Also: what does this mean for the dex vs might/str/res debate? Both Dex and Str give diminishing returns, but the diminishing returns on Dex are much stronger?

 

Is "diminishing returns" the correct term?

Each extra point of the stat gives a 3% bonus relative to the base value, so all stats in PoE have a linear effect.

So 10points give 0%, 15points give 15%, 20points give 30% and so on. Each point gives another 3% of base value, no matter how much points you already have.

Of course, when you have more modifiers than just the stat, the final number will change by a different number than 3% per point compared to base value.

All effects refer to "+X% of base value". If it was "+3% of the current value per point", the increase would be exponential and more points give a bigger bonus with each extra point.

 

 

Yeah, it's a matter of framing; linear increase relative to base values, but diminishing returns as percentage of total damage.  This becomes important when you're weighting different stats against each other; for example, in the first game, if you had a character with 20 Might but 10 Per and 10 Dex, going from 20 to 21 Might would increase your overall damage by much less than going from 10 to 11 Dex or 10 to 11 Per would, with the net result that it's better to raise your stats in rough parity than to go whole-hog stacking one stat at the expense of others.

 

 

 

Does it mean that each point above 10 gives a bonus of 3% (relative to base value), but each point below 10 gives a bigger malus than 3%?

 

 

 

Good question! I'm having a hard time parsing all this new math in this thread because I can't quite figure out how it translates into concrete game advice -- i.e., does this mean dumping stats is a better or worse idea than it was before, is stacking buffs the new hotness or the new wimpiness, are the punitive modals not as bad as they seem if you're already in heavy armor, etc. 

Edited January 31, 20187 yr by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy

Strength and Resolve are still multiplicative damage bonus atm, aren't they (as MIG was in the first

version of the beta)? So they have no diminishing returns like in PoE1.

Edited February 1, 20187 yr by Boeroer

Moowhoowhoownohawhawhaaaawww!

 

I've taken a long hard look on MaxQuest calculations and built myself an extremely fun character in the beta right now, I call her the Barrage Witch, and indeed, a witch she is!

 

I wanted to create a barbarian that gets frenzied but who never gets touched, but with super-human ranged attack speed. Well, guess what? You can.

I put one wand in each hand, wands are superfast with recovery and all. And I've picked bloodlust. Wood Elf, of course, nothing can stop this Dex machine from hell.

Plus Living Lands for +1 strength, and Colonist for Alchemy (certain potions will be useful, she's a witch after all).

 

I even picked just an exceptional hide armor, just to speed things up even more. And when enemies get a bit tougher, I switch to interfering barrage, a modal that lowers my damage by half, but I lower their accuracy by 10 for each hit, and I hit very, very fast. (Acc. to the tooltip for mainhand and offhand, attack time is 0.6s, and recovery time 1.0 s with my armour and all my gear on.) She looks like's she's a magical speed shooter with one gun in each hand. She almost whips the air (and as a cipher she takes full advantage of Soul Whip, an Ascendant), better Pen with Hammering Thoughts, and AoE for each hit, which is like always, so imagine my Barbarian Carnage. She almost stun lock enemies, and she can take care of them on their own (those mercenaries are just meatshields). She is ridiculously fast too. Which is useful. "Oh noes, several baddies run towards me. Well, I guess I have to move." So, despite Deadfire enemies being fast - they can't catch this witch. I just move, and use my range to the fullest. I even find myself pausing the game much less using her.

 

The mighty warbow only has a meager range of 12!!!! Well, each of her wands has 8, she's much better than I thought.

I'm not even sure she's aiming. She seems to attack any nearby enemy automagically, and this without AI turned on. I've played melee characters nearly exclusively in Deadfire, but this may be my starting build when Deadfire gets released. It's a different feeling in combat, that's for sure.

I set a custom party formation, so that she starts at the back, but still near the front, if that makes sense. In this way, she gets more hits in before any critter reach her.

 

Why would I ever wanna use a 2H warbow or any other bulky ranged weapon with reload times? My dual-wielded wands have no reload time, it seems. It's just swoosh, swoosh... And there are these nice red bloody effects, like visceral gibs. My witch melts them in their own pools of blood. This is evil.

Edited February 1, 20187 yr by IndiraLightfoot

Nice build, maybe I was wrong when I suggested a ranged barbarien as one of the worst builds. And maybe we are also wrong when we think that melee soul blade ciphers are the only good ciphers now.

