AC: the stepchild of defense.

[Ape_Man]

I'm a long-time AC who pre U14 had a 95 AC stalwart and a 100 AC pally. Now I don't bother building for AC on any character as it's a waste of time. As a D&Der more than an MMOer that bothers me.

After all the U14 changes . . . AC DOES NOT MATTER AT ALL if you run stuff above EH. Sure, AC works in EH and lower content but EH and lower content is so easy defense doesn't matter.

Yes, DEFENSE matters in EE, but ARMOR CLASS does not. I do not know a single player who runs EEs who gives a fig at all about AC. Look at all the various discussions and build threads and tell me I'm wrong.

AC is the LEAST important aspect of player's layered defense, I'm sorry but that's dumb. At a 150 AC on my stalwart I don't notice enough misses for it to be worth the bother. Dodge works, PRR works, concealment works, your actually armor class score doesn't matter at all.

What's the point of changing the to-hit formula when you're just gonna give the mobs enough to-hit that they hit 95% of the time anyway?

[Bowser_Koopa]

The reason for this is simple, if the mobs can't hit us and we all have evasion, and we all self-heal and have uber-phatz lootz we bought with astral shards. What is the point of mobs anyways?

Sure they are amusing the first time you see them and they have words over they're head or make funny jokes when they summon earth ele's or get defeated and say "not again" but really what chance do they even have. They march blindly into combat and by koopa the only thing they are good at is hitting us with whatever the dev put in their main hand to attack with.

But could you imagine if we went back to a time when 95 to 100 ac meant unless the mob rolls a 20 you never get hit. It would be just another step down the road of DDO become a social game with some quest playing in the background. Hell they might as well put in an option to let you chat while the hireling AI runs your character at least that may be someone fun to watch while you chat to people about lag or five guys burgers or whatever.

So I say rather than buff AC, I say we do what Turbine does to the mobs all the time but to the players. NERF! Downgrade Dodge, Concealment, resist, healing, evasion etc etc until us and the mobs are back on a more even playing field.

I would ask to buff the mobs but with 6 int I don't know that even with buffs they could put together enough intelligence and strategy to kill anyone.

Bowserkoopa,

Little Mac didn't have AC he had to dodge and use his blocking DR to beat Mike Tyson...aren't you better than Little Mac

[Ape_Man]

So I say rather than buff AC, I say we do what Turbine does to the mobs all the time but to the players. NERF! Downgrade Dodge, Concealment, resist, healing, evasion etc etc until us and the mobs are back on a more even playing field.


It would be better if that were that case, if the AC score actually meant SOMETHING. Now it means NOTHING.

[Ape_Man]

But could you imagine if we went back to a time when 95 to 100 ac meant unless the mob rolls a 20 you never get hit. It would be just another step down the road of DDO become a social game with some quest playing in the background. Hell they might as well put in an option to let you chat while the hireling AI runs your character at least that may be someone fun to watch while you chat to people about lag or five guys burgers or whatever.

This is a strawman argument, first off pre-u14 grazes hit you on 13s. Post U14 that's absolutely impossible.

[SmashBang]

I just did the first Eveningstar chain with my guild on EE.

Depending on which shield I was using my AC was any where between 145 and 170. 6% dodge, a 76% chance of being missed and a 47% damage reduction when I am hit.

In this chain the only thing that hurt me at all was traps.

Now I don't think it was just my AC that helped but instead it was all of the above. In any case I will contniue to play my Stalwart Defender with S&B as I enjoy it.

[Ape_Man]

I just did the first Eveningstar chain with my guild on EE.

Depending on which shield I was using my AC was any where between 145 and 170. 6% dodge, a 76% chance of being missed and a 47% damage reduction when I am hit.

In this chain the only thing that hurt me at all was traps.

Now I don't think it was just my AC that helped but instead it was all of the above. In any case I will contniue to play my Stalwart Defender with S&B as I enjoy it.

Try that in the level 24 EEs and get back to us.

I should have been more clear. It does work on the CR 40ish mobs in the easy EEs, but the mid 50s CR mobs . . .

[Bowser_Koopa]

I say no to your begging for not being hit. You have HP's for a reason you took toughness 34 times for a reason and those 3 barb past lives you suffered through for 30 hps those too have reasons. It's all a battle of attrition you hit them they hit you until only one remains.

There will be no unhittableness there will be only the healed by yourself or others...and the dead.

Also I am not a strawman I am an Evil Koopa get it straight. I had a turtle tank back in the day I was amused raid bosses would of had to hit me 234,833 times to kill me while apparently I said things to them in an intimidating manner so that they only hit me and not my minions. Honestly though all it really taught me was hey...this is sad this mob is a boss amongst bosses of his race/faction and here I am on Elite and short of me walking away from the keyboard he can't kill me.

Again Mr. Ape_Man there will be no AC buffing the mobs must have their chance to win occasionally even if it is through insane means such as giving them +200 to hit and immunities etc. Surely you don't really want to go back to when mobs almost literally could not kill you where is the fun in that.

Bowserkoopa,

Little Mac 1 Ape_Man 0

[IronClan]

I was in an EH Servants healing with someone who had your attitude towards AC, they died a lot, they blamed me, everyone else in the party ran around never dropping below 75% health while this player huffed and hhhmm'ed and I finally explained to them: we are half way through the end fight and I have literally mana dumpped quickened heals on you, nearly out of SP half way though, for the first time in 15 repetitions of this quest, only occasionally topping the others off with mass cures, perhaps my healing isn't your problem.

I'm not a big EE player, so I admit I'm no expert there, though I do know people who seem to be nearly unhittable in EE, and I've healed them or rather not needed to heal them much on a few occasions when I get dragged into a EE quest. but I can't imagine it is that hard to get 26% miss chance with AC anywhere in the game, certainly in EH it's trivial, at which point at least in EH it is unequivocally the best permanent miss chance in the game, better than Shadow Fade, Shadow Stance, Blurry items, Max Dodge, Ghostly.

Being someone who only occasionally does EE and only occasionally did old Epic's and had one of those high AC Pali's that got pretty nerfed from the Intim change and then had the "coup de grace" applied when they made his nearly unhittable AC about half as effective, I do not agree that AC is useless... in fact it seems to me that it's the single most effective possible miss chance that one can build into a character if chosen to. The fact that this is REALLY hard for EE, seems IMO to be exactly how EE is supposed to work but admittedly I say this from a outside looking in perspective (or at least mostly). I certainly haven't tried to build one of these 250 AC EE tanks I've read about so, maybe they are all BS'ing who knows.

[IronClan]

Try that in the level 24 EEs and get back to us.

I should have been more clear. It does work on the CR 40ish mobs in the easy EEs, but the mid 50s CR mobs . . .

So..... maybe rename the thread "AC: the red-headed stepchild of the couple odd level 24 EE quests I am currently doing"

[Vellrad]

Red headed step child (if a girl) is not negative term at all.
Red heads are cute and hot, and if its step child, she's not my real sister, so we can...

[heavenandhell]

AC rocks in epic casual too. Otherwise I totally agree with OP

[Ape_Man]

I was in an EH Servants healing with someone who had your attitude towards AC, they died a lot, they blamed me . . .

judging from your next statement, it probably was your fault.



I'm not a big EE player, so I admit I'm no expert there . . .

Then stop posting.

[SableShadow]

Then stop posting.

People who don't play the content under discussion, not commenting?
Like that's gonna happen.

[-Satureon-]

I'm a long-time AC who pre U14 had a 95 AC stalwart and a 100 AC pally. Now I don't bother building for AC on any character as it's a waste of time. As a D&Der more than an MMOer that bothers me.

After all the U14 changes . . . AC DOES NOT MATTER AT ALL if you run stuff above EH. Sure, AC works in EH and lower content but EH and lower content is so easy defense doesn't matter.

Yes, DEFENSE matters in EE, but ARMOR CLASS does not. I do not know a single player who runs EEs who gives a fig at all about AC. Look at all the various discussions and build threads and tell me I'm wrong.

AC is the LEAST important aspect of player's layered defense, I'm sorry but that's dumb. At a 150 AC on my stalwart I don't notice enough misses for it to be worth the bother. Dodge works, PRR works, concealment works, your actually armor class score doesn't matter at all.

What's the point of changing the to-hit formula when you're just gonna give the mobs enough to-hit that they hit 95% of the time anyway?

You can see how useful your defense (with ac too) by my program. I love ac on my ee solo paladin also, and helps a bit, but only with other defenses, can't rely only by the ac... And yes i agree, nowadays outstanding ac is only a plus.

[Viisari]

I was in an EH Servants healing with someone who had your attitude towards AC, they died a lot, they blamed me

AC is actually useless for EH too because mobs hit for so low damage and die so quick that you're better off just getting some disp clickies and more damage.

[psykopeta]

It's all a battle of attrition you hit them they hit you until only one remains.


don't forget that we gang bang em!!poor boss surrounded by loot *****s :(

what annoys me is that being pure arcane my chances to fail attacking a boss are... rolling 1?XDDDDD

[Ape_Man]

You can see how useful your defense (with ac too) by my program. I love ac on my ee solo paladin also, and helps a bit, but only with other defenses, can't rely only by the ac... And yes i agree, nowadays outstanding ac is only a plus.

I have an Excel sheet that does the same thing but without know mob to-hits how are you calcing anything?

Nice app though, this thingy's pretty cool. But where you getting a CD54 mobs has a 135 to-hit?

[Ape_Man]

AC is actually useless for EH too because mobs hit for so low damage and die so quick that you're better off just getting some disp clickies and more damage.

any TWFer with a pair of Vampric weapons is immortal in EH.

[exvanguard]

Try that in the level 24 EEs and get back to us.

I should have been more clear. It does work on the CR 40ish mobs in the easy EEs, but the mid 50s CR mobs . . .


so you are upset that you are getting hit by mobs that are twice your level?
At best, you are a CR 25 since CR roughly equates to your level in D&D terms. Take your lvl 25 character and stomp through a lvl 12 dungeon (or lvl 10 quest with CR 12 mobs) and see how often you miss them.
At some point, when fighting mobs more than twice your level, you should expect to get hit every swing. You are in EE after all - you are there for the challenge.

[noinfo]

The reason for this is simple, if the mobs can't hit us and we all have evasion, and we all self-heal and have uber-phatz lootz we bought with astral shards. What is the point of mobs anyways?

But could you imagine if we went back to a time when 95 to 100 ac meant unless the mob rolls a 20 you never get hit.

There was never such a time.

[dpadan17]

To quote to op.

"I sense much greatness in this thread!"

To agree ac is useless but buffs are king now. I dumped a bit of ac on my monk and beefed up my dodge and buff clickys and he is definitely more survivable.

My rogue virtually has no ac but with dodge, perma blur, displacement clickys, and prr from black scale armor, he survives quite well for no ac.

The ac era has gone away. He'll it was a blast with my monster tank that was virtually non killable. But the game changes in ways. I am thinking that the enhancement passes will help considerably ( troll feeding).

P.s. koopa...... The mike Tyson reference to little Mac was priceless.

[skullzz]

I say no to your begging for not being hit.

I don't see begging from the posts here. So what if 2 builds are hard to hit. That is all they are good for. Their dps is in the s**t hole. This is actually a tactic that should be available for use in all content (though greater investment in EE).

I have the reverse argument for you then. NERF Shiradi to only work with arrows and bolts not spells, nerf energy burst and dragon breath to only 20d6.

Those nerfs that I just gave you will be about equivalent to the AC nerf not working for all content.

[Ape_Man]

so you are upset that you are getting hit by mobs that are twice your level?
At best, you are a CR 25 since CR roughly equates to your level in D&D terms. Take your lvl 25 character and stomp through a lvl 12 dungeon (or lvl 10 quest with CR 12 mobs) and see how often you miss them.
At some point, when fighting mobs more than twice your level, you should expect to get hit every swing. You are in EE after all - you are there for the challenge.

It's dumb that AC is the LEAST important aspect of layered defense.

[oweieie]

Turbine removed the progressive -5 penalty to hit, then they added all sorts of weird ways to get bonus AC that aren't in PnP, some of which is limited to certain classes. Realizing that they had completely broken AC they tossed it out and put the totally moronic PRR in.

[Ape_Man]

Turbine removed the progressive -5 penalty to hit, then they added all sorts of weird ways to get bonus AC that aren't in PnP, some of which is limited to certain classes. Realizing that they had completely broken AC they tossed it out and put the totally moronic PRR in.

Pretty much

[danzig138]

As a D&Der more than an MMOer that bothers me.
As a "D&Der", you'd know that it shouldn't bother you, since in the edition upon which this game was based, AC quickly because useless, because it never kept pace with attack bonuses. In that respect, they have gone back to the foundation of the game a bit. Now if they would only do that more instead of moving further and further away.


Still wish they would have just implemented a simple Defense Bonus.

[Ape_Man]

As a "D&Der", you'd know that it shouldn't bother you, since in the edition upon which this game was based, AC quickly because useless, because it never kept pace with attack bonuses. In that respect, they have gone back to the foundation of the game a bit. Now if they would only do that more instead of moving further and further away.


Still wish they would have just implemented a simple Defense Bonus.

I played "real" D&D, not 3.5 :)

[dpadan17]

It's dumb that AC is the LEAST important aspect of layered defense.

Agreed. How ac was "god" and now absolutely nothing? I like versatility but it went from apples to oranges in a few steps.

I understand that mobs at 2x your Cr but they don't have the "gear" you have. You build to survive and flourish, while mobs are massive but typical.

I just hope that there is a happy medium out there somewhere. Lets face it, with a good group ee content can be accomplished easily, but with grinding and good loot it should make things easier. That's the purpose of the game. Get better Plain and simple.

[Ape_Man]

Agreed. How ac was "god" and now absolutely nothing? I like versatility but it went from apples to oranges in a few steps.

I understand that mobs at 2x your Cr but they don't have the "gear" you have. You build to survive and flourish, while mobs are massive but typical.

