Just cause I felt like it, and didn't have anything important to buy now I have my healing AAs caught up for LDoN... I saved up and bought all the regular levels of combat stability at once.

Did a 1 hr parse before and after vs the venerable mist panther. I know all the arguments about whether he is a useful mob for this, but it was something I could do while browsing the web for 2 hrs. Just take it for what it's worth.

Before, 23.47% minimum hits, 7.82% max hits, pretty even in between.

After, 27.71 % min hits, 6.7% max hits, still fairly even otherwise, although both before/after were mildly weighted towards the low end.

DPS taken was reduced from 39.4 to 37.5. Not exactly a major difference, but I think significant with a test size of approximately 1700 hits each before and after.

Couldn't figure out on short notice how to get the YALP damage graph to HTML or I'd have posted that.

What I'm really interested in his how big of an increase Innate Defense is over CA3

The bigger difference in max-hit and min-hit the better will this AA become.

Using the mist panther as an example will return a lesser dps reduction than using a PoP mob, due to oldworld mob often having a lesser difference in min- and max-hit. If your spending most of your time in PoP, CS/ID becomes more usefull.

with CS3 and assuming the description for the AA is correct (10% better mitigation), damage reduction should look like...

Mist Panther:
Max hit 115
Min hit 58

115-58= 57
10% = 5,7
5,7 out of 115 = 4,96%

So on the Mist Panther the damage reduction should be approx 5% with CS3.

If we look at a tier2+ mob they got a min-hit for 150ish and max-hit for 650ish? ( just using approx numbers here)

650-150 = 500
10% = 50
50 out of 650 = 7,69%


No big difference i must admit, but its there. :)

Originally posted by Pinepath
DPS taken was reduced from 39.4 to 37.5.
That's depressing, but not surprising. It means that skill is even more useless than Combat Agility / Lightning Reflexes.

Keep in mind this was just with CS3, if I read the original post correctly. ID5 should further improve it.

A 5% reduction in damage for just CS3 isn't bad at all, I think.

Actually...is there a magelo for the character used for the test? I'm curious how much mitigation AC he has. Since CS3 increases mitigation AC by 10% (I think) that could make a difference too.

I have 303 aa atm.....wont even put it on this ability yet (than the easy 2 points)...rather get resists up.


Tils

Yup not seeing how it's worth any points really :( Sorry SOE

I just got ID 5 last night. I'm just glad to be done so I can finish off the last few aa's before I work on resists. :)

Ok, just to finish this off, I went and repeated the parse against mist panther with defense 5. I had LR5 already before the first one, so ID5 should be the only difference, although some time has passed. I also adjusted stuff so I was at the same AC (1010) as before, without thorn skin up.

Over a 1 hr parse, just sitting on horse letting MP beat on me and keeping healed;

32.4% minimum hits, 4.9% maximum hits, 34.8 DPS.

I noted a little stronger tendency for hits to be on the low side, as a matter of fact, the 7 smallest hit groupings on this parse, were the 7 highest possible hits, excluding the max hit case.

Ok, that is sizeable. We are talking a 12% decrease in DPS on the panther. According to Uegolas observation, it likely becomes 15% or more against PoP mobs.

Callahad

Why would you get a few more points on resists, rather than get a VERY noticable reduction in melee damage taken?? By the time I have 400+ AA, my gear will be upgraded to the point that 10 more MR is near meaningless.

Taking 12-15% less melee damage, its certainly noticable.

Assuming that CA3/LR5 is comparable, you are talking a reduction in melee damage taken by close to 1/3. Considering that druid and shaman dont get any aggro reduction AA, being able to last 30% longer when you get aggro is a very good thing. Resisting 1 more spell in 3 weeks time (a rough guess what 10 more resist would get you) isnt even going to come close to comparing.

At the end game the only innate resists you really will need to be concerned with are Poison/disease/magic, on the other hand CS/ID have been a huge boost for me. If need be I can tank in Ldon as a druid, I've soloed Gore, and Fay with only self buffs, I can tank in bot and lesser planes when I am fooling around with friends, and I die Much Much less when I do catch aggro due to our debuffs/heals/nukes.

That extra mitigation offers me that extra second for a cleric to land a fast heal on me.

What the people aren't parsing is how the buffs, ac, and these skills are helping. When you hit 8000hp and a 1600 AC, with ID5 / LR5 just how little dps you take compared to a 1200 AC without them.

It's funny these same people are the ones who'll pay 12 AA's without blinking for MC3 because it increases their mana regen by 3 / tick in the face of C5, Spiritual Dominion Mask of the forest and PoT9, or a 7.8 % gain in mana (not medding, if you use a horse or med its even lower).

