How to Fix the Attribute Design in Pillars of Eternity

[Valorian]

Thinking more about it I think thematically AoE might make a bit more sense on Resolve as it's kind of the 'force of personality'/charisma* attribute. If the AoE of Paladin auras and Chanter chants was affected (which I dont think they are now by Int), that would be pretty cool and thematic.

 

Duration could stay on Int but maybe reduced to less than 5%  per level if Int is also going to increase deflection (assuming the % effects of all attributes are staying in the range they are now).

 

*the description talks about drive, emotional intensity, and being good for intimidation, leadership and performances

 

I agree. Even the selective AoE edge sounds good if you imagine a caster who can bend magic, e.g. magical fire, with his immense will (Resolve) to affect only enemies. + AoE and Concentration

Same with Cunning/Intellect affecting duration. The rogue knows how and where to hit to cause crippling strike to last longer. Same with casters and spells etc. + Duration and Deflection

 

Instead of barbarian intellectual, rogue intellectual or druid intellectual; cunning fits nicely.

 

 

 

As for "if Constitution is a completely defensive attribute, why can other attributes also be!?"

Because attributes that are useful for both melee and ranged combat take precedence. Constitution also makes perfect sense in its current form.

[Sensuki]

Problem I generally see with adding deflection into the mix: Deflection is generally more valuable for fighters than health/endurance because of their already high base deflection.

Not necessarily, that's only against Deflection-based attacks. If you neglect your CON as a Fighter you'll get d1cked hard by Reflex, Fortitude (and possibly Will) attacks. You could pump both for this effect:

 

 

I think there could be a way to make the Barbarian work with a high Deflection build, you'd also need to compensate with some other items though, which is fine. Like, use two Hatchets or something. It also depends on the enemy accuracy, it would be great against lower accuracy enemies but not quite as good as higher accuracy enemies that target Deflection.

 

I agree. Even the selective AoE edge sounds good if you imagine a caster who can bend magic, e.g. magical fire, with his immense will (Resolve) to affect only enemies. + AoE and Concentration

Same with Cunning/Intellect affecting duration. The rogue knows how and where to hit to cause crippling strike to last longer. Same with casters and spells etc. + Duration and Deflection

Makes thematic sense, but it makes both attributes weaker, which is not a good thing. We tried to achieve as much mechanical balance across attributes as we could as well as trying to best achieve the stated design goals in our solution. Josh (and others) are suggesting making changes to the best three attributes that the system has at the moment (Might, Con, Int) and I just don't think that will work at all, based on the math and logical findings of our paper. YMMV.

Edited September 13, 2014 by Sensuki

[limaxophobiacq]

I think because we used math/statistics to investigate how the attributes are related, it makes it pretty clear to see that changing the 'good' attributes such as Might, Constitution and Intellect would not be a good thing.

 

Might is very strong on it's own. The flat percentile damage is great, scales well with everything. Constitution is really good, but it's also better for high HP characters, technically. However you can see that if you split Health and Stamina, Constitution becomes not as good as pure Deflection on it's own (theoretically). If you take away Durations from Intellect, this gimps casters a little bit because they now *have* to invest in two different attributes just to get the benefits that are most relevant to them. I think AoE and Durations together was a great idea to begin with and should not be changed.

 

Not all casters need Deflection/Concentration, Concentration is good for them sure, because it hurts them more if one of their 3 sec spells is interrupted more than it hurts melee characters or something, but the DPS loss from that is probably made up by just being more Mighty, or more Intelligent - or FASTER (as one thing we didn't check is how IAS affects chance to be interrupted) and they can technically get more benefit out of bonus Might on an AoE or Duration.

 

Then there's also the problem of the attribute balance. We proposed putting Interrupt with Accuracy because Accuracy on it's own at +1 per point is weaker than Might is, and likely not as strong as Intellect either for caster classes. Accuracy at +2 per point would outclass Might (we checked) so you can't do that. Accuracy and Interrupt really fits. However if you don't also put Deflection and Concentration together - then Concentration as a combat stat is just plain weaker than the Acc/Int combo, because now you are forced to pump two attributes to protect yourself from interuption from physical attacks as Deflection grants an indirect bonus to Concentration by reducing effective interrupt against these attacks, whereas Accuracy increases them because Interrupt is reliant on the roll, and that makes pure Concentration on it's own weak, even when combined with durations because then the attribute wouldn't be great for every class.

 

I think Josh said they were going to change the interrupt mechanics, but they have to be careful because folding Interrupt directly into Accuracy may not solve the problem of Accuracy not being as strong as Might or Intellect on it's own.

