities and items used against other racers, the damn sheep actually wasn't in contention this time. Still, I finally managed to win with a still-developing chocobo--SS/A/D/B with Gallop--that had mediocre discernment and no Canter. Considering that these developers still hold the fucking conceit that imposing "Japan midnight" time restrictions everywhere (here, between non-repeat official races) serves a purpose other than to annoy the fuck out of players, I'm glad to get these piece-of-shit races out of the way when I can.
With that in mind I even tried the next race, the "Deadly Race"--similar setup again with mobs that can use their abilities twice (which is cheap) and yet another fucking annoying sheep--and also cleared it after three attempts.
I can't say that I'm ecstatic that I spent 195 chocobucks (about 55,714 gil worth of "free" runs for a total reward of 15,500 gil) for these two official races, but no one forced me to attempt these races with an unfinished chocobo, just as no one forced a group of players to fight Pandemonium Warden for 18 hours to the point of nausea. They knowingly accept the costs and risks of being part of the "vanguard" by fighting an unknown quantity. (Perhaps they should read up on the concept of "sunk cost" before trying again.) Who isn't surprised that the FFXI developers shit on our faces again and again and again and again and again, yet we continue to play? And I was so impatient about my chocobo's unexpectedly slow progress that I decided to roll the dice.
How slow does my chocobo go, anyway? From day 44 to day 55, my chocobo had been digging for treasure (care plan) twelve times, yet its discernment had yet to clear the "average" threshold. This indicates that the increase in discernment during this time was at best between 89 and 91, which does not jibe with claims that the most intensive plans raise an attribute one level in 3-4 days without failures. (In my impatience I used one session of training during this period.) This seems to agree with the idea that a chocobo's personality influences the effectiveness of care plans. It never took more than five days to raise either strength or discernment one level while "carrying packages."
Another explanation is that care plans become less effective as the chocobo gets older. A chocobo is in the prime of its life, so to speak, after the day 43 progress report, but I have never used anything other than "digging for treasure" after day 43. It's also possible that care plan results are constrained when the chocobo is at 640/640, which I finally thought to check today with Robino-Mobino.
Whatever the case, prospective chocobo raisers should consider these things should they strive for a certain attribute "profile." At this point I am very concerned that my chocobo's endurance won't "decay" fast enough so that I'll have to spend even more chocobucks adjusting strength, discernment, and receptivity in order to force my chocobo's endurance down. More chocobucks means more free runs. More free runs means more time. (Depending on how endurance pans out, I could have saved myself the cost if I had stopped endurance training around 192/255 instead of 224/255.)
Even so, at this point in my FFXI "experience," the time spent on free runs doesn't crowd out other things I could do in the game because there are no things I even want to do without having to cajole unmotivated people to do things like the Ashu Talif series of quests, or even some simple assaults to hoard points for Salvage. ZNMs can be spawned on demand, yet no one wants to do them. I am not so enamored with some rare/ex loot that will collect dust in mog storage. But neither do I care anymore about trying things that are off the beaten path (in other words, things that are off the path of least resistance).
I could go on and on, but it's a waste of time in the face of other people's lassitude. Other people can't squander my goodwill because there's nothing left to squander. As for soloing, that doesn't much appeal to me anymore. I will never step foot in Temenos again with the intention of soloing some Goblin Slaughtermen or doing anything else (other than zoning) now that I finally got a fourth Plaited Cord without having to do 10+ attempts between the third and the last, or wait 3+ months because some shitty LS is fixated on Apollyon to outfit with Homam shitty players with worse attitudes and personalities than mine. I don't care much to spend an hour obtaining access to Holy Cow just to be one-shot. Even if I were motivated to solo Genbu, the cost of Winterstone (650k seems to be a common list price if not a selling price) and Gem of the North (100k) means I should expect a net loss in exchange for the "fun" of kiting for hours and some shitty abjurations.
At this point I don't need to manufacture so-called fun through contrived challenges. Instead, I'll simply log on for minutes a day to feed and care for my chocobo and bide time before the next version update is revealed to be the barebones disappointment that I expect it to be, the anomaly of June 9 notwithstanding.
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Heat without light
Hypothesis testing pertaining to game mechanics is mostly a waste of time because the kinds of questions asked are mostly a waste of time.
For example, on the BG forums I found a proposal to determine whether the critical hit rate bonus on Senjuinrikio increases the critical hit rate of the first hit of Blade: Jin, involving testing on "too weak" mobs so that the mob dies on the first hit of the weapon skill. Two sets of data, one using Mamushito +1 (DMG 38), the other using Senjuinrikio (also DMG 38), are to be produced.
