Well, Bliz released another update to the talent calculator (finally), so it's time for another warlock analysis. No real changes to the base class abilities, but a lot of changes to Spec abilities and some talent changes.
Starting off with the talent changes:
Dark Regeneration is much improved, it's now an instant 50% heal with a 20 second 25% bonus to healing. Harvest Life got an upgrade, as it now replaces Drain Life and heals 4% health per tic instead of 2%.
Howl of Terror now has its duration reduced by 1 second for each damaging attack you take.
Sacrificial Pact is now a X HP shield, and Dark Bargain is damage immunity (that then does 50% of damage absorbed over 20 seconds), instead of the opposite.
Blood Fear is now its own fear, instead of modifying Fear, but otherwise unchanged. Burning Rush is now a 50% move speed boost at the cost of 5% health per second, lasts until canceled, that should be fun. Spell Drain is gone, replaced by Unbound Will, which is a PvP trinket on a 20 second cooldown, that costs 25% health. I'm sure I won't be seeing that one next build.
Illidan's Guile is gone, replaced by Mannoroth's Fury, which increases non-talent AoE radius by 200%.
Spec changes are interesting, but first a couple important class changes that I overlooked:
Soul Fire is now auto-crit, and damage is increased by crit strike chance. Demonic Tactics is a level 1 passive that "causes your imp, succubus, and voidwalker to behave more intelligently," whatever that means. Dark Soul is the sequel to Demon Soul (I love you blizzard), and is the spec-specific Demon Soul we had all been hoping for. Exact mechanics are being "experimented" with, but comes in Haste, Crit, and Mastery versions with a weak passive boost and strong active boost that negates the passive.
Now the spec changes, clearly Destruction was this build's favorite.
Affliction: No changes?
Demonology: Bane of Doom does not specify a damage period, possibly getting rid of the silly 15 second wait. More bonuses to Metamorph, such as shadow bolt becoming demonic slash, an instant attack.
Destruction: Auto Wand? What the hell is this? World's strangest passive aside, Destro has another new passive, Chaotic Energy, mana regenerates substantially faster, soul fire and fel flame cost more mana but deal 12% more damage. Ember Tap consumes burning embers to heal HP, because Burning Embers now inflict damage over time to the warlock. Aftermath now makes Rain of Fire an instant cast instead of channel, and stuns targets struck twice. Fire and Brimstone, if it's off the global cooldown, puts Destruction ahead of Demonology in AoE ability. "Your next Immolate, Incinerate, Conflagarate, or Curse will hit all targets in 15 yards and deal 44% normal damage." Destructive Influence causes demon attacks to reduce Soul Fire cast time per hit, instead of a chance to instant cast, which is much appreciated.
Destruction looks like a ton of fun, I might try leveling with it to see if I can learn how to play it on the way to 90, get myself a functional offspec instead of "lol i press button and AoE low dungeons to death."
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Talents, version 5.
So yesterday / sometime early this morning, Blizzard released the 5.0 talent calculator, which turned out to be a preview of the entire new class/specialization/talent system. Warlock received some interesting changes in the month since my last post, and rather than going over all the individual changes in depth, I'll be going over the changes this means for warlock affliction play. I don't know Demonology and Destruction well enough to do a good analysis for them.
First, there are some quality-of-life changes. Curse of Enfeeblement merges two curses (Weakness and Tongues) that were never used in conjunction and, in short, saves a hotbar button. Empowered Channeling is an interesting mechanic that I am happy to see applied to more of warlock, as it now applies to Drain Life and Health Funnel, which will save a lot of trouble in trying to hit a half-second-or-less window to not clip Drain Life's last tic. Shadow Ward is now Twilight Ward, which covers Holy damage as well. Demonic Circle Teleport removes snares by default.
Second, there are mechanics changes. Demon Armor is gone, old Fel Armor is gone, new Fel Armor is an armor/stamina/health generation buff. Fel Armor's spellpower bonus has been moved into Dark Intent, of all places, which has become a raidwide spellpower buff. Worth noting, Focus Magic also appears to be gone from mage. The health-per-hit generation of Fel Armor is apparently the level 15 talents. Fel Flame no longer refreshes the duration of Unstable Affliction, same as Hand of Gul'dan no longer refreshes Immolate. Haunt seems to be gone, the damage from it and Shadow Bolt merged into Malefic Grasp, the new Affliction filler spell. Bane of Doom is removed to a Demonology exclusive ability, and Bane of Agony takes its place with a new 1 minute duration. Soulburn can now be used to make Fear instant cast.
Last, the outright new stuff. Malefic Grasp is a channeled spell, does a small amount of damage over time for 3 seconds, is subject to Empowered Channel, and causes dots to tic twice as fast. Nightfall now affects Malefic Grasp instead of Shadow Bolt, causing it to be instant cast and dots tic twice as fast for the next 9 seconds. Unending Resolve gives an actual damage reduction cooldown to warlock, 50% less damage for 12 seconds, 3 minute cooldown. Demonic Portal is a Demonic Circle for everybody else, teleporting people between two portals up to 70 meters apart.
