Goumindong

OMG this will teach me to do math when i am tired Two Attack DPS = (2* Base Damage + (Base Damage * (1+dmg bonus) - 10) /4 +10 ) * 1+dmg bonus / twice Attack Speed So for a greatsword this is (2* 21 + (21 * (1+dmg bonus) - 10) /4 +10 ) * 1+dmg bonus / 2*4.7 -> 4.468 + .558 * (1+dmg bonus) -.265 + 1.063 * (1+dmg bonus)= (5.266 + .588 * (1* dmg bonus)) * (1+dmg bonus) And for Rapier this is : (2* 12 + (12 * (1+dmg bonus) - 10) /4 +10 ) *( 1+dmg bonus) / 2*3.5 -> 3.428 + .428 * (1+dmg bonus) - .3571 +1.42 *(1+dmg bonus) = (4.4909 + .428* (1*dmg bonus)) *(1+dmg bonus) Accuracy and penetration independent this is between a 19% damage increase at zero damage bonus to a 22.6% damage increase at a 200% damage bonus. This represents between a 30% (at zero damage bonus) and 63% dps increase(at 200% damage bonus) over auto attacking for two handed and a 43% to 74% increase for a one handed weapon. This might actually make one handed superior in net, penetration and modals depending edit: Slow two handed is 26 to 28% behind the two handers with a 35 to 67% increase. Given the value of accuracy this makes a pretty strong case for rapiers/clubs/daggers/flails edit: Sun and Moon Gets a bit of a bonus because it hits twice but they're reduced damage hits so the main advantage is in sliding some of the damage from the dmg-10/4 to the 10 portion. Which, to be fair, does help one handers a good deal. But It may not be enough to overcome other advantages. Edit: Xoti's Sickle may be an interesting option. You're gonna get a lot of kills. Both Finality and Urgent Harvest are very good. Finality because you don't want to be attacking near death enemies since you don't generate as much focus. Urgent Harvest because its a big action speed bonus (up to 10 dex equivalent with 20 religion). And the bonus sickle damage should be nice too (This should apply to SA but i don't think i can easily check). Its a pretty big bonus at 5%+.5%/religion. So max bonus at 20 religion =60%. Just a mythic xoti's sickle with soul whip would provide a 1.55 dmg bonus edit: On testing the sickle damage does apply to SA. So focus generation/damage isn't as good here as an AoE weapon. But it nets a pretty nice damage bonus (58% for a class that doesn't start with religion) edit: And I want to add that even if my ramblings didn't go in the direction of your support. I definitely did pay attention and learn from your posts and appreciate it Boeroer/Yorname

From testing i am coming to the same opinion (and i had missed that it also gave a primary attack because i had just like... not noticed two damage numbers when testing because i was killing things with one application of damage). Which means that SA is indeed a huge damage bonus even on a single target. This definitely clears the damage issues. However i noticed some interesting things. 1) On-crit effects that grant extra attacks trigger before the soul annihilation focus clear. So it may be better to try to get extra attacks with a fighters if that triggers AFTER the focus clear? Second head from sun and moon fixes this but it would be nice to have it in the build. Monks can't do this. Tactician is also possible here because Clear Out interrupts on hit and so has a high probability of restoring its discipline. Alternately the barbarian attack reset makes a lot more sense. 2) Pure SA isn't quite so bad. You lose a LOT but knives -> SA every attack -> 50% dmg bonus if you're not dual wielding. 