 

I also think the elegant solution of two offensive, two defensive and two universal attributes is a good mix.

 

If +1 Accuracy is too good compared to +2% damage and +2 isn't good enough it'd be better to bump Might/Con/Dex up to +3% (I like that all physical attributes now have the same modifier, be it +2% or more, is neat), Int to +7% or +8% AoE/Duration (if we hate fractions), and Per/Res to +2 Accuracy/Deflection and get rid of interrupt/concentration from attributes entirely. Seems tidier.

 

While cluttered, +1 Acc and +x% interrupt on Perception/+1 Def and  +x% Concentration on Resolve at least has a symmetry +1 Acc on Per/+1 Def & +5% AoE on Int/+x% Duration & Concentration on Res lacks.

 

Being harder to hit due to Resolve still doesn't make too much sense though, I guess every one in PoE has Divine Shield?

[Sensuki]

We didn't want to suggest that because we know that the developers and others like the Interrupt and Concentration mechanics. If they were to remove Interrupt and Concentration mechanics, that is something that we could calculate, sure.

 

We wanted to try and come up with something that required the least change to the current system, that would not be much work for the dev team.

 

Being harder to hit due to Resolve still doesn't make too much sense though, I guess every one in PoE has Divine Shield?

Refer to my description of the attribute on page 1 of the thread:

 

"Resolve is like your determination and stuff right? You have so much guts and determination that you are a boss at defending your body and your mind ... however this does not mean that your body can defend you from Fortitude and Reflex attacks that are beyond it's capability."

Edited September 13, 2014 by Sensuki

[morhilane]

Problem I generally see with adding deflection into the mix: Deflection is generally more valueable for fighters than health/endurance because of their already high base deflection. For Barbarians on the other hand, pumping health/endurance seems to be always the better choice because of their low base deflection and high health multiplier, plus using a shield is not their style. Of course they'd have less concentration in the proposed system, but that was already declared as a not so important stat.

 

Deflection is important to everyone who doesn't want to be hit often at full damage via weapons. Like Sensuki said, Deflection doesn't help against Reflex (AoE), Fortitude(Poisons/disease) and Will (mental) attacks. A defensive character needs to invest into both the Deflection stat and Constitution to be effective.

[Valorian]

 

Makes thematic sense, but it makes both attributes weaker, which is not a good thing. We tried to achieve as much mechanical balance across attributes as we could as well as trying to best achieve the stated design goals in our solution. Josh (and others) are suggesting making changes to the best three attributes that the system has at the moment (Might, Con, Int) and I just don't think that will work at all, based on the math and logical findings of our paper. YMMV.

 

 

It doesn't make it weaker. "Your" resolve is cardinal for melee combat and still practically useless for ranged characters in comparison.

 

Right, thematic sense is important.

[Sensuki]

Durations and AoEs are best together. Intellect is most beneficial for caster classes. Priests and Druids (perhaps Ciphers too?) moreso than anyone as they have lots of duration based spells, and lots of AoE (duration based) spells.

 

If you separate Duration from AoE, this makes it much, much harder for these casters to get the most out of their build, as they will be wanting to ideally pump the attributes that give these things, but because the bonuses are now split over these two attributes they have to sacrifice a lot more of their attribute points just to get the bonuses. They would be getting other bonuses as well (the other bonuses that would paired with them on this proposed system) however I think this actually creates less flexibility.

 

Constitution and Resolve are defensive stats, so you could technically say "Your Resolve" and Constitution are cardinal for melee characters but practically useless for ranged characters in comparison, instead of just singling out our proposed Resolve attribute - and this is a problem that stems from the AI at the moment, and not the attributes themselves.

 

Our system would allow casters to go all out - Priest and Druid? try Intellect and Dexterity/Agility for buffest of all buffers. Due to their lack of defensive capability (not pumping CON or RES) you'd have to be smart about their positioning and stuff, and protect them and when they got hit they'd likely get interrupted (not much Res) and take a large proportion of DPS to their total Health.

 

If you split up Durations and AoEs, this creates an inflexibility where such classes would struggle to get the most benefit out of the attributes, as ideally they want extra durations, larger AoE and increased cast speed, so now you'd have to pump three attributes to do this instead of two, and you would never be able to get as much of an effective build.

 

All attibutes are going to be better for some classes than others, too - there's no way around that.

Edited September 13, 2014 by Sensuki

[Seari]

Instead of barbarian intellectual, rogue intellectual or druid intellectual; cunning fits nicely.

