Dex vs Str in the expansion

[Potta]

I've been mulling this question over for the past few weeks as beta information has been revealed, and almost convinced myself that contrary to the popular build advice of today, most monks would be better off as Dex based in the expansion. Before I take my final TR however, I'd like some other input. It's not one big change that is leading me to this believe, more the convergence of several influences that taken together, make Dex the superior choice. I'll run through them now:

Str is preferred now because it does not cost a feat to use and it does more damage per hit. Str also has more bonuses available than Dex does, making it possible to attain a higher AB. I believe these factors will become less relevant in the expansion.

For a start, Madstone Boots are one of the primary reasons to be Str based. However, as more gear comes out, Madstone Boots will face increasing competition from items that offer things it does not. As we get more abilities from our Epic Destinies and Twists of Fate, we will increasingly find even as a melee that many abilities we could want are prohibited to use under Madstone Rage. I believe Madstone Boots will be replaced by level 25, taking -4 Str off the maximum attainable in raids.

We are also likely to be remaining in Air Stance. For a Monk that wants max DPS and to not pull aggro, it is the ideal choice. The +4 Dex in this stance has always lent weight to the argument to be Dex based, and it will not be changing.

We will be stretched even further in stats by being required to have 23 base wisdom to access one of our new epic feats. Even though the requirement is strict, the benefit the feat provides seems to be worth it. For Str builds however, the extra levelup points put into Wis instead of Str are far more costly than a Dex build. A Str build is required to have at least 18 Dex for Grandmaster Air, but there is no such requirement on a Dex build to maintain 18 base Str. We could drop to 16 Str and still perform well, placing those points into Wis and lowering the impact to our primary AB stat.

Our Monk flavoured Epic Destiny has no Str increases. Neither does Shadowdancer. The other melee destinies that do offer Str increases are littered with abilities that do not affect/are not suited for unarmed combat. It seems the only way to increase our AB in line with other melee whilst also picking a suitable destiny for our class is to be Dex based.

Shadowdancer is a particularly powerful Epic Destiny to a Dex based monk. Though the early choices in the tree are a little weak, the destiny is extremely strong due to the power of its passives. +6d6 sneak, passive weapon finesse and passive bonus to damage from Dex instead of Str. Why not Grandmaster of Flowers however? It's a fine choice, but for what appears to me to be an entirely different role. A GoF would be better at AoE CC/Insta killing, but weaker in DPS. The GoF abilities also compete with our current monk abilities instead of enhancing them. Ki is a limited resource, and the costs of the new abilities are high enough that no Dark Monk could use them whilst also maintaining frequent use of Stunning Fist, Touch of Death and Elemental Strikes. The 6 second future punch sounds like reasonable damage until you realise that against bosses, it's just a ToD on a longer timer for the same Ki that probably won't proc on damage on offhand/doublestrike. The Ki blasts interupt the attack sequence and actually lower DPS. There are issues with aiming the Ki blasts in melee combat. There are no such problems with 6d6 sneak. It's simple and powerful, and does not compete for exclusivity with any abilities we have currently.

One of the benefits that Dex is supposed to provide now is worthless to most of us. AC. This is changing in the expansion. The range at which AC begins to be useful has been drastically decreased. A Dex Monk will have a significant survival advantage over a Str monk even without a focus in AC gear.

After the expansion, we will see an update to the enhancement system. This will bring a whole new set of changes, and the details we have currently are a lot more 'up in the air' than what we know for the expansion. It seems however that for a monk focused on DPS, the availability of the Assassin as a racial prestige is likely to be of interest. Even without the Int for the Assassin specials, the bonus to sneak attacks and the bonus to hit while sneaking is tempting. This prestige is however...tied to Halfling, which almost always means: Dex build. Halflings offer +1 ab from racial dexterity for a traditional halfelf/human monk build, and another +1 from halfling racial enhancements. The size modifier is another +1 ab. The halfling sneak attack enhancements are another +4 ab while sneaking - enhancements that many suspect will go down in cost in the update. Taken altogether, a Halfing Dex Assassin Monk will have a 9 ab advantage over the traditional half-elf monk of today. You'll see people complain that 9ab doesn't mean as much as it used to, and they're right. It used to mean A LOT. But just because its efficacy has been reduced does not mean that it's not still the best thing you can do to improve your DPS. And that's not just a matter for DPS, a missed attack is certainly a loss in DPS, but even more so if that attack was attached to a tactical attack. It could be a missed Sunder, losing your stack, or a missed Stun, leading to a dead party member. Increasing your chance to hit is always the best thing you can do.

