MageChick
Diabloii.Net Member
To carry infinity or not, that is the question
Should your sorc carry Infinity herself or delegate the task to her merc? There’s some pro’s and con’s of each, but lets explore the numbers a bit (you know I want to :soapbox: ).
I’m going to look at damage from your sorc as well as survivability. We can compare damage and FCR rate to determine damage per second. The –enemy resistance varies, so we’ll have to look at damage applied to monsters of various resistances. Beyond that, the comparison will get kind of fuzzy. In the end you’ll have to make a decision based not only on damage, but on various elements of survivability, MF and most importantly play style.
Of course making your merc carry the infinity will really limit what your merc can do for you, but I’ll leave the merc debate for some other time.
Build
I’m going to do this comparison for pure lightning sorcs, non-es type.
20 Charged Bolt
20 Nova
20 Lightning
20 Chain Lightning
20 Lightning Mastery
1 Thunderstorm
1 Static
1 Telekinesis
1 Teleport
1 Warmth
105 points total, complete at lvl 95.
Gear
There are four different gear setups we’ll look at.
1) Infinity build, high FCR
2) Infinity build, high resists
3) Eschuta/Spirit/CoH
4) Hoto/Spirit/Enigma
* = Perfect
** = Average
*** = spirit has 35% res to cold, light and poison not listed
All gear faceted where possible
Calculations
Here's the formula as I know it:
[base skill damage] * [synergy mod] * [mastery mod + (+% skill damage)] = [total damage]
Don't worry, I'n not going to drag anyone through the math this time, but I know someone wants too :thumbsup: If you want to see how I came up with these numbers, check out post #13 on this thread where I did similar math for the blizzballer/meteorb/CL&FO comparison.
Calculation Table
Damge Table
Conclusions:
Initially I see that it’s probably not worth it to sacrifice skills and resists (CoH + SOJ) to get a higher fast cast rate (Viper Magi + FRC/Resist Ring). You do more damage and have higher resists using CoH. The down side is that your teleport speed will suffer, and that may affect your MF run time.
Looking at the non-infinity carrying builds I also see that Eschuta/CoH is better than Hoto/ Enigma, at least for damage and resists. You will get more MF by going Hoto/Enigma, but I just don’t think it’s worth it.
So that kinda brings it down to the Eschuta/Spirit vs. Infinity (the two middle rows in the above chart). These actually look close enough in terms of damage to make it a personal play style preference. Eschuta/Spirit will give you more damage in the non-immune monsters, but Infinity will give you more damage in the original immunes.
When you already have –85% coming from conviction, plus –15-20% coming from griffons and a few extra –5%’s from any facets, the extra -45-55% by carrying infinity yourself doesn’t help all that much for non-immune monsters. In fact, for 0-50% resistant monsters its actually a waste as you can’t lower them more than –100%. But it does come in handy for the 100-115% resistant monsters. For the non-immune monsters not carrying infinity will get you about 30-75% more damage. But you’ll do about that same percent less damage when it comes to immunes.
For me, I’d say the other benefits of Eschuta/Spirit will be what makes the difference for me. I like to teleport fast. But if you’re running placing where your merc needs to worry about IM, then carrying infinity yourself will help. Some people will also like the steady damage of carrying infinity vs. the huge range of damage by leaving your merc to carry it.
I really thought there was going to be a bigger difference in the damage analysis. The merc comparison is closely tied in to this debate but is beyond the scope of this work. I just thought it would be good to get the numbers out there so we can debate this knowledgeably.
Should your sorc carry Infinity herself or delegate the task to her merc? There’s some pro’s and con’s of each, but lets explore the numbers a bit (you know I want to :soapbox: ).
I’m going to look at damage from your sorc as well as survivability. We can compare damage and FCR rate to determine damage per second. The –enemy resistance varies, so we’ll have to look at damage applied to monsters of various resistances. Beyond that, the comparison will get kind of fuzzy. In the end you’ll have to make a decision based not only on damage, but on various elements of survivability, MF and most importantly play style.
Of course making your merc carry the infinity will really limit what your merc can do for you, but I’ll leave the merc debate for some other time.
Build
I’m going to do this comparison for pure lightning sorcs, non-es type.
20 Charged Bolt
20 Nova
20 Lightning
20 Chain Lightning
20 Lightning Mastery
1 Thunderstorm
1 Static
1 Telekinesis
1 Teleport
1 Warmth
105 points total, complete at lvl 95.
Gear
There are four different gear setups we’ll look at.