Never mind how tedious it would be to carry out such an experiment. Never mind the widely accepted conventional wisdom that Senjuinrikio's crit bonus does affect Blade: Jin. Let's pretend a formal statistical test is actually worth using.
Then the concern here is what sample size (the same for each set of data) is "sufficient" enough to be able to detect the effect of Senjuinrikio on Blade: Jin? To answer that question, it might help to do some prospective power computations for a test of two independent proportions (under the Neyman-Pearson paradigm of hypothesis testing). In other words, given a sample size that is the same for each group, what is the probability of rejecting the null hypothesis (Senjuinrikio has no effect) when the null hypothesis is false (so that you are inclined instead to accept that Senji has an effect)?
When determining a "suitable" sample size, one practical concern is that the variance of a (known) binomial proportion is a function of both the actual value of the proportion and n, the number of trials, and that when the number of trials is fixed, the variance is maximized for p = .5.
So not only can you control the sample size for your experiment, you can also attempt to keep your "base" critical hit rate as far away from 50% as possible in your attempt to achieve adequate statistical power. If you want to try to keep your sample size low (relatively speaking), and you know people willing to be your bitch on demand, you could try to conduct these tests in Salvage and, hell, throw in some Stumbling Sandals, too. (I honestly don't know what kind of critical hit rates you can expect in Salvage, though.)
Assuming that the Senji does actually have an effect on Blade: Jin, power curves of this two-sample test (Fisher's exact test in this case) for various null proportions (base critical hit rates) show that the power is lower for higher null proportions:
Let's say you'll accept a power of .80 given a Type I error of .05 ("false positive"). If your base critical hit rate is 20%, you'll need a sample size of 639 for each sample proportion. But if your base critical hit rate is 5%, you'll need a sample size of 278.
Of course, you can always accept a higher Type I error in exchange for lower sample sizes for a given level of power:
Given a Type I error of .10, if your base critical hit rate is 20%, you'll need a sample size of 475 for each sample proportion to achieve a power of .80. But, if your base critical hit rate is 5%, you'll need a sample size of "just" 211.
Again, this is all under the assumption that Senji does have an effect on Blade: Jin in the way that we expect.
Let us suppose it is possible to achieve a base critical hit rate of 5% and, therefore, assume that the critical hit rate with Senji is 11%. Assuming this, here is some R code that estimates the power of the test of two proportions from 1,000 simulated experiments (as expected, Fisher's exact test will correctly reject the null hypothesis about 80% of the time), using n = 211 for each group:
For example, on the BG forums I found a proposal to determine whether the critical hit rate bonus on Senjuinrikio increases the critical hit rate of the first hit of Blade: Jin, involving testing on "too weak" mobs so that the mob dies on the first hit of the weapon skill. Two sets of data, one using Mamushito +1 (DMG 38), the other using Senjuinrikio (also DMG 38), are to be produced.
Never mind how tedious it would be to carry out such an experiment. Never mind the widely accepted conventional wisdom that Senjuinrikio's crit bonus does affect Blade: Jin. Let's pretend a formal statistical test is actually worth using.
Then the concern here is what sample size (the same for each set of data) is "sufficient" enough to be able to detect the effect of Senjuinrikio on Blade: Jin? To answer that question, it might help to do some prospective power computations for a test of two independent proportions (under the Neyman-Pearson paradigm of hypothesis testing). In other words, given a sample size that is the same for each group, what is the probability of rejecting the null hypothesis (Senjuinrikio has no effect) when the null hypothesis is false (so that you are inclined instead to accept that Senji has an effect)?
When determining a "suitable" sample size, one practical concern is that the variance of a (known) binomial proportion is a function of both the actual value of the proportion and n, the number of trials, and that when the number of trials is fixed, the variance is maximized for p = .5.
So not only can you control the sample size for your experiment, you can also attempt to keep your "base" critical hit rate as far away from 50% as possible in your attempt to achieve adequate statistical power. If you want to try to keep your sample size low (relatively speaking), and you know people willing to be your bitch on demand, you could try to conduct these tests in Salvage and, hell, throw in some Stumbling Sandals, too. (I honestly don't know what kind of critical hit rates you can expect in Salvage, though.)
Assuming that the Senji does actually have an effect on Blade: Jin, power curves of this two-sample test (Fisher's exact test in this case) for various null proportions (base critical hit rates) show that the power is lower for higher null proportions:
Let's say you'll accept a power of .80 given a Type I error of .05 ("false positive"). If your base critical hit rate is 20%, you'll need a sample size of 639 for each sample proportion. But if your base critical hit rate is 5%, you'll need a sample size of 278.
