Thief: Guide to Weapons and Armor

Notice
This guide is based on opinions from myself and the original author, Andres. He made the base (Top comments and gear to 37), where as I have made the suggestions up to 50. Refer to Thief: Guide to Playing the Job for more info on THF. -Falk

Main Weapons
Due to the nature of Daggers, at low levels, their low DMG rating and relatively weak Weapon Skills makes them poor options for the soloing and early partying. Also, since the first Dagger Weapon Skill that works really well with Sneak Attack and/or Trick Attack is Viper Bite, many Thief's will use either Hand-to-Hand or Sword weapons at the early levels. Both Fast Blade and Combo stack fully powered with Sneak Attack, and at early levels, the lower skill rank has a lesser effect on weapon skill.

Dagger
Since many Daggers come with beneficial effects, Ninja is the most common sub in order to Dual Wield two daggers. Warrior may be used before level 20. However, WAR may become a viable sub 30+ for Berserk, but /NIN is still very common, ask your leader.


 * lvl 1 Bronze Knife
 * lvl 7 Beestinger or Blind Dagger
 * lvl 9 Brass Dagger
 * lvl 12 Dagger, Silence Dagger, or Spark Dagger
 * lvl 20 Decurion's Dagger and/or Mercenary's Knife
 * lvl 23 Corrosive Dagger (optional)
 * lvl 25 2x Federation Knife or Windurstian Knife
 * lvl 28 2x Archer's Knife (Nice to use to build TP with a Crossbow.)
 * lvl 30 2x Mercenary Captain's Kukri or Royal Squire's Dagger.
 * lvl 34 2x Windurstian Kukri/Federation Kukri or San d'Orian Dagger/Kingdom Dagger.
 * lvl 40 Marauder's Knife (AF1), Corrosive Baselard.
 * Marauder's Knife has lower DPS than Federation Kukri or Corrosive Baselard, but has nice DEX/AGI bonuses.
 * lvl 43 Calveley's Dagger. Again, lower DPS than earlier daggers, but has DEX+3.
 * lvl 46 Bone Knife Plus 1 if you are missing a lot, do x2, otherwise calv/this is good for now, personal preferance here.
 * lvl 48 Hornetneedle dropped from Death from Above, if you have high level friends or a high level job get this, but not really needed, replace calv with this if you can.
 * lvl 50 Corsair's Knife x2 if you don't have Hornetneedle.
 * lvl 59 Darksteel Kukri or it's plus one, not too pricy. You can replace Hornetneedle if you want now.
 * lvl 62 Cermet Kukri or plus one, same as darksteel, not pricy. Duel wield these.
 * lvl 65 Garuda's Dagger if you want, I would keep 2x Cermet Kukri though. Garuda can be soloed by a 74 /nin really easy.

Sword
Swords are the recommended choice of the soloing levels of 1~10, due to their higher DMG rating, more powerful 1st weapon skill, and relatively same attacking speed of a dagger. In the early party levels, this or Hand to Hand weaponry is most commonly used, since at Level 15, Sneak Attack is far more effective with these weapons. If using a sword, most Thief sub Warrior or Ninja.


 * lvl 1 Wax Sword
 * lvl 7 Sapara
 * lvl 10 Royal Archer's Sword
 * lvl 12 Brass Xiphos (most skip directly to Scimitar)
 * lvl 13 Scimitar
 * lvl 18 Fire Sword, Flame Sword, Iron Sword, or Iron Sword +1
 * lvl 19 Small Sword (often used as an offhand weapon for a long time due to +DEX, with one of lvl 18 swords as mainhand)
 * lvl 24 Nadrs (Rare/Ex, dropped by Cargo Crab Colin. Good 'til lvl 33, best 'til lvl 28.)
 * lvl 27 Gladius (Often skipped for Mithran Scimitar)
 * lvl 28 Mithran Scimitar (Note: Often expensive, usually dual wielded, nice bonus to DEX however)
 * lvl 30 Centurion's Sword (Note: debatable if better/worse than Mithran Scimitar)

Past 33 when you get Viper Bite, swords start to lack. Stick with daggers 33+.

Hand to Hand
Hand to Hand weapons receive less skill than Swords for a Thief. However, with a Monk subjob, they provide a decent amount of damage and speed. Combo is likely the strongest Weapon Skill until Viper Bite when combined with Sneak Attack, but in exchange a THF must lose some of its Accuracy and Attack offered by Swords. Although this is slightly compensated for in many Hand to Hand weapons. This is not recommended until level 15, to combine Sneak Attack + Combo, to use earlier is to merely weaken yourself usually. Monk is the only viable sub for this choice of weapon, due to Martial Arts.

