Calculating Melf's Acid Arrow Dmg, an exercize in investigation....

[ZhenBuYaoShi]

Hey guys, so one of my characters is an Earth Savant, has Master of Earth, and so I expected my Melf's Acid Arrows to really increase in power; they barely seem to have been affected by the new boost; it doesn't seem like my spellpower is being applied correctly, either.

Is there some sort of known issue going on with Melf's Acid Arrow that I just don't know about that just isn't getting taken care of, because it used to be a pretty cool spell when it actually functioned properly! Plus, why design an new epic feat around a spell that isn't working properly, that's just horrid.

So, please, let me know if I am doing the following calculations correctly for my own personal Acid Arrows, with my spellpower, my feats, gear and enhancements. Because, I intend to investigate about 50 ticks, and report back what I find.

Melf's Acid Arrow:

2d4 +1/caster level Acid Dmg per tick= Avg of 2d4, or 5, rounded down, +1/(10Heroic casting levels + 10 Master of Earth casting levels + 7 casting levels from Earth Savant enhancements + 2 caster levels from gear, or 29 caster levels) Acid Dmg per tick

= 5 + 29 Avg Acid Dmg per tick

= 34 Avg Acid Dmg per tick

= 37 Max Acid Dmg per tick and 31 Min Acid Dmg per tick

Spellpower and Casting Multiplier:

529 Spellpower from Gear and Effects + 75 Spellpower Empower + 150 Spellpower Maximize + 75 Spellpower Intensify + 20 Greater Potions

= 849 Spellpower Total

Effective Spell Damage Calculation:

(Spell Damage @ level 29)( (Spellpower + 100)/100 ) = Damage when cast at level 29 with 849 spellpower? (IS THIS CORRECT?)

= (34 Avg Acid Dmg per tick)( 9.49 )

= 322 Avg Acid Dmg per tick cast at level 29 with 849 spellpower

= 294 Min Acid Dmg per tick " "

= 351 Max Acid Dmg per tick " "

= Crits ranging from 588 - 702 Acid Dmg per tick

Can I please get some verification that I have analyzed this spell correctly, and if I haven't, please correct me! Thank you!

[acdcrocks]

Hey guys, so one of my characters is an Earth Savant, has Master of Earth, and so I expected my Melf's Acid Arrows to really increase in power; they barely seem to have been affected by the new boost; it doesn't seem like my spellpower is being applied correctly, either.

Is there some sort of known issue going on with Melf's Acid Arrow that I just don't know about that just isn't getting taken care of, because it used to be a pretty cool spell when it actually functioned properly! Plus, why design an new epic feat around a spell that isn't working properly, that's just horrid.

So, please, let me know if I am doing the following calculations correctly for my own personal Acid Arrows, with my spellpower, my feats, gear and enhancements. Because, I intend to investigate about 50 ticks, and report back what I find.

Melf's Acid Arrow:

2d4 +1/caster level Acid Dmg per tick= Avg of 2d4, or 5, rounded down, +1/(10Heroic casting levels + 10 Master of Earth casting levels + 7 casting levels from Earth Savant enhancements + 2 caster levels from gear, or 29 caster levels) Acid Dmg per tick

= 5 + 29 Avg Acid Dmg per tick

= 34 Avg Acid Dmg per tick

= 37 Max Acid Dmg per tick and 31 Min Acid Dmg per tick

Spellpower and Casting Multiplier:

529 Spellpower from Gear and Effects + 75 Spellpower Empower + 150 Spellpower Maximize + 75 Spellpower Intensify + 20 Greater Potions

= 849 Spellpower Total

Effective Spell Damage Calculation:

(Spell Damage @ level 29)( (Spellpower + 100)/100 ) = Damage when cast at level 29 with 849 spellpower? (IS THIS CORRECT?)

= (34 Avg Acid Dmg per tick)( 9.49 )

= 322 Avg Acid Dmg per tick cast at level 29 with 849 spellpower

= 294 Min Acid Dmg per tick " "

= 351 Max Acid Dmg per tick " "

= Crits ranging from 588 - 702 Acid Dmg per tick

Can I please get some verification that I have analyzed this spell correctly, and if I haven't, please correct me! Thank you!

