How well you understand this game and mechanics? [Oakfather Retribution]

imPDA · April 28

I saw a post "There needs to be a PvP Dev Team" and I am absolutely agreeing with it, and to show how bad dev understanding of game mechanics is and everything written in the set/skills description, and a little bit of fun, I came up with an interesting example. Many of you might know Oakfather's Retribution set, it is old, and it was discussed already, so you will answer this question easily.

Set description:
(2 items) Adds 129 Weapon and Spell Damage
(3 items) Adds 129 Weapon and Spell Damage
(4 items) Adds 129 Weapon and Spell Damage
(5 items) Gain 449 Offensive Penetration against enemies for each Major Buff they have active. Gain 20 Weapon and Spell Damage against enemies for each Minor Buff they have active.

Approximate test setup: PTS/Templar/no skills/no passives/no CP (even no guild buffs or passives, totally clear), only 5 set pieces, fists, and Piercing Javelin on front bar. You deal damage to training skeleton without buffs on it, write it down, then learn restoring aura (3 minor buffs), place it on front bar and do damage with Piercing Javelin again.

Question: how Oakfather's Retribution affects your own stats in theory (in tooltip) and in reality?

I intentionally avoided one tiny detail and other test I've performed, so if you can recognize it and accurately describe how set really works, I'll send you 1M gold (first message only). Think twice! It is really interesting question!

Do not open spoiler until you answer the question

Extra question: do you feel like it should really be fixed already? It was reported back in 2024, and still has this misleading hidden, um, "feature". And I would be glad it is one set broken only, but there are a lot of sets and bet you can find more broken ones. Some of them were fixed, but not all of them, because none understand all mechanics anymore (IMO!).

Kickimanjaro · April 28

It does not affect my own stats in any way, because it only works against enemies, set works as described

I was unaware of how this actually worked, thanks for making me test it out myself!

So, it shouldn't be buffing my weapon damage stat based on my own Minor buffs based on my understanding of the plain text of the item set... yet it is. But that number appears to be only visual / on the character sheet because the amount of damage done remains the same.

Fun!

MincMincMinc · April 28

It does not affect my own stats in any way, because it only works against enemies, set works as described

You have to remember though that your stat sheet is not actually connected to what is going on. You cant rely on the ESO stat sheet to be correct.

There was a similar situation with onslaught where the statsheet would give you pen based on YOUR resists. So if I was a 30k resist PvP build running DovRha and going up to about 50k resists, when I onslaught an enemy it would show I suddenly have +50k pen. Which is hard to test because the point of onslaught was to get perfect pen on your target so it was hard to tell if you were ACTUALLY getting 50k pen or if you were only getting the other persons resists worth of pen.

At the end of the day the statsheet does its own calcs and sometimes they pulled info from the wrong userID in the code.

imPDA · April 28

For some reason, character tab gives you info as if you were the target for yourself, so onslaught grants you penetration against targets equal to resistance they has, and you are treated as target, so you can have this additional penetration added to stats sheet.

Oakfather works the same way, it shows additional penetration and damage because you treated as "enemy" and it gives you penetration and damage based on your buffs (but x2 actually, that was one thing I intentionally wrote wrong, you gain 40 WPD/SPD per Minor Buff, not 20 as you can find in the set tooltip, and x2 penetration as well), but they are useless, because you can't use this WPD/SPD or penetration against yourself... or can you?

Soarora · April 28

It does affect my stats in tooltip, e.x. it wrongly increased my WPD/SPD by 3x20 WDP/SPD, but nothing else will change and set works as described

Fun thought exercise, would love to see more posts like this.

I recall that you are the target of character sheet changes because of community and dev notes about nightblade’s flanking passive treating yourself as the target for your character sheet (which iirc they changed a patch or two ago).

Also shown with resource node customized actions (seems to treat you as the resource node) and skill styles (treats you as the target).

Soarora · April 28

It does affect my stats in tooltip, e.x. it wrongly increased my WPD/SPD by 3x20 WDP/SPD, but nothing else will change and set works as described

imPDA wrote: »

but they are useless, because you can't use this WPD/SPD or penetration against yourself... or can you?

When a projectile is reflected back to hit you, does it do damage based on the target it was intended to hit or does it do damage based on the target it actually hits… hmm…

edit: or even dealing damage based on the reflector’s offensive stats…?

imPDA · April 29

OK, I am dropping full explanation:

As I said, it treats you as a valid target, meaning all minor and major buffs grants you damage and penetration respectfully. It displayed in stats, and doubled for some reason (e.x. 40 damage instead of 20 per minor buff), but in fact does not affect your damage to other players, but it can affect you own damage and healing to yourself

Here you can see healing without buffs, healing with one buff (Minor Resolve from Resolving Vigor), and then with 4 buffs. You need to cast Resolving Vigor twice to see the difference because Minor Resolve applied after healing, so it wouldn't be picked up by set as you can see, but after it applied - it will affect healing.

So, the answer is - this set IN FACT affects you, not only an enemy, which does not line up with description

It also can work like this to allies, I have not tested it yet, I bet it is. And I want to remind it is not the only set with obscure mechanic

@ZOS_Kevin Is it possible to change the set mechanic not to count you and allies as a valid target but count enemies only (according to description), so it would stop adding stats to wearer? Same for Onslaught. It was discussed a lot of time, and it is still here after years. It makes devs look like bumblings who can't comprehence it's own code and make a valid changes.

imPDA · April 29

"But the worst enemy you can meet will always be yourself." — Friedrich Nietzsche

This probably would explain set behaviour tho.