 

I really like your idea of renaming INT to Cunning, if Josh does go with the aforementioned changes. It makes a lot of sense in dialogue as well.

 

Renaming Dexterity to Agility would also make a lot of sense, since it's the attribute that would mainly govern action speed. It would also help to separate the attributes from d&d, and to prevent confusing them with the former.

 

Agility - the power of moving quickly and easily; nimbleness

[Sensuki]

Agility would work, yep.

 

I don't like Cunning though I think Intellect is good.

Edited September 13, 2014 by Sensuki

[Seari]

To me it depends if INT is changed to give deflection.

[Sensuki]

Oh, then yeah. But I hope they don't do that for reasons stated in my previous posts. I don't care what the attributes are called - just what combat stats are paired together.

Edited September 13, 2014 by Sensuki

[Valorian]

Durations and AoEs are best together. Intellect is most beneficial for caster classes. Priests and Druids (perhaps Ciphers too?) moreso than anyone as they have lots of duration based spells, and lots of AoE (duration based) spells.

 

If you separate Duration from AoE, this makes it much, much harder for these casters to get the most out of their build, as they will be wanting to ideally pump the attributes that give these things, but because the bonuses are now split over these two attributes they have to sacrifice a lot more of their attribute points just to get the bonuses. They would be getting other bonuses as well (the other bonuses that would paired with them on this proposed system) however I think this actually creates less flexibility.

 

Constitution and Resolve are defensive stats, so you could technically say "Your Resolve" and Constitution are cardinal for melee characters but practically useless for ranged characters in comparison, instead of just singling out our proposed Resolve attribute - and this is a problem that stems from the AI at the moment, and not the attributes themselves.

 

 

 

If you split damage output into might (raw damage), perception (accuracy) and dexterity (attack speed); it will hurt melee classes! No. It's a valid consideration, do they care more about a large and selective AoE or duration of spells.

 

Your observation about resolve is simply not correct. Yes, it's partially because of the AI, but melee classes are inherently more likely to be exposed to attacks that target deflection and suffer from interrupts as a consequence.

Also, it's not anymore a case of a "one-dimensional" attribute (like interrupt for ex perception). Now it could be two things: Concentration + AoE 

[Valorian]

To me it depends if INT is changed to give deflection.

 

Indeed, that's the point. Cunning boosting deflection makes perfect sense.

[Sensuki]

Attack speed is not in the attribute system currently so your first statement is not correct, and attack speed is never better than Might anyway as demonstrated in our paper.

 

Caster interrupts are much more serious than melee interrupts because if their casts (which can be 3 or 6 seconds long) get interrupted, they have to start casting again and that's anywhere from 0.01 to 5.99s of DPS lost on top of the 0.5s interrupt, which is much more serious than interrupting a melee attack, which is at worst 0.99s lost + 0.5 s interrupt time.

 

Just a question though, does interrupting an arbalest reload or a gun reload reset the reload ?

 

I don't think Concentration + AoE will be a good attribute. As stated in the paper, Concentration prevents DPS loss, which can be more than made up for by an extra point in Might, old Dexterity, Intellect (and probably new Dexterity) depending on the class. As a Fighter, why would I take that attribute? I would just bump Might to max to make up for the DPS loss, and I don't need the AoEs at all really. I have dumped Resolve on every single character I've made in the beta so far (which have mostly been melee characters) because the Concentration bonus is pretty much "lol who carez".

 

What's your reply to my bit about Constitution and Resolve together? Instead of just singling out our proposed Resolve. Also remember that you acted rather narkily to me in another thread recently after I disagreed with you on something.

 

I am not disagreeing that our proposed Resolve wouldn't be the best immediate choice for casters/ranged characters, but it would be a lot better for melee characters than it is now, instead of a laughably bad choice as it is currently, and it wouldn't reduce the efficacy of any of the already pretty much perfect attributes. Thing is though, if you took Resolve - you'd be able to use Wizards, Priests and whatnot in melee better right ?

 

That would be great extra flexibility IMO.

Edited September 13, 2014 by Sensuki

[Lychnidos]

Instead of barbarian intellectual, rogue intellectual or druid intellectual; cunning fits nicely.

.

Being intelligent doesn't equal being intellectual, and vice versa.  

[Gumbercules]

Great work, Sensuki and Matt516! Both of you have been providing useful information and suggestions throughout the beta, but this thread goes above and beyond.

 

Some quick *~gut feels~* thoughts on the original proposal and Josh Sawyer's suggestions:

 

Original Sensuki/Matt516 Proposal: I like it! As long as the math is accurate and you haven't missed anything, I would be satisfied if those were the final attributes. I like how everything remains elegant and simple while still mostly making sense, and the 2-2-2 attribute function split feels right as well.

