Evasion Isn't bad - A Revolutionary Breakthrough

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_wuv_ wrote:

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DestroTheGod wrote:

Aside from my game experience with evasion being fine, theoretically it's fine as well. Armor and evasion honestly deal with damage exactly the same way. 30% damage reduction to 30% chance to miss. It plays out the same over time.

no it doesn't

It does in this game due to the forced pseudo-randomness of the guaranteed-evasion mechanic. The only time the difference is noticeable is when you can't take a single hit without the armor that you could with.

Which, admittedly, can happen in quite a few places, with quite a few gear layouts.




Ya know, given that there seems to be as many people who don't understand this mechanic as there are people who don't understand that .999~ = 1, maybe GGG should reiterate it in a game wide announcement? Clear up some of the misunderstandings that the evasion% is in fact NOT random chance beyond the first swing?

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themousemaster wrote:

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_wuv_ wrote:

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DestroTheGod wrote:

Aside from my game experience with evasion being fine, theoretically it's fine as well. Armor and evasion honestly deal with damage exactly the same way. 30% damage reduction to 30% chance to miss. It plays out the same over time.

no it doesn't

It does in this game due to the forced pseudo-randomness of the guaranteed-evasion mechanic. The only time the difference is noticeable is when you can't take a single hit without the armor that you could with.

Which, admittedly, can happen in quite a few places, with quite a few gear layouts.




Ya know, given that there seems to be as many people who don't understand this mechanic as there are people who don't understand that .999~ = 1, maybe GGG should reiterate it in a game wide announcement? Clear up some of the misunderstandings that the evasion% is in fact NOT random chance beyond the first swing?

No. Status ailments and the problems associated with getting hit multiple times in short succession mess up that whole theory. Not getting hit over 90% of the time isn't the same as absorbing 90% of physical damage.

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MonstaMunch wrote:

No. Status ailments and the problems associated with getting hit multiple times in short succession mess up that whole theory. Not getting hit over 90% of the time isn't the same as absorbing 90% of physical damage.

My statement was assuming that the 2 "test subjects" had equal resists, raw hp values, etc., and would be affected by the same aliments at the time off testing.

Now, if you meant that one of the test subjects might *avoid* a status ailment the other gets afflicted with SPECIFICALLY because of the mechanics, then yes, that will result in a variance.

FYI if you deal good damage reflect is still a major issue even with Ondar's Guile.

It checks your own accuracy against your own evasion now, so if you have just 1 or 2 accuracy pieces it's gg.

Thanks GGG, for the terrible accuracy/evasion formula, and the terrible reflect mechanic.

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themousemaster wrote:

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MonstaMunch wrote:

No. Status ailments and the problems associated with getting hit multiple times in short succession mess up that whole theory. Not getting hit over 90% of the time isn't the same as absorbing 90% of physical damage.

My statement was assuming that the 2 "test subjects" had equal resists, raw hp values, etc., and would be affected by the same aliments at the time off testing.

Now, if you meant that one of the test subjects might *avoid* a status ailment the other gets afflicted with SPECIFICALLY because of the mechanics, then yes, that will result in a variance.

That's what happens when you evade a hit rather than absorb it, you don't get the status ailment.... So two characters with the same resists but one with pure armor and the other with ev, the ev has a clear advantage. Same with stuff like stun. Not getting hit is better than getting hit and absorbing some of the damage. The thing is you still have to be able to take the damage of at least one big hit every now and then either way, but in the case of ev, it's pretty much guaranteed to be only one hit.

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MonstaMunch wrote:

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themousemaster wrote:

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MonstaMunch wrote:

No. Status ailments and the problems associated with getting hit multiple times in short succession mess up that whole theory. Not getting hit over 90% of the time isn't the same as absorbing 90% of physical damage.

My statement was assuming that the 2 "test subjects" had equal resists, raw hp values, etc., and would be affected by the same aliments at the time off testing.

Now, if you meant that one of the test subjects might *avoid* a status ailment the other gets afflicted with SPECIFICALLY because of the mechanics, then yes, that will result in a variance.

That's what happens when you evade a hit rather than absorb it, you don't get the status ailment.... So two characters with the same resists but one with pure armor and the other with ev, the ev has a clear advantage. Same with stuff like stun. Not getting hit is better than getting hit and absorbing some of the damage. The thing is you still have to be able to take the damage of at least one big hit every now and then either way, but in the case of ev, it's pretty much guaranteed to be only one hit.

I was agreeing with that. Not sure why you are arguing with me ;p.


That said, EVA-tanking does have a big disadvantage against Armor-tanking: As your skill tree is likely going to be on the *right* side of the "passive forest", you are going to have far fewer raw HP to work with (both because of less STR, and missing out on the juicy HP-based nodes in the Marauder/Templar area), so your actual ability to TAKE that 1 hit may be diminished.

But discussing the merits of evasion tanking overall is a different topic than just discussing the effective-incoming-damage of DEX vs STR tanking.