 

So berserker gives you frenzy (big stat bonus, speed and penetration, but you need a way to cure confusion) and you get extra speed when you kill things and cipher gives you extra penetration and extra damage from biting whip.

You take ascendent because full focus goes down by itself, so biting whip stays on.

 

- Do you use any cipher spells? Your focus should build up fast and even the 5 seconds until max focus drops for ascendents seem like a long time with lower damage.

- Does the bonus penetration from frenzy and hammering thoughts stack? I saw a bug report that some things that increase penetration do not stack, but I am not sure which ones.

Strength and Resolve are still multiplicative damage bonus atm, aren't they (as MIG was in the first email

version of the beta)? So they have no diminishing returns like in PoE1.

This is from MaxQuest:

FinalDamage = (RolledDamage * DamageMultiplier + AdditiveDamageBonus) * PostAdditiveDamageMultiplier

 

DamageMultiplier is influenced by:

- weapon quality bonus (e.g. fine/exceptional/superb)

- weapon type bonus (e.g. sharp)

- bonus damage talents (e.g. two-handed style, sneak attack, soul whip)

- crit bonus

- over-penetration bonus

 

PostAdditiveDamageMultiplier is influenced by:

- might damage coefficient

- modal malus (like -50% from daggers modal)

- graze malus

- under-penetration malus

 

As for AdditiveDamageBonus, am not completely sure but it can include flat damage bonuses; think of Novice's Suffering from PoE1.

 

Question: Now, how are these multipliers actually calculated? Additive or multiplicative?

Answer: additive with a big twist:

- all damage coefficients are broken into steps

- now, if it's value is above 1, the step will be (value - 1)

- and if the value is below 1, the step will be (1 - 1 / value)

- after that all these steps are added up, into one big coefficient

- if the value of this coefficient is above 0, the group multiplier will be (coefficient + 1)

- and if the value of this coefficient is below 0, the group multiplier will be [1 / (1 - coefficient]

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So mig is a multiplicative factor, but it is not the only one.

Does this count as diminishing return according to whatever definition you have?

According to my definition PoE has no deminishing returns because each stat point give the same linear bonus relative to base value. (as opposed to every extra point gives a smaller bonus than the one before, relative to base value.)

 

- Do you use any cipher spells? Your focus should build up fast and even the 5 seconds until max focus drops for ascendents seem like a long time with lower damage.

- Does the bonus penetration from frenzy and hammering thoughts stack? I saw a bug report that some things that increase penetration do not stack, but I am not sure which ones.

 Thank you! If I hadn't read all these illuminating posts from MaxQuest, I'd never even consider it. But I do love ciphers, but I didn't think that ranged combat cipher builds had it in them. And now I get to play one! Thx, MaxQuest!

 

As you can guess, there's little room to pick cipher spells. The last thing I did was reaching max level in the beta with it last night, and if I recall correctly, I got to pick 3 spells in total. The rest of my talent picks went into other cipher passives and barbarian talents. Ironically, after plowing through level 1 and almost the entire level 2 of those ruins, my cipher never used any spell. I must check what I chose, probably stunning/debilitating spells, like Eyestrike (blinding) and Mental Binding. And I hadn't any room for that cipher passive that let spells penetrate a bit better. 

 

As for penetration something strange is going on. A few enemies, I got no pen blooms, the first seconds I started barraging them with my wands, but then that went away, as if the stacking began to work in a delayed fashion.

Edited February 1, 20187 yr by IndiraLightfoot

Another nice speed option with tremendous single target dps is Devoted/Helwalker with Swift Strikes + Two Weapon Style and the modal. The modal gives you higher damage and +2 PEN and wounds pretty fast while the Devoted gives you even more PEN and Constant Recovery which counters the self damage a bit. But watch out: once the Helwalker part has max wounds not only the damage is great, but also the self damage.

 

I think dual scepters + modal is the highest dps weapon atm, right? The range is very short though.

 

Add the several goodies like Stunning Strikes, Swift Flurry and Disciplined Barrage tree and it's quite the show. I didn't test if Cleaving Stance works with ranged weapons...

Edited February 1, 20187 yr by Boeroer

Hey MaxQuest, I still have a hard time understanding your speed formula. Can you explain what will be the final recovery for someone in heavy armor using Overdraw (no other bonuses/penalties). And also what would be the recovery of a dual wielder with Two Weapons Style, Frenzy and 20dex (no other penalties)? 

