Dual-wielding, full attacks, and recovery

[mant2si]

For primary attack yes, for full not :D

[MaxQuest]

Do these sound accurate, and are there any other benefits to dual-wielding that I missed?

They do sound accurate) Especially 1, 2 and 5.

 

Here are a few notes regarding points 3, 4 and 6:

 

3. Similar to afflictions, if the attack has a chance to return resources or do something else on crit, dual-wielding gives two chances to do so. Even if that thing can only happen once, having two chances to trigger it is still a major benefit.

They indeed get two chances. But there are some situations when having double-chance... is still less. For example you have by 15 higher accuracy than enemy defense and:

> you make a Full Attack while dual-wielding:

- chance to crit on mainhand: 16%

- chance to crit on offhand: 16%

- So the chance to crit at least once during FA is: 29.44%

 

> you make a Full Attack while wielding 1H weapon: (with built-in +12 acc bonus and +20% hit-to-crit conversion from 1h-style):

- chance to crit on mainhand: (16 + 12 + 0.20 * 50) / 100 = 38%

 

4. Dual-wielding means faster recovery, which means they can take other actions such as casting spells or making another full attack more quickly. So not only do they get major benefits from full attacks, but they can also make those attacks more quickly. Obsidian appears to have balanced dual-wield recovery time based on auto-attacks, but that doesn't take other types of actions into account.

From auto-attack perspective:

> dw increases your attack rate

> 2h has higher base damage

> 1h has higher accuracy (misses less, crits more)

 

Full-attacks aside, this should be fairly balanced.

 

6. They get bonuses from two different weapons. In theory, this should be solved by two-handed weapons having better benefits, but in practice, I haven't really noticed that. (Sword & Shield gets this benefit as well, but Sword & Shield is kind of its own thing, and isn't as much of a concern for this conversation.)

Yeah there are weapon bonuses that are attached to directly to character, if they are related to stats, engagement_limit, power_level and so on.

But there aren't that many weapons that have such bonuses. And even less weapons that are also good from dps perspective.

 

Solitude from Acolyte's Frostbite

True Independence from Modwyr

+2 fire PL from Magran's Favor

+15 all Defences against Plant attacks from Vion-ceth

+5 Resolve for 10 sec per kill from Last Word

and +20% action speed/dmg with Daggers while drunk from Pukestabber

 

Are there any other weapons whose bonuses apply to character himself?

Afaik majority of bonuses are weapon related and apply only to their respective hand.

And if a weapon lists +pen, +acc, +speed bonus (something that is a property of weapon class) but applies to both hands, is most likely a bug, like in the case with Harpooning from Mahora Tanga (which was already fixed).

 

---

#5 is in my opinion the main reason that makes dual-wielding that good.

Full-Attacks while DW greatly increase the attack rate.

Not to mention that not needing to reload main-hand firearm ever, or having a rapier with modal on without any downside is really sweet.

 

I think dunehunter suggested that two handed weapons should just get a max dmg roll with Full Attacks. I found that pretty interesting. Basically it's a base damage increase for Full Attacks with two handers and makes them very predictable (when it comes to dmg output). I liked that suggestion best so far.

I remember advocating the same solution ^^ here

 

Was also calculating the steady dps during backers beta for auto-attacks, primary-attacks and full-attacks: link

The conclusion to which I arrived was that Full Attacks with a non-dw setup require a 11%-35% damage boost in order to compete.

 

Making Full Attacks roll max damage, will have the following consequences:

- Estoc/Pollaxe/Morning Star: 14-22 -> 22 => +22% increase

- Great Sword/Pike/Quarterstaff: 18-24 -> 24 => +14% increase

- Arbalest: 17-25 -> 25 => +19% increase

- Hunting Bow: 14-24 -> 24 => +26% increase

 

I like the idea of giving 2H a max damage roll on full attacks; not sure how to make 1H more attractive though.

Easy

 

Full-Attack: roll max damage. If you are dual-wielding: hit with both weapons instead.

Edited July 31, 2018 by MaxQuest

[Boeroer]

For primary attack yes, for full not :D

 

That is not correct.

 

If you deliver a Full Attack with dual weapons the main hand strikes first, its recovery is omitted and the second weapon strikes second and its recovery counts,

 

So if you put a faster weapon in the offhand you will have a faster recovery with a Full Attack than doing it the other way round.

 

So it's smart to put the faster weapon into the offhand and the slower one into the main hand when doing Full Attacks.