This assumes use of Knuckles only from 15 till approximately level 30, this is not recomended otherwise.


 * lvl 15 Bastokan Knuckles or Republic Knuckles
 * lvl 20 Metal Knuckles (Only use if you obtain +1 version)

Those are seriously the only two Knuckles I recommend for those levels. Both offer relatively high DMG for hand to hand weapons and +Accuracy.

Ranged Weapons
Thief have a wide variety of ranged weapons available to them, and since THF are likely one of the best classes for pulling, this is a good thing. The typical/cheapest pulling device for a Thief are a Boomerang, due to its unlimited uses and a boomerang with +AGI for THF. However, Marksmanship is also a potentially useful thing for a Thief to use, a well placed Acid Bolt at the beginning of a fight is one great way to improve damage output. Ranged weapons are also another great way to help gain TP.

Another benefit of a THF pulling is for SATA. As the puller, a THF has control of when the monster arrives at camp. If timed well, a THF can land 2 SATA's within the span of a few seconds, instead of only one.

Bow
In the Soloing levels, a well placed bow and arrow shot can destroy near half of an anemy's HP. At party levels, it can place a decent damage first hit on the enemy. Also, the longer delay allows a THF to stop the shot easier if something occurs to the party.


 * lvl 1 Shortbow
 * lvl 7 Self Bow
 * lvl 15 Windurstian Bow
 * lvl 24 Wrapped Bow
 * lvl 30 Hamayumi (best bow a THF can use till Lv70, made for Promys; but it's an NM drop from Promyvion - Vahzl)
 * lvl 36 Composite Bow
 * lvl 55 Lightning Bow or its +1 will keep you forever if you want to use bows.

Arrow

 * lvl 1 Wooden Arrow
 * lvl 7 Bone Arrow
 * lvl 14 Iron Arrow or 15 Fang Arrow
 * lvl 17 Beetle Arrow
 * lvl 19 Poison Arrow
 * lvl 24 Silver Arrow
 * lvl 29 Horn Arrow
 * lvl 35 Sleep Arrow

Crossbow
Unlike a bow and arrow, the first Crossbow is not available to a THF until the soloing levels are traditionally over. However, unlike a Bow + Arrow, a crossbow has status bolts that can weaken a enemy before it arrives at camp when used to pull or damage.


 * lvl 10 Legionnaire's Crossbow
 * lvl 12 Crossbow
 * lvl 25 Power Crossbow (+1 AGI, keep this for TA if your pulling with crossbow)
 * lvl 40 Thug's Zamburak (Nice for the AGI+ and Ranged Acc+)
 * lvl 63 Velocity Bow, real cheap, but optional. A nice upgrade from Thug's IMO.

Bolts

 * lvl 10 Blind Bolt
 * lvl 15 Acid Bolt (Very useful bolt, lowers DEF of enemy. One DEF Down effect nomally lasts the entire battle, so switching Bolts is a good idea because of the price of these.)
 * lvl 20 Sleep Bolt (Extreamly useful for soloing. Able to use Sneak Attack in the middle of a solo fight.)
 * lvl 25 Venom Bolt (Extreamly Cheap bolts, Low Delay, High Damage. Nice to build TP with)
 * lvl 25 Bloody Bolt (Pair'd with the other bolts, allows a THF to be able to solo a T+. Blind to help keep shadows up if subbing NIN. Bloody Bolt to gain back HP when you take damage. Sleep Bolt for when you need to recast Utsusemi.

Throwing Weapons
Most popular pulling tools due to the shortest time in delay, and infinite use. There are +DEX and +AGI throwing weapons, and a +ACC throwing weapon, leaving a few good choices for a THF for this weapon even when not pulling. Keep in mind though, Changing a Ranged Weapon will also Reset your TP.


 * lvl 6 Coarse Boomerang
 * lvl 14 Boomerang
 * lvl 15 Rogetsurin (This has +1 AGI, but low damage)
 * lvl 19 Flame Boomerang
 * lvl 24 Wingedge
 * lvl 28 Chakram
 * lvl 33 Long Boomerang (This has +2 AGI, best ranged for SATA use for a while)

Armor
A Thief will generally want to have two sets of gear: one set focusing on Accuracy and Attack for normal melee attacks/TP gain, and another set focusing on DEX and AGI for SATA. Optionally, they can carry a third set of gear for ranged accuracy if they want to land status bolts consistently. A Thief after level 30 doesn't usually need to worry about defense, as they will be able to transfer almost all enmity gained onto another person of the party. However, during the levels of 15-29, Thiefs can generate a large amount of hate from damage from Sneak Attack alone, and usually must incorporate some defense gear (Although at level 24, Utsusemi from a Ninja sub is usually sufficient). Equipment change macros are common for Thief, because alot of gear that has +DEX or +AGI, often is poor in other stats for melee such as STR, Accuracy, and Attack.

