Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

[billking]

Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

Hi. I've only played Necromancer so far, but I had some ideas for various builds involving characters that actually, you know, attack, not just sit back and watch.

I was investigating the Deadly Strike ability in particular. I have 3 questions:
1. The Arreat Summit says (here) that Deadly Strike doubles all damage, whether physical, elemental, or magical. However, I couldn't find anything on this site to confirm, and some sources on this site, such as this Riftadin guide, seem to indicate that isn't the case: "Deadly strike won't help you there as your physical damage is so low." What's the real deal?
2. Does Deadly Strike stack with Crushing Blow? In other words, if you manage to pull off a 100% Crushing Blow, 100% Deadly Strike monster of a melee character, will his hits always take away 1/4 of a boss's health per hit, instead of the usual 1/8?
3. While we're at it, is the Arreat Summit correct in saying Crushing Blow hits bosses for 1/8? I read somewhere that it is 1/10 (the same as PvP).

 

[sirpoopsalot]

Re: Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

I could very easily be wrong, but my understanding:

1. DS is only for physical damage.

2. I don't think they stack. I think CB damage is always completely independent of any other damage type you deal. As far as I'm aware, the only way to increase CB's damage is by lowering a monster's physical resistance (with Amplify Damage or Decrepify curses).

3. I thought it was 1/10.

 

[billking]

Re: Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

2. I don't think they stack. I think CB damage is always completely independent of any other damage type you deal. As far as I'm aware, the only way to increase CB's damage is by lowering a monster's physical resistance (with Amplify Damage or Decrepify curses).

Interestingly, the Arreat Summit sort of disagrees with you there: "Physical resistance does apply to Crushing Blow damage, but only if the resistance is positive." That means Amplify Damage can be useful for dropping the resistance down to zero in the case of physical resistant monsters, but worthless against most of them. Assuming, of course, that the Arreat Summit isn't just being an internet version of the LCS.

I was hoping someone had done some tests. :shrug:

 

[MYK]

Re: Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

but worthless against most of them.

A lot of monsters have physical resistance, usually starting at around 30 on average. Using Amplify Damage of Decrepify are excellent ways of increasing Crushing Blow damage.

When CB is triggered it deals a % of the monsters life modified by their physical resistance.

Deadly Strike cannot be applied to Crushing Blow because it's not really damage that's being directly dealt, if that is understood.

 

[billking]

Re: Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

When no one else has run some tests, the best thing to do is to run them yourself. :thumbup:

Results were as predicted. Contrary to Arreat Summit, DS does not work with +magic damage items, and DS and CB do not work together.

 

[SnickerSnack]

Re: Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

I just read a thread that said that DS is applied last and modifies all damage - even elemental damage.

I'll look for the thread again.

 

[HegemonKhan]

Re: Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

heres the (or a) link (on deadly strike):

http://diablo.incgamers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=687216&highlight=deadly+strike

if anyone can accurately test deadly strike to confirm or defirm if the info about it is right or not, would be greatly appreciated.

(i can NOT tell by myself)

does it double final damage?

does it double final damage no matter the sum or combination of damage types that create the final damage?

will the unique pole arm grim reaper with 100% deadly strike (DS) on it on a paladin using holy shock at 1-4000 damage, now be able to do 1-8000 damage every single time or at least 95% of the time (everything in d2 is suppose to be capped at 5% and 95% ) ?

 

[lumpor]

Re: Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

You don't need to run tests. I'm sure that it only affects physical damage.

Crushing blow is affected by positive resistance. Most enemies in hell do have positive resistance, so amp and decrep are good.

Crushing blow's default is 1/4. When it's used with ranged, it's halved. When used against bosses, it's halved too. In other words:

Melee:
Normal enemies: 1/4
Bosses: 1/8

Ranged:
Normal enemies: 1/8
Bosses: 1/16

 

[HegemonKhan]

Re: Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

testing: facts, data, and observation...is the closest thing we humans have to certainty and the existance of things.... V.V

*the problem with "assuming" it only does physical, is that than whats the "assumed" point of the item (weapon) with deadly strike mod on it when it only does like 10-20 damage.... V.V

 

[sirpoopsalot]

Re: Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

For the Deadly Strike test, anyone got an Enchantress setup with Highlords, Gorerider's, etc.? That should settle it easily, since 99% of your damage is usually elemental and often you have a moderately-tight range of damage.

