Am I dense?

[Rogue]

Translation:

character stats (IE point allocation) does not have as big of an effect as stats on gear. they are adjusting this so that stats from leveling points are equal to stats from gear.

Diminishing returns are being added to materia melds. optimal melds will likely be either double or tripple.

IE: they are essentially flipping the effect. right now you must have great gains in stats to notice a difference. +10 STR vs +100 str is HUGE.

instead, they want you to notice +10 STR (say 10% increase in damage). but not notice a difference so much between +80str and +100STR (say 5% increase in damage).



i'm not sure what the point of this statement is. it implies to me that they are not planing on changing the formula. because dLVL is the most important factor, when dLVL is large (IE: when fighting stuff that matters) you dont' notice a large difference in adding stats due to the overwhelming force of dLVL.

IE: dLVL determines the range of damage you can do based on your DPS score.

if dLVL is +5 you can only do a maximum of 3k damage. if it is -5 you can do up to 6k damage or something like that.

that means maximum accuracy at dLVL+5 is capped to 75% and evasion capped to 15%, or something like that. but at dLVL-5 it is capped at 100% and 30% or something like that. Therefore they cannot show an accuracy rating on our attribute page due to the overwhelming force of dLVL on the equation.

TL;DR: dLVL determines caps on accuracy, evasion, and damage. accuracy/evasion rates will vary greatly depending on the level of the enemy you are fighting. therefore it is not feasible to display rating.

Thank you.

im not sure why a quad melded item shouldnt have equal gains considering the difficulty in aquiring such gear but whatever... also, whether certain gear/melds is required or not should depend on the actual content surely.. if double melds are required set the mobs damage,etc to be consistant with that... imo this has nothing to do with potential gear.

anyway! a good answer without any arrogance.

[Fadigre]

a good answer without any arrogance.

That's my favourite bit!

[Lux_Rayna]

Thank you.

im not sure why a quad melded item shouldnt have equal gains considering the difficulty in aquiring such gear but whatever...

Its more a concept of diminishing returns. I imagine they want it to be more progressive, instead of a vertical line. It's a bit silly that you can't notice tangible differences until you're multi-melded. As it stands single-melding is practically pointless. And thats bad no matter how you look at it. Besides, quad melds are mostly useless anyhow due to dLvl capping your dmg against anything you'd want a quad meld for. The obvious exceptions are HP, MP, store TP, enmity, etc etc. So really the only thing the change affects is how you'll quad meld your gear. Instead of stat stacking, you might have a quad meld INT, M.attk, -enmity, MP (not that this is possible, just an example). In other words, you wont have to quad meld int to one piece to notice a large difference. You might only have to double meld..or single meld int, leaving room for the other minor stats. Its good imo. A lot more variety in melds that way.

also, whether certain gear/melds is required or not should depend on the actual content surely.. if double melds are required set the mobs damage,etc to be consistant with that... imo this has nothing to do with potential gear.

Well it does, because multi-melding is affected by probability, luck, and the depth of your pockets. In other words, you don't want that filtering out ppl from content. Its much better to flatten the curve a bit and allow for, say, a full-set of single melded gear to be a viable option. In that instance, probability and luck are thrown out. They don't WANT to balance content around double melds, because that could alienate too many players (especially casuals). But they can't balance content around single melds successfully right now because of the way their stats work. So basically dLvL kicks our ass unless we go double or higher. And thats basically the problem. There's no feasible way to balance a game around single melds because it does not make up for the overriding effect of dLvl.

