21 réponses à ce sujet

[BananaDePijama]

Which is the best staff for Knight Enchanter, and which is the best staff for Rift Mage?

 

Sorry for my bad english :/

[Mushashi7]

It depends.

Some prefer the 'Masterwork Archon Staff', others the 'First Enchanter Staff.

The 'Masterwork Mortalitasi Staff' is not (yet?) released in the game although it exists.
 

 

Masterwork Archon Staff - T3
Damage 22 Metal max. 115 dps
Utility - 8 Cloth
Utility - 6 Cloth
Offense - 6 Leather
Masterwork Slot

In order to get Masterwork Archon Staff you must complete Iron Bull's personal quest and let the Chargers die. Then complete Here Lies the Abyss or Wicked Eyes and Wicked Hearts. Then you get a series of war table missions about a venetory spy network that's pretty long (unless you use the exploit forwarding your system's time by a day therefore completing the operations instantly) after you finish them you automatically get the schematic.


First Enchanter Staff - T3
Damage 22 Metal max. 115 dps
Offense - 6 Leather
Offense - 6 Cloth
Utility - 6 Leather
Masterwork Slot

First Enchanter Staff is for sale at the merchant in Suledin keep (Emprise Du Lion) after defeating Imshael and taking the keep.

 

 

The two staves have the same DPS.
The Masterwork Archon Staff has a Cloth (Magic/Willpower) where The Grand Enchanter Staff has leather (Cunning and Dexterity).
The Masterwork Archon Staff also has a Metal Utility Slot (Constitution/Strength). If you want a real battlemage this staff is for you.

 

 

Parentesis:

Mortalitasi Staff (T3 Staff)
Damage 22 Metal max. 115 dps
Utility - 8 Cloth
Utility - 6 Cloth
Offense - 6 Leather
Masterwork Slot

This staff is only available if you use Cheat Engine. It's probably meant as part of a future DLC? So, forget about this one. Here's a few pics for the fun:
 

[Rynas]

The consensus pick at the moment seems to be:

 

Seer Staff:

71 damage (22 Dragon Bone)

6 Offense, Leather: +11% critical chance (Great Bear Hide)

6 Offense, Leather: +11% critical chance (Great Bear Hide)

6 Offense, Cloth: +21% critical damage (Dragon Webbing)

 

Hilted Staff Grip:

8 Offense, Leather: +14% critical chance (Great Bear Hide)

3 Offense, Cloth: +11% critical damage (Dragon Webbing)

 

Dragon Staff Blade:

6 Offense, Leather: +11% critical chance (Great Bear Hide)

3 Offense, Metal: +6% attack (Everite/Stormheart)

 

Total 71 base damage, +47% crit chance, +32% crit damage, +6% attack.  This is better than either the Masterwork Archon Staff and First Enchanter Staff because Utility slots only grant about half as much benefit to damage as equivalent Offense slots.

 

Switching out the Dragon Bone for a T3 Cold or Electricity material can be good for versatility but reduces base damage to 69.  If your attack is low, you could also put +attack in the Cloth slots instead of Dragon Webbing.

 

Good options for other gear are Superb Ring of Attack (+10% attack), Superb Ring of Critical Damage (+20% crit damage), Superb Amulet of Willpower (+10 willpower = +5% attack), and a helm with 10 Cloth Utility slots for +18 Magic/Willpower (= +9% attack).

[actionhero112]

I mean ok the top two staffs in the game is the Archmage Staff schematic which is easy to farm out and the Seer Staff schematic, which I only have on one of my characters because it eludes my farming.

 

Why the Archmage

 

With the highest level of metal offense, the Archmage will have the best attack value in the game on staffs. Because mages can't use the Mighty Offense tonic, crit% becomes much less valuable to them. (It also makes them the least optimal damage dealers)

 

Archmage Staff gets

 

21% attack

10.5% crit%. 

 

Masterwork Battlemage Staff Grip

 

19.25% attack

 

Masterwork Archon Blade

 

19.25% attack

 

With a total of 59.5% attack, it easily becomes the best staff you have available. 

 

It has 6 less weapon damage than the seer staff, but it's made up in the attack difference.