I just hope that there is a happy medium out there somewhere. Lets face it, with a good group ee content can be accomplished easily, but with grinding and good loot it should make things easier. That's the purpose of the game. Get better Plain and simple.


First off it never was "god" with grazing hits on a 13.

Second off with the current formula 50 AC above the to-hit threshold is a 60% miss. 200 AC against +150 to-hit would be hit 40% of the time. The worries of player invulnerability exist only in the minds of ignorant people who don't understand the game mechanics.

[dpadan17]

First off it never was "god" with grazing hits on a 13.

Second off with the current formula 50 AC above the to-hit threshold is a 60% miss. 200 AC against +150 to-hit would be hit 40% of the time. The worries of player invulnerability exist only in the minds of ignorant people who don't understand the game mechanics.

Couldn't have said it better. Mixing sitting at a bar and talking ddo is too tough. Math is hard, and beer is easy!

[Spartywinz]

whew, almost went a day without "someone" complaining about ac I was getting worried.

[Ape_Man]

whew, almost went a day without "someone" complaining about ac I was getting worried.

The BYOH stuff seems to be much more trollerrific today, I'm surprised this hit 2 pages.

[IronClan]

judging from your next statement, it probably was your fault.



Then stop posting.

Start naming your threads "CR24 EE only" and I'll consider not posting in your threads. Stop naming your threads with sweeping incorrect generalizations and that might help too :) I have played EE content, it's a slog that is hardly what I consider fun. However I'll comment on it all I wish, as I have actually played it. And have grouped with effective AC toons in it.

The statement in your thread title is objectively wrong, your premise is objectively wrong. Your attitude that the 2 or 3% who play EE only in the tiny range of EE that you specify are the only things that matter in the game when making sweeping statements on a forum is just as wrong :)

You are probably right that the tiny portion of the game you are tunnel visioned on is not going to allow you to have unhittable AC, I'll take your word for it, so whats that 1 out of 3? 75% wrong isn't bad I suppose.

[Ape_Man]

Your attitude that the 2 or 3% who play EE only in the tiny range of EE that you specify are the only things that matter in the game . . .


We are the only people who matter.

[oweieie]

As a "D&Der", you'd know that it shouldn't bother you, since in the edition upon which this game was based, AC quickly because useless, because it never kept pace with attack bonuses.

Uh... actually AC easily keeps pace with attack bonuses in PnP. You must have no concern at all for AC if the -15 on the 4rth attack isn't missing you frequently, and since power attack is the main source of boosting your damage, higher AC mean less damage as power attack can't be fully utilized.

[Spartywinz]

We are the only people who matter.


You had me at hello.

[IronClan]

We are the only people who matter.

Well that's certainly the typical mindset :D To take that comment seriously for a moment;

I think the 2-3% could disapear entirely and the game would become more popular. I mean why do you think Turbine effectively segregates EE players into content where they are least likely to interact with new players? They even made ED's super powerful so that TR'ing is less about min maxing and more about trying out heroic builds progressing characters and re-playing 1-20 content these days (or so the typical end game player claims regularly around here when the subject of TR'ing versus ED's comes up)... This effectively reduces Elitist to Regular player interaction even more.

Sorry man I think they're trying to push you guys out :D

[Ape_Man]

Well that's certainly the typical mindset :D To take that comment seriously for a moment;

I think the 2-3% could disapear entirely and the game would become more popular. I mean why do you think Turbine effectively segregates EE players into content where they are least likely to interact with new players? They even made ED's super powerful so that TR'ing is less about min maxing and more about trying out heroic builds progressing characters and re-playing 1-20 content these days (or so the typical end game player claims regularly around here when the subject of TR'ing versus ED's comes up)... This effectively reduces Elitist to Regular player interaction even more.

Sorry man I think they're trying to push you guys out :D

We only interact with the peasants on the forums.

This is a conversation about how the layered defense works in EE, you don't run EE, why are you here?

[Ape_Man]

Bah, I'm bored of this already. I'll be troll . . . I mean . . . posting in the BYOH threads.

[redspecter23]

I see the problem with AC like this. It's variable defense. Displacement is always 50%. Ghostly is always 10%. Dodge is always whatever dodge % shows up on your character sheet. AC is a defense that works appropriately against "at level" mobs. The problem is, many players don't fight "at level" mobs. We fight mobs up to 35 levels above us. That kinda makes a huge difference when you base a defensive score on fighting mobs of approximately your own level.

I find it extremely silly that a caster or bard or melee with a pile of displacement clickies has far and away the best single defense of any character in epic elite currently. Dodge caps at 25%... with effort. Displacement can be kept up 100% of the time for 50% defense against nearly all mobs. Now I'm not saying displacement is too powerful, but it is so far ahead of other defensive layers that it boggles my mind.

AC needs another look. The current system is just as broken as it was prior to the changes, which makes me wonder why they changed it at all to begin with.

[Kmnh]

I love the defenses system. AC changes killed the intimitanks that took no physical damage. PRR and dodge boosted melee defenses so casters wouldn't be so far ahead of everything else on the defensive side.

[Viisari]

I love the defenses system. AC changes killed the intimitanks that took no physical damage. PRR and dodge boosted melee defenses so casters wouldn't be so far ahead of everything else on the defensive side.

Yet casters are still far more survivable than almost anything else in the game.

[Kilbar]

Yet casters are still far more survivable than almost anything else in the game.

Well, that does reflect the lore of the game DDO is based upon wherein the best way to kill a wizard is either with another wizard or quietly, while he's asleep. And even then, you're probably still better off going with another wizard. DnD is full of lore about powerful mages who grew so potent they simply left their home world or home plane while every other class seems to end up in tastefully appointed tombs.

[psykopeta]

so you are upset that you are getting hit by mobs that are twice your level?
At best, you are a CR 25 since CR roughly equates to your level in D&D terms. Take your lvl 25 character and stomp through a lvl 12 dungeon (or lvl 10 quest with CR 12 mobs) and see how often you miss them.
At some point, when fighting mobs more than twice your level, you should expect to get hit every swing. You are in EE after all - you are there for the challenge.

but but EE means easy for everyone!! it's not fair!! :( XDDD

[IronClan]

but but EE means easy for everyone!! it's not fair!! :( XDDD

Which is ironic because he clearly wants AC to be more effective in the handful of quests he's talking about... Which are apparently too challenging for him.

Personally I think Ape_Man just needs to join me and the other peasants in EH.

[Viisari]

Which is ironic because he clearly wants AC to be more effective in the handful of quests he's talking about... Which are apparently too challenging for him.

Care to point out where he said that?

This thread exists because AC is simply not worth investing in for EE's. Extremely high values might do something but in the end the investment required is so high that you're better off just doing something else with that gear and build points.

At least try to understand the issue before making stupid comments.

[bloodnose13]

20 ac + 1500 hp = 2-3 hits in any quest on EE, 2-3 hits is about 2 seconds, most ppl in this game dont have such reflex to be able to heal someone who go goes donw that fast, not to mention cooldowns on spells.

150+ ac + 1000+ hp = 5-10 hits, lot of time to manage to notice, target and hit heal,

/sarcasm on
so from healer perpective, sure ac does not matter, lets go back to drinking pots all the time.
/sarcasm off

if you are too lazy to work on getting higher value of ac (its too easy with all the new items and augs in the game now) but not lazy enough to blame healer for your 2 second life span, then maybe you should learn some neat little tactic, HIT..... THEM...... FROM.... THE.... BACK.......... and let real tank take aggro.

[Ape_Man]

AC needs another look. The current system is just as broken as it was prior to the changes, which makes me wonder why they changed it at all to begin with.

if the AC score added to PRR maybe it wouldn't be a waste of time.

[Ape_Man]

if you are too lazy to work on getting higher value of ac (its too easy with all the new items and augs in the game now) but not lazy enough to blame healer for your 2 second life span, then maybe you should learn some neat little tactic, HIT..... THEM...... FROM.... THE.... BACK.......... and let real tank take aggro.

I'm sorry, but if you need a tank for anything in this game except EE LOB your groups needs to learn to play.

[Ape_Man]

I love the defenses system. AC changes killed the intimitanks that took no physical damage. PRR and dodge boosted melee defenses so casters wouldn't be so far ahead of everything else on the defensive side.


The worries of player invulnerability exist only in the minds of ignorant people who don't understand the game mechanics.


Thank you for proving my point.

[HAL]

I say no to your begging for not being hit. You have HP's for a reason

There is also an AC stat for a reason to use your own logic. Why don't they use some of the middle ground between mobs not being able to hit on a 20 and mobs hitting 95% of the time? AC could make the mobs hit 65% of the time, for instance...:rolleyes:

[Karavek]

I love how people here keep spreading the same myth they spread way back when. That anything but an AC that renders you untouchable is worthless AC and a waste of energy to build for. Yet I dont find these things true when put to the test. Even a lighter armed dex based swashbuckler like my main who has truly benefitted from the AC changes, feels the benefit to defense even in EE.

Not long ago I got begged to aid a few friends with an EE battle for eveningstar. EE is not something I enjoy doing not because I cant get completion, but because the time, resource consumption, and morale debuff to play one encounters running content that lacks any real challenge beyond bigger hp punching bags. However I knew I would be able to bring them much needed aid and so I joined.

Now my mains AC averages around 70 up or down depending on situations. For example if I put down my epic tier 3 swashbucklers buckler it costs me a fair bit of AC and PRR since I have a nice bit of training in US ED. However when I do its to use my repeater which im quite handy with and have the option of running in shiradi or twisting in its tricks if I think ill be needing them more.

So began the battle for eveningstar on epic, and aside from a completionist monk in earth stance tanking, I was the least deaths. Everyone else including a pure stalwart fighter died many more times then myself. The stalwarts AC pushed into the triple digits, yet when i used my shield and went defensive I could FEEL the difference it made against incoming dps. Yet also I could self heal with rejuve caccoon, had on 20% blur( not that it helps much in epic with all the true sighted casters) and ofcourse good ol heal scrolls for spot healing. Not to mention my res scrolls which I burned through for my allies. The poor healer cleric who had joined us sadly was to much healing and not enough dps and often meant when it was down to him and one or two others it was as good as a wipe and lucky we where near shrines.

So for whatever reason I have to call the OP either a liar or a whiner. Because in EE I can feel the difference with even a small ac boost and PRR boost. Serious tanks feeling to much DPS in EE are those who seem to think there is only one layer to defense. You like any should have to have solid AC PRR miss chances from magical sources, alot of self healing, and ways to recover from special effects. If you cant your not a tank. What class you are or your build is meant to do all becomes meaningless if your not ready to go the whole way. mundane steel is no match for tactical skill and spiritual will.

[Ape_Man]

Not long ago I got begged to aid a few friends with an EE battle for eveningstar.


Play some real content and get back to me.



EE is not something I enjoy doing not because I cant get completion, but because the time, resource consumption, and morale debuff to play one encounters running content that lacks any real challenge beyond bigger hp punching bags. However I knew I would be able to bring them much needed aid and so I joined.

EE is something that good players blast through at warp speed because they don't waste their time focusing on stuff that doesn't work like armor class.

AC is the least important aspect of the layered defense, that's my point and nothing more.

[HAL]

Which is ironic because he clearly wants AC to be more effective in the handful of quests he's talking about... Which are apparently too challenging for him.

Care to point out where he said that?

This thread exists because AC is simply not worth investing in for EE's. Extremely high values might do something but in the end the investment required is so high that you're better off just doing something else with that gear and build points.

At least try to understand the issue before making stupid comments.

He likes trolling and ad hominem comments. He has nothing better to say but apparently feels compelled to say something.

[Ensis]

Which is ironic because he clearly wants AC to be more effective in the handful of quests he's talking about... Which are apparently too challenging for him.

Personally I think Ape_Man just needs to join me and the other peasants in EH.

Dislike his personality if you'd like, but he has a fair point about armor class that you don't seem to be willing to recognize.

As a note, AC is a little more effective at lower difficulty levels or older content such at the Epic Normal/Epic Hard difficulty and MotU content; however, by now this content is irrelevant (MotU is year-old content) and out of the scope of this discussion.

Defense, as has been mentioned, is layered in this game. Enemies have to bypass a player's incorporeal, dodge, concealment, and armor checks before they can apply physical damage, which is then mitigated by the player's physical resistance rating and damage reduction.

The first three mentioned are static and independent of the level difference between player and enemy; ghostly will always cause enemies to miss 10% of the time, displacement will always cause enemies to miss 50% of the time if they aren't coded to have true seeing, and so forth.

Armor class is the only defensive layer that takes level difference into account. Additionally, armor class is the only defensive layer that the traditional 'tank' classes such as Stalwart Defender and Defender of Siberys have an easier time obtaining and maintaining than other classes--monks and arcane casters have a much easier time maximizing dodge, keeping displacement active, and achieving 25% incorporeal mitigation. Due to the significant level differences between players and enemies at the upper-difficulties of the game this sole defensive-layer advantage is mitigated to the point of uselessness.

The point is that the investment and payoff from armor class is out of balance; a player that is able to maintain 150 AC is sacrificing a lot--especially in regards to damage output--but this increased AC does not cause enemies to 'miss' on incoming attacks enough to justify this course of action. This in turn returns AC its 'dump stat' status; if 150 AC is not going to make a noticeable difference on Epic Elite content, why sacrifice functionality in other areas to stack it? That's the impetus behind this discussion.

[Ape_Man]

Dislike his personality if you'd like, but he has a fair point about armor class that you don't seem to be willing to recognize.

As a note, AC is a little more effective at lower difficulty levels or older content such at the Epic Normal/Epic Hard difficulty and MotU content; however, by now this content is irrelevant (MotU is year-old content) and out of the scope of this discussion.

Defense, as has been mentioned, is layered in this game. Enemies have to bypass a player's incorporeal, dodge, concealment, and armor checks before they can apply physical damage, which is then mitigated by the player's physical resistance rating and damage reduction.

