Doing less damage does not equal Unskilled

unrefuted

This is an extension of the thread (http://pwi-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=1722341) so it doesn't get derailed. For the arguments leading up to this post, please refer to the thread.

This thread is to address the common misconception people have that if one person does less damage than another person, that person automatically suck.

This is not true at all because damage is random.

Assume 2 people of the same class using the same attack on the same mob. It is highly unlikely that they will do the same damage. So damage says nothing of their skill.

Extend this to pvp and we have the same result. Just because 1 person 2 shot you, and another person 3 shot you, this does not mean the person who 2 shot you is better. It just means they got a lucky crit or zerk crit.

The difference between a 2 shot and a three shot is that a 2 shot is 1 non-crit and 1 crit. A 3 shot is 1 crit, 1 non crit, and 1 crit. You cannot determine who is better based off this alone.

OPKossy wrote: »

You can solo FB29 as a level 80 in NPC armors. And, once again, if you somehow can't even do that it's saying a lot more about the player than the instance.

Your analogy, on the other hand, fails here because it has the two people doing the exact same thing which completely equalizes the two players. A more fitting example of the situation at hand is one I use frequently. I can handle APS with incredible ease on my lowbies in NW to the point where unless I have everything on CD, APS isn't gonna kill me and will likely let me kill you. Yet if these same people were to take half a second to use their brain and use skills on me instead, they'd absolutely destroy me. It's not that I'm extraordinarily good as there's only so much you can do in a lowbie in +5 gears. It's that these people are extremely bad and that's why they die to me when other opponents with the same gear range can kill me easily.

Your analogies are trying to imply it's something the OP did differently that they're bragging about being the cause of their survival or that it's variant damage to blame. What I'm explaining is that no... some people are just THAT bad. I've seen a level 100 cleric in full G15 Nirvana gear die in human FB19 before. Twice in a row. At that point, you can't say it's the instance being hard. You can't say it's that they somehow don't have the gear. The fact of the matter would be that the person in question was just -that bad-.

Your analogy is incomplete. You only take into account whether the person successfully soloed the FB. That is, you only take into account whether it was completed. Whether the FB was beaten. Whether the person won.

However, we are discussing more than that, because we already established that the "FB" was beaten.

To reiterate:

Colum - Raging Tide wrote: »

I mean... really? The person bragged about 3 shotting a T3 barb while he triple sparked with r9rr+12 weapon. What is glorious in that? Good T3+10 casters can 1-2 shot me.

It is already a given fact that Colum died. So it is already a given fact that they have "completed the FB". So it is insufficient to simply compare it to the ability to FINISH the FB.

Instead, it is more about HOW FAST they finished it. If your lv 80 in NPC armor soloed a FB in 10 minutes, and some other Lv 80 in NPC armor soloed the same FB in 9 minutes and 30 seconds, does that mean the other person is better? No. Because there are many possible factors that could have caused the extra 30 seconds delay, and it is completely unrelated to skill.

This is different from a real life race where you are in complete control of everything. Because here, lucky crits and zerks is a huge factor as to how much damage you do - something completely out of your control.

So similarly, just because someone took 3 shots instead of 2 shots, it does not make them worse than the person who did the 2 shotting.

DionDagger - Dreamweaver

Because of that randomness, saying that doing less damage=unskilled is a fallacy at best.

DarkSkiesx - Dreamweaver

Originally Posted by AWiseDude - RealLife
Stick & stones may break my bones, but words shall never hurt me

/thread

Colum - Raging Tide

Nobody ever said anything about whether the mystic is unskillful or not. I only pointed out there's nothing bragworthy in what he did. You can assume whatever you want from what I posted, it - however - does not make it true.

ZentDreigon - Raging Tide

unrefuted wrote: »

This is an extension of the thread (http://pwi-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=1722341) so it doesn't get derailed. For the arguments leading up to this post, please refer to the thread.

You were the one who started derailing the other thread when you focused on something you misunderstood. Then, because you can't admit defeat, you started to ramble on. As you seem to be pleased by derailing I shall present my contribution.

