I wonder how much damage you're doing when you're dead.
GWF's who get power from defense are a special case. It's perfectly reasonable for them to load up more on the defense side of that line because of how much it benefits their power. Killing enemies faster means less tankiness is needed and also provides more lifesteal. And even so, we're not talking about huge differences. HP and Defense both still benefit you if overstacked. The main use of the chart is intended to be for people who want to optimize their build.
For example, my CW had 1k defense and 33k HP. I just made and equipped 5 new personalized rings which opened up 5 new defense enchantment slots that I didn't have before and I wanted to know if I should put defense or HP in them. That's where the chart is helpful. It doesn't mean that if I stacked all HP my build would suck, it would just mean it's not quite as good as it could have been.
micky1p00Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 3,594Arc User
edited December 2014
Can you please share how you reached the durability function.
I've tested long time ago for GS investment in HP vs Defense and for all points tested HP looked better, after hit you left with more hp, meaning it was more worthwhile to soak damage instead of resisting.
So I will be glad to learn how you calculated and re-check.
Can you please share how you reached the durability function.
I've tested long time ago for GS investment in HP vs Defense and for all points tested HP looked better, after hit you left with more hp, meaning it was more worthwhile to soak damage instead of resisting.
So I will be glad to learn how you calculated and re-check.
Sure. Here's an example calculation. Let's say someone has 30k HP and 1500 Defense and they're wondering whether to slot a Rank 10 Radiant to increase HP 1200 or a Rank 10 Azure to increase defense 300.
1500 Defense is 23.85% Damage Resistance. So this person can withstand 30000/(1-.2385) = 39,396 enemy damage before dying.
If 300 Defense is added then DR goes up to 26.13%. Now this person can withstand 30000/(1-.2613)= 40,612 enemy damage before dying.
If 1200 HP had been added this person would be able to withstand 31200/(1-.2385) = 40,972 enemy damage before dying.
The HP will give them more ability to survive than defense. The line on the chart is just the "break even" point where adding HP or Defense doesn't matter because it gives the same amount of survivability either way.
Now, this is most accurate when you're just taking burst damage, then healing to full, then more burst damage. In the event that you're trying to survive constant damage while healing then defense will be slightly more valuable (since the HP you are healed will "go farther"). For that reason it's ok to shade toward defense a bit more, but I think the majority of problems people have when trying to survive is just absorbing a quick, hard beating where rate of healing doesn't come into play all that much.
*Edit*
Since you were thinking that HP is always better let me give an example that shows when defense is better. If someone has 30k HP and 500 Defense. Damage Resistance at 500 is 11.66%. At 800 it is 16.37%
Then durability = 30000/(1-.1166) = 33,960
Durability with HP added = 31200/(1-.1166) = 35,318
Durability with Defense added = 30000/(1-.1637) = 35,871
Here defense out-performs HP.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
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micky1p00Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 3,594Arc User
Sure. Here's an example calculation. Let's say someone has 30k HP and 1500 Defense ....
Ahh i did the same thing, I wrote a small script that shows the remaining hp over very high damage (killing or near death), only the main difference i was to lazy and was not looking for the break points or general rule but the adjustment near my build 25k~30k HP & 1.4k, and tested about 1k gs 'area' in smaller modification steps. it fits your graph too.
Thanks.
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inthefade462Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian UsersPosts: 0Arc User
The graph has all the same shortcomings as the "effective health pool" term used in some other games. It only offers a means to determine the highest possible hit a character can survive but doesn't touch on actual sustainability in combat. Calling what the graph shows "durability" is very misleading.
Highest possible damage survivable is useful as a "bare minimum" concept; say a mob does exactly 30k damage, how would one best go about combining hitpoints and damage reduction to survive such a hit?
But combat rarely consists of a series of large hits in a short timespan, or we'd all be dead all the time. It consists of lots of hits over time. What matters in such fights is your ability to reduce incoming damage to the point where it can be outhealed, while still keeping a large enough effective health pool that you can survive the highest possible damage you will take before you will gain health back. The combination of healing skills, lifesteal, regeneration, potions, companions and various minor healing buffs add a plethora of options how to go about attaining enough healing for your character.
A character with 10000 hit points and no damage reduction will never survive a prolonged fight if incoming healing doesn't surpass incoming damage, but a character with 8000 hit points and 20% damage reduction (equal effective health pool) will generally survive longer, or might actually not die at all. Both of them will die to a 10000 damage hit, both of them will survive a 9999 damage hit, but the latter will have better sustainability.
This is also where deflection enters the picture, it raises the damage resistance and therefore increases sustainability further, at a point where defense will add very little and hit points add nothing at all.
The graph has all the same shortcomings as the "effective health pool" term used in some other games. It only offers a means to determine the highest possible hit a character can survive but doesn't touch on actual sustainability in combat. Calling what the graph shows "durability" is very misleading.
Highest possible damage survivable is useful as a "bare minimum" concept; say a mob does exactly 30k damage, how would one best go about combining hitpoints and damage reduction to survive such a hit?
But combat rarely consists of a series of large hits in a short timespan, or we'd all be dead all the time. It consists of lots of hits over time. What matters in such fights is your ability to reduce incoming damage to the point where it can be outhealed, while still keeping a large enough effective health pool that you can survive the highest possible damage you will take before you will gain health back. The combination of healing skills, lifesteal, regeneration, potions, companions and various minor healing buffs add a plethora of options how to go about attaining enough healing for your character.
