Two handed style seems weak

[dunehunter]

Two Handed Style should give +15% (or even +20%) and +1 PEN - or two handers should have higher PEN per se. More force = more penetration. More penetration translates to additional damage without raisig the dmg modifier.

 

I really don't care how much more damage it can do, its just too slow specially all other things are speed up now, the cast time of slowest spell is 6 sec, while 2h recovery time with plate is also 6 sec.

[M4xw0lf]

So... I recreated my Witch with focus on dual wielding. The important abilities: Soul blade: Draining Whip, Penetrating visions, Hammering thoughts; Berserker: Frenzy, Blooded, Barbaric blow, Accurate carnage, bloodlust, one stands alone. 

I used dual fine sabres for maximum damage. However, I find it doesn't feel as powerful as great sword + great sword modal + 2handed style instead of dual wielding. I have no accurate numbers for this, but I think the dps with the great sword might actually be better... maybe something with the weirdness of how soul annihilation works.

 

Someone interested in giving this a try as well?

[kmbogd]

I have made an upgrade to the model I was using, it now takes into account attack resolution (miss, graze, hit, crit), perception and weapon modals. The average DPS was computed as per the miss/graze/hit/crit distribution.

 

In the table attached there is a comparison of the average DPS of the weapons against 1-13 enemy AR. The setup used in this comparison is the following:

• 10 dex, 10 might, 10 perception
• the difference between accuracy (before weapon modifiers) and enemy's deflection is 0
• all weapons are fine quality
• When 2-handed weapon was used, two-handed style was assumed
• When dual welding 1-handed weapon, two-weapon style was assumed
• When using a single 1-handed weapon, 1-weapon style was assumed
• character is wearing heavy-armor

 

The green lines represent the DPS for using a 2-handed weapon or for dual-welding 1-handed weapons. The yellow lines represent the DPS for using a 1-handed weapon in 1-weapon style mode. The white lines following a green or yellow line represent the same setup but with the weapon modal enabled.

 

For some weapons the modal was not implemented. Among these only mace, battle axe and pike have modals that are potentially able to increase DPS in some setups.

 

Looking at the results, it seems that dual-welding clubs/daggers/rapiers (without modal) is optimal against AR 1-8. Dual welding swords with modal is optimal against AR9. Dual welding stilettos (without modal) is optimal against AR10. And using estoc with modal is optimal against AR11-13.

Edited April 12, 2018 by kmbogd

[M4xw0lf]

I have made an upgrade to the model I was using, it now takes into account attack resolution (miss, graze, hit, crit), perception and weapon modals. The average DPS was computed as per the miss/graze/hit/crit distribution.

 

In the table attached there is a comparison of the average DPS of the weapons against 1-13 enemy AR. The setup used in this comparison is the following:

• 10 dex, 10 might, 10 perception
• the difference between accuracy (before weapon modifiers) and enemy's deflection is 0
• all weapons are fine quality
• When 2-handed weapon was used, two-handed style was assumed
• When dual welding 1-handed weapon, two-weapon style was assumed
• When using a single 1-handed weapon, 1-weapon style was assumed
• character is wearing heavy-armor

 

The green lines represent the DPS for using a 2-handed weapon or for dual-welding 1-handed weapons. The yellow lines represent the DPS for using a 1-handed weapon in 1-weapon style mode. The white lines following a green or yellow line represent the same setup but with the weapon modal enabled.

 

For some weapons the modal was not implemented. Among these only mace, battle axe and pike have modals that are potentially able to increase DPS in some setups.

 

Looking at the results, it seems that dual-welding clubs/daggers/rapiers (without modal) is optimal against AR 1-6. Dual welding sabres (without modal) is optimal against AR 7-8. Dual welding swords with modal is optimal against AR9. Dual welding stilettos (without modal) is optimal against AR10. And using estoc with modal is optimal against AR11-13.

Going by your calculations, dual sabres should be comfortably better. Maybe I'm just biased towards great swords, so it doesn't feel this way for me :D

[theBalthazar]

Looking at the results, it seems that dual-welding clubs/daggers/rapiers (without modal) is optimal against AR 1-6. Dual welding sabres (without modal) is optimal against AR 7-8. Dual welding swords with modal is optimal against AR9. Dual welding stilettos (without modal) is optimal against AR10. And using estoc with modal is optimal against AR11-13.

 

 

For DR story...

