15 réponses à ce sujet

[Phthartic]

Hello.

This is my second time through the game. First game I didn't let Varric keep the idol shard. When I found out it was safe to do so AND made him more awesome, this time I did give it to him. So I added 3 more damage runes to Bianca; 3 different elemental damage bonuses, but when he hits the combat numbers aren't showing anything besides his normal physical (white numbers) and some electrical (yellow-orange numbers.) It happened through the whole combat (Templars and Mages led by Grace in "Best Served Cold") and I find it hard to believe they were all 100% resistant to my three chosen elements. Didn't even get Hawke's bonus elemental damage from the "Elemental Weapons" sustain, but then that frequently glitches and stops working so I have to turn it off and on again. He's supposed to be getting 27 points each of fire, electrical, nature and cold. I know there are modifications to these numbers, but....

I am very impressed with many aspects of this game - my favorite since Baldur's gate et. seq. - but the combat system seems riddled with excessively complicated details that frequently don't work as described or intended. That's when they ARE described; frequently we're just left to experiment to see how stuff works for ourselves, which I think detracts from the immersive nature of the game. I'd like to know how stuff works and not wonder if the cool sounding ability will actually WORK like it implies if I take it. Don't try to dazzle me with your brilliance by making it so "realistically" convoluted if you can't make it work properly. Make it simpler, like D&D, but make it WORK.

Also, I wish designers would stop thinking they're cool if they can make a monster with more HPs then the designer in the next cube. You aren't awesome because you can make a battle last a freakin hour. It's not challenging; it's just tedious.

Anyway, am I missing something or is this a known problem or what's the deal with his three new rune slots?

[Sabotin]

If memory serves right I read something about a glitch that sometimes turns the bonus damage to the base damage element. Do you notice any increase in damage at all?

[Mocker22]

So first off the elemental damage runes suck hardcore. Don't use them much after act 1. Second, DON'T let Varric keep the idol, by not letting him keep it you get Primeval Lyrium rune, which is the best rune in the game. In act 3 you can start using Runes of Destruction, these add the most damage. Runes of striking for crit chance are also good on a lot of characters.

[Phthartic]

Sabotin-- Thanks, that may be the problem. His white number did seem higher than it should have been, but I figured it was just because I was suddenly paying attention to it. Who knows how all those modifiers work. It's more calculating and research than I'm interested in doing.

Fil-- Not on my laptop they couldn't. And I make full use of the pause button, but of course that's my choice. I'd hate to just let the battle run in real time and try to keep up. I'd stress out.

Brock-- The way I figured it, it appeared that Rune of Devastation added less than a regular damage rune. I put one on Bloom (38 base + 16% with 2 rune slots) and it said it added 10%. That would be either 4 or 6 points depending on how they did it, whereas damage runes added 8 points. Last game I got ahead of myself in the endgame and lost out on lots of good stuff. Not sure if I had the primeval rune in use or not but I didn't notice any huge speed change. I'll try it next game.

Thanks a lot guys.

[Phthartic]

Well certainly when Fenris gives them a Mighty Blow and he does like 1300 or 1500 points with Cleave and Assail but no cross class combo effect I've been tempted to try and figure out how on earth they come up with that number. I guess if I'm not willing to do that then I should just try stuff and see how it feels.

It just seems like they're thinking we're all immature kids and want to see huge damage numbers, so then they have to give their bosses like 100,000 hit points. Why not just let us hit 50 or 75 points and have the monsters' HPs something reasonable? Then they could make it possible for a player to easily calculate effects like these.

I saw a post somewhere (Dragon Age Wiki?) by a purported designer of the game listing the steps the game follows to calculate damage and it took like 10 or 20 factors into account, half of which would have required yet more research to understand. Just seems overcomplicated for the sake of making them feel like they're geniuses for making a hyper realistic combat model.

But maybe I'm just getting intellectually lazy in my old age.