[Fade in]

It was a cloudy day in late October. The Chosen One woke up moody because you tripped on your slippers and landed face down on the cat litter box. It tasted funny. Fishy, but funny. The cat must be sick or something so The One decides to contact an experienced venomancer to help with the cat's condition.

While browsing the forum looking for a venomancer, The Chosen One reads random threads. Suddenly, something catches his eyes. A thread named "Stupid things people brag about". "This might be fun!", he thought. He looks at the cat. She's not moving. Probably sleeping. Better not bother her.

As The One reads the thread, he create empathy with a mystic who, according to the the thread's OP, struggled in killing them when they shouldn't because of the outgear factor. The time has come for The Chosen One and he decides to take action and types "You know what else is stupid?". This was the perfect beginning for what was to come. Afterall, someone must commence the drama, right?

Words are exchanged. The One has problems in making a point and as no one takes his side so he decides to drag the thing away from topic and start focusing on gear matters. The primitive pubescent fury becomes greater after the almighty OPKossy, also known as PWI's Greatest Forum Mystery Mod, points out a flaw in His Chosenness' argument. "What!? Someone other than the OP and his allies taking a stand against me? ME!? And a mod!? What's this nonsense!? How dare they!" He slams the table. The cat doesn't seem to be bothered by the loud noise.

The Chosen replies to the almighty's argument. The feeling was breath taking, but hitting F5 often didn't seem to make Kossy reply faster. It's worth the shot though. Then, finally the response comes. Once more, flaws are pointed out. Experience has spoken. The battle was lost. Yet, the crowd goes wild and asks for more.

The Chosen One has been defeated. He points to the OP "You're out of order!". Then points to Kossy. "You're out of order! This whole forum is out of order!" No one sees him after he shuts the door behind.

But it's not over. A new thread must rise... A thread in which one can revive the issues avoided in the past and assemble allies... A thread focusing on the derailing point... To search for closure so the cat can be seen by a venomancer... To protect the Perfect World from devastation...To denounce the evils of Sage and Demon... To recover the honor of a keyboard with a defective F5 key...

A new thread must rise... An unrefuted thread.

[Fade out]



[Cast]

OP as itself
Tabby Plumdrop - The Motionless Cat
Scarlett Johansson - OPKossy
Christian Bale - The One a r9rr+12 Mystic struggled to kill



Based on real facts.



Stay tuned for the sequel. This November, in a forum near you.

I crossed so many lines with this.

unrefuted

ZentDreigon - Raging Tide wrote: »

You were the one who started derailing the other thread when you focused on something you misunderstood. Then, because you can't admit defeat, you started to ramble on. As you seem to be pleased by derailing I shall present my contribution.

[Fade in]

It was a cloudy day in late October. The Chosen One woke up moody because you tripped on your slippers and landed face down on the cat litter box. It tasted funny. Fishy, but funny. The cat must be sick or something so The One decides to contact an experienced venomancer to help with the cat's condition.

While browsing the forum looking for a venomancer, The Chosen One reads random threads. Suddenly, something catches his eyes. A thread named "Stupid things people brag about". "This might be fun!", he thought. He looks at the cat. She's not moving. Probably sleeping. Better not bother her.

As The One reads the thread, he create empathy with a mystic who, according to the the thread's OP, struggled in killing them when they shouldn't because of the outgear factor. The time has come for The Chosen One and he decides to take action and types "You know what else is stupid?". This was the perfect beginning for what was to come. Afterall, someone must commence the drama, right?

Words are exchanged. The One has problems in making a point and as no one takes his side so he decides to drag the thing away from topic and start focusing on gear matters. The primitive pubescent fury becomes greater after the almighty OPKossy, also known as PWI's Greatest Forum Mystery Mod, points out a flaw in His Chosenness' argument. "What!? Someone other than the OP and his allies taking a stand against me? ME!? And a mod!? What's this nonsense!? How dare they!" He slams the table. The cat doesn't seem to be bothered by the loud noise.