This looks accurate based on my math as well. Still its nowhere near being viable/competitive to other damage methods. It is very interesting to work it out tho

[ZhenBuYaoShi]

195
354 Crit
167
158
373 Crit
410 Crit
150
171
354
186
158
373 Crit
354 Crit
207
317 Crit
317 Crit
373 Crit

Something is very wrong with this spell if this is indeed the way that spell damage is supposed to be able to be calculated. I seem to be getting just about a little bit more than half of the damage I should be getting out of each spell tick. Acid arrows have been doing this terribad damage for a while, but this is the first time that I actually take the time to investigate how badly they are screwed up, and this is pretty badly.

I stopped early in my investigation, because it was clear that something was wrong; however, the number can still be used to demonstrated how badly things are skewed.

174 Avg Acid Dmg per tick, 358 Avg Crit Acid Dmg per tick. What the heck? Do I submit a bug report?! Is this a known issue? And, what's with all of these different damage numbers, there should only be a few different values, some of which should repeat often? Clearly, (Base Damge)( (Spellpower + 100)/100 ), is not how they calculate damage exactly. You could not possibly get all of these widely varied outcomes of damage. Can someone please explain to me what's going on here?

[Krelar]

I haven't checked in game but according to the wiki it's +1 per 2 caster levels, which would explain why you're getting about half what you expected.

[Grailhawk]

Melf's Acid Arrow:

2d4 +1/caster level Acid Dmg per tick= Avg of 2d4, or 5, rounded down, +1/(10Heroic casting levels + 10 Master of Earth casting levels + 7 casting levels from Earth Savant enhancements + 2 caster levels from gear, or 29 caster levels) Acid Dmg per tick

I think your calculating this wrong

Master of earth is +10 Max Caster levels
Earth Sevant cores have +7 Caster level
Earth Sevant cores have +4 Max Caster Level
Gear is +2 Caster Levels (not sure what gear your talking about but pretty sure its not max caster)

This gives you a max caster level of 34, with caster level 31.

Acid Arrow is 2d4 +1 per 2 caster levels this gets us avg base of 20 damage (2*2.5 + 30/2)

Spellpower and Casting Multiplier:

529 Spellpower from Gear and Effects + 75 Spellpower Empower + 150 Spellpower Maximize + 75 Spellpower Intensify + 20 Greater Potions

= 849 Spellpower Total

20*9.49 = 189.8


195
167
158
150
171
186
158
= 1188

1188/7 = 169.7

That's close enough to right given how small the sample size is I think.

[ZhenBuYaoShi]

I haven't checked in game but according to the wiki it's +1 per 2 caster levels, which would explain why you're getting about half what you expected.

I couldn't understand why, but now, it's perfectly clear. Thank you!

[ZhenBuYaoShi]

Now that I know that the damage I'm getting out of this spell is WAI, I'm pretty disgusted with it. It's only moderately helpful in heroics, and it's absolutely useless in epics except for pulling things.

This is a spell that could use some sort of new scaling benefit like "This spell scales @ 200% spellpower". Then, the spell might be useful, again. This could solve similar problems with other spells, not just 200% everywhere, but whatever scalar was deemed necessary to bring the spell's damage in-line with what it should be outputting for the level of the spell and the level of the cast with a certain spellpower. And, when something is outputting too much damage, just scale it down a bit. I think it could really work for damage dealing spells.

[ZhenBuYaoShi]

I think your calculating this wrong

Master of earth is +10 Max Caster levels
Earth Sevant cores have +7 Caster level
Earth Sevant cores have +4 Max Caster Level
Gear is +2 Caster Levels (not sure what gear your talking about but pretty sure its not max caster)

This gives you a max caster level of 34, with caster level 31.

Acid Arrow is 2d4 +1 per 2 caster levels this gets us avg base of 20 damage (2*2.5 + 30/2)





20*9.49 = 189.8


195
167
158
150
171
186
158
= 1188

1188/7 = 169.7

That's close enough to right given how small the sample size is I think.

I went and checked the combat dialog box to be certain, but yes, I do know how to calculate my caster levels correctly. I don't know exactly what you mean with your separations, but for every caster level that I included from the savant tree, it specified below it that it also was raising the maximum caster level, and therefore, I knew that it counted. Combat log confirms that the Acid Arrow is being cast at Level 29.