They also spend 30 AA's to max their crits, or a 13 % gain in dps.

They spend 55 AA's to max their heals, ( a signifigant gain in heals )

Many are elemental flagged and spending 15 AA's to raise one resist. A resist which by spending raid points could be brought to 300+ quite easily. or a 10% gain in one resist.

Their reasons are their own, some call ID5 / LR5 a placebo saying they make you feel good. The parses show a "marginal" improvement, but as the math shows all improvements are marginal in the big picture. It's all a matter of which margin matters the most to you. For me, resists and innate stats matter the least. Raid buffed, my stats hit 305 across the board, my resists hit 500 with bardsong, both hard caps. Hence ID5 / LR5 came after natural durability.

Well, I must say that with CA3 and LR5 I die a lot less than I did when kiting at the tables in PoFire. I went for those first before adding ND3. CS3....gonna be a while before I do those. Getting hit less and dodging more has made it much easier for me to cast through getting hit as well, I only have CF1 for that.

What the people aren't parsing is how the buffs, ac, and these skills are helping. When you hit 8000hp and a 1600 AC, with ID5 / LR5 just how little dps you take compared to a 1200 AC without them.

It's funny these same people are the ones who'll pay 12 AA's without blinking for MC3 because it increases their mana regen by 3 / tick in the face of C5, Spiritual Dominion Mask of the forest and PoT9, or a 7.8 % gain in mana (not medding, if you use a horse or med its even lower).

They also spend 30 AA's to max their crits, or a 13 % gain in dps.

They spend 55 AA's to max their heals, ( a signifigant gain in heals )

Many are elemental flagged and spending 15 AA's to raise one resist. A resist which by spending raid points could be brought to 300+ quite easily. or a 10% gain in one resist.

Their reasons are their own, some call ID5 / LR5 a placebo saying they make you feel good. The parses show a "marginal" improvement, but as the math shows all improvements are marginal in the big picture. It's all a matter of which margin matters the most to you. For me, resists and innate stats matter the least. Raid buffed, my stats hit 305 across the board, my resists hit 500 with bardsong, both hard caps. Hence ID5 / LR5 came after natural durability.

Ah, but there's a difference. My druid nukes dozens of times per session, heals dozens of times per session and is constantly wanting MORE mana regeneration than he has (even with C5, FT12, MC3, Pot9 & Mask of the Forest). In other words, those other skills are used constantly.

On the other hand, my druid gets aggro MAYBE twice per session and is hit MAYBE 8-10 times total. That's experience grouping in LDON and the planes - I don't raid. Having the CHANCE for a hit to land for a lower amount will matter in the very long run, but not in the short run - the healing, damage and mana regen AA's matter both in the short run and the long run. They have a measurable and even noticable effect on a daily basis - they are quantitatively and qualitatively different than the melee AA's for a druid (or other caster who tries to AVOID being hit at all costs).

For my paladin, the avoidance and mitigation AA's are immensely more important than, say, the healing AA's, the mana regen AA's or, of course, Spell Casting Fury. Now that I have those skills, I'm glad to have them - but in general they make only a small dent in performance whereas the combat AA's make a big dent. The difference is that my paladin is hit by mobs thousands of times per session, not a dozen times. For a melee class, the defensive skills have an impact in the short run and in the long run.

I'm certain that the the defensive skills will make a tiny different for my druid - when people talk about the placebo effect with respect to these skills, they aren't really saying that they have NO effect. What they are saying that the real value is not the same as the perceived value - people will talk about noticing a "huge difference" with these skills and parses show that it is not a "huge difference" and, in most cases, are nothing that could be detected by simple observation.

The question is really where do you prioritize these skills? My druid has 220 AA's and it will still be a while before I get to them (whereas my paladin did them in the first 100).

Romidar, thats my point, its all in how you play and value skills. They all rate about the same percentage improvement. Calling it a placebo since its the same overall improvement over all your other skills does it a disservice. I play a bit more aggressively as a druid, I plan to get aggro and get hit.

In LDoN's I cast the first heal on the puller/tank, why? It splits the mobs and makes it easy for crowd control to work. I've never once heard the enchanter say, "don't cast that heal and leave all the mobs in a pile at the tank for me to try and target." Since these events are timed, we pull the entire room, and this makes it easy to mezz.

