Let's Talk About Bonus Point Allotment with Dario!

Time for another Ask the Devs FAQ! This week they cover a long debated topic about bonus points and more specifically the effects of raising your stats as you advance your character. So let's dive right in!

Anything in italics is taken from the official Lodestone site.

First they talk about bonus points themselves which is generally common knowledge to most XIV players at this point. You gain bonus points every time you raise your physical level and they can be applied towards your stats and elemental affinities.

Q. I am having a hard time deciding where to allocate my bonus points. What effect will raising each of the various stats have on my character?
A. The effects for each available stat are listed below:

Strength (STR)
# Increases damage dealt by physical attacks
# Increases damage prevented when blocking attacks with a shield

I was not aware that Strength boosts your ability with a shield, definitely something to keep in mind but Gladiators will probably be raising Strength anyways. Maybe the magic classes or perhaps a spell casting hybrid would want to block more. Mystic Knight anyone?

Vitality (VIT)
# Reduces damage taken from physical attacks
# Increases maximum HP

Dexterity (DEX)
# Increases accuracy of physical attacks
# Increases chances of evading physical attacks
# Increases critical hit rate of physical attacks and resulting damage
# Increases parry rate for certain weapons

Many sources have indicated that Dexterity is currently bugged and not working as intended. I'm inclined to agree considering I had my character's dexterity raised over 80 with a suitable optimal rank weapon and definitely miss much more than I would like. Nonetheless, if it gets fixed with this major November update on the way every DoW class should invest heavily in it. You can't do damage if you can't hit anything.

Intelligence (INT)
# Increases damage dealt by magic attacks

Mind (MND)
# Reduces damage taken from magic attacks
# Increases maximum MP

Piety (PIE)
# Reduces chances of your magic attacks being resisted
# Increases your chance of resisting magic attacks of others

Mmmm pie. Many have referred to Piety as magical accuracy, myself included. It's not as though a spell can miss a target, but even simple Fire spell can be resisted by a tiny marmot if your Piety isn't up to snuff.

Elements
# Increases damage dealt by attacks of that element
# Reduces damage taken from attacks of the opposing element

I have not seen a great difference in damage caused by elemental attacks, but I am not a magic caster. I'm referring to elemental weaponskills such as Seismic Shock (Earth) and Red Lotus Blade (Fire). I've put in many points to test these abilities and really seen nothing to indicate this. As for opposing elements, there has been much theorycrafting on the subject and many have speculated that the elemental wheel in this game is different than in XI. I'm going to do some research and post a column about it at a later date. Stay tuned for that.

Disciplines of War & Magic

So in summary DoW classes want to use STR, VIT and DEX and DoM classes want to use INT, MND and PIE. Pretty self-explanatory.

In addition, there are bonuses to the effect of magic spells that are also based on attribute values. Below is a list showing the general relationship between attributes and magic types. The conditions that result in such bonuses, however, varies between spells.

Offensive (attack/counter): INT
Healing, Defensive: MND
Absorb, Damage over Time (DoT): PIE

Just like it was in XI with the exception of the Piety stat affecting Thaumaturgy abilities, many of those absorb abilities being taken from XI's Dark Knight job.

Now they give us some long awaited answers to what stats affect the abilities of the gathering and crafting classes!

Discipline of the Land

Indications as to which attributes are most important to classes within the Discipline of the Land can be found in-game by closely examining the gathering-related abilities obtained via guild marks. Again, for those not willing to invest that sort of time, we have listed the relationships below.

Class Attribute
Miner VIT, MND
Botanist STR, INT
Fisher DEX, PIE

I'm assuming that they list two stats because they are the stat counterparts between DoW and DoM classes. So you don't have build up INT if you're a big beefy Marauder that wants to chop down trees on the side. Just my guess.

Discipline of the Hand

The effect of attributes on synthesis is limited. When attempting to craft a high-quality item, however, the likelihood of success increases as the attribute most closely associated with the tool being used rises. As the attributes associated with the main and off hand tools of each class are different, players may wish to give careful consideration to the class on which they wish to focus. A list showing the attributes related with the main and off hand tools of each class can be found below.

(The first stat is related to the main hand tools, while the second is to off hand tools)

Carpenter VIT DEX
Blacksmith STR MND
Armorer VIT STR
Goldsmith DEX INT
Leatherworker VIT INT
Weaver DEX MND
Alchemist INT PIE
Culinarian MND PIE


So these stats only factor into the HQ chance. Very interesting. I generally don't mess around with the off hand tools for several reasons. First off they take inventory space, second they are low rank unless you obtain the second tiered one which is optimal at rank 27. Still if you are aiming for HQ under specific circumstances they are better to have.

For example, you're an armorer and want to make bronze rings. If you use the main hand armorer's hammer if you get a HQ, you will obtain 3 bronze rings +1-3. But if you use the off hand pliers tool and get a HQ, you will obtain 6 rings. Double the amount for the materials used just because you used the other tool. So keep that in mind.

Q. I pressed the Reassign button but did not get all of my bonus points back. Why?
A. Using the Reassign feature will reset only a certain number of allotted bonus points. The feature will then become available for use again after a short period of time. Players wishing to reset all of their bonus points will be required to use the Reassign feature multiple times.

We already have a guide up on Reassigning stats. Check it out! Reassigning Stats Guide

Q. I allocated all of my bonus points to STR, but it did not increase my damage output nearly as much as I had hoped. Why?
A. Each attribute has an upper limit, or "cap," that rises whenever a character's class rank goes up. Therefore, even if a player allots all of his or her bonus points to a single attribute such as STR, it is not the case that this will yield overly dramatic results. Distributing bonus points across several attributes rather than concentrating on a single one will result in a much more well-balanced character.

While it's good to know that there is a stat cap, we don't actually know what is. So we can only speculate where the lines are drawn. Personally, I do a lot of crafting so my physical level is much higher than any of my class ranks so I have more points than I know what to do with. Thankfully these stats can be reassign and tweak at our discretion under a manageable cooldown period.

So all in all, it was a very informative FAQ this week with a lot of information that had been widely speculated now finding confirmation. What did you think of the information that we were given? Have you experienced anything in game that is to the contrary? Want to share some of your theorycrafting theories? Leave a comment below.

Official Lodestone FAQ