EE Tanks. I need advice

[Meat-Head]

Some solid ideas here. Thank you. I gave out as much rep as I could.


I plan on dropping CE now. I'll go with IMP SM.


I can see that I will be using PA virtually all the time anyway. Plus, the PRR can be made up partially with Legendary SM. (a good point).


I'm not going to drop Imp Crit OR GTHF because-- again-- I want a close-to-full DPS option (for a thf pally anyway).


Thank you guys again.

[unbongwah]

GTHF by a mile. OC is +2 * base, no benefit to magical procs.

Interesting, because I saw a few people advocate dropping GTHF (inc. Ralmeth who usually knows his stuff), but not OC; my (cursory) research suggested GTHF was better, but I thought maybe there was something I was missing...

[LeLoric]

I think this an interesting mathematical proposal so let's look at it in more detail:

5% double-strike with a bastard sword's critical profile of 25 (with OC) gives...
.05 * 25 * base
= 1.25 * base

GTHF gives us +10% damage and +25% proc rate for glancing blows, or...
+ 19 * .5 * .1 * base
+ 19 * .25 * .5 * base
= 11.875 * base
...assuming we don't twist in any glancing blow stuff or run in Fury or some other crazy idea.

So in terms of raw damage the GTHF is 10.625 ahead, but what about magical effects? Well:

5% double-strike gives...
.05 * 19 on-hit
(also .05 * 4 on-crit and .05 * 1 on-vorpal, but we'll put that aside for now)
= .95 on-hit

GTHF gives...
19 * .5 * .03 on-hit
19 * .25 * .09 on-hit
= .7125 on-hit

In terms of on-hit effects the double-strike is .2425 ahead, so we technically need to know what our base and what our on-hit effects are to know for sure which one wins out, but it's pretty unlikely that you have 44 times as much damage from on-hit effects so I'd go with the GTHF from a pure DPS perspective.

Your numbers are Dmg over 20 hits instead of average dmg per hit so if your numbers were correct then we are talking less than .5 dmg per swing in favor of gthf.

This is a paladin which deals with things like smites, divine sacrifice as well as often some destiny attacks for which doublestrike is amazingly good and gthf does absolutely nothing for.

Fact is Imp shield mastery is more dps than gthf 90% of the time as well as provides more defensive benefit for the above build.

[unbongwah]

Your numbers also assume gthf adds a third glancing blow effect which it hasn't for a long long time now. You have the 3/4 glancing blows irregardless of the feat.

Are you sure? When did that change?

[LeLoric]

Are you sure? When did that change?

Can't say absolutely sure but pretty sure that all changed when they redid glancing blows back somewhere around u6-u7.

EDIT: Tested and this was incorrect so I was wrong there.


Even if that isn't true once again the benefits of doublestrike on smites/divine sacrifices, midnight enervate procs, etc. make up for that less than half a point of dmg per swing you get by having gthf over imp shield mastery, not to mention the defensive benefits. Also don't forget the lack of any glancing blows if moving.

I know Junts is running his bastard sword 18/2 pally tanks with no gthf for the same reasons.

Running without combat expertise is kinda a bad idea too if you are really serious about tanking and dmg mitigation. The ability to add 10% more ac as well as twist in 20ppr is a big difference maker in EE content. The AC often takes you from the get hit a lot point to rarely getting hit. The 20 prr is extremely important in cases where you get hit regardless of ac.

Can you tank without combat expertise? Sure but the difference of having it and not is pretty big in certain circumstances and those circumstances tend to be some of the most difficult in the game and having that tool available is more important than a slight dps increase in my opinion.

I think the choice on a build like this falls between OC and GTHF. GTHF provides a much more reliable dps outcome whereas OC helps things like smites, sacrifices, lay wastes etc provide some better burst dps. Since you want the cleaves/great cleaves most likely anyways I'd say take the OC.

[Munkenmo]

I think this an interesting mathematical proposal so let's look at it in more detail:

snip

In terms of on-hit effects the double-strike is .2425 ahead, so we technically need to know what our base and what our on-hit effects are to know for sure which one wins out, but it's pretty unlikely that you have 44 times as much damage from on-hit effects so I'd go with the GTHF from a pure DPS perspective.

your math makes me reconsider my earlier point, but imo you've overstated glancing blows, you don't get any when moving, and given how often i've got to reposission in eelob or eema, i'm definately not qualifying for them all the time.