3) Dual wielding dmg becomes weird. You get the recovery advantage for the main attack but not for the SA attack. This gets you to the stronger SA attack faster but only gets you half the recovery advantage effectively. HOWEVER this can also be used potentially strategically to cycle the pen type maybe. From testing it looks like SA always triggers on the main attack AND also always applies the position of the main hand cycle. That is. If you regular attack main hand, regular attack off hand, SA, then you regular attack off hand. And if you regular attack main hand, SA, then you regular attack main hand. What this means is that if you're dual wielding two weapons with different pen qualities you can CHOOSE which attack to make by when you SA (provided you hit the primary attack). Such, you could dual wield the soulbound cipher blade AND the animancers blade but only attack with the animancers blade for your "non-SA" attack if an enemy was resistant to piercing. I am unsure how to use this well. But its an option. 4) DMG Maths for weapons: So lets say you use a greatsword 18-24 dmg and a 4.7 second attack cycle. Vs a dagger 10-14 dmg and a 3.5 second attack cycle (ignore pen for a second). Because you will have, roughly the same damage bonuses and attack speed is linear the margin here is the toggles. So 21 avg/4.7 = 4.4 dmg/second. vs dagger 10-12 3.42 dmg/second. Vs animancers blade 3.24 dmg/second vs sabre 3.4 dmg/second. But the SA DPS is ((dmg-10)/4 * +10 ) / 2* Attack Cycle time. So for a greatsword the damage of two attacks is [42 + (11*dmg bonus-5)/4] / 4.7 = 4.4 + 2.2*dmg bonus - .265 Multiplied by accuracy. And for a dagger its 3.42 + 1.71 * dmg bonus - .35. multiplied by accuracy. Greatswords can get +.3 on dmg bonus which is pretty big, but take a 27 point accuracy penalty for this compared to a accurate one hander. Probably worth having both honestly. But +27 accuracy assuming a 100% graze rate already is effectively 100% graze to crit. And this effects the damage bonus portion of the SA attack cycle. Then again, so does main attack penetration. Importantly the dmg bonus portion is really big here. Those numbers aren't modified by final damage bonus. That is. If your dmg bonus is 0% then you get 4.4+2.2 - .265 dmg/attack modified by accuracy/missing. But if your dmg bonus is 100% you get 4.4+4.4 - .265 dmg/attack. I.E. a 100% increase in damage. And if your damage bonus is 200% you get 4.4+6.6 -.265 dmg/attack I.E. a ~150% damage bonus over attacking normally. Single target this kinda makes rogue or barbarian the only reasonable path. Barbarian gets +dmg via hit to crit and bonus crit damage. Rogue gets between .30 and 1.15 bonus dmg on sneak. And due to the dmg multipier being on the SU this is magnified by power level. edit: Pure Cipher at PL 10 is doing 4.4+2.2*dmg bonus * 1.5 where a barb is doing 4.4+(2.2*dmg bonus * 1.35). Barb can get a much higher damage bonus obviously. Cipher is limited to might + 1.1 (mythic + two handed style + soul whip) and barbarian can get another 40% on top of that (blooded/one stands alone) plus easy access to +15% from might (not to mention the 1-2 punch of SA and then Barbaric Smash to finish an enemy off). Plus attacking fort and the morningstar modal.... edit: LOL, because barbaric blows damage bonus is NOT a function of the ability it is suppressed by the savage attacks modal... Bloodthirst is amazing but i am not sure its that amazing Edit: So mob stance sometimes triggers on SA and sometimes doesn't... I can proc it if both damages portions are required but not if only the first damage portion is requried to kill a target. it seems like SA does the raw damage first, and then the primary attack (and so the raw damage does not benefit from the primary attacks focus gen) and THEN clears focus. So if you kill an enemy with the primary attack portion of SA then you cleave and can SA again And also tactician is not getting discipline from interrupting things that aren't spells or abilities that take up a resource, unfortunate. edit: preliminary i am getting that two handed is about 20% better than 1 handed. But this isn't accounting for misses (a miss means you cannot SA the very next attack, which is very bad). So i am thinking Barbarian or Rogue and having the Animancers blade as a backup. I am a bit unsure precisely how much penalty missing applies to total damage since if you miss you can not efficiently cycle SA.

