New U13 Items

[LeLoric]

my whole point is, that getting dex this high is impossible without possibly gimping str/con, and you can't use tower shields for AC with such solution, too.

now, i took a look at your character layout. +4 dex tome, alchemical martial dex bonus, 18 base dex and 5 dex levelups. let's see some changes: give up artificer past life for mobility, start with 16 dex and 14 cha. spend 2 levelup points in con instead of dex. wear rakshasa instead of eDuelist. benefit: Roar, 24 hp, +2 umd, +3 intimidate. loss: 15% chance not to spend clicky charge, 15 balance on duelist, 1 to int skills, 2 reflex save.

That arti life is +2 ac also the main reason to take it. 15 balance is really nice for chrono and lailat tanking as well as epic ma tanking. +2 reflex save is viable for getting me to that point where I don't fall to lailat cometfalls or take any dmg form abishai fire breaths as well as elob blade barriers all of these are extremely important to me. I don't think I am gimping str or con at all I can hold aggro with the strength I have and hit things just fine and I really haven't sacrificed con either I have a 40 con when I tank most dwarves don't have this.

Anyways it's not a build thread here but an item thread I have said I like the hide just not as much as leathers which is fine.

[noinfo]

with +7 epic augment on rakshasa armor, and rough hide, it's 15 AC from the armor (not counting insight bonus, as i have it elsewhere). that's highest you can get on evasion armors; for comparison, icy raiment + armor bonus +8 bracers = 12; epic duelist leathers slotted with +7 = +13. now, with stalwart enhancements, mobility feat and stuff, mithral tower shield MDB becomes high enough to warrant using it. my current AC shield is +5 mithral tower of superior stability (cannith crafted), and my MDB is currently limited by my armor (mournlode fullplate, as i couldn't get eCav)

So the MDB of a MTS is 4 +2 Mobility (opens 2 more to armour as well for 12) +3 for SD? +3 if you max out shield line total 12 Shield and Armour which is more than most can fit into dex so your statement is spot on but only in the case of a SD and then only if they have this precise amount of Dex and not up to 3 points more that they could have with the armour if they took all 3 levels of FAM (Massive investment in Dex not really practical (40 dex?). For anyone else not so much as without all 3 Shield Enhancements available only to fighters and the PRE.

Much better than I orginially thought though.

[maddmatt70]

Honestly was not expecting great items with only 3 epic quests and likely none too difficult to boot. My guess is this is intended to be something like the red fens or house d epics or something similiar and not like the epic desert. That there are some items which are appealing to several of my characters is enough for me, but it would be nice to have that one/two really exciting items. It is missing the epic claw set basically.

[sirgog]

Honestly was not expecting great items with only 3 epic quests and likely none too difficult to boot. My guess is this is intended to be something like the red fens or house d epics or something similiar and not like the epic desert. That there are some items which are appealing to several of my characters is enough for me, but it would be nice to have that one/two really exciting items. It is missing the epic claw set basically.

You seriously underestimate the quest difficulty. Servants of the Overlord is harder than all 6 player epics on the live servers, and I don't think it will get much easier with practice. Don't think Spinner has been completed on Epic yet either - it didn't seem too hard but my 2½ hour slog through Servants had drained me quite a bit.

[artistx]

nothing appealing to my cleric and clonk.... that makes 2 updates in a row...

[Dolphious]

I really like this list of new items, and in particular I like that it caters to some less common/powerful builds. I think people need to accept that if you make a build based on what is the most powerful given the currently available items, that you can't expect to get much love going forward.

They're a bunch of really nice items here, they just might not be perfect for the most common cookie cutter builds. And IMO, that's a good thing.

[Cauthey]

I was about to tease some of my guildies with an image of the Epic Flameward, and then I realized that the epics had not all been showcased as Katz did for a number of the other items.

So, I cropped out a few (these were Dev event handouts on last Saturday). My apologies, the Epic Darkstorm Helm, the Epic Golden Guile, and the Epic Rakshasa Hide are not clean (I slotted them):













Slotted Toughness



Slotted Greater False Life



Slotted Heavy Fortification

[Qhualor]

ok, the epic bow definitely needs a boost like greater undead bane. i mean, its epic so it should be... um... epic. the cruel nobility looks pretty cool, but im assuming we will now be able to change our alignment to evil? but than if you slot good in the augment slot than you get a neg level? damned if you do, damned if you dont it seems. the epic fury with adamantine? take away that and its a pretty decent undead beater. are we getting warforged undead soon? im confused...