A character with 10000 hit points and no damage reduction will never survive a prolonged fight if incoming healing doesn't surpass incoming damage, but a character with 8000 hit points and 20% damage reduction (equal effective health pool) will generally survive longer, or might actually not die at all. Both of them will die to a 10000 damage hit, both of them will survive a 9999 damage hit, but the latter will have better sustainability.
This is also where deflection enters the picture, it raises the damage resistance and therefore increases sustainability further, at a point where defense will add very little and hit points add nothing at all.
In general your point is valid. It is true that over a series of small hits and small heals the person with higher defense and lower HP will survive longer.
However, my observations of Neverwinter are that it is very, very rare that something like that occurs. Personally, I know that 99% of my deaths are because of spike damage where I either take a massive hit from one source, or a mob of adds surrounds me and pummels me all at once. I don't know that I've ever been in a situation where my ability to heal has been in a race with the rate I'm taking damage and my inability to heal or be healed at a high enough rate is what resulted in my death. For me it's always spike damage, heal to full, repeat. Maybe others experience something else. But if indeed that is the most common form of death then there's nothing misleading or inaccurate about characterizing this metric as a characters durability and there's nothing wrong with planning to maximize it to decrease the frequency of deaths.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
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inthefade462Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian UsersPosts: 0Arc User
In general your point is valid. It is true that over a series of small hits and small heals the person with higher defense and lower HP will survive longer.
However, my observations of Neverwinter are that it is very, very rare that something like that occurs. Personally, I know that 99% of my deaths are because of spike damage where I either take a massive hit from one source, or a mob of adds surrounds me and pummels me all at once. I don't know that I've ever been in a situation where my ability to heal has been in a race with the rate I'm taking damage and my inability to heal or be healed at a high enough rate is what resulted in my death. For me it's always spike damage, heal to full, repeat. Maybe others experience something else. But if indeed that is the most common form of death then there's nothing misleading or inaccurate about characterizing this metric as a characters durability and there's nothing wrong with planning to maximize it to decrease the frequency of deaths.
yeah my observations as well. healing currently always overtakes dmg received so it's not a question of prolonged sustainability, it's a question of being 1 shot.
Other games like Eve refer to these calculations as EHP, Effective Hit Points. Resist+hp pool = total hp pool. In games with either little to no healing (like eve) or games with an overabundance of healing (like nw) then EHP is all that really matters.
It doesn't really matter if you are missing 5 health or 5k. If you have any health missing your next attack is going to heal you 30k (or if EC procs, 90k) health.
The graph has all the same shortcomings as the "effective health pool" term used in some other games. It only offers a means to determine the highest possible hit a character can survive but doesn't touch on actual sustainability in combat. Calling what the graph shows "durability" is very misleading.
Highest possible damage survivable is useful as a "bare minimum" concept; say a mob does exactly 30k damage, how would one best go about combining hitpoints and damage reduction to survive such a hit?
But combat rarely consists of a series of large hits in a short timespan, or we'd all be dead all the time. It consists of lots of hits over time.
On the contrary, combat in this game consists entirely of a small number of large hits. Speaking PVE here not talking about PVP (although the same argument could be made there as well)
Mobs do not have at will attacks. They average 2 encounter abilities with med-longish cooldowns. Average delay between attacks is roughly 4-8 seconds (this varies greatly depending on the mob of course). So by offsetting their 2 attacks, they can, at their "swiftest" seem to hit you every 2 seconds.
The truth is the vast majority of combat time the mob is just standing there scratching themselves. There are a few things they do that makes it appear as if combat is more fluid (namely, long "wind up" style attack animations) but if they changed it so that mobs switched to idle animations when they weren't executing an attack 90% of the time they would just stand there.
This isn't challenging so mobs are grouped together as an "encounter" and we, the players, further increase the challenge by pulling 5-10 of these "encounters" at once since we so vastly outgear the dungeons.
Because the mobs of the same type work off of the same timer/cooldowns their attacks will sync together which is what produces the very large "hits" which is really just 5 Trolls slamming you instead of 1. With enough mobs hitting you it can seem that you are receiving a constant influx of dmg received, but the reality is it's just a bunch of singular attacks because you pulled half the dungeon at once, and with where gear is at now, none of this is actually life threatening and you're still lifestealing through it.
However with the more recent content additions they've slowly been focusing on much harder hitting smaller number of mobs, which follow the same rules, so it really has become a handful of very large hits instead of dozens of very small hits (only considered small since we outgear it so greatly)
Thanks again for this very valuable work that you did and shared to the NW community.
I have a question on the positioning of the blue line (eg: When AC=24 vs AC=10) which seems unintuitive for me. I would have thought that the break even point when AC is higher should be below, not above.
If I have AC=10 then I have a lower overall Resistance compared to AC=24, right ? So, I should compensate by taking additional Defense.
Let's take an example, If I have, lets' say 35K HP and 1500 Defense:
- Then the Ideal Durability Line (for AC=10) suggests that I should have a little bit more HP
but
- The Ideal Durability Line (for AC=24) suggests that I should have more Defense (Which seems illogical as I have already more "Defense" overall due to the higher AC)
Can you help me to understand ? As I think the blue line should be below the dark one.