To use only a single +DEX and +AGI set of gear for THF is not advised. A daggers low DMG rating makes a hit of 0 on a high defense IT monster very possible. 0 Damage equates to 0 TP, and Weapon Skills play an important role for THF.

Head

 * lvl 1 Bronze Cap
 * lvl 7 Leather Bandana
 * lvl 9 Compound Eye Circlet (due to THF's high Evasion, many keep this over higher DEF gear under the hope of avoiding more attacks as a result. It is also a very nice piece for soloing in the 10-15 range)
 * lvl 10 Royal Footman's Bandana
 * lvl 16 Bone Mask or lvl 17 Lizard Helm
 * lvl 20 Trader's Chapeau
 * lvl 21 Beetle Mask
 * lvl 24 Emperor Hairpin or Empress Hairpin, Empress drops from Valkurm Emperor (Emperor is VERY expensive, you can live without it or it's RA/EX version, but I will reccomend hunting VE occasionally after 45 and you get TH2. Save yourself a headache and go THF/RNG.
 * lvl 30 Mercenary Captain's Headgear or Noct Beret +1
 * lvl 41 Voyager Sallet (The only piece I can think of that competes with the lvl 24 Hairpin. Use for Attack set.)
 * lvl 50 Crow Beret, for soloing without Empress/Emperor.
 * lvl 54 Rogue's Bonnet, lol. I didn't get it in a hurry, you should get it around 70 if you want to steal from Maat though. I never used it though.

Body

 * lvl 1 Starting RSE, Aketon, or Bronze Harness
 * lvl 7 Leather Vest
 * lvl 10 Legionnaire's Harness or lvl 11 Brass Harness
 * lvl 16 Bone Harness or Lizard Jerkin
 * lvl 18 Garrison Tunica (Relatively expensive, but only piece that offers any +DEX for a while. Up to person)
 * lvl 21 Beetle Harness
 * lvl 30 Mercenary Captain's Doublet for TP and SATA, Noct Doublet +1 for RA.
 * lvl 33 Consider RSE for DD set. None have enough +DEX/AGI to warrant macroing in for SATA
 * lvl 40 Iron Musketeer's Gambison is good to macro in for RA.
 * lvl 45 Brigandine Armor, replaces that old Merc. Captain Doublet.
 * lvl 50 Crow Jupon for soloing purposes.
 * lvl 50 Rapparee Harness better than AF body with Haste+4%
 * lvl 57 Scorpion Harness or it's plus one, but really NQ is more then fine. This is a hot topic, as it is quite pricy, but I would save up a bit and farm for it. You really don't need it too much, especially if you're using sushi, but it's great for soloing anyway.
 * lvl 58 Rogue's Vest, another crap piece. Macro it in for Hide or don't get it at all. Yet again may want it for Maat though.
 * lvl 59 Black Cotehardie, macro in for SATA if you have SH, otherwise use full time.

Hands

 * lvl 1 starting RSE or Bronze Mittens
 * lvl 7 Leather Gloves
 * lvl 10 Legionnaire's Mittens or Royal Footman's Gloves
 * lvl 14 Battle Gloves (best gloves for Attack for quite a long time due to +ACC, decent Defense, and Evasion)
 * lvl 27 Hume, Taru, and Elvaan have viable RSE. Hume may desire to wear full time, Elvaan should macro in for SATA, and Taru should use in Melee, macroing in +DEX/AGI for SATA when possible
 * lvl 30 Mercenary Captain's Gloves (macro in for SATA), Noct Gloves +1 for RA.
 * lvl 34 Windurstian Gloves/Federation Gloves
 * lvl 38 Mage's Cuffs (Macro in for SATA)
 * lvl 50 Crow Bracers, for soloing.
 * lvl 52 Rogue's Armlets, use for SA if you aren't Hume. A nice Steal bomus too. =)

Legs

 * lvl 1 Starting RSE or Bronze Subligar
 * lvl 7 Leather Trousers
 * lvl 16 Bone Subligar or lvl 17 Lizard Trousers
 * lvl 21 Beetle Subligar (for DEF) or Garrison Hose (Good gear for TP and SATA, but pricy)
 * lvl 25 Republic Subligar (for TP, macro in Hose for SATA if you get these)
 * lvl 30 Noct Brais +1 (macro in for SATA and RA)
 * lvl 31 Elvaan have perfect RSE to macro into SATA, Galka is debatable.
 * lvl 56 Rogue's Culotte, great, use all the time IMO. Steal is a bonus again.

