Do Weapon Focus bonuses stack?

[Magnificate]

Suppose I've got both Weapon Focus: Adventurer and Weapon Focus: Knight. Does my character get +20 or +10 accuracy with war bows? For that matter, would +20 accuracy with one specific weapon worth investing two talents? If those bonuses do stack, why not add several more Weapon Focuses talents?

[cmergler]

The Weapon Focus talents got changed a bit, so each weapon only is part of one talent.

[Luckmann]

Also, as of v392, the Weapon Focus Talent(s) confer +6 Accuracy, not +10.

 

The Weapon Focus talents got changed a bit, so each weapon only is part of one talent.

 

I hope they change that again, and just mark it down that they don't stack. I'd like to see greater diversity in the Weapon Focus Talents, like a Weapon Focus Talent that makes you proficient in all the gunpowder weapons, for example, simply different thematic combinations, really.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

In addition to all the above, here's a post by Josh Sawyer on another forum explaining stacking:

 

There's a glossary entry for Stacking, but the essential information is that there are four broad categories of bonuses: passive, active/modal, equipment, and weapons/shields.

 

Passive almost always comes from things like Abilities and Talents that you don't need to activate.  All passive bonuses stack.

 

Active/modal abilities come from spells, Abilities, Talents, consumable items (potions, food), and resting bonuses that are activated and/or have a duration to them.  The highest bonus from this group is applied.  All others are suppressed.

 

Equipment is everything you don't put in your hand slots.  Armor, hats, gloves, belts, books, cloaks/amulets, etc.  The highest bonus from this group is applied.  All others are suppressed.

 

Weapons/shields are just weapons and shields.  All of these bonuses stack.

 

Food and inn bonuses are useful for long-term Attribute checks and Rite scrolls can be used for long-term Skill bonuses.

http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3593502&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=341#post441845980

 

So no, if you had two talents that gave the same bonus, they wouldn't stack.

Edited February 22, 2015 by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy

[Diogenes]

They would be passive bonuses though and therefore, they would stack.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

They would be passive bonuses though and therefore, they would stack.

 

Yeah, I was dense and misread the quote, you're right.

[Luckmann]

In the current rules, speaking strictly mechanically, they would probably stack. It is a moot point, however, since there are no Weapon Focus Talents that overlap.

This being said, I hope that there will be Weapon Focus Talents that do overlap, and they shouldn't stack.

[Bazy]

The bigger issue is that it pushes you down a path you may not want to take. If you pick up the talent you are must use those weapons without feeling a loss of power. 

 

A big part of the weapon/armor system is choosing the right tool for the situation... these talents make it limited. 

 

Also for RP purposes you can never have weird crazy combinations without feeling the loss. 

 

Still a huge improvement over proficiency points.... I think. 

[Luckmann]

The bigger issue is that it pushes you down a path you may not want to take. If you pick up the talent you are must use those weapons without feeling a loss of power. 

 

A big part of the weapon/armor system is choosing the right tool for the situation... these talents make it limited. 

 

Also for RP purposes you can never have weird crazy combinations without feeling the loss. 

 

Still a huge improvement over proficiency points.... I think. 

 

This. Honestly, I'll probably "solve" this by simply giving myself the appropriate Talent(s), so when I want to play that gunpowder inquisitor of Magran, I'll pick one weapon focus, and then simply cheat in the other weapon foci, so that I can use all of the gunpowder weapons without absolutely crippling myself by spending 3+ out of 6 talents just to realize a pretty reasonable character concept.

 

It's pretty far from ideal, and it doesn't solve the overall issue, but there's plenty of situations in PoE where you feel like you're fighting the game, why would character creation/roleplaying be any exception? It's at least a band-aid on a pressing concern, and one I would advice anyone to use without feeling like a cheater, in order to play what they want.

[Doppelschwert]

I think it was an explicit design goal that these talents give you access to approximately one weapon for each type of damage and each distance so that you have the option to always pick a weapon that you are proficient with and is effective in each possible combat scenario.

 

They wanted to evade the problem of the IE games that you pick a weapon focus for that one ultimate weapon at the end of the game and disregard the other stuff until then because that type of item may be rare.

 

You also can't choose talents at lvl 1 so that you don't have to take these talents blindly and experiment with some weapons beforehand.

 

That said, I can understand your complaints, but I'm not so sure how more of these talents can do more than alleviate the problem. You'll always be able to come up with a subset of weapons that is not covered as long as you leave it at an reasonable amount of talents. Look at it that way - it's meant to be a strategic choice for your gear, as just choosing everything you want with a single talent is a no-brainer.