Thanks again for this very valuable work that you did and shared to the NW community.
I have a question on the positioning of the blue line (eg: When AC=24 vs AC=10) which seems unintuitive for me. I would have thought that the break even point when AC is higher should be below, not above.
If I have AC=10 then I have a lower overall Resistance compared to AC=24, right ? So, I should compensate by taking additional Defense.
Let's take an example, If I have, lets' say 35K HP and 1500 Defense:
- Then the Ideal Durability Line (for AC=10) suggests that I should have a little bit more HP
but
- The Ideal Durability Line (for AC=24) suggests that I should have more Defense (Which seems illogical as I have already more "Defense" overall due to the higher AC)
Can you help me to understand ? As I think the blue line should be below the dark one.
Thanks !!
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The easiest way to understand this is by looking at the extremes. Pretend it was possible to get your Armor Class so high that AC granted you 90% Damage Resistance by itself. In that case if you put points in Defense such that it increased your Damage Resistance 5% up to 95% you will have, effectively, cut the damage your character takes in half (from 10% of each hit to 5% of each hit). You've doubled your survivability. Increasing your damage resistance from 0% to 5% by adding defense is much less impactful. Then you take 95% of each hit instead of 100% - which is not much of an improvement. You've only increased your survivability 5%.
Basically, the more Damage Resistance you can get from sources other than Defense the more valuable the points spent in Defense become.
ok, ok, I see. Thanks. So, basically having higher AC is like improving the effectiveness of the additional Defense stat vs the additional HP, so moving the break even point higher in case of your chart.
First off I want to thank abaddon for putting in the time and work creating this chart. Much appreciated.
I’ve seen multiple posts in this topic saying deflect on characters with 50% severity is not worth the points at all. I would like to make a case to the opposite.
Lets take a PvP DC as example. This hypothetical person has the following stats:
- 5000 defence
- 42 AC (anointed armor and the legendary cloak)
- 30% tenacity (easily reachable with the 36% buff to tenacity last patch)
- 45k HP
This would give the guy around 50% damage resistance (the AC combined with defence) and 30% damage resistance added in PvP from tenacity, giving the guy a total damage resistance (DR) off 80% which is also the hard cap.
Considering it is a DC he will have access to a few more damage reduction buffs like hallowed ground (30%) – Astral shield (30% = still bugged as it should be 10%) – Exaltation.
These spells will give enough added DR to take an enemies ArP out of the equation.
But what about weapon enchants like GPF you might ask? Well they actually don’t reduce the DR by 45% but the defence stat itself. Looking at the above buffs I think its save to say the 80% is still more then over capped.
So we are assuming the 80% DR is maintained after ArP and weapon enchants.
This means if the person is hit, after all the damage reduction is calculated he will still be able to deflect to even reduce the damage by 10% more.
Wouldn’t this make deflection the best stat to stack by far if your goal is a tank build and you are able to reach the 80% DR cap?
It will net much more result then stacking more HP (if that’s even possible to get much higher HP then 45k as a DC in PvP) and also way better then say stacking more defence?
I know this is fairly specific case but I think its very reachable these days for at least GF’s (guard), GWF’s (unstoppable), DC’s and for TR’s its good either way. Wouldn’t that mean deflection IS actually a good stat to stack once you took care of other stats for the above mentioned classes?
Tenacity is added to the total DR once you enter PvP. However you are correct that 10% of the DR from tenacity will always be present and can not be reduced by anything like ArP.
To qoute Kaelac again: "Tenacity determines the TeR %, an additional multiplier in PvP which serves to reduce spike damage. It combines with your base DR to make you tankier. Furthermore, in cases against opponents with high ArP, tenacity ensures you will still have a base level of protection. It also reduces the magnitude of incoming crits and the duration of any control effects.
In more simple terms, tenacity offers every player a base level of protection in PvP, and will never take more than 90% incoming damage from attacks (excluding buffs) even if you fight naked or have your defense fully negated by attacker's armor penetration. The more your base tenacity, the more base defense you have.
In PvP, the max DR cap is still 80%. The min DR is 90% (zero tenacity). If you have tenacity on your gear, your min DR% is equal to your TeR%."
Or in a formula:
If RI > DR, RI = DR.
Damage in PvP = base damage * (1 + RI % – DR %) * (1- TeR%)
First off I want to thank abaddon for putting in the time and work creating this chart. Much appreciated.
I’ve seen multiple posts in this topic saying deflect on characters with 50% severity is not worth the points at all. I would like to make a case to the opposite.
Lets take a PvP DC as example. This hypothetical person has the following stats:
- 5000 defence
- 42 AC (anointed armor and the legendary cloak)
- 30% tenacity (easily reachable with the 36% buff to tenacity last patch)
- 45k HP
...
This is an interesting problem. The answer is that it really depends on how much deflection this person already has. If this person were to increase their HP by 1200 they would gain 2.67% more durability. If they had 0 Deflect, then adding 300 Deflect would increase their durability 3.86%. So in that case, Deflect has merit. But it doesn't last long. If that person has 500 deflect, then adding 300 more will only increase their durability 2.7% - about the same as HP. Above that it's worse. If they have 800 Deflect to start then adding 300 more only increases their durability 2.45% - less than the benefit from HP.