Some talents have been redone as well. Hour of Twilight at level 45 is gone, replaced by Spell Drain from level 60. The other level 60 talents have been replaced by 3 new abilities, Blood Fear, Burning Rush, and Dark Bargain, all focused around spending HP. Blood Fear is a fairly spectacular ability, Fear becomes instant cast, but costs 10% HP. Burning Rush gives a 25% for 8 seconds movement speed bonus to Life Tap. Dark Bargain is a 30 second recast/duration absorb, with a neat mechanic. It absorbs damage equal to 20% of your maximum HP, but any absorption not used will be dealt as damage to the player when the effect ends, so you can't just leave it up all the time.
Overall, the new warlock direction looks interesting, and Malefic Grasp should help a lot with Affliction's filler spell not really feeling... affliction-y.
First, there are some quality-of-life changes. Curse of Enfeeblement merges two curses (Weakness and Tongues) that were never used in conjunction and, in short, saves a hotbar button. Empowered Channeling is an interesting mechanic that I am happy to see applied to more of warlock, as it now applies to Drain Life and Health Funnel, which will save a lot of trouble in trying to hit a half-second-or-less window to not clip Drain Life's last tic. Shadow Ward is now Twilight Ward, which covers Holy damage as well. Demonic Circle Teleport removes snares by default.
Second, there are mechanics changes. Demon Armor is gone, old Fel Armor is gone, new Fel Armor is an armor/stamina/health generation buff. Fel Armor's spellpower bonus has been moved into Dark Intent, of all places, which has become a raidwide spellpower buff. Worth noting, Focus Magic also appears to be gone from mage. The health-per-hit generation of Fel Armor is apparently the level 15 talents. Fel Flame no longer refreshes the duration of Unstable Affliction, same as Hand of Gul'dan no longer refreshes Immolate. Haunt seems to be gone, the damage from it and Shadow Bolt merged into Malefic Grasp, the new Affliction filler spell. Bane of Doom is removed to a Demonology exclusive ability, and Bane of Agony takes its place with a new 1 minute duration. Soulburn can now be used to make Fear instant cast.
Last, the outright new stuff. Malefic Grasp is a channeled spell, does a small amount of damage over time for 3 seconds, is subject to Empowered Channel, and causes dots to tic twice as fast. Nightfall now affects Malefic Grasp instead of Shadow Bolt, causing it to be instant cast and dots tic twice as fast for the next 9 seconds. Unending Resolve gives an actual damage reduction cooldown to warlock, 50% less damage for 12 seconds, 3 minute cooldown. Demonic Portal is a Demonic Circle for everybody else, teleporting people between two portals up to 70 meters apart.
Some talents have been redone as well. Hour of Twilight at level 45 is gone, replaced by Spell Drain from level 60. The other level 60 talents have been replaced by 3 new abilities, Blood Fear, Burning Rush, and Dark Bargain, all focused around spending HP. Blood Fear is a fairly spectacular ability, Fear becomes instant cast, but costs 10% HP. Burning Rush gives a 25% for 8 seconds movement speed bonus to Life Tap. Dark Bargain is a 30 second recast/duration absorb, with a neat mechanic. It absorbs damage equal to 20% of your maximum HP, but any absorption not used will be dealt as damage to the player when the effect ends, so you can't just leave it up all the time.
Overall, the new warlock direction looks interesting, and Malefic Grasp should help a lot with Affliction's filler spell not really feeling... affliction-y.
Friday, October 21, 2011
566 days, 10 hours, 56 minutes and 4 seconds
since the last post here.
Um, oops?
Well anyway, SE is dumb and keeps releasing anti-content, announcing non-content, and overall refusing to give us content. Blizzard, on the other hand, is announcing an entire new expansion, and all sorts of goodies. Among them, a rework of the talent system, because for the 3rd expansion in a row they have been forced to admit that the talent system really isn't working as intended, it's a maze that must be navigated by theorycrafters to find the best possible DPS / tanking / healing spec, and not any sort of character customization. So they're throwing out the whole system, baking everything into the raw spec choice, and leaving a whole... 6 choices in talents. 6 meaningful choices every 15 levels, though. I think they can make this work.
I play warlock, so here's what the first draft of Warlock looks like. Numbers may change, yada yada, everything is unbalanced.
Level 15: Seems to be the self-healing tier.
Dark Regeneration: instant cast, 3 minute recast.
Restores 50% of your max HP over 25 seconds.
Soul Leech: passive.
Shadowbolt, Incinerate, and Malefic Grasp heal you for 25% of their damage.
Harvest of Life: channeled.
AoE Drain Life. Drains the life from the target and all other targets within 20 yards, causing X shadow damage and restoring 2% of the caster's total health per target per second, lasts 3 seconds. Recasting this spell before it finishes boosts the duration by 3 seconds, up to 5 times.
The existence of this tier to begin with is odd, given warlock's already strong self-healing, makes me wonder if they'll be making other changes. But that said, Soul Leech is incredibly strong, by far the strongest source of raw healing in the tier. Harvest of Life has an interesting mechanic to it that I would love to see applied to more of warlock, and should be spectacular in places like Alterac Valley. Dark Regeneration is more arena oriented. This is also the first mention of Malefic Grasp, which I would assume is the new Demonology filler spell.
Level 30: Crowd Control
Howl of Terror: instant cast, 40 sec cooldown.
Unchanged from its current form, causes 5 enemies within 10 yards to flee in terror for 8 seconds, damage caused may interrupt.
Mortal Coil: instant cast, 45 sec cooldown.
Death Coil: The second. Causes target to run in terror for 3 seconds, restores 25% of the caster's HP.
