[X] My Assistant

I'm not a mage so I'm just taking a guess at things: does this mean PAWD is better than PARD? The difference looks fairly significant. But how can PAWD be better than PSWD? I thought electric mage is better than cold mage? I saw the clothes are different, but at a glance the stats seem better on the shocking setup. More magic damage, more edb, same proficiencies. So how did it perform worse?

I'm not a mage so I'm just taking a guess at things: does this mean PAWD is better than PARD? The difference looks fairly significant. But how can PAWD be better than PSWD? I thought electric mage is better than cold mage? I saw the clothes are different, but at a glance the stats seem better on the shocking setup. More magic damage, more edb, same proficiencies. So how did it perform worse?

Look at the turns spent on curative actions (cold set has higher defensive stats across the board).

That's not how you shall come to a conclusion for another style.
With 13% less counter-resist, it's likely redwood players would encounter at least 3~5 more 50% and 75% resist. At the end, redwood might take more turns, so likely willow would still be better than redwoood.
With imperil, the damage is high enough to kill most monsters even if a few is 50% resisted. Therefore, the effect of counter-resist on damage is minimized in this case. As long as we don't know the trade-off between CR and Damage depending on conditions, we cannot easily draw a conclusion.

Besides, the elec and cold results were different set-ups. That's hard for me to learn the difference between elec and cold mages...

You are correct about the first line. My apologies if my post was misleading. It is an inference based on my own studies combined with the data provided. As I cannot provide the full details of those studies at present, my statements on the matter are essentially worthless and I cannot back up any further claims, so I will keep my mouth zipped on what (I think) I know about counter-resist. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

The data here is not used to compare cold and elec. It is used to compare redwood and willow (and significantly it helps isolate the effect of the EDB difference on the staffs, by comparing one element that is present on willow, to one that is not).

This post has been edited by lestion: Oct 13 2019, 14:46

I'm not a mage so I'm just taking a guess at things: does this mean PAWD is better than PARD? The difference looks fairly significant. But how can PAWD be better than PSWD? I thought electric mage is better than cold mage? I saw the clothes are different, but at a glance the stats seem better on the shocking setup. More magic damage, more edb, same proficiencies. So how did it perform worse?

Lower cast speed results in more cures = more turns.

I see it now, thanks. So then I guess we can presume cold doing equally well to electric in this test was due to better gears? Peerless vs legendary. The offense stats were made to look kind of equal by having way more radiants on the electric setup, at the expense of defense and casting speed. Ultimately that trade-off did not allow the electric mage with lower quality clothes to perform at the same level.

It would seem that the difference in cold and electric with identical quality clothes is probably fairly close though. The loss in EDB on the Willow is pretty much the only difference I guess.

I see it now, thanks. So then I guess we can presume cold doing equally well to electric in this test was due to better gears? Peerless vs legendary. The offense stats were made to look kind of equal by having way more radiants on the electric setup, at the expense of defense and casting speed. Ultimately that trade-off did not allow the electric mage with lower quality clothes to perform at the same level.

It would seem that the difference in cold and electric with identical quality clothes is probably fairly close though. The loss in EDB on the Willow is pretty much the only difference I guess.

Like I said, this is not to be used as a quality comparison between cold and elec. The difference between them is to simply isolate the effect of the staffs. This is a comparison between willow and redwood.

(And, as has been noted to me on Discord, for the 100% coverage imperil recast style. I am not convinced limiting imperil casts and switching to pure damage after some resists is anything but significantly worse, though.)

As long as we don't know the trade-off between CR and Damage depending on conditions, we cannot easily draw a conclusion.

You can check the last part of this post for my approach.
Average resist is probably a lot higher now and I wouldn't be surprised if 13CR is worth >3.5% damage.

Yay Sapo84 came back!

I'm going to repeat the Haste tests this week. I plan to do Arenas 55, 60, and 65 without infusion using the spread style, and Arenas 80 and 90 with infusion using the individual targeting style. Though sample sizes will still be small it could provide further insight to the following questions:

• How much worse does Haste get without infusion?
• Does turns/second truly drop in larger arenas due to spread wasting?
• How does individual targeting compare to spreading at mid level?
• Does turns/second improve with Haste in arenas due to just casting?
• Does Haste improve or worsen the individual targeting playstyle?

Yay Sapo84 came back!

Not really, I'm just lurking when I have nothing to do at work (god bless >2 minutes of build time) (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif)

Anyway, from what I remember when i tested haste with 1H not using it made me a lot faster, and with a lot I mean 5% or more.
But it was tested with OFC and with t/s close to 4 so it probably doesn't reproduce your conditions at all.

