Make AC work in Epics

[grodon9999]

Dex bonus to AC is as old as first edition D&D, as least. WOTC had nothing to do with it. People have been min maxing monks to be nigh invulnerable at high levels for a long time now, wearing a T-shirt and baggy pants.

The difference of course is that monks cant go all willy nilly on multi classing in P&P, nor can paladins. What DDO did do is make monks and paladins multi-class-able within their alignment restriction.

Before all this epic content and glancing blow mechanics were added, the best intimitank in DDO was a 15 monk 1 rogue. Untouchable in pajamas.

I think he meant to say Wisdom Bonus.

[Thucydides04]

So are we asking for a lower to hit from mobs?
Glancing blows to auto hit and AC mitigates that damage through DR?

Grazing hits are not part of D&D... they are construct of the devs imagination that was passed on to the DDO community under the ruse "To help new players deal with low to-hit scores." The change was really intended to minimize AC as a tactic but it failed. Then, frsh on the heals of failure, the devs implemented epic and to-hit scores of 85+ on trash mobs. If I knew how to take video captures I would take my Tempest dex build into an epic and do a video capture of him getting mauled by epic mobs with a 90+ac.

I don't have a problem with the d20 system and forcing players to decide between AC and dps, especially with the role that gear has taken on in helping improve dps. But, right now there is no choice to be made. Your choice is to build a great dps toon or a gimp.

[fluffybunnywilson]

It's probably true, in which case they have no business working on a game with the name "Dungeons and Dragons" in the title.

AC is even worse in D&D, though. There are lots of sources of "To Hit" in D&D, but not as many sources of AC.

By the time you get to level 15, AC has pretty much vanished as a significant factor.


...of course so have Fighters, Monks, Barbarians, etc.

[grodon9999]

AC is even worse in D&D, though. There are lots of sources of "To Hit" in D&D, but not as many sources of AC.

By the time you get to level 15, AC has pretty much vanished as a significant factor.


...of course so have Fighters, Monks, Barbarians, etc.

Not in the D&D I played

What can I say? I'm old. I remember looking in awe at a Red Dragon with a -11 AC (31 in DDO terms) wondering how we were gonna hit that . . .

[Krago]

Grazing hits are not part of D&D... they are construct of the devs imagination that was passed on to the DDO community under the ruse "To help new players deal with low to-hit scores." The change was really intended to minimize AC as a tactic but it failed. Then, frsh on the heals of failure, the devs implemented epic and to-hit scores of 85+ on trash mobs. If I knew how to take video captures I would take my Tempest dex build into an epic and do a video capture of him getting mauled by epic mobs with a 90+ac.

I don't have a problem with the d20 system and forcing players to decide between AC and dps, especially with the role that gear has taken on in helping improve dps. But, right now there is no choice to be made. Your choice is to build a great dps toon or a gimp.

Yes I realize that those are our options today. But what do we want to ask the devs to help us with to fix AC to make it a viable tactic again for tomorrow?

Reduce to hit bonuses of mobs?
AC to mitigate damage?

Those seem to be the two choices posed by Grodon.

[ProdigalGuru]

Were this change implemented, people would complain.

Power gamers have dumped AC, or TR'd.

They would now have to re-tool to AC builds, and this would cause much gnashing of teeth.

[fluffybunnywilson]

Not in the D&D I played

What can I say? I'm old. I remember looking in awe at a Red Dragon with a -11 AC (31 in DDO terms) wondering how we were gonna hit that . . .

In AD&D, that was absolutely true, but in 3.0 and 3.5, To Hit ended up increasing faster with levels than AC in exactly the same way that it happens in DDO.

[Thucydides04]

Yes I realize that those are our options today. But what do we want to ask the devs to help us with to fix AC to make it a viable tactic again for tomorrow?

Reduce to hit bonuses of mobs?
AC to mitigate damage?

Those seem to be the two choices posed by Grodon.

The way it should work... reduce to-hit bonuses... and eliminating grazing hits would be good too.

Were this change implemented, people would complain.

Power gamers have dumped AC, or TR'd.

They would now have to re-tool to AC builds, and this would cause much gnashing of teeth.

So TR again. I know most powergamers have multiple toons. Besides its not a nerf, it just provides choice rather than forcing all melees to focus on dps if the want to play epics.

[Junts]

Junk, the problem is basically this:

Imagine that ac works in epic. High-end requirement is around 85-90, so you get decent results in the high 70s and low 80s, and you'll hae to push it really high to reduce damage by a lot.