And, my gear, and why are you giving so much attitude, just because you're ignorant to the enchant that is on several pieces of gear in this game, sometimes it'll say it raises by one level, sometimes by two levels, for all spells level 1-9; mine are the Gauntlets of the Arcane Soldier. And, before you come back and say that it doesn't specifically say that it increases the max caster level of the spells that are being cast, the item would be completely stupid if it didn't raise the max caster level of the spells that are being cast while they are on, being that you're going to be capped already. They aren't going to give you 2 extra caster levels that you can't put to use.

My idiotic mistake was to not divide my caster levels by 2. Had I done that, all of my calculations would have come out correctly.

[Krelar]

And, my gear, and why are you giving so much attitude, just because you're ignorant to the enchant that is on several pieces of gear in this game, sometimes it'll say it raises by one level, sometimes by two levels, for all spells level 1-9; mine are the Gauntlets of the Arcane Soldier. And, before you come back and say that it doesn't specifically say that it increases the max caster level of the spells that are being cast, the item would be completely stupid if it didn't raise the max caster level of the spells that are being cast while they are on, being that you're going to be capped already. They aren't going to give you 2 extra caster levels that you can't put to use.

It may be stupid but according to the wiki that is in fact how it works.

[Grailhawk]

I went and checked the combat dialog box to be certain, but yes, I do know how to calculate my caster levels correctly. I don't know exactly what you mean with your separations, but for every caster level that I included from the savant tree, it specified below it that it also was raising the maximum caster level, and therefore, I knew that it counted. Combat log confirms that the Acid Arrow is being cast at Level 29.

And, my gear, and why are you giving so much attitude, just because you're ignorant to the enchant that is on several pieces of gear in this game, sometimes it'll say it raises by one level, sometimes by two levels, for all spells level 1-9; mine are the Gauntlets of the Arcane Soldier. And, before you come back and say that it doesn't specifically say that it increases the max caster level of the spells that are being cast, the item would be completely stupid if it didn't raise the max caster level of the spells that are being cast while they are on, being that you're going to be capped already. They aren't going to give you 2 extra caster levels that you can't put to use.

My idiotic mistake was to not divide my caster levels by 2. Had I done that, all of my calculations would have come out correctly.

So in my original post i made a little mistake where i messed up when i added 7+2 = 9 not 11 as i did.

Every thing else in that post is correct, I'm sorry if you read attitude in there there was none, just me trying to decode what you did wrong.

[Eth]

Combat log confirms that the Acid Arrow is being cast at Level 29.

Careful with combat log. It always shows caster level, even when CL is higher than MCL (in practise in such a case MCL gets applied still).

However in your case your CL is already lower than the possible MCL. You could raise it to 34 by running in an arcane destiny (+5 CL from cores).

So in my original post i made a little mistake where i messed up when i added 7+2 = 9 not 11 as i did.

Every thing else in that post is correct, I'm sorry if you read attitude in there there was none, just me trying to decode what you did wrong.

Earth cores give you 5 MCL (capstone has 2 increases, one passive one for the active form), so should be 35.


The only items that can raise MCL are ToD savant sets, which still work (+2 MCL).
Destiny stuff that works are Master of xyz (magister) and Dragon spell knowledge (both raise 3 CL + 3 MCL).

[Grailhawk]

Earth cores give you 5 MCL (capstone has 2 increases, one passive one for the active form), so should be 35.

My bad missed the active max caster level.

So to summarize (with correct math I hope)
Caster Level
20 Sorcerer Levels
06 Passive Sevant Cores
01 Active Sevant Capstone form
02 Gear
29 Total

Optioanlly
+05 Caster Level if in Arcane Destiny
34 Total


Max Caster Level
20 Sorcerer Levels
10 Master of Earth
04 Passive Sevant Cores
01 Active Sevant Capstone From
35 Total

[Rykka]

I take it from this conversation, that the SLA: Acid Arrow doesn't share the spell's MCL of 5, correct?

Edit: NM, the wiki page lists Melf's as MCL5 for some reason.

[Grailhawk]

I take it from this conversation, that the SLA: Acid Arrow doesn't share the spell's MCL of 5, correct?

Both should have a default max caster level of 20.

[Rykka]

Both should have a default max caster level of 20.

From Master of Earth. Gotcha.

I was just looking at the Wiki page on MCL that had a list Wizard/Sorc spells and their respective MCL. It lists the wrong base value for Melf's.

[Rykka]

Oh wait. Melfs actually has a MCL of 20 to start with. hmmm