Shadowfury: instant cast, 20 sec cooldown.
Also unchanged from its current form, stuns all enemies within 8 yards for 3 seconds.
Here again, we have something of the choice between battleground, arena, and raiding. Howl of Terror and Death / Mortal Coil are fairly useless outside of PvP but great inside, and Shadowfury being accessible to all warlock specs is a wonderful improvement.
Level 45: Damage mitigation
Hour of Twilight: passive.
When a damaging attack brings you below 20% of your maximum health, all damage is reduced by 50% for 10 seconds, cannot occur more than once every 90 seconds.
Soul Link: instant cast, buff.
When active, all damage and healing the Warlock takes is shared with her active demon.
Sacrificial Pact: instant cast, 5 minute cooldown.
Your demon sacrifices itself to prevent all damage you would take for 10 seconds.
So here, we have Soul Link, not Soul Link, and not Soul Link. Or that's what it looked like at first, but Soul Link has been changed to also share healing with the pet. It would really depend on the numbers, but that could be a huge change for what is otherwise a no-brainer source of passive damage reduction. Hour of Twilight is definitely a PvP talent, and Sacrificial Pact gives warlock a true bubble, instead of the fairly thin one that voidwalker can provide.
Level 60: Damage reduction.
Bloodstone: instant cast, 2 minute cooldown.
Instantly restores 44% of the warlock's base health and increases healing recieved by 50% for 10 seconds.
Spell Drain: instant cast, 20 sec cooldown.
The next single target spell aimed at you heals you for half the damage it would have otherwise dealt, lasts 4 seconds.
Nether Ward: instant cast, 30 sec cooldown.
Replaces Twilight Ward. Absorbs 3141 damage, lasts 30 seconds. When you absorb damage, you gain nether protection, reducing all damage from that spell school by 15% for 12 seconds.
All interesting things in this tier, for different reasons. The first, essentially a second, better Healthstone, is a nice addition to PvP, but I could see it in raiding too. The second, which turns a damaging spell into a healing spell, has all sorts of uses. And the third is worth mentioning for two reasons. 1: What's Twilight Ward? Nether Ward used to replace Shadow Ward. 2: Absorbs X damage. Not spell damage, just 'damage.' I suspect a typo, but then if Shadow Ward is being renamed, that would suggest they're making Twilight Ward apply to all spell damage in the first place, so Nether Ward reducing melee damage wouldn't be unreasonable.
Level 75: Mai needs new pants tier.
Grimoire of Supremacy: passive.
You command stronger demons, replacing your normal minions. These demons deal 10% more damage and have more powerful abilities.
Grimoire of Service: instant, 2 minute cooldown.
Instantly summon a second demon who fights for 30 seconds.
Grimoire of Sacrifice: instant, 2 minute cooldown.
You sacrifice your pet to gain increased damage and health, lasts for 3 minutes, summoning another pet cancels the effect.
This is obviously the pet tier. All 3 talents are great. The first is something warlocks have been asking for, the second is just plain cool and a nice addition to the 2-minute damage button, and the third is very interesting. For Supremacy, there's something to note. It lists 6 demons, but warlocks can only summon 5 types of demons right now, 7 if you count cooldown demons. So either way, the numbers don't line up. And for Sacrifice, you can keep it up constantly, does that mean the damage buff is strong enough to be worth giving up your demon for? I really don't know which of these I would pick, they're all so good.
Level 90: Mimic tier
Archimonde's Vengeance: instant cast, 1 minute cooldown.
Curse an enemy, inflicting 25% of all damage you take to also harm them, lasts 15 seconds.
Kil'jaeden's Cunning: passive.
You can cast and channel while moving, but doing so doubles the cast time or period of the spell.
Illidan's Guile: instant cast, 2 minute cooldown.
Shadowbolt, Incinerate, and Malefic Grasp deal splash damage to enemies within 10 yards of their target, lasts 30 seconds.
And for the highest tier of talents, there are 3 very different options. First is essentially a reverse soul link, I'm sure it'll be great in PvP. Second is the strongest mobility talent I think I've seen in this entire announcement, if it updates the cast time of spells automatically if you star moving halfway through. Third is a massively powerful AoE attack, if "splash" is full damage, because Shadowbolt does approximately 3 times the damage of my current AoE, Seed of Corruption, and Incinerate is equally comparable to Rain of Fire.
As the talents currently stand, and looking at this from the PvE Affliction angle, I would go something like: Soul Leech, Shadowfury, Soul Link, Nether Ward, Grimoire of Supremacy, Kil'jaeden's Cunning. But even then, I'm not sure. The other options look nice.
I've never thought that before about talents, they've never really felt like choices, and that makes me confident that Blizzard is truly heading in the right direction with this new talent system.
Um, oops?
Well anyway, SE is dumb and keeps releasing anti-content, announcing non-content, and overall refusing to give us content. Blizzard, on the other hand, is announcing an entire new expansion, and all sorts of goodies. Among them, a rework of the talent system, because for the 3rd expansion in a row they have been forced to admit that the talent system really isn't working as intended, it's a maze that must be navigated by theorycrafters to find the best possible DPS / tanking / healing spec, and not any sort of character customization. So they're throwing out the whole system, baking everything into the raw spec choice, and leaving a whole... 6 choices in talents. 6 meaningful choices every 15 levels, though. I think they can make this work.
