New Defensive Disc

[Bumamgar]

Defensive used to work by taking the difference between max damage and min damage, and dividing it in half.

For example, if a mob hit for 800 - 1650, while defensive was running, it hit from 800 - 1225.

The new Defensive discipline (and Stonewall) supposedly boost "Damage Mitigation" by 45%.

This doesn't seem to be the same thing.

My understanding of Damage Mitigation (as it applies to things like Combat Stability and Innate Defense AA lines) is that it reduces overall damage by X percent (ie: CS3 reduces overall damage by 10%) however, it does so over time and is only really noticable in long term parses. A mob with a hit range of 800 - 1650 will still hit someone with CS3 for 1650 some of the time.

So, does the new Defensive discipline just boost the same Damage Mitigation that we may already have from CS3/ID5 AA? In other words, over time (3 minutes) it will reduce the damage we take by 45%, but it doesn't actually reduce the maximum hit value?

I'm confused, please enlighten me!

[Kavhok]

It operates in almost the same way. Instead of reducing the damage interval by half, it reduces it by 45%. The other 5% comes from the innate warrior mitigation that also went in. You will take the same damage while in defensive that you did before the patch.

[Ainorli]

Does this 5% migation thing work while under evasive too?

[Gunrack]

And are we sure that the new 5% stacks with all the CS style AAs?

[Fafnir]

i don't really see the point in not keeping it at 50% (and also adding in the 5% mitigation) - sure, sure, it would have meant we got upgraded a tiny bit whilst using defensive... but... if we weren't far enough ahead in tanking as must be the conclusion, wouldn't this be warranted anyway?

[sineral]

warriors already tank well enough while defensive, far better than anybody else. we only needed help when tanking while not defensive. so now we tank the same while def, and while not def we get DIx1 shaved off each hit from the mob.

[Gharghael]

Does this 5% migation thing work while under evasive too?
And are we sure that the new 5% stacks with all the CS style AAs?

The 5% mitigation boost is innate and permanent for all level 1+ warriors and stacks with defensive, evasive, AAs, you name it.

[Bumamgar]

I parsed our VT raid last night. I save all my logs in general, so I also parsed our VT raids for the intire month of December.

Looking at boss fights only, it appears that while the max hit/ min hit numbers are the same with defensive/stonewall as they were before the patch, the average hit has gone UP.

Non-Defensive, the max hit is indead 4% less than it was before the patch, but again, the average hit is higher.

Kaas Thox Xi Aten Ha Ra vs YOU (hit):
OLD - defensive
Attacks: 969
Hit: 482 times (49.74%) for 246796 damage total (512 avg)
Min: 257 Max: 950

NEW - defensive
Attacks: 172
Hit: 84 times (48.84%) for 44354 damage total (528 avg)
Min: 257 Max: 950

OLD - normal
Attacks: 3164
Hit: 1618 times (51.14%) for 1211225 damage total (748 avg)
Min: 288 Max: 1650

NEW - normal
Attacks: 12
Hit: 11 times (91.67%) for 11465 damage total (1042 avg)
Min: 317 Max: 1580


Thall Va Kelun vs YOU (hit):
OLD - defensive
Attacks: 841
Hit: 452 times (53.75%) for 172747 damage total (382 avg)
Min: 198 Max: 600

NEW - defensive
Attacks: 188
Hit: 98 times (52.13%) for 38750 damage total (395 avg)
Min: 198 Max: 600

OLD - normal
Attacks: 4150
Hit: 2063 times (49.71%) for 1145451 damage total (555 avg)
Min: 216 Max: 1000

NEW - normal
Attacks: 1072
Hit: 530 times (49.44%) for 320470 damage total (604 avg)
Min: 215 Max: 960


Va Xi Aten Ha Ra vs YOU (hit):
OLD - defensive
Attacks: 747
Hit: 365 times (48.86%) for 143863 damage total (394 avg)
Min: 252 Max: 754