The Chosen replies to the almighty's argument. The feeling was breath taking, but hitting F5 often didn't seem to make Kossy reply faster. It's worth the shot though. Then, finally the response comes. Once more, flaws are pointed out. Experience has spoken. The battle was lost. Yet, the crowd goes wild and asks for more.

The Chosen One has been defeated. He points to the OP "You're out of order!". Then points to Kossy. "You're out of order! This whole forum is out of order!" No one sees him after he shuts the door behind.

But it's not over. A new thread must rise... A thread in which one can revive the issues avoided in the past and assemble allies... A thread focusing on the derailing point... To search for closure so the cat can be seen by a venomancer... To protect the Perfect World from devastation...To denounce the evils of Sage and Demon... To recover the honor of a keyboard with a defective F5 key...

A new thread must rise... An unrefuted thread.

[Fade out]



[Cast]

OP as itself
Tabby Plumdrop - The Motionless Cat
Scarlett Johansson - OPKossy
Christian Bale - The One a r9rr+12 Mystic struggled to kill



Based on real facts.



Stay tuned for the sequel. This November, in a forum near you.

I crossed so many lines with this.

Defeated? Please, I moved to this thread because OPKossy asked me to not derail the other thread; I did this only as a polite gesture.

christyyyoung

or cause u still wanted to qq about it and cant let it go like a 4 yr old child?
also u were asked to pm mod not make new thread
quoting in a new thread about a previous one is STILL derailing it..
so where is the polite gesture?

HideYoHubby - Archosaur

christyyyoung wrote: »

or cause u still wanted to qq about it and cant let it go like a 4 yr old child?
also u were asked to pm mod not make new thread
quoting in a new thread about a previous one is STILL derailing it..
so where is the polite gesture?

You cant derail existing thread by creating a new thread, the whole concept is laughable. On this case it might very likely reduce the amount of derailing in the original thread.

opkossy

The above. A new thread on this is perfectly valid in this case.



Anyways, part of the thing you're forgetting is that damage, while random, has an absolute minimum and maximum range. Consider the fact that R9 third cast absolutely blows G16 out of the water and that going from +10 to +12 has a greater an effect than from +0 to +10. The fact would be that, in this case, damage range wouldn't be as much of a factor as you're trying to make it seem like it is. If I'm the same class as you and my high-end damage is below your low-end damage, yet you're killing slower than I am, outside of external things like lag it means that you're doing something wrong in this case.

Same thing applies to the example being used in that thread. In fact, my NW example that you seem to have glossed over exemplifies this. I can run into two people with the exact same stats, gear, and skills in a NW and consistently survive one while consistently being killed by the other not because of variances in damage but because of how they approach killing me. This doesn't serve to brag about me in one way or the other, but it does show a comparison between the skill of the person I'd survive compared to the one who would kill me.

Put a different way, if I will always die in a single hit to a certain setup of debuffs available and it's a fairly common setup at that (IE: Seeker QPQ combos into hard hitting metal skill)... someone who does not recognize my weakness (especially if they were talking up a storm beforehand) and fails to take advantage of said setup is inherently going to seem less skilled than someone who does see and exploit my weakness to said setup. Thus allowing me to safely say that their inability to do it to me speaks more about their lack of skill/knowledge than of any skill/knowledge I may possess.

Rhahiki - Morai

There are 2 school :

1) Doesn't count the kills used to buff oneself or debuff you as hits to kill you. A combo counts as 1, being purged or debuffed before by someone else is considered not to exist. These are usually the 1vs1 guys who considering mass pvp as unfair.
2) Any skill cast counts, by yourself or others, even if it doesn't really do damage or as a pre-attack buff. After all, every skill costs time, increasing the chance to be interrupted or engaged by others. These are usually the TW/NW squad play guys who consider 1vs1 boring/pointles.