Of course, you can always accept a higher Type I error in exchange for lower sample sizes for a given level of power:
Given a Type I error of .10, if your base critical hit rate is 20%, you'll need a sample size of 475 for each sample proportion to achieve a power of .80. But, if your base critical hit rate is 5%, you'll need a sample size of "just" 211.
Again, this is all under the assumption that Senji does have an effect on Blade: Jin in the way that we expect.
Let us suppose it is possible to achieve a base critical hit rate of 5% and, therefore, assume that the critical hit rate with Senji is 11%. Assuming this, here is some R code that estimates the power of the test of two proportions from 1,000 simulated experiments (as expected, Fisher's exact test will correctly reject the null hypothesis about 80% of the time), using n = 211 for each group:
p_value = rep(0,1000)
n = 211
for (i in 1:1000) {
a = rbinom(1,n,.05)
b = rbinom(1,n,.11)
c_table = matrix(c(a,n-a,b,n-b),nrow=2)
p_value[i] = fisher.test(c_table,alternative="less")$p.value
}
power = sum(p_value < .1)/1000
power
Monday, August 4, 2008
Do the math
Recently I fought Water Leaper (a pugil) in Sea Serpent Grotto for the Impulse Drive polearm weapon skill, and I took a gamble by fighting it near its spawn point, hoping that the nearby mobs wouldn't wander in my direction. Unfortunately, with about 1/5 of Water Leaper's HP to go, I eventually got aggro from a crab. I was still game to continue on since the crab was EP, but not long after I "reeled" in a nearby sahagin, which finally led to my demise. (It turns out that I-13 on the first map is a good place to fight it provided you sneak pull Water Leaper to that location after killing the sahagin that would otherwise block your way there.)
Since the fight itself is not interesting I'll instead use some probability to round out this filler post.
Each mob's attack round can be treated as an independent Bernoulli trial with some fixed probability of "success" (any result that does not result in my evading the attack). In this situation I could model an "effective evasion rate," or the probability that I evade all attacks after all mobs involved complete one attack round. (I'm not including parrying since its contribution is negligible.)
The pugil's hit rate, which I estimated at about .50 from a parse, is higher than that of the EP mobs. Still, independent events are involved, so my effective evasion rate with the pugil and the crab involved is estimated to be (.80)(.50) = .40. With all three mobs involved, my effective evasion rate is estimated to be (.80)(.80)(.50) = .32. 32% is not that much worse than 40%, is it?
Of course, a 32% "effective" evasion rate is misleading because even though the probability of getting hit at least once (or losing at least one shadow) after a series of attack rounds is .68, the probability of getting hit once (or losing one shadow) is .48, and the probability of getting hit two or more times (or losing 2-3 shadows) is an uncomfortable .20.
Barring a double attack, a pugil alone can only land one hit per attack round at worst. But the contribution of the other mobs is what allowed my shadows to be depleted so rapidly that there wasn't much of a chance to survive.
Here is a case where probability computations don't really belie a situation where it's obviously futile to take on three mobs at once, where one is IT and even though the others are EP. But still, one should be wary of all kinds of bullshit mathematical sophistries that are often left unchecked on FFXI-related forums. You might be able to call a thief on his BS claims that he was able to "solo" a bunch of IT mobs all at once, though.
Since the fight itself is not interesting I'll instead use some probability to round out this filler post.
Each mob's attack round can be treated as an independent Bernoulli trial with some fixed probability of "success" (any result that does not result in my evading the attack). In this situation I could model an "effective evasion rate," or the probability that I evade all attacks after all mobs involved complete one attack round. (I'm not including parrying since its contribution is negligible.)
The pugil's hit rate, which I estimated at about .50 from a parse, is higher than that of the EP mobs. Still, independent events are involved, so my effective evasion rate with the pugil and the crab involved is estimated to be (.80)(.50) = .40. With all three mobs involved, my effective evasion rate is estimated to be (.80)(.80)(.50) = .32. 32% is not that much worse than 40%, is it?
Of course, a 32% "effective" evasion rate is misleading because even though the probability of getting hit at least once (or losing at least one shadow) after a series of attack rounds is .68, the probability of getting hit once (or losing one shadow) is .48, and the probability of getting hit two or more times (or losing 2-3 shadows) is an uncomfortable .20.
Barring a double attack, a pugil alone can only land one hit per attack round at worst. But the contribution of the other mobs is what allowed my shadows to be depleted so rapidly that there wasn't much of a chance to survive.
