Curse

Aug 13, 2005, 08:49 PM // 20:49

Good number crunching there. However, now I see the reason we were missing each other: I always keep expertise at 12/14 and choose between WS and Marks.

Dot spiking is when you put continous pressure on the entire enemy team through constant Dots. MA does this will since every arrow is autobleeding and even Martyr cant constantly keep up with it. So what you do is DoT enough targets to a good amount of HP so that the monks have to triage(picking who to heal). You just spike a target at that moment since from the opposing teams view there is no priority target till the spike starts, and you've exhausted energy so they cant efficiently deal with the spike.

Mind Wallaby · Aug 13, 2005, 10:44 PM // 22:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

Going from 12 to 14 in Wilderness Survival increases MA damage by 2 points, per arrow.
Yes, if you are using Dual Shot (a very good idea in a MA build), you get 2x the benefit from MA. However, you need to account for the fact that you also lose 11 points of damage per arrow, in that Dual Shot. Indeed, at Marksmanship 9, instead of being only 25% weaker, each arrow in the Dual Shot is now a whopping 55% weaker, than if the character's Marksmanship was at 14. You gain twice the benefit of Melandru's, twice the benefit of Favourable Winds, twice the benefit of Judge's Insight armor penetration, but at the same time, you lose 30% damage per arrow because of low Marksmanship.

Err, how are you calculating these numbers? The usage of Dual Shot should not change the relative strengths of the two builds. If the ratio is X/Y for one shot it will still be X/Y for Dual Shot assuming the 25% reduction form Dual is applied at the end.

Let's say we're comparing Marks 9 + WS 14 versus Marks 14 + WS 12.

Marks 9 + WS 14: 25.3 expected damage to start with
Judge's Insight gives 20% AP for an extra 23% vs 60AL targets, raising expected damage to 31.1.
Melandru's is added last, flat +26 damage results in 57.1 expected damage.

Marks 12 + WS 12: 36.8 damage
Judges Insight raises this to 45.3
Melandru's adds a flat +24 to give 69.3 expected damage

So we find that the Marks 9 build does about 18% less damage per arrow than the Marks 14 build. Of course it doesn't matter if you use one shot, Dual Shot, or ten shots, the percentage difference will always be 18%.

You'll notice that I added Melandru's damage last. This is how I understand the damage calculations work. Just in case I am wrong though, and Melandru's is applied before JI, here are the numbers with the different order of calculations:

Marks 9 + WS 14: 63.2
Marks 14 + WS 12: 74.9

Which works out to be about a 16% difference decrease from Marks 14 to Marks 9.

That being said, I agree that you shouldn't go below 12 Marks in a Ranger damage build.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

In this particular example I did not need to show the entire damage range. The 30% difference is in play at both the minimum and the maximum damage, and at every point inbetween.

That's the reason your calculations confirm my statement

You made two statements:
1) You'd be doing 30% more damage per arrow with Marks 14 than with Marks 9
2) From 1), using maximum damage as a particular value, you'd be losing 11 damage on every hit ("[...]cannot possibly justify giving up 11 points of damage on every hit that build is ever going to make.").

1) is more or less true; you forgot to account for the different probabilities of critical hits but they're close enough to suffice (the real expected difference is about 31.3%).

2) does not follow from 1). You'll only lose 11 points of damage on those hits when 11 happens to equal 30% of the larger value. As a counterexample, if you get unlucky and roll the minimum base damage (15), the difference between Marks 14 and Marks 9 is only about 6 points. If you get a critical hit the difference is almost 20 points.

The coincidence here is that your calculation with maximum damages yielded approximately the same absolute number as my calculation with expected damage. This only happened because of the particular real values for bow damage, not because there was a necessary correspondence between your calculations and mine.

Aaaaanyway I have a feeling this number crunching is losing its interest to most people. I agree with the logical points you made

Ender Ward · Aug 13, 2005, 11:11 PM // 23:11

As far as I know, Melandru's Arrows is applied directly to the initial bow damage, and benefits from Judge's Insight.