 

Still, I see the benefit of having more choice from a roleplaying point of view. I'd be all up for a sword exclusive guy, but I can live with the way it is.

[Bazy]

I see both sides... but... for example...

 

Say I want to play a wizard that carries a staff and uses a wand, rod or, sceptre. I "have" to pick up two different talents.

 

At least with the proficiency system there was a cap on points, which forced you to diversify... Here diversity = weakness.  

[Lephys]

That's the biggest problem I have with the current weapon talents, too. If you want to use some really simple groupings of even just two weapons, you have to either take two talents, or suck with one of the weapons.

 

I really think the talents should maybe just have you pick X weapon types with which to gain an Accuracy bonus. If you want that to be Staves, wands, and maces, then so be it. If you want it to be wands, bows, and swords, then so be it.

 

Then, you can have different tiers, so that the more weapons you pick in a specialization talent, the smaller the bonus. Want to mainly use wands? Take the next tier of specialization in Wands (maybe +10 instead of +5).

 

*shrug*. I dunno. In that way, the points kinda work a lot better. I mean, even if you don't just outright copy D&D proficiencies, a points system still does a lot of things that "you're good with these 5 weapons" doesn't. Especially when we're only going to get, what, 5 or 6 talents if we max out a character, and something as simple as "I want to have a character that's good with these two weapons, but nothing else, really" requires TWO talents?

[Doppelschwert]

To me, this debate is still kind of strange. Consider it from a point of view from DnD 3.X.

If you go to the level range of 1-20, you get 6 talents. DnD Weapon focus in PoE terms gives +5 accuracy to one type of weapon. One single type. A lot of people still pick weapon focus if they play a melee class and I've never see someone complain about that.

 

In a possible sequel that raises the level cap in PoE to 20, you will get 10 talents by that time. If you pick weapon focus here, you get +6 accuracy to several types of weapons.

 

The weapon focus in PoE is already cheaper, more diverse, more powerful by its numerical value and even more valuable because the attack resolution places a greater focus on accuracy. From the DnD viewpoint, you can consider the talent in PoE as choosing a single weapon, getting the corresponding talent and having the other weapons as bonus candy for your convenience.

 

Arguing that you want to customize these sets yourself to eliminate that little strategic trade off they still have seems kind of munchkin-y to me. On the other hand, lets crunch numbers. When I didn't miscount, there are 28 different types of weapons in PoE. Lets say we are modest and want to have at least one talent for each combination of two weapons. Thats 28*27/2 = 378 combinations. Let's be optimistic and claim that we can partition them in a way such that each weapon focus, that is, each combination of 5 weapons, produce new pairs, that is, each pair of two weapons is in exactly one weapon focus talent and not in multiple. Then a single talent can cover 5*4/2 = 10 combinations, so you'd need at least 38 talents. So unless you go overboard you will always be able to come up with a fun character concept that resolves around 2 weapons and can't get covered by premade talents. Don't get me started on combinations of more then 2 weapons, it's way higher.

 

So if you want to cover every combination, it boils down to one of this:

- no-brain munchkin selection

- way too many talents

[Karkarov]

I agree with Doppel, this is a non issue.  Weapon focus gives you bonuses with a wide range of weapons no matter which one you pick.  So saying "diversity" is a weakness is nonsense, simply by picking weapons focus you have gained a bonus to a "diverse" set of weapons with multiple ranges, speeds, and ideal uses.  Now if you need to have weapon focus in10+ different kind of weapons that is your problem and no RPG ever made supports that without sacrificing something.  Meanwhile if all you cared about was "2 weapons" well guess what?  If you can't pick two weapons in one group it still takes 2 talent choices to do it in Eternity.... just like it would take 2 in DnD 3.5 for example.

[Lephys]

Diversity isn't a problem. Precision is. You could take all the different weapon focus grouping talents in PoE and have an Accuracy bonus with every single weapon in the game. That's not really something that needs to be a goal, because it's pretty infeasible (especially for all the talent options you're giving up, and the fact that you don't get a greater bonus to anything... just the same Accuracy bonus to all the weapons, of which you can only use up to 2 in any given combat encounter, because you can't have selected the additional weapon-slots talent).

 

The problem I'm seeing is that, in the earlier games that used proficiency points, for example, you could hit level 5, and have 3 points in one weapon (of your choosing), 2 points in another, and maybe one in a third, etc. I don't know the math on how many points you got when. The point is, you got two things at once:

 

A) Proficiency in multiple weapons (because caps prevented you from spending all your points on the same weapon every time)

B) Different levels of proficiency in different weapons.