NEW - defensive
Attacks: 194
Hit: 104 times (53.61%) for 46390 damage total (446 avg)
Min: 251 Max: 754

OLD - normal
Attacks: 1717
Hit: 882 times (51.37%) for 503414 damage total (570 avg)
Min: 274 Max: 1254

NEW - normal
Attacks: 525
Hit: 282 times (53.71%) for 174545 damage total (618 avg)
Min: 302 Max: 1204
Ignore the non-Defensive numbers for KTXAHR, as I died within seconds of defensive dropping, then the server crashed, and all hell broke loose. So the average hit, non-defensive, is skewed quite high due to it being only over a spread of 12 attacks that also happened to include 2 or 3 1580 hits in a row (love that RNG)

Anyway, it seems that the actual Mitigation boost granted to warriors is 4%, as the new max-hit values for mobs are 4% less than before. Also, this works differently than CS/ID line of AA, as they do NOT reduce the max hit of mobs (in fact, do they actually do ANYTHING? boggle)

A perfect example is TVK. His max hit is 1000. Ask anyone, including casters, and they'll confirm this. Even with CS3/ID5, which should provide what, 17.5% mitigation boost (10% for CS3, 1.5% per level of ID?) his max hit is STILL 1000.

Anyway, the point is, the change to warriors in the patch dropped the max hit by 4% non-defensive, yet we now take on average 8% more damage.

Something ain't right in Warrior land.....

FYI:
"OLD" values are for a total of 4 fights on each boss (ie: I had logs for 4 VT raids in December before the melee patch)
"NEW" values are, of course, for a single fight on each boss.

[Splaktar]

I was going to say that wasn't enough data... but then I kept reading and scrolling down... and it looks pretty convincing.

In each and every case the average damage per hit is increased. Very strange.

[Haass]

That's fuckin great. I'm gonna look thru my logs and see what I can see. I didn't fight anything last nite that I've killed in awhile, so I wasn't able to gauge the amount of damage I was taking. Maybe it's time to go back and compare some old stuff to new stuff.

[Mourningloree]

Going to parse logs as well now =/ It *FELT* like I was taking far more damage in LDON then I normally do. (Tank 3 mobs at once, needing a heal once a minute.) But since Divine Arbitration was also messed up it could have been the fact i wasn't getting the heals when I thoguht i was getting them.

[Minna]

I noticed this as well on my parses last night. Max hit was lower, avg damage was higher. Can't say I understand why..... You would think a boost in mitigation would reduce both over time. Something else was changed somehow....

[Tarkas]

I wouldn't read alot into those yet. Could be something as simple as no druid doing both Ro's. All those VT bosses are low level and atk debuffs will swing DPS by alot. Get 1 or 2 more trips worth of data and compare.

[Kavhok]

There were no changes made to the normal combat formulas aside from the damage interval reduction for warriors. The variance in damage taken from fight to fight can be quite high with EQ's combat system because of the many random elements. When parsing your DPS while fighting through an LDoN adventure, you'll see a lot of fluctuations. Like Tarkas said, small changes like whether or not druid debuffs were in can also affect it.

[Haass]

Kavhok, with all due respect, let me ask you this.

We know how the combat formula works. It's Damage Bonus, + (N, [where N is a number between 1 and 20] multiplied by the damage interval), which is at least partially influenced by AC, and probably the rest by the RNG. We determined that the boost in mitigation you gave us removed the possibility of a mob hitting us for DB + (DIx20). So where did the other hits go? Did you simply change the formula for warriors so that N is 1 to 19? Did you make some kind of backend change where it removes one DI if the target is a warrior?

I'm just wondering because I fought Dozekar last nite for the first time (and owned his candy ass, btw), and my log showed a spike at minimum damage (DB + DI), and one at the next step up (DB + DIx2). That's the first time I've ever seen that happen, but like I said, it was also the first time I fought him. All I'm asking is exactly how you modified the damage formula for how warriors take damage...perhaps there is an issue in there. You can use the ol' "RNG is streaky" argument, but you have to admit that some pretty sketchy data has been posted here.