I play warlock, so here's what the first draft of Warlock looks like. Numbers may change, yada yada, everything is unbalanced.
Level 15: Seems to be the self-healing tier.
Dark Regeneration: instant cast, 3 minute recast.
Restores 50% of your max HP over 25 seconds.
Soul Leech: passive.
Shadowbolt, Incinerate, and Malefic Grasp heal you for 25% of their damage.
Harvest of Life: channeled.
AoE Drain Life. Drains the life from the target and all other targets within 20 yards, causing X shadow damage and restoring 2% of the caster's total health per target per second, lasts 3 seconds. Recasting this spell before it finishes boosts the duration by 3 seconds, up to 5 times.
The existence of this tier to begin with is odd, given warlock's already strong self-healing, makes me wonder if they'll be making other changes. But that said, Soul Leech is incredibly strong, by far the strongest source of raw healing in the tier. Harvest of Life has an interesting mechanic to it that I would love to see applied to more of warlock, and should be spectacular in places like Alterac Valley. Dark Regeneration is more arena oriented. This is also the first mention of Malefic Grasp, which I would assume is the new Demonology filler spell.
Level 30: Crowd Control
Howl of Terror: instant cast, 40 sec cooldown.
Unchanged from its current form, causes 5 enemies within 10 yards to flee in terror for 8 seconds, damage caused may interrupt.
Mortal Coil: instant cast, 45 sec cooldown.
Death Coil: The second. Causes target to run in terror for 3 seconds, restores 25% of the caster's HP.
Shadowfury: instant cast, 20 sec cooldown.
Also unchanged from its current form, stuns all enemies within 8 yards for 3 seconds.
Here again, we have something of the choice between battleground, arena, and raiding. Howl of Terror and Death / Mortal Coil are fairly useless outside of PvP but great inside, and Shadowfury being accessible to all warlock specs is a wonderful improvement.
Level 45: Damage mitigation
Hour of Twilight: passive.
When a damaging attack brings you below 20% of your maximum health, all damage is reduced by 50% for 10 seconds, cannot occur more than once every 90 seconds.
Soul Link: instant cast, buff.
When active, all damage and healing the Warlock takes is shared with her active demon.
Sacrificial Pact: instant cast, 5 minute cooldown.
Your demon sacrifices itself to prevent all damage you would take for 10 seconds.
So here, we have Soul Link, not Soul Link, and not Soul Link. Or that's what it looked like at first, but Soul Link has been changed to also share healing with the pet. It would really depend on the numbers, but that could be a huge change for what is otherwise a no-brainer source of passive damage reduction. Hour of Twilight is definitely a PvP talent, and Sacrificial Pact gives warlock a true bubble, instead of the fairly thin one that voidwalker can provide.
Level 60: Damage reduction.
Bloodstone: instant cast, 2 minute cooldown.
Instantly restores 44% of the warlock's base health and increases healing recieved by 50% for 10 seconds.
Spell Drain: instant cast, 20 sec cooldown.
The next single target spell aimed at you heals you for half the damage it would have otherwise dealt, lasts 4 seconds.
Nether Ward: instant cast, 30 sec cooldown.
Replaces Twilight Ward. Absorbs 3141 damage, lasts 30 seconds. When you absorb damage, you gain nether protection, reducing all damage from that spell school by 15% for 12 seconds.
All interesting things in this tier, for different reasons. The first, essentially a second, better Healthstone, is a nice addition to PvP, but I could see it in raiding too. The second, which turns a damaging spell into a healing spell, has all sorts of uses. And the third is worth mentioning for two reasons. 1: What's Twilight Ward? Nether Ward used to replace Shadow Ward. 2: Absorbs X damage. Not spell damage, just 'damage.' I suspect a typo, but then if Shadow Ward is being renamed, that would suggest they're making Twilight Ward apply to all spell damage in the first place, so Nether Ward reducing melee damage wouldn't be unreasonable.
Level 75: Mai needs new pants tier.
Grimoire of Supremacy: passive.
You command stronger demons, replacing your normal minions. These demons deal 10% more damage and have more powerful abilities.
Grimoire of Service: instant, 2 minute cooldown.
Instantly summon a second demon who fights for 30 seconds.
Grimoire of Sacrifice: instant, 2 minute cooldown.
You sacrifice your pet to gain increased damage and health, lasts for 3 minutes, summoning another pet cancels the effect.
This is obviously the pet tier. All 3 talents are great. The first is something warlocks have been asking for, the second is just plain cool and a nice addition to the 2-minute damage button, and the third is very interesting. For Supremacy, there's something to note. It lists 6 demons, but warlocks can only summon 5 types of demons right now, 7 if you count cooldown demons. So either way, the numbers don't line up. And for Sacrifice, you can keep it up constantly, does that mean the damage buff is strong enough to be worth giving up your demon for? I really don't know which of these I would pick, they're all so good.
Level 90: Mimic tier
Archimonde's Vengeance: instant cast, 1 minute cooldown.
Curse an enemy, inflicting 25% of all damage you take to also harm them, lasts 15 seconds.
Kil'jaeden's Cunning: passive.
You can cast and channel while moving, but doing so doubles the cast time or period of the spell.
Illidan's Guile: instant cast, 2 minute cooldown.
Shadowbolt, Incinerate, and Malefic Grasp deal splash damage to enemies within 10 yards of their target, lasts 30 seconds.