 

Full reasons(in which I analyze the optimal build paths for the two weapons)

Spoiler

Seer Staff in a crit build

 

Seer Staff with all of it's upgrades

45.5% crit chance

6% attack

32% crit damage

 

For the purposes of this discussion we'll use the most optimal helm in the game for crit available to non qunari, the Mask of the Grand Duchess, even though it's better on a rogue or warrior. 

 

Mask of the Grand Duchess

15% crit chance

 

Superior Prowler Armor

26.25 crit damage

4.37 guard damage bonus

 

2 crit damage rings

40% crit damage

 

Superior Amulet of Dexterity

10% crit damage

 

Given:

5% crit chance

40% crit damage

 

Total

65.5 crit chance

148.25 crit damage

6% attack

 

Because your crit damage only applies to 65.5 percent of your hits, your effective damage increase at that crit chance is 97.82. With that attack percentage you will have an average modifier of 102.1

 

Archmage Staff with all of its upgrades

59.5 attack

10.5 crit chance

 

Again for the purposes of this discussion I'm not taking into account qunari, if they were this analysis would heavily favour the archmage staff. We'll use one of the t3 mage helms here. 

 

Superior Seer Cowl

9% attack

 

Superior Battlemage Armor

19.25% attack

7% crit damage

 

1 superb ring of attack and 1 super ring of crit damage

10% attack

20% crit damage

 

1 superior amulet of willpower

5% attack

 

Given:

5% crit chance

40% crit damage 

 

Total:

102.75 attack %

15.5 crit chance %

67% crit damage

 

Because that crit damage bonus only applies 15.5 percent of the time, it's effective damage increase is 10.3. With that attack level you will have an average modifier to your attacks will be 113.05

 

Conclusion:

The 102.1 modifier you get from the Seer Staff is worse than the Archmage modifier 113.05. The difference between the two is large enough that the 6 weapon damage wouldn't matter.

[swk3000]

I mean ok the top two staffs in the game is the Archmage Staff schematic which is easy to farm out and the Seer Staff schematic, which I only have on one of my characters because it eludes my farming.

Why the Archmage

With the highest level of metal offense, the Archmage will have the best attack value in the game on staffs. Because mages can't use the Mighty Offense tonic, crit% becomes much less valuable to them. (It also makes them the least optimal damage dealers)

Archmage Staff gets

21% attack
10.5% crit%.

Masterwork Battlemage Staff Grip

19.25% attack

Masterwork Archon Blade

19.25% attack

With a total of 59.5% attack, it easily becomes the best staff you have available.

It has 6 less weapon damage than the seer staff, but it's made up in the attack difference.

Full reasons(in which I analyze the optimal build paths for the two weapons)

Spoiler

Seer Staff in a crit build

Seer Staff with all of it's upgrades
45.5% crit chance
6% attack
32% crit damage

For the purposes of this discussion we'll use the most optimal helm in the game for crit available to non qunari, the Mask of the Grand Duchess, even though it's better on a rogue or warrior.

Mask of the Grand Duchess
15% crit chance

Superior Prowler Armor
26.25 crit damage
4.37 guard damage bonus

2 crit damage rings
40% crit damage

Superior Amulet of Dexterity
10% crit damage

Given:
5% crit chance
40% crit damage

Total
65.5 crit chance
148.25 crit damage
6% attack

Because your crit damage only applies to 65.5 percent of your hits, your effective damage increase at that crit chance is 97.82. With that attack percentage you will have an average modifier of 102.1

Archmage Staff with all of its upgrades
59.5 attack
10.5 crit chance

Again for the purposes of this discussion I'm not taking into account qunari, if they were this analysis would heavily favour the archmage staff. We'll use one of the t3 mage helms here.

Superior Seer Cowl
9% attack

Superior Battlemage Armor
19.25% attack
7% crit damage

1 superb ring of attack and 1 super ring of crit damage
10% attack
20% crit damage

1 superior amulet of willpower
5% attack

Given:
5% crit chance
40% crit damage

Total:
102.75 attack %
15.5 crit chance %
67% crit damage

Because that crit damage bonus only applies 15.5 percent of the time, it's effective damage increase is 10.3. With that attack level you will have an average modifier to your attacks will be 113.05

Conclusion:
The 102.1 modifier you get from the Seer Staff is worse than the Archmage modifier 113.05. The difference between the two is large enough that the 6 weapon damage wouldn't matter.