Am I wrong? Am I missing something important that shifts the balance back to Str in the expansion, or should I prepare myself to return to Dex?

[AylinIsAwesome]

I haven't been able to put much time into studying the Epic Destinies, so I won't comment on that.

But on the new feat, I'm not entirely sold on it. The Vorpal effect (which is much more important than the slashing part) already comes on the Epic Ring of the Stalker, which also doubles as the Seeker item with extra Sneak Attack on it.


I think it would depend almost entirely on the Epic Destinies stuff, but as I said I'm not really well versed in it right now.

[Jaid314]

shadowdancer has not offered dex to hit or damage for a couple of weeks and several builds now.

also, the devs haven't really given us any information about the new racial PrEs in quite a while now. in fact, while they've pretty clearly indicated that there will be an enhancement revamp (which they intended, last we heard, to include all existing PrEs into up to their highest tiers), they haven't really given us an awful lot of detail. some of us are hoping for the announced racial prestiges to be changed, and pretty much all of us should be cautious about blindly charging into things on the basis of what we haven't really even actually seen yet.

remember, a couple months ago they hoped (though they didn't promise, they certainly didn't deny it as a possibility either) to have enhancements come out with the expansion. the implication to the fact that it was pushed back not one, but two, updates, is that there is a lot of stuff to be done. which implies a lot of changes, at least to me, with a lot of tweaking, rebalancing, redesigning, etc. of course, it's also possible that they just underestimated how much time it would take them to finish off the existing PrEs and create the several missing ones (there are, after all, quite a few of them), i suspect that some degree of redesigning is going to be done, partly in light of the fact that epic destinies are now out, and partly in light of the fact that certain things have come up in creating epic destinies which previously had not been considered, and partly the simple fact that some PrEs really just need to be redone (let's face it, not a single one of the virtuoso songs are bug-free, and deepwood sniper basically may as well not even exist right now, just as some examples).

personally, i'm hoping they've also been paying attention to the feedback regarding racial PrEs that i've been giving... although i certainly have enough people who appear to think very differently from me in the player base, so it's just as likely they've considered my opinions and think that i'm completely horribly wrong ^^ or, for that matter, that they simply haven't even noticed my opinions at all.

[Chette]

The shadowdancer effects specifically say "and all weapons you fight with use dex instead of strength for damage if higher". Handwraps are not considered weapons (which is one of the reasons there's so many bugs with them if I understand it correctly.) Has it been confirmed that this effect will work with handwraps?

Even if it does, I don't know if I'd be willing to pass up the goodies in grandmaster of flowers.

My answer to this issue? Go wisdom based. The increase to your touch of death and quivering palm DCs alone is worth it. Then, judge how you are doing, and see if dex or strength will net you higher DPS factoring in your hit percentage.

I used to have a nice dex/wisdom halfling monk that I TRed into a half-elf str/wisdom a while ago. Part of me would love to go back to halfling, but I"m addicted to the 95% heal-scroll chance and not sure I could give it up :P

[AylinIsAwesome]

The shadowdancer effects specifically say "and all weapons you fight with use dex instead of strength for damage if higher".

I've been looking through the Shadowdancer Destiny on ddowiki.com, but I have not been able to find any such statement.

[Potta]

I was not aware of changes to the Shadowdancer destiny. Obviously the thread I was reading has gone out of date, is there a more up to date list available? I've tried the Lamannia client, but the servers do not appear to be up at the moment.

As regards the enhancement information, you are right. However, the assignment of the Assassin as the Halfling racial prestige is one of the few pieces of information that the devs have given us about the system. Thematically, I cannot imagine many other prestige's that would fit for Halfling, so much so that I consider Assassin to be a safe bet unless the racial prestige system was removed entirely. Not impossible certainly, but considering that it is being touted as one of the main benefits of the revamp, I find it hard to believe it being removed.

In response to the suggestion to go wisdom - I can not help but think this is a bad idea. Wisdom is a good secondary stat, but it does not contribute at all to our AB or melee damage. For a melee class to put its primary focus on a stat with these failings is absurd. Quivering Palm is completely worthless against challenging content if you are at all sane about stat distribution. I'm not even sure it could shake that worthless description even if you were insane enough to focus everything in Wisdom. I'm convinced that regardless of whether the optimal choice is Dex or not, it certainly will never be Wisdom. Unless GoF offers a Zen type effect for unarmed combat.