The first three mentioned are static and independent of the level difference between player and enemy; ghostly will always cause enemies to miss 10% of the time, displacement will always cause enemies to miss 50% of the time if they aren't coded to have true seeing, and so forth.

Armor class is the only defensive layer that takes level difference into account. Additionally, armor class is the only defensive layer that the traditional 'tank' classes such as Stalwart Defender and Defender of Siberys have an easier time obtaining and maintaining than other classes--monks and arcane casters have a much easier time maximizing dodge, keeping displacement active, and achieving 25% incorporeal mitigation. Due to the significant level differences between players and enemies at the upper-difficulties of the game this sole defensive-layer advantage is mitigated to the point of uselessness.

The point is that the investment and payoff from armor class is out of balance; a player that is able to maintain 150 AC is sacrificing a lot--especially in regards to damage output--but this increased AC does not cause enemies to 'miss' on incoming attacks enough to justify this course of action. This in turn returns AC its 'dump stat' status; if 150 AC is not going to make a noticeable difference on Epic Elite content, why sacrifice functionality in other areas to stack it? That's the impetus behind this discussion.

You've restored my faith in intelligent people actually still playing DDO.

[maddmatt70]

Ac does lead to some misses, but a player has to invest a fair amount into it to see a benefit which I do not think was quite the devs intent is my only comment. The devs should tweak the scale a little bit i.e. monsters should miss somewhat more if they roll on an 80 AC on epic elite then they do. Same with 100 AC. Its the lower values that should be missed a little more.

A bigger concern for me then AC is just how powerful displacement is compared to prr, dodge, and ac on trash and even named mobs. There should definitely be more mobs that have true seeing or cast true seeing in my opinion for level 20 to level 30 content. Displacement is overpowered as a 3rd level arcane spell.

[elraido]

The thing with AC is the laws of diminishing returns. When an AC of 240 is only like 10% points higher than an AC of 140, that is the issue. The investment requirement to go above 140, on most builds is so high, the marginal increase in % to be missed is not worth it.

[Karavek]

Play some real content and get back to me.



EE is something that good players blast through at warp speed because they don't waste their time focusing on stuff that doesn't work like armor class.

AC is the least important aspect of the layered defense, that's my point and nothing more.

UHM.......DUUHHHHHHH! Welcome to D&D where depending on sheets of mere metal to keep you safe in a land of wraiths, swords that ignore physical barriars, called shots to unarmored areas, touch spells, and grappling all make physical armor meaningless. I have never once in all the years of PnP made a character who foolishly depends on armor, Evasion, Mettle, High dex bonus to AC and magical deflection bonuses are all much higher on the list of AC( or in the case of advanced D20 Dodge/parry) boosts that smart vet dice chuckers aim for. Even in the systems where armor acts as physical dmg resistance not unlike here now in DDO, its always far inferior to mystical or science based force fields and the like.

Really man do you start forum threads on the sky being blue, the grass green, and the world being round to? Because if all your whole point has been in these rants is what you said that I highlighted, that is all your effectively doing, ranting about the way things are.

[Ape_Man]

A bigger concern for me then AC is just how powerful displacement is compared to prr, dodge, and ac on trash and even named mobs. There should definitely be more mobs that have true seeing or cast true seeing in my opinion for level 20 to level 30 content. Displacement is overpowered as a 3rd level arcane spell.

Don't forget they nerfed displacement because melees have AC to protect them.

It's just friggin ponderous.

[HAL]

Dislike his personality if you'd like, but he has a fair point about armor class that you don't seem to be willing to recognize.

As a note, AC is a little more effective at lower difficulty levels or older content such at the Epic Normal/Epic Hard difficulty and MotU content; however, by now this content is irrelevant (MotU is year-old content) and out of the scope of this discussion.

Defense, as has been mentioned, is layered in this game. Enemies have to bypass a player's incorporeal, dodge, concealment, and armor checks before they can apply physical damage, which is then mitigated by the player's physical resistance rating and damage reduction.

The first three mentioned are static and independent of the level difference between player and enemy; ghostly will always cause enemies to miss 10% of the time, displacement will always cause enemies to miss 50% of the time if they aren't coded to have true seeing, and so forth.

Armor class is the only defensive layer that takes level difference into account. Additionally, armor class is the only defensive layer that the traditional 'tank' classes such as Stalwart Defender and Defender of Siberys have an easier time obtaining and maintaining than other classes--monks and arcane casters have a much easier time maximizing dodge, keeping displacement active, and achieving 25% incorporeal mitigation. Due to the significant level differences between players and enemies at the upper-difficulties of the game this sole defensive-layer advantage is mitigated to the point of uselessness.

The point is that the investment and payoff from armor class is out of balance; a player that is able to maintain 150 AC is sacrificing a lot--especially in regards to damage output--but this increased AC does not cause enemies to 'miss' on incoming attacks enough to justify this course of action. This in turn returns AC its 'dump stat' status; if 150 AC is not going to make a noticeable difference on Epic Elite content, why sacrifice functionality in other areas to stack it? That's the impetus behind this discussion.

While your post is succinct and logical, you seem to be arguing for Ape_Man's (OP) point. IronClan didn't make a point about AC except essentially "get over it".

[Ape_Man]

<Overly -snarky comeback removed>

[maddmatt70]

Don't forget they nerfed displacement because melees have AC to protect them.

It's just friggin ponderous.

Casters have more defense then nearly all melee just because of the displacement spell and they do not have to ever engage an opposing melee in close combat to affect the opposing melee especially if they are a shiradi type. Makes 0 sense. or how a blur item affords the equivalent protection of several prr or several dodge items or several ac items that have to be worn to get the same ac/dodge/prr advantage and 99% of mobs and vast majority of bosses do not have true sight ,etc.

[Chai]

AC in D&D fashion was an all or nothing gambit. So they MMOd it instead and turned it into a layered defense mechanic rather than a one number mechanic. This made AC matter for everyone. The people who are saying AC doesnt matter enough now are those who were shooting for unhittable_on_a_19 status before the AC revamp, and were used to their close to invulnerable toon. If they get hit 40% of the time now, thats alot worse than the 5% of the time they were getting hit previous to the revamp.

The reason people dont bring AC toons to EE as much as any other archtype is because we have a choice. We can either win by knockout or win by decision, and most players choose the knockout method. CC is better than AC as far as mitigation methods are concerned for trash. Very few and far between now are the quests and or raids where an AC tank is the best solution for a boss. Build enthusiasts take current content into account when designing toons around specific needs. If no content needs it, people stop seriously building for it.

[Ape_Man]

Casters have more defense then nearly all melee just because of the displacement spell and they do not have to ever engage an opposing melee in close combat to affect the opposing melee especially if they are a shiradi type. Makes 0 sense. or how a blur item affords the equivalent protection of several prr or several dodge items or several ac items that have to be worn to get the same ac/dodge/prr advantage and 99% of mobs and vast majority of bosses do not have true sight ,etc.

That's also why I've concluded bring a tank to an EE is a waste of a party slot.

A tank gets more AC and PRR, the rest of the static defense are static.

PRR Hit's diminishing returns pretty early. Most tanks will have 45-50% damage mitigation . . . but it's not hard to get 30% mitigation from PRR on a real DPS build.

So the tank's advantage over a DPSer left is AC . . . which in the highest level content in the game (level 24 EEs) effectively does nothing. A defense a tank build has over the damage lost bringing them isn't worth the trade off.

YMMV and I have found tanks to work better in bad groups.

[chrisdinus7]

Dislike his personality if you'd like, but he has a fair point about armor class that you don't seem to be willing to recognize.

As a note, AC is a little more effective at lower difficulty levels or older content such at the Epic Normal/Epic Hard difficulty and MotU content; however, by now this content is irrelevant (MotU is year-old content) and out of the scope of this discussion.

Defense, as has been mentioned, is layered in this game. Enemies have to bypass a player's incorporeal, dodge, concealment, and armor checks before they can apply physical damage, which is then mitigated by the player's physical resistance rating and damage reduction.

The first three mentioned are static and independent of the level difference between player and enemy; ghostly will always cause enemies to miss 10% of the time, displacement will always cause enemies to miss 50% of the time if they aren't coded to have true seeing, and so forth.

Armor class is the only defensive layer that takes level difference into account. Additionally, armor class is the only defensive layer that the traditional 'tank' classes such as Stalwart Defender and Defender of Siberys have an easier time obtaining and maintaining than other classes--monks and arcane casters have a much easier time maximizing dodge, keeping displacement active, and achieving 25% incorporeal mitigation. Due to the significant level differences between players and enemies at the upper-difficulties of the game this sole defensive-layer advantage is mitigated to the point of uselessness.

The point is that the investment and payoff from armor class is out of balance; a player that is able to maintain 150 AC is sacrificing a lot--especially in regards to damage output--but this increased AC does not cause enemies to 'miss' on incoming attacks enough to justify this course of action. This in turn returns AC its 'dump stat' status; if 150 AC is not going to make a noticeable difference on Epic Elite content, why sacrifice functionality in other areas to stack it? That's the impetus behind this discussion.

Not entirely accurate. DoS and SD also have a notable PRR and HP advantage. They get something on the order 40 more PRR from enhancements (over and beyond what they can get from just the shield, shield feats, and destiny effects). Likewise, a lot of their dps sacrifice comes from using a shield instead of THF or TWF. So, compared to other melees, they are getting another large PRR boost there. They get an additional PRR boost against arcanes from wearing heavy armor (though, you can make an arcane wear heavy armor, but that does take some gear / build sacrifice).

The point being, DoS and SD do get a significant defensive advantage relative to other builds in PRR and HP. That said, I do agree with the OP that high AC should offer good defensive advantages.

[elraido]

AC in D&D fashion was an all or nothing gambit. So they MMOd it instead and turned it into a layered defense mechanic rather than a one number mechanic. This made AC matter for everyone. The people who are saying AC doesnt matter enough now are those who were shooting for unhittable_on_a_19 status before the AC revamp, and were used to their close to invulnerable toon. If they get hit 40% of the time now, thats alot worse than the 5% of the time they were getting hit previous to the revamp.

The reason people dont bring AC toons to EE as much as any other archtype is because we have a choice. We can either win by knockout or win by decision, and most players choose the knockout method. CC is better than AC as far as mitigation methods are concerned for trash. Very few and far between now are the quests and or raids where an AC tank is the best solution for a boss. Build enthusiasts take current content into account when designing toons around specific needs. If no content needs it, people stop seriously building for it.

I was one of those people before who had a high ac when most of the time I was getting hit 5% of the time. The thing is, even back then on EE, AC didn't matter. I think that is more the situation here. While it equalized a little bit with the revamp, in EE, AC doesn't do a whole lot. Granted it does reduce some of the incoming hits, it is no where near enough to really consider using it viably in EE. The giant skeletons for example in EE Madstone. They were hitting my Paladin for 200 points a shot...and they weren't missing him either. That is about 4 hits before he is dead. And the rate he does DPS vs a barb or kensi, they have just has much of a shot of of survivability as my paladin. Try tanking the Marilith in EE pop? 1200 hp to 0 in .25 seconds. Literally alive one second, dead the next. The only way that much damage should be getting threw is via spells when someone is built to withstand physical damage.

[Ape_Man]

The people who are saying AC doesnt matter enough now are those who were shooting for unhittable_on_a_19 status before the AC revamp, and were used to their close to invulnerable toon. If they get hit 40% of the time now, thats alot worse than the 5% of the time they were getting hit previous to the revamp.

Come on, with grazes nobody was every invulnerable. And I'm not talking about the 1-19 game anyway.

When I'm saying "AC doesn't" matter I'm referering to the level 24 EEs where the to-hits are tuned so high that getting an AC score high enough to mitigate enough damage to make it worth it doesn't happen.

40% miss in level 24 EE? I'm calling BS on that, it doesn't happen. Yes, it does hold up on the lower settings but the lower settings are so easy defense isn't needed at all.



The reason people dont bring AC toons to EE as much as any other archtype is because we have a choice. We can either win by knockout or win by decision, and most players choose the knockout method. CC is better than AC as far as mitigation methods are concerned for trash. Very few and far between now are the quests and or raids where an AC tank is the best solution for a boss. Build enthusiasts take current content into account when designing toons around specific needs. If no content needs it, people stop seriously building for it.

Brute-force is by far the most effective option for 95% of DDO. It's the reality of the game.

[oweieie]

AC in D&D fashion was an all or nothing gambit.

Yes in 4E and it's looking like that in 5E (and that is one of the many problems with those piles of trash), but in 3.5E with multiple attacks per round it's not all or nothing.


So they MMOd it instead and turned it into a layered defense mechanic rather than a one number mechanic.

You can call it "layered" if you want, but it still boils down to a single hit %. It is no more "layered" than AC being "layered" with natural armor, armor, shield, dodge.


This made AC matter for everyone. The people who are saying AC doesnt matter enough now are those who were shooting for unhittable_on_a_19 status before the AC revamp, and were used to their close to invulnerable toon.

No, as the OP said, the people that are saying AC doesn't matter are the ones that are hit all the time with 150 AC, and the vast majority of characters can't even dream of reaching the totally useless 150.

EE have CR 60 mobs which are an appropriate challenge for level 60 characters... yeah.

[Ape_Man]

Not entirely accurate. DoS and SD also have a notable PRR and HP advantage. They get something on the order 40 more PRR from enhancements (over and beyond what they can get from just the shield, shield feats, and destiny effects). Likewise, a lot of their dps sacrifice comes from using a shield instead of THF or TWF. So, compared to other melees, they are getting another large PRR boost there. They get an additional PRR boost against arcanes from wearing heavy armor (though, you can make an arcane wear heavy armor, but that does take some gear / build sacrifice).

The point being, DoS and SD do get a significant defensive advantage relative to other builds in PRR and HP. That said, I do agree with the OP that high AC should offer good defensive advantages.