Another nice speed option with tremendous single target dps is Devoted/Helwalker with Swift Strikes + Two Weapon Style and the modal. The modal gives you higher damage and +2 PEN and wounds pretty fast while the Devoted gives you even more PEN and Constant Recovery which counters the self damage a bit. But watch out: once the Helwalker part has max wounds not only the damage is great, but also the self damage.

 

I think dual scepters + modal is the highest dps weapon atm, right? The range is very short though.

 

Add the several goodies like Stunning Strikes, Swift Flurry and Disciplined Barrage tree and it's quite the show. I didn't test if Cleaving Stance works with ranged weapons...

 

Devoted is supposed to work with melee weapons only. (devoted is buggy right now)

 

Dunehunter created a monk/paladin: https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/94602-beta-build-monkpaladin-helwalkerkind-wayfarer-build/ (This was for the first beta version)

 

I have read somewhere that it works with sceptres too. so we have:

helwaker/kind wayfarer dual wielding sceptres.

Sceptre modal on/off to gain damage and wounds, but not kill onself.

Retribution for extra damage when taking damage.

With eternal devotion you get a permanent fire lash ( plus the permanent shock lash from lightning strikes) and you heal yourself with FoD

A monk talent gives you also extra penetration (name forgotten, was it thunderous blows?)

 

I would prefer a kind wayfarer as multi class with your helwalker (compared to fighter/helwalker)

FoD + eternal devotion gives you lots of damage + healing and you could use the upgraded defensive aura as constant recovery, though I think other talents may be better.

But having damage and healing on seperate stats makes it a bit harder for him. Mig bonus of helwalker does not improve your healing when doing FoD any more.

 

Ok, maybe both choices are equally good: fighter gives you disciplined strikes, weapon style, constant recovery, weapon specialisation, stances and armored grace. kind wayfarer gives you FoD + healing + fire lash, retribution, LoH, auras and higher defenses in general. paladin is also more useful for the party (LoH, auras, other buffs). The sceptre suicide bomber should work best from second row behind a meat shield.

 

Edit: OK, speed wise the fighter is better (dual style, armored grace), to stick at least a bit to the topic.

Edited February 1, 20187 yr by Madscientist

Another nice speed option with tremendous single target dps is Devoted/Helwalker with Swift Strikes + Two Weapon Style and the modal. The modal gives you higher damage and +2 PEN and wounds pretty fast while the Devoted gives you even more PEN and Constant Recovery which counters the self damage a bit. But watch out: once the Helwalker part has max wounds not only the damage is great, but also the self damage.

 

That was pretty much my Deadfire LoP until they moved Healing to RES and rained on my parade. (Yes, I'm bitter about it )

 

Devoted is supposed to work with melee weapons only. (devoted is buggy right now)

 

Actually, last I checked its description no longer specified "melee" weapons. Are we 100% it's still supposed to not work with ranged?

Also: what does this mean for the dex vs might/str/res debate? Both Dex and Str give diminishing returns, but the diminishing returns on Dex are much stronger?

Good question.

Since DEX coefficient is now aggregated additively, it gets diluted by other bonuses. At the same time it's impact is not that much reinforced by maluses... (like MIG was on grazes in PoE1) because of double inversion.

 

Here's a mini-comparison:

 

And what conclusion can we make? Not sure completely, but on first glance I'd say:

- if you have many speed bonuses, it might be better to max MIG > PER >= DEX for auto-dps

- if you have maluses, then it depends how much. At 50% maluses, you might want to either leave DEX at 8 (i.e. some point where PER becomes better investment), or max it.

 

P.S. Btw there is no longer any inter-action delay when auto-attacking. I suppose the delay from PoE1 was related to exit-time on idle animation, and was finnaly removed.

P.P.S. Just a note: that delay wasn't influenced by DEX, that's why I mention it.

 

Hey MaxQuest, I still have a hard time understanding your speed formula. Can you explain what will be the final recovery for someone in heavy armor using Overdraw (no other bonuses/penalties). And also what would be the recovery of a dual wielder with Two Weapons Style, Frenzy and 20dex (no other penalties)?