[Boeroer]

Making Full Attacks roll max damage, will have the following consequences:

- Estoc/Pollaxe/Morning Star: 14-22 -> 22 => +22% increase

- Great Sword/Pike/Quarterstaff: 18-24 -> 24 => +14% increase

- Arbalest: 17-25 -> 25 => +19% increase

- Hunting Bow: 14-24 -> 24 => +26% increase

Cool. Did you take into account that this would be an increase of base damage and thus would be multiplicative? I strongly suspect so - just to be sure...

[MaxQuest]

When deciding which (slow or fast) weapon to put into mainhand/offhand, I also look at:

- full-attack ability cost

- character's role

 

If it's cost is low (let's say 1 zeal) and it can be spammed, it's wise to go with MH_slow + OH_fast.

If it's cost is high (let's say 4 rage) and you want to inflict max possible damage: MH_slow + OH_slow.

If the character's role is not to deal damage, but to cc instead (and he's not using a shield): MH_fast + OH_fast. (think of a skald who full-attacks with MH_rapier + OH_dagger with rapier modal on)

 

Cool. Did you take into account that this would be an increase of base damage and thus would be multiplicative? I strongly suspect so - just to be sure...

That's the thing ^^

Since it is an increase to base damage, there is no need to take into account any damage coefficients)

 

Great Sword before: (18+24)/2 * f(c1+c2+c3+...+cn)

Great Sword after: 24 * f(c1+c2+c3+...+cn)

Edited July 31, 2018 by MaxQuest

[AndreaColombo]

Any idea whether the max damage roll solution is moddable? If it is, it would be great to try out and give Obsidian feedback based on user experience. It made a difference during the beta.

[mant2si]

* Modwyr - +20 lash for both weapons

* Scordeo's Edge +2 acc for both weapons 
* Amaliorra  affect all attacks vs vessels

* Hel Beckoning + 2% lash on hit

* Grave Calling + 2% lash on hit
* Scordeo's Trophy +5% recovery speed

* Tuotilo's Palm + 20 Deflection, scaling with PL, Retalation

All weapons that give you something on hit, will increase your average DPS for each full attack. Scordeo's Edge can give you +10ACC with 5 full attack. Ranger / Barbarian can achieve max bonus with single HoF/WW use

I'm sure even max roll can't help with abilities like, Stunning Surge, Gambit, all upgrades of Blinding Strike , because you can very easy increase DPS even with 2H, but can't use any other game mechanic, game should give you alternative mechanics instead of same DPS

Edited July 31, 2018 by mant2si

[MaxQuest]

Thank you for the list)

 

* Modwyr - +20 lash for both weapons

* Amaliorra  affect all attacks vs vessels

* Hel Beckoning + 2% lash on hit

* Grave Calling + 2% lash on hit

Have you checked if these apply to spells? If the effect is attached to character and not weapon, there is a high chance it will be working with them...

 

Must note also that lashes applying to both weapons doesn't look as intended to me (unless the tooltip is explicit about it)

 

I'm sure even max roll can't help with abilities like, Stunning Surge, Gambit, all upgrades of Blinding Strike , because you can very easy increase DPS even with 2H, but can't use any other game mechanic, game should give you alternative mechanics instead of same DPS

Do you refer to Stunning Surge and Gambit because they can refund resources?

If so, the first will be fixed in v2.0: "Stunning Surge will no longer refund its cost twice if dual wielding and both attacks crit.".

And I guess Gambit shall be adjusted in the same manner.

 

Regarding Confounding Blind: it has a deflection malus cap of -30, and iirc is achievable with just 1 blunderbuss shot.

As for Gouging Strike: I have yet to try it)

 

Any idea whether the max damage roll solution is moddable? If it is, it would be great to try out and give Obsidian feedback based on user experience. It made a difference during the beta.

I don't see any Full Attacks from abilities.gamedatabundle to contain any related properties (e.g. Flames of Devotion)

So modding (via json) is highly unlikely.

 

But I think it should be possible via dll modding (the way IEMod in PoE1 was doing it).

Edited July 31, 2018 by MaxQuest

[mant2si]

Amaliorra - affect even spells, all other weapons should affect only weapon damage, but for example Chill Fog from Grave Calling affected by lash bonus from Hel Beckoning

> Stunning Surge will no longer refund its cost twice if dual wielding and both attacks crit

But you still has double chance to crit (I assume that accuracy for 2DW and 2H is same), i.e you has ~50% more to refund at least 2 resources (with 50% crit chance)

> Regarding Confounding Blind: it has a deflection malus cap of -30, and iirc is achievable with just 1 blunderbuss shot.

