Sage or Demon?

Seirina - Dreamweaver

I have one very simple question, does sage bloodpaint make up for the loss of demon spark, strictly pve in terms of how easy it is to solo things?

If there is already a thread on this please link it. b:thanks

Hellzbells - Harshlands

Inb4ponies, and yeah I can't link cuz I'm on my iPad but there are tons

Seirina - Dreamweaver

I doesn't come up with anything when I search it, I need an actual link.

Hellzbells - Harshlands

Can't help you there because my iPads a *****

CritCat - Archosaur

Demon. I don't care what anyone else says.

Seirina - Dreamweaver

So the 1% more hp soakage doesn't make much of a difference?

Salari - Raging Tide

here is a bit of ajustment from sage and demon, but more on genie skills and such. You use the same gear and such. There is no "right" answer to sage or demon, both have their ups and downs one way or another. The best answer is to look at the skills and how they compare to each other and decide for yourself. What you decide is the right answer, if you dont like how sage is or demon switch after you finish your 100 cult. For me if you are just going to pve and farm stuff go demon. That is my choice, but either way the class can be expensive to farm, time and coins

Phoenix_Eye - Heavens Tear

Seirina - Dreamweaver wrote: »

So the 1% more hp soakage doesn't make much of a difference?

No just CritCat is Sage and regretted for no actual reasons.


Sage Bloodpaint is indeed really powerful. Along with the dmg reduction from Sage spark , you solo abilities become very high. Also Sage bloodpaint is welcome in squads.

But notice 2 things.

1) you can receive Sage bloodpaint from any sin around
2) Sage spark dmg reduction is nulified if you tend to use Windshield genie skill.

However endgame , when you most probably have decent APS and refined gear , Culti doesnt matter . In the end it is just a preference of skills.

Personally I'll go demon , though im a bit sad of some particulart sage skills im going to lose , there are demon ones that really interest me.

Depends on your playstyle , how much money you can make , and how long you are going to work on this game

BurnWhenIWiz - Heavens Tear

From my experience on a sin (sage btw), lvls 89-100 demon is better for pve. Demon spark is much more effective vs sage blood paint (lvl 92) until you get your aps end game gear.

Now, I haven't bothered to get the nirv daggers, so my aps is only 2.86 or 3.33 w/ windshield, but I regularly run with several 4.0 base sage sins and have discussed it at length with them. Even at that lower aps, I regularly pull aggro off of demon sins if they're of the spark, normal atk variety.

Once you get your sin geared up to where you're 4.0 base (5.0 w/ windshield) then the combination of sage bloodpaint, constant (albeit lower dmg increase vs demon) wolf emblem, and sage dagger devotion makes all the second guessing you'll do during those 10 levels about your culti choice seem silly. If you become adept at pulling off power dash combos every 2nd or 3rd triple spark, you'll be a damn near unstoppable dd force.

While windshield does override the def boost from sage spark, it is nice to have the flexibility to either keep a defense boost w/ 4.0, or go 5.0 depending on the situation.

Either way, you can't go wrong. Sins are the best solo'ing pve class in the game. I know demon sins who love it and regret it, and sage sins who love it and regret it. Completely depends on your playstyle and abilities, and how much effort you're willing to put into gearing your sin.

Sakubatou - Sanctuary

BurnWhenIWiz - Heavens Tear wrote: »

From my experience on a sin (sage btw), lvls 89-100 demon is better for pve. Demon spark is much more effective vs sage blood paint (lvl 92) until you get your aps end game gear.

Now, I haven't bothered to get the nirv daggers, so my aps is only 2.86 or 3.33 w/ windshield, but I regularly run with several 4.0 base sage sins and have discussed it at length with them. Even at that lower aps, I regularly pull aggro off of demon sins if they're of the spark, normal atk variety.

Once you get your sin geared up to where you're 4.0 base (5.0 w/ windshield) then the combination of sage bloodpaint, constant (albeit lower dmg increase vs demon) wolf emblem, and sage dagger devotion makes all the second guessing you'll do during those 10 levels about your culti choice seem silly. If you become adept at pulling off power dash combos every 2nd or 3rd triple spark, you'll be a damn near unstoppable dd force.

