Attack and Defence update

[knifebait]

Well since the update I have been running around killing monsters in the new area and noticed I'm doing considerably lower damage on my amano and ragnarok than before. Usually whats 3-5k ws's I'm averaging 1.5-3k all the time now. Has the new update nerfed us or do we just need to put some major def down on mobs to hit high numbers again? Has anyone else noticed this difference cause it seems a few in my ls with relics just aren't pumping out the numbers we were before.

Oh and can someone edit Defense* in title lol....

[urat]

If we got nerfed that means the monsters got nerfed as well, so that means SE essentially would've slowed down the game forcing us to fight for longer.

[IceSylph]

3k to 5k is not an average. That's a range.

[Belgaer]

3k to 5k is not an average. That's a range.

This. Perhaps it's simply that the new monsters have abnormally high defense or evasion (lol if you were fighting one of those crab-tank things). Try on mobs you have comparable numbers for and then bring it to the thread.

On another note, I noticed an Easy Prey skele in Gustav Tunnel was hitting my SMN consistently for over 100 (80 broke stoneskin and then up to 148 before crits) damage per swing. I know SMN is squishy anyway, but that seemed abnormally high for a low end Easy Prey. I only have about 350 defense, which is obviously the culprit, but I was only getting hit by around 40-80 before the update. That damage seemingly (nearly) doubled. This seems really odd to me, not to mention concerning, because the patch notes lead me to believe we'd only be affected against mobs of a significantly higher level than ourselves.

[Byrthnoth]

Naw. Most monsters have pretty ridiculous attack. The update is going to affect a lot of content. Also, monster TP moves that have increased Attack (like Tachi:Gekko, but for monsters) are going to matter more than ever before. In the past we probably couldn't even tell that monster TP moves had attack multipliers, but I'm almost entirely sure that at least some do. Before it didn't matter because we capped out at 2.0, but now it will matter.

[Viertel]

This. Perhaps it's simply that the new monsters have abnormally high defense or evasion (lol if you were fighting one of those crab-tank things). Try on mobs you have comparable numbers for and then bring it to the thread.

On another note, I noticed an Easy Prey skele in Gustav Tunnel was hitting my SMN consistently for over 100 (80 broke stoneskin and then up to 148 before crits) damage per swing. I know SMN is squishy anyway, but that seemed abnormally high for a low end Easy Prey. I only have about 350 defense, which is obviously the culprit, but I was only getting hit by around 40-80 before the update. That damage seemingly (nearly) doubled. This seems really odd to me, not to mention concerning, because the patch notes lead me to believe we'd only be affected against mobs of a significantly higher level than ourselves.

Well, if Matsui responses are to be believed didn't they raise the mob attack cap from 2.0 to 4.0? *Your* defense hasn't changed from pre to post patch so receiving nearly double damage, sadly, seems about right.

It makes me wonder if they're going to attempt to control player growth by throwing HP onto more gear (and in larger amounts) after these monster attack cap and game defense changes have settled. The "augmented" gear from Adoulin certainly seems like they're going to try to go that route.

[Belgaer]

I remember Sickle Slash from spiders just outside Whitegate hitting like a truck at 70/75... Maybe I'll have to go back and see if I get 1-shotted by it now (despite the significant level difference). The weird thing is, I'm not noticing any difference in my avatars' staying power. I was under the impression their actual defense was pretty mediocre and that they just had PDT to make up for it, so I expected a major SMN nerf. Which would be more retarded than the Twilight Scythe nerf, but whatever.

[Jem]

Naw. Most monsters have pretty ridiculous attack. The update is going to affect a lot of content. Also, monster TP moves that have increased Attack (like Tachi:Gekko, but for monsters) are going to matter more than ever before. In the past we probably couldn't even tell that monster TP moves had attack multipliers, but I'm almost entirely sure that at least some do. Before it didn't matter because we capped out at 2.0, but now it will matter.

I can't wait to see what ludicrous damage Legion mobs do now. It would take a pretty huge drop in stats for us to actually take less damage post update. Given that they bandied around at 10% HP drop, I'm not remotely hopeful.

[Darkmagi]

I did a BR1 last night and Automatons were hitting me for 400+ with counterstance on, was really scary. lol

[Byrthnoth]

Yeah... Here's how I think about it:

1) Any EM monster probably has about 50% more attack than you have Defense (assuming you're a melee with Protect V on. You have 500-600 defense, and they probably have about 800-900 attack.) <-- This is based on level 75 Avatar tests, Ig'Alima's stats (minus some traits because he's probably DRK), and some of the more recent Avatar/BST tests.

2) Counterstance drops your Defense by 50% post-patch, while before it dropped it to shit but the ratio max was 2.

