Ac is out HP is in?

[grodon9999]

I'm gonna guess he was trying to point out to "newer" players that AC is a fool's errand then.

No it's not, going "full ******" is a fool's errand. But remember the lessons learned in Tropic Thunder, you never go Full ******. Full ****** is aiming for an un-achievable AC for areas that you don't need AC anyway (Epic).

I was explaining it to my g/f.

Here is what I said.

DEX=AC.
DEX=To hit if you use Weapon Finesse but your damage will be low.
Most people's HP suffer with "finesse builds" due to being spread too thin.
At low levels monsters have low "to hit" so your AC works.
At low levels monsters lack DR.
At high levels monsters never miss.

Finesses build = bad idea 99% of the time (that freak who solo'd VoD and a few other fit that 1%). You do not have to be a finesse build to get usable AC where AC still works. More on that in a second . . .

You're right about HP though, going from 400-500 HP on my evasion mook's made a world of difference in those situations where you have tot take a hit.

High level monsters hit really hard.
At high levels monsters have bajillions of HP and DR.

There's two kinds of high-level monsters, epic and non-epic. Lets go with Elite Amrath which actually harder than any epic I've seen. The big difference between Epic and non epic-trash is non-epic trash actually fights back. In epic everything has such **** saves that they are either stunned or held and we pound on them when senseless. When they aren't helpless, they swing VERY SLLLLOOOOOOWWWWLLLLYYY so you'll either have time to get out of the way or heal yourself before they swing again. AC in epic simply isn't needed because we have other exploits (yes, I said it) to mitigate the incoming damage. Non-epic content it's still useful which is what 95% of the player play.

Here is what she said about pondering it for 5 seconds...
"Sounds like to me DEX builds rock at low and mid levels but will suck ballz at end game"

Why can't others get this? She has never played DnD or DDO or any MMORPG. But she came to this conclusion.

Keep in mind, epics are only played by 5% of the population. The "real" endgame of DDO is TR-grinding and it that the Dex build would be fine.

[TFPAQ]

It is like everything else in this game. How you build and gear has a huge effect.

I'd agree with most of the posts here.

Finesse builds will allow you to run through "most" of the content while leveling or TR-ing. Soloing is another place where they shine.

I have a finesse build that I solo much of the Amrath content with for ingredients - lots of us do. Although I also have my Hp/DPS FvS that solos Amrath "faster".

[BlackPlague]

What is this too fast hes talking about?

My thoughts exactly Shile

well, 45 at level 16 is very low for someone wearing a tower shield

the point is not to say AC is the only thing that matters - point is that if you are someone who invest in AC (as the tower shield wearing should imply) then you dont have enough


so he is basically right - either you have high AC - either you dont wear a tower shield (which lowers your dps a lot)

middle AC is totaly useless, there are many ways to avoid/reduce damages (as said in previous messages : displacement, blur DR, hit points, skill)

I thank you sir for understanding the gist of my statement.

Also Big ups to you Aneist for a great sense of humour and the compliment.

I posted this last night as a bit of a joke and with a small intention that will never really translate into anything productive.

My intentions towards Player1gimpnon-contributingpartymember922: AND all other mid ac S&B characters (although I consider 45 at lvl 16 to be low ac... ) is don't do it. You're reducing your offensive capabilities by wielding a shield instead of a Two-hander or Two weapons... I had thought that this was made clear a few mods (not updates) ago. Apparently we need to re-present the message to newer people If you're not doing either you become .... A (leafs through dictionary...) Manasponge.

I'm glad to see it actually attracted attention.

It just really got to me that this guy thought he was doing such a good job. He was so confident. I had a mixture of feelings from anger (wasted reconstruct scrolls) to pity (higher kill count lolz.)

Anyways, sorry I wasn't more clear about my intentions.

AND LOLZ@ thinking I was Player1gimpnon-contributingpartymember922:

[Ralmeth]

I think the problem is that DDO is misleading to newer players...they find that S&B works just fine at lower levels, and they have a meaningful AC simply be getting the best armor and shield they can find. In fact, this was true back in my PnP days, so even an old school pnp player could be misled.

This issue can only be dealt with by the developers. Perhaps there should a warning on every shield like:

WARNING: Shields work well until level 10. After this please discard and go THF or TWF with as many HPs as you can muster

[Darkrok]

Also, what's a shield?

A returning ranged weapon for Captain America.

[ddobard1]

Sure HP is a priority, but you can get a decent AC too. Suppose you can hit 60 AC at level 16, then by taking the right gear AC could be improved, so that's meaningful at level 20. Don't think AC only to be hit on a 20! Think it as not to be hit on a 7, and I be happy with my AC.

[TheDearLeader]

A returning ranged weapon for Captain America.

Holy sh-....

You're right. And that leads be to the big question:

Why do we have shields like the Epic Ward of Undeath, that deal Flaming Burst and Greater Undead Bane damage... but are not imbued with returning?

Turbine, GET ON THIS! XD

Also, enjoy my baby +1.

[Quikster]

Sure HP is a priority, but you can get a decent AC too. Suppose you can hit 60 AC at level 16, then by taking the right gear AC could be improved, so that's meaningful at level 20. Don't think AC only to be hit on a 20! Think it as not to be hit on a 7, and I be happy with my AC.

to gain a ~30% reduction in damage? Depends what you have to give up to get that.

[Varr]

60 ac +displacement + some game/quest knowledge + modest self healing makes you invulnerable in all content from my experiences.

60 ac is not a wholesale investment anymore.....tell that 45 ac toon how to push it to 60, not tell him to lose the shield IMO.

Dps is preferred to toon duability to often also IMO.