It would probably be good even for me in the last ~400 rounds or so of PFUDORFest but since doing fests with 1H is awful (actually doing anything with 1H is awful when I can just use my mage persona and clear everything 2-3X time faster).

[imgur.com] http://imgur.com/FOKJ8O1 [imgur.com] http://imgur.com/UNgNXTy [imgur.com] http://imgur.com/hQFWw0l
[imgur.com] http://imgur.com/LaOlftG [imgur.com] http://imgur.com/A3qRaL1 [imgur.com] http://imgur.com/72jlgZt
[imgur.com] http://imgur.com/P24e3JL [imgur.com] http://imgur.com/WfJs0Ei [imgur.com] http://imgur.com/8VtroC3
[imgur.com] http://imgur.com/vUUdKal [imgur.com] http://imgur.com/OV7cDYR [imgur.com] http://imgur.com/U3fix86
[imgur.com] http://imgur.com/fsGgQCU [imgur.com] http://imgur.com/MlYFUXR [imgur.com] http://imgur.com/vcCXtKP

55 round 882 turns 0:05:55 (2.485 t/s) 5.4% faster, 5% weaker (Attack: 859 Counter: 1026, Protection: 1, Spark: 1, Shield: 1, Heartseeker: 4, Regen: 7, Cure: 1)
60 round 1,071 turns 0:07:03 (2.532 t/s) 3.6% faster, 5.5% weaker (Attack: 1045 Counter: 1357, Protection: 1, Spark: 1, Shield: 1, Heartseeker: 3, Regen: 9)
65 round 1,103 turns 0:07:22 (2.495 t/s) 10.5% faster, 2.3% stronger (Attack: 1079 Counter: 1441, Protection: 1, Spark: 1, Shield: 1, Heartseeker: 2, Regen: 10, Cure: 1)
80 round 1,462 turns 0:12:57 (1.882 t/s) 3.1% faster, 5.5% weaker (Attack: 1428 Counter: 1527, Protection: 1, Spark: 1, Shield: 1, Heartseeker: 4, Regen: 12)
90 round 1,442 turns 0:11:29 (2.093 t/s) 7.3% faster, 8.3% weaker (Attack: 1411 Counter: 1334, Protection: 1, Spark: 1, Shield: 1, Heartseeker: 3, Regen: 11, Cure: 1)

55 round 858 turns 0:05:47 (2.473 t/s) 8.4% faster, 2.1% weaker (Attack: 829 Counter: 968, Protection: 1, Spark: 1, Shield: 1, Heartseeker: 3, Regen: 9, Mana Draught: 1)
60 round 1,043 turns 0:07:17 (2.387 t/s) 6.4% faster, 2.8% weaker (Attack: 1006 Counter: 1309, Protection: 3, Spark: 3, Shield: 3, Heartseeker: 3, Regen: 7, Cure: 3, Mana Draught: 1)
65 round 1,107 turns 0:07:39 (2.412 t/s) 10.1% faster, 1.9% stronger (Attack: 1072 Counter: 1415, Protection: 3, Spark: 3, Shield: 3, Heartseeker: 4, Regen: 9, Cure: 3, Mana Draught: 2, Potion: 1)
80 round 1,434 turns 0:12:39 (1.889 t/s) 5.2% faster, 3.5% weaker (Attack: 1404 Counter: 1475, Protection: 1, Spark: 1, Shield: 1, Heartseeker: 3, Regen: 12, Cure: 1)
90 round 1,465 turns 0:12:02 (2.029 t/s) 5.6% faster, 10.1% weaker (Attack: 1432 Counter: 1344, Protection: 2, Spark: 1, Shield: 1, Heartseeker: 3, Regen: 12, Cure: 1)

