MoM, unreserved mana, and mana regen

Edit: please move to gameplay discussion.

So for the raging spirit build I'm using MoM is a great tool. What I'm confused about is how to find how it improves effective HP in game.

For instance, suppose our unreserved pool is 500 mana, we have 300 mana reg/sec, and we are attacking for 200 mana/sec, and AA drains 50 mana/sec so we regen at about 50 mana/sec. Our attacks cost 135 mana. We sustain a hit for all of our 500 mana. Now we are not able to attack for 135/250=0.54sec. After 0.54sec, we attack and now we have 0 mana. In the next 0.46 sec, we will regen 115 mana. So on average during the first second after getting hit we have 62 mana. Any time we get hit in the second right after the first hit that drained our mana, our MoM is effectively working off of 62 mana.

My point is that when we compute the effective HP with MoM we shouldn't be using the full mana pool, but a percentage of it. Say we have 3k HP, and we take 1k phys dmg, MoM takes 500 from mana, so its mitigation is 50%. We could say our effective HP is 3k/0.5=6k, but I don't think this is realistic. I feel like we need to look at not the maximum unreserved mana we have, but the average unreserved mana we have after being hit. In this case the average would be 281, and MoM would provide 28.1% mitigation, giving us 4.2k HP.

This framework seems reasonable to me because when I play MoM's effectiveness does seem to depend both on the unreserved pool and mana reg. What do you guys think, how should effective HP be calculated with MoM?

Max Mana Unreserved + Max HP.

Small hits mean very little, it's the big hits where you get tested.

Best case scenario, effective HP with MoM = Max HP / 0.7 or Max HP x 1.428. This is the case if you always have enough mana for MoM and you aren't using energy shield (MoM only gets activated on health damage).

Mana regen doesn't directly affect your eHP with MoM; it affects your sustain/healing.

I understand what both of you are saying, but my question is more along the lines of is it fair to say cloak of defiance which needs 1k mana and gives 55% mitigation is better than lightning coil which requires no mana an gives 50% mitigation.

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Chundadragon wrote:

Small hits mean very little, it's the big hits where you get tested.

Don't think this is fair to say. Consider devourers, jumpers, spitting gulls. Lots of medium hits in quick succession are common ways of people dying.

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MatrixFactor wrote:

I understand what both of you are saying, but my question is more along the lines of is it fair to say cloak of defiance which needs 1k mana and gives 55% mitigation is better than lightning coil which requires no mana an gives 50% mitigation.

Since when did Coil give 50%? :d You have to consider that MoM works with everything that isn't a degen, Coil is only physical. Then you have to consider that Coil will work for Vaal Smashes -> Cloak maybe not if you don't have enough mana.

Different scenarios where each is better :) Although, in general I would say Coil is better all around since no regen/half-regen, MoM/AA starts to fail.

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MatrixFactor wrote:

I understand what both of you are saying, but my question is more along the lines of is it fair to say cloak of defiance which needs 1k mana and gives 55% mitigation is better than lightning coil which requires no mana an gives 50% mitigation.

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Chundadragon wrote:

Small hits mean very little, it's the big hits where you get tested.

Don't think this is fair to say. Consider devourers, jumpers, spitting gulls. Lots of medium hits in quick succession are common ways of people dying.

Usually get a chance to react to those or just let a cwdt+ic setup take care of that. I'm in general agreement with Chunda on this one, more max life/mp will give you a little longer chance to react or logout :P Also the amount of mana regen you can attain isn't going to do much in the short term, the extra ~100 mana/sec you can get is fairly minimal term IMO.

Does the OP not really understand how the whole MoM / EB / AA thing works?

Or is he just picking a pointless fight in semantics on purpose?

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elitedesolator wrote:

Does the OP not really understand how the whole MoM / EB / AA thing works?

Or is he just picking a pointless fight in semantics on purpose?

I'm trying to pick between a rare armor + MoM in tree vs. lightning coil with no MoM vs. cloak of defiance. Is it really that obvious to you how to compare them?

My particular issue is that my unreserved pool is 500-700.

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MatrixFactor wrote:

I'm trying to pick between a rare armor + MoM in tree vs. lightning coil with no MoM vs. cloak of defiance. Is it really that obvious to you how to compare them?

Then the way to approach it is to discuss the EXACT situation you're facing.

Instead of just having an unrelated discussion of if MoM + EB + AA is flat out better than Lightning Coil.

Both have their pros and cons.

EDIT: To me, it's actually really easy to decide whether to use LC or MoM. LC is usually used for builds that aren't mana intensive, or builds that use a lot of auras.

MoM is the opposite. 1-2 auras, using spells that are mana intensive.

Well I have a build that runs 4-5 (4 if using MoM, 5 without) auras and has high mana regen. Basic guidelines don't apply.

The problem is that I have a small amount of mana, 500 with cloak and 700 with a rare armor. This small amount of mana provides a useful amount of mitigation, but often I will be out of mana after medium sized hit, or many small ones, so I can't count on having that mitigation all the time, like I would be able to with coil. The question I'm trying to ask is whether I can count on having it often enough to make MoM better than coil.

Check out my spreadsheet. The "Mana availability" multiplier is something I came up with to try address the above idea of not having full mana at all times.

I guess your point about specific monster fights may be what I have to do.