Here is a case where probability computations don't really belie a situation where it's obviously futile to take on three mobs at once, where one is IT and even though the others are EP. But still, one should be wary of all kinds of bullshit mathematical sophistries that are often left unchecked on FFXI-related forums. You might be able to call a thief on his BS claims that he was able to "solo" a bunch of IT mobs all at once, though.
Chocobo comments
After 2,200 chocobucks, about 628,572 gil, and at least 52 hours of senseless automated free race cutscenes (barriers to entry, right?), I've finally completed my chocobo's receptivity regimen and its current distribution of attributes stands at SS/S/F/B (or 8/7/1/5) STR/END/DSC/RCP. Now I just have to wait out the next 10 days of "digging for treasure" and hope I don't have to do much tweaking to achieve the desired SS/B/B/B profile.As expected, it took 26 targeted chocobuck upgrades to improve receptivity to "better than average." This was accomplished using 14 training sessions (1,120 chocobucks or about 320,000 gil based on the expected value of 3.5 chocobucks earned per 1,000-gil free race entry fee) along with 12 training tokens (1,080 chocobucks or about 308,572 gil) set aside so that I wouldn't have to wait long to finish the training regimen while accumulating another 1,000 chocobucks to pay for the rest of the upgrades.
I did attempt the Survival Race again with this SS/S/F/B chocobo and, not unexpectedly, it placed 7th. I am not so irritated with the result as with the fact that these races have steep entry fees in gil cost and time cost. Now that's 120 chocobucks wasted on four attempts at the Survival Race, or about 35,000 gil and almost 3 hours of free racing.
Considering that the entire Pashhow Swamptrot series takes 225 total chocobucks to finish (about 64,286 gil and 5-6 hours of free racing) without repeated attempts, and the gil rewards add up to 48,000 gil, it's typical of SE to make gil rewards totally incommensurate with the wasted time and gil put forth. Sure, a Chocobo Pullus Torque, another shiny trophy, and a title signifying a difficult "accomplishment" are nice, but consider the cost of raising a chocobo capable of clearing the Swamptrot. What the hell do they expect chocobo racers to do for cheaper chocobucks, Hot and Cold?
I'm banking on my chocobo being able to rake in the gil in the Chocobo Circuit, though, so the gil costs ain't a thing. As far as the time spent accumulating chocobucks goes, I wouldn't excoriate people for being sensible about acquiring chocobucks with, ahem, unattended free races.
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Days at the races
While I'm still stuck on the Survival Race in the Pashhow Swamptrot (recently placed 8th and 7th in the last two attempts), I actually had better results in the Crystal Stakes with my first chocobo, placing 4th, 8th, 4th, and--finally!--3rd. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to observe the 3rd-place race, but having noticed that my low-endurance chocobo always loses steam toward the end of races even on a "keep pace" directive, I went with an elm saddle and a stamina apple.
By low-endurance, I actually mean no-endurance. By the time I took chocobo raising seriously, my first chocobo's endurance wasn't high enough to withstand the "digging for treasure" care plan and it ended up being completely depleted. An 8/1/4/1 chocobo isn't very effective in C1 or C2 races, and it definitely won't make it through the whole Pashhow Swamptrot series. (However, my chocobo did actually win a C2 race because a superior PC chocobo stumbled in the rain and was the target of the NPC chocobo's attacks before its accident. What a fluke!)
Still, I'm satisfied that my old chocobo was good enough to accumulate a few first-place finishes and actually place in the Crystal Stakes. And while it was scrapping its way up the ranks I got to witness some amusing events. For example, assuming receptivity actually does affect a chocobo's ability to repel attacks and avoid accidents in races, I wouldn't expect a poor-receptivity chocobo to resist all attacks thrown at him. (This is a C4 race, if that matters.)
I've temporarily halted participation in the Chocobo Circuit (it hurts the pocketbook a little having spent 320 chocobucks to acquire a CS bronze trophy and stand), but not before having the "Winning Owner" title bestowed on me after my chocobo's 10th first-place finish. (According to the Japanese FFXIwiki, "Victorious Owner" is earned after 25 first-place finishes, and "Triumphant Owner" after 50 first-place finishes, presumably.) My racing data so far:
Solo Victory Points: 71
Number of races: 32
First-place finishes: 10
Fortunately, my second chocobo seems to be coming along well even though its STR and END progression seems a bit slow. After the day 33 progress report, both STR and END are still at "better than average." (STR and END changed to "better than average" after the day 29 report.) If I have to use chocobo training to raise STR or RCP after day 64, I can live with that.