55 round 930 turns 0:06:11 (2.507 t/s) 5.4% slower, 8.1% weaker (Attack: 910 Counter: 768, Protection: 1, Spark: 1, Haste: 1, Heartseeker: 3, Regen: 6, Cure: 1)
60 round 1,110 turns 0:07:09 (2.587 t/s) 3.6~6.4% slower, 6.6% weaker (Attack: 1089 Counter: 1065, Protection: 1, Spark: 1, Haste: 1, Shield: 1, Heartseeker: 3, Regen: 6, Cure: 2)
65 round 1,219 turns 0:07:56 (2.561 t/s) 10.1% slower, 7.0% weaker (Attack: 1192 Counter: 1142, Protection: 1, Spark: 1, Haste: 1, Heartseeker: 3, Regen: 7, Cure: 1)
80 round 1,508 turns 0:12:41 (1.982 t/s) 3.1~5.2% slower, 6.2% weaker (Attack: 1479 Counter: 1122, Protection: 2, Spark: 2, Haste: 2, Heartseeker: 3, Regen: 8, Mana Potion: 1)
90 round 1,547 turns 0:11:53 (2.17 t/s) 5.6% slower, 12.7% weaker (Attack: 1513 Counter: 1052, Protection: 3, Spark: 3, Haste: 3, Heartseeker: 4, Regen: 9, Cure: 1, Mana Draught: 1)

This time I avoided all hardcasting without Haste, then redid those runs with my previous hardcasting style. It made no difference. Due to bizarre luck, hardcasting took fewer turns and used up more draughts. Some runs were so odd I had to throw them out; they got faster without infusions. It's expected that infusions strengthen your main attack by ~11% damage, and overall damage including counters by 7~9%. However the PA wearing off syndrome tends to weaken the main attack more than counters. Thus the tested benefit of infusion to non-Imperil spread 1H is 6~8% with Haste and 3~5% without Haste.

From my previous comparison with infusions using Haste with non-Imperil spread 1H increases turns by 1~3%. Haste originally reduces damage by 12% due to drop in counters; this translates to an additional 1% without infusion (12% * 7~9%). We'd then expect Haste to increase turns by 2~4% without infusion. But because infusions don't benefit Haste and non-Haste styles equally Haste without infusion increases turns by 4~6% in these tests, and potentially more in arenas with smaller mobs considering the data I threw out.

The final two arenas were done using individual targeting with infusions. Arena size shouldn't matter but I lost Spirit Stance in the beginning of Arena 90 which skewed its results. Individual targeting was about 4~6% worse than spreading at my level. It should be a closer comparison at high level. I tried to target Stunned enemies so my turns/second dropped. Using Haste increased turns by 3~5% with the targeting style.

This new data provides more turns/second examples. My turns/second is consistently 6~9% quicker when spreading with Haste, on the large mob arenas only. For the individual targeting tests my turns/second is 5% quicker on average. The arena size doesn't matter and this should be purely the result of casting spells. Thus there seems to be ~2% turns/second increase due to the spread wasting phenomena in large arenas.

When I played without Haste using absolute minimum casts my turns/second was higher, and there was a ~2% turns/second difference with Haste in large arenas. This matches the above, meaning I was able to reduce unnecessary casting time to zero, but could not reduce spread wasting. I consider the casting time issue to be legitimate for players at my level, but it should eventually disappear for high level players in arenas.

-snip-

BlueWaterSplash, could you put the description of the game method before each result list? The way you write it gets confusing.

About what you described from the results, I have the same comment made by Sapo84. I have no recent practical results, but I know all my times have gone down after I stopped using Haste and Shadow Veil.

But apparently, Haste seems to help in specific cases (like yours). I also discovered another one with use for Haste: Ring of Bood. For the last two weeks I've been playing RoB FSM, with and without Haste, for both Rapier and Shortsword. These were the best results I got:

Rapier without Haste (Holy + Elec Infusion)(Holy Day): 62 turns
Rapier with Haste (Holy + Elec Infusion)(Elec Day): 49 turns

Shortsword without Haste (Elec + Holy Infusion)(Elec Day): 72 turns
Shortsword with Haste (Elec + Dark Infusion)(Dark Day): 64 turns

Note:
(1) Since I don't use scripts, the turn count was based on the number of turns of Spark of Life. My first action is to cast Spark of Life, see the initial duration, and at the end see how much is left. The difference is the number of turns of the round. It's not ideal, but it's the best I can do. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/heh.gif)
(2) With Rapier, I focus all attacks on FSM until it is defeated (normal attacks + Vital Strike), and then I eliminate the rest (normal attacks + OFC). With Shortsword I use the spreading method, using Vital Strike over the FSM until he gets weak, and finishing with OFC. Individual target does not work with Shortsword and, in this specific case, spreading does not work with Rapier (the results were 10 to 20 more turns).
(3) My Rapier is full forge (ADB 12769), while my Shortsword is forge level 50 (ADB 13053).

Apparently Haste is good against extremely tough monsters.