[Andveeter]

The shadowdancer effects specifically say "and all weapons you fight with use dex instead of strength for damage if higher". Handwraps are not considered weapons (which is one of the reasons there's so many bugs with them if I understand it correctly.) Has it been confirmed that this effect will work with handwraps?

Even if it does, I don't know if I'd be willing to pass up the goodies in grandmaster of flowers.

My answer to this issue? Go wisdom based. The increase to your touch of death and quivering palm DCs alone is worth it. Then, judge how you are doing, and see if dex or strength will net you higher DPS factoring in your hit percentage.

I used to have a nice dex/wisdom halfling monk that I TRed into a half-elf str/wisdom a while ago. Part of me would love to go back to halfling, but I"m addicted to the 95% heal-scroll chance and not sure I could give it up :P

Handrwaps are essentially treated as a trinket that apply weapon effects to your strikes. Fist is the weapon. Finesse works on fists. It's very likely the shadowdancer finesse effect will be copypasta of the finesse feats code and function the same and therefore apply to unarmed strikes. If it doesn't I feel bad for the code monkey who had to retype something they already had if they did that or if it was copy pasta and remove fists would be left to ask why oh why would you do that... I assume with 85% certainty the effect will apply to unarmed strikes. If you still doubt it however should perform testing.

[Chette]

I assume with 85% certainty the effect will apply to unarmed strikes. If you still doubt it however should perform testing.

Which was exactly what I was asking if anybody had done, since the OP seemed to be assuming it would work

[andreascott89]

Hmm. AC and to hit will now suffer major diminishing returns. Damage still scales linearly...I would have thought the changes favor str based. Wis based is less clear due to DC impact could be vital.

I guess you could start str based then TR to dex if you can use it for damage...


J

[Potta]

Diminishing Returns is such a dirty phrase.

It has to be, I mean, its meaning is very clear. Yet it has been assigned a level of hate amongst this community that is incongruous to what it actually means for us in the expansion. Be careful of what value you assign to AB and AC purely off the back of forum dwelling doom prophets. They live off their minor celebrity and invented outrage - and are only too happy to misrepresent the facts to do it.

Diminishing Returns does not mean useless. It does not mean terrible. It does not even have to mean worse. It merely means that the value of the stat will diminish as you get more of it. Is that such a big change to what we have now? Not at all. In fact, that's exactly what we have now. Ask a 70 STR barb with +75 to hit what value +1ab is to him. Nothing. The highest AC in the game is 69 on epic. He could drop to 67 to hit and not notice a difference. Those 8ab had no value at all. Compared to the 20 ab before them, they have diminished in value. The difference in the expansion is that the changes in how a stat is valued are spread over a wide range instead of being focused in an area so confined that it could have a disastrous impact on build diversity.

Because that's what this is really about. Diversity. As we gain in levels, we will be presented with more options for character development. Options are invariably about improving some aspect of our character, with the cost being mutual exclusion of other options. When Turbine are designing encounters, they will be doing so keeping in mind what options their players may have picked. So should the AC of your epic boss be designed for minmaxxed Barb? Or for a Warchanter? Or a Battle Cleric? Or the tank? Picking any one of these makes AB completely worthless within some range to some of the others. Pick a minmaxxed Barb and suddenly 3/4 bab classes are hurting. Even full BAB classes with some level of MAD are hurting. If you pick one of the lower options, AB becomes worthless to Barb too, as in our +75 hit example above.

The d20 combat system as it is now is already showing the strains of trying to fairly confine the wide range of options a player could pick. 2 more ability points. 2 more feats. The entire range of options in Epic Destinies and Twists of Fate, these would shatter it completely. Pick an AC too high and you as a melee would be required to devote every aspect of your character to attaining that +hit. Your "options" for epic destiny, or the points within the destiny, or your twists of fate, would not be options at all. They would be forgone conclusions. Pick one that's too low and you make +hit actually worthless because it'd be too easy to max. Turbine would be cursed by any decision on AC for the crime of limiting build diversity. Don't be fooled into thinking that it's a Goldilocks decision either. It's not something that can be solved by moderation, that can be made 'just right'. The variances are large already. They will get larger. The d20 system and AB/AC as it works now is no-where near granular enough to solve this problem to any level of satisfaction.