How much PRR you got? My Melees have 30% damage mitigation from it while TWFing.

My tank has 45-50% with a shield equipped.

Is that significant? Is that worth it?

yes, tank's got a bunch more HP. 1200ish compared to 800ish.

Dodge is the same.

Incorporeal is the same.

Healing amp is the same.

The Tanks real defensive advantage is AC . . . which accounts for nothing.

[mute_mayhem]

Personally I think Ape_Man just needs to join me and the other peasants in EH.

As someone who regularly runs with Ape_Man, I fully support this statement.



Also, AC is OP, more nerfz plz.

[Isolani]

Some dude posted a big chart of to hit vs AC a while back, once I saw on the chart that 100 AC was still going to be hit 95% of the time by the to-hit of some EE mobs/bosses, I abandoned AC completely. It's a futile endeavor for anybody but a stalwart, DoS, and possibly some monk builds.

So the devs went through all the trouble of changing the entire combat system to end up with the same thing we had before the change...AC is useless for nearly everybody. It broke a lot of fun builds that used to be able to get meaningful AC for a lot of content in the process (tempest rogues, monk splashes in general, etc).

Since I still spend most of my time TRing, it bothers me more that AC is useless even in the heroic game if you are elite streaking. Melees suck worse than ever in the heroic game, and they sucked pretty bad before the AC changes, but at least a lot of builds could get enough AC to reduce your damage by a lot up until GH elites. Now having 50-60 AC at L9...you get the **** kicked out of you in equal level elites, where before that would have reduced your damage by a lot for those levels.

It made the game more bland and boring in my opinion. There is no choice between building for pure dps or building for moderate dps with solid defense (combat expertise, some AC gear, etc)...it's all just dps and hps now. Of course, dps and hps were always king, but now it's the only option where before there was some middle ground. If you are even thinking of building for AC on anything but a stalwart or DoS, you are just making a mistake now. That didn't used to be the case.

I dunno, the new system just seems like no build decision I make even matters. My stats are irrelevant aside from needing enough for feat prereqs. There aren't anymore decisions like "should I dump X stat to increase my dexterity for a couple more AC", or "should I start with enough INT to take combat expertise". Just put on the highest tier armor you can wear, take every feat that increases your dps and/or hps, put on a blur item, displace yourself if you can and you are good to go...that is the new combat system in a nutshell.

[Ape_Man]

Some dude posted a big chart of to hit vs AC a while back, once I saw on the chart that 100 AC was still going to be hit 95% of the time by the to-hit of some EE mobs/bosses, I abandoned AC completely. It's a futile endeavor for anybody but a stalwart, DoS, and possibly some monk builds.

So the devs went through all the trouble of changing the entire combat system to end up with the same thing we had before the change...AC is useless for nearly everybody. It broke a lot of fun builds that used to be able to get meaningful AC for a lot of content in the process (tempest rogues, monk splashes in general, etc).

Since I still spend most of my time TRing, it bothers me more that AC is useless even in the heroic game if you are elite streaking. Melees suck worse than ever in the heroic game, and they sucked pretty bad before the AC changes, but at least a lot of builds could get enough AC to reduce your damage by a lot up until GH elites. Now having 50-60 AC at L9...you get the **** kicked out of you in equal level elites, where before that would have reduced your damage by a lot for those levels.

It made the game more bland and boring in my opinion. There is no choice between building for pure dps or building for moderate dps with solid defense (combat expertise, some AC gear, etc)...it's all just dps and hps now. Of course, dps and hps were always king, but now it's the only option where before there was some middle ground. If you are even thinking of building for AC on anything but a stalwart or DoS, you are just making a mistake now. That didn't used to be the case.

I dunno, the new system just seems like no build decision I make even matters. My stats are irrelevant aside from needing enough for feat prereqs. There aren't anymore decisions like "should I dump X stat to increase my dexterity for a couple more AC", or "should I start with enough INT to take combat expertise". Just put on the highest tier armor you can wear, take every feat that increases your dps and/or hps, put on a blur item, displace yourself if you can and you are good to go...that is the new combat system in a nutshell.

Another intelligent post . . . is this still the DDO forums?

[Chai]

I was one of those people before who had a high ac when most of the time I was getting hit 5% of the time. The thing is, even back then on EE, AC didn't matter. I think that is more the situation here. While it equalized a little bit with the revamp, in EE, AC doesn't do a whole lot. Granted it does reduce some of the incoming hits, it is no where near enough to really consider using it viably in EE. The giant skeletons for example in EE Madstone. They were hitting my Paladin for 200 points a shot...and they weren't missing him either. That is about 4 hits before he is dead. And the rate he does DPS vs a barb or kensi, they have just has much of a shot of of survivability as my paladin. Try tanking the Marilith in EE pop? 1200 hp to 0 in .25 seconds. Literally alive one second, dead the next. The only way that much damage should be getting threw is via spells when someone is built to withstand physical damage.

This is why I still dont understand why everyone doesnt twist in pin from shiradi. Works on giant skellitons as it does most other stuff.

As far as the maralith, there are just some mobs a melee should have a severe disadvantage against, period. Dragons are one, and something that has 4 more arms than you, all using blades, is another.

The majority of mobs is still something AC matters against, it just doesnt matter much alone like it used to. It needs to be combined with other layers to be effective.

What would the result be if they took the "level dependancy" effect off AC?

[donblas]

The combat system with respect to AC shows all the symptoms of its birth: it was rushed out to "get something done before the Expansion came out".

Alas we now see what many of us knew: "doing something" is not the same as "doing something right". Many problems with the new system were pointed out at the time but the devs had no time or resources to fix anything.

As has been said, a lot of fun builds were destroyed and we still have the problem we had before: at the highest levels AC becomes useless. All they did was move what was considered "the highest levels". After all the time that has elapsed since the combat system change, I still remember all the easy ways that were suggested to tweak the old system that would have produced far better results than we have now.

Hmmmm it seems to be colon day.

[Ape_Man]

This is why I still dont understand why everyone doesnt twist in pin from shiradi. Works on giant skellitons as it does most other stuff.

There are better ways to handle that fight, though Pin is awesome.



As far as the maralith, there are just some mobs a melee should have a severe disadvantage against, period. Dragons are one, and something that has 4 more arms than you, all using blades, is another.

This is just a stupid encounter, period.



The majority of mobs is still something AC matters against, it just doesnt matter much alone like it used to. It needs to be combined with other layers to be effective.

If you run EH sure.

[skullzz]

Not entirely accurate. DoS and SD also have a notable PRR and HP advantage. They get something on the order 40 more PRR from enhancements (over and beyond what they can get from just the shield, shield feats, and destiny effects). Likewise, a lot of their dps sacrifice comes from using a shield instead of THF or TWF. So, compared to other melees, they are getting another large PRR boost there. They get an additional PRR boost against arcanes from wearing heavy armor (though, you can make an arcane wear heavy armor, but that does take some gear / build sacrifice).

The point being, DoS and SD do get a significant defensive advantage relative to other builds in PRR and HP. That said, I do agree with the OP that high AC should offer good defensive advantages.

Yes they have 40 PRR bonus above the none SD or DoS however once you go past the 100 PRR mark the return for this is next to nothing.

For example my SD can hit 175 PRR when in US and has his flawless white plate armor which gives him ~54% mitigation. Now when I switch to an outfit that drops to 155 PRR and ~51% mitigation. When I shut off improved combat expertise that drops to 135 PRR and 48% mitigation.

So the 40 PRR that the tanks gain over the average joe can be mitigated with not much investment.

While EE enemies hit around 300 per swing total mitigation on my tank in full defense mode is 162 resulting in a 138 point hit.
When wearing a shield and robe and have PA on instead mitigation is 144 resulting in a 156 point hit.

This results in a 13% increase in damage which is only 1-2 swings at most.

I think they need to rethink the formula for AC again so it is partial relevant in end game versus not at all.

From http://forums.ddo.com/newreply.php?do=newreply&p=4567541


The formula is

(monster attack bonus +10.5)/2*AC = hit chance

It seems they use monster to hit is 2.5*level



This gives fast diminishing returns versus a lvl 23 mob.

I would possibly say same formula for AC < 120
and when you hit that magic 120 mark change the 2*AC to 3*AC to give some bonus for investing in armor that much.

Or change the US epic moment which sucks to have the bonus change to 3*AC and still same as it is in its near useless state of requiring 200 hits, giving a hp buff for 30 secs and full heal.

[Viisari]

This is why I still dont understand why everyone doesnt twist in pin from shiradi. Works on giant skellitons as it does most other stuff.

Because while Pin is good for certain character types Overwhelming Force is better in general and for more character types.

[cforce]

To remind people, in the old system, AC was useless for *most* players (not a Stalwart or a Monk splash? Don't bother) in Normal and Hard content, and useless for *all* players in endgame content. Just because the system we have now is still useless in endgame content doesn't mean it's not a *huge* improvement over what we had before. It's easy to see the past through rose-colored glasses.

All that being said -- yeah, having such a low return on AC in current endgame content is unfortunate. Arguably, the current system allows them to potentially tune to fix it, though. Assuming for the moment that this is accurate:


The formula is

(monster attack bonus +10.5)/2*AC = hit chance

It seems they use monster to hit is 2.5*level


It wouldn't take a drastic change to make AC on-par with PRR in terms of value. Reduce this to 2*level, and you've got something that's closer to PRR in mitigation in endgame content, while still not making a huge change to the non-AC builds. Someone running around with less than 50 still gets hit all the time. Someone running around with 80 goes from "hit every time" to "hit 80% of the time". Someone with a 150 AC going up against only a CR*2 to-hit gets close to 60% mitigation, which is a good hefty chunk, without causing a "invulnerability" problem.

I think the overall system is actually good -- it's just the to-hit values in the endgame content have gotten a bit too silly. There's room to salvage the system with a pass on to-hit. The math in this system makes it much easier to tune to "fix" this problem, whereas the old system couldn't be fixed without breaking it for other scenarios.

[Chai]

Because while Pin is good for certain character types Overwhelming Force is better in general and for more character types.

Pin is good for all. Even works with a throwing weapon, and puts mobs into helpless - even giant skellys.

And if I am already fury, which you have to be to use OF (due to the requirement of the attack needing under the effect of Adrenaline) I already have overwhelming force anyhow... so a pin twist ensures even less incoming damage.

[grandeibra]

There's room to salvage the system with a pass on to-hit. The math in this system makes it much easier to tune to "fix" this problem, whereas the old system couldn't be fixed without breaking it for other scenarios.Disagree with this. There were many ways to fix the old system, some meant actually using DnD rules, others were creative suggestions by the playerbase (not me).

I do agree that AC used to be close to useless in end content with the old system too BUT my main gripe with the current system is not the effect on player ac but the effect on player to hit. It used to be that some situations and/or builds could/should focus on to-hit items (e.g., vs the Queen with high AC), others focused on damage items since they hit anyways (e.g., barbs). Now with the diminishing returns there simply is NEVER a reason for to-hit items so the game has become more boring for me and too much like other lame MMOs. I quit for a year and came back this month but still feel the magic is gone even though the quests from the "new packs" 14-16 are great fun to run the first few times!

[oweieie]

Pin is good for all. Even works with a throwing weapon, and puts mobs into helpless - even giant skellys.

1 mob, that isn't moving, per 15 seconds, if you hit, with a ranged/thrown. That isn't "good for all", that is good for people that are using ranged weapons already and only fighting single mobs.

The helpless is also a bug and will eventually be nerfed, it is only supposed to reduce their movement speed to 0. It could be a while though, they're probably trying to figure out how to nerf EiN a couple more times and make wail work even less often.

[Carpone]

What's the point of changing the to-hit formula when you're just gonna give the mobs enough to-hit that they hit 95% of the time anyway?
This. Inquiring minds want to know.

[Aashrym]

I see the problem with AC like this. It's variable defense. Displacement is always 50%. Ghostly is always 10%. Dodge is always whatever dodge % shows up on your character sheet. AC is a defense that works appropriately against "at level" mobs. The problem is, many players don't fight "at level" mobs. We fight mobs up to 35 levels above us. That kinda makes a huge difference when you base a defensive score on fighting mobs of approximately your own level.

I find it extremely silly that a caster or bard or melee with a pile of displacement clickies has far and away the best single defense of any character in epic elite currently. Dodge caps at 25%... with effort. Displacement can be kept up 100% of the time for 50% defense against nearly all mobs. Now I'm not saying displacement is too powerful, but it is so far ahead of other defensive layers that it boggles my mind.

AC needs another look. The current system is just as broken as it was prior to the changes, which makes me wonder why they changed it at all to begin with.

Displacement is useless against anything with true seeing and dodge is capped by armor so is generally traded off for PRR plus AC miss chance.

There is a difference between miss chance and damage mitigation as well. The miss chance doesn't prevent damage on hits and opens up more potential of an unlucky melee crit due to the reduction in fortification we see, which PRR helps with.

When I get hit I get hit hard and even on what I consider a low AC the additional miss chance seems to be just as relevant a stacking layer as most other defenses. It's not 25% dodge but 25% dodge doesn't come with the high PRR, which is where the defense really is these days. Even relatively small miss chance is a stacking layer, and I do see misses on EE content, some more than others.

I play bards. They tend to be squishy. ;)

The most effective damage mitigation in this game has nothing to do with miss chance in the game mechanics. Moving around prevents damage. Crowd control prevents damage. I don't need to bother with either of those except in EE content because healing through content still seems the be the easiest thing to do.

From my perspective the current system for AC makes it more relevant than the largely all or nothing approach used in the past. One more layer of miss chance is still one more layer of miss chance. :)

[Viisari]

Pin is good for all. Even works with a throwing weapon, and puts mobs into helpless - even giant skellys.

And if I am already fury, which you have to be to use OF (due to the requirement of the attack needing under the effect of Adrenaline) I already have overwhelming force anyhow... so a pin twist ensures even less incoming damage.

