Light Fortification vs. AC in low level toons

[nordlav]

I've been playing casually for a few months experimenting with different builds and have a newbie question about light fortification. Apparently fortification is very important at higher levels, but how important is light fortification vs higher AC at low levels (1-5)? For example if you have an item choice between a ring of lt. fort. and a +1 ring of AC, which is more beneficial for a low level toon? Would it depend on the situation? i.e. Single mob - higher AC may be better, multiple mobs - light fortification due to higher chance of sneak or critical attack.
Thanks

[Adarro]

Lt Fort vs +1 AC? fort every time.

Although at low levels, I think positioning is really the difference.
Combined with some clickies low levels are more of a chore than a challenge.
(Naturally there are some exceptions)

Math wise, you're +1 AC might be the different between a miss on a 6 vs rolling a 7 or ~5%. I'd rather reduce the chance to do 2x - 4x critical damage by 1/4 or 25%.

[Consumer]

Carnifex + bta str item > AC+fort

[k1ngp1n]

Lt Fort vs +1 AC? fort every time.

Although at low levels, I think positioning is really the difference.
Combined with some clickies low levels are more of a chore than a challenge.
(Naturally there are some exceptions)

Math wise, you're +1 AC might be the different between a miss on a 6 vs rolling a 7 or ~5%. I'd rather reduce the chance to do 2x - 4x critical damage by 1/4 or 25%.

Not quite. Most low level mobs have a 20/x2 crit profile, in which 1 AC has more damage mitigation over 25% fort. 25% fort is equal to 1 ac at 19-20/x3 or 17-20/x2 in raw damage avoidance. This of course assumes that the 1 ac makes a difference.

The effect of AC at low levels is quite extraordinary, and will mitigate far more damage than fort. A 30 AC will defend against 80% of all melee attacks, and provide excellent defense against ogre and trolls. Ideally you should have both, but if a choice has to be made, personally my lowbies go for ac due to the very minor effect they have. Past lbl 8ish or so I begin my switchover. Don't forget that mobs need to bypass AC to confirm their crit, so a valid AC IS fort in a sense.

[Club'in]

Carnifex + bta str item > AC+fort

What the ....?

[nordlav]

Not quite. Most low level mobs have a 20/x2 crit profile, in which 1 AC has more damage mitigation over 25% fort. 25% fort is equal to 1 ac at 19-20/x3 or 17-20/x2 in raw damage avoidance. This of course assumes that the 1 ac makes a difference.

The effect of AC at low levels is quite extraordinary, and will mitigate far more damage than fort. A 30 AC will defend against 80% of all melee attacks, and provide excellent defense against ogre and trolls. Ideally you should have both, but if a choice has to be made, personally my lowbies go for ac due to the very minor effect they have. Past lbl 8ish or so I begin my switchover. Don't forget that mobs need to bypass AC to confirm their crit, so a valid AC IS fort in a sense.

I guess that has been my subjective experience with various melee types I've rolled, it seems to make sense.
Thanks

[Adarro]

What the ....?
Carnifex (http://compendium.ddo.com/wiki/Weapon:Carnifex)
BTA = bound to account, i.e. lotsa goodies from Water Works, Delera's, Catacombs, STK that can't be bought but are easy enough to get. Downside: Most of it is not F2P

Basically advocating the Barbarian method of defense... if I wail on you and you die in 2 rounds, how much damage is your corpse hitting me for?

@k1ngp1n you're technically right I'm sure. I'm all "math'd out" after a brief stint in that 1 - 10 > 1d10 thread.

Mind you, I tend to have notoriously poor rolls, and Ogres and their ilk seem to defy the odds according to my combat log, not to mention auto-crits like hold spells if you're not a Will save type. My clerics / pallies wear the biggest thickest thing they can find at the low end, and my other builds tend to be either more mobile focused (i.e. the quick or the dead concept or a caster)

They also have much better saves than my other guys.

However, since lt fort is essentially free before you even leave korthos, I tend to keep it.

Occasionally I'll even employ Consumer's 'defense'.

However, regardless of the numbers, position is still king IMO.

[sirgog]

Light Fortification is really weak. It prevents very few critical hits.

The only low level encounters where I would really like light fort are against Ogres - everywhere else even a single point of AC is better.

Medium fort, however, prevents a lot of crits.


Heavy Fort is critical at higher level because crits are usually extremely deadly - in the Shroud, the rednamed Orc can crit for over 200 damage on Normal difficulty. Damage output like that is pretty much unhealable unless you are personally babysitting the person on the Orc, but with Heavy Fort, you can let someone on the Orc get down to 150hp before throwing them a heal, confident that even if you get interrupted, they can still survive two more hits.

[gamblerjoe]

im going to suggest AC as well. it will mitigate more damage on average, unless you have a terrible AC. i cant think of a situation where iv ever had to chose between the two, unless i didnt care. if you have the ring and bracers from korthos, dont sweat it, your options will open up when u start doing harbor quests.