The new system has been mis-represented to the point that many now believe +hit is a worthless stat. They say that rounding makes it so that you can get +3 hit and it will provide no difference to your character. Are they right? They'll follow up their claim with a bunch of numbers certainly, and while they aren't wrong in the facts they present, they are wrong by omission. Statistics are a funny business. You end up with so many figures in analyzing this problem that you can get them to show almost anything, if you're willing to trust that your audience does not care to question your assumptions or what you've left out.

It is true that you can gain +1 ab and not notice a difference in how often you hit because of rounding. Terrible right? Well...what are the assumptions this statement makes? It assumes you'll always be fighting the same mob. It assumes that mob will always have the same AC. It assumes your AB never changes. It ignores the attack sequence.

Obviously you will not always be fighting the same mob. That's stupid. And even when you are fighting the same mob, the number and uptime of various AC debuffs will not always be the same. The same mob can have different ACs. You could be under temporary +AB bonuses, or -AB penalties. You could be moving and take -4 ab there. And most importantly, the attack sequence is huge. They forget that the final two attacks of the sequence are done at +5/+10. Even on a single target with unchanging AC and AB, that +1 could move you up to a new rounding category in either/both of those attacks.

So that's what they omit, what do they assume? They assume ridiculously high levels of AC with no debuffs. This is particularly egregious because of how AB actually diminishes in the expansion. It's not an internal change that devalues the stat based on how high it gets. It's external. The value of AB diminishes when compared to higher and higher ACs. 69 is the highest we see now, but I see figures of how AB is worthless when compared to 100 AC. Huh. You know, 100 AC could be reduced fairly easily to 73AC? Imp Sunder, Insult, Destruction, Improved Destruction. Yet the condemnations of AB rarely consider the effect of these AC debuffs in the continued relevance of AB. A general rule is that for every 10AC, the AB required to move up a rounding category increases by 1. Reducing an opponent by 23 AC is huge because not only do you hit more because of the decrease itself, but the +hit you have is increased in value. You can go from a 70/70/75/75% chance to 85/85/90/95% against a 100 ac opponent with 80ab. An increase to 81ab would change that final figure to 90/90/90/95. Now because of rounding, the complaints will say you see no increase until another +8ab. Wrong. At another +3ab you get 90/90/95/95. At another +2 after that, 90/90/95/100. Then it's only another +3 for 95/95/95/100. +2 after that for 95/95/100/100. You see how this goes? You've been lied to when told that the differences between useful AB bands are so far apart. You will NEVER see a +9ab increase with nothing to show for it. Never. Anyone who told you that is a moron or a liar. You should heed advice from neither.

Oh, and those figures above? I must reinforce this point. They assume a +31ac increase in the absolute highest AC we see in game now. This is massive. They assume only 80ab to start - an increase on a much smaller scale. They assume debuffs which are easily available to almost any character. A single character could carry 3/4 of them. 4/4 if dual-wielding with different weapons.

Diminishing Returns on AB is hated because it fails to solve a problem it was never designed to solve. The melee caster imbalance. It is a melee change that does not close this gap. Therefore, hated. Sorry, but I judge this change on the basis of how it solves the problem of enabling build diversity while maintaining melee viability without pumping every last stat point into STR.

So no, I will not bow to the idea that +9 hit is an irrelevant build choice in the expansion. It is a significant advantage of one build over another. Enough I believe to overcome several damage per hit lost from strength.

[maddmatt70]

Serious text wall.. Assuming you want to make a monk I would say wisdom based is best option. Wisdom > then strength or dex and then make your second stat strength.

[CarpeNoctu]

I'll see what I can do to let you all know the answer to this soon, depending on how much time I get to play... I just TRd my Fighter into a Str Monk and my Dex Monk into a Wis Monk. Both on Lamannia. Just to let everyone know, my Drow Dex Monk, before TR, was soloing epic normal content and having no difficulty.

As for Wisdom being a nearly useless stat... I have to disagree. I have build numerous monks that I didn't add anything to wis for, but my Drow started with 12 wis and then got fed tomes and uses a +6 item, and her ToD and Quivering Palm are beautiful. And that was the case both on Live and Lamannia. As I said, she's a Wis based Halfling Monk now, and (at level) she stuns nearly everything that can be stunned. Of course she's only lvl 8 right now, and the content is still a breeze, so I'm going to have to get her a few more levels to see how it goes.

