Increased Burning Damage VS Fire Penetration Gem:

Disclaimer: I've seen this thread being bumped 2017, you know that things have changed and all this cannot be correct anymore. E.g. ignite damage is 1/5 of the initial hit now.... come on guys, this is from 2013........

Burning Damage VS Fire Penetration:

Following is based on these information:


LvL 20 Fire Penetration Gem: 35% Penetration
LvL 20 Burning Damage Gem: 59% Burning Damage
LvL 20 Flammability: Cursed Enemies lose 49% Fire Resistance
LvL 20 Elemental Weakness: Cursed Enemies lose 49% Elemental Resistances

For example = 100 Base Fire Damage

Ignite Damage per Second: 1/3 of Damage dealt
Keep in mind that the base Ignite Duration is 4 seconds.


Example 1:
The target's Fire Resistance is 0%. A monster with that value doesn't show "Resists Fire" or "Vulnerable to Fire".

With Fire Penetration Gem:
100 * 1,35 * (1/3) = 45 Ignite Damage per Second

With Burning Damage Gem:
100 * (1/3) * 1,59 = 53 Ignite Damage per Second


Example 2:
Monsters can have more than 200% Fire Resistance. In that case Double Curse won't help you at all. Though the monsters Resistance is 200% or more, their maximum Resistance is capped at 75%.

With Fire Penetration Gem:
75%-35% = 40% -> 100 * 0,6 * (1/3) = 20 Ignite Damage per Second

With Burning Damage Gem:
75% -> 100 * 0,25 * (1/3) * 1,59 = 13,25 Ignite Damage per Second


Calculations and Tables:

Without Double Curse:
- Monsters with more than 41% Fire Resistance take more Damage when using the Fire Penetration Gem.
- Monsters with less than 41% Fire Resistance take more Damage when using the increased Burning Damage Gem.

With Double Curse (98% lowered Resistances):
It's actually the same:
- Monsters with more than 139% Fire Resistance take more Damage when using the Fire Penetration Gem.
- Monsters with less than 139% Fire Resistance take more Damage when using the increased Burning Damage Gem.

Now the stupid part about this: All these information are kinda useless, when there is no list about Monsters Resistances.

But! What I can say is that there are always some High-Resists Monsters/ Curse-Immune Monsters in end game Maps. And my experience says yes for Fire Penetration for these maps.
Of course, you could check all mods a monster has and change your Gem according to that, but who has the time for that? I think that more steady Damage is a good way for lazy people like me. The only thing that helps in end game maps is to know what kind of monsters are on the specific maps and then to decide what gem to use.



If there only existed a detailed list about the Resistances of Monsters on end game Maps. That would be the best thing ever! :D

Edit(thx to the idea of Live4evil):
Fire Pen is almost always the better choice when using a Searing Touch and the main Burning Damage Passive Nodes.

"

LMHTB wrote:

For the 0% FireRes Example, Fire Pen is always the better Gem when having Searing Touch and the main Burning Damage Nodes.

For the high % FireRes Example with Double Curse Burning Damage is only in a few cases better than Fire Pen, and thats fucking unexpected.

useful info


ty sir

What's your point? What would be a better support gem dps wise?
If that's the case you would have to add the damage increase of the initial base fire damage that triggers burning. Fire penetration gives a considerable damage boost, burning damage increase (quite obvious) none. The FP damage in example 1 would therefore be 35+45=80, in example 2 35+20=55. You would have to lower the base damage for the IBD case down to 65 as the 100 base damage in the FP case would already have a 35dps portion that was caused by FP. You also have to take into account the probability to ignite the target (chance to ignite + crit chance). Even if you assume 100% chance to ignite, FP damage increase is always bigger than pure IBD increase.
But maybe your point was something different that i missed.

Hi thanks for the feedback,

I concentratred on Ignite/Burning Damage mainly and that is why I didnt include Critical Hits or the Initial Damage. The reason why is because there would be to many variables for each Skill/Spell and Build etc.

My main point/question here is: When is Fire Penetration the better choice for the Ignite Damage.

Means you can see my 100 Base Fire Damage as 100% Damage for the Burning Damage calculations. Its not that I want to do more calculations for all possible stuff...

Of course, when your main damage Source is raw Spell/Fire Damage, you should take Fire Penetration.

So that means you really missed my point ;) Besides that I should add that the base Ignite Duration is 4 seconds.

Bumping, so more people can see what the best for burning damage based builds is. ;)

Just that you have an idea what build I am using:

bump :)

Looking at this it seems like Fire Penetration is the better choice. Fire Penetration would increase the damage of the initial hit and increase burn damage in certain situations.

Also you should consider the fact that you already have increased Burn Damage from Searing Touch and passive points. This means that the Increased Burning Damage gem isn't a straight up 59% burn damage increase since they stack additively. This would also help verify that Fire pen is better.


Edit: After some quick math assuming you have 70% increased Burn damage from Searing Touch and another 60% from the 3 Burn damage increase points near the Templar area, I have found out that Fire Penetration deals 103.5 dmg/sec versus a mob with no fire resist while Increased Burn Damage deals 96.3 dmg/sec versus that same monster. This means that Fire Penetration is better in every situation.

"

Live4evil wrote:

Looking at this it seems like Fire Penetration is the better choice. Fire Penetration would increase the damage of the initial hit and increase burn damage in certain situations.

Also you should consider the fact that you already have increased Burn Damage from Searing Touch and passive points. This means that the Increased Burning Damage gem isn't a straight up 59% burn damage increase since they stack additively. This would also help verify that Fire pen is better.

xD, do you know what you are talking about? Maybe it helps when you read more about this topic, it seems you didnt understand some mechanics and my calculations.

ok, your edit shows you didnt get the idea behind this. your calculations are wrong.

I would like to see you do the calculations with 70% Burn damage from Searing Touch and 60% Burn damage from passives.

Its funny how you assume I did the calculations wrong without doing it yourself.

ok forget it, I will do the calculations, 1 sec.

Edit: Omfg...
I couldnt imagine that. Thats crazy and interesting. Thanks for pointing that out.

You are right there. Sry not believing you, it was just beyond my imagination.

For the 0% FireRes Example, Fire Pen is always the better Gem when having Searing Touch and the main Burning Damage Nodes.

For the high % FireRes Example with Double Curse Burning Damage is only in a few cases better than Fire Pen, and thats fucking unexpected.

TL;DR:
Fire Penetration is almost always the better Choice when using Searing Touch and having the Burning Damage Passive Nodes.