You have two characters who will get missed: Your fighter and your ranger.

Which character will be more effective?

It doesn't work this way in tanking situations, but the monk stuff is really out of whack when ac works on every mob because they (especially ones with mostly rogue) can maintain a much larger aount of their dps while being missable.

[Astraghal]

There's a lot of things they could do, for example they could add a PrE for Fighters and Paladins called 'Bulwark of the Defender' or something similar, allowing damage to be absorbed at a progressive rate of 5%/10%/15%/20% of current AC, which will stack multiplicatively with the Shield Mastery feats.

So if you have 70 AC and are using a tower shield with the Shield Mastery feat and full 'Bulkwark of the Defender' enhancement line, you are getting 44% (1.2 x 1.2) damage absorbtion or 20% (1.2) without.

Developers just need to commit to making AC useful.

[Junts]

There's a lot of things they could do, for example they could add a PrE for Fighters and Paladins called 'Bulwark of the Defender' or something similar, allowing damage to be absorbed at a progressive rate of 5%/10%/15%/20% of current AC, which will stack multiplicatively with the Shield Mastery feats.

So if you have 70 AC and are using a tower shield with the Shield Mastery feat and full 'Bulkwark of the Defender' enhancement line, you are getting 44% (1.2 x 1.2) damage absorbtion or 20% (1.2) without.

Developers just need to commit to making AC useful.

But outside of tanking something big it doesn't matter if you mitigate extra damage, if you're taking no damage and not helping kill trash mobs, you aren't useful.

The roguey things are useful because most of their dps isn't equipment based and comes from the sneak. They give up something, but they're still twfing with sneak attacks and being generally helpful.

If you're using a shield to fight trash mobs, you're worthless.

[Waylayer]

OMG UR SUXXXXX

/signed ... can't +1 until I spread the love a bit more




Seriously, let's make AC matter. I'm a fan of having some mobs that hit with huge bonuses and some that don't where AC can be a useful benefit.

In fact, it would be nice if there was a bit of a range to allow for
- Players who dump AC and are hit by everyone
- Players with solid AC that are missed by most trash, but still generally hit by high-accuracy trash
- Players with great AC that can even be missed by the high-accuracy trash

I will repost my thought on this - change how dodge works.

If each point of dodge reduced the monsters chance to hit the player by 1 REGARDLESS OF TOTAL AC, it would provide everyone with the ability to improve their chance of not being hit - ACROSS ALL AC RANGES - and wouldn't change the mechanics of the already super AC people.

I.E. 1 point of dodge means a monster would always have to roll at least a 3; 10 points of dodge means a monster would always have to roll at least an 11. I would cap the Max Dodge Benefit @ 10.

IF your AC was high enough the mobs already missed on a 19 (and you actually had 10 points of dodge), backing the dodge out of your AC calculation would mean that the mob could hit you on a 10; but the dodge mechanic would bring that back to 20.

[Astraghal]

But outside of tanking something big it doesn't matter if you mitigate extra damage, if you're taking no damage and not helping kill trash mobs, you aren't useful.

The roguey things are useful because most of their dps isn't equipment based and comes from the sneak. They give up something, but they're still twfing with sneak attacks and being generally helpful.

If you're using a shield to fight trash mobs, you're worthless.

It would help a lot even for solo'ing and general self-sufficiency, especially on a Fighter. I agree that Monks get way too many stackable bonuses to AC without many drawbacks. IMO the class benefits of a Fighter should be to be able to switch between doing great DPS and having great defense, without having to LR or respec enhancements.

Edit: The solution to making AC something to build for on traditional AC themed classes like Fighters, is to not have items and abilities that can be borrowed or splashed by other classes, while retaining the effectiveness of their main class.

[Chai]

I think he meant to say Wisdom Bonus.

Wis bonus to AC for monks has been around for a long time as well. Multiclassing monks is a DDO thing. The issue is that one stinkin level gets absolute Wis bonus to AC. Previous to the capstones being added just about everyone who cared about AC at all had a monk level, heh. Rogues and rangers are actually more vulnerable to melee attack than they used to be, because back in the cap 16 days, Dex + wis to ac + pajamas + evasion was pretty uber.

Turbine not only made their own bed on that issue by allowing multiclassing monks, but then putting +8 bracers into the game, and dodge bonus out the wazoo, shield bonus without actually wearing a shield, etc.

We get right back into a similar discussion we get into when talking about DPS. Challenge = ramping up mob stats, which not only includes HP, but also includes to-hit. The major issue I see is there is a HUGE RANGE of worthless AC, and the range gets higher as you climb in levels. If it was a linear progression Id be fine with it, but its far from it.

