Deflection / Rogues That Dodge

[LHWong]

Can someone correct me if my understanding of this is incorrect?

 

My understanding is that a tank character in this game would be a character with high damage reduction (via heavy armour) and a shield. The ability for this character to dodge would be limited but is offset by the ability to mitigate damage.

 

If I wanted to build a rogue with a high damage output with the ability to dodge attacks, how is that achieved?

 

Is deflection a stat that mitigates damage or increases avoidance of damage?

[Magrusaod]

Pretty sure cranking Perception/Resolve will boost your Deflection, add in magic items and a Shield, and you would boost your Deflection. Which allows you to block attacks from ever hitting you. Hence, avoiding some attacks entirely. However, just a guess, haven't played this game yet.

[mrmonocle]

Your evasive rogue will suffer severely in acc (because of the shield) and dmg output

[Bazy]

If I wanted to build a rogue with a high damage output with the ability to dodge attacks, how is that achieved?

 

Is deflection a stat that mitigates damage or increases avoidance of damage?

Deflection is dodge. Armor is flat damage reduction. 

[Voss]

Can someone correct me if my understanding of this is incorrect?

 

My understanding is that a tank character in this game would be a character with high damage reduction (via heavy armour) and a shield. The ability for this character to dodge would be limited but is offset by the ability to mitigate damage.

 

If I wanted to build a rogue with a high damage output with the ability to dodge attacks, how is that achieved?

 

Is deflection a stat that mitigates damage or increases avoidance of damage?

Hmm.  These are inter-related questions, but the easy one to answer is the high damage rogue with the ability to dodge attacks.  Basically, this isn't really achievable. You basically have to trade one for the other at several places:

either might/dex (both have an impact on damage) for perception/Resolve (both raise deflection);

two weapons, a two handed weapon or a gun for a single weapon and shield (and associated style talents),

modal talents (cautious attack gives bonus deflection at the cost of attack speed), and so on.

 

A tank actually relies more on deflection than armor.   The basic system relies on accuracy minus the targets deflection.  The result is then added to a roll from 1 to 100. 

15 or less (including negatives, which is quite achievable with a high deflection) is a miss

16-50 is a graze (half[?] damage)

51-100 is a hit

100+ (Basically accuracy must be greater than the targets deflection) is a crit

 

So a tank with a 50 deflection being attacked by an enemy with 25 accuracy inflicts a -25 on the chart.  So, in this case a roll of 1-40 is a miss, 41-75 is a graze, and only 76-100 is a hit (and crits aren't possible)

 

Then you factor DR in.  Now since grazes are a lot more common than misses, having DR is a way of paring down damage even further (though there is also a Minimum Damage that goes through regardless), and since you want the tanks to be taking all the attacks, it is inevitable that they will take some hits and a fair amount of grazes (35%, unless deflection is more than 50 points high than the attackers accuracy), so basically armor only exists to mitigate the damage that will statistically bleed through the accuracy vs. defense roll.

 

Basically, the best way to avoid damage is to tie up the entire enemy force with the tanks (and crowd control) and avoid being targeted at all.  The AI is fairly stupid, so this isn't as hard as it seems, as long as you keep the tanks in front, and don't take stupid risks with positioning.  Ranged attacks (and extended reach weapons like pike and quarterstaff) make this even easier. 

Edited March 26, 2015 by Voss

[LHWong]

Thanks everyone, all is much clearer now

[Doxy]

Evasion Rogue is best done in a duelist manner. Use small shields. They don't impose any accuracy penalties and give you decent deflection.

Dump Int to 3 and pump Per/Res as high as you can to get + deflection.

Get Weapon & Shield and Adaptive Evasion passives.

Most enemies should be grazing you by now and missing alot of their hits.