Ondar's Guile keystone: need some help with math

That build looks interesting and the movement speed is awesome but it wouldn't work as well with the specific skill and gear combination i used on my Ranger since the build i used was optimized specifically around level 85+ and on what gear i had available. It was the third char i made in Rampage so i could plan it all out from the beginning although i adjusted some things while leveling. The low movement speed and strength from passives was compensated by large boni to these stats from gear i had ready and the high accuracy is rather important on a crit build since your effective critchance for attacks equals to: [chance_to_hit]^2 x [tooltip_critchance], meaning that a crit has to pass a second evasion check to determine whether it will be reduced to a normal hit. For situations that required me to move even faster, i used an extra speed Quicksilver Flask to temporarily boost my movement speed to over 200% of the base speed.

That doesn't mean you build is bad at all! It should work really well with a slightly different skill/gear combination and can do without a Quicksilver Flask which frees up one valuable flask spot. However, it may still be a bit light on life unless you can get 500+ base life from gear but you can always adjust that as it goes, like you already mentioned ;).
Personally, i usually aim for ~300 with mostly self found/crafted gear since i often use unique items as build enablers and many of them don't have life on them.

You also shouldn't underestimate the effect of the Acrobatics cluster on a pure evasion build where it can be used without the drawbacks. That extra 40% dodge chance is multiplied on top of any evasion chance and the effect is quite big and, unlike evasion, in no way influenced by accuracy or anyting else (and the 30% spelldodge is awesome too).
I also almost never died to reflect on this build. Out of the ~25 deaths it had at lvl 86, only 2-3 were to reflect, which is totally acceptable on a softcore char.
A Cast when Damage Taken setup with Immortal Call automatically triggers when you take a certain amount of damage and can make you immune to physical damage for a few moments. This means that if i shoot a barrage of projectiles into a reflect mob group, i will take a lot of damage from the first few projectiles that hit and bypass both my evasion and dodge, while the subsequent projectiles' reflect will be ignored due to IC being active. The maximum life in endgame was also tailored in a way that i wouldn't be able to one-shot myself on reflect, which would naturally bypass the CwDT-IC setup.
Another thing to note is that i, as Snorkle_uk suggested, had mixed physical/elemental damage even though i only scaled the physical part via passives. To be more specific: i used elemental boni from Added Fire, Hatred, Herald of Ash and Weapon Elemental Damage on my Split Arrow (main small-medium mob group clearing skill) for a total of ~140% of physical as extra fire/cold damage.
The elemental reflect is largely mitigated by resistances so i wouldn't one-shot myself accidentally and i used Puncture (without weapon ele) to quickly take out rares with reflect auras in reflect maps to avoid the double damage. The physical reflect was largely mitigated by the CwDT setup so although i would take a lot of damage from reflect sometimes, it was well managable.

On another note, you will get a bunch of respec points from quests and can easily get a couple more from Orb of Regrets, so it can be a good idea sometimes to plan out a build with a handful respec points in mind. I often only have a rough draft of my build early on that features only the most important parts for that build to work (Ranger was a bit of an exception ;)). This means that i will deliberately take nodes that i know i will probably respec later just so i can get some important stuff early on and optimize the pathing later to get all the efficient "side" nodes to compliment my build depending on what gear i find and in which direction i choose to develop my build.

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Fins_FinsT wrote:

Physical reflect can't be mitigated through resist that much; its "resist" - armour, - can't be even 50% mitigation i suppose, probably even waaay lower than that will be the case end-game even with some +armor passives (if present) and most/all armor pieces being armour+evasion (which is, i guess, unlikely). That's how even for a build which deals 75% of its damage as elemental, remaining 25% of physical still pose large threat, when reflected.

Physical damage is reduced less than elemental in most cases, it depends what your setup is tbh because theres more layers of defense that deal with phys damage. You have armour that, if stacked properly, will reduce a huge amount of small to mid damage and not so much large damage per hit, theres endurance charges that add a flat % of physical resist to your armour that doesnt change with the size of the individual hit, theres mechanics like lightning coil chest, cloak of flame chest, taste of hate flask etc that send a % of the incoming physical damage to an elemental resist before the other phys calculations occur, theres immortal call which will just make you completely immune to phys for a short duration... In practice physical damage reflect can be something where a physical crit build that does 35k tooltip dps can easily kill itself against as physical reflect pack and another that deals 80k dps tooltip physical crit can be so care free about reflect that they would happily run a map with a physical reflect mod on the entire area and run around attacking physical reflect aura packs inside fairly safely.