[Potta]

As for Wisdom being a nearly useless stat... I have to disagree. I have build numerous monks that I didn't add anything to wis for, but my Drow started with 12 wis and then got fed tomes and uses a +6 item, and her ToD and Quivering Palm are beautiful. And that was the case both on Live and Lamannia. As I said, she's a Wis based Halfling Monk now, and (at level) she stuns nearly everything that can be stunned. Of course she's only lvl 8 right now, and the content is still a breeze, so I'm going to have to get her a few more levels to see how it goes.

I've never said Wisdom was a useless stat. I have 16 base and a +3 tome. It was the second stat I farmed for a +1 exceptional on. It's a secondary stat however, since your DCs do not matter if you cannot reliably hit.

I will maintain however that Quivering Palm is a quivering pile of ****. It has a DC of at least 15 lower than Stunning Fist while costing twice as much. It doesn't even have the decency to work on things that Stunning Fist would not work on, with Deathblock/ward being much more common than stun immunity. You might kill low level, low fort **** with it, but low level/low fort **** are not found in elites/epics. The few that are are not worth 30 ki to have a chance of killing.

[stoerm]

Diminishing Returns on AB is hated because it fails to solve a problem it was never designed to solve. The melee caster imbalance. It is a melee change that does not close this gap. Therefore, hated.

I haven't been reading the threads closely enough, so I'm not sure I follow.

What I've seen is complaints on diminishing returns on AC. People have spent hundreds of hours grinding for gear to get that extra 1 or 2 AC. Now that work is devalued. The same applies to gear that improves your to hit stat, whether it's Str or Dex. There's little point grinding for a rare raid reward like a +4 Str tome when it's barely better than +2. Diminishing returns on stats means diminishing returns on grinding, so it's a slap in the face for the hard core forum-dwelling power player population.

[Stillwaters]

Hype on diminishing return is hype.. look at the math

Here's the table with (your) AC vs monster's to hits.
A few more points of AC has some chance of generating an actual change (1%) in monster hit values.

Attack     Hit Rate
      0.7  0.65 0.6  .55   0.5   0.45   0.4  0.35  0.3   0.25   
35    33   35   38    42    46    51    57    65    76    91   Gianthold?
40    37   39   43    46    51    57    64    73    85   101   
45    40   43   47    51    56    62    70    80    93   111   Demon queen (normal?)
50    44   47   51    55    61    68    76    87   101   121   VoD Norm
55    47   51   55    60    66    73    82    94   110   131   
60    51   55   59    65    71    79    89   101   118   141   VoD Hard
65    54   59   63    69    76    84    95   108   126   151   
70    58   62   68    74    81    90   101   115   135   161   VoD Elite, ToD judge (normal?)
75    62   66   72    78    86    95   107   123   143   171   
80    65   70   76    83    91   101   114   130   151   181   LoB (normal + hard)
85    69   74   80    87    96   107   120   137   160   191   
90    72   78   84    92   101   112   126   144   168   201   LoB (elite)
95    76   82   88    96   106   118   132   151   176   211   
100   79   85   93   101   111   123   139   158   185   221   ~Demon Queen (epic)
105   83   89   97   105   116   129   145   165   193   231   Lob (epic)

To, to get hit 50% of the time in Gianthold needs around a 46 AC, to get hit 30% of the time needs around a 76 AC. Each (bump) of 5% misschance is larger than the step before hand.

Here's the table with the minimum + to hit that you need to hit certain ACs, plus how much you have to increase "bump" your to hit to get to the next actual increase (5%).
(assuming weapon proficiency, because if you aren't using a proficient weapon, you are gimp)
These figures can easily be adjusted for our Attack sequence, the size of the distance between 5% "bumps" (in brackets) does not change, and grows larger with higher AC! This is the "essence" of diminishing returns + rounding.