[Gurunt]

We failed phase 3 for the first time since our first time there because we had to chain-rez our monk pullers, mobs were constantly hitting max damage and raping them.

Mobs are all hitting high end to max hits most of the time since the patch.. I do not have extensive parses handy but it's easily noticable.

If the warrior parses show 8% more damage taken with the mitigation "boost" in effect it's probably hurting everyone else more.

[zhakran]

Still that's pretty speculative...it's either a fluke or a bug, I don't really think anyone would just flat out lie. He said that nothing was changed with the base combat system.

Then again, the servers have been completely fuxxed since the patch, crazy lag, crashes, etc.....

So either it's some weird bug or everyone is just paranoid...I doubt the Devs are really out to get us...

[warcry]

So either it's some weird bug or everyone is just paranoid...I doubt the Devs are really out to get us...
--------------------------------------------------------


Agreed ;)

[Moze Emdoyne]

heh with the amount of problems that this patch has created I wouldnt be surprised at ALL if some more bad code got pushed... Khavok the warriors on this board KNOW their characters... Most if not all of us can tell during a fight whether we are taking more damage or not without having to look at parses and hard numbers. Dont make us all do hours and hours of parsing to show that something is wrong particularly when the batting record on this patch is as horrible as it is.

Bad code pushed (more than once) on disciplines.

Disciplines not resetting right.

Disciplines on wrong timers.

Numerous bugs that were allowed to go live (dispel negating buffs)

Casino crashing multiple servers.

At this point if warriors are noticing increase in damage taken (where according to the patch we should be taking less) than might not it be wise to double check the code with regard to our mitigation boost?...

hehe judging from the amount of bugs with this patch thus far that any assurances from SoE that "...x is working as intended" is sounding VERY hollow.

[aspit]

Translation, Evasive is more powerful than before and stonewall is useless on raids as defensive grants a bit higher mitigation. So our "defensive upgrade" is a situational upgrade...basically if you are exping and need to kill a mob fast and take minimal damage, of course then you snare yourself so you are fuck anyway if shit goes down. Good fucking going on adding very little to the warrior class yet again.

[Fitemore]

New defensive and stonewall both add 45% mitigation, so the tradeoff is between offensive and snare.

[Casai]

Moze I can see that you are very proud of your character, but no mortal can tell 5% difference in mele damage taken without parses. Whatever you can tell about what you feel is right may be off at best totaly wrong more likley. Spreading false info does not help anyone.

[Keane Abrams]

Originally posted by aspit
Translation, Evasive is more powerful than before and stonewall is useless on raids as defensive grants a bit higher mitigation.

Why do you think defensive grants higher mitigation than stonewall?

[ThanAlhazred]

The real effect of the mitigation improvement is simply a reduction in the max hit by 1 DI. This is not quite a 5% mitigation bonus as mobs as well as players tend to show spikes in the damage distribution. So if we were spending all of our time getting pummeled by critters that used to beat us for max virtually every swing we would now be getting beat on for a new, lower, max every swing. It could very well be that *how* the new max hit got implemented could have shifted the median hit higher, thus on average increasing mob DPS.

[aspit]

apparantly it doesnt anymore..it was weaker than defensive on test.

[Redhenna]

Khavok the warriors on this board KNOW their characters... Most if not all of us can tell during a fight whether we are taking more damage or not without having to look at parses and hard numbers.

This is true to an extent, but it is also true that it is easy to be fooled. Over on PoN they are having a number of pallies saying that their stun agro got nerfed. Most agree that it did not. I don't think those pallies who think stun agro was nerfed are lying, just that they where fooled. When dealing with random numbers, and as streaky as the EQ RNG is, I would have to say without parsing you simply cannot tell.

[Keane Abrams]

I agree Red. One or two nights experience with the new discs is not going to prove anything.