While windshield does override the def boost from sage spark, it is nice to have the flexibility to either keep a defense boost w/ 4.0, or go 5.0 depending on the situation.

Either way, you can't go wrong. Sins are the best solo'ing pve class in the game. I know demon sins who love it and regret it, and sage sins who love it and regret it. Completely depends on your playstyle and abilities, and how much effort you're willing to put into gearing your sin.

I agree with most of this, although I'd disagree that 92-100 soloing is easier for demons, since at that point your squishiness is the biggest issue your dps isn't high enough to make up for it on paint heals. I think with lower quality gear sage is better. With higher quality gear that is more endgame demon becomes better because you are no longer as squishy and you are able to worry less about survivability and more about your damage output.

Put it this way, I have windshield and extreme poison on my genie. If I notice I'm getting close to dieing I have the choice of damage reduction from windshield or increasing my damage output by EP. About 95% of the time I use EP and increase my damage output and therefore my heals and survivability. The sage/demon spark arguments are along the same lines once you can survive at least a few hits.

I've done the math in a few threads. Sage bp does indeed give you more heals but not by as much as people think. Sage paint gives you 50% more heal, but demon has about a 30% higher dps. In the end you still get more heal from sage, but it's only by a tiny bit.

As people before me have pointed out, once you have decent gear its more about your culti's other skills than paint or spark.



Anyone else wish they'd reduce sin paint to 1% and sage 1.5%? Seems like it'd balance out the game more.

Hellzbells - Harshlands

Sakubatou - Sanctuary wrote: »

I agree with most of this, although I'd disagree that 92-100 soloing is easier for demons, since at that point your squishiness is the biggest issue your dps isn't high enough to make up for it on paint heals. I think with lower quality gear sage is better. With higher quality gear that is more endgame demon becomes better because you are no longer as squishy and you are able to worry less about survivability and more about your damage output.

Put it this way, I have windshield and extreme poison on my genie. If I notice I'm getting close to dieing I have the choice of damage reduction from windshield or increasing my damage output by EP. About 95% of the time I use EP and increase my damage output and therefore my heals and survivability. The sage/demon spark arguments are along the same lines once you can survive at least a few hits.

I've done the math in a few threads. Sage bp does indeed give you more heals but not by as much as people think. Sage paint gives you 50% more heal, but demon has about a 30% higher dps. In the end you still get more heal from sage, but it's only by a tiny bit.

As people before me have pointed out, once you have decent gear its more about your culti's other skills than paint or spark.



Anyone else wish they'd reduce sin paint to 1% and sage 1.5%? Seems like it'd balance out the game more.

actually yeah i would rather sage be 1% and normal be .5% would make sins less of a pve pwerhouse

BurnWhenIWiz - Heavens Tear

Sakubatou - Sanctuary wrote: »

I've done the math in a few threads. Sage bp does indeed give you more heals but not by as much as people think. Sage paint gives you 50% more heal, but demon has about a 30% higher dps. In the end you still get more heal from sage, but it's only by a tiny bit.

Not disputing this, but I am curious how this is possible. Maybe a link to a thread if you've posted this before. If you're comparing 4.0 to 5.0, obviously demon out dps' sage, but given equal aps, and accounting for the differences in dagger devotion, I'm at a loss as to how demon could generate higher dps.

While I agree that there should be something done to rebalance the classes for pve purposes, just lowering the recovery % from bp isn't gonna do it alone. With the aps possible in game, lowering bp will not result in balance, but will result in a lot of dead sins and bms in instances. Really, I only see that helping to make clerics more necessary again.

There has to be a reduction in aps, or the dph damage from claws, fists, and daggers to balance aps vs dph classes in pve.

Olbaze - Sanctuary

BurnWhenIWiz - Heavens Tear wrote: »

Not disputing this, but I am curious how this is possible. Maybe a link to a thread if you've posted this before. If you're comparing 4.0 to 5.0, obviously demon out dps' sage, but given equal aps, and accounting for the differences in dagger devotion, I'm at a loss as to how demon could generate higher dps.

Comparing Sage and Demon at equal APS is a rather silly assumption.