[Diyon]

ok, the epic bow definitely needs a boost like greater undead bane. i mean, its epic so it should be... um... epic. the cruel nobility looks pretty cool, but im assuming we will now be able to change our alignment to evil? but than if you slot good in the augment slot than you get a neg level? damned if you do, damned if you dont it seems. the epic fury with adamantine? take away that and its a pretty decent undead beater. are we getting warforged undead soon? im confused...

No, we aren't getting evil alignments by this. You take a neg level with unholy if you are good. Neutral takes no penalty. Likewise, putting a good augment in wouldn't give a hypothetical evil character a neg lvl. The augment doesn't do that. Holy specifically does that. Pure good does not do it either. And vice versa for an evil augment.

[Qhualor]

No, we aren't getting evil alignments by this. You take a neg level with unholy if you are good. Neutral takes no penalty. Likewise, putting a good augment in wouldn't give a hypothetical evil character a neg lvl. The augment doesn't do that. Holy specifically does that. Pure good does not do it either. And vice versa for an evil augment.

this is why i need to go to bed lol. i knew all that already *embarrassed*

[SealedInSong]

It has boosted (19-20/x2) crit range. Possibly coolest weapon out of them all.

I wonder how epic stats are ...

From what I gathered on ddowiki (not from the forum, possibly it's later in this thread where I haven't read),

eLuminousTruth =
Quarterstaff (2d6, Enhanced threat: 19/x2) +6
Epic Combustion VI
Epic Radiance VI
Superior Fire Lore
Superior Radiance Lore
Flaming Burst
Incandescence
Incineration
Red Slot

I agree that clonks that have gone the THF route for things like eNat Gann and eSouleater may benefit a lot from a weapon like this, but I think it could really use some reconsideration.

We already have a fire-oriented epic staff, and it's truly awful: eTinder. It's, in my opinion, one of the absolute worst epic items on the table.

eTinder=
+6 Enhancement Bonus
Superior Combustion VII
Incineration Guard
Empty Colorless Augment Slot
Empty Blue Augment Slot
Greater Inferno IX

I mean, really? I'm sure someone has visited this before, but two slots cannot make up for the confused and largely redundant mods on this item.

The clicky is even outclassed by a vanilla/suppressed Regalia of the Phoenix. A caster would be aiming for profoundly less optimized equipment by clogging both hands with a two-handed caster stick with an okay (easily resistable by most high level content) guard. An acrobat or other staff-signature character would find almost very poor damage with a tiny quarterstaff crit range/mod and no direct damage mod to speak of.

It makes much more sense to give a good fire damage mod to the fire-themed epic staff we already have and give eLuminous Truth the radiant blast mod seen on eWraps of Endless Light/Mournlode weapons from both a thematic and epic-item-comprehensive perspective.

eTinder does lack the double lore/epic elemental boost but it would still have some utility up against cold-susceptible targets, those that don't have/want a Regalia (full time for the static combustion mod or in their inventory solely for the clicky), and has the extra colorless slot. I would consider adding Radiance and possibly a modified x3 critical multiplier to eTinder but that's a different thread, I guess.

Skewing the damage mods to all light damage in eLuminous Truth would also make it harder to resist by devils/demons/fire resistant mobs, making it more attractive for the divine characters it clearly caters to best. This includes druids in the future, who would still be better served if this weapon were to provide consistent dps in a variety of situations including fire resistant mob content.

I'd go so far as to add that tasty new Godly Wrath light damage DoT onto this staff rather than flaming burst. After all, are we really afraid that hordes of quarterstaff acrobat/clonk/kensei/druid characters are going to be released to threaten eSoS or khopesh builds? I think not.

Revised eLuminousTruth =
Quarterstaff (2d6, Enhanced threat: 19/x2) +6
Epic Combustion VI
Epic Radiance VI
Superior Fire Lore
Superior Radiance Lore
Godly Wrath
Incandescence
Radiant blast
Red Slot

Swapping these mods could make for a pretty versatile, moderate-dps, hybrid caster+melee quarterstaff in the hands of builds that need more help than their innumerable PM, FB, AoV, and Elemental Savant comrades. It maintains all of its flavor and also defines its niche as an epic quarterstaff and epic item in general.

EDIT: Also, Devs, please give this DEX or STR to-hit and damage mod since you won't let us use quarterstaves as double weapons as would be proper, and to benefit dex-based acrobats if you don't include a finesse enhancement line for their tierIII/enhancement update.