 Add 5 to any of these figures while in power attack or combat expertise mode (-5 to hit)
AC                  Hit chance
    0.5      0.55     0.6      0.65     0.7      0.75     0.8      0.85     0.9      0.95
30   3 (+3)   6 (+3)   9 (+3)  12 (+3)  15 (+3)  18 (+3)  21 (+3)  24 (+3)  27 (+3)  30
35   6 (+3)   9 (+4)  13 (+3)  16 (+4)  20 (+3)  23 (+4)  27 (+3)  30 (+4)  34 (+3)  37
40   8 (+4)  12 (+4)  16 (+4)  20 (+4)  24 (+4)  28 (+4)  32 (+4)  36 (+4)  40 (+4)  44
45  10 (+5)  15 (+4)  19 (+5)  24 (+4)  28 (+5)  33 (+4)  37 (+5)  42 (+4)  46 (+5)  51
50  12 (+5)  17 (+5)  22 (+5)  27 (+5)  32 (+5)  37 (+5)  42 (+5)  47 (+5)  52 (+5)  57
55  15 (+5)  20 (+6)  26 (+5)  31 (+6)  37 (+5)  42 (+6)  48 (+5)  53 (+6)  59 (+5)  64
60  17 (+6)  23 (+6)  29 (+6)  35 (+6)  41 (+6)  47 (+6)  53 (+6)  59 (+6)  65 (+6)  71
65  19 (+7)  26 (+6)  32 (+7)  39 (+6)  45 (+7)  52 (+6)  58 (+7)  65 (+6)  71 (+7)  78
70  21 (+7)  28 (+7)  35 (+7)  42 (+7)  49 (+7)  56 (+7)  63 (+7)  70 (+7)  77 (+8)  85
75  24 (+7)  31 (+8)  39 (+7)  46 (+8)  54 (+7)  61 (+8)  69 (+7)  76 (+8)  84 (+7)  91

So, to hit AC 30 50% of the time, you need a base to hit of 3. To go up to .55, you'd need to add 3 to hit. Adding 5 to hit still only gets you a +5% chance to hit.
So, rule of thumb is: to get +5% to hit, add 10% of the targets AC in increased attack bonus.

You can see the "bump" size (in brackets) isn't affected regardless of power attack, or precision style bonuses.

Want to see the numbers for the cost of 1 feat and adding precision?
Pretty much shifts the whole table 1 spot to the left, as expected. <-- keep eyes on the 50% prize

With precision or point blank shot +5% bonus
AC                  Hit chance
    0.5      0.55     0.6      0.65     0.7      0.75     0.8      0.85     0.9      0.95
30   0 (+3)   3 (+3)   6 (+3)   9 (+3)  12 (+3)  15 (+3)  18 (+3)  21 (+3)  24 (+3)  27
35   2 (+4)   6 (+3)   9 (+4)  13 (+3)  16 (+4)  20 (+3)  23 (+4)  27 (+3)  30 (+4)  34
40   4 (+4)   8 (+4)  12 (+4)  16 (+4)  20 (+4)  24 (+4)  28 (+4)  32 (+4)  34 (+4)  38
45   6 (+4)  10 (+5)  15 (+4)  19 (+5)  24 (+4)  28 (+5)  33 (+4)  37 (+5)  42 (+4)  46
50   7 (+5)  12 (+5)  17 (+5)  22 (+5)  27 (+5)  32 (+5)  37 (+5)  42 (+5)  47 (+5)  52
55   9 (+6)  15 (+5)  20 (+6)  26 (+5)  31 (+6)  37 (+5)  42 (+6)  48 (+5)  53 (+6)  59
60  11 (+6)  17 (+6)  23 (+6)  29 (+6)  35 (+6)  41 (+6)  47 (+6)  53 (+6)  59 (+6)  65
65  13 (+6)  19 (+7)  26 (+6)  32 (+7)  39 (+6)  45 (+7)  52 (+6)  58 (+7)  65 (+6)  71
70  14 (+7)  21 (+7)  28 (+7)  35 (+7)  42 (+7)  49 (+7)  56 (+7)  63 (+7)  70 (+7)  77
75  16 (+8)  24 (+7)  31 (+8)  39 (+7)  46 (+8)  54 (+7)  61 (+8)  69 (+7)  76 (+8)  84

Look at how low the values are for 50% hit rate. Divine power alone is giving a lvl20 toon +20 to hit. The "bump" sequence is unchanged

Now imagine a ranged style toon with both spots for precision + point blank shot.
Keep concentrating on that 50% threshold if you dare