What would you say is best for a Qunari Knight Enchanter? Because that's what I'm running.

[actionhero112]

What would you say is best for a Qunari Knight Enchanter? Because that's what I'm running.

 The archmage staff is the best. Less crit chance on the helm makes a crit build less efficient, while it has no effect on the attack build that the archmage staff uses. 

 

Use the Arishok Vitaar, which is the best to my knowledge. 

[BananaDePijama]

I liked the Seer Staff, i will try to farm it's schematics.

 

Thank you guys

[Rynas]

Seer Staff in a crit build

 

Seer Staff with all of it's upgrades

45.5% crit chance

6% attack

32% crit damage

 

For the purposes of this discussion we'll use the most optimal helm in the game for crit available to non qunari, the Mask of the Grand Duchess, even though it's better on a rogue or warrior. 

 

Mask of the Grand Duchess

15% crit chance

 

Superior Prowler Armor

26.25 crit damage

4.37 guard damage bonus

 

2 crit damage rings

40% crit damage

 

Superior Amulet of Dexterity

10% crit damage

 

Given:

5% crit chance

40% crit damage

 

Total

65.5 crit chance

148.25 crit damage

6% attack

 

Because your crit damage only applies to 65.5 percent of your hits, your effective damage increase at that crit chance is 97.82. With that attack percentage you will have an average modifier of 102.1

 

Archmage Staff with all of its upgrades

59.5 attack

10.5 crit chance

 

Again for the purposes of this discussion I'm not taking into account qunari, if they were this analysis would heavily favour the archmage staff. We'll use one of the t3 mage helms here. 

 

Superior Seer Cowl

9% attack

 

Superior Battlemage Armor

19.25% attack

7% crit damage

 

1 superb ring of attack and 1 super ring of crit damage

10% attack

20% crit damage

 

1 superior amulet of willpower

5% attack

 

Given:

5% crit chance

40% crit damage 

 

Total:

102.75 attack %

15.5 crit chance %

67% crit damage

 

Because that crit damage bonus only applies 15.5 percent of the time, it's effective damage increase is 10.3. With that attack level you will have an average modifier to your attacks will be 113.05

 

Conclusion:

The 102.1 modifier you get from the Seer Staff is worse than the Archmage modifier 113.05. The difference between the two is large enough that the 6 weapon damage wouldn't matter.

 

A lot of this is not quite right...when considering gear, the damage formula can be simplified to

 

Average Damage = baseDamage * (1 + Attack) * (1 + CritChance * CritDamage)

 

With T3 mats, the Archmage Staff has baseDamage of 62, compared to 69 for the Seer Staff.  Based on your numbers, setup 1 with the Seer Staff has a modifier of +102%, which means baseDamage is multiplied by a factor of 2.02.  Setup 2 has a multiplier of 2.14.  So

 

Setup 1 (Seer Staff): 69 * 2.02 = 139.4

Setup 2 (Archmage Staff): 62 * 2.14 = 132.7

 

So the extra +12 percentage points is not enough to make up the difference in base damage.

 

However, this isn't an accurate comparison because in order to compare staffs, you need to hold everything else constant.  Also, some of the numbers aren't right.

 

The game rounds up the bonus in each slot, then adds the rounded results together.  For example, if you have two slots that each give 10.5 to a stat, the game gives the item 11 + 11 = 22 to the stat, instead of 10.5 + 10.5 = 21.  The numbers you actually get from each staff are:

 

Seer Staff

69 base damage

+22% crit chance

+21% crit damage (Dragon Webbing)

 

Archmage Staff

62 base damage

+22% attack

+11% crit chance

 

For upgrades, a couple of good options are

 

Hilted Staff Grip + Dragon Staff Blade

+25% crit chance

+11% crit damage

+6% attack

 

Masterwork Battlemage Staff Grip + Masterwork Archon Staff Blade

+40% attack

 

Consider your second setup: Superior Battlemage Armor gives 6 + 8 + 8 Cloth Utility = +19.5% attack [Edit: CORRECTED: +7% crit damage or +3.5% crit chance from the Leather Utility, sorry].  Along with rings/helm/amulet, that means a total of 53.5% attack from non-staff gear, assuming 10% base from "natural" Magic/Willpower from abilties and the Fade (10 base + 5 amulet + 19.5 armor + 10 ring + 9 helm).  There's also a 5% base crit chance and 40% crit damage (+20% from ring, +7% from armor).