Yet Pin is a tier II twist and there's plenty of stuff that's either as good or better for many situations.

[Chai]

Yet Pin is a tier II twist and there's plenty of stuff that's either as good or better for many situations.

Than a one shot no save application that puts mobs into helpless....? - even many mobs that cant be stunned.

Yeah - many of these require you to be in that destiny to use for one semantic or another, and Im not seeing another that is a tier one twist.

Pin is under rated because many see it is a "ranged toon" thing, when it can really be used by anyone with a throwing weapon to put a mob into helpless from a distance. The biggest challenge in EE isnt killing the mobs, its playing well enough that the mobs dont kill you.

[Chai]

1 mob, that isn't moving, per 15 seconds, if you hit, with a ranged/thrown. That isn't "good for all", that is good for people that are using ranged weapons already and only fighting single mobs.

Nope, its good for all. Its not hard to see and be able to attack mobs before they aggro. Throwing weapons are easy to come by. If everyone had it, each stuns a different mob on it, no save. 6 people in the group = 4-6 stunned mobs per encounter.


The helpless is also a bug and will eventually be nerfed, it is only supposed to reduce their movement speed to 0. It could be a while though, they're probably trying to figure out how to nerf EiN a couple more times and make wail work even less often.

WHeres the confirmation for this?

[Viisari]

Nope, its good for all. Its not hard to see and be able to attack mobs before they aggro. Throwing weapons are easy to come by. If everyone had it, each stuns a different mob on it, no save. 6 people in the group = 4-6 stunned mobs per encounter.

Currently my guild groups are pretty much some combination of the following: furies, blitzers, shiradi casters, monkchers in fury. There are of course other types of characters people bring too but in my guild these are the most common with furies being the most common.

Now monkchers will obviously have pin, but when you're running a quest with say... 5 furies and a shiradi caster then pin is absolutely unnecessary for others, those furies are better of with twisting momentum swing for more boss dps because in a group like that trash is completely irrelevant.

[Ape_Man]

From my perspective the current system for AC makes it more relevant than the largely all or nothing approach used in the past. One more layer of miss chance is still one more layer of miss chance. :)

And you're wrong.

[Ape_Man]

Currently my guild groups are pretty much some combination of the following: furies, blitzers, shiradi casters, monkchers in fury. There are of course other types of characters people bring too but in my guild these are the most common with furies being the most common.

Now monkchers will obviously have pin, but when you're running a quest with say... 5 furies and a shiradi caster then pin is absolutely unnecessary for others, those furies are better of with twisting momentum swing for more boss dps because in a group like that trash is completely irrelevant.

And you guys "crush" EE quests like you're running through Waterworks.

And none of you give a hoot about AC do you?

[Ape_Man]

Pin is good for all. Even works with a throwing weapon, and puts mobs into helpless - even giant skellys.

And if I am already fury, which you have to be to use OF (due to the requirement of the attack needing under the effect of Adrenaline) I already have overwhelming force anyhow... so a pin twist ensures even less incoming damage.

- PIN is awesome

- I can't fit it in most of my mooks without a significant tradeoffs

- If I had a 4th twist it'd be Pin.

[oweieie]

Nope, its good for all. Its not hard to see and be able to attack mobs before they aggro. Throwing weapons are easy to come by. If everyone had it, each stuns a different mob on it, no save. 6 people in the group = 4-6 stunned mobs per encounter.

So to do EE you need to have 6 people twist something, stop before every room, co-ordinate what they're going to toss at? Fail. EE Tor already takes an hour, no one is going to make it take 10 hours with your method.


WHeres the confirmation for this?

Try reading the description.

[Viisari]

And you guys "crush" EE quests like you're running through Waterworks.

And none of you give a hoot about AC do you?

AC isn't worth investing in because the threshold for good returns is ridiculously high. What this means is that you're just better off getting more damage and mitigating incoming damage with saves, PRR, disp clickies and movement.

So no, pretty much nobody in our guild bothers with AC. We do have a few tanks but only situation they're ever used in is if we're running EE LoB... which doesn't really happen often considering the loot there. A pity really, I quite enjoy the raid.

I guess I could hit around 80-100 AC on my main who's currently a juggernaut, but really, is that worth several augment slots and at at least one item slot?

Oh yeah and I'd need to drop mithral body because of the ******** MDB (derp static 5 MDB so uber and awesome, costs you a feat too), but that would make black docent look so stupid it's not even worth considering solely for that reason.

[Chai]

So to do EE you need to have 6 people twist something, stop before every room, co-ordinate what they're going to toss at? Fail. EE Tor already takes an hour, no one is going to make it take 10 hours with your method.

Nope. Its not hard to do if people understand the concept of not CCing a mob thats already CCd, which is something I hope they would understand before stepping into EE. If you play a monk, do you run up and stun the mob the fighter already stunned with SB? LOL



Try reading the description.

Conjecture does not confirm what was said.

[oweieie]

Nope. Its not hard to do if people understand the concept of not CCing a mob thats already CCd, which is something I hope they would understand before stepping into EE. If you play a monk, do you run up and stun the mob the fighter already stunned with SB? LOL.

Yes. Constantly. And they stun mine. And mobs at 5% health get fingered all the time too. And stun has a far more noticeable alert than pin. Also, as soon as the first mob gets pinned, the rest start moving...

You've clearly never actually done what you're saying to do.

[HalfORCastrator]

Now my mains AC averages around 70 up or down depending on situations. For example if I put down my epic tier 3 swashbucklers buckler it costs me a fair bit of AC and PRR since I have a nice bit of training in US ED. However when I do its to use my repeater which im quite handy with and have the option of running in shiradi or twisting in its tricks if I think ill be needing them more.

So began the battle for eveningstar on epic, and aside from a completionist monk in earth stance tanking, I was the least deaths. Everyone else including a pure stalwart fighter died many more times then myself. The stalwarts AC pushed into the triple digits, yet when i used my shield and went defensive I could FEEL the difference it made against incoming dps.
My post will be slightly off topic...


You say you could notice the difference in incoming damage when switching to a shield. I infer from this(and your repeater comment) that you don't usually use a shield when fighting. When one switches to a shield, it's usually to mitigate damage. Being in a position to motivate someone to mitigate damage usually provokes more than just switching to a shield.

One of those other things being running away, while healing in some fashion.

Is it possible that while being "in the action" you tend to pay less attention to your hp and incoming damage and more on positioning and actions boosts(or the like) until you get very low?

You also previously said that you're in US destiny sometimes. The extra PRR(even in such a small amount as 30) does a lot for mitigating damage.

I'm going to assume you're on some rogue-mechanic build, judging by "swashbuckler" and "my repeater". This playstyle sounds like it would lend to not attracting aggro, and by using a repeater in some fashion that generally will directly lead to not taking so much damage.

These points could be the perceived reduced damage you speak of.

You post saying AC does matter, but then said that you took less damage and died much less than the "triple digits AC" SD. This by itself contradicts your position on AC.

And regarding the SD tank dying more than you, I notice that when I'm on my barb I take more damage than the other players. I've found that this is because I'm a lot more aggressive(zerging, grouping mobs, etc) than the others, and my DPS(or aggro, as the case may be) is usually higher. Could it be possible he was actively trying to take aggro, as being a SD fighter implies, from the others, the swashbucklers and casters, causing him to take more damage and hence contribute to his dying more often?

[Kmnh]

Yet casters are still far more survivable than almost anything else in the game.

Yes, quicken spell is still the most powerful defensive ability on the game. It's what that makes the 2 flavor of the month builds tick. But now even a light melee like a rogue can take more hits than my pale master before needing a heal. This is a good thing.

[bloodnose13]

I'm sorry, but if you need a tank for anything in this game except EE LOB your groups needs to learn to play.

oh so for you, getting hit all the time and killed and blameing healer is so much better than admiting you need someone else to NOT take that kind of damage,so so you dont have to take it?.

sure past some point value of ac drops, but not so much to make it useless, even if it makes you getting hit half of times on EE, Its worth time and trouble to get that much ac.

you say tanks are only needed for the lob raid, what they are supposed to do in other times??? go to closet and wait for oportunity to shine? get yourself a good tank to party adn go to any EE quest, i guarantee your healer will thank him for his work at end, when he wont use any pots and will scroll heal him in ee run, as oposed to rezing and barely keeping up with healing you.

[Ape_Man]

oh so for you, getting hit all the time and killed and blameing healer is so much better than admiting you need someone else to NOT take that kind of damage,so so you dont have to take it?.

If you're getting hit all the time the problem exists between the keyboard and the chair.

Tanks are a waste of a party slot, I'm coming to the mind that so are healers.



sure past some point value of ac drops, but not so much to make it useless, even if it makes you getting hit half of times on EE, Its worth time and trouble to get that much ac.

The AC stat is useless (in the highest level content of the game), that is what this thread is about. Somehow it's more about the projections of bad players but going off topic happens.



you say tanks are only needed for the lob raid, what they are supposed to do in other times??? go to closet and wait for oportunity to shine? get yourself a good tank to party adn go to any EE quest, i guarantee your healer will thank him for his work at end, when he wont use any pots and will scroll heal him in ee run, as oposed to rezing and barely keeping up with healing you.

We don't even bring healers into EE half the time. They aren't needed for good players but you apparantly wouldn't know that.

What should the tank player do? Roll another toon.

[Chai]

Yes. Constantly. And they stun mine. And mobs at 5% health get fingered all the time too. And stun has a far more noticeable alert than pin. Also, as soon as the first mob gets pinned, the rest start moving...

You've clearly never actually done what you're saying to do.

False. I use it all the time. Im surprised fewer people do, as it is that good.

If you are ccing already cc'd mobs repeatedly, it is you, and not I, who are doing it wrong.

[Chai]

What should the tank player do? Roll another toon.

A tank doesnt only need to be JUST a tank that sacrificed every possible other thing to get a few more points of AC. A stalwart fighter for instance, can click into LD and contribute quite well in EE content. They dont have to be holed up and cookie cuttered into the tank destiny combined with a PRE which together provides very little offense. Most of the good tank players have understood this for a while now. Even before destinies, many of them built and geared for self healing and viable offense, especially after intim was nerfed so that it wasnt lockdown aggro management, which was quite some time ago now.

Building for only defense and mitigation is just as bad as building only for offense while ignoring all defense.

[Viisari]

you say tanks are only needed for the lob raid, what they are supposed to do in other times??? go to closet and wait for oportunity to shine?

Exactly.


get yourself a good tank to party adn go to any EE quest, i guarantee your healer will thank him for his work at end when he wont use any pots and will scroll heal him in ee run, as oposed to rezing and barely keeping up with healing you.

Get yourself a decent group and you don't even need a healer.

All tanks and healers do is slow you down, dps is what you want.

Someone put it pretty nicely in some other thread: "DPS isn't king anymore, dps is god." Anyone claiming to the contrary has absolutely no idea what they're talking about. If you still do not understand then have a look at this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVIPEpti6DE) or maybe this. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49tY58lG4JE)

[Karavek]

My post will be slightly off topic...


You say you could notice the difference in incoming damage when switching to a shield. I infer from this(and your repeater comment) that you don't usually use a shield when fighting. When one switches to a shield, it's usually to mitigate damage. Being in a position to motivate someone to mitigate damage usually provokes more than just switching to a shield.

One of those other things being running away, while healing in some fashion. Nope just good ol rejuve cacoon and maybe the occasional spike heal from our new lovely endless flask of rum. Yeah in FUBAR moments run and heal scroll, but that usually also means im the last alive or playing field medic to an ally in the thick of it.

Is it possible that while being "in the action" you tend to pay less attention to your hp and incoming damage and more on positioning and actions boosts(or the like) until you get very low? Only if I am using the Primal Fury ED or twisted in the ability that gives benefits while injured then just like a bleeding edge str barb ill choose to run injured and walk the fine line for some extra oomph if I feel ill need it, often in content I tend to feel either no real pressure in and can get away with slower heals, or in content where no matter what I will be healing often and thus spending some average of time injured.

You also previously said that you're in US destiny sometimes. The extra PRR(even in such a small amount as 30) does a lot for mitigating damage. Indeed which is why for many I advocate carrying a good shield and for content with alot of dmg twisting in legendary shield mastery Far to many sing the praises of offensive twists, I encourage more to carry tools like rejuve cacoon or LSM as great low teir options to add to ones defensesI'm going to assume you're on some rogue-mechanic build, judging by "swashbuckler" and "my repeater". This playstyle sounds like it would lend to not attracting aggro, and by using a repeater in some fashion that generally will directly lead to not taking so much damage.

These points could be the perceived reduced damage you speak of. Oh I know they all factor in, my point being EVERYONE who calls themselves a professional adventurer( IE D&D characters) would sanely carry these tools pure kamikaze glass cannon builds do no exist in PnP because they never last long.
You post saying AC does matter, but then said that you took less damage and died much less than the "triple digits AC" SD. This by itself contradicts your position on AC. No this was a point to stress that AC alone isnt viable defense, had that SD friend of mine had what he now does after taking my advice, and always have some form of self healing twisted in, his death rate has sunk to almost never even in EE lacking a dedicated healer, he went from THing to Hulk and seems the happier for it.

And regarding the SD tank dying more than you, I notice that when I'm on my barb I take more damage than the other players. I've found that this is because I'm a lot more aggressive(zerging, grouping mobs, etc) than the others, and my DPS(or aggro, as the case may be) is usually higher. Could it be possible he was actively trying to take aggro, as being a SD fighter implies, from the others, the swashbucklers and casters, causing him to take more damage and hence contribute to his dying more often?

To explain clearly my main character these days for epic, is a 13 assasson/6 stalwart defend/1 artificer. Specced for using both sword and shield effectively as well as being skilled in a repeater up to and including IPS. My DPS in neither reaches top lvls but the myth of needing to reach that imagined 100% dps goal is just that, a work of fiction. A toon capable of switching tools to adapt for example when facing a bloody maralith, is always much better off staying out of 6 arms reach.

