[X] My Assistant

Sorry to keep asking questions, and thanks to everyone who's answered so far(as soon as my karma refills, I'll dole it out again).

From looking at the wiki, I think I understand why I should stick with all one type of armor. Here's my reasoning. Am I wrong about this?
It has to do with Evade and Block. These two seem to both have an identical effect, from the wiki.

Heavy Armor(most of my stuff is shield) has block, while light armor has evade.

Given the mathematical formula used for chance to avoid attack, let's do a hypothetical situation where I've got 20 points of E or B, so I could choose to do 20% evade, or 20%block, or 10% of each. Ignoring parry and resist, the chance to avoid an attach is:

1-[(1-Evasion)*(1-Block)]

If I had 20% Evade
= 1 - [(1-.2) * (1)]
= 1 - [(0.8)]
= .2 (20 percent chance of avoiding damage)
If I had 20% Block
= 1 - [(1) * (1-.2)]
= 1 - [(0.8)]
= .2 (20 percent chance of avoiding damage)

If I have 10 percent of each
= 1 - [(1-.1) * (1-.1)]
= 1 - [(0.9 * (0.9))]
= 1 - [0.81]
= .19 (19 percent chance of avoiding damage)

Too much mathematical information to enjoy the game. But you are two-third right.

Basically it all comes down to this. When wearing same armor set, every 10 proficiency gives particular bonus that can stack, imagine heavy armor with 200 prof that give +20 endurance (translates into 80~120 depending on HP Tank), - 20 burden (reduce evade and critical attack penalties), and +14% Mitigation.

Mixing armor types actually penalize your killing efficiency more than the stat they give.

Not quite. Evade and Blocking, as well as accuracy, mitigation, and most other stats stack multiplicative. 5 peices of equipment that gives 10 percent evade each would stack like Total Evade = 1 - (.9*.9*.9*.9*.9) = 40.95%. You total chance to avoid damage would be 1 - (1-Evade * 1-Block), so with evade only, it would be 40.95%. If you stick 2 peices of 10 percent block in there then you block chance is 1 - (.9*.9) = 19% and your evade would be 1 - (.9*.9*.9) = 27.1%. Your total chance to avoid damage would be 1 - ( 1 - .271 * 1 - .19 ) = 1 - ( .729 * .81 ) = 40.95. It doesn't change since the chances are multiplied.

It has to do with proficiencies.

You only get the bonuses from proficiency with a full set.

It also has to do with playing style.

Light armor and heavy armor will play quite differently. Light armor attempts (and might I add fails) to use high evade, low burden, and low interference, and high action speed to allow you to dish out many hits before being hit back (and using stun), and uses evade to avoid that damage, with some mitigation to allow you to take hits better than a mage. Lower interference also means you can use more supportive spells to supplement your combat ability.

Heavy armor is more about brawn, because it gives bonuses to endurance and str and has higher mitigation. You can take more hits, and if you use power armor, you will also deal more damage than light armor. If you use shield, blocking will reduce the damage you take more than evade does because the base values are higher. In exchange, your supposed to be slower and can't cast spells as much, but in practice, especially with the latest patch, heavy is almost as fast as light, does more damage, takes less damage because blocking and mit are much better than evade and lower mit, featherweight shard enchantments remove both burden and interference and at higher levels, they are very common, and light armor has quite a bit of interference anyways.

If you mix them, then your kinda stuck in a situation where you lose out on proficiency bonuses (which really have more effect at higher levels), lose evade because of the higher burden of heavy armor, and can't do anything as well as pure light or pure heavy could do.

Thanks you two, that makes a lot of sense.I didn't realise that it had to be a full set, I just thought those benefits scaled(so you would get half the benefit if you had a half set.) I'm going to change to have all one type, either light or heavy. My light prof is better right now, but I'm not too sure. These are my best(or what I think is best) items. Do you think I should go heavy armor or light armor?:

Light Armor
[L65] Fine Shade Helmet of the Shadowdancer ( - ) Price: 780
[L52] Fine Leather Breastplate of the Fire-eater ( - ) Price: 624
[L38] Fine Leather Gauntlets of the Thunder-child ( - ) Price: 456
[L31] Average Shade Leggings of Negation ( - ) Price: 310
OR [L65] Fine Kevlar Leggings of Dampening ( - ) Price: 780
[L109] Exquisite Shade Boots of the Fleet ( - ) Price: 2180


Heavy Armor
[L49] Superior Plate Helmet of Protection ( - ) Price: 735
[L52] Fine Shield Cuirass of Warding ( - ) Price: 624
[L64] Fair Shield Gauntlets of Protection ( - ) Price: 512
[L54] Fine Shield Greaves of Warding ( - ) Price: 648
[L60] Fine Power Boots of Protection ( - ) Price: 720

I'd go with heavy armor, because as I mentioned, light armor is really not worth it right now. Its not actually much faster than heavy armor since burden has no effect on action speed, heavy armor can take hits better, power armor deals more damage than shade, evade stacks poorly, and with the new featherweight shards, you can actually get NEGATIVE burden with heavy armor. The removal of damage absorption as a stat has also hurt light armor (especially kevlar) more than mage or heavy armor.

Also see this.

You should always try to use equipment that is higher than you in level. Try out some peices in the shops I mentioned.

There are two pages in the wiki that I'm wondering about:

http://ehwiki.org/wiki/Item_World

The page above says that "Item World does, however, have the same drop quality bonuses as Grindfest." in the EXP section. Does that mean the quality of drops from Grindfest and IW tend to be higher than the ones from Arena when on the same difficulty?