 

So:

 

Seer Staff + Hilted Staff Grip + Dragon Staff Blade

69 base damage

59.5% attack

52% crit chance

99% crit damage

Expected damage: 69 * (1 + 0.595) * (1 + 0.52 * 0.99) = 166.7

 

Archmage Staff + Hilted Staff Grip + Dragon Staff Blade

62 base damage

81.5% attack

41% crit chance

78% crit damage

Expected damage: 62 * (1 + 0.815) * (1 + 0.41 * 0.78) = 148.5

 

 

So the extra attack does not make up for the lower base damage, crit chance, and crit damage.  Seer Staff is better by a whopping 12%.

 

Using the other upgrades:

 

Seer Staff + Masterwork Battlemage Staff Grip + Masterwork Archon Staff Blade

69 base damage

93.5% attack

27% crit chance

88% crit damage

Expected damage: 69 * (1 + 0.935) * (1 + 0.27 * 0.88) = 165.2

 

Archmage Staff + Masterwork Battlemage Staff Grip + Masterwork Archon Staff Blade

62 base damage

115.5% attack

16% crit chance

67% crit damage

Expected damage: 62 * (1 + 1.155) * (1 + 0.16 * 0.67) = 147.9

 

[Edit: typos; added +7% crit damage as in OP; re-itemized second upgrade set for full attack; fixed attack value]

 

So Seer Staff is still better, and in fact Archmage Staff + Masterwork Battlemage Staff Grip + Masterwork Archon Staff Blade is the worst of the four.  The Seer Staff + Hilted Staff Grip + Dragon Staff Blade combo does 12.7% more damage overall.

 

TL;DR: Seer Staff + Hilted Staff Grip + Dragon Staff Blade is the highest-damage combination, given the armor/accessory setup above.

[actionhero112]

 

Masterwork Battlemage Staff Grip + Masterwork Archon Staff Blade

+28% attack

+22% crit damage

 

 

Given that this is an attack set up, why are you investing in crit damage here. 

 

You should only invest in crit damage over attack when your crit chance is at least 50%. At least in cloth offense. It's like you took the cloth offense slot and automatically invested in crit damage even though it wasn't optimal, at least to my knowledge.

 

I don't really trust this because you're not investing in attributes the way I specified or know to be optimal. 

 

but I'm interested to learn that the game rounds up.

[JaegerBane]

but I'm interested to learn that the game rounds up.

Yeah, it appears that is consistent across crafting - any +0.75 stat point or something similar is treated as +1 if the slot is odd numbered for materials. I'm guessing it's because the system can't deal with partial numbers.

[Rynas]

Given that this is an attack set up, why are you investing in crit damage here. 

 

You should only invest in crit damage over attack when your crit chance is at least 50%. At least in cloth offense. It's like you took the cloth offense slot and automatically invested in crit damage even though it wasn't optimal, at least to my knowledge.

 

I don't really trust this because you're not investing in attributes the way I specified or know to be optimal. 

 

but I'm interested to learn that the game rounds up.

 

I thought that was how you itemized the upgrades, but after re-reading it I see that you put Attack in all slots.  I've updated the numbers, but the conclusion is the same anyway.

[swk3000]

Rynas, Im a little lost when looking at your info, at least as far as it pertains to my Qunari Mage. I understand that the Seer Staff is the best in terms of A Crit build, but my character can't equip that +15% Crit Chance Helm. Does losing that piece of gear make another staff better for a Qunari Mage, or is it still the best staff overall? Or is there another staff that would serve a Qunari Mage better?