Trying to convince a person from school 1 of a school 2 point of view is pointles. From your point of view, you are right, but you can't impose your point of view to the other so they will always consider you're wrong. If you know where you stand, you can respect their point of view without forcing the other to be like you.

XXHotXx - Morai

imo the whole concept debated here is pointless, for the actual state of the game,

supposing equal gears,

saying that player X is unskilled cause he deals less damage than player Y it's not valid nor debatable

simply because that's way too much class dependant and currently we really don't have a decent metagame balance (some class played in a certain meta is way more effective than if it's played with a diff meta)

player X could be skilled by dealing less damage if he is playing a certain class, but he would be not if he is playing some other one, as some "gamestyles" rely to a fast sequence of small damage hits (DPS) while others rely on slower nukes (DPH)

but well dealing damage actually is the only way to kill your target, so being able to deliver consistent damage (at equal gears) it's skill-depending
(and for "dealing damage" term you have to include all the debuffs\amps\CCs mechanics in it)

opkossy

Now that, I agree with depending on the context of the person being attacked. DPS vs DPH styles are a very valid thing and vary in use from class to class.


That said, depending on the gear gap, even a DPS based class should be able to 1/2-shot their opponent. So while in endgame vs endgame PvP, you won't expect archers, for example, to be 1-shotting their equally geared opponents even with debuffs applied... in mass PvP with varying gear levels, you do expect archers to be 1-shotting all the people with much lower gear (or at least killing them much faster than they can react) at a rapid pace from tab autos combined with their range. And that happens simply because of a vast gear gap.

unrefuted

OPKossy wrote: »

The above. A new thread on this is perfectly valid in this case.



Anyways, part of the thing you're forgetting is that damage, while random, has an absolute minimum and maximum range. Consider the fact that R9 third cast absolutely blows G16 out of the water and that going from +10 to +12 has a greater an effect than from +0 to +10. The fact would be that, in this case, damage range wouldn't be as much of a factor as you're trying to make it seem like it is. If I'm the same class as you and my high-end damage is below your low-end damage, yet you're killing slower than I am, outside of external things like lag it means that you're doing something wrong in this case.

Same thing applies to the example being used in that thread. In fact, my NW example that you seem to have glossed over exemplifies this. I can run into two people with the exact same stats, gear, and skills in a NW and consistently survive one while consistently being killed by the other not because of variances in damage but because of how they approach killing me. This doesn't serve to brag about me in one way or the other, but it does show a comparison between the skill of the person I'd survive compared to the one who would kill me.

Put a different way, if I will always die in a single hit to a certain setup of debuffs available and it's a fairly common setup at that (IE: Seeker QPQ combos into hard hitting metal skill)... someone who does not recognize my weakness (especially if they were talking up a storm beforehand) and fails to take advantage of said setup is inherently going to seem less skilled than someone who does see and exploit my weakness to said setup. Thus allowing me to safely say that their inability to do it to me speaks more about their lack of skill/knowledge than of any skill/knowledge I may possess.

Not necessarily. For example, if the instance has a lot of AOEs that needs to be done on kite-happy mobs, and two people can both kill all the mobs in one zerk crit (but nothing less), then the speed of their run depends entirely on the number of zerk crits they get. If they get a zerk crit they can immediately move on. If not, mobs spread out and drastically add more time.

The reason I ignored what you said about NW is because you're getting the premise wrong again. The premise is that the person already died. So by saying one person can kill you and one person cannot is not a good analogy.

So far, your last example makes the most sense, and is the only one I can agree to, with one minor detail lacking. You were talking about a seeker that can ALWAYS one shot you given their best combo, crit or no crit. I am not. I am talking more so about a seeker that can 1 shot you if they zerk crit only on that combo. So if it happens that they didn't zerk crit that day, it doesn't mean they suck.