But with 2DW you need only 2 attack, when with 2H you need still 4 attack or switch to blunderbuss
 

Edited July 31, 2018 by mant2si

[mant2si]

* Magistrate's Cudgel - has 30% chance to mark enemy and give you +10 acc to all attack

* Rust's Poignard - has 30% chance to prone and lower deflection by -10 

Both mechanic require from you fast attack speed 
 

Edited July 31, 2018 by mant2si

[Boeroer]

Confounding Blind does -2 deflection on hit. A blunderbuss should only do -8, a Full Attack with Blunderbuss -16.

 

Dual wieldig might have two chances of refunding Stunning Surge - but the one handed style still has a higher overall chance to crit/refund. Only two handers will have a disadvantage in this case - but to be honest: it's only Stunning Surge and Gambit. I can live with that.

Edited July 31, 2018 by Boeroer

[jww]

A lot of good possibilities here that could be tried, to see what's best. I wish we knew whether Obsidian was looking into this.

 

Some sort of damage bonus for full attacks seems almost necessary (for two-hand or single-weapon style). A small accuracy bonus would be nice for two-hand style on full attacks to help land afflictions. Single-weapon already has pretty good accuracy, but maybe a bonus to crit damage as suggested above. These extra bonuses might change the math for how much the damage bonus should be, but I don't think it would change it by that much, and it would enhance the flavor of the different styles.

[Boeroer]

They are looking. I have the impression that they are looking more than ever.

 

Which is good!

 

They are answering a lot more questions from the forum in the streams now, they mention stuff from the forums in the streams. This might sound evil but maybe the pause that Josh is taking from PoE does us good. No more Somethig Awful and Tumblr questions in the streams means more place for our suggestions/questions, hehe.

 

Still wish that he comes back pretty soon though.

[MaxQuest]

> Stunning Surge will no longer refund its cost twice if dual wielding and both attacks crit

 

But you still has double chance to crit (I assume that accuracy for 2DW and 2H is same), i.e you has ~50% more to refund at least 2 resources (with 50% crit chance)

 

> Regarding Confounding Blind: it has a deflection malus cap of -30, and iirc is achievable with just 1 blunderbuss shot.

 

But with 2DW you need only 2 attack, when with 2H you need still 4 attack or switch to blunderbuss

Some abilities are better with specific style. Tbh... I'm ok with this.

 

If a monk wants to spam primary attacks (like Torment's Reach) he might prioritize 2H.

If he wants to spam full-attacks - DW is usually the way.

 

In case of Stunning Surge, he has the following options from cost-refund perspective:

- DW - which has x2 the chance to refund the resource cost when compared to mundane 2H

- 1H - and benefit from +12 acc and 20% hit-to-crit conversion (this can lead to higher chance-to-crit than during DW)

- unusual 2H - which depending on implementation can go through attack resolution multiple times, e.g: Whispers of the Endless Paths (which attacks in a cone), Three Bells Through, also it wouldn't hurt to check the interaction with Rods with modal on / The Red Hand / and Frostseeker.

 

* Rust's Poignard - has 30% chance to prone and lower deflection by -10, on crit

 

Both mechanic require from you fast attack speed

Feeling kinda torn apart between two point of views on these.

From one pov, these are effects that even other hand benefits from, while they are in effect.

From another, these are not some passive bonuses, and require to be actively inflicted. And they cannot be inflicted while you are performing an attack with another weapon.

 

There is a following example that is not going out from my head:

 

Imagine you have:

- Sword_A - a mundane sword

- Sword_B - same as A, but with +4 MIG

- Sword_C - same as A, but with +5 acc

You can dual-wield or single-wield, but (!) have the same auto-attack hit rate and acc bonuses with both styles. Now:

 

If you replicate Sword_B and dual-wield it, you get +8 MIG vs +4 MIG if you would single-wield it .

If you replicate Sword_C and dual-wield it, you get the same +5 acc on each hit, as if you would single-wield it.

If you replicate Rust's Poignard and dual-wield it, it's same stuff as if you would single-wield it.

And same thing with the Cudgel

 

 

Btw, offtopic, but really do like that Cudgel on a cc battlemage (with dumped MIG, maxed PER/DEX/INT). Charge, Knockdown, Visage, hit/stun with Cudgel, insta-kill lower-level enemies.

Edited August 1, 2018 by MaxQuest

[grasida]

 

Do these sound accurate, and are there any other benefits to dual-wielding that I missed?