 

Was a big problem with POE1 if it was your first playtrhough or if you have a bad memory. (like me)

 

Because if data is not displayed, you cannot adapt your weapon slightly before the battle. Quickly this is boring and you don't pay attention.

 

So if obsidian want to push players to change frequently of weapons, all data must be always knows. AR - defense. ETC.

 

Far more logical. If not, the player dont take the habitude to look at high-left screen. In the head of the player "boarf, anyway there is 3/4 of time few "?""

 

(true story)

Edited April 7, 2018 by theBalthazar

[kmbogd]

2-handed weapons still do more burst dmg, but adding in the longer recovery they equate to lower DPS. "Primary attack" type of abilities will be better with 2-handed weapons though (higher burst). Overall yes, looks like dual welding is optimal in most of the cases.

[M4xw0lf]

Ok, now calculate everything with the use of soul annihilation as well! 

[dunehunter]

New recovery formula gives me a feeling that it diminishes really hard. If you only have one big penalty or big speed bonus, it has large impact on recovery time. However, the more you stack, the way less you get.

 

For example with -50% recovery time from streetfigher heat up, greatsword can have 4->2.3 sec recovery time, while if I dual wield fast weapon and have heat up, which is -50% -30% -20%, my recovery time is 3->1.2 sec or something like that. So you see the first -50% makes miracles. But at same time if you have penalty, it’s also a nightmare.

Edited April 7, 2018 by dunehunter

[dunehunter]

I made a Berath/Streetfighter build that really benefit from this. Max INT and dump Res, so with blunderbuss modal you get maximum time of flanked debuff to trigger heat up.

 

Then streetfighter’s +50% sneak attack, -50% recovery time benefit Berath’s greatsword a lot. I’m able to deal 140+ damage per swing at around 2 second recovery time under the flanking debuff, which is insane

[Boeroer]

Yes, due to the new attack speed formula, attack speed bonuses have diminishing returns. Quite the opposite to PoE where they had increasing returns. But in Deadfire it also affects attack animation!

Edited April 7, 2018 by Boeroer

[MadDemiurg]

Yeah, 2h gets good if you manage to get -recovery.

 

But -recovery is very limited currently.

 

Basically it's either hunting bow (which is a great 2h weapon) or streetfighter. Also Ila's chant for arquebus, but it's not enough to make it good.

Edited April 7, 2018 by MadDemiurg

[dunehunter]

Yeah, 2h gets good if you manage to get -recovery.

 

But -recovery is very limited currently.

 

Basically it's either hunting bow (which is a great 2h weapon) or streetfighter.

Exactly, or use potions, which I never did in rpg games

[MadDemiurg]

Well, I do use consumables because I solo but the build that relies on using them all the time to be viable is kinda eh...

[Yosharian]

What's the best weapon for 1H+Shield?  Goldpact Knight/Troubadour btw.

[bleedthefreak]

How does two handed compare to one-handed with nothing in the off hand (+12 accuracy bonus)?

[KDubya]

What's the best weapon for 1H+Shield?  Goldpact Knight/Troubadour btw.

 

Now that Sabres are only +10% damage they are basically the same as using an accurate weapon which adds +5 accuracy which is roughly equivalent to +2% damage per accuracy or +10% when not considering the penetration caused by crits leading to overpenetration or reducing underpenetration.

 

So for damage per hit  you have Sabres, and Spears with a dps of 3.74, or fast accurate clubs, daggers, rapiers at 3.77 dps. Basically they are pretty much the same, go with what's cool or has the best modal.

 

 

 

 

How does two handed compare to one-handed with nothing in the off hand (+12 accuracy bonus)?

 

Two handed does 21 average damage, with two handed style it is 24.15 damage per hit. Pikes and great swords have attack speed of 0.7 while quarterstaffs have 0.5 (not sure if bug or feature) so dps is 5.14 for pikes and 5.37 for quarterstaffs.

 

Accuracy roughly converts to +2% damage per accuracy so single wielding gets you +24% damage so a spear or sabre does 21.44 damage per hit and a dps of 4.56. Single wielding a fast accurate rapier, club or dagger gets you 16.08 damage and a dps of 4.59.

 

The above calculations do not factor in the effects of criticals increasing penetration or the effects of possible overpenetration or reduced underpenetration. I also did not add in single weapon style as it only converts 20% hit to crit which is an additional +2.99% damage which is not very good.