3) 1+2 mean an EM monster is going to jump from a Ratio of 2 (pre-patch) to a Ratio of 3 (post-patch) against a Counterstance'd Monk. So they're going to do approximately 50% more damage/hit to a counterstance'd monk. Now using Counterstance would double the damage you take (3/1.5) instead of increasing it by 33% (2/1.5).

4) Furthermore, if you combine Berserk with it then you'll drop to -75% Defense, which will cap Ratio at 4.0. So while before your Berserked/Counterstanced Ratio on Monk would have been 2 (pre-patch), now it will be 4 (post-patch). This will be approximately twice as much damage taken as before (4/2), and 2.66 times as much as a non-berserked, non-counterstanced player (4/1.5).

5) If you continue the above comparisons, you'll notice that Berserk (-25%) now grants about as much of a defensive penalty (+33% damage) as Counterstance did before (+33% damage)



On one hand, this is balance. It never really made sense to have an ability gave a massive defensive advantage and sizeable offensive advantage with only minor drawbacks when used against EM+ monsters (+33% damage taken on hits that land in the example above). On the other hand, this severely limits the applications of Counterstance.

[Sechs]

I'm starting to get scared.
How will this affect dynamis farming? EP mobs are low level, will we receive that much more damage now?
Was this change really that necessary? Couldn't they do it just for players and leave things as they were for mobs?

I mean, I can understand the higher goals of this change with end-game, making it scarier to leave DDs tping freely because they're not bothered about the damage received, making so jobs who Excel at defense can make a bigger difference in tanking compared to DDs, it's all good.
But in all the rest of the game? Lowmen content? Solo content? Old content? What's the pro of doing it there?

I hope people in this thread are just overestimating things by eyeballing >___>

[Karbuncle]

Yah i can safely say I'm rather concerned about how this is going to effect 75 content based on what I'm hearing here. I mean, it'll probably only really show with Counterstance/Berserk on, together... But kinda really punches MNK tanks in the d**k a bit for 75 content and beyond, no?

[Byrthnoth]

Naw, I think it's really going to show against a lot of things. The weird part about Counterstance in the past was that it offered a much larger Defensive penalty if you used it against weakshit monsters compared to tough monsters because it boosted the crap out of their Ratio and they weren't already capped. Like, for a while I did DNC in SSR1 (level 75 targets) as level 99 and using Counterstance increased my damage taken from ~60/hit to ~120/hit. It approximately doubled it against weakshit stuff, because it was pushing it from about a 1.0 ratio to about a 2.0 ratio. It didn't matter nearly as much against EM/T stuff because most of that crap was already at or near capped Ratio anyway. Now it does matter, and we can expect to see an approximate doubling of Ratio because it decreases defense by 50%.

It kind of is a dickpunch for MNK, but the ability is still usable in many situations with proper support.

[mdkuser]

cerberus just one shoted me with a 2k sulfurous breat ( had counterstance+berserk). BRII. CC big no now and this means more curing but still doable np.

[NightScope2142]

Hmm. Byrthnoth got me scared after reading his post. Would this effect 99 content such as Salvage II on the mega bosses where you already take 400-500 dmg a hit with counterstance on? I assume in this case the mobs attack is already destroying your defense? From what i read you seem to be saying i am going to be hit 1k a hit after the patch. Would really suck if mnk/thf/whm can't trio salvage II anymore.

[mdkuser]

its counterstance + berzerk combo that got nerfed, it auto-caps mob's ratio and you'll take 2x more dmg than before. Honestly it was broken and needed nerf. You could use your best DD JA while taking no damage. CC will now be a defensive skill now lik it should have: if you DD, use berzerk, if you look to mitigate damage use CC but not berserk. BRII boss is still a joke (dies before formless stikes/impetus/berzerk wears off for the NQ, HQ a bit longer).

[Byrthnoth]

Yeah, but be ready to take substantially increased TP move damage even with just Counterstance up. I have not tested it, but I bet that overall monster Ratio is still capped at 4.0 though, so against really really high level targets there still won't be much penalty to using Counterstance.

Like, before the patch pet damage stopped increasing (they hit a 4.0 Ratio cap) when it was a level 99 pet vs. a level 59 monster (or thereabouts). This indicated that they were getting +2 Ratio (and were already at the 2.0 cap). If they still get the level correction boost (and they probably do), then level 119 monsters fighting level 99 players will already have +1 Ratio, so the max that they can gain from Attack vs. Defense is only 3. Therefore the effective cap on Ratio would be 3. In that situation, using Counterstance would increase your damage taken less than against a weaker enemy. Just food for thought!

[dasva]

Iirc the update notes said there still is a a positive lvl correct factor for higher lvl mobs hitting you but that it was reduced by half

[Stromgarde]

Proto-Omega and Arch-Omega always seemed like they did significantly more damage than most enemies. Was that due to overwhelming attack, high base damage, or just selective memory?

[Byrthnoth]

Probably a combination of their levels (level correction) and their base damage. Also, they didn't do substantially more than similar monsters.