[MattiG]

To answer the earlier question, I wouldn't take either feat on a pure pally.

With respect to gthf, have you all tested that with wild weapons twisted? I dont know what the result would be but it may well change all that gthf advice.

Is fred working now? Maybe I'll go try and snap some screenies.

[Kinerd]

Your numbers are Dmg over 20 hits instead of average dmg per hit so if your numbers were correct then we are talking less than .5 dmg per swing in favor of gthf.

.5 per swing per base damage, though. Smites very strongly favor GTHF for this reason: +67 base is a heck of a lot. Divine Sacrifice certainly favors the double-strike, and I like DS very much, but you can still only use it once per 3 seconds. When you're getting 5 swings in those 3 seconds, the 1 doesn't have a lot of leverage.

your math makes me reconsider my earlier point, but imo you've overstated glancing blows, you don't get any when moving, and given how often i've got to reposission in eelob or eema, i'm definately not qualifying for them all the time.

It's true that you don't get glancing blows while moving, but the beauty of the math is that you can account for that if you have a (rough) percentage figure for how often you're stationary. Let's say its 70%. Then instead of 11.875 * base and .7125 * on-hit, you get .7 * 11.875 = 8.3125 * base and .7 * .7125 = .49875 * on-hit, and we continue through the calculations as before. Or if its 50%, we use .5, and so on. This is also great because you can tailor it to each situation (you presumably run around more in LoB than VoD), then rate how important each situation is to you (who cares about VoD), and you'll have your solution.

[squishwizzy]

.5 per swing per base damage, though. Smites very strongly favor GTHF for this reason: +67 base is a heck of a lot. Divine Sacrifice certainly favors the double-strike, and I like DS very much, but you can still only use it once per 3 seconds. When you're getting 5 swings in those 3 seconds, the 1 doesn't have a lot of leverage.It's true that you don't get glancing blows while moving, but the beauty of the math is that you can account for that if you have a (rough) percentage figure for how often you're stationary. Let's say its 70%. Then instead of 11.875 * base and .7125 * on-hit, you get .7 * 11.875 = 8.3125 * base and .7 * .7125 = .49875 * on-hit, and we continue through the calculations as before. Or if its 50%, we use .5, and so on. This is also great because you can tailor it to each situation (you presumably run around more in LoB than VoD), then rate how important each situation is to you (who cares about VoD), and you'll have your solution.

Which leads me to a question: is Divine Sacrifice worth it for a pure pally tank? Do I take Divine Sacrifice AND Exalted Smite, one or the other?

I ask this mainly because You have to take so many defensive enhancements for DoS, that you're somewhat limited as to what you can spend on offense.

[elraido]

Which leads me to a question: is Divine Sacrifice worth it for a pure pally tank? Do I take Divine Sacrifice AND Exalted Smite, one or the other?

I ask this mainly because You have to take so many defensive enhancements for DoS, that you're somewhat limited as to what you can spend on offense.

Yes, you take both. And you spam the heck out of DS when you are attacking. And you take ES because it uses a different animation that is faster than regular smite.

[Kinerd]

Which leads me to a question: is Divine Sacrifice worth it for a pure pally tank? Do I take Divine Sacrifice AND Exalted Smite, one or the other?

I ask this mainly because You have to take so many defensive enhancements for DoS, that you're somewhat limited as to what you can spend on offense.

Divine Sacrifice absolutely. There's no question DS is really really good. The question is whether how much better it is with ISM is better than how much better all your other attacks are with GTHF. It's an intricate, very specific point. To be clear: every pally should have DS 1.

Exalted I'm not in love with from a mechanical perspective, but the animation issue elraido mentions is absolutely crucial for THFers. I don't know how it works for SnBers, but if it's anywhere near as bad absolutely. Plus it's only 1 AP on top of DS.

[elraido]

Plus it's only 1 AP on top of DS.

And that is why I take it as well.

[LeLoric]

.5 per swing per base damage, though. Smites very strongly favor GTHF for this reason: +67 base is a heck of a lot. Divine Sacrifice certainly favors the double-strike, and I like DS very much, but you can still only use it once per 3 seconds. When you're getting 5 swings in those 3 seconds, the 1 doesn't have a lot of leverage.