[Rogue]

In other words, you don't want that filtering out ppl from content.

i think the concept of diminishing returns is so abstract the average player wouldnt even consider this and as such i dont see how it would filter people from content.. it wouldnt even occur to people is what im saying.

im not sure the difference between single and triple.. hell even quad melded gear is so noticeble.. i have been trying to gear my DRG and WAR to do more damage, i have some respectable gear- darklight, GC trident, double melded STR hands, when i compare it to what people would consider lesser gear, (non melded/non darklight) is see minimal returns, and on boss mobs those returns are reduced even further!..

when i equip that dark light cuirass i spent 2 months doing the same dungeon 20 times a day to get... i expect to see something.

however, i know blm's rave about melded gear and INT so i dunno- maybe if i was blm i would be singing a different song. but this isnt the case with what i have experienced as a melee dps.

edit-

fundamentally, you CANNOT ballance content for players with "crappy" gear and players with good gear if you want the good gear to mean anything if they have better gear the content is going to be easier for them and it is pointless to try and get around that with "diminishing returns" and such

the only way to make the gear meaningfull is by making it filter people from content.. this should even serve as their motivation to get the gear in the first place.

[Onisake]

i think the concept of diminishing returns is so abstract the average player wouldnt even consider this and as such i dont see how it would filter people from content.. it wouldnt even occur to people is what im saying.

it's for the hardcore crowd.

im not sure the difference between single and triple.. hell even quad melded gear is so noticeble.. i have been trying to gear my DRG and WAR to do more damage, i have some respectable gear- darklight, GC trident, double melded STR hands, when i compare it to what people would consider lesser gear, (non melded/non darklight) is see minimal returns, and on boss mobs those returns are reduced even further!..

this is about optimization. let's say i'm a war and i need +70STR and +40 VIT. I have sanction, a garuda's and storm officer's cap and +60STR gloves. I can hit cap with those pieces alone. that opens my body, rings, neck. etc. for crit damage. i can drastically increase my damage now due to improved optimization because i only need to find 10 vit somewhere between my now available slots.

If i only have +20STR glovse. I need to get the other 50 STR in rings, legs, etc. no room for crit damage.

when i equip that dark light cuirass i spent 2 months doing the same dungeon 20 times a day to get... i expect to see something.

however, i know blm's rave about melded gear and INT so i dunno- maybe if i was blm i would be singing a different song. but this isnt the case with what i have experienced as a melee dps.

int does not have a soft cap. magical damage is dealt differently than physical damage. a BLM can always increase their damage by adding more INT. melee have to find a different way (Crit, att, etc.)

edit-

fundamentally, you CANNOT ballance content for players with "crappy" gear and players with good gear if you want the good gear to mean anything if they have better gear the content is going to be easier for them and it is pointless to try and get around that with "diminishing returns" and such

the only way to make the gear meaningfull is by making it filter people from content.. this should even serve as their motivation to get the gear in the first place.

Diminishing returns is mainly for PvP. PvE i would agree this does not matter. Yoshi has said he loves PvP. this falls in line with that goal.

[Rogue]

Diminishing returns is mainly for PvP. PvE i would agree this does not matter. Yoshi has said he loves PvP. this falls in line with that goal.

hmm im not sure why it should be different for PVP, it is the exact same scenario, if i have better gear than someone i should have an advantage or else why bother? not trying to argue but i think this is a valid point.

if someone can get 500 STR from melding then all the power to em, in fact im sure they deserve whatever benefit they get- without the stat-police saying "oh no we will have to cap you at 350, sorry bout that"

brass tacks- the whole stat system imho is a complete mess, everything about it is counter-intuitive and overly complicated.

changes have obviously been thought about though- going by yoshi's post, so hopefully it will come good, but i think it is flawed on a fundamental level and needs drastic changes.

[Sephrick]

hmm im not sure why it should be different for PVP, it is the exact same scenario, if i have better gear than someone i should have an advantage or else why bother? not trying to argue but i think this is a valid point.

if someone can get 500 STR from melding then all the power to em, in fact im sure they deserve whatever benefit they get- without the stat-police saying "oh no we will have to cap you at 350, sorry bout that"

brass tacks- the whole stat system imho is a complete mess, everything about it is counter-intuitive and overly complicated.

changes have obviously been thought about though- going by yoshi's post, so hopefully it will come good, but i think it is flawed on a fundamental level and needs drastic changes.