I carry a swachbucklers buckler which for those not in the know has guardbreaking on it, a lovely and useful soft CC effect that keeps trash off balance and compliments a rapier or scim user alot. Yes it might offer abit less upfront AC or PRR that a tower shield brings, but the swashucklers buckler for the finesse fighter who uses style and cunning to take down foes never notices that lack.

My whole argument is not that AC is alone useful nor useless but now actually takes its fitting place as part of the layers of defense any smart player should be building for. Physical armor is both the first and yet the least line of defense in PnP. Here in DDO its not exactly that, but it is both useful and useless, and that imo is EXACTLY what armor should feel like in D&D. So in that light I feel the armor changes where not simply a need or nerf, but a success in staying true to the spirit of D&D.

[Ape_Man]

Exactly.



Get yourself a decent group and you don't even need a healer.

All tanks and healers do is slow you down, dps is what you want.

Someone put it pretty nicely in some other thread: "DPS isn't king anymore, dps is god." Anyone claiming to the contrary has absolutely no idea what they're talking about. If you still do not understand then have a look at this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVIPEpti6DE) or maybe this. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49tY58lG4JE)

This man is 1000% right.

[Ape_Man]

A tank doesnt only need to be JUST a tank that sacrificed every possible other thing to get a few more points of AC. A stalwart fighter for instance, can click into LD and contribute quite well in EE content. They dont have to be holed up and cookie cuttered into the tank destiny combined with a PRE which together provides very little offense. Most of the good tank players have understood this for a while now. Even before destinies, many of them built and geared for self healing and viable offense, especially after intim was nerfed so that it wasnt lockdown aggro management, which was quite some time ago now.

Building for only defense and mitigation is just as bad as building only for offense while ignoring all defense.

That works okay, I do that on mine but since I have other toons in my stable I've found it's just better to bring other toons.

[Viisari]

My whole argument is not that AC is alone useful nor useless but now actually takes its fitting place as part of the layers of defense any smart player should be building for.

And the whole argument of this thread has been that AC is useless for vast majority of character even when combined with other defensive layers because the returns you get are not worth the investment.

That, and that it's mostly just "meh" even for characters that completely spec in AC.

[Ape_Man]

So in that light I feel the armor changes where not simply a need or nerf, but a success in staying true to the spirit of D&D.

What?

[Karavek]

A tank doesnt only need to be JUST a tank that sacrificed every possible other thing to get a few more points of AC. A stalwart fighter for instance, can click into LD and contribute quite well in EE content. They dont have to be holed up and cookie cuttered into the tank destiny combined with a PRE which together provides very little offense. Most of the good tank players have understood this for a while now. Even before destinies, many of them built and geared for self healing and viable offense, especially after intim was nerfed so that it wasnt lockdown aggro management, which was quite some time ago now.

Building for only defense and mitigation is just as bad as building only for offense while ignoring all defense.

This is not true only in DDO. for years back in City of Heroes it was understood that for a arch type like tank, you built out of the box for dmg and an archtype like blaster based in dmg built with defense and self healing in mind for both to get to their super heroic ideal. Meanwhile those who made glass cannon blasters and pure wall tanks would complain about not being able to live or being needed respectively. My blaster had tanks leave his group for feeling like dead weight, and firex3 blasters do the same feeling they spent more time dead then dealing dmg and thus over all far more useless then my character. Funny enough in CoH no one wanted to end up a piker. if you felt like one you would rather go solo or start a new toon trying to become more then the last one.

[Karavek]

And the whole argument of this thread has been that AC is useless for vast majority of character even when combined with other defensive layers because the returns you get are not worth the investment.

That, and that it's mostly just "meh" even for characters that completely spec in AC.

You say vast majority Id say an extreme minority, keep in mind that is what we are discussing when we are talking about players running EE, an extreme minority. And that is what this thread is about the lack of viable tanking in EE. Or a lack of need for a devoted tank outside of EE, really im not sure on that one myself. But the fact is just as many players hate having a devoted tank as hate being dependent on a devoted healer. I myself prefer taking my fair share of aggro and prefer it in groups when all do the same. Devoted tanking is very anti PnP as it is an MMO mechanic dependant on unthinking AI rather then a living mind using RP to embrace and make use of a given foes abilities fully. You cant tank a dragon for example in PnP it just flies up and hits ALL the group at once with its breath weapon or sends them scattering so far apart none can depend on another during the battle.

IMO its just as wrong to look at a warrior as a tank as it is a divine as a healer. Warriors should be ready to fight and win at all costs using every viable tactic in their book. Most do not however choosing very stagnant fighting styles and developing dependencies upon others rather then finding ways to fill in their own deficient abilities.

When you plan a character dont plan a fighter, barbarian, or ranger. Plan for a midevil special forces operative, think about what that entails and build for that. That is D&D adventurer, pure fighters etc are commoner class NPCs.

[Viisari]

You say vast majority Id say an extreme minority, keep in mind that is what we are discussing when we are talking about players running EE, an extreme minority.

And as I explained before (and funnily enough got neg rep for explaining) AC is not very useful for difficulties below EE either simply because the mobs are not dangerous enough. A combination of displacement/blur and some PRR is more than enough for EH, rest of your gear should just focus on damage and versatility.

I mean really, why bother with any more defensive stats than absolutely necessary when most monsters die when you just look their way? Epic destinies are so utterly overpowered for any difficulty besides EE that there's really nothing to discuss about them.

[bloodnose13]

If you're getting hit all the time the problem exists between the keyboard and the chair.

Tanks are a waste of a party slot, I'm coming to the mind that so are healers.



The AC stat is useless (in the highest level content of the game), that is what this thread is about. Somehow it's more about the projections of bad players but going off topic happens.



We don't even bring healers into EE half the time. They aren't needed for good players but you apparantly wouldn't know that.

What should the tank player do? Roll another toon.

well thanks for confirmation that its useless to try to talk with you....

more adn more its visible that this thread is not for conversation but for trolling....

[Ape_Man]

well thanks for confirmation that its useless to try to talk with you....

more adn more its visible that this thread is not for conversation but for trolling....

You should just hang back and listen.

[Ape_Man]

And as I explained before (and funnily enough got neg rep for explaining) AC is not very useful for difficulties below EE either simply because the mobs are not dangerous enough. A combination of displacement/blur and some PRR is more than enough for EH, rest of your gear should just focus on damage and versatility.

people don't like their delusions shattered. The amount of "I rarely run EE" people commenting on how a game mechanic functions in EE is just laughable.

[bloodnose13]

what is laughable is the fact how some ppl think their opinion about some things is only best in world and everyone should convert to their ways......

your opinion is just that.. yours.

[Ape_Man]

what is laughable is the fact how some ppl think their opinion about some things is only best in world and everyone should convert to their ways......


Everyone should think their opinion is best, otherwise why would it be their opinion?

AC adds nothing meaningful in EEs and no EE players build for it. It is the least important aspect of a layered defens. This is not a matter of opinion.



your opinion is just that.. yours.

Which makes it right.

Heck, this can be proven. Post a Youtube video of your AC toon in Level 24 EEs and prove to me that AC isn't worthless, prove it gives you a significant amount of defense.

You can't because it doesn't.

[bartharok]

Still, AC is not worthless combined with the otehr parts. Its far from as important as it was, but its not useless.

Try to not act like you are always right, and people wont make threads this long and pointless.

[Ape_Man]

Still, AC is not worthless combined with the otehr parts. Its far from as important as it was, but its not useless.

It is worthless in EE, that was the point of the OP.

What people projected into the thread and took things way off topic has nothing to do with that point.



Try to not act like you are always right, and people wont make threads this long and pointless.

I am absolutely right on this point (like I always am) and will not back off on that because uninformed players think differently.

[bartharok]

It is worthless in EE, that was the point of the OP.

What people projected into the thread and took things way off topic has nothing to do with that point.



I am absolutely right on this point (like I always am) and will not back off on that because uninformed players think differently.

Youre always right, that is the problem. Its like me and arguing about pointless stuff. It attracts people who disagree

[Ape_Man]

Youre always right, that is the problem. Its like me and arguing about pointless stuff. It attracts people who disagree

Point taken, you can't beat a brick wall in tennis.

[bartharok]

Point taken, you can't beat a brick wall in tennis.

indeed

[Tirisha]

That works okay, I do that on mine but since I have other toons in my stable I've found it's just better to bring other toons.

this ^ you can build a tank to do some decent dps as well but when it comes down to it, the quest will run smoother with a character truly built for dps. If you have more than one character, considering all the loot is BOE than there is very little reason to dust off a tank for anything other than EE LOB or FOT or TORs blue dragon (depending on your party).

Having useful AC wouldn't really change this fact ^ but it would make me at least consider bringing my tank to the quest.

[eonfreon]

Exactly.



Get yourself a decent group and you don't even need a healer.

All tanks and healers do is slow you down, dps is what you want.

Someone put it pretty nicely in some other thread: "DPS isn't king anymore, dps is god." Anyone claiming to the contrary has absolutely no idea what they're talking about. If you still do not understand then have a look at this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVIPEpti6DE) or maybe this. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49tY58lG4JE)

Lol. Watching that all I could think of was "send in the clones". Yes, there is almost always something that is the very best. And many people copy it. It's quite funny.

[Bowser_Koopa]

I say no to your begging for not being hit. You have HP's for a reason you took toughness 34 times for a reason and those 3 barb past lives you suffered through for 30 hps those too have reasons. It's all a battle of attrition you hit them they hit you until only one remains.

There will be no unhittableness there will be only the healed by yourself or others...and the dead.

Also I am not a strawman I am an Evil Koopa get it straight. I had a turtle tank back in the day I was amused raid bosses would of had to hit me 234,833 times to kill me while apparently I said things to them in an intimidating manner so that they only hit me and not my minions. Honestly though all it really taught me was hey...this is sad this mob is a boss amongst bosses of his race/faction and here I am on Elite and short of me walking away from the keyboard he can't kill me.

Again Mr. Ape_Man there will be no AC buffing the mobs must have their chance to win occasionally even if it is through insane means such as giving them +200 to hit and immunities etc. Surely you don't really want to go back to when mobs almost literally could not kill you where is the fun in that.

Bowserkoopa,

Little Mac 1 Ape_Man 0

So apparently this tongue-in-cheek post ruffled some feathers and was inflammatory or some other garbage. Or maybe it was the other post I made but oh well.

Look the fact of the matter is this the mobs in this game need all the help they can get. Do I have a high AC toon, well I have one that sits around 160 which I feel is moderately high. Do I think his AC is not so valuable on EE. Yes I do.

But what I also think is this, if my AC made me unhittable or was even 50% better on Epic Elite, it wouldn't be very Epicly Elite now would it? Epic Elite to me is for when you want to have a struggle you want to actually have to remotely pay attention and not just steam roll content. And yes I do realize there are people and builds out there already steamrolling Epic Elite.

However I am still someone who has a dream that mobs in this game will gain some strategy and intelligence. I am someone who thinks its odd that a Giant a being much larger and one would think stronger than little us can swing a weapon and now we don't get knocked back. I also find it fascinating when the Reaver got "changed" and air elle's got Gust of Wind as a spell people were appalled and offended, I mean really a being made out of Air can produce wind effects? This bothered people.

I said earlier in this thread I had a turtle tank, and sure I used him in every raid I could under the old intimidate but really looking back on it, when the healer my wife spent the entire time healing me with "healing word" once every 2-3 minutes I realized that it wasn't "fun" to me it was sad and pathetic that the raid boss literally had 0 chance of killing me short of myself and my wife letting it happen.

So if we improve AC in EE I ask that we also improve the mobs, maybe we've reached the limit of what the devs can do with Mob AI and tactics and my wish will never come true.

Bowserkoopa,

Mobs are people to...well actually they're mobs but still they have feelings....maybe...ok I don't know but they need to win too.

[Charononus]

So apparently this tongue-in-cheek post ruffled some feathers and was inflammatory or some other garbage. Or maybe it was the other post I made but oh well.

Look the fact of the matter is this the mobs in this game need all the help they can get. Do I have a high AC toon, well I have one that sits around 160 which I feel is moderately high. Do I think his AC is not so valuable on EE. Yes I do.

But what I also think is this, if my AC made me unhittable or was even 50% better on Epic Elite, it wouldn't be very Epicly Elite now would it? Epic Elite to me is for when you want to have a struggle you want to actually have to remotely pay attention and not just steam roll content. And yes I do realize there are people and builds out there already steamrolling Epic Elite.

However I am still someone who has a dream that mobs in this game will gain some strategy and intelligence. I am someone who thinks its odd that a Giant a being much larger and one would think stronger than little us can swing a weapon and now we don't get knocked back. I also find it fascinating when the Reaver got "changed" and air elle's got Gust of Wind as a spell people were appalled and offended, I mean really a being made out of Air can produce wind effects? This bothered people.

I said earlier in this thread I had a turtle tank, and sure I used him in every raid I could under the old intimidate but really looking back on it, when the healer my wife spent the entire time healing me with "healing word" once every 2-3 minutes I realized that it wasn't "fun" to me it was sad and pathetic that the raid boss literally had 0 chance of killing me short of myself and my wife letting it happen.

So if we improve AC in EE I ask that we also improve the mobs, maybe we've reached the limit of what the devs can do with Mob AI and tactics and my wish will never come true.

Bowserkoopa,

Mobs are people to...well actually they're mobs but still they have feelings....maybe...ok I don't know but they need to win too.

Your evil plan is over, here is the walk thru of how to get him.

http://faqs.neoseeker.com/Games/NES/super_mario_bros_world_8_4.gif

[Bowser_Koopa]

Your evil plan is over, here is the walk thru of how to get him.

http://faqs.neoseeker.com/Games/NES/super_mario_bros_world_8_4.gif

So Mario beat me.....once or twice....