I do not know why this is the case? So. I can see it for like.. Unbroken and devoted. Not because they're actually better as "fighters" but because if you are going to be casting the obvious answer is Tactician. A monk does get bonuses to int/dex/might/accuracy. But a fighter gets intuitive. and (with concentration) and conqueror stance. +15 AC, +50% graze to hit and +25% hit to crit. And since you're spells first you're tactician. Which means that you can get brilliant for +1 power level and infinite spells. And if you have any spells that interrupt you can utilize them to generate more discipline which you can use to ensure you're always intuitive and have high defenses and are unbending (which might trigger on blood mage damage but definitely is just something you can use since why not). Is +30% dmg +30% action speed +100% area of effect and maybe +12 accuracy better than that? Maybe. Intuitive itself is worth about +30% damage multiplicative, +30% action speed matters a lot less if you don't have infinite spells. And OK, +100% area of effect is amazing and absurd. And you don't lose any of that when an enemy uses a dash and stabs you.

Multi-class or not. Weapon Choices and racial choices So i am looking at this and doing a lot of "hrrm". The first is, that obviously streetfighter pairs "best" in terms of damage because it gets the most damage bonuses. Though other things may be better in general due to ease of getting inspirations/bonuses (fighter for aware/intuitive, maybe tactician or devoted, Barbarian for Carnage for focus gain, brute force for AC when paired with a morningstar, bloodlust, bloody slaughter, etc), and other defensive options. The second is that I am not sure soul annihilation is even that good ability. The main problem being its supreme inefficiency. Soul Annihilation's problem is mainly that, At PL 1 with draining whip, if you do less than 56 dmg/attack and are swinging a greatsword that you might as well swing the greatsword again. At PL 8 this goes down to ~22.5, which is a lot better and more manageable. But still not great in terms of "how much more damage am i getting". Like, lets say you're PL 8, you attack generally for +200% damage from various non-lash bonuses(i.E. x3 mult on attack). Which is 64.5 dmg/swing. Soul Annihilation should do ~99.25 dmg/attack (10+54.5/4 * 1.4 x 3) . So you Attack once and then SA once and do, on average 81.8 dmg/swing. Which is only 26.9% more damage than attacking with the greatsword normally at +200% dmg. Which means that you're awful close to just being worse than a X/monk where X is whatever your priory MC was and adding a 20% lash and +10 int. As your damage bonus goes down this gets worse. Based on this this implies that maxing might is ideal but tanking might still might be better for (DPR +3% dmg from +200% is .4% dmg increase over the full cycle which is just lower than any reasonable action speed bonus or perception bonus throughout the relevant range). In order to beat "make a lot of focus and disintegrate" then, defense dependent you need to do north of 126*might bonus dmg/3 seconds. (action speed independent. That is, disintegrate does ~252 dmg*might with a 6 second cast time so if your annihilation cycle isn't better than this you're better off just making disintegrates. Lower might makes this easier but Focus costs are irrelevant Sooo stat ideal is Min Might Decent Con (for fortitude) Max Dex Max Per Min Int duration and AoE barely matter except in on the MC side decent Res (might as well survive) But racial options are hmmm. Hit to crit for Orlan? Resistance to an affliction type. Or nature +power level? So breaking down SC/MC options we have Everyone Potentially: Two Handed Style +15% dmg, Greatsword +30% (-10 acc), One Handed Style (+20% hit to crit[equiv to about +8 ACC],+12 ACC), Rapier 20 ACC (+50% recovery). Borrowed Instinct +20 Acc/+20 defenses. Tactial Meld (aware +5 ACC/50% graze to hit), Draining Whip +20% Single Class; Time Parasite, Reaping Knives for Focus, 1000 cuts. By far highest damage net due to 1000 cuts and Reaping Knives. But only lategame. +3 PL Barbarian: Carnage (does this stack focus?). Frenzy (+15% dmg, +25% action speed), Zerker (30% hit to crit + 2 pen). Barbaric Smash (+20% dmg, 30% hit to crit, 50% dmg if crit), lions sprint (+15% action speed, +15 acc for SA), Bloody Slaughter (20% hit to crit, 50% crit dmg if crit vs near death), bloodlust (20% action speed on kill), One stands alone (+20% melee dmg should apply to SA), Bloodthirst (recovery immediately once on a kill). When healthy resistance to physical afflictions So net we have 35% dmg, 55% if we're killing things with BS. +15 accuracy for SA itself a set number of times per fight. +45% action speed after the first kill. +55% action speed for SA a set number per encounter. 