*DEFINITIVE* spell resist/penetration/sharpened trait results thread - bugs, stam imbalance and why!

Attorneyatlawl

@Jelark, that's a good test idea to confirm, again the problem is getting impen gear on PTS since I have had two rollbacks so far in the last day, but if I am able to do it I will check an easy couple of tests such as crit less than an enemy's impen (can you still crit? that'll prove/disprove the general working knowledge) and then adding beyond the impen (assuming the 10 rating = 1% reduction as currently known and off of old psijic testing) by a small amount and seeing if the crit rate is appropriately low over a couple of hundred hits (while randomness could factor into the exact percentage, we can safely assume that if I magically crit more than half the time when I only have what should be 5-10% above the target's impen, that something is wonky ).

@ExiledKhallisi‌, that's unfortunately a very broad topic dependent on a lot of factors including spec and combat situation as well as of course gear. I will keep the idea in mind but it's beyond the scope of the testing I'm doing here .

@Rodario, to play devil's advocate and be fair, on a large project like an MMO not every member of the team (even combat) is going to know every detail about the game specifically and in-depth, especially if it's a bug they weren't aware of on one part of the testing they're looking at here. Probably reading wayyyy too much into the comment.

Jelark

@Attorneyatlawl‌ Can be tested in the live at first?

it would be easy, I guess to test whether impenetrable rate > critical rate = 0 criticak strike

Attorneyatlawl

Jelark wrote: »

@Attorneyatlawl‌ Can be tested in the live at first?

it would be easy, I guess to test whether impenetrable rate > critical rate = 0 criticak strike

Neither account has a high enough level toon on another faction to zone into cyrodiil on live, but that would be an easy way to check so long as I did it at a very off hour in a remote location. One way or another I'll get it done .

zbtiqua

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Main take-aways are:

-Sharpened trait is completely broken and unfortunately is probably part of the cause for the huge outcry of magical abilities being overpowered compared to stamina/physical attacks.
-The urban legend of "spell penetration is additive against resistances" is completely false. They operate as a percentage of your enemy target's resists in a linear fashion as expected.

Edit: Now I understand, you are saying that the sharpened trait is "broken" in the sense that it is completely overpowered! Hours later, I am finally catching up to the math

Attorneyatlawl

zbtiqua wrote: »

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Main take-aways are:

-Sharpened trait is completely broken and unfortunately is probably part of the cause for the huge outcry of magical abilities being overpowered compared to stamina/physical attacks.
-The urban legend of "spell penetration is additive against resistances" is completely false. They operate as a percentage of your enemy target's resists in a linear fashion as expected.

Is it that the sharpened trait is broken, or that the player is actually capped on spell pen without the trait?

I read a thread here suggesting that the spell penetration calculation is actually bugged, and falsely inflated. This could explain why using a sharpened trait does not increase the damage you are doing, if you are already ignoring all the resist that you can ignore?

Forgive me if this is already addressed and incorrect, I am not quite as strong in mathematics as some

The data in the table supports that much much higher percentages of spell penetration don't take away all of the enemy's mitigation, but as soon as sharpened is added into the mix the damage skyrockets beyond what those prior values could obtain. In fact if you look at the crystal shard testing with sharpened, notice how it goes from 5xx damage range done, to 688 (tooltip value) as soon as sharpened is added. This is confirmed to be the unmitigated value additionally by the absorb bubble/shielding testing in the first update to the post as well . Therefore, sharpened is definitely bugged.

As for the resists/spell pen. in general, they behave as you'd expect if you look across the table , scaling up and down with various passives, light armor buffs, and varying resistances on the target.

zbtiqua

Yes! Thank you. Moments before you replied I finally realized haha

Attorneyatlawl

zbtiqua wrote: »

Yes! Thank you. Moments before you replied I finally realized haha

Haha, guilty of that at times myself as I'm sure everyone is .

Rodario

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

@Jelark, that's a good test idea to confirm, again the problem is getting impen gear on PTS since I have had two rollbacks so far in the last day, but if I am able to do it I will check an easy couple of tests such as crit less than an enemy's impen (can you still crit? that'll prove/disprove the general working knowledge) and then adding beyond the impen (assuming the 10 rating = 1% reduction as currently known and off of old psijic testing) by a small amount and seeing if the crit rate is appropriately low over a couple of hundred hits (while randomness could factor into the exact percentage, we can safely assume that if I magically crit more than half the time when I only have what should be 5-10% above the target's impen, that something is wonky ).

@ExiledKhallisi‌, that's unfortunately a very broad topic dependent on a lot of factors including spec and combat situation as well as of course gear. I will keep the idea in mind but it's beyond the scope of the testing I'm doing here .