But really do you think the princess really got Kidnapped over 10 times unwillingly? Not all is well in the mushroom kingdom between Mario Mario (Yes his name is really Mario Mario) and Princess Peach.

And obviously Nintendo realized I'm better too I got my own game Bowser's Inside story with minor appearances by the Mario's and it was the best game of the Superstar Saga. That and I got into Disney's Wreck-It Ralph there was no Mario there because they knew I was the star.

Bowserkoopa,

The King of Awesome

[Charononus]

So Mario beat me.....once or twice....

But really do you think the princess really got Kidnapped over 10 times unwillingly? Not all is well in the mushroom kingdom between Mario Mario (Yes his name is really Mario Mario) and Princess Peach.

And obviously Nintendo realized I'm better too I got my own game Bowser's Inside story with minor appearances by the Mario's and it was the best game of the Superstar Saga. That and I got into Disney's Wreck-It Ralph there was no Mario there because they knew I was the star.

Bowserkoopa,

The King of Awesome
lol
You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Vyrtigo again

[THOTHdha]

I skipped over a lot of the posts that seemed to be whining and ranting, so forgive me if this has already been posted. But it seemed like people were mostly basing everything on "feelings" of how AC was working, rather than just setting down and checking the formulas that Turbine has posted against what is actually being observed.

So with the conservative +150 to-hit for EE GH, once plugged into the AC formula , any AC value below 81 will be hit 100% of the time. At 81 you work your way up to a 1% chance to avoid being hit.

With the more generous aproximation of +165 to-hit, that chance to have a 1% possibility of being missed moves to 88.

A 10% miss chance would require 90 AC with a +150 to-hit, and a 98 AC against +165 to-hit.

A 25% miss chance would require a 107 AC for +150 to-hit, and a 117 AC for +165 to-hit.

And that mythical 95% miss chance that people like to ramble on about would require a 1605 AC for the +150 to-hit, and 1755 AC for +160 to-hit.


Personally, I see the game reflecting these numbers. My character with a moderate investment in defenses is typically at about 100ish AC, and tends to see misses a bit less than 10% of the time, which would be expected if Dodge/Concealment/Incorporeal is checked before hit/miss.

This is a pretty big contradiction from the stated goal of the new AC/to-hit system. That being that the idea was to make everyone, even those who did not make massive investments towards high AC, to have ~some~ contribution from armor. Getting up to even a 1% miss chance for EE GH certainly requires a bit of work besides just +5 of the best armor type you can wear. But dedicated tanks can certainly still see some benefit from AC in EE GH content.

The question of whether or not the party sees some benefit from bringing along a dedicated tank is an entirely separate debate....

[Viisari]

So with the conservative +150 to-hit for EE GH, once plugged into the AC formula , any AC value below 81 will be hit 100% of the time. At 81 you work your way up to a 1% chance to avoid being hit.

With the more generous aproximation of +165 to-hit, that chance to have a 1% possibility of being missed moves to 88.

In other words, why bother with it at all unless you're a high wisdom monk/monk splash or heavy armor user?

[THOTHdha]

In other words, why bother with it at all unless you're a high wisdom monk/monk splash or heavy armor user?

Exactly. The 100ish AC character that I mentioned in that post is a high WIS w/ Monk. So getting to that level of AC is not too difficult for them. But for the vast majority of characters, hitting a useful level of AC is going to require way more than it actually benefits them. Blurry/Displacement and Ghostly are much easier to build for, and provide even more benefit than having a 100+ AC.

It seems very hypocritical to me that Turbine rolled out this new AC/to-hit system that no one really liked. Yet they claimed that it ~had~ to be done in order to make AC actually useful again. And then they super inflated all of the values in the system until even their ~new~ AC system makes AC useless for all but a very few builds.

[Chai]

Exactly.



Get yourself a decent group and you don't even need a healer.

All tanks and healers do is slow you down, dps is what you want.

Someone put it pretty nicely in some other thread: "DPS isn't king anymore, dps is god." Anyone claiming to the contrary has absolutely no idea what they're talking about. If you still do not understand then have a look at this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVIPEpti6DE) or maybe this. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49tY58lG4JE)

Those toons have quite a bit of defense built in. Back in the "DPS is king" era, people built 100% offense 0% defense meat bags and expected a full time healer to keep them propped up. That era is dead. Building something that outDPSed those Juggs you guys are playing would not be tough to do, but it would not have any of the survivability, self sufficiency, or defensive capability. If the "DPS is god" era were in effect, and it mimiced the "dps is king era" wed all be rockin 100+ maxed out str furyshot 18/2 barbarians with no self healing whatsoever, and a cleric or fvs would be in the background of those videos hitting the heal button repeatedly to keep that party alive.

In the current era, it is better to build something that does 85% of that max DPS toon, and then not need a dedicated healer due to being self sufficnient, built in defense, good saves, etc. The days of the zero defense meatbag are over, save for the few holdouts who dont mind waiting for a healer for quests that everyone else can solo.

[RedHost]

Those toons have quite a bit of defense built in.

A displacement clicky, a ghostly item, a spell absorb item, and maybe a Mobility and Dodge% item does not really qualify as "quite a bit of defense built in". Building for AC is pretty much pointless.

[Ape_Man]

Those toons have quite a bit of defense built in. Back in the "DPS is king" era . . .

You mean last week?

DPS is still king.

[Ape_Man]

So if we improve AC in EE I ask that we also improve the mobs, maybe we've reached the limit of what the devs can do with Mob AI and tactics and my wish will never come true.



I'd be cool with that.

[Chai]

You mean last week?

DPS is still king.

try 2009, back when the groups that got stuff done the quickest were 1x CC wiz, 1x healer, and 4 meatbags 100% offense 0% defense toons.

[Chai]

A displacement clicky, a ghostly item, a spell absorb item, and maybe a Mobility and Dodge% item does not really qualify as "quite a bit of defense built in". Building for AC is pretty much pointless.

And evasion with attention to saves, and built in buffs, and built in quickened recon, and yeah....welcome to the era in DDO where AC is not total defense. Compared to the toons that were built in the "DPS is king" era, those toons have quite a bit of thought put into defense.

[Ape_Man]

try 2009, back when the groups that got stuff done the quickest were 1x CC wiz, 1x healer, and 4 meatbags 100% offense 0% defense toons.

See . . . we put a few groups together like this just for a joke and they absolutely crush (no pun intended) quests. We originally tried it as a torture test for my friend's FVS . . . and then we saw how effective it is.

My favorite is still my Horc bard, hjealbot FVS, and 4 barbarains. 5 ESoS overwhelming-force cleaving in unity is just a thing of beauty.

[Ape_Man]

And evasion with attention to saves, and built in buffs, and built in quickened recon, and yeah....welcome to the era in DDO where AC is not total defense. Compared to the toons that were built in the "DPS is king" era, those toons have quite a bit of thought put into defense.

AC isn't total defense, AC is NONE of your defense in EE.

[Chai]

See . . . we put a few groups together like this just for a joke and they absolutely crush (no pun intended) quests. We originally tried it as a torture test for my friend's FVS . . . and then we saw how effective it is.

My favorite is still my Horc bard, hjealbot FVS, and 4 barbarains. 5 ESoS overwhelming-force cleaving in unity is just a thing of beauty.

Sure they crush quests, but good luck getting stuff done if you like to PUG, with all of the "i didnt build my divine to hjeal your barb" mentality built up over the years.

Thus, the current building mentality is sacrificing a small amount of DPS - usually right where more sacrifice for it yeilds diminishing returns, for a decent amount of defense and survivability.

[Kaldais]

It's actually not a problem with AC. AC is just a side effect.

The problem is with the ridiculus CR of the EE mobs, and the growth curve of to-hit, save, SR, caster-level such ridiculus CR brings. Which renders AC system, counter spell, spells with DC, player SR, player spell penetration vs drow completely useless.

[elraido]

They tried to reinvent the wheel instead of repaving the roads we drive. All I can say is, these new hexagonal wheels we are on, aren't the best.

[Viisari]

Building something that outDPSed those Juggs you guys are playing would not be tough to do, but it would not have any of the survivability, self sufficiency, or defensive capability.

Technically it actually is because dead characters do no damage :)

But yeah, pure combat classes will do more damage on paper and in conditions where they can stay alive - if they also have furyshot. If they don't have it they will fall behind.

[samthedagger]

Hrm... I disagree with the OP. Pre-U14, it used to be the case that unless you invested hundreds of hours of grind, you could not really achieve a worthwhile AC for hardly any at-level elite or epic content. Now, AC is at least helpful while leveling even if you don't have the best gear. It is also helpful in all but a few of the most challenging quests in the game. Plus, the fact that armor now gives you PRR is not something to be ignored.

I do tend to agree that AC is one of the less-important factors in defense, but that does not bother me.

[Ape_Man]

They tried to reinvent the wheel instead of repaving the roads we drive. All I can say is, these new hexagonal wheels we are on, aren't the best.

The formula's not terrible. Not a fan of it, didn't think it was needed, would love to see it gone, but it's not the villain.

The issue is Turbine fell into the same trap they did with epics of setting to-hits too high.

[Ape_Man]

Hrm... I disagree with the OP.

You start out being wrong be disagreeing with me.



Pre-U14, it used to be the case that unless you invested hundreds of hours of grind, you could not really achieve a worthwhile AC for hardly any at-level elite or epic content.

It was more like dozens of hours for some effectiveness in elites, and an IQ above room temperature so you could figure out the game mechanics.



Now, AC is at least helpful while leveling even if you don't have the best gear.

Anyone could get effective AC up until about level 12 pre-u14 with just basic gear and some knowledge of the game mechanics, and that's about the same now. On my last melee TR it didn't feel that different. Past say level 14 forget it, you're just gonna get hit.

I never understood this mentality of "I can't figure out how to build good characters so nerf everyone else to be as bad as mine."

I guess it's what happen when all kids in little league get trophies regardless of them being terrible.




It is also helpful in all but a few of the most challenging quests in the game.

It's helpful in content so easy a a blind chimp could beat. Seriously, the incoming damage in EH and lower content is so little any TWFing toon with a pair of Vampric Weapons is unkillable.



Plus, the fact that armor now gives you PRR is not something to be ignored.

PRR is cool, we're not talking about PRR.



I do tend to agree that AC is one of the less-important factors in defense, but that does not bother me.

If you knew what you were talking about you'd know it means nothing. From the rest of your post it is clear you've never played a toon with AC either pre or post U14.

So why are you posting other than to reveal how little you know about the game mechanics?

[Chai]

Technically it actually is because dead characters do no damage :)

But yeah, pure combat classes will do more damage on paper and in conditions where they can stay alive - if they also have furyshot. If they don't have it they will fall behind.

Right, this is basically what ive been saying. Most of the time if you claim to have soloed a real tough encounter or quest, most people in the dps is king mindset dont believe it, not because of the lack of ability to output damage, but usually for perceived lack of ability to mitigate incomming damage to the point where it is survivable. The "dps is king" era was loaded with folks who perpetuated the myth that 100% offense and 0% defense was the best way to go because the healers will just do all the mitigation work while their meatbags pounded away on the mobs.

In 2009 when this mindset was huge on the forums, TOD elite first fight was the encounter where players could test the survivability of their toons. Too often if there were significant deaths, it was the evasion pally, the clonk, and a couple multiclass striker builds who focused on saves that were left standing, and the pure offense characters whose players were bragging about damage per time unit were sitting in the penalty box waiting for the "gimps" to complete part 1.

Nowdays with the ratio of incomming damage to HP on toons ramped way up in EE, combined with the mentality that people dont play divine to keep damagers propped up, makes me wonder why anyone rolls up a pure offense build at all. While its far more a minority than it used to be, I still see them regularly enough, many times all loaded up in the same group who is only looking for clerics, fvs, or druids. :p

[Ape_Man]

Nowdays with the ratio of incomming damage to HP on toons ramped way up in EE, combined with the mentality that people dont play divine to keep damagers propped up, makes me wonder why anyone rolls up a pure offense build at all. While its far more a minority than it used to be, I still see them regularly enough, many times all loaded up in the same group who is only looking for clerics, fvs, or druids. :p


And AC plays 0% a part of this building for self-sufficiency.

[wolfy42]

AC is good as you level up...although still not worth sacrificing dps for in most cases.

Dodge + PRR + displacement + evasion = best survivability.

My bard/barbarian/rogue for instance.....has all of that. Dodge (tons when using uncanny dodge) and displacement alone make a WAY larger difference then AC does. Through the heroic levels at least...AC still adds a bit of a chance for enemies to miss...but it's never something I specialize in (I keep shield up mainly just for the MM blockage..but the ac boost is kinda nice as well).

End game, to reach a usable AC takes a ton of work/specialization. Only a few builds can really do it, and honestly, it's way easier to get similar miss chances with other setups..and not as much specialization.

With 50% dodge, 50% displacement, 10% incorp and about 15-20% miss from AC...you end up with something like a 15% chance to get hit. A maxed out AC might...might get you down to a 10% chance to be hit...just not worth it in my opinion.

PRR makes a much bigger difference in that equation end game (not to mention decent DR as well). Main problem for me is many sources of PRR either sacrifice Damage (using a shield), or sacrifice evasion (heavy armor)...which isn't worth it.

Without sacrificing evasion (using light armor), or DPS (using a shield), it's hard to get PRR up high enough to make a large difference even when getting pounded for 200+ damage per hit. A 40 PRR (you can get higher in light armor..but it requires sacrifices/more feats etc and or twists..which I don't think is worth it)....reduces damage by about 20% after DR has been taken out. On a 200 hp hit....that is 40 less damage...nice...but going over that (sacrificing other stuff) just doesn't seem worth it.

It's far more important to make sure your Fort is high enough 140%+ at least, so you don't get crit...especially if your max hp are already high enough to prevent getting 1 shotted from normal attacks.