Another is this:

http://ehwiki.org/wiki/User_talk:Varst

In the Battle Modes section, why does Arena have less drops on average? Wouldn't it have more because of the Last Round bonus?

There are two pages in the wiki that I'm wondering about:

http://ehwiki.org/wiki/Item_World

The page above says that "Item World does, however, have the same drop quality bonuses as Grindfest." in the EXP section. Does that mean the quality of drops from Grindfest and IW tend to be higher than the ones from Arena when on the same difficulty?

Another is this:

http://ehwiki.org/wiki/User_talk:Varst

In the Battle Modes section, why does Arena have less drops on average? Wouldn't it have more because of the Last Round bonus?

1. No, it just means they should have the same quality bonus. Because people are always asking if they'll get better equips when playing IWs with better prefix (ex, mag, leg). While there's no official answer from Tenb, experience tells me that they have the same quality bonus.

2. Arena tends to give less drops on average because there are less monsters per round compared to IW/GF. The effect is more noticeable if you compare the average number of rounds required to get an artifact between arenas and IWs.
Of course, if you only play the first ten arenas daily, the last round bonus may be more important. But that effect will diminish if you play arenas with more rounds.

I'm really having some trouble since absorption got removed.

I'm really having some trouble since absorption got removed.

For starter, dont mix armor type. Heavy Armors should be your main priority your first 100 level, survival is very important. Dont use 2-hander until then, use 1-hand and shield if you have them.

Invest Ability Points into HP Tank, this should be top priority over other abilities, get Cure and Aura Slot. As soon as the Tier 4 is unlocked, get Protection.

Aura should be Green

1. No, it just means they should have the same quality bonus. Because people are always asking if they'll get better equips when playing IWs with better prefix (ex, mag, leg). While there's no official answer from Tenb, experience tells me that they have the same quality bonus.

2. Arena tends to give less drops on average because there are less monsters per round compared to IW/GF. The effect is more noticeable if you compare the average number of rounds required to get an artifact between arenas and IWs.
Of course, if you only play the first ten arenas daily, the last round bonus may be more important. But that effect will diminish if you play arenas with more rounds.

So that means if you're hunting for Legendary or other high prefix bonus equipment, the best course of action would be switching the difficulty to IWBTH and going into a Crude equipment, right?

So that means if you're hunting for Legendary or other high prefix bonus equipment, the best course of action would be switching the difficulty to IWBTH and going into a Crude equipment, right?

Well...theoretically you're correct, but you'll have some hard time leveling your legendary equip through IW if you get them at lower level, and at higher level you can simply play those arenas in IWBTH difficulty for better chance.

Edit: Also, if I remember correctly, arenas should have some loot quality bonus if you finish them.

This post has been edited by varst: Apr 5 2012, 08:11

So that means if you're hunting for Legendary or other high prefix bonus equipment, the best course of action would be switching the difficulty to IWBTH and going into a Crude equipment, right?

Yes, because in Crude IW, monsters have much lower HP and damage than those in Fair or Average IW.

But Flimsy is the most ideal choice for Legendary hunting, since it sucks worse than even the Crude, but only few players still have them now and nearly as expensive as an ethereal mace in WTS.

double post

This post has been edited by Coma: Apr 5 2012, 08:06

So that means if you're hunting for Legendary or other high prefix bonus equipment, the best course of action would be switching the difficulty to IWBTH and going into a Crude equipment, right?

The best chance to get your legendary are noodles and iwbth arena clear bonus, the chance of getting one dropped by a monster are infinitesimal.

For starter, dont mix armor type. Heavy Armors should be your main priority your first 100 level, survival is very important. Dont use 2-hander until then, use 1-hand and shield if you have them.

Invest Ability Points into HP Tank, this should be top priority over other abilities, get Cure and Aura Slot. As soon as the Tier 4 is unlocked, get Protection.

Aura should be Green

HP Tank is maxed, I have Cure, Aura Slot, and Protection.
I have Red, Green, and Blue auras.

I'll work on the equipment then.

Though its gonna bug the heck outta me not having shatter strike to finish off those big groups all at once.

This post has been edited by Anonyslime: Apr 5 2012, 08:21

HP Tank is maxed, I have Cure, Aura Slot, and Protection.
I have Red, Green, and Blue auras.

I'll work on the equipment then.

Though its gonna bug the heck outta me not having shatter strike to finish off those big groups all at once.

Why? It only requires 100 OC to use shatter strike. And you don't need to be in spirit stance to do so.
Also, if you want to use shatter strike, it's better to use it at the start of rounds, since it'll also stun your enemies.

Oh you mean 2-handed vs 1-handed? Personally I don't think it's a great problem.
It's better to use DW/1-handed against small mobs, but against more enemies 2-handed is still the king.

This post has been edited by varst: Apr 5 2012, 09:06

I have 42.7% Phys Mit, 29.7% Mag Mit and 17.9% Block without wearing greaves (I'm looking for them).

What's Mit good for?

I have 42.7% Phys Mit, 29.7% Mag Mit and 17.9% Block without wearing greaves (I'm looking for them).

What's Mit good for?

What type of armor do you use?

Shield of Protection. Full set.

Shield of Protection. Full set.

Check your MoogleMail. :3

When does artifacts randomly drop? Is it after each completed round in the Grindfest and Arena? Or is it only at the very end of an Arena?

This post has been edited by Fille84: Apr 5 2012, 12:12