When does AC become unimportant?

[EKKM]

Unless your build can eventually get an AC into the mid-60s to low 80s don't worry about AC. Anything less than that is a hit on anything other than a 1.

He is level 12. He can get a worthwhile AC at that level.

snip

+1 great post

At level 12, based on the above.

10 base
14 FP +5, w ritual
2 aura
4 prot
3 bark (pots last 7 mins)
1 dex
1 haste
--
35 - this is a useful number at level 12 with minimal gear requirements
2 recitation
4 shield (clicky/wand if UMD)
--
41 - incl short term buffs - very useful at level 12, no additional gear req'd
--

Even in GH and the vale (norm - hard) that 41 AC will be useful for most trash mobs, saving your healer some SP. In higher levels DT armour, an improved aura and a full ranger bark will make that buffed ac a 47 - which is not useless.

Stating that AC is worthless unless you are a tank or heavily invest in gear is a complete crock. Can you make yourself immune to melee damage, no. Can you reduce the incoming damage - yes. Also, there will be bosses and even some trash that will blast through that AC, there will also be some that miss 75% of the time on that AC.

When you hit 18-20 and you are gearing up for epic then yes, drop that protection item and dex item as the DPS gear you can acquire is worth more than that protection. Until then, you can have a useful AC, especially on a pally.

[wiglin]

Most numbers I have seen are a little inflated on ac matters threads. I have been in a quest and asked for say a rangers barkskin. When asked for my ac I tell them and response is always... oh thats too low you need 70+ to even matter. During combat I see the following

miss
blurry
miss
incorp (acrobat/ninja)
miss
miss

or something of that nature.

Either way I learned along time ago ac matters on anything normal and below and it is not hard to build for it on a paladin, monk, fighter, or ranger.

The issue is once you are capped you do not run alot of quests on normal anymore, unless farming ingredients, so elite raids and epic ac is pretty much out of reach for all but the highly geared and planned.

I would say this for ac based on my experience in playing characters that have had the following ac numbers at each level. If you can obtain these numbers then you will see noticeable misses.

35-40 AC is very good in the middle levels (up to 12ish)

45-50 AC by Gianthold

50-60 AC in Vale

60-70 Amrath

[grodon9999]

The chattering ring is a particularly frustrating grind, speaking as someone who's been working on it. The drop rate is very low and just about everyone running the raid wants that ring, so if it doesn't drop for you chances are you won't have the chance to even roll for it . . .

You should do 20 Titans in a toons life anyway if you ever want to TR.

My human ranger got lucky, Chattering Ring on 3rd run.

My Elf didn't get it in 25 runs in her last life. She did however get the gloves, the belt, and the boots. All three are fantastic and I'm glad I did this.

It's also a refreshing change from the tank-and-spank raids and mind-numbing "epic" content.

[Emili]

This is dated but here you go... I offer this just to give you some incite as to what the trade offs are. It is quite possible to stress the max DPS of a class and cycle back in gear (diminishing dps for AC) for tanking situations.

The gear listed below is a slightly post-UE kensei fighter character (non epic gear) running with a buffed AC of 'bout 76 in AC gear and is capable of switching to emmitt 'bout 450+ dps when in DPS modes.

equip layout (ac mode)
head: minos legens
trinket: head of good fortune
eye: tier III ,+6 cha skills, air guard
neck: verik's necklace (+6 constitution, lesser action boost)
body: dragontouched plate (+5 resist, +5prot, +3dodge)
back: tier III, +45 hp, concordant opposition
waist: disease immunity of greater false life
wrist: chaosgarde
finger 1: verik's ring (+6 strength, +1 exceptional constitution, +2 exceptional strength)
finger 2: +15 intimidate
hands: spectral gloves (+5 dexterity, +1 to hit, ghost touch)
weapon 1: mineral II, holy, acid burst, insight +4
weapon 2: leviks defender
foot: kundarak delving boots (freedom of movement)

equip layout (dps mode)
head: minos legens
trinket: bloodstone
eye: tharnes goggles
neck: verik's necklace (+6 constitution, lesser action boost)
body: dragontouched plate (+5 resist, +5prot, +3dodge)
back: tier III, +45 hp, concordant opposition
waist: knost's belt (constitution +6, greater false life)
wrist: leviks bracers
finger 1: verik's ring (+6 strength, +1 exceptional constitution, +2 exceptional strength)
finger 2: encrusted Ring (strength +6, exceptional strength +1 +2 exceptional constitution)
hands: spectral gloves (+5 dexterity, +1 to hit, ghost touch)
weapon 1: mineral II, holy, acid burst, insight +4
weapon 2: mineral II, holy, acid burst, acid blast
foot: tier III. blindness, disease, fear, poison immunities, death block, slay living guard

As you may see pure fighters and pallys get a bit of a shaft ... they most costs and trade off than other classes to garner one role or the other.