Honestly, the extreme time and gil costs associated with acquiring chocobucks for training programs don't bother me much anymore. Considering the possibility of winning about 700k every week (before entry costs) just by signing up for C1 races (which takes a few minutes at most) makes the initial outlay seem like a good investment in the long run. We'll see in a few weeks.
Of course, the adventurer races require chocobuck entry fees, and chocobucks cost time and money. But taking first place in any of the C1-C4 races basically results in a refund of the chocobuck entry fee. Since C1 races require entry fees of 10k and 80 chocobucks, no net change in chocobucks for a first-place result would save the owner the trouble of having to spend about 23k and wasting a few hours to reclaim 80 chocobucks through free races. (I must say though that the separate gil entry fee is annoying since you have to spend gil anyway to accumulate chocobucks in a timely manner.)
Of those players who actually spent time with chocobo raising and racing, I'd hardly be the first person to say correctly that the FFXI devs did a terrible job with the implementation and execution of this feature, but I suppose the high barriers to entry are necessary to prevent RMT from exploiting it. But at least it's still a more satisfying activity than Pankration and bottom-of-the-barrel quests such as "The Miraculous Dale." Seriously, how old is FFXI? Shit like "The Miraculous Dale" with absolutely no redeeming qualities you would've expected in 2004.
By low-endurance, I actually mean no-endurance. By the time I took chocobo raising seriously, my first chocobo's endurance wasn't high enough to withstand the "digging for treasure" care plan and it ended up being completely depleted. An 8/1/4/1 chocobo isn't very effective in C1 or C2 races, and it definitely won't make it through the whole Pashhow Swamptrot series. (However, my chocobo did actually win a C2 race because a superior PC chocobo stumbled in the rain and was the target of the NPC chocobo's attacks before its accident. What a fluke!)
Still, I'm satisfied that my old chocobo was good enough to accumulate a few first-place finishes and actually place in the Crystal Stakes. And while it was scrapping its way up the ranks I got to witness some amusing events. For example, assuming receptivity actually does affect a chocobo's ability to repel attacks and avoid accidents in races, I wouldn't expect a poor-receptivity chocobo to resist all attacks thrown at him. (This is a C4 race, if that matters.)
I've temporarily halted participation in the Chocobo Circuit (it hurts the pocketbook a little having spent 320 chocobucks to acquire a CS bronze trophy and stand), but not before having the "Winning Owner" title bestowed on me after my chocobo's 10th first-place finish. (According to the Japanese FFXIwiki, "Victorious Owner" is earned after 25 first-place finishes, and "Triumphant Owner" after 50 first-place finishes, presumably.) My racing data so far:
Solo Victory Points: 71
Number of races: 32
First-place finishes: 10
Fortunately, my second chocobo seems to be coming along well even though its STR and END progression seems a bit slow. After the day 33 progress report, both STR and END are still at "better than average." (STR and END changed to "better than average" after the day 29 report.) If I have to use chocobo training to raise STR or RCP after day 64, I can live with that.
Honestly, the extreme time and gil costs associated with acquiring chocobucks for training programs don't bother me much anymore. Considering the possibility of winning about 700k every week (before entry costs) just by signing up for C1 races (which takes a few minutes at most) makes the initial outlay seem like a good investment in the long run. We'll see in a few weeks.
Of course, the adventurer races require chocobuck entry fees, and chocobucks cost time and money. But taking first place in any of the C1-C4 races basically results in a refund of the chocobuck entry fee. Since C1 races require entry fees of 10k and 80 chocobucks, no net change in chocobucks for a first-place result would save the owner the trouble of having to spend about 23k and wasting a few hours to reclaim 80 chocobucks through free races. (I must say though that the separate gil entry fee is annoying since you have to spend gil anyway to accumulate chocobucks in a timely manner.)
Of those players who actually spent time with chocobo raising and racing, I'd hardly be the first person to say correctly that the FFXI devs did a terrible job with the implementation and execution of this feature, but I suppose the high barriers to entry are necessary to prevent RMT from exploiting it. But at least it's still a more satisfying activity than Pankration and bottom-of-the-barrel quests such as "The Miraculous Dale." Seriously, how old is FFXI? Shit like "The Miraculous Dale" with absolutely no redeeming qualities you would've expected in 2004.
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
The albatross
I probably wouldn't have even bothered leveling black mage all the way to 75 were it not for the Sorcerer's Ring, which allowed me to "one-shot" Yagudo's elementals and Goblin's pets up to level 70.