First .5 base dmg per swing of extra dmg is irrelevant as you have already calculated in any difference in the dmg type with crit values and glancing dmg increase etc. If anything it being base dmg is a benefit to the doublestrike argument as it can further be leveraged towards the doublestrike advatage through things that affect crit range/multiplier like smites, sacrifices, lay wastes, etc. That base dmg is static as far as glancing blows go outside of some of fury's benefits.

As for your smite claim, this is if you are accepting that smites are just used randomly instead of at more opportune times. To use smite on the attack hook that gthf gets as a bonus would be a bad idea just as using smite while moving is. It's quite possible that it's best to used on a third attack hook though due to the ability to speed up the slowest of the attack animations but further data would be required, if this were true of couse the benefit would highly favoe the doublestrike as no glancing blows are generated off that attack hook. Because smite is limited in use it's efficiency doesn't require it to be used as soon as it's off timer so selective useage comes into play.

As such depending on your level of exalted smite taken it varies on benefit here but its generally a push for exalted smite II and III. I favors gthf and IV favors doublestrike.

If we consider divine sacrifice II (the most likely option for this build as it can't get III) we look at a benefit for gthf of .03(.75)(7*3.5) or ~.55 dmg per hit to consider the gain it would get for the extra 3% of magical effects carried over to glancings. For the doublestrike benefit we look at an average swing dmg of a plain +6 bastard sword with the op's build and seeker 10.

sacrifice := .75*(2*5.5+6+x+7*3.5)+.1*(3*(2*5.5+6+x+10)+7*3.5)+ .1*(4*(2*5.5+6+x+10)+7*3.5)

or simply 54.925+1.45*x where x is the extra dmg modifier.

now our double strike benefit would be 5% of this amount or 2.74625+0.0725x

If we set x to a reasonable value of 50 we look get a benefit for divine sacrifice of 6.37125. Subtract the gthf benefit for a value of 5.82 average dmg per divine sacrifice II. If we use your 5 swings per sacrifice we get an average of 1.16 dmg per swing which negates your benefit you claimed earlier of about .5 dmg per swing and this is with a plain +6 bastard sword once we add weapn flags this benefit only increases for the doublestrike benefit.

Once again for the pally build presented gthf provides on most any circumstance slightly lower dps than imp shield mastery and has none of the defensive benefits.

[squishwizzy]

Yes, you take both. And you spam the heck out of DS when you are attacking. And you take ES because it uses a different animation that is faster than regular smite.

Divine Sacrifice absolutely. There's no question DS is really really good. The question is whether how much better it is with ISM is better than how much better all your other attacks are with GTHF. It's an intricate, very specific point. To be clear: every pally should have DS 1.

Exalted I'm not in love with from a mechanical perspective, but the animation issue elraido mentions is absolutely crucial for THFers. I don't know how it works for SnBers, but if it's anywhere near as bad absolutely. Plus it's only 1 AP on top of DS.

I had ES in my pally's past life, and he was a THF. I think I took it to lvl II. My biggest issues were that a) it seemed anemic, and b) the animation never seemed to show up, so I never knew if it was proc-ing. I'd watch the floating numbers, and maybe see a 95 dmg float by - no critical - so I know something was going on. Every now and again I'd see maybe 300+, but that was rare, and on a critical.

Anyhow, this is good information to know while I'm planning this out.

[elraido]

I had ES in my pally's past life, and he was a THF. I think I took it to lvl II. My biggest issues were that a) it seemed anemic, and b) the animation never seemed to show up, so I never knew if it was proc-ing. I'd watch the floating numbers, and maybe see a 95 dmg float by - no critical - so I know something was going on. Every now and again I'd see maybe 300+, but that was rare, and on a critical.

Anyhow, this is good information to know while I'm planning this out.

What were you using that you were only getting 300ish? Even with just the oathblade, I am hitting for over 400. But you are right. Smite, while it has gone threw some improvements, it is still a very anemic ability for paladins. It can deliver good DPS in a short burst, it just really lacks the sustained DPS most other classes get from a "main" ability.

[Alternative]

I have exactly the same build as OP, with SM and ISM, used to have CE but then swapped it to bastard sword proficiency. Only used CE once, then I learned I cannot use momentum swing without PA on, so never used CE again. 20 PRR isn't that big a deal, more important imo is to have as much dps as possible to hold aggro, especially since you don't get obscene imtimi number that is needed for EE DQ or EE lob.

