109 réponses à ce sujet

[dainbramage]

 

As for the player Qis, I find it's a waste of time reading and replying her posts.    A lot of numbers but she doesn't know what she's writing.  She's too confused with the game mechanics.

when you are level 35 or 40.  Maybe you'll understand when your game progresses.

 

Level cap in DA:O is 25... What's the saying about glass houses and throwing stones? Except that's an unfair comparison. Qis hasn't actually got any game mechanics wrong in this thread.

 

 

Other points...

 

The hit rate heroic attribute compares the amount of times you've hit to the amount of times you've swung your weapon. Pretty simple right? Except that the counters for each of those only go up to 9999. Which means once you start to get to the end of the game, it lies. You can have a cunning rogue swinging everywhere missing frequently with the character sheet still saying 100% hit rate. All you have to do to know that AWs struggle with attack is play one. You miss a lot. Dex helps you not miss as much.

 

 

The sad thing is, I personally prefer all magic to putting anything in dex. But that doesn't mean that adding dex is invalid, and I know that I'm giving up attack for the magic. I simply value the stronger spellcasting over more reliable attacks. It's like dex vs cun for rogues, they each have their advantages.

[Callidus Thorn]

90+% is Not just a figure "including staff attack from the start" as you assumed, you can count it and feel it in end game.  I'd say the higher the level the higher the hit rate.  BTW the number of attack using staff in the first seven levels contributes a very small proportion to your total attacks when you are level 35 or 40.  Maybe you'll understand when your game progresses.
 
So dexterity 0.5 attack score / point is redundant.  When you can hit 95% why the hell not to invest in an attribute that makes you the most powerful?  Last time I read this thread was about the so-called "Ultimate build".   
 
Since the attack seldom misses, attack speed is irrelevant in this topic.
 

As for the player Qis, I've found it's a waste of time reading and replying her posts.    A lot of numbers but she doesn't understand the game..  She's too confused with the game mechanics.
 
And for those who emphasize 60 magic = insignificant attack from combat magic, they probably never know they can have 170++ spellpower in end game if they invest heavily in magic.

 
Wow, you just love being condescending, don't you?
 
I've completed DA:O in the past with an Arcane Warrior, and I've completed all the DLCs too. I only mentioned my character to illustrate that there are points to spare in an all magic build, so boosting dexterity won't knock anything really noticeable off your spellcasting ability.
 
I know the game, so I know that anyone running an Arcane Warrior doesn't trade their staff for a sword until much later than level seven. Switching to melee before you pick up Shimmering Shield at level 14 is pretty inadvisable, because without the physical resistance boost it gives you you're going to be susceptible to all kinds of special attacks. Considering the level cap is 25(and we'll ignore Awakening because at that point an Arcane Warrior is just stupidly powerful, and this guide doesn't cover that or the DLC), that's more than half the PCs level using the staff, and with the extremely high hit rate you'll get from that, that'll have a marked affect on your hit rate throughout the game.
 
"Feel it in end game"? Okay, here I'm just going to throw this claim of yours right out of the thread. Your feeling on how often you're hitting is worth nothing.

 

"Since the attack seldom misses" maybe that's the case late in the game, and I mean really late game, but for the bulk of the actual game, this really isn't the case. When I ran through DA:O with my Arcane Warrior, with an all magic build except for boosting my dexterity to 30(which would only mean a higher attack than had I boosted magic) I wasn't hitting anything like enough for a claim like that.
 
And you think Qis is confused? You mention level 40 above, when the level cap with Awakening is 35. Which is irrelevant anyway, because this guide wasn't written for, and therefore doesn't include/apply to DA:A, as you can see here. Add to that the fact that you've already misinterpreted one of her posts, due to being condescending, and I'm less inclined to read yours than hers.

 

Since you're clearly talking about an endgame Arcane Warrior in the expansion or DLCs, nothing you've said in this thread is relevant to this guide, or playing an Arcane Warrior in the basic game.

 

I'm done with you.

[Qis]

 

As for the player Qis, I've found it's a waste of time reading and replying her posts.    A lot of numbers but she doesn't understand the game..  She's too confused with the game mechanics.

 

And for those who emphasize 60 magic = insignificant attack from combat magic, they probably never know they can have 170++ spellpower in end game if they invest heavily in magic.

 

 

170 spellpower? 180 magic?

 

That's just 34 attack bonus (170/5), alright +10 from Combat Magic and Aura of Might, +6 from combat skill, you get 50 attack bonus

 

But a Warrior with 180 strength, even if it is possible, have 85 attack bonus (170/2) just by attribute itself, better play as warrior lol

 

A Mage with 170 spellpower better play as a caster and not an Arcane Warrior, you can one shot kill everyone with fire ball, why waste time watching melee attack animation?

 

I know i make a mistake about claiming Combat Magic don't add attack bonus, i admit that, but then you thought Combat Magic bonus is too big in which you are WRONG, it's not big at all, and that's why AW players do invest in dex, because magic alone is not enough.

 

If really want to play melee with such number, better play a warrior from the begining, at level 7 you already have high enough str to hit most enemies without miss, (HN will get around 41 str if invest in str only), the same is not true for AW at level 7

[Myalzalean]

I was looking to roll a new Arcane Warrior to start an all mage play-through of all three games and I became intrigued with this issue of to dex or not to dex.

 

I am basing the calculations on a Level 14 Elven Mage with bonuses from Into the Fade. I chose level 14 because this would probably be the earliest I would switch to melee with the acquisition of Shimmering Shield. For the sake of simplicity I am not taking into account bonuses from tomes, equipment, buffs, debuffs, etc.