For example you have by 15 higher accuracy than enemy defense and:> you make a Full Attack while dual-wielding:- chance to crit on mainhand: 16%- chance to crit on offhand: 16%- So the chance to crit at least once during FA is: 29.44%> you make a Full Attack while wielding 1H weapon: (with built-in +12 acc bonus and +20% hit-to-crit conversion from 1h-style) chance to crit on mainhand: (16 + 12 + 0.20 * 50) / 100 = 38% 

This only applies to stunning surge specifically, since that’s the only full attack that really cares about crits. For the rogue’s strike powers, for example, just hitting is more important. In that case, single weapon style is more or less never better than dual wield. You only have a higher chance to apply the affliction if you would have a 14% chance to miss while dual wielding, or a 2% chance with single weapon style. With a few higher points of accuracy, while technically single weapon will be more reliable, the chance for dual wield to fail to apply an affliction is less than 1%. It’s true grazes are important for the duration of afflictions, but not enough to compare with the other advantages full attacks have.

 

For a skald looking to score crits, for example, a fast single hander with a rapier + modal spamming accurate wounding shot would almost certainly build more crits over the course of a fight than a single rapier using the same ability. Aside from a specific band of accuracy vs. deflection within the single case you mentioned, dual wield beats single weapon in terms of crit generation and reliability of affliction application in the vast majority of cases.

 

Single-weapon already has pretty good accuracy, but maybe a bonus to crit damage as suggested above.

 

Does it have “enough” accuracy? 100% crit rate seems quite unattainable, and since the overall speed increase from dual wielding with full attack is far, far higher than the accuracy boost from single weapon style, there’s only a certain band within which single weapon is better. In most cases where you want to be accurate for reasons other than just dealing damage, dual wield will still be more effective because of full attacks.

 

And how much +crit damage would you have to give it? It would have to be a lot. +25% crit damage would still only be a moderate damage increase, even if you crit 100% of the time assuming some bonus from might, a legendary weapon, class damage bonuses, etc. And one specific goal Josh Sawyer has repeatedly mentioned is his desire to avoid reliable, extreme damage spikes, since that would encourage scumming the opening of a fight until you roll a powerful crit and one shot an enemy. That’s the reason guns have -% crit damage. So an extremely high bonus seems problematic as well.

 

If people don’t like the idea of accuracy, maybe instant recovery on melee crit, or something more exotic, like 50% chance to retaliate against melee attacks on crit for 2 seconds, would be better.

[mant2si]

Ohh, maybe I replay in games like Grim Dawn and Median XL where you  take 2H and it feel like 2H, you know when base damage overcome both weapon with 2DW style, when something like Fireband give you +4PL to fire spell and 15% chance to cast AOE fireball, when your COOL LOOK fire godlike cast meteor shower with big sword ... because you know they synergy so well (you has armor vs your fireball AOE and your fire-shield get +4PL)

And now I just has +25% fire lash ... Single Modwyr has +20% lash, attack speed and immunity to intellect
 

Edited July 31, 2018 by mant2si

[grasida]

Partly I think that’s because for ARPGs gear is so important to every build, and almost every piece of gear should be supporting your damage in some way, that it becomes a lot more obvious. The one-handed fire sword has +100% fire damage, so the 2-handed fire sword has to have +200% fire damage. A decent claw can give your assassin +200% damage, so frysturgard had better blow it through the roof.

 

Gear is far more low key here, with strong caster gear giving a +10% bonus to spells and plenty of caster builds don’t have an “+% to spells” at all. But still, if you can find a one-handed sword with +10% to spells, you should be able to find a two hander that helps casters about twice as much, one way or another.

[jww]

 

Single-weapon already has pretty good accuracy, but maybe a bonus to crit damage as suggested above.

Does it have “enough” accuracy? 100% crit rate seems quite unattainable, and since the overall speed increase from dual wielding with full attack is far, far higher than the accuracy boost from single weapon style, there’s only a certain band within which single weapon is better. In most cases where you want to be accurate for reasons other than just dealing damage, dual wield will still be more effective because of full attacks.

 

And how much +crit damage would you have to give it? It would have to be a lot. +25% crit damage would still only be a moderate damage increase, even if you crit 100% of the time assuming some bonus from might, a legendary weapon, class damage bonuses, etc. And one specific goal Josh Sawyer has repeatedly mentioned is his desire to avoid reliable, extreme damage spikes, since that would encourage scumming the opening of a fight until you roll a powerful crit and one shot an enemy. That’s the reason guns have -% crit damage. So an extremely high bonus seems problematic as well.