20 to 50 to 80% hit to crit depending on how they sum and enemy health levels and whether or not berzerker is chosen. Questions. Would mage slayer prevent self buffs from cypher? UPSIDE: not a lot of use for INT if refreshing frenzy chosen. Though that is late. Just loads of hit to crit. Refresh on kill negates a lot of recovery penalties if you can keep it up. Fighter: Tactician Possible(brilliant is OK for soul blade but not great). Disciplined Strikes (Intuitive! 25% hit to crit), Knockdown (+10 Acc interrupt on graze... tactician infinite) Mob Stance(bonus attacks on kill -recovery per threatened enemy), conqueror stance +5/10 ACC, Refershing defense(+20 defenses), Clear Out(AoE for focus generation), Confident Aim (30% graze to hit), determination(+20 def vs affliction attacks!), resistance to might,dex, resolve afflictions. Weapon spec/mastery +15% dmg, armored grace (+armor with same recovery penalty) Net +25% hit to crit +15% dmg, bonus attacks on kill so long as the kill isn't with SA. +5/10 ACC with SU. 30% graze to hit. Bonus attacks... downsides: Needs int to keep intuitive up for a decent duration. This seems defensively much better than barbarian but MUCH worse offensively. Monk: Transcendent Suffering. Option for good crush dmg fists. Unsure of exact dmg/PL but its good. Competes a little bit with legendary/mythic weapons so lets say +2 AC,+15% dmg. Iron Wheel +3 armor (i know int tends to be viewed as better but the lash doesn't apply to SA so survival seems better, though int does help with stats due to monk needing int). Swift Strikes (30% action speed), 33% crits trigger another attack, Enduring Dance, maaybe 3-12 AC. Hearbeat Drumming 25% crits trigger new attack. Loads of active attacks that should generate focus Subclasses, +crush dmg vs fort makes single weapon easier for enemies immune to dmg types. (not great wound generation). +1 might/wound but take far more damage, 5 wound limit, but wounds on dealing damage. Would lean to Forgotten Fist here. But the main value seems to be in Swift Strikes + hearbeat drumming and i am not sure barbarian is just better than this Net +58%? crit to new attack. +stats, 30% action speed. potential crush dmg attacks without changing weapons downsides Needs Int Rogue: Sneak Attack +25% +5% per PL (or 15% for illusionist), Mirror Image and Displaced Image(illusionist), Or heating up(loads of dmg but complicated not always available), Gouging Strike (attack vs reflex), Crippling strike(attack vs fortitude), Finishing Blow (huge bonus damage), (backstab +100% if you can cheaply get invisible, and guile is limited), dirty fighting(10% hit to crit), Deathblows(+50% dmg) , Slippery Mind(immunity to mental afflictions when blow 50% HP, combines with food for full affliction immunity below 50% HP), persistant distraction (free flanking) net: + 55% to 165% dmg, -50% recovery maybe, Finishing Blow to smash enemy HP. Like, the potential spike for a 1/2 HP invisible streetfighter is +265% dmg. That makes a 10 might character do 108 SA damage with 50 focus. Cons: Not much really. Illusionist specifically. Streetfighter may have trouble triggering heating up depending on how you're playing. Paladin: Goldpact is the only real option. +40% damage and +4 armor from sworn rival. But aside from that you don't get a lot. It may be better to be a straight paladin given the low damage bonuses achieved here. Wodica is OK for healing and +1 PL from start conditions if you really want that but armor seems better. Can regen zeal. Can gain loads of armor. Pros: not a lot of active abilities focused on making SA better besides being able to use eternal devotion to kill things/generate focus. Wizard (conjurer). Conjurer is the only real option for +3 to a stat, +another ancillary bonus and +1 power level. But spells besides spirit lance are kinda eh. At least in terms of enabling SA ---- So defensive the answer is probably fighter. Offensive i think its barbarian or streetfighter. Streetfighter is harder to get going since you don't have a way to get yourself bloodied or flanked easily. (you can use blunderbuss but you don't want to swing with it and its a lot of weapon switching so if you are int light you can very easily lose your buff. ) Rapier Barbarian which is reliably killing gets +37 AC and +huge hit to crit with no downside. So really... Am i missing anything. (important itemization that changes the calculations?). And... is it still just worse than a "not a cipher" (Like Streetfighter/Zerker seems hilarious with a way to track their HP (if they're heating up and not flanked!) and huge bonuses to damage and up to 45% action speed with 225% bonus damage and 150% extra crit damage and very large hit to crit) and just... probably kinda better than trying to use SA edit: and before you say "ahh but other cipher MC's" yes, i know. I don't want to cure cancer i want to be a soul blade.