So I guess I'll cede the point. There are some specific circumstances where Deflect has value. But for most players and most builds Deflect is almost never the optimal choice. And even in builds where it may have value, you still don't need very much before it becomes sub-optimal.
deflect for pvp is by far the best: cause the dmg comes in high bursts. If the dmg would be lets say dots like from a dc, then deflect would be worthless, but if you are against a TR/GWF/GF you;d wish you have 50% deflect.
deflect for pvp is by far the best: cause the dmg comes in high bursts. If the dmg would be lets say dots like from a dc, then deflect would be worthless, but if you are against a TR/GWF/GF you;d wish you have 50% deflect.
Well, of course, everyone would love to have 50% deflect in PvP, in a vacuum. Of course that would be great. But you're not choosing between having 50% deflect or not having 50% deflect. You're choosing between having high deflect or having loads of HP and defense instead. When you're faced with that decision there's almost no situation in which choosing high deflect will actually make you live longer than the alternative. You're free to disagree and build your character however you like, but the numbers do not support your conclusion.
yeah, but deflect comes mostly as a bonus from different things and not much as a choice, but deflect also has the advantage of cutting down the cc as well and for a class like DC it should be a very high priority for example.
And what i was trying to point is that it is rly about how the dmg comes... if is in high bursts then deflect becomes a solid choice, while if it comes in small and frequent amounts it becomes a poor one.
Well, of course, everyone would love to have 50% deflect in PvP, in a vacuum. Of course that would be great. But you're not choosing between having 50% deflect or not having 50% deflect. You're choosing between having high deflect or having loads of HP and defense instead. When you're faced with that decision there's almost no situation in which choosing high deflect will actually make you live longer than the alternative. You're free to disagree and build your character however you like, but the numbers do not support your conclusion.
I have a few questions.
How does the opponents resistance ignored factor into the value of taking defense?
And isn't there value added to deflect, as it cannot be negated by your opponent in any way?
If you are talking PvP the fact that anything and everything debuffs defense will significantly change your opinion about how long you should build defense instead of HP, depending on how often you believe you will encounter those debuff, but there is a huge laundry list of stacking ways to remove defense from a person.
Really what this charts is EHP (effective HP sorry. An acronym used in many other games). This makes it a good baseline but you certainly should not twist your build to fit this ideal curve. As qutsemnie points out in PVP your defence is going to face many defense debuffs that alter the equation. In PVE it is more relative to your healing rate. You may want to go well north of the line in defense if you are not getting regen/ Life Steal gfast enough to replenish your well of HP. I know in clerics phase sometimes I aggro multiple devils and really I will favor defense over HP because I am going to try to survive by lifesteal and burst damage. Because EHP is HP x mitigation all HP you are missing become null in the equation. Also ther was some discussion of deflect and why it does or does not matter. As in HP gain HP that you never lose also apply to defense. And specific cases like TRs and HRs using Lone Wolf (much less the profound set or Combats) drastically change that. I guess I am kinda necroing here but it is a good baseline to make decissions off of. Merry Xmas all.
My personal opinion in pvp if you are not GWF or GF who can't hit 50% DR
it's better to stack HP because with 3k def you only got +-30% DR with arpen stat in pvp build at least 24% arpen so 3k stat for +-6% DR return not worthed
At best it is a mechanism suited as a secondary layer of self-defense and cannot function alone without a primary layer, which, in case of HRs would be the collective lifesucking mechanic involving [regen + (deflect=heal) + (high lifesteal + unending stream of DoTs)]... and in case of TRs, stealth - which limits the frequency of attempted attacks in the first place, thus limiting the overall numbers of attacks that might make past the unstable, chance-controlled layer.
As mentioned many times in the past, empirically, chance-based deflection/parry/block/dodge/evade/whatever-name-the-game-calls-it type of mechanics begin to reach stability suitable enough to be used as a primary defense mechanic once the chance starts crawling above the 60% threshold (in which case it's still not perceived as particularly tough - simply acceptable levels).
When this chance-based mechanic starts going past 75% chance, people begin to wonder WTF is this.. am I fighting Spider-man or something?...and thus, at this point the character becomes what other MMOGs call 'dodge tanks'
In other words, try not using Wilds Medicine+pathfinder/CA DoT mechanics with HR, or try not using stealth+supplementary ITC... and see how far "50% deflect" gets you. Most usually back to the spawn point.
Even in Champions Online where you could maintain 75~80% dodge chance, it still required the "dodge=heals" mechanic, another heal power, a 90s recharge/15s duration "evade everything" mode plus another optional active defense (usually a 90s recharge, heal 60% of HP bar power) to reach "OP" status. In other words, chance based mechanics almost always need a supplementary mechanic, and without those, a set damage resistance that works 100% of the time is almost always more reliable.
The problem with NW would be its just too easy to stack ArPen.
Stop making excuses. Be a man. If you know something to be broken, stop using it. Otherwise, you've got no right to be speaking of 'balance.'
Dont know about the overrated part, but that is the role of deflect: break the burst damage potential and provide you with extra time to recover (lifesteal, regen or direct heals), in NWO it also gives you a chance to almost ignore CC and that makes it OP for classes like dc/hr/tr.
In other games deflect could be easily countered by Dots, but here if someone uses dots it gives unlimited mobility to CW/SW and i think that they should really take a second look to those feats.