So sadly, AC....and to some extent, PRR...both take a back seat late game. PRR is great....but you need 150-160 PRR to hit around 50% damage reduction (diminishing returns big time from there). You could possibly build a S&B, light armor character that could reach that mark (Prob have to go US though as your epic destiny)..and still keep evasion as well. Not sure if it would really be worth it.

Basically 40 PRR or so gives you a 20-25% damage reduction and can be done in light armor, with evasion and no Shield.

150 or so PRR gives you 50% damage reduction but requires at least a shield (and possibly higher then light armor...I havn't tried to do that yet). I don't think the extra 25% damage mitigation (For physical attacks) is worth that sacrifice.

Dodge + displacement (which you can keep up fairly constantly) + Incorporeal, High fort, and decent max hp works quite well vs melee attacking enemies. You can get all that AND evasion with high saves as well...making your character very hard to kill.

[Bowser_Koopa]

The fact that I have proven that Little Mac is better than Ape_Man, Little Mac doesn't need AC he has HPs dodge and PRR and he beat Mike Tyson, or Mr. Superstar or whoever the boss is in the newer punchout games.

Bowserkoopa,

Soon DDO will be consumed by the 8-bit universe and mobs just touching you will kill you!

[Chai]

And AC plays 0% a part of this building for self-sufficiency.

For the majority of players, this is incorrect, because they arent playing EE. There are even cases in EE where this is incorrect. The new endgame doesnt showcase any of those cases however.

In the new endgame, what AC does provide is far outshined by what was sacrificed to get it. Feels like old epics all over again for melee - remember when someone *could* min max an AC that doesnt always get hit, but they needed to dump str on a dex/wis build monk to do it?

[Ape_Man]

For the majority of players, this is incorrect. There are even cases in EE where this is incorrect.

For the level 24s?

Youtube video or it didn't happen.

[Chai]

The fact that I have proven that Little Mac is better than Ape_Man, Little Mac doesn't need AC he has HPs dodge and PRR and he beat Mike Tyson, or Mr. Superstar or whoever the boss is in the newer punchout games.

Bowserkoopa,

Soon DDO will be consumed by the 8-bit universe and mobs just touching you will kill you!

Pffft, he spent half the game chasing that dude who stole his bike. :p

[Chai]

For the level 24s?

Youtube video or it didn't happen.

You do understand how a parabolic system works right? Diminishing returns at both the low and high ends.

You keep trying to say the value is zero, and this is wrong. The value is far less desireable than what you have to sacrifice for advancement in a diminishing returns system. The fact that the system was literally designed with this in mind is an automatic indicator to anyone who understands how it works to not use it past the middle peak, because the diminished gains are not worth the sacrifice in another area as a trade off.

[Ape_Man]

You do understand how a parabolic system works right? Diminishing returns at both the low and high ends.

You keep trying to say the value is zero, and this is wrong. The value is far less desireable than what you have to sacrifice for advancement in a diminishing returns system. The fact that the system was literally designed with this in mind is an automatic indicator to anyone who understands how it works to not use it past the middle peak, because the diminished gains are not worth the sacrifice in another area as a trade off.

I know exactly how the formula works. it's not rocket science.

still waiting on that video.

[THOTHdha]

You do understand how a parabolic system works right? Diminishing returns at both the low and high ends.

You keep trying to say the value is zero, and this is wrong. The value is far less desireable than what you have to sacrifice for advancement in a diminishing returns system. The fact that the system was literally designed with this in mind is an automatic indicator to anyone who understands how it works to not use it past the middle peak, because the diminished gains are not worth the sacrifice in another area as a trade off.

Except that the value ~IS~ zero, if you have an AC that is less than roughly half of what the MOBs to-hit is. As I showed in a post earlier today that you conveniently ignored, since the facts do not support your soap box ranting. And in most endgame situations where a game's systems should be very important, the majority of players will have an AC that gives them absolutely zero benefit.

[Bowser_Koopa]

Here is your proof!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsC0zIhWNww

You see how his jump skill and striding and haste help him defeat the level in record time? And his str to not only break blocks with his fist but his AC to keep his fist from breaking!?!?!? Or the incredible AC of his feet for surviving jumping on his enemies!??!!??!!?

Take that Mr. AC is turrible man!!!!

Bowserkoopa,

Being evil is fun...and has better health benefits

[Viisari]

A 40 PRR (you can get higher in light armor..but it requires sacrifices/more feats etc and or twists..which I don't think is worth it)....reduces damage by about 20% after DR has been taken out. On a 200 hp hit....that is 40 less damage...nice...but going over that (sacrificing other stuff) just doesn't seem worth it.

It is possible (http://i.imgur.com/HzLPpmM.jpg) to get a pretty nice PRR with just light armor without using shields or any twists. It does take some work and perhaps specific weapons, which are fortunately mostly good, but it is possible.

[Chai]

I know exactly how the formula works. it's not rocket science.

still waiting on that video.

Look at the level of the mob you are fighting in higher level elites. Ive got better things to do than walking into EE on a tank, like walking into EE on a non tank and witnessing the far superior performance that occurs when I stop at the middle peak of AC due to not wanting to sacrifice anything to gain somethign with insanely diminished returns due to the difference between the my toons level and the mob level.

What you are really complaining about here is the whole level ratio involvement when facing high CR mobs making a good portion of that AC useless, which was earned on diminishing returns in the first place. In order to fix this, they would merely need to relax the way mobs being far higher than you negatively affects your contribution to miss chance that AC provides. If you get specific with this rather than just continuing to quote people and say ac provides zero contribution, your feedback will go alot further.

[Chai]

Except that the value ~IS~ zero, if you have an AC that is less than roughly half of what the MOBs to-hit is. As I showed in a post earlier today that you conveniently ignored, since the facts do not support your soap box ranting. And in most endgame situations where a game's systems should be very important, the majority of players will have an AC that gives them absolutely zero benefit.

Didnt read, lol. If you had, you wouldnt be posting in the tone that you are. I just explained what you guys even need to be complaining about. If you turn from that and keep quoting people and telling them AC contribution is zero unconditionally, then it doesnt surprise me that the entire issue gets ignored, due to getting burried in quantity based proclimations.

The AC contribution is only zero in these extreme scenarios that the minority of gamers play in due to a parabolic system. Relaxing the effect the ratio of your level -vs- the mobs level has on that contribution is the answer to resolving this issue if you want AC to be effective in those minority scenarios the self proclaimed ubergamers want to use as a measuring stick for the rest of the majority of players who dont even touch that content.

[RedHost]

Look at the level of the mob you are fighting in higher level elites. Ive got better things to do than walking into EE on a tank, like walking into EE on a non tank and witnessing the far superior performance that occurs when I stop at the middle peak of AC due to not wanting to sacrifice anything to gain somethign with insanely diminished returns due to the difference between the my toons level and the mob level.

So essentially what you are saying here is that you are well aware that the AC system does not work. But you like trolling, so you are going to argue about it anyways? Rockin'.

I really love how you state:

You do understand how a parabolic system works right? Diminishing returns at both the low and high ends.

You keep trying to say the value is zero, and this is wrong.
And then when it is pointed out to you that in any part of the game where physical damage actually matters any kind of reasonably achievable AC's benefit is exactly ZERO you just ignore it! Excellent Trollmanship. Many aspire to this level.

The early game, up to level 12 or 14 or so, makes it very easy to have a good AC. After that anyone who isn't an Arcane can have very reasonable AC. And guess what? Physical damage never really matters through any of that! If you have any kind of decent build the only thing that really threatens to kill you is the Spell damage that never really got fixed after the MotU Spell Power changes.

Maybe I am crazy. But I kind of have the feeling that game systems should work in the content that is actually important. Not the "you aren't really supposed to be able to fail this" Hard level of content. But the stuff that is actually supposed to challenge people. And if there is no difference between a 0 AC and a 60 AC for the content that actually matters, then why did they have to go and change the game system in the first place?

[Ape_Man]

Here is your proof!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsC0zIhWNww

You see how his jump skill and striding and haste help him defeat the level in record time? And his str to not only break blocks with his fist but his AC to keep his fist from breaking!?!?!? Or the incredible AC of his feet for surviving jumping on his enemies!??!!??!!?

Take that Mr. AC is turrible man!!!!

Bowserkoopa,

Being evil is fun...and has better health benefits

I expected Rick Ashley. Bad Koopa.

[Bowser_Koopa]

I should of posted a video of punch-out to continue the theme....oh well there will be other times I can make obscure 8-bit video game references and link videos!

Bowserkoopa,

AC didn't save me from Mario why should it save you.

[Firepants]

Hell they might as well put in an option to let you chat while the hireling AI runs your character at least that may be someone fun to watch while you chat to people about lag or five guys burgers or whatever.
Not for nothin, but this DOES sound pretty awesome. Create a character, and have a variety of horribly bad AIs just truck em through dungeons while you and your friends crack jokes and watch the hilarity that ensues. This could be the replacement for the Lobster Parties on Argo.

[Karavek]

What the people who dont want to grasp the issue, much like in certain threads about the viability of being casters using DC spells, is there is suppose to be times when something ( like in this thread AC) becomes worthless altogether. This is common even and especially in PnP where for example say my group is composed of a bunch of super AC meta gamed min maxxer specced characters as DDO is all about, I would make sure I build an adventure that made armor at least useless and at the worst a dire encumberance even a fatal one. Everything from making all foes carry brilliant energy weapons( crafted specifically for them and unusable by anyone else) to casters using touch or always hit spells.

Just like EE content renders casters overly dependant upon DC based spells more in need of debuffing enemy saves, warriors need to look to tools to debuff enemy to hit and other things while defeating foes. Perhaps if instead of saying the AC system is the flaw, its that EE has silly aspects with little real reason for being there beyond a heavy handed DM response, they made EE mobs not regenerate from stat debuffing virtually instantly so warriors had a reason to use weapons that cause STR dmg for example, rather then go all out ****** DPS we would not even be here having this debate.

Yes by end game AC feels the least useful in the most challenging content. Guess what that is very like D&D. It still has use in alot of content, the changes to how it work made it alot more friendly to newer players to get a viable one for norm and hard content on both heroic and epic. That I am fairly sure was the main goal, since those who make EE their whole game seem to imply its meant to challenge them, big surprise turbines answer to that is pure number pumpage, not increased need for strategy via mobs having more unqiue and advanced abilities,

For example what if mobs did have to on average roll a 10 or higher in EE to hit the typical well geared epic AC build but the price was say for example mob archers and casters had the stances of the shiradi champions instead to show their more epic ability? What if enemy rogues all where using the powers of a shadow dancer and regularly trying to assassinate our player casters at the opening of every fight? How long before people demanded the mobs be dumbed down?

AC has use for a wide percentage of the content and player pop, that seems good enough in my book. It has a minimal function even in EE but less so then virtually every other layer, last and least maybe but still there.

[Ape_Man]

AC has use for a wide percentage of the content and player pop, that seems good enough in my book. It has a minimal function even in EE but less so then virtually every other layer, last and least maybe but still there.


And we're talking about EE, so why even comment?

EE is still Extremely Easy, doesn't mean the game mechanics should go out the window.

[RedHost]

Yes by end game AC feels the least useful in the most challenging content. Guess what that is very like D&D.
Actually, this is nothing like AC's effect in D&D. In D&D you could very easily get to the point where a powerful foe's first attack was almost guaranteed to hit. But you know, that is the reason why attack chains go DOWN in their bonus instead of up. That high AC character is barely going to get hit on the second and subsequent attacks, and the middling AC character is even going to see some likely misses towards the end of the attack chain. But they decided to make the attack bonuses go UP instead for DDO, which completely shoots that entire system out of the water.


AC has use for a wide percentage of the content and player pop, that seems good enough in my book. It has a minimal function even in EE but less so then virtually every other layer, last and least maybe but still there.

If something works fine for the portion of the game that is breezed through regardless, often in just a couple of weeks, but it does not work at all at the portion of the game that is actually relevant then the system does not work. Or maybe people have just gotten to accepting of things that are 'good enough' even though they do not actually function. You say that it has 'a minimal function', but this isn't even true. If your AC is less than about half of what the enemy's to-hit is, which is in the +140 to +160 range, then it has no functionality at all. Not minimal. Not "last and least but still there'. No. Effect. At. All. This is just the way that the formula that the DDO devs made up works.

And this is exactly what this new system was supposed to solve. Only rather than actually 'epic difficulty content' that is challenging from a tactical standpoint, the hyper inflation of numbers in Epic Elite quests has made even this new system, with it's broader range than the d20 rolls, obsolete as well.

I appreciate that the developers are in a rather tricky situation. Even as a PnP game, the D&D rules really scale poorly into epic levels. But the entire reason that the game continued to work anyways is that it is all about interesting, and often uniquely challenging encounters. Like Sor'Jek throwing you off the top of Tempest Spine! Or Velah breathing deadly fire over the party, unless they take shelter from it. (OK, before U14 it was fairly deadly at least....) Things that challenge the player to ~play~ well, rather than just stacking their stats to insane levels to try and keep up with numerical hyper inflation.

[guardianx2009]

The AC-toHit is out of whack on both extremes.

Korthos Quests on Elite is a joke now. My tr'ed L1 toon with no ship buffs and nothing but Korthos gear can solo them easily... Trash mobs barely can barely land a hit, this didn't use to be case. Jacoby Drexelhand on Elite used to be a challenge to solo at level 1.. not anymore.

Of course it's low level so nobody cares. Carry on.

[elraido]

The AC-toHit is out of whack on both extremes.

Korthos Quests on Elite is a joke now. My tr'ed L1 toon with no ship buffs and nothing but Korthos gear can solo them easily... Trash mobs barely can barely land a hit, this didn't use to be case. Jacoby Drexelhand on Elite used to be a challenge to solo at level 1.. not anymore.

Of course it's low level so nobody cares. Carry on.

When the game first launched, when you would go into the basement of the tavern to get the cask, it was basically impossible to kill the main guy on a rogue. :D