The confusion here is because you think the difference is in the sequence of skills they used. Except that is not the case, because the sequence is already given by Column: triple spark. And he thinks he should have took more damage from triple spark. But unless we are talking about another combo that possibly does NOT involve triple spark, there is nothing a triple sparked damage says about someone's skill. So it would be out of context to discuss how the mystic COULD have done more damage WITHOUT triple spark, when triple spark is part of the premise. The most you can say is that using triple spark at all indicates unskilled, but that is off topic (and not necessarily true)

opkossy

Edit: Hope the wall isn't too much of a thing. If you want a short summary skip to the bottom. ^^;

unrefuted wrote: »

Not necessarily. For example, if the instance has a lot of AOEs that needs to be done on kite-happy mobs, and two people can both kill all the mobs in one zerk crit (but nothing less), then the speed of their run depends entirely on the number of zerk crits they get. If they get a zerk crit they can immediately move on. If not, mobs spread out and drastically add more time.

The reason I ignored what you said about NW is because you're getting the premise wrong again. The premise is that the person already died. So by saying one person can kill you and one person cannot is not a good analogy.

So far, your last example makes the most sense, and is the only one I can agree to, with one minor detail lacking. You were talking about a seeker that can ALWAYS one shot you given their best combo, crit or no crit. I am not. I am talking more so about a seeker that can 1 shot you if they zerk crit only on that combo. So if it happens that they didn't zerk crit that day, it doesn't mean they suck.

The confusion here is because you think the difference is in the sequence of skills they used. Except that is not the case, because the sequence is already given by Column: triple spark. And he thinks he should have took more damage from triple spark. But unless we are talking about another combo that possibly does NOT involve triple spark, there is nothing a triple sparked damage says about someone's skill. So it would be out of context to discuss how the mystic COULD have done more damage WITHOUT triple spark, when triple spark is part of the premise. The most you can say is that using triple spark at all indicates unskilled, but that is off topic (and not necessarily true)

Your example, again, does not take into account the sort of difference we were showing to begin with. If both players need a zerkcrit (and no less) to kill the mobs in one shot, then they don't have a gear gap as wide as G16+10 to R9 third cast +12. In essence, meaning that you've skipped my point about the differences in damage range. The max damage of the first person cannot be lower than the min damage of the second if they both need the exact same type of hit to 1-shot a mob. So my example of somehow killing faster than someone who outdamages me like that remains unrefuted.

The premise is still fairly accurate, truth be told. If I offer no real resistance and didn't utilize my defenses appropriately (IE: What happened with Colum who was uncharmed and didn't even bother with his survival skills), both are going to kill me. The difference is that the one who can kill me consistently can do so even when I utilize those defenses while the one who cannot only can do so when everything I have is on cooldown. This shows that fundamentally, the latter player is less skilled in their approach because while they can kill me, it's an unlikely event and as long as I have any defense ready they're going to fail. How is this relevant? Because it's showing that it's not all about the damage itself. Yes, the damage you can deal is an important aspect, but how you go about it is also important. Someone who does not play smart is going to be killing slower than someone who does play smart even at times where, looking at raw damage potential, the former shouldn't have a chance of killing faster than the latter.

My argument has never focused on a person who can be killed in X hits with the luck of a zerk or a crit involved. It would be dishonest to claim that someone who got a crit/zerkcrit on that type of person is more skilled than someone who just got a normal hit. On the flip side, yours has heavily relied on the assumption that a crit or zerkcrit was required. This is likely a large part of our differing views on this subject as my case has never been that someone getting on their high-end of damage range while someone else that was equal geared getting their low-end had anything to do with skill. Rather, my goal was to point out that if someone with inferior gear is killing someone quickly. There's no reason why someone in much better gear should have a harder time with the same target doing the same things. On the other hand, someone with worse gear can outperform someone with better gear by being smarter about their attacks.

Actually... you're not quite right on this. While he said good casters in T3+10 can 2-shot him, he never said how they can do so. Only that this mystic with much better gears triple sparked and still took 3 hits to kill him. Granted my original response to you was more on general terms instead of being specific to this case as I felt he wasn't really bragging but still, point remains that a comparison of the methods used was never really given.