The way I understand it they just want people to be able to use more Materia than the base attributes.

With a lower cap on those, it opens up for a wider use of attack or crit attack and things like that. So something quad melded still will be superior, but all four of those melds don't have to be str anymore.

Again, as I understand what others are saying.

[Griss]

With a lower cap on those, it opens up for a wider use of attack or crit attack and things like that. So something quad melded still will be superior, but all four of those melds don't have to be str anymore.

Again, as I understand what others are saying.

Bingo.

They lower the soft caps, but at the same time increase the weight of those numbers on the math magic. It allows for a wider array of options when it comes to the types of rocks people cram into gear.

[Onisake]

So we're kinda saying that after a certain point your stats will begin to benefit you less and less if you pump them too high giving you the option to pump other fun stats.

yes

But isn't that exactly what we have now with caps or am I looking at it from the wrong angle?

Yes, but it's the inbetween where the problem lies

right now, if you're way below stat cap, you don't do a lot of damage. IE: if you're 80 STR below stat cap, there is not a lot of difference between +20 STR and +40STR.

but once you get to +60 STR, you will begin to notice a difference between +60 and +70. more on this a little later

I really wish either DLvl was taken out or the coding for criticals to be changed. Right now they're hardly worth boosting unless you sacrifice all of your stats to bolster these two stats!

I agree

Thank you.

im not sure why a quad melded item shouldnt have equal gains considering the difficulty in aquiring such gear but whatever... also, whether certain gear/melds is required or not should depend on the actual content surely.. if double melds are required set the mobs damage,etc to be consistant with that... imo this has nothing to do with potential gear.

anyway! a good answer without any arrogance.

my best guess is that damage is a function of several things

Base Damage (bd): determined by your STR and DPS score of your weapon. up to a cap.

f(atk): your atk vs the def of the target. no apparent cap. can act as a multiplier (your atk is higher than targets defense) or dampener (your attack is lower than targets def). this appears to be linear.

dLVL: diffrence in level between you and your target. most likely a log function. as large gaps show drastic differences than smaller gaps. mainly determines the cap to your damage. can act as a positive multiplier (you are higher level than your target) or a dampener (you are lower level than your target).

f(str): Your primary attack modifier vs primary defensive modifier of target. up to a cap. most likely a log function, as the closer you are to the threshold the bigger the difference. I believe this only acts as a multiplier. this does not seem to influence the function by a large amount.

so over simplifying: damage = [(base+f(atk))*f(str)]/dLVL

this is all based on looking at the testing of others. I personally have not tested any of this. especially since it is difficult to get a lot of +att with no +str etc.

some testing is also limited, so i'm filling the gaps with theory crafting and knowledge of how these formulas generally work.

-------------

this means a couple of things

STR is used in two places on the formula. once to check your potential base damage. and again as a multipler of base damage.

IE: +10 str increases your base damage. but the modifier is low if your STR score is drastically below against the primary defense modifier of the target.

so you won't notice +10 str. you won't notice +20 str. and you may not notice all the way up to +50 str really.

10*0.01 is about equal to 50*0.015 when you're rounding to whole numbers. even with a difference of 40 STR. a difference of .1 damage vs .75 damage

but once you hit the magic threshold where STR checked against VIT starts to matter, you will begin to notice a bigger difference in return.

60*.1 is no longer about equal to 70*.15. even though the difference in STR is smaller, because the multiplier increases so much the damage is more noticible. a difference of 6 damage vs 10.5 damage. not super, super noticeable, but the affect is greater.

IE: the soft caps we see mean we have hit the base damage cap of our weapon, and are above the threshold of the target. so the only additional damage is gained from the +att. which is why it is more beneficial to just add +att after a certain point.

[Fadigre]

yes

Yes, but it's the inbetwe...

-Quote cut-

...fter a certain point.

Fantastic job. I totally understood all of that ~
Thank you!