Feet

 * lvl 1 starting RSE or Bronze Leggings
 * lvl 7 Leather Highboots or
 * Leaping Boots/Bounding Boots dropped from Leaping Lizzy (Extremely powerful THF footwear. However, it is very expensive or a fairly annoying NM hunt. A level 15(TH1) THF can solo the NM, but as the boots are highly sought after, claiming the NM is a challenge. I recommend getting these at 45 if you still don't have them).
 * lvl 16 Bone Leggings or lvl 17 Lizard Ledelsens
 * lvl 20 Royal Footman's Clogs
 * lvl 20 Strider Boots (Very very hard to get, but movement boost is fun.)
 * lvl 24 Winged Boots (same as Leaping/Bounding, but with more DEF. Don't get them unless you already have them, the DEF+ isn't worth the extra amount of gil you spend.)
 * lvl 29 Almost all RSE has a use.
 * Hume, Elvaan, and Galka: Macro in for SATA, if you do not have Leaping/Bounding/Winged
 * Mithra and Taru: Use in Melee, macro in +AGI after TA, or Leaping/Bounding/Winged
 * lvl 30 Noct Gaiters +1 get the plus one, will last until Jaridah/AF if you don't have Leaping/Bounding.
 * lvl 60 Rogue's Poulaines, use these if you don't have Leaping/Bounding. Only a small upgrade from Noct +1 though. However, the thing I mainly like about these is the Flee bonus. Put them in a flee macro and enjoy 15 more seconds of running faster then everyone.

Neck

 * lvl 7 Feather Collar +1 or Rabbit Charm (Rabbit charm is a rare NM drop, not required)
 * lvl 21 Spike Necklace (very nice with its +STR and +DEX.)
 * lvl 33 Peacock Amulet or Peacock Charm (Very nice improvement to Accuracy, but very pricey, macro in Spike Necklace for SATA)

Waist

 * lvl 1 Blood Stone
 * lvl 15 Warrior's Belt (or +1) (for defense)
 * lvl 20 Key Ring Belt (put in for SATA if you get it, only from quest)
 * lvl 30 Mercenary Captain's Belt (use for SATA)
 * lvl 40 Tilt Belt (for TP, still use Merc Belt for SATA)
 * lvl 43 Swordbelt +1 (Attack is good for both TP and SATA).
 * lvl 48 Life Belt (Macro in something else for SATA)
 * lvl 50 Swift Belt (Haste is good for TP. Macro in something else for SATA)

Back

 * lvl 4 Rabbit Mantle
 * lvl 12 Traveler's Mantle
 * lvl 21 Night Cape
 * lvl 24 Nomad's Mantle (+1 if you can afford it)
 * lvl 28 Wolf Mantle (+1 suggested, though Nomad's probably still better)

Earrings

 * lvl 16 Bone Earring (+1 suggested, Melee Earring)
 * lvl 21 Beetle Earring (+1 suggested, Melee Earring)
 * lvl 29 Dodge Earring Soloing purposes.
 * lvl 30 Genin Earring pricey, but one of the best earrings, effect works with /NIN.
 * lvl 35 Drone Earring if you don't have Genin or are not /NIN.

Ring

 * lvl 1 Starting Ring
 * lvl 14 Courage Ring (for Melee) and Balance Ring (For SATA)
 * lvl 30 Rajas Ring (Best ring for both Melee and SATA if you have it, reward for finishing CoP.)
 * lvl 34 Venerer Ring, good for TP building, a bit pricey.
 * lvl 35 Jaeger Ring, NM drop in Riverne - Site #A01.
 * lvl 36 Puissance Ring (for melee) and Deft Ring (for SATA)
 * lvl 40 Sniper's Ring, best ACC ring, VERY expensive...debatable if needed, with sushi I didn't miss THAT often.
 * lvl 50 Unyielding Ring and/or Garrulous Ring, both somewhat pricey, but great for SATA, and can last you a long time.
 * Another thing you can do with rings, is get Ranged Acc rings. These can be macroed into the ranged attack for a quick TP boost.