Ironically, I have an example of something like this happening from personal experience. Namely damage testing with a couple of archer friends. One was a level 102 with a +7 G15 bow (this was back before G16) and the other was level 89 with a +3 FC green bow. They were both using my BM as a test dummy and using what they felt would get them the most damage. G15 archer 3sparked, cloud erupted, and... used barrage of all things to hit me for 4 digit damage even with crits. The 89 archer (who suffered a 40% damage penalty due to level gap against me mind you) also 3sparked... and the similarities ended there because that archer used a metal combo on me while using their genie to debuff me and frenzy. The result was the 89 archer getting 5 digit damage on me... while not even doing what would be their full damage if they were my level because of the level gap.

The point of that example? Even though the lower level archer with the weaker weapon should have by all means done less damage to me... they used their resources smarter/more skillfully and wound up hitting harder than the higher leveled one with better equips. Same thing applies to this discussion. If we're assuming same gear, same build, same skill use... then no the damage dealt doesn't display anything more than who the RNG favored more at the end. Much like you say and have been using as a base assumption. However, when we take into account gear gaps, varying use of skills, different methods of attacking, and so on... if the one with better gear is being outperformed by the one with worse gear, odds are the one with better gear is also less skilled. Which is the assumption I've been using.










In short, I agree with what you've said if we're using the same assumption you're using of total equality. When that assumption isn't being used, however, I feel that speed and damage can, in fact, be a measure of skill. Of course, this only applies to two people of the same class since different classes will have different methodologies, damage ranges, and so on and so forth by necessity.

Colum - Raging Tide

unrefuted wrote: »

...the sequence is already given by Column...

Colum has nothing to do with columns. b:angryb:angryb:angry

opkossy

Colum - Raging Tide wrote: »

Colum has nothing to do with columns. b:angryb:angryb:angry

Hahahaha. I was wondering if you'd catch that! b:laugh

Colum - Raging Tide

OPKossy wrote: »

Hahahaha. I was wondering if you'd catch that! b:laugh

b:laugh I'm watching the forums closely...

... Just in case. b:angry

opkossy

Colum - Raging Tide wrote: »

b:laugh I'm watching the forums closely...

... Just in case. b:angry

Column for mod 2015!

With mod adviser Colum.

/derail

tsyfall

This thread's title is common sense in the bounds of equivalent gear and situation. Why is this even being discussed? The random number generators embedded in damage calculation take no account of skill whatsoever, so if everything else is held constant, then the damage will be random.

Walpurga - Dreamweaver

OPKossy wrote: »

-snip-

In short, I agree with what you've said if we're using the same assumption you're using of total equality. When that assumption isn't being used, however, I feel that speed and damage can, in fact, be a measure of skill. Of course, this only applies to two people of the same class since different classes will have different methodologies, damage ranges, and so on and so forth by necessity.

Comparisons are only valid ceteris paribus. Stating that DD ability = skill would dimply a controlled environment using the same combo, same target and under same latency, in which case we clearly see that DD ability is only a. gear if there is gear difference and b. luck if equal gear.

An interesting thought experiment: What if you normalized all damage, crit strikes and gear defense, and removed all procs and % to succeed (ignoring 0 pdef proc as an outlier for now)? Assume each class damage is calibrated so that each class expends the same relative (to class resources) cost to deal the same relative (to target HP) damage. In that case yes, damage dealing would be a matter of skill. However the game is not equalized thus.

DionDagger - Dreamweaver

Walpurga - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Comparisons are only valid ceteris paribus. Stating that DD ability = skill would dimply a controlled environment using the same combo, same target and under same latency, in which case we clearly see that DD ability is only a. gear if there is gear difference and b. luck if equal gear.

An interesting thought experiment: What if you normalized all damage, crit strikes and gear defense, and removed all procs and % to succeed (ignoring 0 pdef proc as an outlier for now)? Assume each class damage is calibrated so that each class expends the same relative (to class resources) cost to deal the same relative (to target HP) damage. In that case yes, damage dealing would be a matter of skill. However the game is not equalized thus.