EDIT2:

Epic Luminous Truth ...
First, this weapon looks amazing when equipped.
It strikes me as being somewhat confused - is it a caster stat stick (at which it is mediocre and far behind t2 alchemical), or is it an acrobat weapon, or is it for a Clonk build that wants to both cast offensive spells and swing a weapon while centred? I'm assuming the latter.
IMO Incineration is not enough to make this a solid DPS weapon. I don't think this would be overpowered if Incin was replaced by Greater Incineration.

Much agreed, except that I do prefer my revised addition. Greater radiant blast would be absolutely welcome :]

Luminous Truth is weird. A melee staff designed for spellcasters? I don't really get how that's useful. Either make it for one or the other.

Again, agreed. It certainly already has more powerful mods than eTinder, but that doesn't mean it should automatically be a subpar dps weapon as well.

[budalic]

Revised eLuminousTruth =
Quarterstaff (2d6, Enhanced threat: 19/x2) +6
Epic Combustion VI
Epic Radiance VI
Superior Fire Lore
Superior Radiance Lore
Godly Wrath
Incandescence
Radiant blast
Red Slot

I don't know how Godly Wrath works, but if it's like Peals of Thunder, then your version is actually worse than current one against anything that isn't immune/resistant to fire. Now, I know that that type of resistance/immunity is widespread, but I still feel that new quarterstaff should do fire damage... that seems to be the theme.

So, I'd rather see (leaving out irrelevant spell damage mods):

eLuminous Truth
2d6, 18-20/x2 crit range
Superior Fire Lore
Superior Radiance Lore
Flaming Burst
Incadescence
Incineration (or Greater incineration, even)
Radiant blast
Impact (because melee divines want something that isn't quarterstaff to break DR)
Red slot

I've not done the math, but this should be close to lit2/ecalo/whatever. Might be tad too powerful, though.

EDIT: when I say close to, I mean close to falchion version of those weapons.

[SealedInSong]

I don't know how Godly Wrath works, but if it's like Peals of Thunder...(snip)

So, I'd rather see (leaving out irrelevant spell damage mods):

eLuminous Truth
2d6, 18-20/x2 crit range
...(snip)
Flaming Burst
Incadescence
Incineration (or Greater incineration, even)
Radiant blast
Impact (because melee divines want something that isn't quarterstaff to break DR)
Red slot

...(snip) Might be tad too powerful, though.

EDIT: when I say close to, I mean close to falchion version of those weapons.

I could definitely stand behind pumping up the power of this weapon even more, Budalic :]

The primary reasons why I didn't suggest even more damage mods were:

1) To not give further tools for casters to DoT enemies, heal themselves, AND do some melee dps as necessary, thereby widening the already formidable gap between caster v. melee abilities.

2) To preserve the flavor of the staff's niche without stepping on the niche of eTinder.

My version just seemed closer in power to the intention of the dev's original item, though as you said, it COULD (depending on Godly Wrath's dps) be slightly worse dps against fire mobs.

I could backpedal a bit and say that you did do the most appropriate thing by preserving flaming burst because the staff obviously centers are fire+light rather than just light. In that respect, flaming burst, incandescence, AND radiant blast would be more than acceptable to me.

3) To give THF characters a chance to apply some stackable direct-damage (not guard-procced) DoTs.

I could be forgetting something, but I can't recall any THF weapons that have the similar DoT properties we will be able to encounter on a scimitar, bastard sword, and dwarven axe, however poor the dps may be from the actual proc rate.

I'd rather devs hand these types of mods out to more weapon types and fix the proc rate rather than discontinue or limit their implementation because the dps coding is poor.

That said, I totally agree--I doubt the next eSoS contendor would come from a F2P epic in the form of a hybrid caster-melee staff, but I'm entirely sick of knowing that I'm dealing suboptimal dps with my acrobat and other characters not wielding an epic adamantine greatsword.

[budalic]

1) To not give further tools for casters to DoT enemies, heal themselves, AND do some melee dps as necessary, thereby widening the already formidable gap between caster v. melee abilities.