How am I calculating the Dual Shot numbers? The difference in arrow damage before buffs, between 9 and 14 Marksmanship is 30%. Dual Shot reduces the base arrow damage by another 25% (it does not affect +damage buffs). If additive, the total damage reduction is 55% per base arrow.

I ignored critical hits for the purpose of the comparison, as they (IMO) introduce a dregree of complexity that isn't really relevant to the point being made: that you want your marksmanship way higher than 9 (12 minimum). The 11 point figure was used as an illustrative example. To show the effect of the 30% loss/gain in damage betwen 9 and 14 Marksmanship. It was meant to put a less abstract value on the damage a character would actually be doing.

I wasn't even attempting to cover all disclamers and be 100% accurate in the numbers. But merely attempted to illustrate a point (that you seem to agree with).

When stating that your calculations agree with my statement, I'm stating a fact. You used the a difference of 30% in base bow damage, in your comparison between the 'expected damage' at 9 and 14 Marksmanship.
Note, that I did not state that the difference in damage would be 11 points at every point in the damage range, between the minimum and maximum. I stated that it would be 30%. The direct damage value of 11 points is only relevant to the top range, as you've pointed out.

As I hope you've noted, I stil kept including the disclamer "before buffs", when talking about the 30% damage loss. I kept referring to base bow damage, not wanting to make the impression that overal damage is reduced by 30%. I was already burying myself in disclamers, so can I not be forgiven for not being 100% precise in all aspects of the comparison

?

Now, my statement about losing 30% base arrow damage at every point in the damage range, remains as true as ever, doesn't it? And that was the only point I was trying to make (and ofcourse the point that competition between Marksmanship and Wilderness Survival attribute point allocation isn't necessary).

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mind Wallaby

Aaaaanyway I have a feeling this number crunching is losing its interest to most people. I agree with the logical points you made

Fair enough

Neo-LD · Aug 13, 2005, 11:13 PM // 23:13

Actually I was pretty sure melandru's / RtW added amage directly to the arrow and would therefore recieve the benefit of 20% AP (JI)

UberRusty · Aug 14, 2005, 01:12 PM // 13:12

I love how posting the TF + MA +JI combo started a whole new argument.

Anyway, this is my experience with MA/JI combo. The damage is added after all calculations are done (supposing the arrow hits the target). That means the additional damage do not recieve the 20% armor penetration from JI.

ToMTeMoR · Aug 14, 2005, 08:17 PM // 20:17

What armor do you recommend using?
Druids gives 3 more energy, but studded leather still gives +5 nrg but on top of that +15 ligthning resistance, which is good against light eles. What do you think?

oh and btw, im gonna use two superior runes (marksmanship and expertise) so that might be something that adds to this decision?

Or perhaps Having everything druid's except for the armor, which can be studded? It will leave you with the most vulnerable area protected against light, while still giving +9 to energy (as opposed to +12 with full druids)... perhaps it will look ugly as hell tho

What armor set are you using?

ICURADik · Aug 15, 2005, 01:10 AM // 01:10

Judge's Insight on a ranger is horrible. 2.75 second cast time(4.75 with NR) that only affects a ranger's rather mediocre physical damage just doesn't work. You might as well attack two or three more times than to cast the JI.

On any Melandru's Ranger 14 Marks makes no sense. Melandru's already accounts for nearly half your damage. 14 marks might make some sense on a Quickshot ranger because your preperation isn't nearly as strong as Melandru's, but you are already required to have 14 Expertise, and running double superior is very touchy unless fertile season is up.

Ender Ward · Aug 15, 2005, 02:22 AM // 02:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by ICURADik

Judge's Insight on a ranger is horrible. 2.75 second cast time(4.75 with NR) that only affects a ranger's rather mediocre physical damage just doesn't work. You might as well attack two or three more times than to cast the JI.

Judge's Insight affects the entire damage from the bow (21.7-40.51 @ 14 Marksmanship), Read The Wind and Favourable Winds. JI armor penetration takes the total damage into account.

It will not affect conjures or preparations like Kindle Arrows, which is why you don't use them.