Modifié par Phthartic, 05 septembre 2011 - 03:49 .

[AreleX]

care to elaborate a bit?

i might be able to help

[mr_afk]

Yeah, they made hawke and co deal lots of damage but have little health while the mobs have lots of health but little damage. It all works out in the end I suppose.
Also, it appeals to my thing for seeing big numbers haha.

In terms of how calculations work, if I remember correctly you would go:
Fenris's base damage*Mighty Blow ability modifier*+%damage modifers +extra damage


Base damage is calculated by weapon base damage + (strength-10)/2
The mighty blow ability modifier is x6 (check the wikia for info)
If it was a crit and he had an upgraded might there would be +75% from critical damage
Cleave and assail will add up to +85% damage

If you had any bonuses from gear they would also play a part,
but assuming fenris had ~70 strength and a weapon base damage ~40 that would give a base damage of 70.

(70*6)*175%*185%= 1359.75
which is surprisingly close to the numbers you gave given I just pulled them from my arse hahaha

So it's not impossible to calculate things, in fact lots of the people here do nerd maths to min-max builds etc. However, it's not necessary to do so if you don't want. Trial and error also works quite nicely.

Anyway, which boss takes an hour? I wouldn't have thought any bosses post-patch were that difficult...

[Phthartic]

Well it's not that they're difficult, just time consuming. Ancient rock wraith, ethereal golem, high dragon, arishok (duel). Those are the ones I'm remembering. And that was on my first game when I tried to do it without looking at wikis. I played a 2H warrior and typically took Fenris, Merrill and either Varric or Isabela. Too much fighter; not enough mage, I know. This time I'm a mage and take Fenris, Isabela and whoever NEEDS to go or either Varric or Merrill. I know these aren't strictly the most efficient choices, but I play for the character interactions. I just don't really LIKE Aveline or Anders. Too uptight.

And I paused every "round" since the AI frequently has characters ignoring commands or standing around like idiots and the like. I suppose if you play totally efficiently and are quick on the keys you can just let it go on auto; that would go MUCH quicker but I find that pace too stressful.

Plus my computer runs the game REEEAALLY slow, like as in I have to hold the left mouse button down for half a second to select characters when there's fire or smoke or mist on screen. My slow computer aint their fault admittedly, but really, I'd be just as happy if they still made Baldur's gate sequels that don't gobble up resources. It's about the story for me, not the detailed graphics.

I also bought the game at version 1.00 and left it there cause I know half the stuff they "fix" in patches nerfs the game. So my "Who Needs Rescuing" quest is unplayable, but I got +7 to all our attributes with Runes of Valiance, not +2. But if the playability in combat is improved, maybe I will patch it for my 3rd playthrough as a rogue....

Fenris at 70 STR? That would make him a very strong fragile asthmatic it would seem. I put some points in WILL and CON as well as STR. Though with Second Wind I could see doing with a bit less stamina.

I guess I just need to figure out the basic "when does the +X points or + X% get added in the calculation, at the beginning or at the end?" and it sounds like it's at the end where percent means a lot more.

[mr_afk]

The patch makes things a lot easier- i'm not sure what you mean by 'playability in combat' but if you're looking to spend less time on bosses etc the patch could help.
While it does reduce the bonus from valiance runes it also reduces the enemy hp a lot. While most of the changes to difficulty are felt mostly on nightmare (no melee autoattack friendly fire, haste no longer bugged) I think all the difficulties are a lot easier simply due to less knockback.

The wikia guides are pretty terrible tbh. Most of them involve kiting or pulling which is just plain unnecessary on any difficulty. But yeah, pre-patch some fights can be tougher, especially when dealing with them without any preparation (no warding runes or weapons for elemental weaknesses etc). But even pre-patch, simply using a dps setup should get you through the fights you refer to waay faster than an 'hour' haha

You can avoid silly AI by setting up good tactics. Once you have good tactics telling your companions what to do you can sit back and just control your one character. Pause-play can help in situations but with tactics it isn't necessary.

