Phantom Dex Testing

[Whirlin]

At this point, I recommend if you're so dissatisfied with the results of the testing, to go out and repeat the efforts under the various size, race, and profession variables you have highlighted, posting the swing results, and evaluating the target's armor with crit randomization factored in. You'll get an idea for how painstakingly long it takes to test this stuff.

[Latrinsorm]

This thread was discussed on lnet tonight. I don't recommend anyone choose a weapon type based on this threads, its super speculative. Also, I don't think the theory is likely to be correct ... I don't really know what testing could be done to prove or disprove the theory. So, let me offer reasoning combined with what the do know about weapons (i.e what is from the official documentation) ... I think the weapons are balanced around the non-secret features of AvD, DF, and weapon speed in seconds. If they were balanced around a fourth secret factor, one would expect to see many "good" weapons that didn't not appear to be balanced around AvD, DF, and weapon speed in seconds. If you think this theory is true, then I would start collecting evidence around popular weapons that do not appear to be balanced. I am not sure what those would be (again I don't think this theory is likely to be correct). For instance, if there is a first weapon that appears to be OP based on the known factors (Avd, DF, weapon speed), and a second weapon that appears to be UP based on the known factors, then start looking to those two weapons for an undocumented point of balance.

I don't think weapon types are or are intended to be balanced in any way. For instance, when would you ever use anything but a falchion or morning star for open attacks in their respective weapon classes?

[Riltus]

I for one would be interested in hearing from Riltus about this testing:

Ranger w/ handaxe: No weighting
Warrior w/handaxe: Weighting


In regard to the height/size system. Was the warrior that did the testing the same height/size as the ranger. And what were the targets being tested. For instance, was the ranger a giantman swinging a handaxe at hobgoblinss, and the warrior a halfling swinging the handaxe at hobgoblins? You get the idea.


EDIT - interestingly I went back and read the thread and it seems that Riltus used a halfling warrior and a DE rogue for testing. I don't know what race, i.e., the height/size, of the ranger who didnt realize phantom damage from his dex bonus (whereas the halfling warrior did), however, and would be interested to know!

EDIT2 - skimmed again, the ranger was a half elf. So Ritlus found no phatom damage from dex by a half elf attacking a hobgoblin with a handaxe, but he did find phantom damage from dex by a halfling attacking a hobgobilin with a handaxe. Ritlus speculated that the difference could be related to some sort of profession factor, and I have no idea on that, and I don't meant to discount that possibility by speculating other possible grounds for the difference he found there, i.e. the height/reach system which as discussed in another thread here on the PC has a surprising amount of granularity accounting not just for the height of the attacker/defender but also the size of the weapon used. A simple enough experiment would to repeat the test on waraxe, this time using the same size warrior and ranger when attacking the hobgoblin.


Anyone more familiar with the height size system mind chiming in on the relative sizes of halflings, half elfs, and hobgoblins? Also, what is the "height" of a halfling with a waraxe (if you will, again I am referred to the incredibly granularized height system from another thread) vs. a hobgoblin? here is that other thread by the way:

http://forum.gsplayers.com/showthrea...e-Aiming/page5

I should have edited that post. Additional testing with the ranger/handaxe combo resulted in dex weighting. I don't think race, profession or height/weight are factors. Results indicated that heavier, more damaging weapons have Dex weighting caps but all weapons that I tested demonstrated a minimum of +2 pts of weighting including claidhmores.

Mark

[gilchristr]

Hey Ritlus good to hear from you man! Interesting that you eventually found dex weighting on the ranger/handaxe combo.

[gilchristr]

The original post in this thread has a column that states "dex bonus"... and for several of the weapons "no" is listed.

But ritlus just said "but all weapons that I tested demonstrated a minimum of +2 pts of weighting including claidhmores." It would be awesome if you could clarify the original post with the most current information.

[Donquix]

We were able to get the exact formula on discord the other night btw. The thing always missed in testing is there is a penalty based on weapon speed that can be counteracted by strength.

melee weapons:
(DEX BONUS - (STR BONUS - weapon speed factor)) /4

weapon speed factor = summation(weapon base speed + 1 [- 3 if you have an open hand ]) * 2

open hand is either a "real" empty left hand with a one handed weapon (i.e. no shield, no twc), or the empty hand from a THW/POLE also applies.

So for a lance the speed factor is: summation(9 + 1 - 3) * 2 = summation(7) * 2 = (7 +6 +5 +4 +3 +2 +1) * 2 = 28 * 2 = 56

if you have 56 STR bonus you can get the full (dex bonus / 4) weighting for a lance.

for ranged / thrown (lol buckle up) the phantom weighting is derived from...
((Int bonus + Wis bonus) / 6)
...because reasons


also the phantom con padding was revealed:
con bonus / 6



https://discordapp.com/channels/2260...10848052609126
a lot of chatter but formulas around there

[gilchristr]

Wow, I had observed dex bons / 4 many many years ago. It seemed quite simple

But I was testing with a max strength giantman, so there you go.

[Donquix]

Wow, I had observed dex bons / 4 many many years ago. It seemed quite simple

But I was testing with a max strength giantman, so there you go.

Yup. We definitely had conflicting information specifically around larger weapons and....well, there you go.

For people curious here are the STR bonus thresholds required for max dex weighting. (assuming the open hand "bonus" take the weapon speed to 0, if it can....i guess swing some sick shortsowrds single handed with you 0 str bonus)

No code has to be inserted here.

[gilchristr]

Did they say anything about the order of operations with the phantom crit padding?

Like if you have CER 10 armor, and 10 points from con bonus, is that effectively the same as CER 20 armor, or is better than 20 CER armor due to two "stages" of randomization?