As for 'Ranger's rather mediocre physical damage' ... let's look at facts, shall we?
With 14 Marksmanship, Favourable Winds and Read The Winds stacked, using an 'ideal +35%' bow, the damage is 37.7-56.51. In comparison, your favourite R/W with a Hammer, using an 'ideal +35%' Hammer @ 12 Hammer Mastery, is doing 25.65-47.25 damage.

Now who attacks faster, a QS Ranger doing normal/QS under Tiger's Fury, or a Hammer R/W under Tiger's Fury? The former, ofcourse. The QS Ranger without JI is sustainable in terms of energy for pretty much forever (with a zealous bow), and has far less counters too.

And I didn't even factor in the 20% armor penetration from JI on the QS Ranger. Otherwise the comparison would be even more lopsided (though sustainability for the QS Ranger will go down).

The numbers speak for themselves.

Quote:

On any Melandru's Ranger 14 Marks makes no sense. Melandru's already accounts for nearly half your damage. 14 marks might make some sense on a Quickshot ranger because your preperation isn't nearly as strong as Melandru's, but you are already required to have 14 Expertise, and running double superior is very touchy unless fertile season is up.

QS costs 2 energy at 13 Expertise. The only reason to pump it to 14 is for Tiger's Fury to cost 4 instead of 5 energy. This however is very far from 'required'.

14 Marksmanship on Melandru's is used because you really have no better place to put those points in (don't 'require' higher than 9 Expertise on a Melandru's build), so might as well go for more damage. Also useful if you're forced to fire on a non-enchanted target. Ofcourse 12 Marksmanship will also do.

14 Marksmanship is needed for Read The Wind to top out at +10 damage. And, if you read the thread, you'd know that you use RtW and not Kindle because RtW benefits from Judge's Insight, while Kindle does not.

Double superior runes on a Ranger is perfectly fine. You're not a caster, and you are low on the priority target list. Hell my rangers get attacked even less often than my warriors (using a flatbow and staying outside of spell range helps).

ICURADik · Aug 15, 2005, 03:10 AM // 03:10

Favorable and RtW? You sure about that? Lol...

Edit: How about we add in an average of +12 damage to the warrior(+24 every other attack)... and remove the fictional extra 6 damage from Favorable Winds. Number's don't lie... but yours certainly try.

Since damage is only done in whole numbers, we now have 32-51 damage with the bow and 37-59 damage with the hammer.

ICURADik · Aug 15, 2005, 03:20 AM // 03:20

Also...a perfect weapon is NOT 35%. It is 38%. 1.15*1.20=1.38.

Aug 15, 2005, 03:27 AM // 03:27

hmmm, additive vs multiplicative, oh my.

ICURADik · Aug 15, 2005, 03:50 AM // 03:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blackace

hmmm, additive vs multiplicative, oh my.

trolling as usual?

Aug 15, 2005, 04:21 AM // 04:21

you're one to talk

ICURADik · Aug 15, 2005, 04:26 AM // 04:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blackace

you're one to talk

true1

Donnie · Aug 15, 2005, 05:16 AM // 05:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by ICURADik

Favorable and RtW? You sure about that? Lol...

remove the fictional extra 6 damage from Favorable Winds.

Forgive me, I'm a little slow. Do you mean that FW never adds +6 or that it won't add +6 if you're also using RtW? Or is it something else entirely? In any case, your damage figures are pretty close to each other for the R and the W, and the R doesn't have to run up to somebody to do it. Obviously W's have their advantages, but that's another subject.

Thanks.

kF

Ender Ward · Aug 15, 2005, 05:27 AM // 05:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by ICURADik

Favorable and RtW? You sure about that? Lol...

What are you asking here exactly?

Quote:

Edit: How about we add in an average of +12 damage to the warrior(+24 every other attack)... and remove the fictional extra 6 damage from Favorable Winds. Number's don't lie... but yours certainly try.

Fictional? This is easily tested. Compare critical hits with Favourable Winds and without. Then test combinations with Read The Wind and Favourable Winds. Fictional my arse.

Next, my numbers are taken directly from the Guru calculators (although in game I'm seing slightly higher ones, usually).

