Empy Weapon Update (Hypothesis)

I have been hoping they will make empy weapons relevant @99. I currently wield 119 spharai and 119 vere but my vere is only useful in voidwatch but even then its not about obliterating the NM as fast as possible, its about procing.. so its useless in the only place its "better" than Spharai.

Spharai have 3x damage AND 35?% boost to Final heaven (granted it sucks but still)
Glanzfaust has occasionally attacks twice or thrice AND 35?% boost to Ascetics Fury.
Idk if im being ridiculous but i think its fair that they should make empys give dbl damage AND 35?% boost to the ws it unlocks.

I'm hoping for this to happen because i know in mnks case that 99 Vere is useless and i'd suspect that many other i119 empys are moot as well.

35% would be an insanely massive boost, especially considering that most empy WS have been boosted. Not gonna happen

Perhaps 35% to match the relic and mythic boost is too much because empy ws are generally a jobs best ws. But i know drakesbane is one of drg's best ws's and they still get a +35% boost on that ws with Ryu not to mention the atks 2-3x. The same with pups and kkk.

Perhaps it would then in turn make relic irreverent if you have a 119 empy. But tbh between the 3 weapons, if one is the weakest it should be the relic because the amount of money or time to farm HMP outweighs dynamis currency many times over.

You should volley for more important issues with hand to hand, half of what you brought up as the R/E/M bonuses for H2H only apply to 1 fist.

Although most empyrean are pretty weak in comparison now days, you have to consider there refusal to make HMP and cinder easier to get, do you really want to make daurb bards even less common? Theres also a greater problem in FFXI that it always comes down to one weapon and one weaponskill being the best for each job, aside from endless skillchaining anyway, if they made empyreans stronger and some overtook the current best weapons then it would be all about those, people would forget about the other weapons, and the people partial to those weapons would want changes again.

I'm sure the price of HMP would increase a little more and make it a strong source of gil making for others to get involved in VW and those interested in making a 119 empy would also be participating more in VW. I think it would balance itself out actually.

if prices of HMP spiked to 150k it would be a rather pricey weapon as well and wouldnt be a practical thing for it to be the only weapon used. It would be equivalent to everyone owning a mythic.

Drakesbane is one of DRG's best weaponskills? did we time travel back to 2009? Drakesbane is a joke, and even Mythic DRG complain that despite the 30% buff it still has a massive attack penalty rendering it useful only to put up Aftermath. if you are a Dragoon you are using Stardiver or in limited circumstances Camlann's. thanks to weaponskill changes, Penta Thrust is likely to outshine Drakesbane.

meanwhile Victory Smite is Monk's best weaponskill, and while Shijin Spiral is serviceable and comes close, there's no reason to invest merits in it. the only buff that Monk's REM weapons need is to not be getting screwed by their procs only occurring on one fist. Verethragna's D96 at i119 is a massive joke, there is no denying that, but all it would take to make it competitive is a boost to its damage rating. the fixes to how they proc should be applied across the board, but Verethragna on its own only needs the damage rating boost.

should plates/dross/cinders be more readily obtainable? absolutely. do Empyrean weapons need an across the board 30% boost to their weaponskills? absolutely not.

Masamune SAM would just leave you all in the dust again and you would all complain etc about it.

This is probably the worst "fix" I have ever heard. If you want a "weapon" to be better there's better ways, increasing Damage or WSC (which since Alpha value removal would actually have a greater impact) on the specific weapons that are not all that great and fixing the H2H issue with only the first hit getting the ODD bonus would go a long way to fixing relic/empyreans. But then Mythics getting OAT~3 on Offhand on MNK might be a tad broken.

Another fix could be a higher percentage of dbl dmg. 50% at 1000tp 60 at 2000 and 70 at 3000. that would bring a come back for it.

50% dbl damage is only 20 dps better than spharai and you have the obligation of maintaing the after math to keep it 20dps better.

I understand your concept, its just that theres no way these weapons can ever be exactly even, so one will always be the best weapon and everyone will want it, and i believe if its not mythic, the people upset by it would be greater then if its not empyrean. Its really a case of pick your poison for SE, and i can't say i wasn't pleased when they picked most mythics to become stronger then there counterparts in the initial 119 REM update.

Such an update would only help a few weapons anyway, likely daggers and h2h, but at this point, daggers dont need another boost. Consider a less broad approach to buffing vere specifically; if i remember correctly, all relics have there "ODD" only proc on the first hit of the attack round, and cannot proc on double attacks. This means spharai can only proc ODD on one fist, however empyreans can proc ODD on double/triple/quad attacks in the same attack round, but vere is still limited to ODD on one fist. If they fixed that it could be far more beneficial for vere then boosting victory smite damage.

Yeah, i hopefully somthing is done that will boost vere, wether it be ws dmg%, dmg base, dbl dmg %, dbl dmg on all hits, some sort of stat added +acc +atk +dbl atk ect. Anything, to not be the best is somewhat fine/not fine but to be second rate to delve weapons is just reterdid (point intended.)