It all comes down to how you are mitigating it and how much damage you do per hit, if I throw out say 40k physical damage a second but its split between 20 individual hits then perhaps none of them is big enough alone to really worry my armour and as Im getting 20 applications of my life on hit and life on kill I barely notice any damage. Where as throwing out 30k damage in 1 single hit could potentially 1 shot the same character. With elemental, because its usually just a pure % resist reducing the damage it doesnt matter if you are hitting once or 100 times per second, its all coming back at you and being reduced by the same %. As you say, elemental leech is rarely as strong as physical leech, so in practice theres a lot of factors which lead to a lot of elemental builds having a much harder time with ele reflect than physical builds do with either of the reflects.

My physical crit dagger builds are only watching their physical damage per hit on a crit, as long as a top end crit doesnt exceed a certain amount of phys Im free to stack as much attack speed and crit chance as I want knowing that its entirely safe to do so. split arrow chain for example, chain significantly nerfs damage per hit and increases the amount of hits you are landing, using chain will up your total dps while possibly making you less vulnerable to phys reflect depending on your spec. Where an elemental version, anything that is increasing your dps is increasing how much damage is coming back at you. A non crit physical build very, very rarely has any issues with reflect, like say cyclone, but when people use facebreakers with Infernal Blow, which is a 50% phys to fire conversion, you see characters obliterating themselves on ele reflect.


case in point

http://www.twitch.tv/zenocidegenius/v/3683713

you can hear from how he reacts that he knew reflect was a big worry, elemental reflect. If that had been phys reflect and you swapped his fire over to phys and vice versa, he might have lived due to the amount of smaller hits involved in killing that pack. Hard to say. Worth noting he had purity of fire aura and hes a marauder, so hes probably at 79% fire resist when this happens.


Zenocide is a good streamer to watch now and then if you want to get into the theory of the game. I've played maybe 5000 hours of this game over the past 2 years, Zenos probably clocked about the same, and we fundamentally disagree about whats great and whats shit in some cases. Thats the kind of game this is and thats why you should never buy 100% into what someone is saying and never disregard anything completely until you've tried that exact thing in practice and found out for yourself. But at least a good 85%+ of what zeno says you can pretty much bank on, the guys played the shit out of this game and knows his stuff. I have 2 monitors, I throw a stream on the second screen usually while I play, everything Ive learned from 2 years non stop playing this game has been doubled by seeing and hearing exactly whats happening in someone elses game at the same time. I've never even played Infernal Blow before and I knew he was going to rip to reflect because Ive seen it happen before, multiple times.

Great information in both last posts, gentlemen! Was a pleasure to read.

About that Ranger which was well planned from the start: here's one extra consideration which might be very useful for some end-game characters.

Considering bow-DPS builds, i realized that taking few +elemental_damage% nodes can be extremely beneficial late-game. It seems to me that % per average node for physical and elemental is very similar, and so, roughly speaking, we can get nearly same amount of +damage% for passives of both types. Thing is, as demonstrated below with simple math, taking some +elemental% can have incredibly powerful effect on already-high-phys_dam% build.

example: multi-projectile ice shot build, dealing bulk of its "AoE" damage with ice shot's cold damage, is using at some point say +300% total +phys_damage% from passives. Now he has say 5 points he can and wish spend for some more damage% - and he can spend it to get, say, +60% physical or +60% elemental damage. Assuming he does, say, 50k damage per click (single multi-projectile ice shot) vs a large pack, and assuming 40k of it is cold damage, here's what we get:

case A: he takes +60% physical damage. Then, he has total +360% phys damage. Since his cold damage is a function of physical, it gets increased just the same %. Resulting damage will be increased from 50k to 50k / 400% * 460% = 57.5k, of which 11.5k will be physical (increasing his life leech by 15% unless/except whenever he's at the life leech speed cap already), the rest is cold damage;

case B: he takes +60% elemental damage. Then, his cold damage is increased from 40k to 40k / 100% * 160% = 64k. His physical damage will remain the same (10k), his total damage will thus be 64k + 10k = 74k. Almost 1.5 times increase! Which is obviously much higher than 57.5k which he gets for those _same_ 5 passive points.

That's why for end-game, _despite_ somewhat lower life/mana leech, it may be very beneficial to take some few +elemental_damage% nodes - the damage output increase for a few passive points is, obviously, very dramatic whenever we talk any build which deals much elemental damage.

This, of course, would make elemental reflect much more difficult to maintain, though. I'd say, though, that if need be, same approach of using skills which deal many smaller hits fast, "cast on taking damage" trigger and something which can protect against primary character's elemental attack - could possibly be used. Perhaps in the same item IC is sitting in, even?