Kalthea · April 29

To be honest? This won't affect me in any way. Once Vengeance is permanent, that is the only way I will be interacting with Cyrodiil.

Thumbless_Bot · April 29

It does affect my stats in tooltip and in reality! WOW! This set is broken!

imPDA wrote: »

OK, I am dropping full explanation:

As I said, it treats you as a valid target, meaning all minor and major buffs grants you damage and penetration respectfully. It displayed in stats, and doubled for some reason (e.x. 40 damage instead of 20 per minor buff), but in fact does not affect your damage to other players, but it can affect you own damage and healing to yourself

Here you can see healing without buffs, healing with one buff (Minor Resolve from Resolving Vigor), and then with 4 buffs. You need to cast Resolving Vigor twice to see the difference because Minor Resolve applied after healing, so it wouldn't be picked up by set as you can see, but after it applied - it will affect healing.

So, the answer is - this set IN FACT affects you, not only an enemy, which does not line up with description

It also can work like this to allies, I have not tested it yet, I bet it is. And I want to remind it is not the only set with obscure mechanic

@ZOS_Kevin Is it possible to change the set mechanic not to count you and allies as a valid target but count enemies only (according to description), so it would stop adding stats to wearer? Same for Onslaught. It was discussed a lot of time, and it is still here after years. It makes devs look like bumblings who can't comprehence it's own code and make a valid changes.

Does it just impact displayed stats or actual computed damage and pen?

Wuuffyy · April 29

I now understand the tooltip values on character sheet are worthless but it function- the same as described (?)

Kickimanjaro wrote: »

I was unaware of how this actually worked, thanks for making me test it out myself!
So, it shouldn't be buffing my weapon damage stat based on my own Minor buffs based on my understanding of the plain text of the item set... yet it is. But that number appears to be only visual / on the character sheet because the amount of damage done remains the same

or?

imPDA wrote: »

OK, I am dropping full explanation:

As I said, it treats you as a valid target, meaning all minor and major buffs grants you damage and penetration respectfully. It displayed in stats, and doubled for some reason (e.x. 40 damage instead of 20 per minor buff), but in fact does not affect your damage to other players, but it can affect you own damage and healing to yourself

Here you can see healing without buffs, healing with one buff (Minor Resolve from Resolving Vigor), and then with 4 buffs. You need to cast Resolving Vigor twice to see the difference because Minor Resolve applied after healing, so it wouldn't be picked up by set as you can see, but after it applied - it will affect healing.

So, the answer is - this set IN FACT affects you, not only an enemy, which does not line up with description

It also can work like this to allies, I have not tested it yet, I bet it is. And I want to remind it is not the only set with obscure mechanic

@ZOS_Kevin Is it possible to change the set mechanic not to count you and allies as a valid target but count enemies only (according to description), so it would stop adding stats to wearer? Same for Onslaught. It was discussed a lot of time, and it is still here after years. It makes devs look like bumblings who can't comprehence it's own code and make a valid changes.

imPDA · April 29

Thumbless_Bot wrote: »

Does it just impact displayed stats or actual computed damage and pen?

It impacts both as described, it takes buffs on target and increases pen and spd/wpd, meaning all skills from you against yourself will be affected, and you see increased stats and damage in tooltip as if you would attack yourself. You can't damage yourself, so you can't really test damage increase, but heal is affected and you can see it, with every minor buff you heal yourself more. Damage against target dummy will not be increased, because it is different target with no buffs.

As far as I know, you can't do damage to yourself any other way but using skills and using ravage health potion (and fall damage), all of them ignores all stats, so you can't test if penetration works or if WPD/SPD increases damage, but WPD/SPD works increasing your healing.

imPDA · April 29

Wuuffyy wrote: »

I now understand the tooltip values on character sheet are worthless but it function- the same as described (?)

Kickimanjaro wrote: »

I was unaware of how this actually worked, thanks for making me test it out myself!
So, it shouldn't be buffing my weapon damage stat based on my own Minor buffs based on my understanding of the plain text of the item set... yet it is. But that number appears to be only visual / on the character sheet because the amount of damage done remains the same

or?

imPDA wrote: »

OK, I am dropping full explanation:

As I said, it treats you as a valid target, meaning all minor and major buffs grants you damage and penetration respectfully. It displayed in stats, and doubled for some reason (e.x. 40 damage instead of 20 per minor buff), but in fact does not affect your damage to other players, but it can affect you own damage and healing to yourself

Here you can see healing without buffs, healing with one buff (Minor Resolve from Resolving Vigor), and then with 4 buffs. You need to cast Resolving Vigor twice to see the difference because Minor Resolve applied after healing, so it wouldn't be picked up by set as you can see, but after it applied - it will affect healing.

So, the answer is - this set IN FACT affects you, not only an enemy, which does not line up with description

It also can work like this to allies, I have not tested it yet, I bet it is. And I want to remind it is not the only set with obscure mechanic

@ZOS_Kevin Is it possible to change the set mechanic not to count you and allies as a valid target but count enemies only (according to description), so it would stop adding stats to wearer? Same for Onslaught. It was discussed a lot of time, and it is still here after years. It makes devs look like bumblings who can't comprehence it's own code and make a valid changes.

They do not contradict each other, both works

aLi3nZ · April 30

I’ve been wondering why oakfather shows my penetration as being so high.

It’s a great set. I think I have 2 pairs of oakfather now for 2 toons. But I’m experimenting with other sets right now. Perfected null arca does hit like a truck in a burst window despite low penetration stats. No wonder it’s popular in pve and PvP now.

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How well you understand this game and mechanics? [Oakfather Retribution]

How well you understand this game and mechanics? [Oakfather Retribution] 12 votes