Under the current system, it should work like that:

 

#1. Heavy Armor + Warbow with overdraw:

 

- base_attack_time: 1.1s

- base_recovery_time: 3.0s

 

- recovery_steps_sum = (1 - 1/0.645) + (1 - 1/0.5) = -0.55 + -1 = -1.55

- recovery_speed_coef = 1 / (1 - steps_sum) = 1 / 2.55 = 0.392

 

- final_attack_time = 1.1s

- final_recovery_time = 3.0/0.392 = 7.65s

 

#2. Dual Sabres, TWS, Frenzy, 20 DEX, no penalties:

 

- base_attack_time: 0.7s

- base_recovery_time: 3.0s

 

- attack_steps_sum = (1.25 - 1) + (1.3 - 1) = 0.55

- attack_speed_coef = 0.55 + 1 = 1.55

 

- recovery_steps_sum = (2 - 1) + (1.2 - 1) + (1.25 - 1) + (1.3 - 1) = 1.2 + 0.55 = 1.75

- attack_speed_coef = 1.75 + 1 = 2.75

 

- final_attack_time = 0.7 / 1.55 = 0.45s

- final_recovery_time = 3.0/2.75= 1.09s

 

Is "diminishing returns" the correct term?

Depends on the used definition, and I've seen a few)

 

Let's take DEX. Each point increases a related action speed bonus in 0.03 increments.

Absolute gain is always the same. But relative gain is going down. Adding 30 extra horsepower to a 500hsp monster, is relatively less than adding those 30 to a 145hsp mini cooper. Or think of adding water drops to the sea.

I call this: "intrinsic diminishing returns".

 

And if absolute gain was also going down: simply "diminishing returns". That's like in wow, fear once and you get 8s duration; fear again and it will have 4s duration; and 2s on 3rd appliance. You made the same investment, but got a lesser result even in absolute values.

 

Also, I often use the term "diluted". Think of MIG in PoE1 on crit. Since it was additive, going from 10 to 11 MIG, would net you a 1.53/1.50 = 1.02 (instead of x1.03) increase.

And, the inverse of it would be "reinforced". That's PoE1 MIG on grazes. 0.53/0.5 = 1.06. So if you grazed a lot, and assuming you could not rise your accuracy, you really wanted high MIG score.

Edited February 3, 20187 yr by MaxQuest

Ok, if I understand well, the recovery formula works like that:

 

1. all the bonuses(+)/penalties(-) for recovery are added together

2. the result ( R ) can be positive or negative and we have two situations:

- if R > 0 then the recovery becomes BaseRecovery / (1+R)

- if R < 0 then the recovery becomes BaseRecovery * (1-R) / (1 + ArmoredGrace * (1-R))   (If no ArmoredGrace then the green part disappears)

Edited February 1, 20187 yr by Kaylon

Ok, if I understand well, the recovery formula works like that:

 

1. all the bonuses(+)/penalties(-) for recovery are added together

2. the result ( R ) can be positive or negative and we have two situations:

- if R > 0 then the recovery becomes BaseRecovery / (1+R)

- if R < 0 then the recovery becomes BaseRecovery * (1-R) / (1 + ArmoredGrace * (1-R))   (If no ArmoredGrace then the green part disappears)

Almost)

 

1. yeap, they are added together. But must note that the maluses are "inverted" before adding. +(1 - 1/malus)

2. yes. except that Armored Grace is not taken into account after the R has been calculated, but during #1.

For example if you had 0.645 speed malus due to heavy armor, with Armored Grace it would become 0.845.

 

I think dual scepters + modal is the highest dps weapon atm, right? The range is very short though.

Dual sabres probably slightly surpass them, if you have enough PEN. But yeap, sceptres are definitely top tier. )

 

Btw, anyone tested Blunted Criticals? The tooltip said "-25% crit damage" in beta1, and "+75% crit damage" in beta2.

It's like with the reload speed/reload penalty confusion. Sometimes I really think the tooltip guys are stoned half of the day.

I've been tinkering new Action Speed Calculator for Deadfire. Here's the current: alpha version

 

Questions:

- since the game doesn't use frames, only seconds, should I remove f units?

- have you seen any other speed related modifiers? Maybe I missed something.

- if you find that something missmatches from ingame values, feel free to write it in this thread)

 

Plans:

- re-test firearms (I'm using 3.0s reloading for crossbows and 6.1s for arquebus, like it was in beta2)

- add alchemy

Edited February 3, 20187 yr by MaxQuest

Interesting. Going by that calculator, the hat that gives +20% reload speed is roughly equivalent to a bonus of 7 dex.

What hat?) Do you have the name or id of it?

What hat?) Do you have the name or id of it?

 

No need; Vektor sells it

Thanks for the calculator, though I just realized my Nalpazca/Berserker is extremely redundant as Frenzy and Bloodlust suppress Coral Snuff, Potion of Deftness and Swift Strikes. So that's kind of waste. 

 

Why not simply reduce each stacked bonuses rather than suppress them outright?