This is interesting but do you remain threatening those enemies when they die? Because it seems like, in order to get the bonus, you have to be surrounded by a huge number of enemies. Which doesn't make it bad, but it does limit the number of enemies you can reasonably threaten by physical space. And its less useful for dangerous enemies as weaker ones die.

Torments reach is crush but its a lash and lashes are based off of the total modified damage and not the base damage of your weapon. So if you add scion of flame to firebrand the crush damage on the torments reach lash increases because the modified damage before DR increases. And the lash damage of Turning Wheel increases as well. I ran the math assuming that crits were additive(though i did have Scion as multiplicative, that will reduce damage across the board, it should be multiplicative on Lashes). The multiplication you're seeing is a result of the multiple lashes, not crits. 60% for Turning Wheel (6%/wound due to Scion of Flame) and 50% for Torments Reach crushing Lash => 110% lash damage = 2.1 multiplier to final damage. Not being able to add a lash to Firebrand is immaterial. You can see the difference in damage compared to Durance's Staff with Scion of Flame. The assumption there is that Durance's Staff is upgraded to superior and since it does fire damage as well it gets the same multiplication error as above. Such the ratio should be precisely the same(I may have messed the numbers as they look low a glance). Not only you can use firebrand far earlier than you can get a Superior or Durgan Superior weapon but the 15% recovery isn't going to make up the 47% base damage increase. What i meant with regards to carnage was whether or not it hit the original target. Or if it only hit the AoE. I am guessing the latter. Barbarians with Firebrand are indeed good. Though i prefer single target damage on melee classes.

Wizards with summoned weapons make great to amazing second line damage dealers. If you're looking for damage on a melee monster that has already been debuffed or you're flanking then all of the melee weapon spells will have top notch damage per second as well as damage per slot. Even if you don't have a lot of +damage modifiers or have a particularly high might the amount of damage they do is top notch. The wizard/druid summoned weapons all have a base damage of 20-30. Which is 47% higher than a normal two handed weapon. Because its weapon base damage this results in multiplicative rather than additive scaling. Thus the most damaging weapons in the game are all summoned. The most damaging in an AoE is Citzal's Spirit Lance. The most damaging single target is firebrand because it does fire damage and so all of its damage stacks with scion of flame multiplicatively*. After that its Concelhaut's Parasitic Quarterstaff. A level 1 wizard spell which you can fairly easily master. Wizards also get some of the best buffing spells in the game, Like DAoM, Displaced Image, Essential Phantom, Safeguard, and Martial Power. If you want to see some really hilarious damage and as an exercise to examine just how strong these weapons are Put the Foregemaster Gauntlet on a monk with Turning Wheel and Scion of Flame, 16 might, and Two Handed Style. This item allow you to summon firebrand [Damaging 3, Bonus Crit damage, 20-30 base fire damage] 3/rest. The Deadfire cannoneer belt will let you do it another 3 times and also give you 2 might, 3 dexterity, and 2 intelligence. This produces 30 base damage attack[25x1.2 from scion of flame] *(1+ .45[weapon damage modifier] + .018[might] + .15[two handed style])* 2.1 [Due to 60% fire lash from turning wheel and scion of flame and 50% crushing lash from torments reach and note that the lash portion only defends against 1/4 DR] AND +1 crit modifier...though you will want a different weapon for dragons as some are fire immune...this produces an average torments reach damage of 80/110/175 [graze/crit/hit] the AoE portion will be 19/26/42 [against 1/4 DR]. And the belt gives you another 2 might and 3 dexterity because this monk clearly needed more damage. Durance's Quarterstaff is also good for this because it does crushing or fire damage... If we assume that we have enchanted it to be superior then its damage scale for those attacks will be 52/73/92 [graze/crit/hit] and the AoE portion of that will be 11/15/19 [against 1/4 DR] A similar two fist torments reach would do 69/95/121[graze/crit/hit] but be twice as susceptible to DR penetration; though it would go off a bit faster. Now the monk is unique in that they can easily stack multiple lashes for well multiplicative damage. Which other classes cannot as easily do(besides barbarians? Is Carnage a lash? does it apply to the character you're attacking as well?). However what is not unique is the ratio at which the summoned weapons do damage compared to even top quality weapons and the ease of acquiring those weapons. Concelhaut's staff is a level 1 spell. It has +8 ACC and does a load of damage. You could use it far into the game as a primary weapon on a wizard.

True. The value of 1 ACC, assuming that you will always at least graze(which is not hard to achieve) is 1%+(additional critical strike modifier)%*. So the max you're going to get with persistence is <1.5%. But even this will have damage be a much more significant portion of the value for the accuracy trade off. *Conversion(hit -> crit and graze -> hit) actually reduces the value of accuracy. Because these are independent checks from the accuracy roll increasing accuracy will decrease the range of outcome rolls at which conversion is applied. However writing out the full formula for a change in 1 ACC is long and full of if statements so its easier to just talk about likely situations. Also i thought the character in question was a ranger. With the talk of wounding shot et al.

Generally depends on your build but i would guess its not worth it. Each point of ACC is optimally worth +1% DMG + .01*(1+DMG bonus-.5)% DMG This is because, optimally, you will move entire spectrum up by one point. So one point of miss becomes a graze which adds (1+dmg bonus-.5) * .01. That is, if your damage bonus is .89 (Vicious Aim, 18 might, Persistance bonus) then going from a miss to a graze adds 1.39% damage linearly. One point of graze becomes a hit which increases your damage by +.5 dmg bonus*.1 One point of hit becomes a crit which increases your damage by +.005. So you would add 2.39% damage for every point of ACC. In this case every point of damage adds 1% * (graze+hit+crit) rate damage. So if your minimum graze rate is at or above 80% 1 point of might (3% damage applied 80% of the time is about 2.39% damage) is worth more than 1 point of perception (1 ACC) If you have enough accuracy to not miss at all then every point of perception is directly equivalent to +1% damage bonus. If you have enough accuracy to not ever graze then every point of perception is directly equivalent to .5% damage bonus. (plus or minus variance modifications... plus or minus secondary crit characteristics) Rangers tend to have very high ACC for a variety of reasons and so my guess is that you will be trading about a 15% damage bonus from dmg modifier for a 4% damage bonus from accuracy. If for some reason you're using swift aim then you might be better off with the accuracy. But even then you're only going to be getting about 8.7% damage bonus equivalent from the +4 accuracy change and you will be losing out on the +15% extra damage increase(assuming a 66% graze rate then that is still worth 10% damage) Modifications come when you consider the ancillary value of critical strikes and hits versus grazes. Critical strikes increase the duration of over time effects. I am not sure how the wounding enchantment works with crits but if it increases the duration like other over time crits do then this may produce a significant increase in DPS. (damage is then increased twice, once from the +dmg as a result of potentially critting and then once from the duration increase of potentially critting)

Uhh well... yes. If you had a weapon that had an infinite recovery time there would be no penalty to using full plate. It is indeed harder to reach zero recovery with heavy armor on anything other than DW but that does not negate the fact that the penalty (so long as you're not over cap) is still larger. I don't know about you but i find that in any of the fights that particularly matter i still do a lot of auto attacking; simply because the duration of the fight means that I am out of activatible abilities long before the fight is over.