You should do 20 Titans in a toons life anyway if you ever want to TR.

My human ranger got lucky, Chattering Ring on 3rd run.

My Elf didn't get it in 25 runs in her last life. She did however get the gloves, the belt, and the boots. All three are fantastic and I'm glad I did this.

It's also a refreshing change from the tank-and-spank raids and mind-numbing "epic" content.

Chattering Ring <- really is best for one wearing icys instead of a plated character. Ring placement becomes more relivant to a plated character, if in DT just sub the sovereign for the chat equivalent, and then both ring slots become more str and of course intimidate. Of course this ring may be worth something more down the line shall epic reach the restless isle.

Pally and fighter were not given the options such to tweak both AC/DPS in placement of PrE, like tempest or such... An exploiter build can get away with a chat ring and yet still keep a medium DPS level. Defenders are hard pressed to tweak the DPS loss and Kensei/Kotc are hard pressed to tweak AC. CE/PA toggling in hand and gear swaps required constantly for role. KOTC is hard to feat to garner AC - seven feats, CE toggle off with spell usage (DF, Zeal a must) you toggle off PA (an +5 damage loss) etc... toggling back into these modes you're dropping a ton dps just with item switches. (i.e. ravager set : +7 and epic claw set : +4 you could be wearing not counting guards).

ENTER EPIC: come epic gear I find is funny they bother place AC, the extremes of 100+ AC yields so much trade off the characer is of little threat except in few cases - such as a intimidating SnB on an Epic DQ. In any case such character only brings agro control and not enough DPS of sigificance. The flip side is the DPS build covered in so many guards and spewing 450-500+ DPS plus another 20 or so out of guards. Many tanks are complaining right now about the tappering back of threat for future developement...

With the advent of latest develope efforts I speculate where Turbine is headed with much of this... their ideas poise to make it such - via fort reduction, componding feats, that significant numbers are less of a threshold mark - I see more mob tossing improved sunder and such - they want risks and chance, removing the idea of being impervious so as to spend in PvE.

[Tsuarok]

Yes, that's very different from my experience, and I've gone out and specifically tested different levels of AC. I should do another test, maybe they've lowered mob hit bonuses?

I won't have time for a few days, but next time I'm out there I'll take a few screen shots. I could very well be wrong, I just saw mostly miss floating over my head, and I didn't lose hps that fast.

Never checked standard deviation.

Edit: This is all solo. Maybe dungeon scaling is responsible?

[sigtrent]

The problem I am having is figuring out whether I should be grinding for AC items (chattering ring, chaosgarde, ring of balance, giant armor) or DPS items (bloodstone, SoS). I don't like to grind ALL the time, I enjoy questing with more experienced players to learn and make friends, so I want to balance my play time.

I'd say grind DPS items. I only grind AC items if I am trying to be a tank and pull agro intentionally and that is a very specific build. Most generic or DPS paladins are going to rely on dropping their foe and healing up after the fight (or during for longer ones) as their MO.

My healing amp pally/monk was originally split AC/DPS but at high level the healing made the AC kind of moot as I could heal about any hit I could deflect and healing is easier to gear for than AC. I did some re-spec and shifted to all DPS/Heal and it was more fun than trying to switch into a low DPS tank mode.

The other thing is most raids will only need 1 or tops 2 tanks and unless you are dedicated to it, someone else is likely to fill that roll. On the other hand groups are happy to have as much DPS as they can muster and there is no such thing as too much of it.

[Zenako]

I won't have time for a few days, but next time I'm out there I'll take a few screen shots. I could very well be wrong, I just saw mostly miss floating over my head, and I didn't lose hps that fast.

Never checked standard deviation.

Edit: This is all solo. Maybe dungeon scaling is responsible?

This is also a big contributor as well, since Dungeon Scaling does come into play, although I beleive it is not that significant in explorer areas (if at all). Mobs HP clearly are lowered as is well known, but their offensive power gets tweaked down as well from all observations.

Which is also why the question about playstyle to the OP was posed, since that affects what course of action would best serve his future needs.

[Hecore]

At your level I would suggest either Shining or Gleaming Adamantine Plate. It drops from Tempests Spine (and is unbound, so it should be cheap on the AH), and have a level requirement of 8 and 10, respectively. It'll give dr 3/-, proof against poison, and command (if you've splashed UMD this is rather nice). It's my personal favorite bit of armor for full plate wearing characters that don't need a high AC.

[Carpone]

Make sure you're qualifying your remarks... You talking about the whole game or epic?