And for the highest tier of talents, there are 3 very different options. First is essentially a reverse soul link, I'm sure it'll be great in PvP. Second is the strongest mobility talent I think I've seen in this entire announcement, if it updates the cast time of spells automatically if you star moving halfway through. Third is a massively powerful AoE attack, if "splash" is full damage, because Shadowbolt does approximately 3 times the damage of my current AoE, Seed of Corruption, and Incinerate is equally comparable to Rain of Fire.
As the talents currently stand, and looking at this from the PvE Affliction angle, I would go something like: Soul Leech, Shadowfury, Soul Link, Nether Ward, Grimoire of Supremacy, Kil'jaeden's Cunning. But even then, I'm not sure. The other options look nice.
I've never thought that before about talents, they've never really felt like choices, and that makes me confident that Blizzard is truly heading in the right direction with this new talent system.
Friday, April 2, 2010
(AMH) * (ARTP) + (AWS) / (DEL/60 * (ARTP))
Or: Why SE bloody fails at making new weapons.
We interrupt our regularly scheduled post to bring you my bitching.
So the numbers are finally coming in on Magian weapons. SE dropped the ball on hand-to-hand, big time, and made a weapon that is outright inferior to Wagh Baghnakhs. Yes, that's right, the 20k level 72 weapons on the AH. Nevermind Hades Sainti / +1, Destroyers, or Oberon Sainti.
Wargfangs, if you're not familiar, are DMG:+17 Delay:+140 Occasionally Attacks Twice H2H weapons. Sounds good on paper. Actually, sounds quite awsome, with how good Faith Baghnakhs are for MNK. (Best possible non-Shenlong's, actually, but fuck its rate of virtue stone consumption.) But they're not. They only double attack on the main hand. They suck. This puts the MNK hand to hand weapon tiers at:
Spharai +2
Shenlong's Baghnakhs
Spharai
Faith Baghnakhs
Mantis
Oberon's Sainti (with max DMG and H2H skill)
Destroyers
Hades Sainti +1
Wagh Baghnakhs
Hades Sainti
Shit you were using at level 70
Wargfangs
(Your mileage may vary due to ACC and my less-than-perfect math)
Other Magian news:
Rune Chopper is still god of zerg weaponry for WAR, there's only so much that a 40% OAT chance can do against something that's hitting 33% faster.
We interrupt our regularly scheduled post to bring you my bitching.
So the numbers are finally coming in on Magian weapons. SE dropped the ball on hand-to-hand, big time, and made a weapon that is outright inferior to Wagh Baghnakhs. Yes, that's right, the 20k level 72 weapons on the AH. Nevermind Hades Sainti / +1, Destroyers, or Oberon Sainti.
Wargfangs, if you're not familiar, are DMG:+17 Delay:+140 Occasionally Attacks Twice H2H weapons. Sounds good on paper. Actually, sounds quite awsome, with how good Faith Baghnakhs are for MNK. (Best possible non-Shenlong's, actually, but fuck its rate of virtue stone consumption.) But they're not. They only double attack on the main hand. They suck. This puts the MNK hand to hand weapon tiers at:
Spharai +2
Shenlong's Baghnakhs
Spharai
Faith Baghnakhs
Mantis
Oberon's Sainti (with max DMG and H2H skill)
Destroyers
Hades Sainti +1
Wagh Baghnakhs
Hades Sainti
Shit you were using at level 70
Wargfangs
(Your mileage may vary due to ACC and my less-than-perfect math)
Other Magian news:
Rune Chopper is still god of zerg weaponry for WAR, there's only so much that a 40% OAT chance can do against something that's hitting 33% faster.
((Lv+2+WSC) * fTP + fINT ) * R * S * W * MDIF * MDA
Or: Why magic damage weaponskills are mediocre, and Thunder IV is not.
((Lv+2+WSC) * fTP + fINT ) * Resist * Staves * Weather * MDIF * Magic Damage Adjustment
Lv+2 = Level(75)+2, replaces D in
WSC = Modifiers, covered last post.
fTP = WS multiplier, also covered last post
fINT = INT vs INT
Resist, Staves, Weather = self evident
MDIF = MAB vs MDB
Magic Damage Adjustment = Shell, MDT gear.
The main problem with magic weaponskills is that chance of Resist right there, and the utter lack of magic accuracy gear for the NIN using Blade: Ei.
Instead of weapon DMG like in the physical equation, magic WS use the character's raw level, which works out to the advantage of one-handed weapons.
WSC is as before, complete with level penalty, though double-dip happens from INT this time around.
fINT is the difference between your INT and the target's INT. More specifically, fINT = 8+ΔINT/2 with a cap of 24, and ΔINT is your INT - target's INT. Due to it being calculated after fTP, it doesn't have as much effect as fSTR does on a similarly-modified physical WS.
(Lv+2 + WSC) * fTP + fINT =
WD, total damage before multipliers.
Resist is magic accuracy vs magic evasion, and determines if you get full damage, or a 1/2 1/4 1/8 1/16th resist. MACC is presumably based off skill with the weapon, but no serious testing has been done.
Staves is the reason that SE will never make a weapon better than HQ staves, because they get their own special spot in the equation. Okay that's a lie, but a HQ staff matching the element of the spell (WS, in this case) gives a 1.15 bonus, and NQ gives a 1.1 bonus.