 

Original Josh Sawyer/Obsidian Counter-proposal: It's great that you guys were heading in the same direction as Sensuki and Matt, but pretty much every way in which the suggestions differ feels worse. In particular, having Resolve affect healing received seems like it would be terrible. From a character-building standpoint, no one's going to think, "I want to build a character who responds to medicine more effectively!" Also having an attribute be that passive and dependent on other characters seems bad. Furthermore, I like that Might currently makes sense for Priests and other support-heavy classes, so I object to removing healing from it.

The 10-as-baseline for attributes with penalties for going below is an idea which I support, however.

 

Later Josh Sawyer Suggestions: These have mostly been better, although I still really like the original Sensuki/Matt516 idea. Having AOE increases be foe-only seems like a good idea as long as descriptions and UI make it clear what is happening. The lore justification makes perfect sense to me.

 

Once again, terrific thread!

[Sensuki]

Original Sensuki/Matt516 Proposal: I like it! As long as the math is accurate and you haven't missed anything, I would be satisfied if those were the final attributes. I like how everything remains elegant and simple while still mostly making sense, and the 2-2-2 attribute function split feels right as well.

 

Once again, terrific thread!

Cheers mate. The spreadsheet link is included in the paper if you'd like to check anything yourself We encourage people to check the math to see if it looks correct. I'm more of a logic guy myself but Matt says it's right.

 

I like the foe only AoE thing as well.

Edited September 13, 2014 by Sensuki

[aeonsim]

Attack speed is not in the attribute system currently so your first statement is not correct, and attack speed is never better than Might anyway as demonstrated in our paper.

 

While the second part may be a true in general in the BB it's a major assumption to make about the game, we don't know enough about the other weapons and abilities they can have to assume that holds for the wider game. There may well be builds you can make using some of the special weapons where speed is far more useful than might in a combat situation.

 

I'd like speed to be added in as an attribute associated effect but one should be careful about general statements when basing them off only a fraction of the currently unbalanced game.

[BillyCorgan]

That's crazy... amazing job !

[Valorian]

Attack speed is not in the attribute system currently so your first statement is not correct, and attack speed is never better than Might anyway as demonstrated in our paper.

 

Caster interrupts are much more serious than melee interrupts because if their casts (which can be 3 or 6 seconds long) get interrupted, they have to start casting again and that's anywhere from 0.01 to 5.99s of DPS lost on top of the 0.5s interrupt, which is much more serious than interrupting a melee attack, which is at worst 0.99s lost + 0.5 s interrupt time.

 

Just a question though, does interrupting an arbalest reload or a gun reload reset the reload ?

 

I don't think Concentration + AoE will be a good attribute. As stated in the paper, Concentration prevents DPS loss, which can be more than made up for by an extra point in Might, old Dexterity, Intellect (and probably new Dexterity) depending on the class. As a Fighter, why would I take that attribute? I would just bump Might to max to make up for the DPS loss, and I don't need the AoEs at all really. I have dumped Resolve on every single character I've made in the beta so far (which have mostly been melee characters) because the Concentration bonus is pretty much "lol who carez".

 

What's your reply to my bit about Constitution and Resolve together? Instead of just singling out our proposed Resolve. Also remember that you acted rather narkily to me in another thread recently after I disagreed with you on something.

 

Action speed (it makes you attack more often, doesn't it) will be made part of the system, as suggested by Josh. What's incorrect about that?

 

Well, good for casters then! There will be an attribute that increases both their AoE (and makes it selective on the edge) and their Concentration. How neat is that?

 

I have already replied about Constitution. Constitution is a defensive stat, but not in the way that deflection is; Constitution mitigates all damage, not just damage caused through a deflection-fail/weapon attack. Constitution is an exception because it makes plenty of sense to keep it that way.

 

Yes, that one sentence directed at you "me me me/ I developer - delusional compulsion" was too snarky so I apologized, but I do think that ego sometimes prevents people to acknowledge that they're wrong.

 

 

@Lychnidos:

Sure, they're not synonyms. I was playing with words and bolded the name of the attribute inside "intellectual". Anyhow, it's called intellect, not intelligence.

[Sensuki]

Action speed (it makes you attack more often, doesn't it) will be made part of the system, as suggested by Josh. What's incorrect about that?

What I thought you were implying there is that splitting damage, accuracy and attack speed over 3 different stats would make it harder for DPSers to focus on a DPS build in reply to my "splitting AoE/Duration" will make it harder to casters to make a good build.