I was under the impression that DR was one of the things effected by difficulty (at least in POTD). If its not then I am wrong there. My estimation was also below 13(as i do not have the expansions). So that effects things as well. As for tanking. I find fighters tend to do it better due to their passive healing and high consistent damage. But the difference isn't big enough to matter most of the time and post 13 Paladins defenses scale better(there is also a margin between a main character paladin and not, with the main character paladin being significantly stronger) According to this thread's updated form and its http://associated html calculator you only have that iteration of attack when you use an ability that says "full attack action" otherwise you alternate attacks with a significant positive recovery modifier. Monks in particular have an good time dual wielding because its very easy for them to always have "full attack action" activated abilities to use since they're not encounter limited. (and lets be honest... you're going to take the damage)* The way attack recovery modifications work is linear in simple effect. Linear in simple effect produces diminishing penalties to increase in absolute effect. I.E. if you move from 20 frames per attack to 30 frames per attack you have lost 33% dps. If you move from 30 to 40 you have lost 25%. So if you're wielding two daggers your attack cycle is 5 raw delay, 20 attack, 16.6 attack delay main hand then 5 raw delay, 20 attack, 16,6 attack delay off hand. Dual wielding has produced a 50% recovery reduction on the main and off hand. If you then put on plate mail you're back up to normal 5 delay, 20 attack, 33.3 delay for each since it produces a -50% recovery reduction. A 29% reduction in DPS. Compare to a Two Hander or one hander. Which went from 5, 30,50 to 5,30,75 when adding the plate. A 23% reduction in dps. Because of this, until you're over the zero recovery cap you will always suffer a larger effective penalty from any penalty when you're closer to the zero recovery cap. This is true. But we're talking about stat allocation here. So adding might is in expense of constitution or perception or resolve. You're always gaining or losing those ancillary advantages and disadvantages in other areas. Once we subtract out the fortitude (because we're now trading off for some other equally important defensive stat) we're largely left with the unique advantage that the stat brings. Attack, Damage, Attack Speed**, AoE etc. If you're thinking to yourself "I gotta have those extra couple of points in might in order to eeek out more damage" you probably don't, you can make up for it with a talent and the marginal value on the stats end up being pretty low once you add a talent or two that specifically addresses that area. There are indeed. And its raw better than DW if you're able to achieve 100% attack recovery reduction. Its just harder to do and so unlikely to be recommended. You're generally either going to want to have a 2H for punching through DR or a 2W for dealing maximum dps. The point wasn't that it didn't have value just that you're more likely to see a guide recommend "don't go one handed only" compared to "don't use two handed weapons" Sure, but you don't get relentless storm early in the game. And can get interrupting blows and high perception early in the game. And its not like you cannot use stunning abilities like the above with high perception and interrupting blows (indeed they're better with high perception as an increased probability of crits/reduced grazes means an increased incapacitated duration). Building around interrupts on a barbarian is pretty iffy since your attack range isn't that great and your tick rate is always going to be low, limited by your attack speed, and its AoE. But AoE recurring interrupts stack with each other because you can stack them by casting more AoE recurring interrupts in the area. *Additionally it is worth noting that if you are attempting to make use of this you may want to use a fast main hand weapon (like your fist or a hatchet) and a large off hand weapon (like a spear or saber) in order to maximize your overall DPS against foes with decent DR **Attack speed is a funky one for a number of reasons but its also the only ability that is fully summable with other stats and so makes dexterity unique.