Dont know about the overrated part, but that is the role of deflect: break the burst damage potential and provide you with extra time to recover (lifesteal, regen or direct heals), in NWO it also gives you a chance to almost ignore CC and that makes it OP for classes like dc/hr/tr.
Like said, for deflect to work it absolutely needs a primary mechanic to synergize with, so in a sense deflect is sort of like a symbiotic defense layer. Hardly worth it by itself and requires certain necessities to help cover up its one, big, gaping hole being chance.
Sure, its a good mechanic. But it owes a lot of its efficiency to a factor outside of its own perimeters, and requires a very, very hefty sacrifice in the most important defensive stat -- HP -- in that it uses up defense slots.
Not really complaining, but just for a FYI, prior to mod5 most TRs didn't even think it worth it to invest in deflect (despite it being the only real defense mechanic the TR had) because it required too much sacrifice in HP -- whereas other classes like HRs (though conditional) had it really easy to stack deflect with stuff like a single class feature that presents a woppin' +15% deflect chance. Even fighter classes like GFs or GWFs were toting 30~40% deflection rates.
Compared to that, a TR with a good investment into all of CON, DEX, CHA with maybe 16~17k GS and 32k-ish HP would be struggling around 28~29%. With a Halfling + MI feats a MI TR would have maybe around 35%, but if it needs to go higher in deflect then he needs to start giving up HP. It is only with the recent changes, and Scoundrel builds, that deflection became a thing.. and frankly 50% is quite difficult to reach if you want to retain the 40k HP threshold... so TRs that are not Scoundrels still remain around 30~35%, since they aren't gonna be out of stealth much anyway.
The point is deflective is EXPENSIVE to maintain, the most obvious problem being it requires the defense slots. So as a defensive stat, it does its job, but does it do better than others? I dunno. Seems much too cost-prohibitive.
keltz0r was actually the one who said to me some time ago, it was his words; "Deflect is overrated". IIRC he used to maintain something like 22% or something. If he were still playing today, I'm kinda convinced he'd still have only so much deflect... and probably have something like 46k HP as a TR.
Stop making excuses. Be a man. If you know something to be broken, stop using it. Otherwise, you've got no right to be speaking of 'balance.'
sorry, but "durability line" is not a good idea, imo
x is HP (linear)
f(y) is a defence function, where y is defence tooltip
Zmax = x/(1-f(y)/100), (maximum damage taken) is utility function (durability)
now you build map (x,y) for Zmax (map is the set of indifference curves) with dx = 400, dy = 100 (steps, GS-wise)
I assume that for each indifference curve you take the point that lies closer to zero... Bad idea:
1) gear for different toon-types is different (GF can easily stack 5k defence, what to do with that?)
2) defensive gear with HP often has defence :-S
4) radiants cost more than azures
Better idea: build map, find curve on map that better suits your goals (max damage you want to survive), twink your gear to make it optimal
e.g. for 35000 HP 1500 defence (which is optimal, according to graph) the values: 33800 HP 1849 defence will be on the same indifference curve, which can be easily achieved by swapping radiant r10 with azure r10 and adding 49 defence from somewhere, but even without this additional 49 defence result will be almost the same.
So you have a piece of equipment with an empty defense slot...what do you put in it?
There are four choices: Lifesteal, Deflect, Defense, and Hit Points.
Lifesteal is great for DPS classes, but diminishing returns hits it very, very hard once you are up around 1500. It's not much use in going above that.
Deflect is very useful for Rogues who get 75% deflection severity, but for everyone else who is stuck at 50% it is a vastly inferior option.
So the question then becomes, "Should I stack HP or Defense? Which will give my character a bigger increase in survivability?" The answer is that it depends on how much HP and defense you currently have. To figure out which will be better for you just consult the handy-dandy chart below:
If you are above the line, you should increase your HP. If you are below the line, increase your defense.
The chart was generated using an overall measure of "durability" which I defined as "how much abuse your character can take before they die." (That measure was derived from the Defense to Damage Resistance curve from here: https://www.desmos.com/calculator/3dqpvhuavj and the HP curve, which is linear)
If your character has huge amounts of HP and no defense, or huge amounts of defense with low HP they're more likely to get one-shotted or beaten to death than if you had distributed your stats via the chart. If your character is on the line you have the best possible balance of HP and Defense. If your character departs from the line significantly then you are not getting the best "bang for your buck" in stat distribution.
Hope this helps.
*Edit - This does not take into account the Guardian Fighter's ability to block damage. That will throw the calculations off quite a bit. However, because of how much defense GF's get from their gear I would think the choice for them would always be more HP.
this is great for some classes i dont see any cws any where near these hps, 2500 def and 57k hp really
Comments
GWF's who get power from defense are a special case. It's perfectly reasonable for them to load up more on the defense side of that line because of how much it benefits their power. Killing enemies faster means less tankiness is needed and also provides more lifesteal. And even so, we're not talking about huge differences. HP and Defense both still benefit you if overstacked. The main use of the chart is intended to be for people who want to optimize their build.
For example, my CW had 1k defense and 33k HP. I just made and equipped 5 new personalized rings which opened up 5 new defense enchantment slots that I didn't have before and I wanted to know if I should put defense or HP in them. That's where the chart is helpful. It doesn't mean that if I stacked all HP my build would suck, it would just mean it's not quite as good as it could have been.