[Kinerd]

First .5 base dmg per swing of extra dmg is irrelevant as you have already calculated in any difference in the dmg type with crit values and glancing dmg increase etc. If anything it being base dmg is a benefit to the doublestrike argument as it can further be leveraged towards the doublestrike advatage through things that affect crit range/multiplier like smites, sacrifices, lay wastes, etc. That base dmg is static as far as glancing blows go outside of some of fury's benefits.

It's not .5 base damage per swing, it's .5 per base damage per swing. If your base damage is 50, GTHF gives you +25 damage per swing over ISM.

As for your smite claim, this is if you are accepting that smites are just used randomly instead of at more opportune times. To use smite on the attack hook that gthf gets as a bonus would be a bad idea just as using smite while moving is. It's quite possible that it's best to used on a third attack hook though due to the ability to speed up the slowest of the attack animations but further data would be required, if this were true of couse the benefit would highly favoe the doublestrike as no glancing blows are generated off that attack hook. Because smite is limited in use it's efficiency doesn't require it to be used as soon as it's off timer so selective useage comes into play.

As such depending on your level of exalted smite taken it varies on benefit here but its generally a push for exalted smite II and III. I favors gthf and IV favors doublestrike.

I certainly agree that smites are used selectively, but I'm afraid you've lost me on the rest. I find it hard to believe people time smites to swing animations, and I don't understand why they would choose an imperceptible speed boost over using them on a glancing blow animation even if they did. Regardless, smites have the same issue that DS does: even if they did favor the double-strike, they are used so infrequently relative to regular attacks that they can't provide enough leverage.

If we consider divine sacrifice II (the most likely option for this build as it can't get III) we look at a benefit for gthf of .03(.75)(7*3.5) or ~.55 dmg per hit to consider the gain it would get for the extra 3% of magical effects carried over to glancings. For the doublestrike benefit we look at an average swing dmg of a plain +6 bastard sword with the op's build and seeker 10.

sacrifice := .75*(2*5.5+6+x+7*3.5)+.1*(3*(2*5.5+6+x+10)+7*3.5)+ .1*(4*(2*5.5+6+x+10)+7*3.5)

or simply 54.925+1.45*x where x is the extra dmg modifier.

now our double strike benefit would be 5% of this amount or 2.74625+0.0725x

If we set x to a reasonable value of 50 we look get a benefit for divine sacrifice of 6.37125. Subtract the gthf benefit for a value of 5.82 average dmg per divine sacrifice II. If we use your 5 swings per sacrifice we get an average of 1.16 dmg per swing which negates your benefit you claimed earlier of about .5 dmg per swing and this is with a plain +6 bastard sword once we add weapn flags this benefit only increases for the doublestrike benefit.

Once again for the pally build presented gthf provides on most any circumstance slightly lower dps than imp shield mastery and has none of the defensive benefits.

You've gone a little astray here: unlike pretty much every other critical multiplier increase, DS gives +1 to the entire range, not just 19 and 20. Other than that the DS math is good, your only serious flaw is comparing it to .5 instead of .5 * 50. You can do this with whatever weapon you like, you're never going to get to 25 from 1.16.

I had ES in my pally's past life, and he was a THF. I think I took it to lvl II. My biggest issues were that a) it seemed anemic, and b) the animation never seemed to show up, so I never knew if it was proc-ing. I'd watch the floating numbers, and maybe see a 95 dmg float by - no critical - so I know something was going on. Every now and again I'd see maybe 300+, but that was rare, and on a critical.

Anyhow, this is good information to know while I'm planning this out.

The animation not showing up is really the main thing you want out of ES. It is rare to time a critical with a smite, which is one of the reasons why Exalted Smite is not a great DPS enhancement and I personally don't take it past 1.

[squishwizzy]

What were you using that you were only getting 300ish? Even with just the oathblade, I am hitting for over 400. But you are right. Smite, while it has gone threw some improvements, it is still a very anemic ability for paladins. It can deliver good DPS in a short burst, it just really lacks the sustained DPS most other classes get from a "main" ability.

Just a generic boss beater: A +4 Holy Silver Falcion of Evil Outsider Bane. I use that as a guidepost (and becausemy crafter isn't yet at the level of +5 Holy Burst Sillver Falcion or Greater Evil Outsider Bane).

It was a 28-pt, first-life pally that went THF with PA...and I forget what else. I leveled HotD, tried an LR, and then just said "screw it" and TR-ed him into a pally DoS tank. My problem was that he was great up until about lvl 18, then from 18 - 21 the anemic DPS showed up in a very uncomfortable way. The problem as I saw it was that he lacked sufficient PRR, and his armor basically sucked so when he's get into melee he'd take horrible damage. Not doing enough damage output, there was really no way I could take him into EH quests without serious issues (though I did manage to get him through a couple).