Note:
(1) Since I don't use scripts, the turn count was based on the number of turns of Spark of Life. My first action is to cast Spark of Life, see the initial duration, and at the end see how much is left. The difference is the number of turns of the round. It's not ideal, but it's the best I can do. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/heh.gif)

FYI, the turn count on any buff will be relative to the game speed... you cannot measure turn count using this, if you use two different attack speeds.

Oh yeah, lestion is right! Good catch, and good thing you responded first!

Regardless, megawife also reported that Haste performs better in School Girl arenas. I do not have plans to test those because there are so many different ways to play them.

Haste should be best for very large mobs and maybe also very small mobs of monsters. The biggest mob arenas 60, 65, and 80 performed well with Haste for me. And if the mob is very small like 1~3 monsters, then as long as Haste doesn't cause you to run out of Spirit Stance before you finish, the number of counter attacks is low.

However the majority of arenas have mob sizes like arena 55 and 90, which Haste does worst in. So if you test over all arenas, Haste will be worse. If you want to see competitive Haste results I recommend only doing arena 60, 65, and 80. And maybe School Girl arenas; if it's not on IA then you can start casting Haste when SchoolGirls appear like megawife recommended.

The best result with Haste so far is Fudo's Grindfest. I don't do Grindfest but IW should be similar. I'm considering to test IW100 but I don't have anything I really want to IW100 at the moment. Also I think I'm still too low level so if I play IW100 correctly I probably still need to target monsters individually once it gets tough, which defeats the point of that Haste test.

How do you spread without script?

I'm not a statistically minded person, but just to throw my experience in, I recently started using haste in DwD. Initially this was by mistake, I was trying out a 1h light armour build, and just swapped gear rather than set up a 3rd persona, and threw haste onto IA, but forgot to take it off again when I went back to heavy.

Initially, my turn count was roughly the same as always. I wasn't burning through mana as quick with it on, but as you said the initial rounds were horrendous for staying in Spirit Stance. I struggle to keep permanent spirit stance on the first rounds anyway, but it went worse with haste. It was easier playing though, not needing to mind mana as much. After trying it a handful times, sometimes I got more or less the same as without haste, sometimes it added almost 100 turns onto my time, but not really managed to improve my time yet. Maybe a different attack strategy is needed with haste or something.

I imagine I'd get better results with fully forged gear, but I've been holding off on upgrading too much until recently in the hope of finding a good strategy without upgrades effecting my turn count, so I don't know for sure. I'll be interested to read what some others experienced with haste.

Using Short Sword + imperil, heavy power of protection (2) and warding (3) (1 savage).

On the note of permanent spirit stance, with the exception of it depleting because of vital strike (so in a case where I didn't use skills but just attacked normally inc. imperil), all rounds with at least 1 sg is enough to stay in spirit stance permanently. Without imperil I'd probably stay in permanent spirit stance in the first rounds, but the decreased damage wouldn't be worth it. I can still go a fair few rounds before I have to build it up again though.

Haste isn't supposed to help Imperil styles, at least not according to my current ideas. Although level should matter, I'm not sure gear matters much for Haste tests. However having better slaughter gear with upgrades will help you to power through the early rounds with few monsters before your spirit stance runs out.

Although there appears to be some potential for Haste to improve non-Imperil clear times in large arenas, Item World, and Grindfest, for the most part it should still be considered to worsen clear times by a moderate 2.5% (with infusion) or 5% (without infusion). However this is much less worsening than some people previously believed, as people only explained it via the drop in counter attacks, without fully realizing all the benefits of Haste.

If the worsening in clear time is 2.5% or less then in my opinion avoiding Haste is pointless; most people who meet the playstyle conditions should use it.

People haven't commented yet upon my latest test suggesting that infusions only improve 1H (without Haste) by a pathetic 3~5%. That's pretty small, why bother with it?

People complain about Haste making them slower due to drop in counter attacks; maybe they should also complain that infusions barely matter if you get decent damage from counter attacks. In my tests I was sometimes faster without infusions, though I considered those exceptionally lucky cases and threw the data out.

People haven't commented yet upon my latest test suggesting that infusions only improve 1H (without Haste) by a pathetic 3~5%. That's pretty small, why bother with it?

Even if you consider 3% and you subtract ~5s for casting (with HVUtil you would be even faster but let's take 5s as baseline), if you play HV for 1 hour a day it stills means you're saving 10.5 hours worth of play every year.
Are 2920 infusions worth more than 10.5 hours?
I'd say no.