In the planes, if your ever aggro kiting or quadkiting, Im sure you'd find it to your advantage to live through the mobs catching you so you don't have to find a rezz, find buffs etc. Of course, some of us are perfect kiters and never get caught ;)

I'm sure none of us charmfight in tactics and have two mobs beating on us for 500 damage a swing while we try and recharm a pig.

Seriously, the value of your AA's is all in how you play and use them, I tend to get hit as I don't fear it in anything less than the elementals, and even there I tank mezz when CC dies early or is missing from the group. The cleric can heal two tanks more effectively than one tank and himself.

Is any of this stuff, stuff I have to do? Not really.
Is it stuff that makes my guild mates appreciate me? Yes. I can login almost anytime of day, and get invited to groups specifically.

Iegil

I finished ID5 by 200 or so. LR5 was earlier, and I like that one too.

Control vs. Efficiency
--------------------
I've found that control of a situation, and the rate at which a group can assert control of a situation, is more important than mana efficiency. Hard LDoN, for example, requires tanks, debuffers, and healers to be on their toes with every pull. Once the mob or mobs are split, slowed, mezzed and tanked, the dps team gets to work, but until then it can be a struggle not to die. When you're xping on mobs that hit for 1k, even a little extra mitigation is a good thing. For me, the combat skills matter in the "short short term", the critical phase when everyone is trying to stabilize the pull, or charm break, or unexpected add(s).

Hate limits and xp grinds
-----------------------
With a cleric in group, and single pulls all day, backup healing can be an extremely light load. So light in fact, as to let this Alteration spec'd druid spend a lot of mana nuking. When I get snare duty in a group like this, with a melee-machine that shreds mobs in under 30 seconds, hate is often the limiting factor, not mana. Taking a round or two of melee every other fight is common, and the overall reduction of damage is measurable. CS helps by reducing the average hit, making it less likely that I'll require a heal, and more likely that the cleric will just let me regen for a minute or so, or let the next group heal cover the damage.

-Quelm
Guildnote: "Likes to tank." yay!

Read though all these threads and still cant find wich would be better to go with the melee AA's before 100 or there abouts

Darklotuss Bloodrunner
63 Heirophant
The server that starts with a "Q"

aggro is not nearly as much of a problem in ldon (guild groups anyways) as it is on raids. Due to healing aggro i usually die 3-5 times on a good ele raid night, more if the brown stuff hits the spinny thingy. Mana regen isnt even an issue anymore, as i either a) cant spend it fast enough of b) go splat from healing. If i die less thats more exp to me, more mana to the people buffing me, more of my mana spent nuking.. etc etc.

btw ive only ever died from healing... nuking i may get summoned but havent died yet... shouldnt you get rewarded for doing a good job? >.<

Darklotuss
It really depends on your playstyle, you need to decide for yourself, how you want to play, and what you want to do. Giving you a definitive answer is impossible as its personal choice.

The 100-200 AA range is where I started my defensive AA's, I went for Combat Agility, Lightning Reflexes first, and finished the Combat Stability / Innate Defense line around my 260th AA.

Iegil

/shrug i see a huge differnce from what i can take in beating in ldon and pop, not every group can be a perfect guild group where i know i can hit assist and nuke 3-4 times. I can tank in ldon (normal) on bad pulls where the cleric/shammy/chanter is getting eaten untill things get back under control.

I like the aa's much better than our useless crit heal aa's imo.

Kay

Hehe yesterday I went on an ldon adventure, it was just a regular adventure but I believe we had only gotten to maybe 2nd or 3rd room had ranger,ranger,shaman,wiz, rogue. Mob pulled maybe there were two that came, I cast KR on MA then another mob (maybe a wanderer) started to hit on me. Someone agroed several small spiders that were in the room. Everyone
's health was falling below 50% so I cast sotw, had several more mobs agro ( I have never seen anything like this before btw on a reg adv). I was getting hit by more than one mob, or at least mob attempted :p. Sotw had already faded and even though I was able to get root on one or two I had to keep attempting to heal (rangers do a good job healing to get aggro too btw). All in all even though the wiz and myself at one moment thought we should have egressed we managed to finally kill all the mobs.

I know if I hadn't had the aa's to avoid getting hit I would have had to exodus/egress or I would have had my corpse laying on the floor. I think this was the fasted 60mob kill adventure I was ever on and the most fun :D.

Never did get a full count on how many mobs were laying on the ground but there were a lot!

I know if I hadn't had the aa's to avoid getting hit I would have had to exodus/egress or I would have had my corpse laying on the floor.
No, you don't <i>know</i> that. You just <i>want to believe</i> that, even though all the numerical evidence I have ever seen about these skills shows that the effect, if any, is too small to notice.