Oh so we're talking about using skills now. Well ... how about we then compare 38-57 damage every 0.8 seconds (shot/QS fires at just under 2 sec) to doing 26-47 damage every 1.17 seconds. Using Irresistible Blow ever other attack for 38-59 damage @ 1.17 seconds attack rate.

Let's say that the +12 damage from Irresistible Blow every other attack (under QZ) makes up for the slightly slower rate of fire on the hammer R/W. And let's forget for a second that QZ being up offers the QS Ranger the option of an unmatched, insane rate of fire ...

This stil doesn't adrees the fact that the Hammer R/W is way more easily countered than the Quickshot R/X.

So, the question becomes:

Do you bring a less easily countered ranged character that has the same DPS, but doesn't have to chase the target (and can use distracting shot to boot) and can fire outside spell range. Or, do you bring a much more easily countered character, that needs to chase his target and is by nature in quite abit more danger?

ICURADik · Aug 15, 2005, 05:54 AM // 05:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Donnie

Forgive me, I'm a little slow. Do you mean that FW never adds +6 or that it won't add +6 if you're also using RtW? Or is it something else entirely? In any case, your damage figures are pretty close to each other for the R and the W, and the R doesn't have to run up to somebody to do it. Obviously W's have their advantages, but that's another subject.

Thanks.

kF

This is easily testable.

ICURADik · Aug 15, 2005, 06:00 AM // 06:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

What are you asking here exactly?

Fictional? This is easily tested. Compare critical hits with Favourable Winds and without. Then test combinations with Read The Wind and Favourable Winds. Fictional my arse.

Next, my numbers are taken directly from the Guru calculators (although in game I'm seing slightly higher ones, usually).

Oh so we're talking about using skills now. Well ... how about we then compare 38-57 damage every 0.8 seconds (shot/QS fires at just under 2 sec) to doing 26-47 damage every 1.17 seconds. Using Irresistible Blow ever other attack for 38-59 damage @ 1.17 seconds attack rate.

Let's say that the +12 damage from Irresistible Blow every other attack (under QZ) makes up for the slightly slower rate of fire on the hammer R/W. And let's forget for a second that QZ being up offers the QS Ranger the option of an unmatched, insane rate of fire ...

This stil doesn't adrees the fact that the Hammer R/W is way more easily countered than the Quickshot R/X.

So, the question becomes:

Do you bring a less easily countered ranged character that has the same DPS, but doesn't have to chase the target (and can use distracting shot to boot) and can fire outside spell range. Or, do you bring a much more easily countered character, that needs to chase his target and is by nature in quite abit more danger?

Sry, your wrong. They don't stack.

What is your +12 every other attack coming from? It's +24 every other attack. Which averages to +12 every attack, as I said already.

Ender Ward · Aug 15, 2005, 06:12 AM // 06:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by ICURADik

Sry, your wrong. They don't stack.

Test it. They stack. Wouldn't be using the combination otherwise (actually, strike that, I stil would, the arrow speedup is quite useful on it's own).

Quote:

What is your +12 every other attack coming from? It's +24 every other attack. Which averages to +12 every attack, as I said already.

You're correct. The damage is then definitely very close. Counterability is stil the reason to go with a QS Ranger instead of a Hammer R/W for DPS.

ICURADik · Aug 15, 2005, 06:32 AM // 06:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

Test it. They stack. Wouldn't be using the combination otherwise (actually, strike that, I stil would, the arrow speedup is quite useful on it's own).

You're correct. The damage is then definitely very close. Counterability is stil the reason to go with a QS Ranger instead of a Hammer R/W for DPS.

Lol. I tested it when the game came out and I tested it an hour ago. They still do not stack. If the damage bonus doesn't stack(as it doesn't) you can almost be asured that the flight time doesnt either.

The great thing about Irresistible Blow is that the normal counters, Wards, Aegis, Guardian, etc. don't work.

Edit: In all seriousness I think there is a place for a damage dealing ranger, thru Melandrus or Quikshot. But what you have described and the incorrect/intentenal biased numbers you use to show it are an absolute farce.