[MECHANICS] Various Testing

[Noqn]

39 minutes ago, MaxQuest said:

Am thinking about setting EncounterLevel to 4 or 5.

The quest is Lv 4 so I think that would be appropriate for the encounter as well.

[Testlum]

Despite its description, Great Maelstrom doesn't actually alternate its attacks. When first cast, it will cause both attacks to anyone caught in the AoE; on pulse, it will only cause the Freeze/Crush attack.

[NotDumbEnough]

The different components of GM also correspond to different keywords, so the +1 pen talents don't apply to all components of GM.

 

Probably relatively well known, but enemies don't drop their weapons if they're equipping a summoned weapon. This is mostly an issue with Katrenn and Eccea, be careful not to kill them while they have summoned weapons out.

Edited November 11, 2021 by NotDumbEnough

[Noqn]

On 11/10/2021 at 12:41 PM, Noqn said:

Here are all lv1 encounters with spawns, i.e. the ones that might not have the proper EncounterLevel value assigned to them:

Spoiler

RE_City_Merchant_Slick1
RE_Mataru_Guard_Ambush
RE_Talfor_Pirates
RE_Lagufaeth
RE_Wahaki_Huana_Ruins
re_campsite_flame_naga
RE_Junvik_Eoten_Guard
RE_Hunter_Camp_Trader
RE_Hunter_Camp_Trader_Huana
2604_Lagufaeth_Warchief
RE_Slavers
RE_Thieving_Imps
RE_Unaffiliated_Pirates
RE_Ghost_Ship_Dispatch
RE_Plague_Ship_Dead
RE_Plague_Ship_Smugglers
RE_RDC_Huana_Ruins
RE_RDC_Pai
RE_Stranded_Ship_Spirits
RE_Vailian_LuminousAdra_Merchant_Ship
RE_Vailian_LuminousAdra_Merchant_Ship_02
RE_Vailian_LuminousAdra_Merchant_Ship_03
RE_Vailian_Merchant_Ship
RE_Ukaizo_Corsairs
RE_Ukaizo_Huana
RE_Ukaizo_Principi
RE_Ukaizo_RDC
RE_Ukaizo_Ruquapa
RE_Ukaizo_Slavers
RE_Ukaizo_VTC
RE_Ukaizo_Watershapers
RE_Wahaki_Sea_Combat
RE_Wrecked_Ship_Lagufaeth

Ok barely any of these encounters were actually implemented in the game... besides Talfor only three other, all related to The Last Sanctuary:

RE_Wahaki_Huana_Ruins: The Wahaki you meet on the beach on the way to Motare o Kōzi. (Embēta is Lv9 and the rest are Lv8.)
RE_RDC_Huana_Ruins and RE_RDC_Pai: Both related to the encounter with Captian Pai after sailing away from Motare o Kōzi. (Pai is Lv9 and the crew is Lv8.)

These three encounters should imo be set to Lv 8 to match the level of the quest.

This should fix these encounters:

Spoiler

{
    "GameDataObjects": [
        {
            "$type": "Game.GameData.WorldMapEncounterGameData, Assembly-CSharp",
            "DebugName": "RE_Talfor_Pirates",
            "ID": "1713167e-427c-4603-a884-70d0d376f197",
            "Components": [
                {
                    "$type": "Game.GameData.WorldMapEncounterComponent, Assembly-CSharp",
                    "EncounterLevel": 4
                }
            ]
        },
        {
            "$type": "Game.GameData.WorldMapEncounterGameData, Assembly-CSharp",
            "DebugName": "RE_Wahaki_Huana_Ruins",
            "ID": "cb884c30-2506-4d09-9e99-f57f612dbe30",
            "Components": [
                {
                    "$type": "Game.GameData.WorldMapEncounterComponent, Assembly-CSharp",
                    "EncounterLevel": 8
                }
            ]
        },
        {
            "$type": "Game.GameData.WorldMapEncounterGameData, Assembly-CSharp",
            "DebugName": "RE_RDC_Huana_Ruins",
            "ID": "9d21db57-8dfd-4d69-a3c1-3c5b52186ae8",
            "Components": [
                {
                    "$type": "Game.GameData.WorldMapEncounterComponent, Assembly-CSharp",
                    "EncounterLevel": 8
                }
            ]
        },
        {
            "$type": "Game.GameData.WorldMapEncounterGameData, Assembly-CSharp",
            "DebugName": "RE_RDC_Pai",
            "ID": "d55bf33e-44f6-47b8-a647-7391f2a9253d",
            "Components": [
                {
                    "$type": "Game.GameData.WorldMapEncounterComponent, Assembly-CSharp",
                    "EncounterLevel": 8
                }
            ]
        }
    ]
}

Edited November 11, 2021 by Noqn

[Elric Galad]

Does anyone has experience with SC Rogue using dual Blunderbusses, but not mortars ?

I would tend to think these 4 hits weapons would pretty much guarantee at least 1 Crit per swing, which is enough for infinite recursive Gambits.