When elementals pause to cast magic before pursuing you, and the vagaries of beastmen movement can interrupt experience chains, the additional damage from the ring can provide just enough oomph to kill with a single ancient magic spell and allow you to avoid these issues. For me, the irritating expense of cobbling together a set of HP-reduction equipment was worth reducing the risk inherent in soloing.
But since there was no reasonable way to one-shot anything T-IT for experience after Newton even with the Sorcerer's Ring, I considered the ring to have no practical use any longer, and so I got rid of the ring and the latent-activating gear altogether.
Recently though, the tantalizing prospect of killing an Ebony Pudding with only three "tier IV" nukes led me to reacquire the ring. And since soloing puddings is a bread-and-butter activity for any "respectable" black mage, this is enough of a pretext for me to keep the ring for good and to put together a set of HP-reduction equipment that is "acceptable" for situations beyond puddings.
The whole point of being able to kill a pudding with only three tier IV nukes is to minimize the MP expenditure per kill (since tier IV spells are among the most efficient of offensive magic available to BLM, in stark contrast to the AM II series, which are generally less MP-efficient than tier 4 and even the tier 3 nukes), thereby allowing a reasonable opportunity to attain exp chain #5. Unfortunately, doing the math with my current equipment and maximum lightning and ice potency shows that this is possible only with the Rairin Obi (lightning) to activate the damage bonus on Lightningday.
For example, with a Rairin Obi a sequence of Thunder IV > Gravity > Blizzard IV > Aspir > Thunder IV on Lightningday should inflict 4467 damage (1548, 1371, 1548). With a 200+ HP Drain to finish the pudding off, the total MP cost is 551 MP at worst.
What about Iceday? With a Hyorin Obi a sequence of Blizzard IV > Gravity > Thunder IV > Aspir > Blizzard IV on Iceday should inflict 4393 damage (1481, 1431, 1481), but it's optimistic to think that Drain will finish off a pudding (544 MP at worst), although it's possible. Here, the Sorcerer's Tonban would be useful, but I don't expect to obtain this ever.
While I don't ever expect to obtain Sorcerer's Tonban or any of the Zenith gear, much less a Novio, at least there's a window of opportunity to be able to chain #5 with puddings even if it's a small one. For all other days I resign myself to chain #4.
As for situations beyond puddings, the extremely peculiar properties of the Sorcerer's Ring latent (which I will not discuss) actually allow the latent to activate above 75% of some "base" HP level and thus without drawing blood aggro. Although this is rather annoying to accomplish without relying on Zenith Mitts (which I don't have), I was actually able to configure a set of HP-reduction equipment so that the Sorcerer's Ring activates at 579/771 HP--it is important to note that the "base" HP is 762 HP before Rainbow Cape, which adds 9 HP--with the following equipment:
Since Penitent's Rope is used for nuking, the net HP reduction is -192. Unfortunately, this setup includes nine pieces of equipment that I would otherwise not use. If I had Zenith Crown, Zenith Mitts, Zenith Slacks, and Serket Ring (three of them I would otherwise not use), the setup would instead be this:
Although I do save inventory space, the net HP reduction (again using Penitent's Rope for nuking, but not using Zenith Mitts) is -202. Suppose I had three more HP merits (pretty much for the sake of using merits, as extra HP "wouldn't hurt") so that my maximum HP were 801 HP instead (or 792 "base" HP for latent activation). The ring would then activate at 601/801 HP instead. At this point I wouldn't remove the Rainbow Cape for HP reduction, and my HP-reduction equipment would then look like this:
From 801 maximum HP (in the presence of Penitent's Rope), a swap of just four pieces (Z. Crown, Z. Mitts, Z. Slacks, Serket Ring) reduces max HP to 601, which is 75.88% of 792 (before Rainbow Cape's HP+9) and 75.03% of 801 (after Rainbow Cape's HP+9, and still "in the white"). And if I chose to use Zenith Mitts instead of some other hand equipment, the "base HP" would still be 792, but the actual HP would then be 601/742 (also in the white). I could elect to use Wizard's Gloves (+1) where warranted, and Zenith Mitts for everything else while still maintaining "white" HP.
Zenith pieces would indeed make life easier, but since I don't count on ever getting them, I can make do with an unwieldy 12-slot equipment swap... without Windower macros. I did say "make do"...
When elementals pause to cast magic before pursuing you, and the vagaries of beastmen movement can interrupt experience chains, the additional damage from the ring can provide just enough oomph to kill with a single ancient magic spell and allow you to avoid these issues. For me, the irritating expense of cobbling together a set of HP-reduction equipment was worth reducing the risk inherent in soloing.