40 AC is very good in the middle levels

50 AC by Gianthold is awesome

60 AC in Vale and Amrath means you barely get hit.

I mean exactly what I said. AC is largely worthless in DDO. Gearing a melee for AC at the expense of DPS in order to solo normal difficulty is just silly when you've got the option of a healer hireling. Level up an evoker divine or an arcane if you want to solo farm (on elite!) and do it in half the time as a gimped melee.

Gearing for useful AC in epics is out of the question for 99.99% of DDO's population. Possible, yes, but few are dedicated to the game and have a raid crew capable of getting them there.

[Zer0AcmE]

I mean exactly what I said. AC is largely worthless in DDO. Gearing a melee for AC at the expense of DPS in order to solo normal difficulty is just silly when you've got the option of a healer hireling. Level up an evoker divine or an arcane if you want to solo farm (on elite!) and do it in half the time as a gimped melee.

Gearing for useful AC in epics is out of the question for 99.99% of DDO's population. Possible, yes, but few are dedicated to the game and have a raid crew capable of getting them there.

The best offence is to have a good defence. You just need the gear and be able to switch it around as needed, even in Epic. At lvl 15 my Paladin was able to hold Initm in DQ and didn't require a single heal because she never could hit me (At 15 Acme can self buff to a 73 AC). When I get my 36 point TR back to 20 I'll have an AC well over 90, actually closer to 100, guess what, that matters even in Epic, throw in a 80 Intim and you'll be hard pressed to find someone that doesn't want you in their group.

[Mercureal]

I won't have time for a few days, but next time I'm out there I'll take a few screen shots. I could very well be wrong, I just saw mostly miss floating over my head, and I didn't lose hps that fast.

Never checked standard deviation.

Edit: This is all solo. Maybe dungeon scaling is responsible?

I did a short, unscientific test last night, and I think the Vale enemies have a wide range of attack bonuses. With 50 AC, the animals just outside Meridia (rats and dogs), missed somewhere from 75-90% of the time, and got a few grazing hits.

Then I moved on the the spiders, got surrounded by 3 or 4 and they took of half my HP in about 30 seconds, even with DR of 5. I healed up then bumped up my AC to 54, and it didn't make a huge difference. I noticed that 2 of the 4 were Slayers though, who are much tougher than the others. To confirm this I found a few of the lower-level spiders (Scouts and Workers), and they hit me very rarely, even when I dropped my AC back down to 50.

I got tired at that point, but it makes me see how both our subjective experiences could be accurate. The CR level of Vale enemies ranges pretty widely, from 10 up to 16 or 17. Even an AC in the 50s didn't prevent all damage (though there were some misses) from the tougher mobs, but the weaker monsters could hardly hit at all.

I don't remember exactly who I tested against before - I know some were ogres but can't recall the others. But I'd revise my earlier comments and say the useful AC is probably lower than I stated, useful meaning basically what EKKM said above, being able to avoid some damage but not all. Against the higher level mobs though, I still think you'd need AC of 50 or above to be able to avoid a significant number of hits, unless you've got great DPS and can kill them very quickly. In which case you probably don't need AC anyway.

[TFPAQ]

For Amrath raise that to about 70 but otherwise yes.

I usually agree with you, but you need to just break into the low 60s for wilderness and most anything "soloable" on normal.

Not everyone has an AC of a gazillion with Power Attack on like you!

Self-buffed I'm usually 61-62 with PA on and don't have much problem in there. If I really need to break out the AC gearing (with pots, etc) I can go through there around 70 or so and I still don't see a significant difference in getting hit (below elite lvls that is).

[TFPAQ]

Yes, that's very different from my experience, and I've gone out and specifically tested different levels of AC. I should do another test, maybe they've lowered mob hit bonuses?

I've capped Vale on XP with 5 different toons, so I've spent (wasted) more of my life in there than I care to think about.

However, I haven't run the vale wilderness for the last couple of updates, so my numbers could be wrong.

My experience was that in the vale, breaking 50 AC, meant virtually no resources spent (on healing etc) on any of my toons. Mid-40s you still got hit fairly frequently. I've got a toon just heading over to the vale so I'll see how it shakes out currently.

[grodon9999]

I usually agree with you, but you need to just break into the low 60s for wilderness and most anything "soloable" on normal.

Not everyone has an AC of a gazillion with Power Attack on like you!

Self-buffed I'm usually 61-62 with PA on and don't have much problem in there. If I really need to break out the AC gearing (with pots, etc) I can go through there around 70 or so and I still don't see a significant difference in getting hit (below elite lvls that is).

At a 60 the Bearded devils will still hit you almost all the time. 60 does give you very high Orthon-resistance though and I'm sure you can solo some of the quests as long as you have some self-healing.

70 AC + blur wands + displacement scrolls = Sins zerg while killing everything in your path, no tact required. It'll also let you solo Bastion with no-stealth although a root canal is more pleasant.