Weather is the 1/3rd chance at the bonus damage from matching weather / day. A 1.1 multiplier for matching the day or weather, 1.2 for matching both, 1.25 for matching double weather, and 1.35 for matching day and double weather. Wearing a matching elemental obi changes the 1/3rd chance to 100%.
MDIF is simply magic attack bonus divided by magic defense bonus. So a BLM75 with MAB+32 native, using Vidohunir on a RDM with MDB+12 native, would have a MDIF of 1.32/1.12 = 1.17~
Magic Damage Adjustment is for spells like Shell. For example, Shell IV reduces magic damage by 56/256 (21%~), and would thus be a magic damage adjustment of 1 - 56/256 = 0.78~
Breaking it down like before,
DMG from Level+2
+
More DMG from WS modifiers * level penalty
*
fTP Multiplier
+
DMG from INT
=
WD
MACC vs MEVA resist penalty, if applicable
*
Elemental Staff bonus, if applicable
*
Weather / Day bonus/penalty, if applicable
*
MAB vs MDB
*
Magic Damage Taken bonus/reduction
=
Multipliers
WD * Multipliers = Damage
Important points:
fSTR and fINT are comparable as damage bonuses, but fSTR has more effect on final damage per stat point.
Lack of magic accuracy, magic attack bonus, and similar stats hurt melee jobs trying to use magic weaponskills, but lets BLM hit respectable numbers.
Lack of weapon damage (As Level+2 is used instead of DMG) actually helps magic WS, since you're not typically going to have a DMG:78 one-handed weapon.
MDIF is worlds easier to calculate than PDIF.
Thunder IV has a base damage of 541, magic weaponskills all have a base damage 78. More on that in the next post, whenever that is.
((Lv+2+WSC) * fTP + fINT ) * Resist * Staves * Weather * MDIF * Magic Damage Adjustment
Lv+2 = Level(75)+2, replaces D in
WSC = Modifiers, covered last post.
fTP = WS multiplier, also covered last post
fINT = INT vs INT
Resist, Staves, Weather = self evident
MDIF = MAB vs MDB
Magic Damage Adjustment = Shell, MDT gear.
The main problem with magic weaponskills is that chance of Resist right there, and the utter lack of magic accuracy gear for the NIN using Blade: Ei.
Instead of weapon DMG like in the physical equation, magic WS use the character's raw level, which works out to the advantage of one-handed weapons.
WSC is as before, complete with level penalty, though double-dip happens from INT this time around.
fINT is the difference between your INT and the target's INT. More specifically, fINT = 8+ΔINT/2 with a cap of 24, and ΔINT is your INT - target's INT. Due to it being calculated after fTP, it doesn't have as much effect as fSTR does on a similarly-modified physical WS.
(Lv+2 + WSC) * fTP + fINT =
WD, total damage before multipliers.
Resist is magic accuracy vs magic evasion, and determines if you get full damage, or a 1/2 1/4 1/8 1/16th resist. MACC is presumably based off skill with the weapon, but no serious testing has been done.
Staves is the reason that SE will never make a weapon better than HQ staves, because they get their own special spot in the equation. Okay that's a lie, but a HQ staff matching the element of the spell (WS, in this case) gives a 1.15 bonus, and NQ gives a 1.1 bonus.
Weather is the 1/3rd chance at the bonus damage from matching weather / day. A 1.1 multiplier for matching the day or weather, 1.2 for matching both, 1.25 for matching double weather, and 1.35 for matching day and double weather. Wearing a matching elemental obi changes the 1/3rd chance to 100%.
MDIF is simply magic attack bonus divided by magic defense bonus. So a BLM75 with MAB+32 native, using Vidohunir on a RDM with MDB+12 native, would have a MDIF of 1.32/1.12 = 1.17~
Magic Damage Adjustment is for spells like Shell. For example, Shell IV reduces magic damage by 56/256 (21%~), and would thus be a magic damage adjustment of 1 - 56/256 = 0.78~
Breaking it down like before,
DMG from Level+2
+
More DMG from WS modifiers * level penalty
*
fTP Multiplier
+
DMG from INT
=
WD
MACC vs MEVA resist penalty, if applicable
*
Elemental Staff bonus, if applicable
*
Weather / Day bonus/penalty, if applicable
*
MAB vs MDB
*
Magic Damage Taken bonus/reduction
=
Multipliers
WD * Multipliers = Damage
Important points:
fSTR and fINT are comparable as damage bonuses, but fSTR has more effect on final damage per stat point.
Lack of magic accuracy, magic attack bonus, and similar stats hurt melee jobs trying to use magic weaponskills, but lets BLM hit respectable numbers.
Lack of weapon damage (As Level+2 is used instead of DMG) actually helps magic WS, since you're not typically going to have a DMG:78 one-handed weapon.
MDIF is worlds easier to calculate than PDIF.
Thunder IV has a base damage of 541, magic weaponskills all have a base damage 78. More on that in the next post, whenever that is.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
( D + fSTR + WSC) * fTP * PDIF = 1283
FFXI numbers are big and scary. I mean, look at this shit.
( D + fSTR + WSC) * fTP * PDIF
That's the equation for WS damage. Putting meaning to the variables...
D = DMG
fSTR = Function of STR vs VIT
WSC = WS modifiers
fTP = Certain WS have a damage multiplier
pDIF = Ratio of Attack vs Def plus randomizer.