 

Also, this is strictly from a melee standpoint and not taking into account the defense benefits of dexterity or spellpowers benefits to casting spells.

 

Attack = Base (50) + .5 * [(STR-10) + (DEX-10)] + Attack Bonus

 

Attack Bonus from Combat Magic = 5 + (Spellpower/5)

 

Scenario One - All points into Magic Attribute

 

Strength 14 (Starting attribute of 10 + 4 Fade Bonus)

Dexterity 14 (Starting attribute of 10 + 4 Fade Bonus)

Magic 63 (Starting attribute of 17+ 5 points at character creation + 2 Fade Bonus + 39 at 3pts/level)

Spellpower 53 (Magic-10)

 

Attack = Base (50) + .5 * [(STR-10) + (DEX-10)] + Attack Bonus

 

Attack Bonus from Combat Magic = 5+(Spellpower/5)

 

Attack = 50 + 4 + 10.6 = 64.6

 

Scenario Two - 30 Natural Dexterity + Rest Magic

 

Strength 14 (Starting attribute of 10 + 4 Fade Bonus)

Dexterity 30 (Starting attribute of 10 + 3 points at character creation + 4 Fade Bonus + 13 at 1pt/level)

Magic 47 (Starting attribute of 17+ 2 points at character creation + 2 Fade Bonus + 26 at 2pts/level)

Spellpower 37 (Magic-10)

 

Attack = Base (50) + .5 * [(STR-10)+(DEX-10)] + Attack Bonus

 

Attack Bonus from Combat Magic = 5+(Spellpower/5)

 

Attack = 50 + 12 + 7.4 = 69.4

 

Based in the Wiki: When the attacker's Attack value is the same as the defender's Defense value, the hit probability is 54%. Each point of attack increases this by one point

 

So as you can see from the calculations our level 14 Arcane Warrior with 30 natural DEX will hit an enemy with a Defense Value of 64 roughly 59% of the time with a melee weapon as opposed to 54% for the AW with all points in magic.

 

This does come at a cost however, per Combat Magic: Spellpower is now used in place of STR for damage.

 

Looking at the formula for weapon damage Damage = Base weapon damage + Attribute Damage + Character Bonus + On Hit Damage - Armor Reduction

 

The attribute damage formula for Arcane Warriors would be Spellpower - 10 * [(Weapon Modifier) * (Style Modifier)]

 

If both Arcane Warriors above are using a sword such as Spellweaver (weapon modifier=1) the AW with 30 DEX will have a +5% chance to hit but will do 16 points less damage than the AW with more spellpower if he manages to hit.

 

I extrapolated the calculations for a level 25 Arcane Warrior with all points in magic from levels 15-25 and the attack values change to 76.2 for all magic and 81 for 30 natural dexterity. The difference in spellpower between the two Arcane Warriors remains at 16 so the attribute damage modifier doesn't change. 

 

So if all you're doing is swinging a sword at something in front of you the argument boils down to this, would you rather have a roughly 5% greater chance to hit or an extra 16 points of melee damage?

[capn233]

I put some points into Dex on AW.  But part of that is because I like to go dw with dagger and sword plus some poison.  You end up becoming basically invincible on nightmare anyway, and dagger + sword looks cooler than sword + board.  Edge gives a cheap attack buff.

[dainbramage]

Based in the Wiki: When the attacker's Attack value is the same as the defender's Defense value, the hit probability is 54%. Each point of attack increases this by one point

 

What page is this on? It's actually 50%. EDIT: I no good at reading code

 

For damage resolution, combat magic makes your damage scale with magic, not spellpower (the tooltip's wrong on this). And attribute damage needs to account for weapon style - 1H / 2H get .625 damage per attribute (random in the interval [0.5, 0.75)), DW and shields get .375 ([0.25, 0.5)), and untrained DW offhand gets 0.125 ([0, 0.25)).

 

The benefit of magic vs dex depends on your weapon choice, weapon style, and the defence and armour of whatever you're hitting. Essentially, what increases your damage output more: a boost to damage or a boost to hit rate? As a result this sort of calculation generally starts to involve spreadsheets.

 

Average enemy defence is somewhere around 80, with the toughest (to hit) having around 110. Though there's some level scaling involved of course. Armour's pretty variable, but tends to average 10-20 with 30 being the higher end, though gaxkang gets up to like 50ish. When I benchmark I tend to do it against 100 defence and 30 armour, because trash mobs are going to die easily either way.

 

From doing the calculations long ago I can tell you that, assuming you're min-maxing, dagger/dagger has the highest dps because of all the flat damage bonuses they get (+20 from flaming weapons, +5 from combat magic, +8 from daggers, etc). Daggers also get full benefit of dex, so you may as well pump dex once you've got enough spellpower to max out flaming weapons (75).

 

Of course, an AW with maximized attack damage is still well behind their warrior or rogue counterparts, which is why I prefer magic. Though still significantly more durable, at least so long as you can sustain shimmering shield.

[capn233]

What page is this on? It's actually 50%.

 

Where did the old formula with 54 + (Attack - Defense) come from?

[dainbramage]

Where did the old formula with 54 + (Attack - Defense) come from?

 

So I went through the hit resolution again, and there's an irritating little variable hard coded to give +4 attack. Which makes it actually 54%... so I guess someone better at coding than me reading the toolset

[Myalzalean]

Thanks for the clarifications dainbramage.

If the attribute modifier is really only .625 that makes the issue even more trivial.

Either way it doesn't seem like taking 16 points out of magic and putting it into dexterity during the midgame is going to make or break the build, especially in the long run.

[Aren]

point 1.0 of the OP was true,but with DAA warriors and rogues and archers surpassed the AW