 

To put it simply, why does 1 talent's worth of talent points = good with 5 weapons, but to be good with the only-2 weapons I actually want to be good with (for example), it requires TWO talent points? With two talent points, I could be good with TEN weapons. But that still doesn't help me be good with two weapons I want, then even better with those two (or at least one of them) weapons.

 

When it comes to character customization, it's a little restrictive in a sense. It's not armageddon. It's just unfortunate, is all. "Just pick a bunch of talents until you get the weapons you want, even though people who happen to love all 5 weapons in one talent grouping win the lottery" isn't really a perfectly-reasonable "solution"/response here.

[Magnificate]

Well, I wouldn't mind more combinations of weapons getting their own talents, so that each weapon is present in two or three Weapon Groups. There's no problem if bonuses from those don't stack. The issue is having varied weapon combinations, especially melee/ranged weapon pairs.

 

Perhaps the Fighter could get an unique class talent, Weapon Focus for 3 cherry-picked weapons of his/her choice?

[Luckmann]

I agree with Doppel, this is a non issue.  Weapon focus gives you bonuses with a wide range of weapons no matter which one you pick.  So saying "diversity" is a weakness is nonsense, simply by picking weapons focus you have gained a bonus to a "diverse" set of weapons with multiple ranges, speeds, and ideal uses.  Now if you need to have weapon focus in10+ different kind of weapons that is your problem and no RPG ever made supports that without sacrificing something.  Meanwhile if all you cared about was "2 weapons" well guess what?  If you can't pick two weapons in one group it still takes 2 talent choices to do it in Eternity.... just like it would take 2 in DnD 3.5 for example.

 

I was confused by this, so I double-checked the thread, and no-one is saying this.

 

I think the main problem is mostly one of fluffing and that, since we do have talents that encompasses multiple weapons (which I think is great), a general feel that there could be more character-appropriate combinations. While there's a clear mechanical intent to supply each group with a generally diverse combination of weapons, likely to avoid overspecialization in weapons that then turn out to be largely absent or arguably underwhelming or underpowered, the roleplaying fluffmonkey in me really want other combinations too.

 

Not because it's a mechanical issue, but simply because I have concepts in mind that are pretty reasonable (Swashbuckling buckaneer, Gunpowder enthusiast, etc) that simply possible without significantly gimping yourself. Furthermore, there's no mechanical reason (although it might present a problem in programming and presentation) you couldn't have the same weapon(s) represented in different weapon groups, as long as they didn't stack.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

 

This. Honestly, I'll probably "solve" this by simply giving myself the appropriate Talent(s), so when I want to play that gunpowder inquisitor of Magran, I'll pick one weapon focus, and then simply cheat in the other weapon foci, so that I can use all of the gunpowder weapons without absolutely crippling myself by spending 3+ out of 6 talents just to realize a pretty reasonable character concept.

 

It's pretty far from ideal, and it doesn't solve the overall issue, but there's plenty of situations in PoE where you feel like you're fighting the game, why would character creation/roleplaying be any exception? It's at least a band-aid on a pressing concern, and one I would advice anyone to use without feeling like a cheater, in order to play what they want.

 

 

Well, if you went Magran, you could take the Inspired Flame talent and get a bonus to both sword and arquebus, then take weapon focus (soldier?) and get another +10 bonus to Arequebus, right?

 

I think the priests all have special weapon talents in the favored weapons for exactly that reason. 

[Luckmann]

 

 

This. Honestly, I'll probably "solve" this by simply giving myself the appropriate Talent(s), so when I want to play that gunpowder inquisitor of Magran, I'll pick one weapon focus, and then simply cheat in the other weapon foci, so that I can use all of the gunpowder weapons without absolutely crippling myself by spending 3+ out of 6 talents just to realize a pretty reasonable character concept.

 

It's pretty far from ideal, and it doesn't solve the overall issue, but there's plenty of situations in PoE where you feel like you're fighting the game, why would character creation/roleplaying be any exception? It's at least a band-aid on a pressing concern, and one I would advice anyone to use without feeling like a cheater, in order to play what they want.

 

 

Well, if you went Magran, you could take the Inspired Flame talent and get a bonus to both sword and arquebus, then take weapon focus (soldier?) and get another +10 bonus to Arequebus, right?

 

I think the priests all have special weapon talents in the favored weapons for exactly that reason. 

 

 

Yes, as far as I know, the bonus from Inspired Flame and Weapon Focus (Soldier) stacks as they should.