But it isn't that powerful. If you compare it to lit2 falchion (according to current info we have):

both have
same base damage
same crit range

holy - 7 damage per blow
shocking burst - 3.5 damage per blow; 5.5 on crit
shocking blast - another 5.5 on crit; 14 on natural 20
lit strike - 9.15 damage per blow

versus:
flaming burst: 3.5 dam per blow; 5.5 on crit
incadescence: 3.5 damage per blow
incineration: 5.68 damage per blow
radiant blast: 3.8 damage per blow

Now, superior radiance lore is sweet; but you're still looking for sub-lit2 weapon. And if you say lit2 is hard to craft, ecalomel falchion has approximately same damage as lit2 (as long as most of party isn't using it), and it can be gotten in 2 days of grinding.

It does bring significant boost to Divine punishment; but keep in mind that fire damage is most resisted/immune to in game. Given that Divine Punishment is used sparingly, it might make very cool orangename/non-DR non-fire immune beater for divines - which is OK, IMO.

Plus, it would be pretty cool for acrobats too. And acrobats do need some love.

[SealedInSong]

... (snip)

So, while the various properties sound neat, I think they're not really suited to be on the same item. It means that it's a semi-decent trash weapon for a first-life TWF Dex-based Assassin, who had a higher-level toon who could farm two of these. But then this Assassin will hop into Shroud/VoD/HoX... and pretty much be useless again.

I'd love to see the Armor-Piercing *and* the Str/Dex on the Turbulent Epee, and see this item lose the Armor-Piercing, and instead gain a +5 Enhancement Bonus. A set of one for trash, a set of the other for Bosses. Neither one incredible DPS, but filling their appropriate roles.

Totally agreed. Not a hard fix and turns two suboptimal items into two very good choices for first-lifers.

[SealedInSong]

But it isn't that powerful. If you compare it to lit2 falchion (according to current info we have):

... (snip)

Plus, it would be pretty cool for acrobats too. And acrobats do need some love.

I'm not sure where you're going with this as I already said that I wouldn't mind it having more damage. I merely expounded upon the three main reasons why I was *okay with* leaving it with less dps.

I don't think we should ever compare a quarterstaff to a falchion because, let's face it, falchions in DDO have found a niche essentially as a gigantic scimitar (as opposed to the historical reality of one-handed, diverse, curved blades). Put what amounts to the best non-eSoS two-handed weapon class in the hands of a centered monk-splashed caster and, yes, I do think it does contribute to some of the caster v. melee power disparity.

Again, however, I did support the extra damage mods you suggested because I believe that quarterstaff users need a leg up, and I did specifically mention acrobats.

So really, the only thing we truly appear to disagree on is the hypothetical inclusion of more weapons that act both as caster sticks and top-notch dps weapons. I for one do not think that casters should be able to have their cake and eat it too, no matter how amazing it'd be for my clonk to hold an eSoS equivalent while centered and healing and throwing blade barrier and divine punishment. Hybrid melee/casters should be giving up a little something in return for being able to melee competitively.

In that vein, I do disagree with:

Impact (because melee divines want something that isn't quarterstaff to break DR)

I don't think we should have any weapons floating around that are caster stick+melee dps one-size-fit-all freebies. If a Silver Flame favored soul/clonk/etc wants to eke out more dps from something like this, they darn well should spend a feat on Improved Critical: bludgeoning. If they don't, you can be guaranteed the quarterstaff kensai and acrobat will, and that's as it should be.

[Zerkul]

My point is that if we don't introduce better weapons for melees, they are sure as hell not going to catch up.

Reading Absolute-Omniscience i thought about some property that has not been yet introduced ingame and that could be good for melee characters, you know something not overpowered to make melee's "Catch Up" with casters. I'll quote a D&D wiki page:

Link

Collision: Collision weapons psionically increase their own mass at the end point of each swing or shot. Such weapons deal an extra 5 points of damage on each successful strike, in addition to the weapon’s enhancement bonus. Bows, crossbows, and slings bestow the extra damage upon their ammunition. Moderate metacreativity; ML 10th; Craft Psionic Arms and Armor, matter manipulation; Price +2 bonus.

5 Damage that gets multiplied by crits are good start point. Maybe one can consider a Greater Collision weapon as well granting that the bonus is higher. Just an idea .

[budalic]

I don't think we should have any weapons floating around that are caster stick+melee dps one-size-fit-all freebies. If a Silver Flame favored soul/clonk/etc wants to eke out more dps from something like this, they darn well should spend a feat on Improved Critical: bludgeoning. If they don't, you can be guaranteed the quarterstaff kensai and acrobat will, and that's as it should be.