Edit: The Grim Reaper (unique War Scythe) comes with 100% Deadly Strike. So I figure cast enchant, attack something, and watch it die in 4 hits. Equip the warscythe, and attack the same monster type, and it should die in either 2 or 4 hits. I'm guessing 4.

Edit2: Nevermind, I'm curious... I'll do it myself.



@billking, I forgot about the 0% cap on lowering physical resistances for increasing crushing blow damage, but, as was mentioned, a lot of monsters do have some physical resistance. I think the AS is probably right, but I haven't really tested it.



Edit3: OK, unless I'm missing something obvious, Deadly Strike definitely DOES NOT increase elemental damage. Here's how I tested it:

I loaded an old enchantress up with +17 fire skills (including a Leaf staff) and no deadly strike (or damage boosting) equipment except for the polearm. I started the game and observed that my physical damage was ~250 average with both the polearm and the staff (so the polearm should've had ~500 damage after DS - not a big difference). Next, I cast Enchant (LCS said I had 7.6-9.2k damage with Enchant active) and set the game to /players8 and got my merc killed off so he wouldn't influence any results.

Then I went out and found a single zombie in the Blood Moor and killed it in 4 hits with the staff equipped. Weapon switch over to the polearm and killed another zombie - in 5 hits.

If Deadly Strike worked on elemental damage, my fire-based damage should've gone from ~8k to ~16k when I switched weapons for the 2nd monster, which should have a big effect on the number of hits required to kill that zombie. Obviously, that wasn't the case.

 

[onderduiker]

Re: Deadly Strike/Crushing Blow questions

% Deadly Strike, Critical Strike and Mastery all apply to physical weapon damage only (although they don't apply to Impale, Dragon Talon, Tail and Flight, Sacrifice and Smite). They're applied after off-weapon +% Enhanced Damage but before conversion to other damage types, so they can double Berserk's magic damage, the converted fire, magic and cold damage of Fire, Magic and Cold Arrow respectively, and the converted lightning damage of Lightning Bolt. They apply to Vengeance's physical damage, but won't double the added elemental damage.

A Barbarian with Level 20 Polearm Mastery (21%) equipping Guillaume's Face Winged Helm (15% Deadly Strike) and an Insight 'RalTirTalSol' polearm with +6 to Critical Strike (46%) would have the following chance of doubling his attack's physical damage:

= 1 - ((1 - 0.21) * (1 - 0.15) * (1 - 0.46))
= 1 - (0.79 * 0.85 * 0.54)
= 1 - 0.36261
= 0.63739 (63.7%)

The Crit assigned to monsters does apply to all damage types, whether it's applied by attacks or spells. Barbarian hirelings and all attacking pets excluding Shadows and Poison Creeper have Crit 5, which would double any non-physical damage. Unfortunately there's no way of increasing it in the unmodified game.

Critical and Deadly Strikes don't apply to Crushing Blow's damage, which is calculated separately to the attack's physical damage (something that's made abundantly clear by the fact that Sanctuary's bypassing of positive Damage Resist % against undead does not apply to CB, rendering it completely ineffective against Immune to Physical undead, even with Sanctuary applied). Positive DR % will reduce CB damage but negative DR % won't increase it. Casting Decrepify (DR -50%) will prevent a monster's DR 50% from reducing CB damage, but casting Amplify Damage (DR -100%) wouldn't increase CB damage applied to a monster with DR 0%.

I ran tests similar to those of sirpoopsalot to confirm all this. The Arreat Summit may be the official site, but some of its information is outdated, misleading or just plain wrong. However, it might be possible that it worked differently in earlier patches, or that it works that way in Classic.