question about weapon and spell damage and alike

Lexalious

Why does the distinction still exist? i know they made this change a couple years ago but it baffles me that they still haven't made the step towards getting rid of weapon and spell words. why not just make them damage or crit chance or resistance. at this point there are only a handful of instances where this distinction matters but im sure they could adjust those with no cost to gameplay as well. so why not do it?

Necrotech_Master

because they are still differentiated by some buffs

sorcery buff (major/minor) only affects spell dmg, brutality only buffs weapon dmg

while most buffs give major of both, theres a lot that does not give minor of both

DK class passives can give minor brutality, but it makes no mention of minor sorcery for example, so a DK inherently will have higher weapon dmg, even if they are running a mag build

Sluggy

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

because they are still differentiated by some buffs

sorcery buff (major/minor) only affects spell dmg, brutality only buffs weapon dmg

while most buffs give major of both, theres a lot that does not give minor of both

DK class passives can give minor brutality, but it makes no mention of minor sorcery for example, so a DK inherently will have higher weapon dmg, even if they are running a mag build

Right, but the distinction is irrelevant anymore. There is no difference between minor brutality and minor sorcery since all sets and buffs apply to spell and weapon damage the same. The only hold out was jewlery glyphs but those no longer matter for damage either.

virtus753

It might be on its way, as it's one of the last steps remaining for complete hybridization. It would also obviate the need for a specific fix for the bug where bashing only scales with weapon crit chance even when spell crit is higher, and even if it's done with a staff.

Potions and poisons seem like they could be hybridized more easily than other places where this distinction matters.

I think it would be a little weird lore-wise to have light armor grant resistances for physical as well as spell, since light armor doesn't tend to do well against physical attacks, but perhaps they could figure out a tweak there.

There are two bigger things that stick out to me:

1) The Warrior and Apprentice stones only give Weapon or Spell damage, respectively, not both. One stone would have to take both Weapon and Spell damage at the same time and the other would have to be redesigned completely, as it would be redundant. It would again be odd to me in terms of naming to have the Warrior grant spell damage or the Apprentice grant weapon damage, but that would be something else for the devs to consider.

2) The DK and Templar class passives for Minor Brutality and Minor Sorcery would be 100% redundant with each other rather than only mostly redundant. The same with Sorc and NB crit passives. Templar and Sorc have already lost so much of their unique group utility - intentionally so, per the devs. It may be a small thing or a matter of principle, but the prospect of feeling 100% useless to my group in terms of utility does indeed feel worse to me than 99%.

virtus753

Sluggy wrote: »

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

because they are still differentiated by some buffs

sorcery buff (major/minor) only affects spell dmg, brutality only buffs weapon dmg

while most buffs give major of both, theres a lot that does not give minor of both

DK class passives can give minor brutality, but it makes no mention of minor sorcery for example, so a DK inherently will have higher weapon dmg, even if they are running a mag build

Right, but the distinction is irrelevant anymore. There is no difference between minor brutality and minor sorcery since all sets and buffs apply to spell and weapon damage the same. The only hold out was jewlery glyphs but those no longer matter for damage either.

It is not irrelevant in all situations.

Potions and poisons do not give both Majors, so the Minors matter when using those to source the Major buffs. That goes for weapon and spell damage as well as for weapon and spell crit.

A DK using Major Sorcery potions and giving themselves Minor Brutality is less powerful than a DK running Major Brutality potions with Minor Brutality from their class kit. They can run Igneous or Degen to get both Majors, but that's a skill slot they're taking up to do so. It's an opportunity cost they wouldn't need to pay if potions gave both Majors.

Apprentice gives only spell damage; Warrior gives only weapon damage. That means anyone running Apprentice will need Major Sorcery and Minor Sorcery to maximize their damage, so having a DK for Minor Brutality won't accomplish what a Templar granting Minor Sorcery will. Vice versa for Warrior: they'll want a DK instead of a Templar.

Just because these things are not meta does not mean they don't exist and shouldn't be accounted for in game design.

edited because my brain keeps thinking Prophecy is the spell damage buff.

Lexalious

the distinction is, whichever minor buff you have available you would stack that with the relevant potion or if you are for some reason trying hard to stack damage then you would also pick the mundus accordingly. this is literally it yet we have all these words that don't mean anything since u35. its been years and still they haven't addressed it

Sluggy

virtus753 wrote: »

Sluggy wrote: »

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

because they are still differentiated by some buffs

sorcery buff (major/minor) only affects spell dmg, brutality only buffs weapon dmg

while most buffs give major of both, theres a lot that does not give minor of both

DK class passives can give minor brutality, but it makes no mention of minor sorcery for example, so a DK inherently will have higher weapon dmg, even if they are running a mag build

Right, but the distinction is irrelevant anymore. There is no difference between minor brutality and minor sorcery since all sets and buffs apply to spell and weapon damage the same. The only hold out was jewlery glyphs but those no longer matter for damage either.

It is not irrelevant in all situations.

Potions and poisons do not give both Majors, so the Minors matter when using those to source the Major buffs. That goes for weapon and spell damage as well as for weapon and spell crit.

A DK using Major Sorcery potions and giving themselves Minor Brutality is less powerful than a DK running Major Brutality potions with Minor Brutality from their class kit. They can run Igneous or Degen to get both Majors, but that's a skill slot they're taking up to do so. It's an opportunity cost they wouldn't need to pay if potions gave both Majors.

Apprentice gives only spell damage; Warrior gives only weapon damage. That means anyone running Apprentice will need Major Sorcery and Minor Sorcery to maximize their damage, so having a DK for Minor Brutality won't accomplish what a Templar granting Minor Sorcery will. Vice versa for Warrior: they'll want a DK instead of a Templar.

Just because these things are not meta does not mean they don't exist and shouldn't be accounted for in game design.

edited because my brain keeps thinking Prophecy is the spell damage buff.

Honestly, I'd forgotten about the potions. So that's a fair point. The mundus is relevant only in a group where a dk or a templar would be present but not both. That would be rare but I guess still relevant. I rescind my point earlier.

OBJnoob

To me the only relevancy are the unique class minor buffs. I don't consider the potions to be relevant to why spell damage and weapon damage are still separate... I consider them to be the main example of why it's silly not to combine them.

Now if it were possible to make a potion that gives major sorcery and major savagery perhaps I wouldn't find it problematic. But as far as I know this isn't possible?

Kisakee

They will merge everything at one point, it's just not as easy as stated in the above comments. As they devoted this year to bugfixes i'm not surprised they haven't done it by now. Next years letter will drop soon, let's see what this will be all about.

IZZEFlameLash

It is because hybridization is kind of left at a limbo unfortunately.

Pelanora

What we need is a great big melting pot.
Big enough for the world and all its got.