[NotDumbEnough]

It is not very good. The odds of failing to get a crit on an attack is bigger than you might think even with 4 attack rolls. I only ever made it work with a rogue wearing Devil of Caroc Breastplate and resting at the bathhouse for more Guile. The problem is that even then your damage output isn't amazing; you might get 50-60 damage per swing even when min-maxed (I was using a SC Assassin dual-wielding Ball and Chain and Sungrazer, which prone and stun on crit respectively). Then you compare it with a single-class Monk using Whispers of the Wind and wonder what the point is. It is also not very good against tougher targets and bosses, e.g. dragons have innate crit to hit, and of course it's not good if you are grazing all the time.

 

IMO the only rogue subclass worth single-classing is Trickster, as WoMC and Kalakoth's Freezing Rake are both amazing spells (Wizards have their best spells at tier 8 -- conveniently you get access to them). I don't bother with either Gambit or Vanishing Strikes as both require lots of investment with very poor payoff.

Edited November 12, 2021 by NotDumbEnough

[Kaylon]

10 hours ago, Elric Galad said:

Does anyone has experience with SC Rogue using dual Blunderbusses, but not mortars ?

I would tend to think these 4 hits weapons would pretty much guarantee at least 1 Crit per swing, which is enough for infinite recursive Gambits.

Melees have better accuracy (Scordeo's Edge buff, no penalties) and more options to debuff deflection (Persistent Distraction + Cap of the Laughing Stock + Rust's Poignard/Sungrazer procs) which means easily 40-50acc advantage over a blunderbuss user. Melees also have better damage and hard CCs (prone, stun, freeze) which makes them superior in almost any situation.

[Boeroer]

14 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said:

It is not very good. The odds of failing to get a crit on an attack is bigger than you might think even with 4 attack rolls.

Don't know what you did, but with 10+ Guile you should have 100% crit conversion when using Gambit. So actually it's quite hard not to get a crit with 8 rolls if you set yourself up properly. In order to not get a full refund you have to miss or graze 7 out of 8 rolls. 

This might happen against certain megabosses - but against everything else this seems very unlikely?

2 hours ago, Kaylon said:

Melees have better accuracy (Scordeo's Edge buff, no penalties) and more options to debuff deflection (Persistent Distraction + Cap of the Laughing Stock + Rust's Poignard/Sungrazer procs) which means easily 40-50acc advantage over a blunderbuss user. Melees also have better damage and hard CCs (prone, stun, freeze) which makes them superior in almost any situation.

As I said above: Gambit can have 100% crit conversion. I didn't write it down but I have the suspicion that it's more likely to miss or graze with 1 out of 2 melee weapon rolls (sun & moon would add a 3rd roll making it 2 out of 3) than it is with 7 out of 8 blunderbuss rolls - even if the melee weapons should have a lot more acc. 

Cap of the Laughingstock can be used with blunderbusses, too. 

The rest (better cc, dmg) still stands though. And I think that's even more impactful than accuracy (because of the crit conversion). It is a lot easier to spam Gambit on an enemy without getting disturbed if that enemy constantly suffers from hard CC - imo. 

 

[Elric Galad]

25 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

Don't know what you did, but with 10+ Guile you should have 100% crit conversion when using Gambit. So actually it's quite hard not to get a crit with 8 rolls if you set yourself up properly. In order to not get a full refund you have to miss or graze 7 out of 8 rolls. 

This might happen against certain megabosses - but against everything else this seems very unlikely?

As I said above: Gambit can have 100% crit conversion. I didn't write it down but I have the suspicion that it's more likely to miss or graze with 1 out of 2 melee weapon rolls (sun & moon would add a 3rd roll making it 2 out of 3) than it is with 7 out of 8 blunderbuss rolls - even if the melee weapons should have a lot more acc. 

Cap of the Laughingstock can be used with blunderbusses, too. 

The rest (better cc, dmg) still stands though. And I think that's even more impactful than accuracy (because of the crit conversion). It is a lot easier to spam Gambit on an enemy without getting disturbed if that enemy constantly suffers from hard CC - imo. 

 

That said, Xefa's Empirical can prone on Crit and Gambit Interrupt on Hit anyways. Scordeo's shall be loaded before reaching +20 Acc and Flanking can be obtained by other party members.

Not to say melee is worse but I would suspect blunderbuss to not be that bad.

Misses and Grazes from blunderbusses will also reduce the damages, which matters too. You're pretty likely to have some. And melee have a sheer diversity of possibilities.

[Boeroer]

Blunderbusses have another disadvantage: Pierce dmg only - and the base PEN is also not good (like swords, but without alternative dmg type). 

[NotDumbEnough]

Certain enemies have very low power levels for some reason; this buff came from Zihaa during the Watershaper's Guild quest while he was dominated. There was no resolve affliction on him, so I guess he just has abnormally low power levels?

Edited November 13, 2021 by NotDumbEnough

[Boeroer]

I think he has some Druid spells/abilities withput actually being a Druid. There are some enemies that are implemented like this (some of the later Xaurip enemies and Lagufaeth for example). Maybe Naga shamans are done the same way.