The best result with Haste so far is Fudo's Grindfest. I don't do Grindfest but IW should be similar. I'm considering to test IW100 but I don't have anything I really want to IW100 at the moment. Also I think I'm still too low level so if I play IW100 correctly I probably still need to target monsters individually once it gets tough, which defeats the point of that Haste test.

Not really, Fests are much tougher.
You can somewhat compare IWTBHFest with IW100, PFUDORFest is on another level entirely.

FYI, the turn count on any buff will be relative to the game speed... you cannot measure turn count using this, if you use two different attack speeds.

I didn't even think about that. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/heh.gif) Unfortunately I will have to wait for Tenboro to add an official turn counter.

How do you spread without script?

As there are only 4 monsters I just need to press keys 1 to 4 in sequence to try to keep everyone under the effect of Bleeding Wound. And since it's just a single round, I don't have to worry about the time, just the amount of turns.

People haven't commented yet upon my latest test suggesting that infusions only improve 1H (without Haste) by a pathetic 3~5%. That's pretty small, why bother with it?

People complain about Haste making them slower due to drop in counter attacks; maybe they should also complain that infusions barely matter if you get decent damage from counter attacks. In my tests I was sometimes faster without infusions, though I considered those exceptionally lucky cases and threw the data out.

Because it is a basic thought: if it improves then it is used; if it gets worse then it is not used.

It's pretty much the same thing about getting the highest DD levels (6-9) or doing the last 20 or 30 upgrade levels (ADB). The gain is minimal, but everyone still wants to have it. After all, what else can be done, in a simple way, to improve the performance?

I think it depends on your level of wealth and your current power. Most players can't dream of DD6~9 and max forged Slaughter until way past level 500. With infusions, anyone can afford it in a short term, but if you add up the cost to continually use it, how rich should you have to be for it to be worth the cost?

Are 2920 infusions worth more than 10.5 hours?

I guess that's very roughly 600k credits. I dunno, to me that's a lot of money. For nearly all my life I only made 10k per day in arenas. Nowdays I can make more, I don't know how much, but maybe 60k per hour? DwD takes me over half an hour.

So to play for 10 hours I will only make 600k. It's equal to this 600k infusions cost. So doesn't matter one way or the other. Doesn't it suck to be a slow 1H player? ;)

DD1 is roughly 8 million credits, but it increases damage more so that would be equivalent to 2.7 million credits scaled down. But DD1 lasts forever; if you played for 5 years then infusing would be more expensive than DD1.

People do a lot in this game for a 2-3% increase. Increasing stuff by small increments is pretty much the goal for many since the game has no real ending.
Also you didn't add experience gain in the 10 hours comparison - even if let's say infusions don't give you a credits gain, you'll end up with more experience. Not a large difference but then again, small increments, etc.

And hitting stuff for more damage and with more strikes is just cool. That's enough of a reason tbh.

I guess that's very roughly 600k credits. I dunno, to me that's a lot of money. For nearly all my life I only made 10k per day in arenas. Nowdays I can make more, I don't know how much, but maybe 60k per hour? DwD takes me over half an hour.

So to play for 10 hours I will only make 600k. It's equal to this 600k infusions cost. So doesn't matter one way or the other. Doesn't it suck to be a slow 1H player? (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

DD1 is roughly 8 million credits, but it increases damage more so that would be equivalent to 2.7 million credits scaled down. But DD1 lasts forever; if you played for 5 years then infusing would be more expensive than DD1.

600k is too much, flames/cold/lightning are worth no more than 120C/piece so we are talking about 300-350k or 30k/hour.
I also assumed you were testing with 2 infusions, but on hindsight 3% seems too low, if it was 3% for each infusion then you can halve the number of infusions to 1460, for a yearly expense of ~160k.
For DwD you would want a dark or holy infusion which would speed up things well above 3% (dark/holy strike do more damage than void against 3 schoolgirls out of 4) so it would need another test entirely.

All in all unless 1H players have very bad clearing speed (very low level, weak equipments, low t/s) infusions are still worth the cost.

The comparison with DD1 is pretty strange, it's apple vs orange, you can pay infusions as you go and they repay themselves immediately, DD1 requires an upfront cost that you may not have available and needs months/years to pay for itself.

Typical monsters at level 500 have between 70%~75% PMit and reaching 80% with chaos upgrades; we might assume they likewise have a similarly high amount of MMit. So I was wondering, how are non-Imperil holy and dark mages viable? Aren't they supposed to be faster than Imperil holy and dark mages, or Imperil elemental mages?

How do mages get through that humongous MMit without Imperil? Prof factor only affects elemental mitigation right?