The reason for impact was to give divine melees a reason to use it. My fvs (and other SH melee favored souls) would have no reason to use it over falchions otherwise. Hell, even with impact it is a lot of grind to get subpar weapon. Same goes for lob favored souls (which would use greatswords) and splashed battleclerics. Clonks already have ic:blunt if they use unarmed anyway (but probably won't use two handed weapon).

So, in that case, it is only acrobat weapon; and lores have no place on it.

[Voldomar]

Reading Absolute-Omniscience i thought about some property that has not been yet introduced ingame and that could be good for melee characters, you know something not overpowered to make melee's "Catch Up" with casters. I'll quote a D&D wiki page:



5 Damage that gets multiplied by crits are good start point. Maybe one can consider a Greater Collision weapon as well granting that the bonus is higher. Just an idea .

Raw damage is not ( and almost never was ) the issue. Melee characters need a wider array of combat abilities. They don't need the ultimate weapon to rule them all. That would only narrow their niche, rather than add new cool tricks.
Things like stances and maneuvers from the Tome of Battle: The Book of Nine Swords are a good starting point if devs want to take a look at 3.5ed material

[SealedInSong]

Raw damage is not ( and almost never was ) the issue. Melee characters need a wider array of combat abilities. They don't need the ultimate weapon to rule them all. That would only narrow their niche, rather than add new cool tricks.
Things like stances and maneuvers from the Tome of Battle: The Book of Nine Swords are a good starting point if devs want to take a look at 3.5ed material

Truer words never spoken. I honestly enjoy niche items that I can seamlessly fit into builds a lot more than any ubercannons like eSoS. All of the Sentinel's items have a flavor that makes me want to include them even if they're suboptimal, and in their latest incarnations, they're both flavorful and competitive. Perfect.

---Hamstring, Feint, and Sap---
I'd be thrilled to see weapons that increase the least-used tactical feats, like a scaling (+2-10) effect adding duration to your Hamstring feat from crippling weapons, and the same for Sap (a new item mod that adds a scaling +2-10 effect to the duration of your Sap feat). Improved Feint would also benefit wonderfully from an item that increases its effective duration.

---Monk elemental finishers---
Handwraps like the Fernian wraps whose "Path of the Fire Dragon" mod give an insight bonus to your finishing moves would be greatly welcomed as well. This would synergize well with the release of Henshin Mystic and encourage even non-mystic monks to perhaps use their elemental finishers a bit more often.

In that vein, I'd be even more excited to see an epic item or two that allows tierIII monk prestiges (meaning monk levels 18+) turn their finishers into devastating forms, i.e. their Breath of the Fire Dragon finisher could be turned into an augmented Flamestrike, or allow their Healing Ki finisher to perform its normal function but also cast a single-target Panacea on self (Heal spell would be too overpowered considering how fast you can spam it), or gains the Icy Prison effect from their The Raging Sea finisher (perhaps lower damage than Icy Prison).

---Reducing ki costs---
An item that would specifically decrease the ki cost of performing the monk's abundant step ability could make it a more readily available ability, especially while not meleeing/ki generating. Since the ki cost is 10, for some monks (primarily those using wind and fire stance most) it could be the cooldown of the ability that's most prohibitive. Perhaps the item could decrease the cooldown length instead.

---Maintaining fascination/enthrallment---
Something that might make me die from happiness might be a low damage one-handed weapon that *doesn't break bardic fascination/enthrallment*. It might be hard to code (since I suspect the code dictates that fascination breaks on any damage whatsoever), but that would be a weapon that every bard and potentially every character running with a bard might want to carry for certain occasions.

---Caster/melee weapons---
From the caster-melee perspective, it'd be pretty delicious to have some weapons that use a personality mod (int, wis, or cha) and have some kind of granted feat to expend spell points to perform an augmented attack. The int weapon could have something called "Eldritch strike," which might function similar to paladin smite using int that consumed 5 sp per use.

---Two-weapon blocking---
For our TWF tankers, it might be nice to see a few weapons that have mods like +1 shield ac, parrying, and blocking DR=5, and/or have some mod that increases the amount of DR gained from the Two-weapon Blocking feat. They could essentially be equivalent to a crappy buckler in the form of a weapon. Careful balancing would have to be considered so that these weapons wouldn't be superior to the best named/epic bucklers but still tantalizing enough to encourage Tempests and other tank/AC-concerned TWFs to take Two-weapon Blocking (or carry these items for emergency tanking situations).