Quote Originally Posted by Shurrikhan View Post
Removing Kaiten, in itself, had absolutely no effect on crit variance.

If I have a skill that increases another skill's damage by 50% (Kaiten), it is no more subject to crit variance than if that original skill just dealt 50% more damage in itself (no Kaiten) and the of the kit is tuned around the reduced opportunity cost in Kenki.

Moreover, Kaiten itself could have just instead guaranteed the critical hit, for --shocked Pikachu face-- roughly the same damage bonus.

If crit variance were the reason for the change, we would have simply swapped "Increases damage dealt by next weaponskill by 50%" for "Guarantees a critical hit on your next weaponskill. Its damage increases with your critical hit chance" and been done, with at most a bit of Namikiri potency shaved off in favor of Shoha in order to balance out the impact that'd have on SkS's relative value.
Oh, nevermind then. I recall hearing people saying Kaiten's damage boost caused a huge gap in Sam's performance, resulting in crit variance actually breaking DSR balance depending whether Sam crits or misses. Hence a portion of the changes were to guarantee crit to stabilize performance and balance, but I guess I recalled incorrectly. I figured even if they did change Kaiten to "guarantee a critical hit", the reasoning behind "removing button bloat" wouldn't then make sense for the changes... not like it made sense in the first place when Shoha & Shoha II exist.