I don't blame you for not wanting to believe that you wasted 15 AAs on a pointless skill. But the fact is, even if you hadn't bought these skills, the encounter you just described would have almost certainly turned out exactly the same.

But the fact is, even if you hadn't bought these skills, the encounter you just described would have almost certainly turned out exactly the same.

No, you don't <i>know</i> that. You just <i>want to believe</i> that, even though all the numerical evidence suggests that CS/ID makes about a 10-15% difference to damage taken.

I don't blame you for not wanting to believe that the 15 AAs you haven’t spent might have made the difference between life and death on this encounter. But the fact is, with the 15AA you spent increasing your heals by 13% instead, the encounter described would have almost certainly have turned out exactly the same.

Post removed, it wasn't polite.

Sorry about that.

But seriously, the parses are showing CS3/ID5 represent a 13 percent reduction in damage taken. 13 percent here, 13 percent there, soon your talking about a signifigant change in your toons abilities. Of course not being a melee class these changes aren't as important as our spell casting AA's. But they are definately important for survival in hostile environments such as raids and multiple fast pulls.

Iegil

Well say what you want I don't believe I wasted points. Maybe its just a matter of opinion. Yes it was a lot of points I will agree on that but wasted, no.

The significance of this AA skill depends on how often you get hit, of course. Myself, I get hit a lot. I solo summoning mobs in Ssra while farming, I am often pulling and root-CCing mobs in LDON, and I love to get summoned on raids. If I'm not getting summoned, that means the mobs don't respect me!

Points spend on CS are not wasted. Now, the points I spent on Int and Dex, THOSE were wasted....:)

No, you don't <i>know</i> that. You just <i>want to believe</i> that, even though all the numerical evidence I have ever seen about these skills shows that the effect, if any, is too small to notice.

I don't blame you for not wanting to believe that you wasted 15 AAs on a pointless skill. But the fact is, even if you hadn't bought these skills, the encounter you just described would have almost certainly turned out exactly the same.

The fact is.. try to tank a npc without any defensive aa's.. then tank things with them.. there IS a noticable difference. That extra 13% might just make the difference of me not getting hit 1 more time allowing me to better channel my heal and keep me alive. Before I got the defensive aa's I would get gibbed by npc's in bot.. now I can tank elementals and casters in bot without fear.

No, you don't <i>know</i> that. You just <i>want to believe</i> that, even though all the numerical evidence suggests that CS/ID makes about a 10-15% difference to damage taken.
And your point is, what? I read the lead post too. I was responding to the poster who seemed <i>absolutely sure</i> that the AAs were responsible for winning that encounter. A 12% damage reduction might help a little in the long run, but if you think it's going to consistently make or break encounters for you, you haven't been playing this game long enough.

Tudamorf:

12% increase in anything is significant and even more so the larger your group/raid is.

By your logic you shouldn't take any AA because none of them increase stuff more than 10-15% by themselves.

5% here 5% there all adds up and in the end, the perosn with 20 5% marginal upgrades is far superior to the person not spending exp on AAs.

Tudamorf's logic comes from when he parsed the panther in western wastes with his enchanter as it bought LR1 to LR5. He saw a minor difference, and has since concluded and posted on every discussion that Innate Defense, Lightning Reflexes, Combat Stability and Combat Agility are useless AAs.

Although defensive AA's will keep us alive and survive many an encounter where we would have otherwise died, these abilities alone won't result in winning or losing the encounter. Though its really simple to see via 3rd grade math, that a 13 percent increase in defensive skills buys you that much longer for a heal to land before you drop below the 40 percent health*aggro lock chain summoning till dead* trap that hits many casters. More healing, faster healing, bigger heals would also help with this issue.

Saying you wouldn't have survived the encounter without the defensive AA's is probably a false statement. However, saying you would survive without them is not necessarily true either. It's purely a subjective statement.

Fact of the matter still remains like it or not, the defensive AA's DO make a difference in the amount of beating a druid can sustain, and they DO enable us to live longer with aggro. Having been hit by every named mob in the Plane of Fire without defensive AA's and with defensive AA's, I will be happy to assure you that the streaky random number generator favors those with defensive AA's.

i have CA3 and CS3. i think i like them both. seems to me i get hit less or for less.. i don't know for sure. BUT

I'm thinking now that CS/ID is the better first choice since it lowers every hit you get. Just like most go with HA and AHA first and then go get HG and AHG later.

But before i started getting CA, CS i finished off ND3. to me THAT is what's keeping me alive and IF i happen to get the random roll and the mob actually misses me more opwer to me!