It is partially true that the advise you have been given is bad. But not because of those specific points but because those points ignore how to succeed in Pillars and focus on how to achieve success better once you know how. Specifically Pillars of Eternity is less about stat optimization as it is about action optimization. There are a few exceptions to this on higher difficulties* but in general success is had by layering debuffs/buffs/actions and not by maximizing stats. The stacking rules with regards to debuffs and buffs are very punishing if you don't realize what is going on. Do you need high accuracy to land those initial debuffs? Not really; since a graze is as good as a hit for the first few seconds of a debuff you can utilize the lowered stats due to the debuff to apply other debuffs for longer. Its also very easy to apply buffs that are already up and not realize it. Zealous Focus does not stack with the level 1 priest Accuracy buff spell as an example. With regards to the specific points: 1) Paladins i think are one of the weaker melee classes. But not because they're weak, simply because they're not as focused as some of the others. They don't do AoE damage like barbarians and monks. They don't produce as much consistent single target DPS as fighters.. And they don't tank as hard as fighters. They don't heal as hard as priests. What they do do is all of those things at once. Adequate single target and burst damage. Adequate tanking. Good healing(especially single target). 2) Two handed weapons are great and get better as difficulty increases. Two handed weapons are less effected by armor attack recovery malus when compared to dual wielding** and do a significant amount more damage than sword and board. There are, additionally, a large number of very good two handed weapons floating around the game. Dealing damage is important to keeping aggro on your tanks (if your disengage does not hurt enemies will simply disengage and surround your squishy units) and two handers are tops at doing that against high DR targets. The real thing that people would be likely to suggest not to do would be to run a one handed weapon with no shield. This does give a significant accuracy bonus but unless you're abusing an "on crit" effect that isn't particularly valuable***. 3) Monks are probably the best melee class at all points in the game. Melee classes are almost always going to take damage regardless and they not only have good defenses but also get stronger as they take damage. Additionally they have ways to take advantage of taking damage even more. A monk with the deadfire cannoner belt is rightly hilarious 4) Min-maxing talents is more important than stats. Every additional point of stats generally has diminishing returns. From 18 to 19 might you gain +3% damage. But you were already at +24% damage so your relative gain is only 2.4%. Going from 10 to 11 dex gives you 3% attack speed. So 18/11 has s slightly higher DPS than 19/10. Unless attack speed really doesn't matter for you you maximize dps at 14/15 or 15/14. Two handed Style is worth 5 points of might. Interrupting Blows is worth 5 points of perception. Weapon Focus is worth 6 points of perception. Utility elemental damage talents are worth > 7 points of might for spells which are that damage type. Weapon Swapping abilities are worth many points of dexterity for situations... etc etc. *certain classes are easy to mess up on higher difficulties because they will not be able to optimize their actions without a fairly optimal build. Offensive casters i think are a focus here. Its really easy to choose spells that simply don't do enough, or leave power on the table compared to abusing interrupting blows and AoE re-apply ticks. Chill Fog is one of the better wizard spells not just because of the damage and the blind, but because each damage tick has a chance to interrupt, producing a rolling AoE- mini stun. Wizards who want to nuke that are not focused on this type of build will find themselves unable to effectively contribute unless others are picking up the slack and because enemy HP increases on higher difficulties, AoE DoT's become a lot more valuable. **Dual wielding gives a bonus to attack speed and recovery for each weapon. Because of the way that bonuses stack this means that the recovery penalty applied from armor hurts them the most. ***Post white March 2 fighters can do this because they will be able to get prone on disengage. Having a high attack bonus basically ensures this hits. Critting produces an even longer effect. Besides this there aren't ways to AoE proc on-crit effects for weapons as far as i know.

Note that "two handed style" only applies to melee weapons and so, if your wizard is focusing on spells or rods, they should avoid a style all together. "two handed style" should only be taken if you plan on using the two melee weapon summon abilities.