ńèЪùŁâ 70 acDC
Nubula, Scrubula, Nutella, Ebola
I've tested long time ago for GS investment in HP vs Defense and for all points tested HP looked better, after hit you left with more hp, meaning it was more worthwhile to soak damage instead of resisting.
So I will be glad to learn how you calculated and re-check.
Sure. Here's an example calculation. Let's say someone has 30k HP and 1500 Defense and they're wondering whether to slot a Rank 10 Radiant to increase HP 1200 or a Rank 10 Azure to increase defense 300.
1500 Defense is 23.85% Damage Resistance. So this person can withstand 30000/(1-.2385) = 39,396 enemy damage before dying.
If 300 Defense is added then DR goes up to 26.13%. Now this person can withstand 30000/(1-.2613)= 40,612 enemy damage before dying.
If 1200 HP had been added this person would be able to withstand 31200/(1-.2385) = 40,972 enemy damage before dying.
The HP will give them more ability to survive than defense. The line on the chart is just the "break even" point where adding HP or Defense doesn't matter because it gives the same amount of survivability either way.
Now, this is most accurate when you're just taking burst damage, then healing to full, then more burst damage. In the event that you're trying to survive constant damage while healing then defense will be slightly more valuable (since the HP you are healed will "go farther"). For that reason it's ok to shade toward defense a bit more, but I think the majority of problems people have when trying to survive is just absorbing a quick, hard beating where rate of healing doesn't come into play all that much.
*Edit*
Since you were thinking that HP is always better let me give an example that shows when defense is better. If someone has 30k HP and 500 Defense. Damage Resistance at 500 is 11.66%. At 800 it is 16.37%
Then durability = 30000/(1-.1166) = 33,960
Durability with HP added = 31200/(1-.1166) = 35,318
Durability with Defense added = 30000/(1-.1637) = 35,871
Here defense out-performs HP.
Ahh i did the same thing, I wrote a small script that shows the remaining hp over very high damage (killing or near death), only the main difference i was to lazy and was not looking for the break points or general rule but the adjustment near my build 25k~30k HP & 1.4k, and tested about 1k gs 'area' in smaller modification steps. it fits your graph too.
Thanks.
I'm not sure. Maybe someday Cryptic will add challenging PVE content and we'll find out?
Highest possible damage survivable is useful as a "bare minimum" concept; say a mob does exactly 30k damage, how would one best go about combining hitpoints and damage reduction to survive such a hit?
But combat rarely consists of a series of large hits in a short timespan, or we'd all be dead all the time. It consists of lots of hits over time. What matters in such fights is your ability to reduce incoming damage to the point where it can be outhealed, while still keeping a large enough effective health pool that you can survive the highest possible damage you will take before you will gain health back. The combination of healing skills, lifesteal, regeneration, potions, companions and various minor healing buffs add a plethora of options how to go about attaining enough healing for your character.
A character with 10000 hit points and no damage reduction will never survive a prolonged fight if incoming healing doesn't surpass incoming damage, but a character with 8000 hit points and 20% damage reduction (equal effective health pool) will generally survive longer, or might actually not die at all. Both of them will die to a 10000 damage hit, both of them will survive a 9999 damage hit, but the latter will have better sustainability.
This is also where deflection enters the picture, it raises the damage resistance and therefore increases sustainability further, at a point where defense will add very little and hit points add nothing at all.
In general your point is valid. It is true that over a series of small hits and small heals the person with higher defense and lower HP will survive longer.
However, my observations of Neverwinter are that it is very, very rare that something like that occurs. Personally, I know that 99% of my deaths are because of spike damage where I either take a massive hit from one source, or a mob of adds surrounds me and pummels me all at once. I don't know that I've ever been in a situation where my ability to heal has been in a race with the rate I'm taking damage and my inability to heal or be healed at a high enough rate is what resulted in my death. For me it's always spike damage, heal to full, repeat. Maybe others experience something else. But if indeed that is the most common form of death then there's nothing misleading or inaccurate about characterizing this metric as a characters durability and there's nothing wrong with planning to maximize it to decrease the frequency of deaths.
yeah my observations as well. healing currently always overtakes dmg received so it's not a question of prolonged sustainability, it's a question of being 1 shot.
Other games like Eve refer to these calculations as EHP, Effective Hit Points. Resist+hp pool = total hp pool. In games with either little to no healing (like eve) or games with an overabundance of healing (like nw) then EHP is all that really matters.
It doesn't really matter if you are missing 5 health or 5k. If you have any health missing your next attack is going to heal you 30k (or if EC procs, 90k) health.
Thanks again for this very valuable work that you did and shared to the NW community.
I have a question on the positioning of the blue line (eg: When AC=24 vs AC=10) which seems unintuitive for me. I would have thought that the break even point when AC is higher should be below, not above.
If I have AC=10 then I have a lower overall Resistance compared to AC=24, right ? So, I should compensate by taking additional Defense.
Let's take an example, If I have, lets' say 35K HP and 1500 Defense:
- Then the Ideal Durability Line (for AC=10) suggests that I should have a little bit more HP
but
- The Ideal Durability Line (for AC=24) suggests that I should have more Defense (Which seems illogical as I have already more "Defense" overall due to the higher AC)
Can you help me to understand ? As I think the blue line should be below the dark one.