I personally don't see the need for willpower and constitution because I work on the mentality that if I deal more damage I will kill things faster so won't receive as much damage or need to use as many abilities. But that's just me- I can't remember how many points fenris has by the end of the game but I would have thought 70 is pretty reasonable.

Anyway, sounds like you've got most things sorted. I'll leave you to it.

Modifié par mr_afk, 05 septembre 2011 - 09:55 .

[andraip]

Well, gameplay in patch 1.03 feels better imo, elites and bosses have less hp, while normal enemies have more. Isabella's (and Sebastian's) friendship bonus work properly. Also enemies don't explode so much. Sunder is bugged . Warriors got a nerf, especilly Reavers. And a lot of things were improved, I suggest you give it a try.

As for your laptop issue, I play the game (medium quality + 2x antialliasing) and it works fine on my nearly 2 years old laptop. Dragon Age 2 has infact "bad" graphics in conparison to another recent AAA titles. If you are a gamer or like computer games at least I suggest you to buy something decent

Modifié par andraip, 05 septembre 2011 - 01:37 .

[Quething]

Phthartic wrote...

when he hits the combat numbers aren't showing anything besides his normal physical (white numbers) and some electrical (yellow-orange numbers.)

Combat aside, as far as this problem goes: conventional wisdom seems to be that extra damage effects always proc, but the numbers don't always display (particularly when they hit fast enough, or several effects hit at once). For example, if you activate elemental weapons with a nature staff equipped, and your tank's sword has a +ice damage rune, you will see either blue floaty numbers or green floaty numbers, but not both, but you'll still be getting both damage boosts.

I don't know if we know that for sure or people are just assuming it on the philosophy of benefit of the doubt, though. Perhaps one of the Strat forum veterans can clarify for you. As everyone else has mentioned, simple +elemental damage runes aren't worth much, so I haven't used them enough to pay attention to their effiacy myself.

Modifié par Quething, 07 septembre 2011 - 05:15 .

[thendcomes]

Quething wrote...
Combat aside, as far as this problem goes: conventional wisdom seems to be that extra damage effects always proc, but the numbers don't always display (particularly when they hit fast enough, or several effects hit at once). For example, if you activate elemental weapons with a nature staff equipped, and your tank's sword has a +ice damage rune, you will see either blue floaty numbers or green floaty numbers, but not both, but you'll still be getting both damage boosts.

I don't know if we know that for sure or people are just assuming it on the philosophy of benefit of the doubt, though. Perhaps one of the Strat forum veterans can clarify for you. As everyone else has mentioned, simple +elemental damage runes aren't worth much, so I haven't used them enough to pay attention to their effiacy myself.

I can confirm that the floating combat text will just not show up sometimes. For the big hit on Hybris in my sig, sometimes the big hit would not show up even though his HP went down. I think it happen when there's already too much information on screen.

[Phthartic]

Well, thanks to the recommendations here I got over my distrust of software upgrades and am playing through again. I'm currently on the Deep Roads expedition and whatever I meant by "playability" in combat IS much improved. Much more got fixed than nerfed or broken with the 1.03 patch. If anything it feels like they may have made battles a bit TOO easy, but I'm sure that's partly due to having some more experience at the game now. Haven't done any of the MAJOR boss fights yet, but the mature dragon in act 1's bone pit was pretty much of a breeze this time, and I know the first time through it was one that took quite a while. I highly recommend the patch for upgradephobics like me.

Rogues can actually detect traps sooner than two-tenths of a second before they step on them now too, so you not only get to hear them being spotted, but you actually get to pause and DISARM them!

Anyway, now I know why so many thought I was pretty lame complaining about the length (which they no doubt interpreted as the "difficulty") of boss battles. They no doubt never played v 1.0. (Which is what they sold me in a brick and mortar store like a month ago.)