[grodon9999]

60 ac +displacement + some game/quest knowledge + modest self healing makes you invulnerable in all content from my experiences.

Have you been to Amrath yet on anything above casual?

[PopeJual]

I agree fully with the sentiment that AC = fools errand IF your AC isn't high enough.

If you can get your AC high enough, then you can easily solo lots of content that you will want to run many times even when you're at cap.

If you have a melee character, you can probably solo all of the Vale quests with some effort. If you have an appropriate AC, you can solo all of the Vale quests without any effort.

AC is handy to have in the Vale, in IQ, in Mindsunder Island, in Amrath and even in Prey on the Hunter. I hear that there are some people who farm quests in all of those packs.

AC is not the only path to success. It is A path to success, however.

[Ardenburl]

Bah your all nutters, (not that I have room to talk) HP didn't replace AC, having a healer(s) to babysit the group replaced AC. Instead of having toons that don't take as much damage but don't do as much damage, the trend is for people to max dps counting on a healer to keep them alive.

Well ^^ imo.

[Varr]

Have you been to Amrath yet on anything above casual?

Sure, just last nighti was in sins (happened to only be a normal run) and with very little displacement actually I went ahead and intimitanked it while stunning blow two handed fighting with a 59 ac. 60 occationally when basted, 4 man party. Pretty much self healed, no death, no problems. On hard I'll go ahead and probably use a shield wand for added safety.

[Varr]

Bah your all nutters, (not that I have room to talk) HP didn't replace AC, having a healer(s) to babysit the group replaced AC. Instead of having toons that don't take as much damage but don't do as much damage, the trend is for people to max dps counting on a healer to keep them alive.

Well ^^ imo.

Qft

[Nattyboh]

I'm down with my buddy X on this. HPs & DR are the way to go.

I still have one AC toon (still needing gear & tomes, currently self buffs to 75), but with just under 500 hps he can get pwned in epic quests. Gunnari is a double TR tempest I kensai II so still has decent dps, but i have a lot more fun with my barbarian.

[MrWizard]

it all really depends on what you are doing, assuming all the proper gear and knowledge are acquired.

you can have all the DR, AC, or hit points in the world, but I would bet on the evasion toon surviving the fire elementals ambush.

500+ hit points gets you well as a tank...the less ac, the higher you would want that.

DR is hard to come by for most as racial and other bonuses don't really get above 10 too much on most classes and races I dare say...
(shield blocking you can get to over 50 easy fyi) but that does you no good if you are fighting.

I play an ac toon and find it is great to survive and beat things.
I am glad I do not do epic and have all my crafted gear because it is insane how much crowd control, survivability, and sustained dps you can have as an ac toon.
It would probably be boring to be fully outfitted...lol


One should strive to do what they can to get the highest DR they want or can get.
One should strive to get the highest AC they want or can get.
One should strive to get the highest hit points they want or can get.

One should bug the devs to allow evasion on full plate toons...as much as humanly possible including bribes.

[BlackPlague]

My OP was neither actually about Ac vs Hp nor about Ac vs Dr

Since we are getting onto that subject, I'll quote an excellent sarlonian player "Unless you can raid buff into the 90s, Go Kensai." I think that unless you're at the top of your game with the top gear, dr and hp are currently more important. But that is only because since returning to the game my previously high ac toon has become a gimp. It has recently become my belief that the most important aspect of a build has actually become Healing Amp.

I was just posting some annoyance at a Pug.

All I can hope for is that the OP's target reads this thread and learns a few things...

[Fourfingers]

I'll quote an excellent sarlonian player "Unless you can raid buff into the 90s, Go Kensai."

From personal experience I'd disagree with that statement a little. My high AC toon has seen 87ac before and has rarely needed to stay that high. Being able to get an AC into the 80s has been good enough.

This is still assuming we're talking about AC and not music.

[Quikster]

From personal experience I'd disagree with that statement a little. My high AC toon has seen 87ac before and has rarely needed to stay that high. Being able to get an AC into the 80s has been good enough.

This is still assuming we're talking about AC and not music.

I agree. If you can get 75 or over youre good for almost all normal content. Low to mid 80's is solid for hard. 85+ for elite and epic. Note these are general guidelines as Ive been over 100 and been pounded by a particular Marilith raid boss

[caution]

I understand the issue caused by high-AC in a d20-based system which is why we say that low or average AC is useless (eg. 40 AC versus raid bosses).

What I have noticed from experience is my low AC builds are extremely squishy (comparatively weaker to the equivalent 'moderate' AC build). When a toon has a low AC, I seem to be getting hit more!

I first really noticed this with my gimped WF monk (ALL feats in improved DR, WIS score of 6) and tanks who just didn't bother with AC (like rangers who just wore robes for effects).

All the threads I have read over the years (I have been playing since Mod 3 or so) have always focused around achieving high AC and being un-hittable, very little discussion has been made towards impacts of low AC.

One theory I have is that mobs have an attack chain that is similar to ours with the whole -5, -10, -15 swing system. If this is true, then I am suspecting what I am seeing would suggest AC is not pointless, because as your AC starts getting over 20 points lower than the untouchable threshold, you will suffer more hits.

Also think about number of times a kobold has swung at you once but hit you 3 times!

I also understand that you will be crit-confirmed almost every time, but why do I notice is typically a stream of numbers comming off me rather than big crits??

For the ney-sayers, we also don't see a stream of 'missed' messages or mutliple attacks in the combat log, but is that because we don't see AI rolls/effects?

Before I try and prove such a radical concept (as I need to roll up new lowbies and screenshots), does anyone else notice this or think I am smoking too much??