Mixing in elemental nodes only has that effect when adding flat elemental damage via auras or gear but converted elemental damage that origins from physical damage works a bit different and the equation goes simplified as follows:

physical part:
base_physical_damage x (1 + increase_to_physical) x (1 - elemental_conversion)

elemental part:
base_physical_damage x (1 + increase_to_physical + increase_to_elemental) x elemental_conversion

This means that in your example you would get the exact same cold damage in both cases but the physical increase would increase both parts. In other words:

Case A:
physical part is increased by 360%
elemental part is increaed by 360%

Case B:
physical part is increased by 300%
elemental part is increased by 360%

You can basically say that all "increased" modifiers are simply added up and then used according for what part they each apply. For converted damage, it is therefore generally more efficient to increase the source damage when both (physical and elemental increase) nodes have similar value per node.
In cases of 100% damage conversion (like for example using Burning Arrow with the Physical to Lightning support gem) you can simply take the nodes with the highest value per node so it makes sense to mix the most efficient physical and elemental nodes.
Elemental or weapon elemental nodes are more efficient when adding any source of "flat", non-converted elemental damage and projectile damage nodes apply to any kind of projectile, including projectile spells like Fireball, Freezing Pulse or Ethereal Knives.

I have found noticeable reason to dismiss the idea of curses-on-hit idea of mine (and any other curses-on-hit idea) :( . It is this map. Elreon sells it, and IIR mod on it is rather big, eh.

I wonder where else "monsters reflect curses" may in fact happen in end-game content.

Besides that map only Atziri herself reflects curses if i remember correctly.

Curse on hit is a very useful and often used mechanic and you see it especially often linked to a secondary skill that is used especially to apply the curse like Herald of Thunder, which will basically auto-curse all nearby monsters for a while after it is activated by killing a shocked enemy. For a regular single curse build i prefer to cast them manually but it is great for dual or triple curse builds!

It is, however, rarely used with the main damage skill since support links are very precious and are generally used more often for increases to damage and clear speed.

The unique map you linked is semi rare and you won't find it very often from drops or masters like Elreon or Zana. Masters have to be at maximum level before they can sell unique items and they only sell one random unique out of the whole item pool once every few resets (resets happen after completing their daily mission in your hideout).

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vargorn wrote:

Mixing in elemental nodes only has that effect when adding flat elemental damage via auras or gear but converted elemental damage that origins from physical damage works a bit different and the equation goes simplified as follows:

Spoiler

physical part:
base_physical_damage x (1 + increase_to_physical) x (1 - elemental_conversion)

elemental part:
base_physical_damage x (1 + increase_to_physical + increase_to_elemental) x elemental_conversion

This means that in your example you would get the exact same cold damage in both cases but the physical increase would increase both parts. In other words:

Case A:
physical part is increased by 360%
elemental part is increaed by 360%

Case B:
physical part is increased by 300%
elemental part is increased by 360%

You can basically say that all "increased" modifiers are simply added up and then used according for what part they each apply. For converted damage, it is therefore generally more efficient to increase the source damage when both (physical and elemental increase) nodes have similar value per node.
In cases of 100% damage conversion (like for example using Burning Arrow with the Physical to Lightning support gem) you can simply take the nodes with the highest value per node so it makes sense to mix the most efficient physical and elemental nodes.
Elemental or weapon elemental nodes are more efficient when adding any source of "flat", non-converted elemental damage and projectile damage nodes apply to any kind of projectile, including projectile spells like Fireball, Freezing Pulse or Ethereal Knives.

I believe this is partially incorrect, - and so was i, as well. The true story seem to be a bit more complex than i thought, and than you think. Based on this calculation in wiki, which i considered after reading your post - so i thankful to you for making it, by the way, - seems to indicate that there are _both_ types of +elemental_damage%. _Some_ work as i thought they would, others work as you describe they would. I currently suspect that ones which work like i described - are those which have the word "more" in their description; ones which don't - i guess would work like you say they would. But it's just a wild guess. Can definitely use more learning here.

Salute!

edit: apparently, there are only 3 passives which have "more" word in their description. One is "Point Blank", and iirc wiki indeed says that this multiplies all damage melee range by 150%. Not related to bow users but rather interesting are two other passives with "more": "infused shield", which gives 15% more energy shield (screened by Chaos Inoculation keystone - and once again, its wiki article confirms it's multiplicative bonus), and Pain Attunement - 30% more spell damage when on low life. The latter in theory could be set permanently active for a specific blood magic auradin build (Mortal Conviction), i guess - in case the user is setting up to run with 71% or more life reserved for auras. Probably tons of energy shield too, and probably Ghost Reaver. But unavoidably, such a buld would be extremely vulnerable to chaos damage, which ignores energy shield, and so demands serious chaos resist (i'd say 60% or higher), ain't so easy to get it, huh... So, obviously very specific use, if at all any practical use, for this one and for two others just as well. Ergo, if my guess about "more" is correct, then you were right about _passives_ giving +elemental_damage%; and what i meant - applies not to passives, but still to some items in game whereever this "more" word stands together with +elemental_damage%.