If that is so they would have 0 PL for the Wizard/Druid spells they use. Like you would have if you stole a Priest or Druid spell as a Wizard with a Grimoire Imprint spell.  

Edited November 13, 2021 by Boeroer

[Testlum]

A lot of the Wall spells (i.e. Wall of Draining, Wall of Frost) seem to have been intended to have 20s durations based on the game's code. In particular, this would make Wall of Draining keep the same duration it had in PoE1. However, the DurationOverride parameter seems to be non-functional, so they instead have the default 30s duration.

[NotDumbEnough]

Her Tears Fell Like Rain seems to have the same kind of jankiness as Avenging Storm when used with Refreshing Encore on Sasha's Singing Scimitar, though it doesn't seem to be reliable. I'm not sure how the secondary damage works in general, whether it is an AOE or a projectile like the initial hit, or something else.

Probably most significant on a Bellower, which could probably clear most fights in the game with 2 uses of the ability.

[NotDumbEnough]

The Bestiary states that Steelspine Warriors have Unbreakable, even though we never see them get back up.

A bit of a shame, it would have been interesting to have enemies that occasionally get back up.

[NotDumbEnough]

This is really dumb, but I just found out that you can retarget single-target abilities much in the same way as AOE abilities. I used to always stop and recast them.

[NotDumbEnough]

Young Panthers have +10 deflection (Cover of Night) at night. Was really surprised to see that day/night cycles mattered in combat on enemies as well.

[Avaritica]

Haven't tested yet but from what I saw in the file, status effects applied by "Plant" abilities(except tanglefoot and pollen patch) are missing "Plant" keyword so Vion-ceth damage bonus might not apply.

[Boeroer]

I know for sure that Binding Roots will trigger Vion-Ceth's bonus damage.

[Avaritica]

47 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

I know for sure that Binding Roots will trigger Vion-Ceth's bonus damage.

Oh! I see now. They are defined in attack.data rather than statuseffect.data.
Seems like only vile thorns and wall of thorns don't have the "plant" keyword in their status effect. (probably intended as these 2 effects are "poison caused by plant" rather than "plant affecting enemies")

Edit : Also found out that Sea troll "Constricting seaweed" ability isn't tagged as plant. lol

Edited November 17, 2021 by Avaritica

[Elric Galad]

5 hours ago, Avaritica said:

Oh! I see now. They are defined in attack.data rather than statuseffect.data.
Seems like only vile thorns and wall of thorns don't have the "plant" keyword in their status effect. (probably intended as these 2 effects are "poison caused by plant" rather than "plant affecting enemies")

Edit : Also found out that Sea troll "Constricting seaweed" ability isn't tagged as plant. lol

Beware about KW. Missing the KW on the status doesn't mean the status does not count as tagged, since I think it carries the ability/attack KW property.

[Constentin Lévine]

Tears of Saint Makawo grant Martyr's memories (-100% Damage taken, Untargetable and petrified for 12 sec for the caster + int) wich with a priest with the wearer, give you a total immunity to ennemies. Indeed, although petrified doesnt downgrade with a resistance and cant be errased from the Sandals of the Water Lily dexterity immunity, a priest or someone with the ring of unshackling can cast Supress Affliction however the Untargetable "affliction". This is just for ennemies so you can extend it with SoT, but just for the combat. 

Sadly that doesnt unlock the Assassinate bonus, ennemies just cannot target you. You are a truly phantom.

Edited November 18, 2021 by Constentin Lévine

[NotDumbEnough]

Some jankiness I noticed with summons.

I am playing as a level 14 single class beckoner. On a shipboard battle en route to Dunnage, I summon the floating weapons, and they have a PL of 7, and accordingly only 9 power pool. Note that at level 13, they were always PL8. After I reached Dunnage, I fought Torkar, where they reverted back to PL8 again. It might have something to do with shipboard battles, or that I had Acute from Xoti while fighting Torkar but not during the shipboard battle, or it may just be some buggy interaction with community patch/balance polishing mod.

[Elric Galad]

1 hour ago, NotDumbEnough said:

Some jankiness I noticed with summons.

I am playing as a level 14 single class beckoner. On a shipboard battle en route to Dunnage, I summon the floating weapons, and they have a PL of 7, and accordingly only 9 power pool. Note that at level 13, they were always PL8. After I reached Dunnage, I fought Torkar, where they reverted back to PL8 again. It might have something to do with shipboard battles, or that I had Acute from Xoti while fighting Torkar but not during the shipboard battle, or it may just be some buggy interaction with community patch/balance polishing mod.

BPM and CP didn't touch Ancient Weapons though. They were always fine.

[NotDumbEnough]

Was pleasantly surprised to find that Take the Hit works with Damage over Time, since Unbending doesn't. Good in conjunction with a single class Paladin as the half damage that the fighter takes can be instantly healed back through the immolation ability's healing effect.