 

0-25 miss

25-50 graze 50% damage

51-100 hit 100% damage

100+ 125% damage

 

So basic weapon unit damage is 0.625 (25 grazes do 50% damage + 50 hits do 100% damage)

 

An accurate single wield has +17 accuracy so

0-8 miss

9-33 graze

34-83 hit

84-100 crit

 so the unit damage is 0.8375 (which is 34% higher than 0.625 hence where the 2% damage per accuracy rule of thumb comes from)

 

The single weapon style changes it to 

0-8 miss

9-33 graze

34-73 hit

74-100 crit

so the unit damage is now 0.8625 (which is 2.99% higher than single wielding alone which is not worth the ability point unless critical hits have some extra benefit)

 

So two handed weapons will kill trash faster but against tough enemies the +17 accuracy from single wielding an accurate weapon will help a lot.

 

If accuracy is 17 less than deflection you get 

 

0-42 miss

43-67 graze

68-100 hit

so unit damage is .455 while the accurate single wield has 0.625 unit damage. This gets you a dps of (.455x24.15) = 10.988/4.7 sec = 2.34 for two hander and (0.625x16)=10/4.7 sec = 2.13.

[Boeroer]

I think that crits are severely underrated. If you only factor them in with +25% damage at 10 MIG this will not display their power in the actual game (as you already said). Crits very often lead to overpenetration which adds another +30% damage. For the same reason I think that hit/crit conversion is much better than most people think and surely 20% translates to more than ~3% dps in the actual game. I know it's impossible to calculate that without major efford. Just saying... That makes one handed weapon usage the best offensive melee option for auto-attacks (and primary attacks without ACC bonuses) in the beta in my opinon. And that's ok, because heavy dual weapon setups profit massively from Full Attacks.

 

Two Handers a bit meh at the moment. Good option for primary attacks with dmg bonuses but not so good for Full Attacks and not for atuo-attacks. This could easily be changed with +1 PEN for Two Handed Style. It makes sense (weapons that get used with both hands have higher kinetic energy and due to their weight also more momentum and thus can pierce armor more easily) and translates to higher dps because you prevent underpenetration or can even overpenetrate. Or give the style a higer dmg mod if you fear the stacking of PEN.

 

The only thing where (I guess) two handers will be the best option at the moment is with Blood Thirst (non-beta ability) if it works like in PoE (0 recovery after kill).

[dunehunter]

I recommend to give all armor a flat recovery time penaly instead of a % based penalty.

 

For example Plate armor give your +1 sec recovery penalty, medium armor gives .5 sec and light armor .25 sec and etc.

 

At least this can make 2hander a bit faster than now, aslo flat penalty will have bigger impact on fast weapons, so a plate armor/dual dagger set is less available.

 

Same as spellcasters, now armor has no effect on self-buffing spells because most of them have 0 recovery time, a wizard wearing plate armor can self buff as fast as one with robe, which is weird to me.

Edited April 14, 2018 by dunehunter

[kmbogd]

How does two handed compare to one-handed with nothing in the off hand (+12 accuracy bonus)?

Check the table at post #28 (one-handed style was also factored in: 20% hits to crits). Basically two-handed seem to be better than one-handed in the lower range of enemy AR. But at the higher end spectrum one-handed wins. The exception is the estoc which looks to be the overall champ at very high enemy AR.

[kmbogd]

I think that crits are severely underrated. If you only factor them in with +25% damage at 10 MIG this will not display their power in the actual game (as you already said). Crits very often lead to overpenetration which adds another +30% damage. For the same reason I think that hit/crit conversion is much better than most people think and surely 20% translates to more than ~3% dps in the actual game. I know it's impossible to calculate that without major efford. Just saying... That makes one handed weapon usage the best offensive melee option for auto-attacks (and primary attacks without ACC bonuses) in the beta in my opinon. And that's ok, because heavy dual weapon setups profit massively from Full Attacks.

 

 

The best discrepancy between crtis and hits can be observed at the other spectrum: when transforming a -75% penalty into a +25%bonus. Take a look at this snippet comparison for dual welding sabres at enemy AR11 and enemy AR12.

 

Related to the affirmation that "one-handed weapons being the best for auto-attacks", my findings are different for any of the 13 enemy AR that I compared in my previous table: usually dual welding something is better, with the exception of the very high end enemy AR where estoc is the champ overall.