Edit2: Or may be you were not... Your math seems to contradict "damage conversion" paragraph of this wiki page, which supports my point of view (in general) instead. Since should your math be correct, then whole table given there would have no sense. Any explanation? Who's wrong - you or this wiki page? Both can't be correct in the same time...

Yes, any modifiers that have the keywords "increased" and "reduced" are summed up according to what they apply for and then form a single multiplier. Any modifiers that have the keywords "more" and "less" are always multiplicative.
That is why i used the word "increased" in quotation marks in my last post to specify that this is specific to increases that have this keyword. This is also why i called the equation simplified.
If you search the passive skill tree for these keywords, you will notice that there are almost no "more" or "less" modifers to damage except for the Pont Blank and Pain Attunement keystones. There are, however, many multiplicative modifiers available from support gems, game mechanics and some unique items. The full equation goes more like i listed below. I will only list it for damage here but other stats like attack speed etc. are calculated in the same way:

[Damage] = [Base Damage] x [Sum of "increased" Modifiers] x More_modifier_1 x More_Modifier_2 x ... x Less_Modifier_1 x Less_Modifier_2 x ...

with:
[Base Damage] = weapon damage + flat damage from gear + flat damage from auras
[Sum of "increased" Modifiers] = any source of increase or reduction to damage from passives, gear (like the physical damage increase from Rustic Sash belts), skill level etc.

Additional notes:
* Things get a bit more complicated if you have all types of damage from different sources so if you want to calculate your damage for some reason, it can be easier to split the whole equation into the different parts for physical, converted elemental, other source elemental, chaos or even split the elemental parts into the respective elements.
* I generally find it unecessary to calculate the exact values but it is helpful to have a rough estimate about how much a passive node or changing a certain gearpiece will affect your total damage output or survivability.


The game adds tags to each portion of base damage like physical, projectile, elemental, cold, chaos, attack, weapon, spell, AoE, Melee etc. These tags correspond to keywords found in the description of passives, skills and gear. It then adds up all "increased" and "reduced" modifiers that have the same keywords as the tags on each portion of the base damage to form a single multiplier for that portion of damage.
Afterwards, any "more" and "less" multipliers are used according to what portion of the damage or skill they each apply.
For skills that use damage conversion, some of the tags are inherited. The cold damage part of Ice Shot for example has the tags: Attack, Projectile, Physical, Elemental, Cold, Weapon
meaning that inhereted the Physical tag from its source.


[TL;DR]
* "increased" and "reduced" is always additive (or rather: almost always with only very few exceptions like burning damage)
* the sum of all applicable "increased" and "reduced" modifiers together forms a single multiplicative modifier
* "more" and "less" is always multiplicative


Edit: I just did some quick testing and my equation is indeed correct for both [x% of physical damage added as elemental] and for [x% of physical damage converted to elemental].
Unless Lightning Arrows damage conversion works fundamentally different than other skills (which i think is very unlikely), the wiki page is wrong but these things can always happen since it is maintained by players and not the devs themselves.

On another note: the low life Pain Attunement combo with Energy shield is only really used with either of two unique chest armors, Solaris Lorica (rather inefficient since it has no ES on its own) or the incredibly powerful (but even more so rare and expensive!) Shavronne's Wrappings. Both will negate the ability of chaos damage to bypass energy shield but you should still aim for a decent chaos resistance when using either.
There are also other boni to being at low life (via auras on life) like the attack speed bonus on the Blood Rage skill as well as several low-life specific boni on other unique items.

Thank you very much for all the info and testing - it appears to me as quite trustworthy. I am glad that my topic helped to spot a partially incorrect wiki page - all the credit goes to you, of course, but still i am a bit proud that it is my questions that led to this discovery. :)

Talking about this topic's subject, i.e. Ondar Guile based relatively low-accuracy high-evasion build (aiming to deal with reflected damage via high chance to evade it) - i have only one uncertainty remaining. It is: what about damage from AoE portion of ice shot? I suppose that being cold, it gets reflected by elemental reflect. But this AoE cone of cold damage is no longer _projectile_, i guess; is it? And so, if it's not a projectile, then reflected damage of it supposedly will NOT be "evadable" via high-evasion Ondar Guile's archer?

As you can imagine, this is quite important to know in advance; if the answer is "yep, AoE portion of Ice Shot gets reflected as a _spell_ and not as a _projectile_", then obviously Ice Shot will NOT do as a main AoE attack for this build... Which has significant implications in terms of which passive +damage% types it's best to get while levelling (having end-game in mind) and whatever else some other main-AoE attack would demand from passives to work efficiently.

The AoE is still an attack and not a spell so evasion still applies but it technically isn't a projectile either although it is created by one and might therefore have inherited the Projectile tag.
To be honest, i don't know if it will still get the double evasion bonus from Ondar's but you could simply test it on a non-hardcore char.