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Armor Penetration PvE
colluzion
Member Posts: 61
I'm having a hard time believing any armorpen is beneficial in comparison to other stats such as power or recovery in a pve situation. Due to the amount of debuffs and what seems to be a 'cap' on the amount of armor and damage mitigation that can be reduced, how is armor penetration useful in a competent group?
Basically what I want to see is a legitimate amount of proof that says stacking armor pen as opposed to power will give you more damage in a pve situation.
I've yet to be out damaged by another cw in any instance. I've seen crit stacked cw's, arpen capped cw's, etc. I've competed against cw's with higher power, but less crit or recovery, which makes a massive difference, but I'm mainly interested in armor pen.
http://vvcap.net/db/Pv5gQqTE4K6eZsgXmEmL.htp <--- Character Sheet
Speak up, arpen stackers!
Edit:
Controlled test with the first hit of Chilling Cloud (to ensure no debuff stacks, etc.). I tested 25 non-crit and 25 crit hits with stats listed on the spreadsheet. Most of the information is there. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AmsEnMQFwizUdFRlZ2syNnNFREpadFl3Z3V6dTg0RUE&usp=sharing
Also tested this in a dungeon with ACT, damage difference was approximately 9% (not a controlled test, only two runs, but thought it was enough information to include in the thread)
Enjoy
Basically what I want to see is a legitimate amount of proof that says stacking armor pen as opposed to power will give you more damage in a pve situation.
I've yet to be out damaged by another cw in any instance. I've seen crit stacked cw's, arpen capped cw's, etc. I've competed against cw's with higher power, but less crit or recovery, which makes a massive difference, but I'm mainly interested in armor pen.
http://vvcap.net/db/Pv5gQqTE4K6eZsgXmEmL.htp <--- Character Sheet
Speak up, arpen stackers!
Edit:
Controlled test with the first hit of Chilling Cloud (to ensure no debuff stacks, etc.). I tested 25 non-crit and 25 crit hits with stats listed on the spreadsheet. Most of the information is there. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AmsEnMQFwizUdFRlZ2syNnNFREpadFl3Z3V6dTg0RUE&usp=sharing
Also tested this in a dungeon with ACT, damage difference was approximately 9% (not a controlled test, only two runs, but thought it was enough information to include in the thread)
Enjoy
Post edited by colluzion on
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If someone did test it, plsss come foreward. I asked a similar question earlier about the 24% but real hard data saying if you have xxxx amount of amorpen pen will give you xxxx amount of extra damage. And also the stat for power, HAMSTER amount of power will give you xxxx amount of damage increase.
Black Lotus
http://nl.twitch.tv/wixardofoz
My experience is pretty much the opposite. I've doubled the damage of a comparably geared CW who stacked 7.5k Power compared to my 4k and ran a similar rotation. Power is a factor, but it's not the most important one. Without at least enough ArP to overcome trash and elite mob DR, overall damage is noticeably impacted.
If you're going all-out for PvE, I'd look at stripping down defensive stats before taking away too much ArP. I run more of a hybrid, moderate defense/deflect + heavy regen build, so my Power rating isn't going to go sky-high without stripping Critical Strike and ArP to unacceptable lows. Slotting companions with Power bonuses is also an option, but the AD investment is rather dear for the payoff.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
Armor Penetration is pretty easy to understand as a "resistance ignored" mechanic.
Ex 1: You have 24% ArP and attack a target with 20% DR. Your attack deals 100% of its rolled damage, exclusive of whatever modifiers are in play. Target resists none of your damage. ArP beyond 20% grants no additional damage in this case.
Ex 2: You have 10% ArP and attack a target with 20% DR. Your attack deals 90% of its rolled damage, exclusive of modifiers blah blah blah. You are dealing 10% less damage because your ArP did not fully overcome the target's resistance.
I don't have the math, but it takes tons of Power to make tooltip numbers budge noticeably. You can test this by stacking Power on an augment pet and watching your tooltips as you summon/dismiss it. This is why most players will recommend stacking ArP to at least a certain point before thinking about stacking Power.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
Damage is a direct derivative of power, armorpen affects the transfer of gross damage to net damage, your base damage obviously is your only damage multiplier until it hits the mob, at which point armorpen takes affect, but when you considering multiplied debuffs from a competent group, how useful does armorpen seem?
For example, if you're in a group and you're clearing trash without any aoe debuffs, armorpen will benefit you, but that's not so for bosses, seeing how most classes have several debuffs that are applied.
I've yet to see any proof that justifies stacking armorpen.
Those debuffs don't substitute for Armor Penetration. There's a thread around here somewhere that explains this a bit more eloquently (fondlez, where are you?
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
Mob can not have higher than 22% DR which we all know, but the fact is most of them actually have only 20%. And boss is 24% but honestly for cw if you dodge a couple stuns or have better rotations you can simply get your self a couple % extra dps in chart. So I recommend aim for 2000 armpen then stop and focus power, crit is nice but no point going over 2000, 1500 seem like a decent stop point.