 

Well, good for casters then! There will be an attribute that increases both their AoE (and makes it selective on the edge) and their Concentration. How neat is that?

Not as neat as it is now

 

I have already replied about Constitution. Constitution is a defensive stat, but not in the way that deflection is; Constitution mitigates all damage, not just damage caused through a deflection-fail/weapon attack. Constitution is an exception because it makes plenty of sense to keep it that way.

Yes, and remember this depends because Constitution will protect you better against attacks with a low accuracy, that is, because you're only getting hit and grazed most of the time. When your Deflection outclasses the attacker's Accuracy, Deflection is always better for increased survival time as it adds more misses with every point. Casters have spells that can protect them in this manner too. This is why we paired Deflection with Concentration though, as technically it's not better than Constitution on it's own.

 

Also not forgetting that Deflection reduces enemy interrupt chance in a multiplicative sense - which is much better for not getting interrupted from Deflection-based attacks than Concentration is on it's own. That's the reason why we think that Deflection and Concentration should be kept together so that the attribute mirrors Perception and cancels out both the Accuracy bonus AND the Interrupt bonus. When they are not paired in opposition, a character with the same points in Perception will have a distinct advantage against a character with the same points in Resolve.

 

edit: and this relationship between Accuracy and Interrupt and Concentration with the defenses was THE very reason why I asked Matt about helping me with this proposal. I thought that this pairing would solve the problem with the attribute system, because of the dependencies.

Edited September 13, 2014 by Sensuki

[Doppelschwert]

Nice work with the paper, although as a mathematician I always die a little inside if this stuff is treated as maths when it's basically engineering.

 

Josh also had good ideas, so I'm sure the game will turn out great.

 

I disagree on renaming intellect just because of the dialogues. They have been written with 'intellct' in mind, not cunning, and cunning doesn't make sense most of the time when you're just smart and know a lot of stuff. In other words, don't dare to kill off the concept of my academic monk. On a related note, I prefer joshs suggestions as it makes the academic monk more viable, but that's just me wanting to be able to slice people into bits with Prof. Contemplation.

[Sensuki]

Renaming Intellect would create problems with the dialogue and scripted interactions too.

[limaxophobiacq]

It's seems I'm somewhat alone in thinking Interrupt & Concentration should both be put into Resolve, but that's never stopped me before. Here's what I'd do based on this thread and this old poll that showed most people (76.32%) would like the effect of attributes magnified.

 

Might: +3% Damage & Healing

Constitution: +3% Health & Stamina

Dexterity: +3% Action Speed

Perception: +1 Accuracy & Deflection (you're aware of where to strike and of incomming attacks)

Intelligence: +7.5% AoE & Duration

Resolve: +5% Interrupt & Concentration

 

To me this seems tidy, fairly balanced, thematic, and would as far as is possible make all attributes usefull to all characters. Maybe only +4% on resolve.

 

+2 Deflection on Resolve and +2 Accuracy on Perception would be balanced as well as nice and symmetrical but it seems a lot less justified thematically.

 

I don't like having both +Y Accuracy/Deflection & +X% Interrupt/Concentration on Perception/Resolve, to me it's messy (combining flat numeric modifier and % modifier on one attribute) and again not very thematic.

 

Combined with making Attribute 10 give the base effect with a 0% modifier, this would also just about but not quite double the magnitude of attritube bonuses compared to now with STR 10 to STR 20 going from a 140%/120% = 1.167 or 16.7% increase in damage to a straight 30% increase.

Edited September 13, 2014 by limaxophobiacq

[Valorian]

 

Action speed (it makes you attack more often, doesn't it) will be made part of the system, as suggested by Josh. What's incorrect about that?

What I thought you were implying there is that splitting damage, accuracy and attack speed over 3 different stats would make it harder for DPSers to focus on a DPS build in reply to my "splitting AoE/Duration" will make it harder to casters to make a good build.

 

 

I have already replied about Constitution. Constitution is a defensive stat, but not in the way that deflection is; Constitution mitigates all damage, not just damage caused through a deflection-fail/weapon attack. Constitution is an exception because it makes plenty of sense to keep it that way.

 When they are not paired in opposition, a character with the same points in Perception will have a distinct advantage against a character with the same points in Resolve.

 

 

1) As hard a consideration as considering if effect duration or AoE (selective edge, I'll point out) is more important for your character concept.

 

 

2) Absolutely not, +1 point in accuracy is not universally more advantageous than an increased selective AoE and +3% concentration.