If someone needs 88 AC to be hit on a 20 only, that means 0-high 60s AC is worthless. Someone could have built for AC as much as they could, but not having access to gear yet, are still getting hit on a 2, but yet are gimped in the DPS DPT with the AC gear they do have on. So we turned to the solution of min maxing for damage most of the time, and if we are going to take AC seriously, we understand that we need a heavy investment. Its an all or nothing situation. Halfway there is nothing. 80% of the way there is nothing + gimped DPS.

The reason why I support these suggestions that are not literal D&D mechanics is because they are D&D in spirit. Being able to throw on a shield and have some protection is a realistic expectation for instance. Theres a trade off there where the player is sacrificing offense for defense. It sounds like they have taken some steps toward that already, but the AC number still is not part of that, and I feel it needs to have a part in it in order for defensive minded gaming to have a seat at the table. We play a game where 40 str is /shrug, 50 str is aight, 60 is better, 70 is decent, 80 is good, and 90 is awesome. We also play a game where 40 ac is worthless, 50 is worthless, 60 is worthless, 70 is worthless, 80 is starting to become worth it, 90 is awesome in most content, but worthless in epics. LOL. Toss on a buncha strength gear, good to go.

[Aesop]

I haven't read the whole thread and probably won't I just was thinking of an idea to make AC worth... something at least.



AC alone, because of the limitations of a d20 system (love it though I do), is not really entirely feasible.

There is too much drift. ACs between 8 and 108 and mobs that can reasonably hit those 108 never miss anything under 98.


So I was just thinking that with the new Shield Mastery benefits maybe its time to expand upon that a little.


The idea is that AC, beyond its basic damage mitigation ability of hit or miss, needs to actually mitigate damage more than it already does in order to make a wider range of AC a viable option for a character build through out the game.

How about taking a page from Shield Mastery and having it convert also mitigate damage in a second way. Now there are a couple ways to make this work.


1. Direct conversion. Every 5-10 points of AC directly reduce incoming Damage by 1%. So a 100 AC character has an additional 10-20% damage mitigation.

2. Dexterity and Dodge Bonuses apply to damage mitigation directly and Physical Armor adds a bonus as well. Light Armor grants 1% Medium 3% and Heavy 5%. Mithril Versions count as their basic counterparts so Mithril Full Plate would grant 5%. Every 2 points of Dexterity Modifier adds 1%. Every 1 point Dodge Bonus adds 1%. So the Dodge Feat would add 1 Dodge AC and 1% mitigation. Combat Expertise adds 5% mitigation.

3. A gradual increase over the AC that starts off small but get significant at the higher ACs.

10AC = 0%
25AC = 1%
50AC = 3%
75AC = 7%
100AC = 15%

or something like this. Now if this was say coupled with damage shield effects procing on Grazing Hits... That would be interesting


Aesop

[Shade]

News Flash Turbine - epics are ALREADY A JOKE for experienced player with decent gear.

FYI: When you put nonsense like this into your suggestions, thats when most devs stop..

Epic trash may be a joke now to a lot of players. But bosses haven't changed, and epic bosses have always been quite hard.

I mean go take a group of random pug melee into epic wiz king, a healer and caster too.. Clear the easy trash undead. Get to raiyum - then dont help them. See how well they do.

It's not easy. Your dis-illusion with the game due to fact you've been aroudn too long and ran too many epics to the point they became trivial. Anything you run repetitively dozens if not hundreds of times becomes trivial. Same with me, but I can still see the big picture as I pug all the time and constantly watch other players struggle in epic.

For players who haven't done certain epics yet, they are still very hard. If only for the boss fights.

And fyi: AC already works fine versus the trash. The minion debuff still exists, and gives them a huge penalty to attack, making double the range of armor class work. So anywhere from 60-100 AC is effective in epics against trash. Sure it's not like casual mode where 70 AC makes your immune to damag,e but it does somewhat reduce the damge you take, and thats all its ever intended to do.

Making AC work against bosses is impossible without making them too trivial for certain players with the max ACs. So it won't happen. The d20 system, even when doubled to 40 like minion AC, just is far too simple system, far too easy to exploit.

[Thucydides04]

Turbine not only made their own bed on that issue by allowing multiclassing monks, but then putting +8 bracers into the game, and dodge bonus out the wazoo, shield bonus without actually wearing a shield, etc.