As for accounting the Mastery, Sakubatou is a major Demon fanboy so he would obviously factor in 40% rage damage for Demon and 20% for Sage.

For example, with 450 dexterity and 35% crit, you'd be looking at the following numbers:
Sage: (1.9+(450/150))*(1+(0.35*1.2)) = 4.9*1.42 = 6.958
Demon: (1.75+(450/150))*(1+(0.37*1.4)) = 4.75*1.518 = 7.2105

That number multiplies your weapon attack, then that gets multiplied by your APS and finally your attack levels for your final DPS. Since you would assume that at worst the two have the same APS and the attack levels would also be identical, Demon would end up superior.

Of course, in reality it's a bit likelier that the Sage has more DoTs whereas the Demon would shard Primevals and JoSD. Even so, Sage would still lose out if the Demon had superior APS, essentially leading to an endgame Demon sin having superior survivability and DPS. But before that point, Sage has better survivability and lower DPS.

thumbs

Can we throw Power Dash into the equation?

Seirina - Dreamweaver

Ive made up my mind we can end thread now...

Hellzbells - Harshlands

Oh kris!!!! Come here I made you cupcakes b:cute

Olbaze - Sanctuary

thumbs wrote: »

Can we throw Power Dash into the equation?

Possible, though slightly bothersome.

I can do it later today.

Azizsixer - Raging Tide

Olbaze - Sanctuary wrote: »

Possible, though slightly bothersome.

I can do it later today.

Not to bother ya or railroad the thread...but mind sharing your info regarding PD when you get around to calculating it?
Both lvl 10 and sage PD plz *Still can't get sage PD as yet*

Sakubatou - Sanctuary

BurnWhenIWiz - Heavens Tear wrote: »

Not disputing this, but I am curious how this is possible. Maybe a link to a thread if you've posted this before. If you're comparing 4.0 to 5.0, obviously demon out dps' sage, but given equal aps, and accounting for the differences in dagger devotion, I'm at a loss as to how demon could generate higher dps.

While I agree that there should be something done to rebalance the classes for pve purposes, just lowering the recovery % from bp isn't gonna do it alone. With the aps possible in game, lowering bp will not result in balance, but will result in a lot of dead sins and bms in instances. Really, I only see that helping to make clerics more necessary again.

There has to be a reduction in aps, or the dph damage from claws, fists, and daggers to balance aps vs dph classes in pve.

Olbaze gave you the math, I was just saying it as a general blanket statement.

Really all I was saying is a 2.86 sage r9 vs a 4.0 demon r9, equal everything else and not including mastery or wolf emblem, the demon gets 40% more damage. *Same comparing 2.86 sage R8 and 4.0 demon R8. *If using G13 Nirvanas you'd compare a 4.0 sage vs a 5.0 demon sin and demon gets a 25% advantage. *If using G15s with only 1 x -int on them you are comparing 3.33 sage G15s vs 5.0 demon G15s and demon is doing 50% more damage and at this point demon would actually be getting back the same or more in paint heals while spark spamming. *Also note, in every one of except the G13 Nirvana, the demon is perma sparked while the sage is not. *Not a huge issue since sage can spark for 30 seconds before they start losing dps/survivability due to skill use to maintain triple spark, but still something to consider.

Demon Mastery gives about 1% more damage. There is wolf emblem, that comparing a 40% demon crit rate with 240% rage damage to a 38% sage crit rate with 220% giving you ... 12%? more dps. I do like to consider wolf emblem in my equations because as a sin, we stealth between mobs and rarely fight one after another after another after another. So if I'm soloing a Seat, I use WE on the first guard *stealth* WE on the second mob *stealth* WE on the snake boss that takes less than 30 seconds to kill *stealth* WE on the group of 4 mobs right before BH boss, and then its cooled down before I pull the BH boss which also dies in about 30 seconds so for me both sage and demon are applied 100% of the time. The difference is remembering to use it vs having it as a permanent buff.