Armor Pen is calculated first before debuffs. So if you have a mob with 20% DR and your ArP is 23% your attack will be full strength as the mobs DR will now be 0% (note it does not go below 0 with ArP). Now all your party debuffs come into effect taking the mobs DR into the negative.
Recently they *fixed* several powers with ArP so it should be more effective than usual. You don't have to have max ArP (24%) but I'd aim for at least 20%.
Always remember that arp is calculated first, then debuffs. Absorb the implications of that.
TL;DR: arp >> anything | up to 20% arp.
Anyway, to the OP, we explained about ArP before quite a few times. You can test it quite easily yourself, there's no need for somebody else to bring proof. Math doesn't lie.
I you're a pure PvE player, I wouldn't bother to go above 22%. However if you also PvP, you will want to fill your offensive slots with darks, since people have so much mitigation.
We're not usually talking about "no ArP"; it's more like 2k or lower ArP with a very high Power rating, which performs optimally against the bulk of enemies in a dungeon. I've never tested the scoreboard for accuracy, but I don't have reason to doubt it (especially since it only counts as much damage as a target has HP remaining, which is fairly specific).
It would be interesting to see an updated chart to illustrate the effect of Power on characters' damage scaling. I found some very old posts with a quick search, but don't want to necro any threads or repost information that I can't verify.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
The PUGs I been runnin with have like 800 ArP and 6k power and they out DPS me by a few mill or so. (recall im 2500 Arp and 4k power). anyway im keepin my ArP but am grindin for my MC body armor (OMG that low seal rate drop...) n gonna try dread ring/ valindra armor split set...
will do! mehpit@mehpit
good point. im pretty comfortable with my RW CW setup. im runnin all the usual suspects (except entangle still in tab as i like it to line up mobs for SS. I do hear the guy that gets off his sing first gets way better DPS and often that guy isnt me.. but i am dropping my OF straight after so figure i still get alot of DPS from that.
4k vs. 6k Power isn't an enormous difference in my experience. The 800 ArP CW is outdamaging you for other reasons. If it's not engaging the mobs before you, it's build, encounter selection, and power rotation.
For example, if you're using Entangling Force, you're sacrificing damage. Your party members (especially your fellow CW) probably appreciate your Tab EF and benefit from increased damage potential because you're helping to ensure that targets stay clustered, but you personally are losing damage because you're giving up an AoE damage slot for an AoE positioning tool while the other CW can keep a full damage rotation and still take advantage of your setups.
Of course, none of the above is necessarily a bad thing; if it helps your runs go more smoothly, by all means keep going with it, but that is part of why your damage is not looking as sexy as that of the CW next to you.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
I hear alot about tabbed CoI bein awesome but i noticed the same AP gain n damage as tab'd EF so I dont think im sacrificing much dmg...
What was the target that you hit? To test ArP, you need to hit targets that have DR. Dummies do not have DR.
So if you want to do a serious test, you should consider doing 100 or 200 round of test, at least. (In WoW, the community have developed a simulator with a little help from dev).
Did we have access to the number (base damage, power coef, etc) behind every ability?
Or did we need to find a way to obtain them ?
Play style has a LOT to do with damage. The "zerg ahead" guy gets to hit all the squishy one shot mobs getting the kill buffs that go along with it. Yes, OF straight after isn't bad unless the sing killed all the squishies (which often occurs now).
Really? Enfeeble a target dummy and tell me if your damage increases.
So you're telling me that accurate averages between 25 of each type of hit isn't sufficient proof? The base damage is displayed in your tooltip, modified by your power in that number, my hits ranged between those numbers in both normal and crit.
The numbers are accurate, not sure why you're trying to disvalue them.
As I and others have stated before, debuffs and ArP work differently. Ray of Enfeeblement directly increases damage to the target; it doesn't ignore existing resistance.
We aren't all crazy, I promise. At least not about this.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
Anyways, at least try it on some mobs with resistance on them, if you didn't on that test.
I'm getting really confused as to why these questions keep popping up. It's simple enough to test for oneself, and while it's a good thing not to take at face value what people on the internet post as fact, it should occur to the poster that there could be something to this ArP and debuff business since we're all saying the same thing in slightly different ways.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
I'm sorry man, but you don't understand ArP and debuffs correctly yet. You shouldn't be so categorical in your finds and try to listen a bit to the others.
Dummies have no DR for ArP to work on them at all. Only the debuffs or buffs to your damage work. You need a target with DR, so ArP is applied first. Then you can see how debuffs work FURTHER after ArP was applied.
This is what makes ArP useful... it negates target damage resistance if you have enough of it. Then your damage is further improved through all kinds of debuffs to the target and self buffs.