Thanks !!
The easiest way to understand this is by looking at the extremes. Pretend it was possible to get your Armor Class so high that AC granted you 90% Damage Resistance by itself. In that case if you put points in Defense such that it increased your Damage Resistance 5% up to 95% you will have, effectively, cut the damage your character takes in half (from 10% of each hit to 5% of each hit). You've doubled your survivability. Increasing your damage resistance from 0% to 5% by adding defense is much less impactful. Then you take 95% of each hit instead of 100% - which is not much of an improvement. You've only increased your survivability 5%.
Basically, the more Damage Resistance you can get from sources other than Defense the more valuable the points spent in Defense become.
Cool.
can you make a graph for 47 AC, rly curious how that looks. Ty!
I’ve seen multiple posts in this topic saying deflect on characters with 50% severity is not worth the points at all. I would like to make a case to the opposite.
Lets take a PvP DC as example. This hypothetical person has the following stats:
- 5000 defence
- 42 AC (anointed armor and the legendary cloak)
- 30% tenacity (easily reachable with the 36% buff to tenacity last patch)
- 45k HP
This would give the guy around 50% damage resistance (the AC combined with defence) and 30% damage resistance added in PvP from tenacity, giving the guy a total damage resistance (DR) off 80% which is also the hard cap.
Considering it is a DC he will have access to a few more damage reduction buffs like hallowed ground (30%) – Astral shield (30% = still bugged as it should be 10%) – Exaltation.
These spells will give enough added DR to take an enemies ArP out of the equation.
But what about weapon enchants like GPF you might ask? Well they actually don’t reduce the DR by 45% but the defence stat itself. Looking at the above buffs I think its save to say the 80% is still more then over capped.
So we are assuming the 80% DR is maintained after ArP and weapon enchants.
Now lets take a look at deflection.
“Deflection is applied last after all DR and buffs have been calculated on damage, i.e multiplicative for purposes of calculating eHP…… With capped DR, deflecting attacks means you only take 10% of all incoming damage and is the only way of bypassing the cap.”
- Paraphrased from Kaelac (http://laggygamerz.com/forum/index.php?/topic/382-kaelac%E2%80%99s-guide-to-damage-tenacity-reisistance-and-debuffs-in-neverwinter/)
This means if the person is hit, after all the damage reduction is calculated he will still be able to deflect to even reduce the damage by 10% more.
Wouldn’t this make deflection the best stat to stack by far if your goal is a tank build and you are able to reach the 80% DR cap?
It will net much more result then stacking more HP (if that’s even possible to get much higher HP then 45k as a DC in PvP) and also way better then say stacking more defence?
I know this is fairly specific case but I think its very reachable these days for at least GF’s (guard), GWF’s (unstoppable), DC’s and for TR’s its good either way. Wouldn’t that mean deflection IS actually a good stat to stack once you took care of other stats for the above mentioned classes?
Tenacity if i recall correct is similar to deflect it applies after DR-RI, in that EHP= HP/[(1+ RI-DR)(1-TEN)]
To qoute Kaelac again:
"Tenacity determines the TeR %, an additional multiplier in PvP which serves to reduce spike damage. It combines with your base DR to make you tankier. Furthermore, in cases against opponents with high ArP, tenacity ensures you will still have a base level of protection. It also reduces the magnitude of incoming crits and the duration of any control effects.
In more simple terms, tenacity offers every player a base level of protection in PvP, and will never take more than 90% incoming damage from attacks (excluding buffs) even if you fight naked or have your defense fully negated by attacker's armor penetration. The more your base tenacity, the more base defense you have.
In PvP, the max DR cap is still 80%. The min DR is 90% (zero tenacity). If you have tenacity on your gear, your min DR% is equal to your TeR%."
Or in a formula:
If RI > DR, RI = DR.
Damage in PvP = base damage * (1 + RI % – DR %) * (1- TeR%)
This is an interesting problem. The answer is that it really depends on how much deflection this person already has. If this person were to increase their HP by 1200 they would gain 2.67% more durability. If they had 0 Deflect, then adding 300 Deflect would increase their durability 3.86%. So in that case, Deflect has merit. But it doesn't last long. If that person has 500 deflect, then adding 300 more will only increase their durability 2.7% - about the same as HP. Above that it's worse. If they have 800 Deflect to start then adding 300 more only increases their durability 2.45% - less than the benefit from HP.
So I guess I'll cede the point. There are some specific circumstances where Deflect has value. But for most players and most builds Deflect is almost never the optimal choice. And even in builds where it may have value, you still don't need very much before it becomes sub-optimal.
I guess this says what I've always abided by: PVP players should have at least 45k-50k HP
Well, of course, everyone would love to have 50% deflect in PvP, in a vacuum. Of course that would be great. But you're not choosing between having 50% deflect or not having 50% deflect. You're choosing between having high deflect or having loads of HP and defense instead. When you're faced with that decision there's almost no situation in which choosing high deflect will actually make you live longer than the alternative. You're free to disagree and build your character however you like, but the numbers do not support your conclusion.
And what i was trying to point is that it is rly about how the dmg comes... if is in high bursts then deflect becomes a solid choice, while if it comes in small and frequent amounts it becomes a poor one.