Edited April 14, 2018 by kmbogd

[dunehunter]

Two Handers a bit meh at the moment. Good option for primary attacks with dmg bonuses but not so good for Full Attacks and not for atuo-attacks. This could easily be changed with +1 PEN for Two Handed Style. It makes sense (weapons that get used with both hands have higher kinetic energy and due to their weight also more momentum and thus can pierce armor more easily) and translates to higher dps because you prevent underpenetration or can even overpenetrate. Or give the style a higer dmg mod if you fear the stacking of PEN.

 

The only thing where (I guess) two handers will be the best option at the moment is with Blood Thirst (non-beta ability) if it works like in PoE (0 recovery after kill).

 

Heavy plate armor just favor dual wielding a lot now, with 15 Dex, you can get 3.1 recovery time with dual sabre/dw style, while with 2h weapon u will have 5.6 recovery time, that's almost doubled recovery time, while damage is pretty close between sabre and 2h sword. I don't know if you give 1 PEN to 2h weapon will make 2h weapons worth picking or not. 

 

I'd say change how armors increase recovery time is a better idea. Following my idea that armor gives flat recovery penalty, plate armor gives +1 sec recovery time, dual sabre recovery time will turns from 2.2(naked DEX) -> 3.2 sec, 2h weapon recovery time from 3.5(naked, 15 DEX) -> 4.5 sec, this will reduce the gap for two styles imo.

Edited April 14, 2018 by dunehunter

[Insidous]

 

I think that crits are severely underrated. If you only factor them in with +25% damage at 10 MIG this will not display their power in the actual game (as you already said). Crits very often lead to overpenetration which adds another +30% damage. For the same reason I think that hit/crit conversion is much better than most people think and surely 20% translates to more than ~3% dps in the actual game. I know it's impossible to calculate that without major efford. Just saying... That makes one handed weapon usage the best offensive melee option for auto-attacks (and primary attacks without ACC bonuses) in the beta in my opinon. And that's ok, because heavy dual weapon setups profit massively from Full Attacks.

 

 

The best discrepancy between crtis and hits can be observed at the other spectrum: when transforming a -75% penalty into a +25%bonus. Take a look at this snippet comparison for dual welding sabres at enemy AR11 and enemy AR12.

 

Related to the affirmation that "one-handed weapons being the best for auto-attacks", my findings are different for any of the 13 enemy AR that I compared in my previous table: usually dual welding something is better, with the exception of the very high end enemy AR where estoc is the champ overall.

 

 

 

I did some calculations how much Crit damage is increased for some Pen Ratings in various Armor Rating distributions of enemies. As a distributions I used a linear bell curve centered between 8 and 9 with little dips at the lower and higher ends to account for heavily buffed or debuffed enemies

 

 

 

If you shift the AR distribution slightly to the right as to account for POTD or something  you get:

 

 

The general sentiment that crits are more important against heavier armored enemies is obvious, but the scope surprised me. You can easily think of a crit as a 30% - 70% damage increase instead of just 25%.

 

Since it wouldn't let me upload my excel file, just tell me if you want other PEN values or distributions tested.

[dunehunter]

To those who still think 2h weapons are better for primary attack abilities, I'd say it's only true when the primary attack has a big damage bonus (like backstab), otherwise 2h weapons has no advantage because dual wielding will have better recovery time for your primary attack abilities. For example knock down, when you use it with 2h sword, you have 4 sec+ recovery time, when u use it with dual sword, its like 2 sec recovery time, u can do another attack in that period of time.

 

MaxQuest has a more detailed math modal that shows 2h weapon vs DW when using primary attacks, and 2h doesn't show obvious advantage there.

Edited April 16, 2018 by dunehunter

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

Two Handed Style should give +15% (or even +20%) and +1 PEN - or two handers should have higher PEN per se. More force = more penetration. More penetration translates to additional damage without raisig the dmg modifier.

 

My "feel" is that all the one-handers (except possibly the scepter, war hammer, and mace) should have their Pen lowered by one, leave the two-handers pen values alone, but yeah, increase two-handed style's damage bonus by 5% so it's equivalent with the attack speed reduction from two weapon style.

 

I'm not sure if that would be enough to compensate for the inherent speed bonus of dual-weilding, though.

[theBalthazar]

In fact 20 % is the perfect number for two handed style.

 

And +10 % for base damage.

 

Need slightly more than = 2W.