But since there was no reasonable way to one-shot anything T-IT for experience after Newton even with the Sorcerer's Ring, I considered the ring to have no practical use any longer, and so I got rid of the ring and the latent-activating gear altogether.
Recently though, the tantalizing prospect of killing an Ebony Pudding with only three "tier IV" nukes led me to reacquire the ring. And since soloing puddings is a bread-and-butter activity for any "respectable" black mage, this is enough of a pretext for me to keep the ring for good and to put together a set of HP-reduction equipment that is "acceptable" for situations beyond puddings.
The whole point of being able to kill a pudding with only three tier IV nukes is to minimize the MP expenditure per kill (since tier IV spells are among the most efficient of offensive magic available to BLM, in stark contrast to the AM II series, which are generally less MP-efficient than tier 4 and even the tier 3 nukes), thereby allowing a reasonable opportunity to attain exp chain #5. Unfortunately, doing the math with my current equipment and maximum lightning and ice potency shows that this is possible only with the Rairin Obi (lightning) to activate the damage bonus on Lightningday.
For example, with a Rairin Obi a sequence of Thunder IV > Gravity > Blizzard IV > Aspir > Thunder IV on Lightningday should inflict 4467 damage (1548, 1371, 1548). With a 200+ HP Drain to finish the pudding off, the total MP cost is 551 MP at worst.
What about Iceday? With a Hyorin Obi a sequence of Blizzard IV > Gravity > Thunder IV > Aspir > Blizzard IV on Iceday should inflict 4393 damage (1481, 1431, 1481), but it's optimistic to think that Drain will finish off a pudding (544 MP at worst), although it's possible. Here, the Sorcerer's Tonban would be useful, but I don't expect to obtain this ever.
While I don't ever expect to obtain Sorcerer's Tonban or any of the Zenith gear, much less a Novio, at least there's a window of opportunity to be able to chain #5 with puddings even if it's a small one. For all other days I resign myself to chain #4.
As for situations beyond puddings, the extremely peculiar properties of the Sorcerer's Ring latent (which I will not discuss) actually allow the latent to activate above 75% of some "base" HP level and thus without drawing blood aggro. Although this is rather annoying to accomplish without relying on Zenith Mitts (which I don't have), I was actually able to configure a set of HP-reduction equipment so that the Sorcerer's Ring activates at 579/771 HP--it is important to note that the "base" HP is 762 HP before Rainbow Cape, which adds 9 HP--with the following equipment:
Main Asklepios (-30 HP)
Sub Astral Aspis (-25)
Head Wivre Hairpin (-20)
Neck Evasion Torque (+ 7)
Body Black Cotehardie (-25)
Hands Errant Cuffs (-20)
Ring1 Ether Ring (-30)
Ring2 Electrum Ring (-20)
Back (empty) (- 9)
Waist Penitent's Rope
Legs (empty)
Feet Errant Pigaches (-20)
Since Penitent's Rope is used for nuking, the net HP reduction is -192. Unfortunately, this setup includes nine pieces of equipment that I would otherwise not use. If I had Zenith Crown, Zenith Mitts, Zenith Slacks, and Serket Ring (three of them I would otherwise not use), the setup would instead be this:
Head Zenith Crown (-50 HP)
Neck Evasion Torque (+ 7)
Hands Zenith Mitts (-50)
Ring1 Serket Ring (-50)
Back (empty) (- 9)
Waist Penitent's Rope
Legs Zenith Slacks (-50)
Although I do save inventory space, the net HP reduction (again using Penitent's Rope for nuking, but not using Zenith Mitts) is -202. Suppose I had three more HP merits (pretty much for the sake of using merits, as extra HP "wouldn't hurt") so that my maximum HP were 801 HP instead (or 792 "base" HP for latent activation). The ring would then activate at 601/801 HP instead. At this point I wouldn't remove the Rainbow Cape for HP reduction, and my HP-reduction equipment would then look like this:
Head Zenith Crown (-50 HP)
Hands Zenith Mitts (-50)
Ring1 Serket Ring (-50)
Back Rainbow Cape
Waist Penitent's Rope
Legs Zenith Slacks (-50)
From 801 maximum HP (in the presence of Penitent's Rope), a swap of just four pieces (Z. Crown, Z. Mitts, Z. Slacks, Serket Ring) reduces max HP to 601, which is 75.88% of 792 (before Rainbow Cape's HP+9) and 75.03% of 801 (after Rainbow Cape's HP+9, and still "in the white"). And if I chose to use Zenith Mitts instead of some other hand equipment, the "base HP" would still be 792, but the actual HP would then be 601/742 (also in the white). I could elect to use Wizard's Gloves (+1) where warranted, and Zenith Mitts for everything else while still maintaining "white" HP.