@Rodario, to play devil's advocate and be fair, on a large project like an MMO not every member of the team (even combat) is going to know every detail about the game specifically and in-depth, especially if it's a bug they weren't aware of on one part of the testing they're looking at here. Probably reading wayyyy too much into the comment.

You're right, I may have overreacted a bit.

zbtiqua

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

The data in the table supports that much much higher percentages of spell penetration don't take away all of the enemy's mitigation, but as soon as sharpened is added into the mix the damage skyrockets beyond what those prior values could obtain. In fact if you look at the crystal shard testing with sharpened, notice how it goes from 5xx damage range done, to 688 (tooltip value) as soon as sharpened is added. This is confirmed to be the unmitigated value additionally by the absorb bubble/shielding testing in the first update to the post as well . Therefore, sharpened is definitely bugged.

As for the resists/spell pen. in general, they behave as you'd expect if you look across the table , scaling up and down with various passives, light armor buffs, and varying resistances on the target.

Does this sharpened damage increase function the same way against Boss/Raid mobs?

I would really like to see how the spell damage compares to physical damage abilities using similar testing!

Mumyo

Soooo ahhm, Zenimax? hummmmmm, there?

MorHawk

Mumyo wrote: »

Soooo ahhm, Zenimax? hummmmmm, there?

Zenimax was already aaahh hmmmm here, a page back.

glavius

Tested fire staff light attack on live with 7 light armor and sharpened trait against combined 2200 spell resist and 3500 fire resist. Still same damage as with no mitigation (tested against a shield)

Attorneyatlawl

zbtiqua wrote: »

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

The data in the table supports that much much higher percentages of spell penetration don't take away all of the enemy's mitigation, but as soon as sharpened is added into the mix the damage skyrockets beyond what those prior values could obtain. In fact if you look at the crystal shard testing with sharpened, notice how it goes from 5xx damage range done, to 688 (tooltip value) as soon as sharpened is added. This is confirmed to be the unmitigated value additionally by the absorb bubble/shielding testing in the first update to the post as well . Therefore, sharpened is definitely bugged.

As for the resists/spell pen. in general, they behave as you'd expect if you look across the table , scaling up and down with various passives, light armor buffs, and varying resistances on the target.

Does this sharpened damage increase function the same way against Boss/Raid mobs?

I would really like to see how the spell damage compares to physical damage abilities using similar testing!

Unknown on the first question... that'd be an interesting thing to check on say the Storm Atronarch though on live!

I'm going to do similar testing for physical damage abilities in the near future ... I'm curious too.

glavius wrote: »

Tested fire staff light attack on live with 7 light armor and sharpened trait against combined 2200 spell resist and 3500 fire resist. Still same damage as with no mitigation (tested against a shield)

Thanks for doing that! That confirms it exists the same way on live at the moment, as well .

Francescolg

-Elemental resistances function as expected in addition to plain spell resistance.

As a vampire with magic resistances on softcap, do I need the (1400 sth.) fire-protection on jewelry?
(excuse my little bit off-topic question)

nikolaj.lemcheb16_ESO

What about penetration trait on stamina based weapons against armor value?

r.jan_emailb16_ESO

nikolaj.lemcheb16_ESO wrote: »

What about penetration trait on stamina based weapons against armor value?

I'm not 100% sure, but...
- Lava Whip and its morphs are mitigated by armor, since it counts as a melee attack, right?

In that case the armor value is also completely neglected when you have a weapon with the sharpened trait, because I constantly hit for tooltip value (or getting hit for 600+, which is basically tooltip value + 50% due to me being vampire).

zbtiqua

Additional Testing - Live Server

-- SPELL TESTING --

Attack used: Fire, Elemental Ring.
Attacker: V12 Dunmer Dragonknight
Target: Lv 42 Giants in The Rift

Spell Pen from Armor/Trait -- Damage Observed --- Tooltip Predicted
30% (5 light) ........................ 284 Direct / 31 DoT -- 305 + 170 over 10s
42% (7 light) ........................ 297 Direct / 32 DoT -- 309 + 170 over 10s
30% (5 light) + 14% Trait ....... 323 Direct / 36 DoT -- 305 + 170 over 10s
42% (7 light) + 14% Trait ....... 327 Direct / 36 DoT -- 309 + 170 over 10s

Note: Observed damage exceeded tooltip predicted, possibly due to Racial/Class passives.