With precision and point blank shot +10% bonus
AC                  Hit chance
    0.5      0.55     0.6      0.65     0.7      0.75     0.8      0.85     0.9      0.95
30  -3 (+3)   0 (+3)   3 (+3)   6 (+3)   9 (+3)  12 (+3)  15 (+3)  18 (+3)  21 (+3)  24
35  -1 (+3)   2 (+4)   6 (+3)   9 (+4)  13 (+3)  16 (+4)  20 (+3)  23 (+4)  27 (+3)  30
40   0 (+4)   4 (+4)   8 (+4)  12 (+4)  16 (+4)  20 (+4)  24 (+4)  28 (+4)  32 (+4)  34
45   1 (+5)   6 (+4)  10 (+5)  15 (+4)  19 (+5)  24 (+4)  28 (+5)  33 (+4)  37 (+5)  42
50   2 (+5)   7 (+5)  12 (+5)  17 (+5)  22 (+5)  27 (+5)  32 (+5)  37 (+5)  42 (+5)  47
55   4 (+5)   9 (+6)  15 (+5)  20 (+6)  26 (+5)  31 (+6)  37 (+5)  42 (+6)  48 (+5)  53
60   5 (+6)  11 (+6)  17 (+6)  23 (+6)  29 (+6)  35 (+6)  41 (+6)  47 (+6)  53 (+6)  59
65   6 (+7)  13 (+6)  19 (+7)  26 (+6)  32 (+7)  39 (+6)  45 (+7)  52 (+6)  58 (+7)  65
70   7 (+7)  14 (+7)  21 (+7)  28 (+7)  35 (+7)  42 (+7)  49 (+7)  56 (+7)  63 (+7)  70
75   9 (+7)  16 (+8)  24 (+7)  31 (+8)  39 (+7)  46 (+8)  54 (+7)  61 (+8)  69 (+7)  76

Kind of freaking amazingly low, isn't it? and this doesn't even take into account grazing style hits that supposedly work on a 2+.

Ignore the hype believe the math
To-hit is still valuable - no where near its old value though

[Potta]

What I've seen is complaints on diminishing returns on AC.

This thread is about AB, not AC.

People have spent hundreds of hours grinding for gear to get that extra 1 or 2 AC. Now that work is devalued.

It's an expansion. Gear reset. That work would have been devalued at the least regardless of any combat change. It's entirely likely that even if the system remained exactly the same, most of the gear of the hardcore AC tanks would have to change. This is an attempt to attach their investment in the current system to fear mongering in to prevent it from ever changing. You cannot use current gear as a reason to avoid a combat system change in the expansion, it's a non argument.

The same applies to gear that improves your to hit stat, whether it's Str or Dex. There's little point grinding for a rare raid reward like a +4 Str tome when it's barely better than +2. Diminishing returns on stats means diminishing returns on grinding, so it's a slap in the face for the hard core forum-dwelling power player population.

I would argue that those who are truly hardcore melee would look at a +4 STR tome and see +1 damage or 2/4/6 AP, not +1 ab. The hardcore melee with all the best gear, the most optimized builds do not need another +1ab. Because +1ab has already diminished for them. Diminished into nothing. Show me a hardcore melee who has grinded for years to minmax his character who still needs +1ab and I'll show you a melee who's significantly exaggerating his time spent grinding. I'm sure those players who have invested the time are worried about doing less damage. About missing from time to time. I'm sorry but, it would have happened anyway. It's the meaning of a gear reset that that which once set you apart from others is going away. At least temporarily until you earn it back. There is no obligation on the part of Turbine to maintain the status quo for these players during a gear reset. To complain about gear resets in an MMO is to build a kitchen without a roof, and complain of the spoiled food when it rains.

[jeremyt]

I haven't been reading the threads closely enough, so I'm not sure I follow.

What I've seen is complaints on diminishing returns on AC. People have spent hundreds of hours grinding for gear to get that extra 1 or 2 AC. Now that work is devalued. The same applies to gear that improves your to hit stat, whether it's Str or Dex. There's little point grinding for a rare raid reward like a +4 Str tome when it's barely better than +2. Diminishing returns on stats means diminishing returns on grinding, so it's a slap in the face for the hard core forum-dwelling power player population.

As a once proud owner of a toon that crested and then kept climbing past the 100ACmark (but ofc is using robes/outfits so is getting smacked twice with the changes) my efforts are now junk. The toon would be much better performing if i went for a much more spread out gear/stat layout. Sorry it stings, and it makes me think the new system stinks. Also have a different toon that I went and did 3x fighter lives on, that used to give a 15% tohit chance increase on targets where my tohit was within 4-19 less of their AC. now on average with his epic gears ect it will on average give me less than 1% tohit chance...thats 15% with the norm being hitting 95% of the time against all targets with current system down to 1% and 65ish to 70ish % hit chance range (with little hope of climbing out of those ranges). So umm, what?

