Feedback on Those Sweet (and Bitter)Skills --Act 2

[jack1974]

Ah no, I remember now, I need to set a flag and now is available only on two weapons (just tested with 2hand weapon doesn't work anymore). The problem was for enemies using the skill but I'll make a special version for them (otherwise was crashing )

[fabulaparva]

How does the Cross Cut skill look now? Dual-wield and Attacker traits activated. Weapons 20 normal dmg primary + 19 dark dmg offhand, both with attack value 5. (v0.8.24.3)

Ranger's Stats & Effective buffs (He's buffed with rally and energize):

Spoiler:

Regular Melee:

Spoiler:

CrossCut:

Spoiler:

Nobody puts Shea in a corner!

[jack1974]

Nice, seems balanced to me now? I mean compared to other Ranger available skills and Vaelis/Krimm powerful attacks? of course there can be some differences depending on weapon types, etc

[yayswords]

It doesn't look quite right to me, though this time it's not Cross Cut's fault. I dug out a save with a similar situation. 93 attack on my ranger, 78 defense on the target. Sporting a 30 (normal) damage weapon, that grants me 31-36 damage. This is twohanding.

You have a 20 damage mainhand, plus a 19 damage offhand. The offhand has a 35% penalty, making it 12.35, but the target has practically no dark resistance, making it 18.525 (1.5 multiplier) if I understood renke right. A total of 38.525. This means that while you do not have even 1/3 more "raw" damage, you're doing pretty much double my damage and the attack:defense ratio isn't to blame.

I'm gonna guess the explanation might lie in:

File under: Arcane. I believe you're generally correct, but this part of the code is spread across multiple functions and includes out-of-the-hat constants and random multipliers.

That was said in regards to elemental weapon damage calculations. I'll check sometime soon though (working on a Cross Cut ranger) what the real culprit is. Note that I'm not opposed to dual wield doing a little more damage, since you after all blow a skill point on that trait. It's just not "a little more" right now.

Could you check your damage with two normal weapons? In a similar situation so I don't have to dig out a new save to give us a comparable attack:defense ratio

[yayswords]

Okay I have been running some tests.

Xsabor: 13 damage water weapon if anyone forgot
The numbers within parentheses are the damage distribution of the actual attack (mainhand+offhand). On a curious side note, yes I do notice that all my attacks did max damage.

NO TRAIT
Ranger attack: 47-48
Target defense: 37-40
Target water resistance: 0-5

2x 15 DW: 24 (19+5)
Xsabor + 15 DW: 27-30 (25+5)
15 + Xsabor DW: 23-26 (19+7)

----------------------

WITH TRAIT
Ranger attack: 48-49
Target defense: 41-43 (I gained a level, so the target did too)
Target water resistance: 0-5

2x 15 DW: 33-36 (19+17)
Xsabor + 15 DW: 41-42 (25+17)
15 + Xsabor DW: 40-42 (19+23)

Firstly I'd like to say the traitless numbers look correct. Offhand damage seems to be penalized down to 25% indeed, with some slight tolerance for whatever rounding is happening behind the scenes, plus of course the damage range. But with the trait, no. Look at the 15 damage weapons: 19 in the mainhand, 17 in the offhand. Now look at Xsabor: 25 in mainhand, 23 in offhand. What's 90% of 19? What's 90% of 25? I think the trait doesn't make your offhand deal 65% damage instead of 25%, I think it makes it deal 65% extra damage, so 90%. You can also try dividing their offhand damage without the trait by 25 and multiplying it by 90 and then compare it to the trait-offhand-damage to see more "data" to suggest this.

If this is the issue, I still think fabulaparva's numbers will be pretty damn impressive after the fix. When I said 65% offhand damage for the trait, I was assuming that after "calculating" the raw damage - the weapon damage of a twohander, or the mainhand damage plus the penalized offhand damage - the other mechanics would treat them equally, but there seems to be something in the formulas that benefits DW more than 2h. I'll see how DW vs. 2h feels in act 2 when I get there anyway. I don't think the elemental damage calculations are to blame for anything though, and obviously not Cross Cut either: It is dealing double damage, as advertised.

P.S. to fabulaparva - do you actually keep different elemental weapons around in your inventory and switch them from encounter to encounter? It's just a game you nerd!

[fabulaparva]

P.S. to fabulaparva - do you actually keep different elemental weapons around in your inventory and switch them from encounter to encounter? It's just a game you nerd!

Lol, I've tried to maintain an arsenal. But on NM, I generally need the money more than I need the different elemental weapons for one character. I used the same combo with my ranger against Yeldin, who has quite high dark resistance (85%). I can't easily compare those figures to this as he also had way more debuffs on him (resulting in 59 normal melee attack dmg, 102 Cross Cut, and I don't have the numbers divided to each hand).

Anyway, I won't have access to the game for most of today, so I'll get back to this tomorrow, if needed. (Hell, I'll probably get back to it even if not needed. )

[jack1974]

Yes that was the error, it was adding +65% fixed it now so the damage is now 65% and not 25+65%

[yayswords]

Chalassa's Fatal Blow uses her melee weapons.

Mr. Fire is probably the most hopeless monster to stagger so far. I used like 5 attacks on him that specifically said they cause extra stagger but still couldn't do it.

I'm skeptical about Bleeding Strike increasing stagger. I caused the same stagger with a simple bow attack for the same damage. We're talking about +2 stagger here, so maybe it's down to rounding, but the upfront damage of Bleeding Strike is kinda low so I would expect a pretty hefty stagger multiplier on it. Else I might as well just use a big attack. Uh, if she has one

[jack1974]

Indeed Bleeding Strike has no stagger bonus
Though I'm not sure if I should add it? it's already a powerful attack because inflicts bleeding ? I can add the stagger bonus no problem, but wondering if I shouldn't give that stagger bonus to another skill instead...

[yayswords]

Well, the stagger bonus is in the freaking tooltip... so either you add it or change the tooltip.

As for using another ability for it... Chalassa is not packed with single target attacks. Poison Dagger already requires stagger, so the only remaining candidate would be Head Shot, unless you want staggering row nukes.

Hmm, what if Fatal Blow caused less damage but bonus stagger to >25% targets?

Okay, okay... you did something with the DoT caps I think and you didn't tell us!