And I wouldn't say I'm a demon "fan boy", lol. I played a sage, I played a demon. I'm just more okay with the lower survivability of demons in exchange for the higher dps. I was a demon barb back in the days when barbs where told "you can't go demon because you won't be able to pull FCC or Delta because demon's are too squishy." And I was constantly told my 3str/2dex was fail because BMs need dex since they're backup tanks so I shouldn't use fists, I should put my dex into vit. Now I'm a demon sin because I like the dps and I don't have too much issues with survivability where my sage sin is out dd'd and out survived by my BM assuming both have paint. I know a demon sin with full JoSD will both out dd and out survive a sage sin with full DoT, even so, I don't see the need for all that survivability since I survive just fine as demon and as DoT sharding (will go 4 pieces DoT, two pieces JoSD), and as I said before I think the demon skill set is better for how a sin is played.

Sakubatou - Sanctuary

Azizsixer - Raging Tide wrote: »

Not to bother ya or railroad the thread...but mind sharing your info regarding PD when you get around to calculating it?
Both lvl 10 and sage PD plz *Still can't get sage PD as yet*

Sage PD is better than demon PD (50% vs 40%).

The three biggest factors for deciding on use of PD is your aps, your current crit rate, and what debuffs the boss currently has. A PD with no debuffs on the boss is almost pointless since the gain of 40% crit is almost countered by the loss of its channel+cast time, but if you can do it as a bm channels HF and the boss is amped + EP + TM... Its excellent burst damage, but we those are all variables.

The benefit of sort of depends what your current crit rate is. Mine is 42% so I go up to 82% when I PD, which is 1.82/1.42 is a 28% increase in dmg for 8 seconds, but I miss about 7 attacks from casting it (.4 channel and .8 cast seconds, then there is a fraction of a second where you resume auto attack = 1.4 seconds).

So I can compare dps for a 30 second window (30 second skill cd) of a demon at 5.0 with 8 seconds of 182% dmg and 20.6 seconds of 142% damage vs 30 seconds of 142% damage. The PD would give me 2.8% more dmg in a 30 second window, which usually isn't important enough for me to use it since I'd rather save my Inner Harmony in case I need it for a spark purge or something.

For a sage with 42% dmg they would get a 92% crit rate which is a a 35% boost in that 8 second window and a 4.7% incease in a 30 second window. Still, nothing amazing, but if applied at the right time (HF, EP, Amp...) you can multiply that number way up.

Also, the difference is higher if you have a lower crit rate. I used my crit rate of 42% but if yours is only 30% then the PD makes a larger difference.

Azizsixer - Raging Tide

So that means at lower aps the boots is also amplified since you don't land as many hits during the cast time?

3.33 sage with 31% crit and lvl 2 PD lol

Don't usually PD unless as you say there are debuffs on the target or I'm lazy and don't wana spark on the last set of mobs in fc for bubble boss.

Olbaze - Sanctuary

Azizsixer - Raging Tide wrote: »

So that means at lower aps the boots is also amplified since you don't land as many hits during the cast time?

3.33 sage with 31% crit and lvl 2 PD lol

Don't usually PD unless as you say there are debuffs on the target or I'm lazy and don't wana spark on the last set of mobs in fc for bubble boss.

No.

While the effect of the "loss time" from casting and channeling is indeed smaller in terms of hits, the quantity of hits you can get in that 8 second period is also smaller.

The increment you gain from PD is identical regardless of how much APS you have.

Also, in terms of buffing, using Extreme Poison with Power Dash is one of the best options you get in terms of damage. The only exception is Sages with Sage Subsea, where using Sage Subsea instead of PD and EP would have a greater effect.

Auronite - Archosaur

Sofar from reading this thread, this is what i have figured out.

Demons= good for offesive abilities and stats
Debuffing
and offensive buffs.

Sage= Defensive abilities and stats,
defences buffing,
healing.

is that pretty accurate?

Azizsixer - Raging Tide

Auronite - Archosaur wrote: »

Sofar from reading this thread, this is what i have figured out.

Demons= good for offesive abilities and stats
Debuffing
and offensive buffs.

Sage= Defensive abilities and stats,
defences buffing,
healing.

is that pretty accurate?

You can't actually try and simplify it like that...Demons have a nice shadow escape which i'm sure ppl enjoy using more frequently and have some nice defense skills as well.
Ask some sages and they'll tell you they have a ton of offensive skills.

It comes down to how you use each skill...

And ty for clearing this up Olbaze