-- PHYSICAL TESTING --

Attack used: Venom Arrow (AT MELEE RANGE).
Attacker: V12 Dunmer Nightblade
Target: Lv 42 Giants in The Rift

Armor Pen from Armor/Trait ......... Damage Observed --- Tooltip Predicted
0% (7 med) ................................. 289 Direct / 58 DoT -- 320 + 365 over 10s
75% (Mark Target) ....................... 320 Direct / 70 DoT -- 320 + 365 over 10s
0% (7 med) + 14% Trait ................ 320 Direct / 68 DoT -- 320 + 365 over 10s
75% (Mark Target) + 14% Trait ..... 320 Direct / 73 DoT -- 320 + 365 over 10s

So as you can see, the Sharpened Trait is doing exactly the same thing for both spells and physical damage in PvE as it is in PvP.

forthewinn2

zbtiqua wrote: »

So as you can see, the Sharpened Trait is doing exactly the same thing for both spells and physical damage in PvE as it is in PvP.

Note: Unclear why observed damage exceeded tooltip predicted, possibly due to Racial/Class passives.

Keep in mind that because mobs have such low armor it's quite likely that the sharpened trait is actually working properly for armor penetration.

It looks like it was probably the dunmer passive boosting your fire damage.

zbtiqua

forthewinn2 wrote: »

zbtiqua wrote: »

So as you can see, the Sharpened Trait is doing exactly the same thing for both spells and physical damage in PvE as it is in PvP.

Note: Unclear why observed damage exceeded tooltip predicted, possibly due to Racial/Class passives.

Keep in mind that because mobs have such low armor it's quite likely that the sharpened trait is actually working properly for armor penetration.

It looks like it was probably the dunmer passive boosting your fire damage.

The PvP Testing should make that a bit more clear. I'm not really sure how much armor the mobs have, or how you would check that.

heyguyslol

Jelark wrote: »

I create my account on the forum just to thank you and increase the popularity of this subject so that ZOS take an early initiative. I am sick and tired that everyone is playing light / stick, it becomes ridiculous.

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

the bug is with sharpened itself .

Can you also test the sharpened trait on 1-handed weapon ?

I don't know what server or game u are playing but not everyone uses light and stick. Yes light is used by probably 80% of the player base and stick I would say about 50%. I see a lot of bows, duel wielders, and 2 hand sword.

A good portion of players are going to be rocking a resto staff to have some sustainability which is fine imo. Now if everyone was using resto on both weapon slots or resto/destro then u would be right but that is not the case and no where near.

heyguyslol

TheBull wrote: »

I wish ZoS would hire people like you to test. The crew they have now seems to be among the worst in the industry.

lol

TRUTH

forthewinn2

zbtiqua wrote: »

The PvP Testing should make that a bit more clear. I'm not really sure how much armor the mobs have, or how you would check that.

Veteran mobs have 600 armor in case you were wondering, which means they have 10% mitigation.
Also I just checked Mark target (in pve) and it was working correctly.
This basically means mark target isn't very good in pve(in terms of armor penetration), but it still works pretty well for pvp.

r.jan_emailb16_ESO

slopezgamesub17_ESO1 wrote: »

TheBull wrote: »

I wish ZoS would hire people like you to test. The crew they have now seems to be among the worst in the industry.

lol

TRUTH

Well, it's always possible they just didn't find it trough their QA. Anyway they really should fix this as fast as possible, like in patch 1.4. If thats not possible, they have to remove this trait until it's fixed. It renders the whole resistance/armor thing completely useless.

Jelark

@slopezgamesub17_ESO1‌ Do you play in a "real" structured PvP guild ?

Xexpo

slopezgamesub17_ESO1 wrote: »

TheBull wrote: »

I wish ZoS would hire people like you to test. The crew they have now seems to be among the worst in the industry.

lol

TRUTH

Can we please stop derailing this AWESOME THREAD with dumb troll comments
Thank You

heyguyslol

Jelark wrote: »

@slopezgamesub17_ESO1‌ Do you play in a "real" structured PvP guild ?

not really, i kinda just run around the cyrodiil map spamming bolt escape cuz its the only thing i know how to do next to dying, lol.

heyguyslol

kaer426 wrote: »

slopezgamesub17_ESO1 wrote: »

TheBull wrote: »

I wish ZoS would hire people like you to test. The crew they have now seems to be among the worst in the industry.

lol

TRUTH

Can we please stop derailing this AWESOME THREAD with dumb troll comments
Thank You

Can you please take your own advice :P

stewie_801

Here are a few things I noticed when combining your testing with the add-on Harven's Extended Stats, and some observations on live/my pts account.