In the end, all that means is that stacking STR boosts raw DMG, and some WS double-dip into STR with WSC. Attack is important, but a lot of WS have attack multipliers (Steel Cyclone and Tachi: Gekko double your attack). Some WS have big fat fTP modifiers, which multiply the damage done.
DMG needs no further explanation, it's written right on your weapon.
fSTR is, more precisely, capped at Rank + 8, with a minimum of -Rank. Weapon Rank, is just DMG / 9. So a DMG:90 weapon is rank 10.
So Hagun is 75 / 9 = rank 8 + 8 = fSTR cap of 16.
Perdu Voulge is 91 / 9 = rank 9 + 8 = fSTR cap of 17.
(Note that 91, the base damage, not 96, the latent damage, is used to calculate rank. The only exception to this is Destroyers-style latents, which are always active and thus change the rank)
If you're breaking 100 STR on WS, it's a pretty safe assumption you're capping fSTR on normal targets.
If you're wearing STR+0 while hitting Kirin, you're probably capping fSTR in the other direction, which is around -5. (It takes Koenig or something to get below that)
/wordy
All of that boils down to getting free DMG:+X on your weapon from stacking STR, around 4-5 for one-handed jobs, 15-18 for 2-handers. Ranged Attacks gets double the effect of any STR with a high cap.
WSC is fairly simple. I'm sure you've heard of weapon skill modifiers. STR 75%, DEX 30%, AGI 60%, etc etc.
If you've got 100 STR and a STR 75% modifier, M = 75 (Arbitrary variable to keep things straight)
100 * .75 = 75.
Using Dragon Kick as a more real example here, STR 50% VIT 50%.
MNK has STR 68+38, VIT 66+30. 106 and 96. Multiplied by .5 is 53 and 48, M of 101.
Finally, that modifier is multiplied by .83, a balancing penalty for being level 75.
M * .83 = WSC, so 101 * .83 = 83.
/wordy
Sum modifiers * .83 = WSC
fTP is also written right out, this time on the wiki.
Tachi: Gekko is 1.5~ at 100% TP, 1.8~ at 200% TP, and 2.5 at 300%
Dragon Kick is 2.0, 2.75, 3.5
Raging Rush is 1.0, 1.0, 1.0
Add D, fSTR, and WSC together, multiply by fTP to get final weapon damage, WD.
WD * PDIF is the actual damage done.
PDIF is the complicated part of all of this.
First, cRatio is calculated.
Then, level correction is applied.
Finally, PDIF adds a couple things and adds randomization to get the variable melee damage we all see.
cRatio. Simply the ratio of your attack to the target's defense. Level 82 Greater Colibri have 327 defense, I have 450-something attack, roughly 1.37. Add in food, minuet and such, closer to 600 attack for a 1.8 ratio.
Remember, some WS have attack bonuses. Gekko doubles your attack, so if this was Gekko, I now have 1200 attack and a cRatio of 3.6 well beyond any cap that on cRatio, which is estimated to be 2.2 for 2-handed and 2.0 for 1-handed. Crits are a free +1.0 cRatio, with a cap of 3.0. Oh, and rangers cheat here, with ranged crits multiplying PDIF by 1.25 with an effective 3.75 cap.
cRatio caps: 2.0 for 1-h, 2.2 for 2-h, 3.0 for crits.
Level correction is then applied to cRatio.
cRatio - (0.050 * level difference), or cRatio - .05 per mob level over 75.
Rangers yet again cheat here, with ranged attacks being cRatio - (0.025 * level difference)
Using level 82 colibri as an example, level correction is cRatio - .35, so this capped cRatio on Tachi: Gekko becomes 1.85.
It's worth noting that no, players don't get any sort of level correction while being hit by targets lower level than themselves.
Finally, this is fed into the PDIF calculation, which looks up the cRatio on a chart and adds a 5% randomization. Assuming the currently known numbers are correct, the example 1.85 will have a value between 1.42 and 2.22. A capped 2.2 would range between 1.84 and 2.64. The 5% randomization added after means a final cap of 2.77.
Going through the entire sequence, we have
Weapon DMG
+
More DMG from STR
+
More DMG from WS modifiers * level penalty
*
fTP multiplier
=
WD
Attack / Defense ratio
-
Level correction
+/-
Randomizer
+/-
Randomizer #2
=
PDIF
WD
*
PDIF
=
The Greater Colibri takes 1283 damage.
Important points:
STR is important on any WS where you can't fill in with the primary mod.
STR is even more important on WS that it's a primary mod (which is to say, the majority of them)
STR cheats on ranged attack, as ranged has literally double effect from STR.
It takes a lot of Attack to make a difference once you break mob DEF. Wearing Ochiudo's Kote (20 attack) on a theoretical colibri WS will only increase its damage by... (cRatio = 600 / 327 = 1.834~, 620 / 327 = 1.896~) 3%. Even unbuffed, the difference between 400 and 420 attack is still only 4%. Ranged attack cheats here too, being able to benefit from much higher levels of cRatio than other weapons.
Level correction is a bitch, and Ranged Attack cheats yet again, only taking half penalty.
Ranged Attack cheats.
This is Mai Ikari, and with any luck, you arn't more confused now than when you started reading this post.
( D + fSTR + WSC) * fTP * PDIF
That's the equation for WS damage. Putting meaning to the variables...