I have a few questions.
How does the opponents resistance ignored factor into the value of taking defense?
And isn't there value added to deflect, as it cannot be negated by your opponent in any way?
it's better to stack HP because with 3k def you only got +-30% DR with arpen stat in pvp build at least 24% arpen so 3k stat for +-6% DR return not worthed
At best it is a mechanism suited as a secondary layer of self-defense and cannot function alone without a primary layer, which, in case of HRs would be the collective lifesucking mechanic involving [regen + (deflect=heal) + (high lifesteal + unending stream of DoTs)]... and in case of TRs, stealth - which limits the frequency of attempted attacks in the first place, thus limiting the overall numbers of attacks that might make past the unstable, chance-controlled layer.
As mentioned many times in the past, empirically, chance-based deflection/parry/block/dodge/evade/whatever-name-the-game-calls-it type of mechanics begin to reach stability suitable enough to be used as a primary defense mechanic once the chance starts crawling above the 60% threshold (in which case it's still not perceived as particularly tough - simply acceptable levels).
When this chance-based mechanic starts going past 75% chance, people begin to wonder WTF is this.. am I fighting Spider-man or something?...and thus, at this point the character becomes what other MMOGs call 'dodge tanks'
In other words, try not using Wilds Medicine+pathfinder/CA DoT mechanics with HR, or try not using stealth+supplementary ITC... and see how far "50% deflect" gets you. Most usually back to the spawn point.
Even in Champions Online where you could maintain 75~80% dodge chance, it still required the "dodge=heals" mechanic, another heal power, a 90s recharge/15s duration "evade everything" mode plus another optional active defense (usually a 90s recharge, heal 60% of HP bar power) to reach "OP" status. In other words, chance based mechanics almost always need a supplementary mechanic, and without those, a set damage resistance that works 100% of the time is almost always more reliable.
The problem with NW would be its just too easy to stack ArPen.
If you know something to be broken, stop using it.
Otherwise, you've got no right to be speaking of 'balance.'
Dont know about the overrated part, but that is the role of deflect: break the burst damage potential and provide you with extra time to recover (lifesteal, regen or direct heals), in NWO it also gives you a chance to almost ignore CC and that makes it OP for classes like dc/hr/tr.
In other games deflect could be easily countered by Dots, but here if someone uses dots it gives unlimited mobility to CW/SW and i think that they should really take a second look to those feats.
Like said, for deflect to work it absolutely needs a primary mechanic to synergize with, so in a sense deflect is sort of like a symbiotic defense layer. Hardly worth it by itself and requires certain necessities to help cover up its one, big, gaping hole being chance.
Sure, its a good mechanic. But it owes a lot of its efficiency to a factor outside of its own perimeters, and requires a very, very hefty sacrifice in the most important defensive stat -- HP -- in that it uses up defense slots.
Not really complaining, but just for a FYI, prior to mod5 most TRs didn't even think it worth it to invest in deflect (despite it being the only real defense mechanic the TR had) because it required too much sacrifice in HP -- whereas other classes like HRs (though conditional) had it really easy to stack deflect with stuff like a single class feature that presents a woppin' +15% deflect chance. Even fighter classes like GFs or GWFs were toting 30~40% deflection rates.
Compared to that, a TR with a good investment into all of CON, DEX, CHA with maybe 16~17k GS and 32k-ish HP would be struggling around 28~29%. With a Halfling + MI feats a MI TR would have maybe around 35%, but if it needs to go higher in deflect then he needs to start giving up HP. It is only with the recent changes, and Scoundrel builds, that deflection became a thing.. and frankly 50% is quite difficult to reach if you want to retain the 40k HP threshold... so TRs that are not Scoundrels still remain around 30~35%, since they aren't gonna be out of stealth much anyway.
The point is deflective is EXPENSIVE to maintain, the most obvious problem being it requires the defense slots. So as a defensive stat, it does its job, but does it do better than others? I dunno. Seems much too cost-prohibitive.
keltz0r was actually the one who said to me some time ago, it was his words; "Deflect is overrated". IIRC he used to maintain something like 22% or something. If he were still playing today, I'm kinda convinced he'd still have only so much deflect... and probably have something like 46k HP as a TR.
If you know something to be broken, stop using it.
Otherwise, you've got no right to be speaking of 'balance.'
x is HP (linear)
f(y) is a defence function, where y is defence tooltip
Zmax = x/(1-f(y)/100), (maximum damage taken) is utility function (durability)
now you build map (x,y) for Zmax (map is the set of indifference curves) with dx = 400, dy = 100 (steps, GS-wise)
I assume that for each indifference curve you take the point that lies closer to zero... Bad idea:
1) gear for different toon-types is different (GF can easily stack 5k defence, what to do with that?)
2) defensive gear with HP often has defence :-S
4) radiants cost more than azures
Better idea: build map, find curve on map that better suits your goals (max damage you want to survive), twink your gear to make it optimal
e.g. for 35000 HP 1500 defence (which is optimal, according to graph) the values: 33800 HP 1849 defence will be on the same indifference curve, which can be easily achieved by swapping radiant r10 with azure r10 and adding 49 defence from somewhere, but even without this additional 49 defence result will be almost the same.
this is great for some classes i dont see any cws any where near these hps, 2500 def and 57k hp really