Earthen rift

E/nY - Sanctuary wrote: »

Well seeing as how this skill is purely % based(220% of weapon damage at lvl1) would that mean if you had a good weapon it be one of the best moves you have? or does stactic numbers +% > pure %? Tad bit confused now because i heard from archers(take aim) which is 300% maxed? (i forget its been a while :x) does less damage then maxed deadly shot. So clarification on this please >.<

That solely depends on your damage value and the comparative integer...

Despite the fact that you disgust me by not knowing this upfront and still managing to hit 50 within 8 days, analyzing this would be beneficial to everybody upfront.

Consider my physical attack:
615-804

And now consider several skills I have, plus the direct 220% of Earthen Rift:
Slipstream: 185%+1820.1
Puncture Wound: 190%+3067.3
Earthen Rift: 220%+0

Let's take the highest value of my attack, both for simplicity's sake and because bigger numbers are better. And for those of you with mediocre math skills, bear with me, because I know its damage will suck, too:

1.85(804)+1820.1
1.90(804)+3067.3
2.20(804)
And to be fair, let's assume Earthen Rift's damage is 300%, because that's just level 1 of the skill, and it'll help you compare as to Take Aim.
3(804)

Which will give us:

3307.5
3887.3
1768.8
And lastly:
2412

Making our first two skills much more damage (let's not get into AEs quite yet). Now, this is with my attack values, as a 38 assassin. So, let's define our damage in linear functions, which means that we can parse how much damage we will do for any physical attack value. We'll consider 'y' to be total damage, 'x' to be our attack value, and use the values for Slipstream, Puncture Wound, and maxed Earthen Rift:

y=1.85x+1820.1
y=1.9x+3067.3
y=3x

Anyone who has taken more than 30 minutes of an algebra class will know that eventually, as 'x' approaches infinity, the last function will produce bigger values of damage for smaller values of physical attack. To do more damage than Slipstream, the amount of physical attack necessary will be 1582. Anything above that will give you more damage for using Earthen Rift, anything lower will give way to Slipstream. This is true for all attacks that use 300% weapon damage, including Take Aim, as long as the other attack you're comparing to is 1.85(phys. attack)+1820.

And then there's the fact that you multiply your damage by the amount of mobs that Earthen Rift will hit, and blah blah blah, but I have to go level now.

HollowMartyr - Raging Tide wrote: »

Wow...That was one of the rudest responses to a decent quest I've ever seen ...:(

...

Anyone who would answer my question based on no data would get a swift kick to the ovaries. I answered the question as I would answer any question involving math. He called for clarification -- that's about as clear as it can get.

Jerk.

Cholla - Harshlands wrote: »

There is also the number of attacks you make, unless most of your battles are one-shots -- this is something fist blademasters will be happy to explain, at great lengths.

But, for most battles, you are trying to minimize the time between your opening attack and your final attack which brings into play all sorts of things. Earthen rift has a 0.7 second channeling time (that is 0.7 seconds when you can be interrupted), a 1.8 second casting time (that is 1.8 seconds where you do nothing after hitting things) and an 8 second cooldown (that is 8 seconds after hitting things until you can use this skill again) and something like an 8 meter radius (which can be great if you have a lot of monsters near by and you want them to attack you).

So.. when you use this skill you are eating up 2.5 seconds of combat time and then you have another 6.2 seconds before you can use it again. Compare this with deep sting which has a longer cooldown but shorter channeling and casting times and only hits one target which will probably stop hitting you.

So... I am trying claim that "best" really depends on your situation. All of your skills can be your "best skills" if you really understand them and if you use them where you should be using them.

You're absolutely correct. I really should've factored those into my calculations, but I guess hangovers take their tolls~

There are other things to take into account as well, like being able to use both skills over the course of a mob's life, but I'm missing Futurama re-runs!

sar-chasm ('sar-"ka-z&m) : The giant gulf (chasm) between what is said and the person who doesn't get it.

And yet, I'm surprised.