As far as barbarian defense goes, Maelstrom (http://compendium.ddo.com/wiki/Weapon:Maelstrom)>Carnifex. i used that on Murdertrain, and loved swinging it at kobolds and hobgoblins. Maelstrom is twink gear though, and it drops from a chest in Tempest Spine. i think i bought mine. also i made a point to allways keep the best fort on him. being WF he got his 100% for at lvl 7. the + to hit gear was super important too. i didnt even power attack with maelstrom because i didnt want to miss. once that washed out i started dual weilding, and experimenting with how much i should PA for (wf barb can go up to 11 with enhancements.) i think i kept all 3 items untill i was 16. i remember taking off the goggles once i was high enough level to wear the gloves (both insight bonus if i remember correctly.) eventually i had to make way for my endgame gear.

[zavozod]

Invulnerability

[Angelus_dead]

Not quite. Most low level mobs have a 20/x2 crit profile, in which 1 AC has more damage mitigation over 25% fort.
That is incorrect because it ignores DR. It's common for a low-level character to have DR 3 against the attack, which will reduce most non-crits down to almost zero damage.

[SaneDitto]

In regards to the OP, both would be nice, but if given a choice, go for AC unless your AC is already terrible. Later, around 7-8, you can make the switch to fortification, even if you're gunning for an AC build. A contingency plan never hurts. ;)



As far as barbarian defense goes, Maelstrom (http://compendium.ddo.com/wiki/Weapon:Maelstrom)>Carnifex. i used that on Murdertrain, and loved swinging it at kobolds and hobgoblins. Maelstrom is twink gear though, and it drops from a chest in Tempest Spine. i think i bought mine. also i made a point to allways keep the best fort on him. being WF he got his 100% for at lvl 7. the + to hit gear was super important too. i didnt even power attack with maelstrom because i didnt want to miss. once that washed out i started dual weilding, and experimenting with how much i should PA for (wf barb can go up to 11 with enhancements.) i think i kept all 3 items untill i was 16. i remember taking off the goggles once i was high enough level to wear the gloves (both insight bonus if i remember correctly.) eventually i had to make way for my endgame gear.

Maelstrom is more effective if the opponent in question is immune to critical hits. Otherwise, Carnifex is the more powerful of the two--look at that 17-20 threat range! D:

[gamblerjoe]

Maelstrom is more effective if the opponent in question is immune to critical hits. Otherwise, Carnifex is the more powerful of the two--look at that 17-20 threat range! D:

im looking...im seeing a +1 frost anarchic greataxe vs a +2 keen greataxe. maelstrom is ML 2, so you are a god in WW at lvl 2, and still a force by the time you're doing STK, and many other quests. theyre both +4 over all, giving them the power level of a ML 6 weapon w no rr.

to find out which does more damage, set bonus damage (str, PA etc.) as a variable. set the damage each axe does equal to eachother and solve for this variable. anything above that value favors carnifax, and anything under favors maelstrom.

against mobs that take the anarchic and cold
...axe..........enh.....str+PA..anarch.......cold. ........extra crit dmg............axe...........enh.....S+PA....extra crit dmg
[1d12(19) + 1(19) + X(19)+ 2d6(19) + 1d6(19) + 1(13 + 2X + 2)] / 20 = [1d12(19) + 2(19) + X(19) + 2(2d12 + 2x + 4)] / 20
7(19) + 3.5(19) + (13 + 2X + 2) = 1(19) + 2(13 + 2X + 4)
225.5 + 2X = 53 + 4X
86.25 = X

a character would have to add 87 or more to their d12 roll for carnifax to be better, assuming it is all damage that is multiplied in crits.

against mobs that take the cold but not the anarchic
[1d12(19) + 1(19) + 3.5(19) + X(19) + (13 + 2X + 2)] / 20 = [1d12(19) + 2(19) + X(19) + 2(13 + 2X + 4)] / 20
81.5 + 2X = 53 + 4X
14.25 = X

a character would have to add 15 or more to their d12 roll for carnifax to be better, assuming it is all damage that is multiplied in crits. this is possible at low level, but requires power attacking. like i said, i didnt power attack much at low level since miss chance is higher at that point.

against mobs that dont take either the cold or anarchic, its no contest. one is a +1 greataxe, the other is a +2 keen greataxe. against mobs that are uncrittable but take either of the procs, maelstrom is better. against mobs that are immune to crits and all the proc damage, its still comparing a +2 greataxe to a +1, so carnifax there.

if carnifax really is 17-20, and the compendium is wrong, the equations need to be modified. the 2 in front of the extra crit damage for the carnifax needs to be changed to a 4. this would obviously shift things in favor of carnifax.

i used the 19/20 method, because its what i use to compare weapons being weilded by capped characters who dont miss. at low level you miss on more than a 1, but adding miss chance adds another variable, turning the pivot point from a single number to a graph, and making the whole thing a lot more complex.

anyway, enjoy. if i made any math errors let me know, i allready cought and fixed one myself.

[toughguyjoe]

Carnifex is indeed 17-20/x3. It starts at 19-20 and the keen does the rest of the work. Pretty special for such a low level weapon.