[CarpeNoctu]

I've never said Wisdom was a useless stat. I have 16 base and a +3 tome. It was the second stat I farmed for a +1 exceptional on. It's a secondary stat however, since your DCs do not matter if you cannot reliably hit.

You're absolutely right, and I apologize for my error... I had multiple tabs open and was confusing this thread with another... I guess I should quote more often so I can refer lol.

I will maintain however that Quivering Palm is a quivering pile of ****. It has a DC of at least 15 lower than Stunning Fist while costing twice as much. It doesn't even have the decency to work on things that Stunning Fist would not work on, with Deathblock/ward being much more common than stun immunity. You might kill low level, low fort **** with it, but low level/low fort **** are not found in elites/epics. The few that are are not worth 30 ki to have a chance of killing.

I still have to disagree with your assessment of Quivering Palm, however... No, I can't use it all the time, but I don't need to. When it works, it works.

I don't know the math nearly as well as many here, nor do I wish to, to be perfectly honest. I choose to rely on my own experience. I do fully recognize that others have different experiences and those experiences inform their opinions just as mine inform my opinions. Because of my own experiences, I have found Quivering Palm to be invaluable on my capped Dex Monk, both on Live and on Lamannia, before I TRd her. Of course, that was on a Dex Monk with Weapon Finesse. The TR build started with 18 Wis and I'm feeding Wis at every raise, making that my base stat. Of course, I would never do such a thing on Live without testing on Lamannia first, which is the whole reason for this experiment.

I've played around some with my Monk on Live, just to see what would happen in certain circumstances, with certain enemies. Now, I realize that this is absolutely useless in ANY other circumstance. I've removed all Str gear from my Monk and switched to Lesser Ocean Stance just to decrease her Str as much as I could and run different slayer areas and quests allowing the vast majority of my damage to come just from my wraps rather than her Str. She's still high Dex, so she still has a great AB with Finesse, but with so little to Str, she was doing next to no base damage (relatively speaking). But my wraps were still doing their job quite well... It does, of course, help that I am rather weapons obsessed and have greater banes for just about everything, not to mention my Epic Mabar wraps for undead, Banish of PG for anything that can be banished, Smiting for constructs etc. and this was all done in high level content. Most things took longer to kill, but with halfway decent AC, the AB and wraps were more than sufficient for me. This obviously won't work for everyone, but it's good for me, as I generally tend to solo more than many so I don't need to worry about the needs and wants of a group too much.

That is my intended goal with the TR build I'm testing on Lamannia. I wish to find out if I can get my AC high enough under the new system to be of any value, as I've never bothered with AC at all before, on any of my characters. To see if the AB will still be good enough to get me through to the end even if Wis is my primary stat then Dex, Con and Str (in that order). Again... No way I'd do this on Live lol.

Just to clarify my idea of the math (as stated above). I totally agree with all the people telling us that math doesn't lie, and if that were the only consideration, I'd be all for the numbers being crunched and taking a more serious look at them. Unfortunately, it's not the only consideration. While math does not lie, it can easily be misunderstood or misinterpreted... Otherwise, physicists would never disagree on anything that could be supported mathematically. As with so many other things in life (government, politics, religion, morals, ethics etc) math is not the problem... Humans are.

Sorry about getting off topic... There, and there, and there... And there...

[Potta]

If your experience of the content is limited to Slayer areas and normal dungeons, you may find use in Quivering Palm. I have yet to see one in Elites or Epics however. In that domain, it is trash.

[Stillwaters]

I would argue that those who are truly hardcore melee would look at a +4 STR tome and see +1 damage or 2/4/6 AP, not +1 ab.

Completely agree with you here Potta,
The diminishing to-hit returns are one thing, damage however is a constant and is ALWAYS worthwhile.

Having a dex based build will be fine on the to-hit front, yet you do suffer a lot from reduced damage from not maximising your damage asset (STR)

Devs hinted that after removing the Dex to hit and Dex to damage component from shadowdancer, they would be looking at making this viable from low levels via the enhancement change.

Once these changes come about you are likely on a winning build formula.
WIS for stuns, and occasional ToD, Dex for tohit/damage, AC and saves.