Best solution? Sin V Sin with r9.3 no cards, same refines/gear/stat allocation, and warsoul daggers. If one dies more than half the time, we can assume the other is more skilled. b:cool

Notice me tsy sempai.b:chuckle

XXHotXx - Morai

DionDagger - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Best solution? Sin V Sin with r9.3 no cards, same refines/gear/stat allocation, and warsoul daggers. If one dies more than half the time, we can assume the other is more skilled. b:cool

Notice me tsy sempai.b:chuckle

that's possibly the wrongest example you could bring

how could you define some sin player skill over some other when there is the tidal factor to heavily influence damage output and CC reliability

even worse if said sins were using r9r3 daggers that is pretty much the common endgame scenario

realistically you cant determ or debate some player skill by his damage output, even if being able to dish out the highest amounts of damage will bring you closer to kill (then outplay) your target, cause i could hit 15k a barb or a seeker but he wont die,

and most same classes 1v1s are nowadays pointless cause there is no such thing as metagame balance

some classes pvp meta are way more effective than other classes pvp meta

defense passives brought so much sustain that most of the same classes, same skills, same gears 1on1s can hardly result in something different than a 30 minute charmrape draw

if f.e. once wizard vs wizard was thrilling cause a sage bid would hit 5 digits, now its just negligible damage and i really can't see a way how a wiz can possibly kill another one at very endgame (or barb vs barb, or cleric vs cleric or mystic vs mystic or bm vs bm etch)

i am calling defense passives as 2k14 pwi cancer, they should've add the resistances increase as a gear value (like adding 80% res on the belt or something) and not as a passive buff value

Rhahiki - Morai

Walpurga - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Comparisons are only valid ceteris paribus. Stating that DD ability = skill would dimply a controlled environment using the same combo, same target and under same latency, in which case we clearly see that DD ability is only a. gear if there is gear difference and b. luck if equal gear.

The whole point that got to a disagreement was based on not-equal gear.

The point was : Caster A has higher attack value then caster B, to the point that min attack of caster A is still superior to max attack of caster B. However, caster A needs more hits to kill target X (who doesn't use any countermeasures) then caster B.

Some state, the reason is that caster B is more skilled.

Others state, the reason is that target X must have been debuffed/amped/unbuffed and/or caster B used some boost/buff/more costly skill and/or crazy RNG (only really crit when saying casters though).

Which leads to what I said before : It's a point of view problem more then a disagreement.

Keisari - Raging Tide

It's actually measureable if one ish more skilled than other, at least PVE-wise.

If person A has less base attack or attack levels than person B, this increases the time person A needs to kill compared to person B by a certain % (which ish difference between base attacks and attack levels). For ex. if person B had 12000 average base attack and 90 attack levels while person A had 10000 aver. base attack and 50 attack levels, the formula would be:

(12000 * 1,90) / (10000 * 1,50)= 22800 / 15000 = 1,52

This would mean person A should take 52% longer time to kill compared to person B, if both are equally skilled while excluding crits or zerks.

The crits and zerks can be roughly added to equation by multiplying the result of previous calculation by (crit%B / crit%A) * (zerk?B / zerk?A). In general Sacrificial Strike has about 15% chance and GoF about 20% chance for zerk.

If person A had 23% crit rate and GoF-weapon while person B has 18% crit rate and no zerk(due to T3-weapon's 40 attack levels), the calculation would be

(1,18 /1,23) * (1,0 / 1,2)= 0,959 * 0,83 = 0,799 .

So, multiplying these together would be 1,52 * 0,799 = 1,21 which means that person A should take 21% longer to kill if both were equal-skilled. If A killed significantly faster than that(in 1,1x same time as B or less) A ish more skilled and if A was significantly slower(taking 1,3x same time or more) B ish more skilled.

Ofc this ish a little rough if either had a lucky day with crits(though even critting can be semi-controlled with certain skills=skill), but that can be considered luck. Though even then accurate result can be achieved by counting how many zerks/crits really happened.