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moozooh wrote:

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

and the truth of the matter is that nothing really one-shots you in this game, you're not facing 3000 physical damage when you life is at 2500, ever

No, but you're facing:
— 4000 in a single hit when your life is at 3000 (Merc Vaal);
— 2000-3000 several times in a row when your life is at 3500 (Merc Kole and map Brutus);
— then there are map Kole, map Perpetus, Hybrid Widow from the Overgrown Shrine, map Hillock from Spider Forest, map Oak, map Vaal, and other bosses that may deal several thousands' worth of physical damage on a good hit;
— AoE reflect from physical attacks paired with certain map mods, and/or status ailments, and/or curses;
— reflected EK crits.

Wow, all of those would be devastating if those were actually true values!

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moozooh wrote:

Yes, with Enfeeble, Granites, and Endurance Charges most of that can be reduced to <50% of the original damage values without IR or any armor-based gear.

Oh, wait, they're not true values. What a relief!

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moozooh wrote:

But another problem is you don't always take these hits at full life, and cannot always escape to regenerate or refill flasks.

Well if you're not taking the hit at full life, the conventional argument against evasion falls apart. Even at getting two-shot evasion starts to play a major role in staying alive, and by the time you get to three-shot there are no issues whatsoever.

Also, Merc Vaal's smash is something you have no excuse getting hit by ever (I've gotten 5 characters to act 3, two of them melee, and zero times hit by Merc Vaal smash), unless you happen to desync just then. And reflect is a known issue and currently solved by Vaal Pact, Aegis Aurora, or just using remote skills.

Up front, i'm not saying evasion is bad!

As soon, as i've seen all this bow users posting: "evasion is ok" ... play an evasion based melee with same eq and than tell what u think.

Started up my sword and board evasion ranger after the tree changes again and didn't have that much fun since a long time. Double strike + melee splash is incredibly useful, my gear is awful and so far I only died because I ran some tests with vaal smash. We'll see how it goes in the higher difficulties, but hopefully my gear will be better then.
Might not be too relevant though since I'm using heavy block + eva + acrobatics to minimize risks. Once I get the sockets I'll throw in enfeeble and blind and stand around laughing while anything other than spellcasters try to hit me.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

Oh, wait, they're not true values. What a relief!

The "truthiness" of those values depends entirely on build and play style, because not every build uses more than 4 Endurance Charges (if at all), curses and whatnot, but that's hardly the crux of the issue.

Stacking 4-5 different forms of damage mitigation is, to me, a very high level of play, which gets the hardcoreness points for being just that, but on the other hand it confines many builds to using all the same tricks which are brutally powerful in their own right. You won't see a high level character (melee especially) that hasn't died and at the same time doesn't use at least three of the following mechanics extensively:

— high base armor from expensive gear;
— Grace/Determination with IR, sometimes with IF too;
— Granite flasks, usually of Iron Skin/Reflexes;
— Enfeeble;
— EC and/or Molten Shell;
— Arctic Armour;
— Immortal Call.

Having less than three forms of mitigation mentioned above, as well as at least one active or passive avoidance technique (evasion/dodge/block/blind/stun/freeze/being ranged), is barely enough when fighting certain bosses! That is the issue, and that is the answer to "pretty much nothing one-shots you in this game, ever": yes, but only if you actually go all out. You don't make a point his way, pal!

Since many of these mitigation mechanics are employed just to avoid being one-shot actually tells a lot about the state of monster damage/player EHP balance. I'm not against things like Vaal smash being potential OHKO events as long as everything is in sync and properly telegraphed (hell, I play Japanese shmups, everything one-shots you there), but there's no excuse for map bosses being so strong that you need to go far out of your way to ensure the absolute minimum of necessary survivability buffer.

0.11 was really a step in the right direction though: it decreased the power of mitigation mechanics simultaneously with decreasing monster damage, allowing freedom of choice between them, but I think there is more to be gained by balancing. Stacking defense mechanics right now is like stacking auras: you can do without it, but the game is balanced around people who are doing it, so you will be harshly punished for deviating from the status quo.

I think that if you stack many defense mechanics to a great extent, you should be near-immortal but do very little damage. This is why I never felt that EK users like chalkline, Kerkrom, Etup and others were breaking the game or anything. Their insane tankiness is counter-weighed by the fact that they do/did less DPS than virtually any other member of their groups. People with less than godly gear would need to do even less dps to avoid one-shotting themselves on reflected crits. This is a good kind of balance, I would say.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

unless you happen to desync just then

Which I did, on Onslaught, three days into the league. The animation played already after the smash had happened. Get on my level. :)

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

And reflect is a known issue and currently solved by Vaal Pact, Aegis Aurora

Both are no-go for life-based builds. ES+evasion doesn't seem to be a solution at the moment. I'm not aware of any high-profile hybrid builds like that; I've run calculations but couldn't come up with anything worthwhile.

Going CI to avoid reflect, let alone with Aegis Aurora, is very expensive and can be considered a luxury.

As for remote skills, there are playstyle archetypes where this is either impossible or shouldn't be necessary. I don't want to avoid reflect in melee or when self-casting, but neither do I want it to be so devastating that I'm expressly punished just for my fundamental choice of playstyle.