D = DMG
fSTR = Function of STR vs VIT
WSC = WS modifiers
fTP = Certain WS have a damage multiplier
pDIF = Ratio of Attack vs Def plus randomizer.
In the end, all that means is that stacking STR boosts raw DMG, and some WS double-dip into STR with WSC. Attack is important, but a lot of WS have attack multipliers (Steel Cyclone and Tachi: Gekko double your attack). Some WS have big fat fTP modifiers, which multiply the damage done.
DMG needs no further explanation, it's written right on your weapon.
fSTR is, more precisely, capped at Rank + 8, with a minimum of -Rank. Weapon Rank, is just DMG / 9. So a DMG:90 weapon is rank 10.
So Hagun is 75 / 9 = rank 8 + 8 = fSTR cap of 16.
Perdu Voulge is 91 / 9 = rank 9 + 8 = fSTR cap of 17.
(Note that 91, the base damage, not 96, the latent damage, is used to calculate rank. The only exception to this is Destroyers-style latents, which are always active and thus change the rank)
If you're breaking 100 STR on WS, it's a pretty safe assumption you're capping fSTR on normal targets.
If you're wearing STR+0 while hitting Kirin, you're probably capping fSTR in the other direction, which is around -5. (It takes Koenig or something to get below that)
/wordy
All of that boils down to getting free DMG:+X on your weapon from stacking STR, around 4-5 for one-handed jobs, 15-18 for 2-handers. Ranged Attacks gets double the effect of any STR with a high cap.
WSC is fairly simple. I'm sure you've heard of weapon skill modifiers. STR 75%, DEX 30%, AGI 60%, etc etc.
If you've got 100 STR and a STR 75% modifier, M = 75 (Arbitrary variable to keep things straight)
100 * .75 = 75.
Using Dragon Kick as a more real example here, STR 50% VIT 50%.
MNK has STR 68+38, VIT 66+30. 106 and 96. Multiplied by .5 is 53 and 48, M of 101.
Finally, that modifier is multiplied by .83, a balancing penalty for being level 75.
M * .83 = WSC, so 101 * .83 = 83.
/wordy
Sum modifiers * .83 = WSC
fTP is also written right out, this time on the wiki.
Tachi: Gekko is 1.5~ at 100% TP, 1.8~ at 200% TP, and 2.5 at 300%
Dragon Kick is 2.0, 2.75, 3.5
Raging Rush is 1.0, 1.0, 1.0
Add D, fSTR, and WSC together, multiply by fTP to get final weapon damage, WD.
WD * PDIF is the actual damage done.
PDIF is the complicated part of all of this.
First, cRatio is calculated.
Then, level correction is applied.
Finally, PDIF adds a couple things and adds randomization to get the variable melee damage we all see.
cRatio. Simply the ratio of your attack to the target's defense. Level 82 Greater Colibri have 327 defense, I have 450-something attack, roughly 1.37. Add in food, minuet and such, closer to 600 attack for a 1.8 ratio.
Remember, some WS have attack bonuses. Gekko doubles your attack, so if this was Gekko, I now have 1200 attack and a cRatio of 3.6 well beyond any cap that on cRatio, which is estimated to be 2.2 for 2-handed and 2.0 for 1-handed. Crits are a free +1.0 cRatio, with a cap of 3.0. Oh, and rangers cheat here, with ranged crits multiplying PDIF by 1.25 with an effective 3.75 cap.
cRatio caps: 2.0 for 1-h, 2.2 for 2-h, 3.0 for crits.
Level correction is then applied to cRatio.
cRatio - (0.050 * level difference), or cRatio - .05 per mob level over 75.
Rangers yet again cheat here, with ranged attacks being cRatio - (0.025 * level difference)
Using level 82 colibri as an example, level correction is cRatio - .35, so this capped cRatio on Tachi: Gekko becomes 1.85.
It's worth noting that no, players don't get any sort of level correction while being hit by targets lower level than themselves.
Finally, this is fed into the PDIF calculation, which looks up the cRatio on a chart and adds a 5% randomization. Assuming the currently known numbers are correct, the example 1.85 will have a value between 1.42 and 2.22. A capped 2.2 would range between 1.84 and 2.64. The 5% randomization added after means a final cap of 2.77.
Going through the entire sequence, we have
Weapon DMG
+
More DMG from STR
+
More DMG from WS modifiers * level penalty
*
fTP multiplier
=
WD
Attack / Defense ratio
-
Level correction
+/-
Randomizer
+/-
Randomizer #2
=
PDIF
WD
*
PDIF
=
The Greater Colibri takes 1283 damage.
Important points:
STR is important on any WS where you can't fill in with the primary mod.
STR is even more important on WS that it's a primary mod (which is to say, the majority of them)
STR cheats on ranged attack, as ranged has literally double effect from STR.
It takes a lot of Attack to make a difference once you break mob DEF. Wearing Ochiudo's Kote (20 attack) on a theoretical colibri WS will only increase its damage by... (cRatio = 600 / 327 = 1.834~, 620 / 327 = 1.896~) 3%. Even unbuffed, the difference between 400 and 420 attack is still only 4%. Ranged attack cheats here too, being able to benefit from much higher levels of cRatio than other weapons.
Level correction is a bitch, and Ranged Attack cheats yet again, only taking half penalty.
Ranged Attack cheats.
This is Mai Ikari, and with any luck, you arn't more confused now than when you started reading this post.
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