DEMHEALSMAN - Dreamweaver

Keisari - Raging Tide wrote: »

It's actually measureable if one ish more skilled than other, at least PVE-wise.

-snip of unneeded calculations-

You can't measure skill by PvE at all, just set up a rofl-stomp-pve macro and you're done. No skill involved there.

Colum - Raging Tide

DEMHEALSMAN - Dreamweaver wrote: »

You can't measure skill by PvE at all, just set up a rofl-stomp-pve macro and you're done. No skill involved there.

When a T3 seeker is dying against Ethereal Abomination there is some lack of skill. b:chuckle

DionDagger - Dreamweaver

DEMHEALSMAN - Dreamweaver wrote: »

You can't measure skill by PvE at all, just set up a rofl-stomp-pve macro and you're done. No skill involved there.

I still retain the fact that those that solo things are generally more skilled than those that don't, for that reason.

unrefuted

Keisari - Raging Tide wrote: »

It's actually measureable if one ish more skilled than other, at least PVE-wise.

If person A has less base attack or attack levels than person B, this increases the time person A needs to kill compared to person B by a certain % (which ish difference between base attacks and attack levels). For ex. if person B had 12000 average base attack and 90 attack levels while person A had 10000 aver. base attack and 50 attack levels, the formula would be:

(12000 * 1,90) / (10000 * 1,50)= 22800 / 15000 = 1,52

This would mean person A should take 52% longer time to kill compared to person B, if both are equally skilled while excluding crits or zerks.

The crits and zerks can be roughly added to equation by multiplying the result of previous calculation by (crit%B / crit%A) * (zerk?B / zerk?A). In general Sacrificial Strike has about 15% chance and GoF about 20% chance for zerk.

If person A had 23% crit rate and GoF-weapon while person B has 18% crit rate and no zerk(due to T3-weapon's 40 attack levels), the calculation would be

(1,18 /1,23) * (1,0 / 1,2)= 0,959 * 0,83 = 0,799 .

So, multiplying these together would be 1,52 * 0,799 = 1,21 which means that person A should take 21% longer to kill if both were equal-skilled. If A killed significantly faster than that(in 1,1x same time as B or less) A ish more skilled and if A was significantly slower(taking 1,3x same time or more) B ish more skilled.

Ofc this ish a little rough if either had a lucky day with crits(though even critting can be semi-controlled with certain skills=skill), but that can be considered luck. Though even then accurate result can be achieved by counting how many zerks/crits really happened.

But this is irrelevant because I begin by assuming that player A and B does the exact same sequence of skill. Thus, any deviation from the expected value is purely luck/gear based and is not an indication of skill.

I assume this because there are much easier ways to tell whether someone is unskilled or not that does not require observing their damage.

i.e. If an aps sin triple spark on an afk person, lands all debuffs and fails to kill, it's a gear problem and not a skill problem. If they triple spark on someone with purify spell and fail to kill, it is a skill problem, unless they know before hand that the caster is super squishy so they can kill the person before purify procs, in which case it is a luck problem.

Colum - Raging Tide wrote: »

When a T3 seeker is dying against Ethereal Abomination there is some lack of skill. b:chuckle

Assuming they are charmed, that might not even be possible and would just indicate they're afk.

opkossy

unrefuted wrote: »

Assuming they are charmed, that might not even be possible and would just indicate they're afk.

You'd be surprised at the amount of sheer stupid some people manage to pull off in this game. >.>;

Toddloveleah - Harshlands

No duh. Any hard hitting DD could of just dropped some money on this game and have absolutely zero skills while some g16 ppl can do everything perfectly and still lose.

Are you familiar with the pay to win concept? [or in gaia's case pay 1000s of dollars or farm for years and you win]

Keisari - Raging Tide

Toddloveleah - Harshlands wrote: »

Are you familiar with the pay to win concept? [or in gaia's case pay 1000s of dollars or farm for years and you win]

Sounds somehow familiar...oh, like PWI.