The double damage is dumber than dumb, OP.
Empyrean weapons are ghetto relics. They were made to give ToAU and WotG jobs comparable weapons to the Relics that they have been blocked out of.
This was why for the vast majority of Relic and Empyrean levels, the two shared dmg and delay.
Because being ghetto!relics makes them: high-damage-low-delay weapons.
This is also the nature of the ODD AM they all have.
Empy's are "equal" to Relics when they have AM up. (Eg they both will randomly proc a 2~3x dmg hit)

Them having +20 to the WS mod attached "balances" them not having ODD 100% of the time like Relics do. (Back when they first were implemented, was 1000% BS SE "logic"... Now that they all have 80% mods... That's closer to actually being true. Eg: less "white" ODD, but naturally more potent WSs.)

All that being said... They are SUPER crap at 119. Their base DPS is.... Just pathetic.
You're better just using a Relic with the Empy WS... Which is dumb.
You're even better off just using a generic 119 weapon... SO much of the time that it's painful.
Which is why making them have the 40% damage of Relics would be fine.
Their damage is lower than basically everything comparable...
So +40% to tiny is still tiny.
However, EmpyWSs are crazy potent..... But then how does it hurt anyone who doesn't have the Empy to use the WS?
Answer: it doesn't.
Giving them the same +40% would make them actually worth making again.
Because right now, they are beyond worthless.
(And it won't bring back REM-Only. If 119 REMs didn't do that, making the Empys, which are currently worse than basically all other 119 weapons with few exception, have a Relic -or even a Mythic +30%- same-WS-dmg-bonus wouldn't either.)

But they shouldn't have a natural ODD like Relics.
Then they'd just be Relics with better WSs.

(And while we're at it, this is why Ergon weapons AREN'T Mythics. They're ghetto!fake!Mythics. No +30%dmg, no Mythic. So if Empys get the same-WS-damage boost, so too should their "mythic cousin".)

Vs is very weak nowaday compared to fudo and rudras. Seems like multi hit ws are failing below single hit ws with high http://ftp. And i supose like most bonuses, the 30% bonus ws from relics and mythics should just applies to first hit so its not that big also. But a +30% fudo or rudra would be broken.

I don't think it's a horrible idea if it comes with more balance changes, it is a little bit silly that Empyreans are basically never worth making outside Shield/Harp right now. For certain jobs it would be a really nice boost they need (Nin, War, Drk), for other jobs they would need to be adjusted if this happened because a +35% Rudras and Fudo would be pretty stupid.

It wouldn't matter much if they didn't fix HMPs/Rift stuff though, if it costs the same to make a mythic you just make a mythic.

tldr; op 99ed an emp while plates were cheap and now that plates cost as much as a mythic he wants it to be as good as one

Such a change would really only help so few weapons that they would be better off just addressing certain weapons or more specifically those jobs instead in my opinion.

I dont think so.

The reason is valid, but most people is already used to it since SoA came, that fast weapons from delve are so even, sometimes stronger than relic/empy. Izhiikoh > mandau and twashtar, tsurumaru > amano and masamune, tinhaspa ~ spharai and vere. Most people would be fine having a relic and empy as the best option if mythic isnt available. I can make a mandau anytime, but cant find a reason to do it, its inv-1 with izhiikoh available.

The only hope for relics and empys is a new expansion, with a new ilv increase, where all 119 weapons will be obsoleted. Then we can hope a better gear release. The max ilv weapon shouldnt never be available as a direct drop, that can be dropped in a 45 min event. Back to soa it was great as delve was very hard to beat, but now it is the basic gear.

Emyprean Weapons were made at a time when Relics still took a modicum more work to obtain and were less readily available to the common player. that SE has refused to address their obvious issues with attaining Plates and Rift-items I feel should actually be dealt with. throw them a bit extra damage so that they are at least closer to obtainable weapons. prior to Adoulin at level 99, they had more damage than the easier to obtain options, often times the best weaponskill available for that weapon type, and the benefits of Aftermath. what screwed the pooch was iLevel and the sudden massive gaps that increasing the gear by 20 levels in one jump. when REM made the jump to 119 Empyreans remained the weakest option, but that gap just kept widening with unlocking the WS from the weapon and number disparity of new gear. correcting the base damage of the weapon to be closer to Relic and Mythic counterparts makes sense. increasing WS damage by 30% does not, same as it does not for Ergon weapons.

Why would u make a spharai and vere? I assume u 99 your vere pre adoulin. and yes vere suxs now and theres no boost in the works. if u make vere pre adoulin just cut your losses stick with spharai or make a mythic.

now if u 99 your vere recently to bring it to 119 then I don't know what to say.

They were never designed to be a mythic class weapon. Merely the SoA version of "Mythic" content. Meaning like mythics you had to clear/spam all of that expansions side content to meet the requirements.

Legend Rank x7 ~= Assault Clear/Reclears
H-P Bayld ~= Alexandrite
Pristine Ygrette Crystal ~= Eyepatch or NI Token item

They are the best weapon for GEO and RUN, and meet their specific need based on the job, with Epeolatry giving RUN 25% PDT2 and Idris giving GEO Pet DT-25% and buffing the crap out of bubbles.