So, instead of trying yet another fix, or paying for a Greater Heart, I had enough tokens farmed from another toon to get him a True Heart, and just TR-ed him into a DoS tank. In a couple of ways its a good thing for me because I'm getting the mechanics of AC with PRR and Dodge while figuring out some of the ways to boost DPS on a pally. So in some ways, I've taken lemons and am made lemonaid.

[LeLoric]

You've gone a little astray here: unlike pretty much every other critical multiplier increase, DS gives +1 to the entire range, not just 19 and 20. Other than that the DS math is good, your only serious flaw is comparing it to .5 instead of .5 * 50. You can do this with whatever weapon you like, you're never going to get to 25 from 1.16.The animation not showing up is really the main thing you want out of ES. It is rare to time a critical with a smite, which is one of the reasons why Exalted Smite is not a great DPS enhancement and I personally don't take it past 1.

I have not gone astray at all I gave the +1 multiplier throughout all crits. It means you get 10% of your attacks doing 3x and 10% doing 4x. Remember this is an OC bastard sword build.

I am unable in any way to come up with a 25 dmg per swing benefit to gthf so i'm gonna go over it all again. Turns out you have some multiplication errors in your original numbers.

Let's consider your original math argument again.

Instead of caluclating out a 20 swing average which is just prone to errors like your multiplications and gives a bloated number for an average dmg per swing calculation let's take a look at a single per swing dmg average for a bastard sword with Overwhelming Critical. This all assumes hit on 2 or above while not idealistic it is simplistic and attack bonus should not change with either choice significanltly.

Gthf Base attack seeker 10 assumed.

.75(x)+.1(2(x+10))+.1(3(x+10))

or simply 1.25*x+5.0 where x is base dmg.

Glancing blows then calculate out to.

.95*.75(.5(x))

or simply .35625*x

So a gthf attack would do on average 1.60625*x+5.0

Now for a 5% double strike calculation:

Base attack

1.05(.75(x)+.1(2(x+10))+.1(3(x+10)))

or simply 1.3125*x+5.25

Glancing blows on a imp thf setup would be

.95*.5(.4(x)) or simply .19*x

bringing out total to 1.5025*x+5.25

For a difference of

.10375*x-.25 per swing.

If we let x = 50 for a moderate amount (10 for 2[1d10], 6 enhancement, 5 power attack, 20 str mod, 9 additional weapon dmg bonuses) we get a difference of 4.93750 per swing.

I've already shown how divine sacrifice can drop this to ~3.75 dmg per swing. Other attacks like lay waste/momentum swing that carry with them expanded crit range/multipliers will lower this also along with attacks like volcano's edge/confront any foe that grant additional non base dmg effects..

Then theres the whole concept that noone uses a plain bastard sword and we have additional magical effects to consider.

Magical effects break down as follows. For non crit based effects the doublestrike setup breaks out at 1.05y for regular attacks + another .06(.5y)=.03y for a total of 1.08y
The gthf setup gets 1y for regular attacks and .09(.75y)=.0675y for a difference of .0125y.
For crit based magical effects imp shield mastery case gains .05(.2)z=.01z. y=attack based magical weapon effects, z=crit based magical weapon effects. Vorpal only affects also give a .0025v benefit to the double strike.

This isn't gonna amount to a ton but it does add up when you factor in weapon flags, sneak attack dmg, things like sense weakness etc. and depending on your setup can create a virtual push.

I won't even go into the benefit Nightmare gets with double strike which happens to be the preferred and most often used weapon for a build of this type.

Then theres the whole movement thing that throws it all out of whack in favor of the imp shield mastery plus you also get a fair amount of prr.

As for exalted smite you should have at least rank 2 as you spend everything to get divine sacrifice 2 also which is a big dps boost. Pally ap are tight but I find it hard to believe you can better spend those 2 ap. And timing them to attack chains it's quite easy really, much easier then old thf twitch attacking and I see no real reason why you would find it that hard to believe.

[pelaaja]

Improved Shield Mastery. But seriously, I'd rather forget the Cleave/Greater Cleave/OC for some self-healing capabilities (Maximize, Quicken...). Then you'd be able to get also CE.