Zenith pieces would indeed make life easier, but since I don't count on ever getting them, I can make do with an unwieldy 12-slot equipment swap... without Windower macros. I did say "make do"...
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
Chocobo raising revisited
Even taking into account the previous tirade about chocobo training tokens, I still consider chocobo raising one of the few long-run activities in FFXI from which I have actually extracted something akin to pleasure. Why babysit a needy, spoiled, infantile linkshell member when you can dote over something similarly needy, spoiled, and infantile, but that you can abandon at your whim? So with an eye toward placing in the Crystal Stakes, I again take up the cause.
By the 60-day mark of my new chocobo's life, I aim for my chocobo to have the following attribute ratings, based on the idea that "balanced" chocobos with first-rate strength fare well in Chocobo Circuit and actually have a puncher's chance at overcoming the new cheap-ass Official Races (Pashhow Circuit):
STR - First-class
END - Better than average
DSC - Better than average
RCP - Better than average
While I proceed to spoil my new hatchling, I put my old, worn chocobo through the ringer, using it to accumulate chocobucks that will be invested instead in its pampered successor. And as a bonus, this old pro is actually earning Solo Victory Points for me in the Chocobo Circuit (29 at last count), only for the young buck to take its place eventually and seize the glory of placing in the Crystal Stakes, after which I'll toss the geezer's VCS registration card. (At least I hope that's how it pans out, as I'll be annoyed if SVPs are reset when registering a new race chocobo altogether.)
Of course, there has to be some nettlesome feature about Chocobo Circuit that's a result of some dubious design choice, and for me it's the fact that one cannot sign up for a C1 race every hour, any hour.
Instead, the schedule of races is such that one can sign up for C1 races every day only during six sign-up periods (times in JST):
5:45-6:00
6:45-7:00
13:45-14:00
14:45-15:00
21:45-22:00
22:45-23:00
It's already irritating enough that one can sign up for a race only every 24 hrs. (Even though you sign up at any time within the 15-minute sign-up period, the race starts at a fixed time 35-40 minutes after the end of the sign-up period.) It's even more annoying that if you wish to hew closely to the ideal situation of racing every 24 hrs, you are stuck with these limited registration times, which can be quite inconvenient depending on your time zone and schedule.
A conceptually simple remedy would be to scrap sign-up periods altogether, and limit signing up your chocobo in a 24-hour period such that one can register for the next upcoming C1 race (or any other race you wish to enter for that matter), no matter when it occurs, any time after midnight JST. So simple and convenient for the players that this will never be implemented.
By the 60-day mark of my new chocobo's life, I aim for my chocobo to have the following attribute ratings, based on the idea that "balanced" chocobos with first-rate strength fare well in Chocobo Circuit and actually have a puncher's chance at overcoming the new cheap-ass Official Races (Pashhow Circuit):
STR - First-class
END - Better than average
DSC - Better than average
RCP - Better than average
While I proceed to spoil my new hatchling, I put my old, worn chocobo through the ringer, using it to accumulate chocobucks that will be invested instead in its pampered successor. And as a bonus, this old pro is actually earning Solo Victory Points for me in the Chocobo Circuit (29 at last count), only for the young buck to take its place eventually and seize the glory of placing in the Crystal Stakes, after which I'll toss the geezer's VCS registration card. (At least I hope that's how it pans out, as I'll be annoyed if SVPs are reset when registering a new race chocobo altogether.)
Of course, there has to be some nettlesome feature about Chocobo Circuit that's a result of some dubious design choice, and for me it's the fact that one cannot sign up for a C1 race every hour, any hour.
Instead, the schedule of races is such that one can sign up for C1 races every day only during six sign-up periods (times in JST):
5:45-6:00
6:45-7:00
13:45-14:00
14:45-15:00
21:45-22:00
22:45-23:00
It's already irritating enough that one can sign up for a race only every 24 hrs. (Even though you sign up at any time within the 15-minute sign-up period, the race starts at a fixed time 35-40 minutes after the end of the sign-up period.) It's even more annoying that if you wish to hew closely to the ideal situation of racing every 24 hrs, you are stuck with these limited registration times, which can be quite inconvenient depending on your time zone and schedule.
A conceptually simple remedy would be to scrap sign-up periods altogether, and limit signing up your chocobo in a 24-hour period such that one can register for the next upcoming C1 race (or any other race you wish to enter for that matter), no matter when it occurs, any time after midnight JST. So simple and convenient for the players that this will never be implemented.
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