If SE goes forward and makes a Ergon based weapon for all jobs, it would be interesting if they followed this same general concept, and gave the weapons certain niche traits best suited (in SEs eyes) for each job.

I was thinking of jobs like WAR, where technically ukon is already better then bravura and while conqueror may be better then both, the standard use for WAR is zerging and ragnarok beats all three. I would love to use ukon again, i would love even more for my bravura to be awesome but its been obsolete since 75, but simply buffing ukon will change nothing for this job.

On the other hand for a job that wields the dagger, it could change everything, and it might just be too much considering how powerful that weaponskill already is now.

I could see if working perfectly for a job like DRK where torcleaver might actually be pretty competitive all of a sudden and then actually surpass ragnarok resolution spam even if the damage were similar simply because empyrean weaponskills have far better skillchain properties.

Samurai is actually more complicated, that much increase to fudo would be huge, but the tp gain you give up would also be huge, and then it would change the way many groups use samurai currently. It would be masa spamming fudo with a dmg boost versus higher tp gain making endless skillchains with other weaponskills for an indirect damage boost, really curious what the difference would look like.

A simple generalized buff to empyreans like that would be really hit or miss for a lot of the jobs though. Consider what this would do for RNG, when there main use if at all now days is enmity management still, they hardly use empyrean weaponskills, then what about mage jobs? I could see them completely forgetting about myrkr and dagan.

After looking at mythic and relic ws boost, they are different. Mythic is 30 and relic is 40. So for it to be an equal boost it isnt necessary or unfair to be anything like 35% since there isnt a cookie cutter boost % for mythic and relic. Somewhere between 10-25% wouldnt be broken. anything less than 10% would leave vere and ukon and masa still below the non mythic competitors and perhaps anything over 25% (maybe even 20%) would be over powered for some jobs.

Emp ws by default are already stronger than relic ws. Only reason relic and mythic ws got boosts was because relic ws dont have "dmg varies wih tp" and most mythic and relic ws are extremely weak. All emp ws are much stronger than the relic and mythic ws(fudo/rudra/camlann/jishnu) that without the 30-40% poteny, nobody would use them.

Also emp 119 have what +20 stat, for most of the emp ws they hVe 80% wsc, so that's like +16ish base damage or so which could be considered a small % boost for that ws.

Also emp ws can chain off eachother and since they're so good, you can VS and Fudo all day long and keep up aftermath unlike mythic or relic ws which require using an inferior ws to keep up AM. Also empy am3 is quite good, better than 95% of relic after aftermaths. Lastly your title is misleading, you have a hypothesis, not a theory.

the reason those weaponskills have a +% to them at all is because most of them are garbage even buffed. with rare exceptions (Mercy Stroke pre-Rudra's buff) you either did not use those weaponskills at all (almost all the Relic/Mythic weapons here) or you were using them for their Aftermath or secondary traits. (Metatron Torment for Hybrid defense sets on WAR, the enmity properties of Namas/Coronoch, the drain of Catastrophe) and even with that, they're still trash. you don't see people trying to break out King's Justice, Drakesbane, Ascetic's Fury, Tachi: Kaiten, Tachi: Rana, Blade: Metsu, Scourge, Geirskogul, or any of those other weaponskills because they're ultra powerful even on the appropriate weapon. you see these for Aftermath/bonuses only, because the temporary use of a bad WS will balance out over the rest of the fight.

Empyrean Weaponskills, meanwhile, are the de facto weaponskills for most jobs except in a few instances where the merit WS pulls ahead. the weaponskills are strong on their own, and are not the functional problem with Empyrean weapons. if you want the weaponskills to have a +% bonus damage, by all means, call for all of them to be about half as effective as they currently are. let's not pretend for an instant that Final Heaven or Ascetics Fury, even with a buff are on a level playing field as the current Victory Smite.

In all fairness SAM's who just spam Fudo are playing the job wrong(content biased obviously), you can nearly double your damage doing 6 step skillchains (where it's possible) so whilst a Masamune would definitely enhance an average player, the more advanced ones who are able to SC and do so in a co-ordinate fashion should win hands down using alternative weapons.

Other jobs, like THF/DNC Dagger empyrean atm would be Stupid powerful.(I do wonder if a nerf is coming for those)

An example is ~

Rana has it's uses as I'm sure others do in certain events, obviously this is just one aspect but I don't think a blanket WSD across all would suffice.

The reason I would love to see this for War is the fact that War is all mythic or nothing currently. Without Conq the job is one of the worst in the game really, with Conq it's averageish. Since Ukon and Bravura are both terrible along with the other 119 options, it would be nice to have a Gaxe that's at least decent in between Conq and everything else. However if the price stayed the same who really cares because you might as well get a conq.

For Drk it would be pretty awesome, Torcleaver is already a decent WS and resolution has terrible SC properties. I already find myself using Torcleaver in most groups just to SC light with Fudo.

Twash is better than Izh by a decent amount currently, the reason it isn't really viable is that mythic is the same cost for an absolutely massive bonus compared. Last I checked Tins really werent comparable to either R or E unless you absolutely needed the accuracy either.