We get right back into a similar discussion we get into when talking about DPS. Challenge = ramping up mob stats, which not only includes HP, but also includes to-hit. The major issue I see is there is a HUGE RANGE of worthless AC, and the range gets higher as you climb in levels. If it was a linear progression Id be fine with it, but its far from it.

If someone needs 88 AC to be hit on a 20 only, that means 0-high 60s AC is worthless. Someone could have built for AC as much as they could, but not having access to gear yet, are still getting hit on a 2, but yet are gimped in the DPS DPT with the AC gear they do have on. So we turned to the solution of min maxing for damage most of the time, and if we are going to take AC seriously, we understand that we need a heavy investment. Its an all or nothing situation. Halfway there is nothing. 80% of the way there is nothing + gimped DPS.

The reason why I support these suggestions that are not literal D&D mechanics is because they are D&D in spirit. Being able to throw on a shield and have some protection is a realistic expectation for instance. Theres a trade off there where the player is sacrificing offense for defense. It sounds like they have taken some steps toward that already, but the AC number still is not part of that, and I feel it needs to have a part in it in order for defensive minded gaming to have a seat at the table. We play a game where 40 str is /shrug, 50 str is aight, 60 is better, 70 is decent, 80 is good, and 90 is awesome. We also play a game where 40 ac is worthless, 50 is worthless, 60 is worthless, 70 is worthless, 80 is starting to become worth it, 90 is awesome in most content, but worthless in epics. LOL. Toss on a buncha strength gear, good to go.

100% of the way there is still nothing....

I do not think the whole sytem needs to be changed. I like the fact that AC requires an investment and a choice.

There are other ways around AC. The badges Horoth casts come to mind. Part of the issue in this whole debate is the fact that there are so many strength buffs available that if AC were viable the % difference between dps focus and ac focus toons can be significantly minimized. From a dev standpoint, I can see why AC has been cast aside. The intim nerf has exasperated the difference even more.

Right now rolling a melee that is anything but a Half-Orc max str build with khops or esos is suboptimal. This polarization of melee toons has made the game seem like it was designed for children. Building well thought out characters is no longer a skill or even a relevant choice.

[Aesop]

I agree that S&B needs some love, but nobody likes to get nerfed. The best idea I've seen recently is have Combat Expertise give a double-bonus if wielding a Shield. It makes sense since power-attack gives double bonus if TWFing or THFighting.

I'd also like to see the enhancement line for fighters getting raised DEX bonuses significantly lowered with larger benefits.

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Interesting idea about Combat Expertise granting an extra bonus with a shield.

I'd like to see the Tower Shield Mastery line get tanked and added into the Armor Mastery line.

So

Armor Mastery would increase the Maximum Dex Mod of Armor and Tower Shields by 1 per tier. 2AP per tier and 5 total tiers

Aesop

[Thucydides04]

FYI: When you put nonsense like this into your suggestions, thats when most devs stop..

You know this how?

And fyi: AC already works fine versus the trash. The minion debuff still exists, and gives them a huge penalty to attack, making double the range of armor class work. So anywhere from 60-100 AC is effective in epics against trash. Sure it's not like casual mode where 70 AC makes your immune to damag,e but it does somewhat reduce the damge you take, and thats all its ever intended to do.

Making AC work against bosses is impossible without making them too trivial for certain players with the max ACs. So it won't happen. The d20 system, even when doubled to 40 like minion AC, just is far too simple system, far too easy to exploit.

That is incorrect. AC toons get mauled in epics. Roll one up and try it. How is making a boss "trivial" for an ac toon any different than buffing DPS to the point where it is trivially easy to achieve enough damage output that boss fights are a cakewalk?

[Chai]

But outside of tanking something big it doesn't matter if you mitigate extra damage, if you're taking no damage and not helping kill trash mobs, you aren't useful.

The roguey things are useful because most of their dps isn't equipment based and comes from the sneak. They give up something, but they're still twfing with sneak attacks and being generally helpful.

If you're using a shield to fight trash mobs, you're worthless.

LOL.

I dont agree. The only reason your statements are true is because AC is worthless unless you have a full investment. In a game where AC isnt worthless, damage mitigation is just as useful as damage production.

This whole "max DPS is the only way" mentality is the easy way out, and was absolutely false until epics were put in. Heck, people still solo raids on exploiter builds and other monk splashes - while middle of the road DPS, are decent AC enough to manage not dying instantly while going toe to toe with a raid boss, which is what will happen to most of these full DPS no defense toons if they fail at playing their build like a rogue to never have aggro.