1. The focus rating both on live and PTS showed what seemed as the correct (not meaning working as intended) number depending on whatever my penetration was (i.e. 42% on live 28% on PTS). So 42% pen on live with 2029 SR showed a focus rating of 952. (852 from pen +100 base penetration). And 1836 SR on PTS had a focus rating of 246 with 8% pen. When I added a sharpened traited item to both, it multiplied those focus rating numbers by 12% and 14% respectively. When adding a 1h sharpened weapon, on live it only multiplied by half its percentage, so one 1h showed 6%, it multiplied the focus rating by 3% giving me 2856 focus rating. When adding a second 1h sharpened weapon, it multiplied the focus rating by 6% giving me 5712 focus rating.


So it appeared to me that the focus rating seemed accurate (not necessarily intended) as far as what these traits/spell penetration are doing. The focus rating with sharpened jumped up well above anyone's SR, correlating with attorney's numbers of unmitigated damage. I ran the crystal frag numbers you gave with the spell resist numbers you had, and spell pen, coming up with the damage numbers you posted without the sharpened traits on.

Here's the math I did for those who may want to see it.

I took the 28% light with 2642 spell resistance numbers for my calculations. Unmitigated you showed 688. With 28% penetration, your focus rating should be 739.76. So your SR would be 2642-739.76=1902.24

So your mitigation using the formula I've seen in other threads (Armor or Spell Resist-100base penetration) / Enemies Level, where VR14 would be 64. Also assuming you were vr14 on both characters since you did it on the PTS. (1902.24-100)/64= 28.16%

So at 28.16% you would mitigate 688 x .2816=193.7408. So damage would be 688-193.7408=494.2592, which goes with your number of 494.

Notice, I have seen a few threads regarding whether vr1=50 or not so vr 14 would be 63 or 64 depending. With 63 instead of 64 the damage should've been 491 instead so thats why I went with 64 instead, since it lined up with what you posted.

2. For the armor penetration, both on live and PTS, we have 100 base pen in PVE, 400 base pen in PVP. When adding a 12% sharpened traited bow to live, the armor pen number went from 100 - 1200. PVP it went from 400 to 1500. On test with a 14% sharpened bow it went from 100-1400 and 400 - 1800 for PVE/PVP.

Don't have sharpened 1h's on pts, but on live it took the armor pen number from 100 to 600 and 400 - 900 with two 6% pen daggers. So it looks like its only getting 5% based on how it is applying the 12% /14% pen from bow.

So it seems like the sharpened trait is multiplying the 12%/14% by just 100 base then adding the 300 extra we get from pvp on top of it. Not sure if that is working as intended, or how it affects damage, until either I can test it later with a friend or someone tests it for me.

forthewinn2

stewie_801 wrote: »

2. For the armor penetration, both on live and PTS, we have 100 base pen in PVE, 400 base pen in PVP. When adding a 12% sharpened traited bow to live, the armor pen number went from 100 - 1200. PVP it went from 400 to 1500. On test with a 14% sharpened bow it went from 100-1400 and 400 - 1800 for PVE/PVP.

Don't have sharpened 1h's on pts, but on live it took the armor pen number from 100 to 600 and 400 - 900 with two 6% pen daggers. So it looks like its only getting 5% based on how it is applying the 12% /14% pen from bow.

So it seems like the sharpened trait is multiplying the 12%/14% by just 100 base then adding the 300 extra we get from pvp on top of it. Not sure if that is working as intended, or how it affects damage, until either I can test it later with a friend or someone tests it for me.

Please be aware that Harven's Extended Stats is currently inaccurate for armor penetration when using sharpened weapons and the armor penetration stat does not appear to reflect the actual penetration given by the aforementioned sharpened trait.

Cuddler

stewie_801 wrote: »

So it appeared to me that the focus rating seemed accurate as far as what these traits/spell penetration are doing. I ran the crystal frag numbers you gave with the spell resist numbers you had, and spell pen, coming up with the damage numbers you posted without the sharpened traits on.

Not sure it's accurate. Your own results show that the game uses the % value from the Sharpened trait as a multiplier to the sum of all other penetration contributions, except the 300 Cyrodiil bonus.

For example, if you add 3% to the focus rating of 952, the new focus rating should be 952*(1+3/100)=981, not 952*3=2856. That is, if we assume the trait's effect is multiplicative with Concentration. If additive, the 3% would be calculated off the target's SR, 2029*3/100=61, and then added to 952, 952+61=1013, which is still much lower than 2856.

The trait's percentage value used a simple multiplier would explain why the trait is broken. You could easily get a focus rating of 3150 to negate a hard-capped SR with the 14% Sharpened trait on a yellow 2-hander plus one or two light armour pieces with maxed Concentration.