[sethroskull79]

Damn you guys are smart.

[Rynas]

Rynas, Im a little lost when looking at your info, at least as far as it pertains to my Qunari Mage. I understand that the Seer Staff is the best in terms of A Crit build, but my character can't equip that +15% Crit Chance Helm. Does losing that piece of gear make another staff better for a Qunari Mage, or is it still the best staff overall? Or is there another staff that would serve a Qunari Mage better?

 

I only looked at the gear setup with an 18 Willpower/Magic helm (+9% attack).  If you use the Grand Duchess instead, you lose 9% Attack and gain 15% Crit Chance, which will increase damage with the Seer Staff/Hilted Staff Grip/Dragon Blade setup (69 base, 50.5% attack, 67% crit, 99% crit damage -> 172.7 avg damage).

 

I've never played a Qunari mage, so I don't know exactly how Vitaars work.  It shouldn't make a difference [Edit: for staff selection], though.  If it does, it's probably very minor.

 

[Edit: If Vitaars work the way I think they do, then they're way, way better than any non-Qunari helm.]

[swk3000]

Yeah, no one seems to have done any in-depth testing on the Vitaar mechanics. No one seems to care that a Qunari mage may or may not be getting a whopping 30% extra damage at the start of the game! I'd do the testing myself, but I have no idea what I'd need to do to even get started. Sucks, really, but I guess the fact that the Qunari were the bad guys in the last game has made people not want to play them as a main character.

[Exalus]

Yeah, no one seems to have done any in-depth testing on the Vitaar mechanics. No one seems to care that a Qunari mage may or may not be getting a whopping 30% extra damage at the start of the game! I'd do the testing myself, but I have no idea what I'd need to do to even get started. Sucks, really, but I guess the fact that the Qunari were the bad guys in the last game has made people not want to play them as a main character.

I would be curious to see as staves have terrible base damage and even a few point of vitaar added damage can scale very well. 

[swk3000]

Yeah. A 30% damage bonus is nothing to laugh at. Of course, that number doesn't include. Magic, Willpower, Attack, Crit Chance, or Crit Damage; after factoring those in, it could shoot even higher. Or not; I'm no good at DPS calculations.

At the very least, I made a thread asking about this in the Combat and Strategy forum; since that's where the Game Mechanics threads are, I figured it would be the place to ask. Hopefully someone has done testing, or is inspired to do some testing, on the subject.

[tirnoney]

In a game where the difficulty doesn't scale very well, I find delving into the min-maxing less enticing that in Origins or DA2.  I'm not particularly skilled with the combat system, but my level 17 KE with fully tricked out seer staff has a crit chance of 50% and crit damage of 164% (40% of that comes from two crit damage rings) rarely loses a single point of guard on nightmare difficulty.  Dorian has a similar setup and we'll often end up with what is effectively 'chain immolate' due to the fire tree passives and the mana regeneration boosts.  It's the fire passive that really makes the crit chance on the seer staff shine above and beyond maxing attack or willpower.

[Nic Mercy]

I find the Seer Staff to be the best for me. Being able to grab 22% crit on it and a big chunk of crit damage is great. I can easily have over 50% crit (I've been as high as 68% crit) using the Seer staff. The itemization is just too good to pass up.

[BananaDePijama]

It was a little hard to farm, cause i'm probably has no luck at all.

 

But now my newest KE Female Elf (Cereza) is dealing tons of crit damage with the Seer Staff

[Mushashi7]

I sometimes have a hard time what to chose.

Should it be defensive of offensive?

With defense I usually win every battle due to healing, health, magic and willpower.
With the opposite the risk of dying is larger.

Maybe the best solution is in between?

[Nic Mercy]

I sometimes have a hard time what to chose.

Should it be defensive of offensive?

With defense I usually win every battle due to healing, health, magic and willpower.
With the opposite the risk of dying is larger.

Maybe the best solution is in between?

 

What I found made me pretty much unstoppable was having the armor on hit on my chest piece and heal on hit on my staff. Energy Barrage basically stacks a ton of armor on you and heals for 12% of your hp every cast. It's pretty ridiculous.