[r3dl4nce]

As someone said, just put on an outfit of invulnerability. DR 5/magic. Even if mobs crit you, DR 5 reduces the crit damage to lesse then 5 hp.
Near level 7, moderate fortification outfit. As soon as you can, heavy fortification

[jkm]

The effect of AC at low levels is quite extraordinary, and will mitigate far more damage than fort. A 30 AC will defend against 80% of all melee attacks, and provide excellent defense against ogre and trolls. Ideally you should have both, but if a choice has to be made, personally my lowbies go for ac due to the very minor effect they have. Past lbl 8ish or so I begin my switchover. Don't forget that mobs need to bypass AC to confirm their crit, so a valid AC IS fort in a sense.

the point you should be making about AC at lower levels is that if a mob needs to roll a 20 to hit you, they have to roll 2 20's to crit you (to hit and confirm roll). with a 30ish ac, you'll rarely get critted.

however, as angelus alluded too, the value of AC is greatly diminished in the harbor without some level of piercing dr. the sheer quantity of grazing hits will get you in any extended fights without it.

my last trip through the harbor on a monk, i just trashed the black widow bracers and drank mage armor pots (and the starter clicky) in favor of the lesser spearblock bracers. i rarely if ever used any healing pots because of it.

[gamblerjoe]

Carnifex is indeed 17-20/x3. It starts at 19-20 and the keen does the rest of the work. Pretty special for such a low level weapon.

Do over!

against mobs that take the anarchic and cold
...axe..........enh.....str+PA..anarch.......cold. ........extra crit dmg............axe...........enh.....S+PA....extra crit dmg
[1d12(19) + 1(19) + X(19)+ 2d6(19) + 1d6(19) + 1(13 + 2X + 2)] / 20 = [1d12(19) + 2(19) + X(19) + 4(2d12 + 2x + 4)] / 20
7(19) + 3.5(19) + (13 + 2X + 2) = 1(19) + 4(13 + 2X + 4)
95.5 + 2X = 8x + 68
21.25 = X

a character would have to add 22 or more to their d12 roll for carnifax to be better, assuming it is all damage that is multiplied in crits. so maelstrom is marginally better against most lawful enemies, but not as much as i had thought.

against mobs that take the cold but not the anarchic
[1d12(19) + 1(19) + 3.5(19) + X(19) + (13 + 2X + 2)] / 20 = [1d12(19) + 2(19) + X(19) + 4(13 + 2X + 4)] / 20
81.5 + 2X = 8X + 87
-.91666 = X

a character would have to add -1 or less to their d12 roll for maelstrom to be better. since that's impossible, carnifax crushes maelstrom.

as miss chance goes up, it gets even better for carnifax. essentially if all those 19s (which represent the 19 out of 20 d20 rolls that will result in a hit) go down, the "4" (representing the 4 out of 20 d20 rolls that are crits) on the right side of the equasion makes up a larger percentage of the hits landed. obviously dps goes down as hit rate goes down, it just goes down more for maelstrom. since it relies more on proc damage, each regular hit that you take away is a bigger loss for maelstrom than it is for carnifax. anway, thats my intuative reasoning, im sure enough that i dont need to do any more math. another factor is the fact that maelstrom is 1 better to hit. if against a certain mob you need to roll a 5 to hit with carnifax, you will need a 6 to hit with maelstrom. in that case you would change the 19s on the left side to 14s, and the ones on the right side to 15s. this alone helps a weapons "dp20"

well, at least maelstrom has its 2 levels of fun.

[UnderwearModel]

That is how I define it.

In my experience, having a high AC is much more important than fortifcation. A 4th level full plate armored fighter is rarely going to be hit by any kobold, spider, dog, bugbear, hobgoblin, etc.

Now, go in with your pajama wearing wizard with a ring of light fort and see how you do?

[Dragavon]

Not quite. Most low level mobs have a 20/x2 crit profile, in which 1 AC has more damage mitigation over 25% fort. 25% fort is equal to 1 ac at 19-20/x3 or 17-20/x2 in raw damage avoidance. This of course assumes that the 1 ac makes a difference.

The effect of AC at low levels is quite extraordinary, and will mitigate far more damage than fort. A 30 AC will defend against 80% of all melee attacks, and provide excellent defense against ogre and trolls. Ideally you should have both, but if a choice has to be made, personally my lowbies go for ac due to the very minor effect they have. Past lbl 8ish or so I begin my switchover. Don't forget that mobs need to bypass AC to confirm their crit, so a valid AC IS fort in a sense.

+1!

Having good AC for your level at low levels is very effective, it is perhaps the only part of the game where focusing on AC works as it should. Not saying AC focus is bad at high levels either, it is just that you have to invest so much in grinding for the right AC items it takes a lot of effort to get there.

[Nospheratus]

If you can, go for Adamantine full plate. IMO it's the best damage mitigation at low levels... up to 7 perhaps?...

That's DR 3/- and you can get 1 of those as low as level 2 - correct me if i'm wrong.

[tlstar]

no matter what your ac is ,no matter how many hitpoints you have , no matter what class you play .always and i mean always have the best fort item you can find equiped on your character.