 

If people don’t like the idea of accuracy, maybe instant recovery on melee crit, or something more exotic, like 50% chance to retaliate against melee attacks on crit for 2 seconds, would be better.

 

 

Sure, I'm open to whatever makes sense. I don't know the math well enough to judge what's best, but there are a lot of potential options mentioned in this thread. If the devs are actually looking into it, maybe they've come up with some we haven't thought of yet...

[mant2si]

Gear is far more low key here, with strong caster gear giving a +10% bonus to spells and plenty of caster builds don’t have an “+% to spells” at all. But still, if you can find a one-handed sword with +10% to spells, you should be able to find a two hander that helps casters about twice as much, one way or another.

Yes, we already has 2x weapon with +2PL and AOE fire on critical hit kill, Obsidian please put some 2H mage/rogue weapon. But I still luck such synergy, we have only monk shield and few weapons with elemental PL

 

 

Edited July 31, 2018 by mant2si

[thundercleese]

 

* Modwyr - +20 lash for both weapons

* Scordeo's Edge +2 acc for both weapons 

* Amaliorra  affect all attacks vs vessels

* Hel Beckoning + 2% lash on hit

* Grave Calling + 2% lash on hit

* Scordeo's Trophy +5% recovery speed

* Tuotilo's Palm + 20 Deflection, scaling with PL, Retalation

 

All weapons that give you something on hit, will increase your average DPS for each full attack. Scordeo's Edge can give you +10ACC with 5 full attack. Ranger / Barbarian can achieve max bonus with single HoF/WW use

 

I'm sure even max roll can't help with abilities like, Stunning Surge, Gambit, all upgrades of Blinding Strike , because you can very easy increase DPS even with 2H, but can't use any other game mechanic, game should give you alternative mechanics instead of same DPS

 

You can add Rust's Poignard - Shank (attack speed against flanked enemies) applies to both weapons.

[fable123]

Full attack suggestions:

 

Dual wield - weapon damage from both (current state)

Single weapon - weapon damage plus raw damage over time

Two Hander - weapon damage in a 90 degree frontal cone

Weapon and Shield - weapon/shield damage plus prone or interrupt

Edited July 31, 2018 by fable123

[thundercleese]

Full attack suggestions:

 

Dual wield - weapon damage from both (current state)

Single weapon - weapon damage plus raw damage over time

Two Hander - weapon damage in a 90 degree frontal cone

Weapon and Shield - weapon/shield damage plus prone or interrupt

I like the Weapon and Shield suggestion, however many full attacks already have interrupt on hit (pretty much all of Rogues, for example). Also there are full attacks that already apply a raw damage dot (Rogues again, Hunter's Wounding Shot). As Boeroer said earlier, some two handers just wouldn't make sense to have an AoE cone. Something like Clear Out would be more suitable imo.

 

Ideally I would like to see something like what they did with Strike the Bell; unique effect based on weapon used. Though it's probably a bit late for such a drastic rework of all the (full attack) skills.

[Boeroer]

It has to be a change that is easy to implement (e.g. doesn't need animation/graphics changes).

 

Because this simply would lower the chances that our wish gets fulfilled.

 

I also don't think that weapon and shield needs a special Full Attack. It's a defensive setup and doesn't need to be on par when it comes to damage dealing. It's a pretty powerful setup already. For Full Attacks with a shield there's stuff like Tuotilo's Palm.

Edited August 1, 2018 by Boeroer

[Haplok]

In case of Stunning Surge, he has the following options from cost-refund perspective:

- DW - which has x2 the chance to refund the resource cost when compared to mundane 2H

- 1H - and benefit from +12 acc and 20% hit-to-crit conversion (this can lead to higher chance-to-crit than during DW)

- unusual 2H - which depending on implementation can go through attack resolution multiple times, e.g: Whispers of the Endless Paths (which attacks in a cone), Three Bells Through, The Red Hand, Frostseeker, also it wouldn't hurt to check the interaction with Rods with modal on.

 

Well, The Red Hand only procs special abilities once. For me it actually seems to stop once the first shot is completed while using Stunning strike (need to issue attack command again to get the shot from the second "barrel").

Frostseeker's aoe is a separate attack also, I think.

 

There's also "unusual 1h"    Hand Mortar, Fire in the Hole. Though I'd prefer Obsidian not to nerf those.

[Veolfen]

The reason Dual Wield are also way better than others is the fact that 90% of the martial art skills are full attacks.

Edited August 1, 2018 by Veolfen