 

Frenzy and Bloodlust would stay at full bonus of +25% & +20% Action Speed respectively, but then divide Potion of Deftness by 2, Coral Snuff by 3 and Swift Strikes by 4 based on largest to smallest bonus. And once Potion of Deftness expires it shifts so Coral Snuff/2 and and Swift Strikes/3. Or some kind of similar calculation that takes Persistent, Temporary and Passive bonuses into account. It gives you increasing diminishing returns for each stacked bonus, but doesn't outright negate things and make certain Multi-classes pointless. Hell even certain single classes are kind of made pointless if this is accurate as even if I was just a Nalpazca Monk it looks like Coral Snuff would suppress Swift Strikes on its own.

 

 

What hat?) Do you have the name or id of it?

Acina's Tricorn - Shootist: +5 Ranged Accuracy, +20 Reload Speed

Edited February 3, 20187 yr by Enduin

Ohooo! Suppression rules are in! Greys out the suppressed bonus? Sweet! Why don't you just do PoE3 on your own? I volunteer as part-time developer.

 

I have the impression that DEX has much less impact than in PoE.

I guess you meant Two Weapon Style and not Two Handed Style in the "Affects Recovery" section?

It also seems that Armored Grace is crap compared to PoE

Crossbow: holy cow! Faster than two handed weapons in plate armor. So it's apparently easier to reload and fire a crossbow than it is to swing a sword. Erm...

 

Also: dw pistols. :/

Thanks for the calculator, though I just realized my Nalpazca/Berserker is extremely redundant as Frenzy and Bloodlust suppress Coral Snuff, Potion of Deftness and Swift Strikes. So that's kind of waste.

Yeah, out of those only the highest bonus is applied, while others get suppressed.

 

Btw, added the hat. It's effect stacks with Sure-Handed.

But can't test if it stacks with Pistols' Modal - since that modal doesn't work ingame atm.

 

Ohooo! Suppression rules are in! Greys out the suppressed bonus? Sweet! Why don't you just do PoE3 on your own? I volunteer as part-time developer.

 

I have the impression that DEX has much less impact than in PoE.

Maybe, some day    

 

As for DEX - you have the right impression. In PoE1 it's coefficient was aggregated multiplicatively. In Deadfire... it turned out to be taken additively with other multipliers.

 

I guess you meant Two Weapon Style and not Two Handed Style in the "Affects Recovery" section?

Fixed)

 

It also seems that Armored Grace is crap compared to PoE

Armored Grace was really good in Beta2. But it was nerfed in Beta3: 0.20 -> 0.10. Here's the related post.

Updated the calculator.

 

Crossbow: holy cow! Faster than two handed weapons in plate armor. So it's apparently easier to reload and fire a crossbow than it is to swing a sword. Erm...

Crossbow turned from awesome to poop overnight. Suddenly it's reloading duration was doubled.

I have checked all firearms' reloading 15 minutes ago. And here are the results (on a naked lvl 1 character at 10 DEX):

 

Arbalest:

- tooltip: 6.0s

- beta 2: not tested

- beta 3: 6.93s (consistently 208 frames)

 

Arquebus:

- tooltip: 6.8s

- beta 2: 6.1s (consistently 183 frames)

- beta 3: 7.3s (consistently 219 frames)

 

Blunderbuss:

- tooltip: 6.0s

- beta 2: not tested

- beta 3: 6.86s(205-206 frames)

 

Crossbow:

- tooltip: 5.0s

- beta 2: 3.0s (not a typo, was indeed consistently getting 90 frames)

- beta 3: 6.1s (183-184 frames)

 

Pistol:

- tooltip: 5s

- beta 2: 4.67s (consistently 140 frames)

- beta 3: 5.86s (consistently 176 frames)

 

P.S. Updated the calculator with these new reloading durations.

P.P.S. Not really fond with tooltips not matching real values.

 

Also: dw pistols. :/

DW firearms does not benefit from DualWielding or TwoWeaponStyle recovery reduction since they don't have recovery.

DW pistols seem to be mainly for Quick Switching... Fire two pistols consecutively, switch to the next two, repeat-n-times.

Edited February 4, 20187 yr by MaxQuest

Added alchemy support, and updated arbalest and crossbow modals for beta 3.

Link

 

P.S. Gunner talent currently decreases Reload Speed instead of increasing it. And I don't even know how to add it to calculator: v1. how it works now ingame, or v2. how it should work)

Edited February 4, 20187 yr by MaxQuest