[Phantron]

Stonewall and Defensive appears to do the exact same thing on mitigation based on spdat so I doubt they'd do anything different.

There's no problem with mitigation I can observe from XPing.

[brutall]

I looked at a few logs and this is what I have.

Tallon zek in potime
nov 19
average hit-1112
DPS-1431
accuracy N/A
hits-319

Nov 25
Average hit 1174
DPS-1370
accuracy N/A
Hits 356

Dec 1st
Average hit 1015.58
DPS 1364.89
Accuracy 51.64
Hits 211

Dec 7
Didn't tank

DEC 13th-
average hit 1045.72
DPS-1290
Accuracy 49.51
Hits 301

Post patch Dec 19th
Average hit 1158.21
DPS- 1400.22
Accuracy-46.15
hits 324

I do have some other logs from accuracy testing tanking the same mob for 30+ minutes. I can rerun the test and compare results which might be more meaningful. I'll see what i can come up with in the next few days.

The talk about things "feeling" like they are doing more damage to you usually don't carry much weight with me but this "felt" like it was doing more damge.

[Fri Dec 19 17:38:57 2003] You are completely healed.
[Fri Dec 19 17:38:57 2003] You bellow something profane at your opponent.
[Fri Dec 19 17:38:58 2003] Tallon Zek hits YOU for 2834 points of damage.
[Fri Dec 19 17:38:58 2003] Tallon Zek hits YOU for 2428 points of damage.
[Fri Dec 19 17:38:58 2003] Tallon Zek tries to hit YOU, but YOU dodge!
[Fri Dec 19 17:38:59 2003] Tallon Zek hits YOU for 2123 points of damage.
[Fri Dec 19 17:38:59 2003] Brutall goes into a berserker frenzy!
[Fri Dec 19 17:38:59 2003] Tallon Zek hits YOU for 1513 points of damage.
[Fri Dec 19 17:38:59 2003] Tallon Zek hits YOU for 1716 points of damage.
[Fri Dec 19 17:38:59 2003] Tallon Zek hits YOU for 1818 points of damage.
[Fri Dec 19 17:38:59 2003] You have been knocked unconscious!
[Fri Dec 19 17:38:59 2003] You have been slain by Tallon Zek!
[Fri Dec 19 17:39:01 2003] Returning to home point, please wait...
[Fri Dec 19 17:39:02 2003] LOADING, PLEASE WAIT...

[Tugurok]

There's no meaningful difference in Brutall's numbers.

This is just an issue we'll have to keep an eye on, but I don't think there's enough clear evidence to suggest some new problem has been introduced.

I just can't see that the change actually means anything.

[aakla]

ok here goes.

the change was to the DB/DI where a mob can only hit you for 20 different numbers. DB is the lowest it can hit, the next 19 are constant, ie; 100min hit the next 19 hits would be 200 300 400 500 etc etc.

now the new change made it so we only get hit for the first 19 so while everyone else would get hit for 100 - 2000 we would only get hit for 100-1900.

however the higher AC you have the lower on the DB/DI list you will have. for example someone with 2000ac tanking Xegony will hit hit for min dmg ruffly 60% of the time and only take 3% or so max dmg.

but lowering the defense from 50 to 45 makes it less effective in fights vs weeker mobs. it will be basicly the same for tier 4 and 5 gods but if you are time equiped and are fighting mobs that no longer hit you for max dmg then the 19/20 wont help, but it wont mater cause the mob would be trivial anyways.

but for people that are still getting hit for max dmg then the defense/5%(19/20) mitigation is the same as it was before but now you always have 5% mitigation going at all times.

[Sscaley]

You guys 100% sure you had the same buffs during all these parses? BoVie and diff AC buffs would be able to shift numbers quite a bit.

[brutall]

Insted on trying to pick apart my data why not suppy some of your own data and make your point with numbers and facts.

Sscaley can you post some parses plz

[Brutul]

I think Sscaley is a wizard now so probably not :p