1) Infinity build, high FCR
Code:
Skill FCR Res FHR MF
Infinity 30
Griffon’s** 1 25
Viper Magi* 1 30 35
Magefists 20
Arachnids 1 20
War Trav’s* 50
Mara’s** 2 25
SOJ 1
FCR/Res Ring 10 15
Anni** 1 15
Torch** 3 15
[B]Total: 10 105 105 0 80[/B]
-77.5% enemy res*
Code:
Skill FCR Res FHR MF
Infinity 30
Griffons** 1 25
CoH 2 65 25
Magefists 20
Arachnids 1 20
War Trav’s* 50
Mara’s** 2 25
SOJ 1
SOJ 1
Anni** 1 15
Torch** 3 15
[B]Total: 12 65 120 0 105[/B]
-72.5% enemy res*
Code:
Skill FCR Res FHR MF
Eschuta 3 40
Spirit* 2 35 *** 55
Griffons** 1 25
CoH 2 65 25
Magefists 20
Arachnids 1 20
War Trav’s* 50
Mara’s** 2 25
SOJ 1
SOJ 1
Anni** 1 15
Torch** 3 15
[B]Total: 17 140 120 55 75[/B]
-27.5% enemy res*
Code:
Skill FCR Res FHR MF
Hoto** 3 40 35
Spirit* 2 35 *** 55
Griffons** 1 25
Enigma 2 95
Magefists 20
Arachnids 1 20
War Trav’s* 50
Mara’s** 2 25
SOJ 1
SOJ 1
Anni** 1 15
Torch** 3 15
[B]Total: 17 140 90 55 145[/B]
-22.5% enemy res*** = Average
*** = spirit has 35% res to cold, light and poison not listed
All gear faceted where possible
Calculations
Here's the formula as I know it:
[base skill damage] * [synergy mod] * [mastery mod + (+% skill damage)] = [total damage]
Don't worry, I'n not going to drag anyone through the math this time, but I know someone wants too :thumbsup: If you want to see how I came up with these numbers, check out post #13 on this thread where I did similar math for the blizzballer/meteorb/CL&FO comparison.
Calculation Table
Code:
LM LM+ed% L min L max L min* L max* L Avg
Infin FCR 398 420.5 28 15943 29 16663 8346
Infin Res 422 439.5 30 18892 31 19525 9778
Eschuta 482 514.5 33 27139 35 28654 14345
Hoto 482 494.5 33 27139 34 27722 13878
LM = Original Lightning Mastery %
LM + ed% = LM + % damage from equipment (eschuta, facets)
L min | L max = skill calculator lightning damage
L min* | L max* = damage with LM + ed% applied
Code:
FPA Dam/Sec -Res 0% 50% 75% 100% 115%
Infin FCR 13 16051 157.5% 32101 32101 29292 14365 11958
Infin Res 14 17461 152.5% 34922 34922 30993 14755 12135
Eschuta 12 29885 107.5% 59769 47068 39597 11804 7322
Hoto 12 28912 102.5% 57824 44091 36863 9975 5638
FPA = Frames Per Attack
Dam/Sec = Average Damage per Second
-Res = Total negative enemy resistance from gear
xx% = damage per second applied to monster with stated resistanceInitially I see that it’s probably not worth it to sacrifice skills and resists (CoH + SOJ) to get a higher fast cast rate (Viper Magi + FRC/Resist Ring). You do more damage and have higher resists using CoH. The down side is that your teleport speed will suffer, and that may affect your MF run time.
Looking at the non-infinity carrying builds I also see that Eschuta/CoH is better than Hoto/ Enigma, at least for damage and resists. You will get more MF by going Hoto/Enigma, but I just don’t think it’s worth it.
So that kinda brings it down to the Eschuta/Spirit vs. Infinity (the two middle rows in the above chart). These actually look close enough in terms of damage to make it a personal play style preference. Eschuta/Spirit will give you more damage in the non-immune monsters, but Infinity will give you more damage in the original immunes.
When you already have –85% coming from conviction, plus –15-20% coming from griffons and a few extra –5%’s from any facets, the extra -45-55% by carrying infinity yourself doesn’t help all that much for non-immune monsters. In fact, for 0-50% resistant monsters its actually a waste as you can’t lower them more than –100%. But it does come in handy for the 100-115% resistant monsters. For the non-immune monsters not carrying infinity will get you about 30-75% more damage. But you’ll do about that same percent less damage when it comes to immunes.
For me, I’d say the other benefits of Eschuta/Spirit will be what makes the difference for me. I like to teleport fast. But if you’re running placing where your merc needs to worry about IM, then carrying infinity yourself will help. Some people will also like the steady damage of carrying infinity vs. the huge range of damage by leaving your merc to carry it.
I really thought there was going to be a bigger difference in the damage analysis. The merc comparison is closely tied in to this debate but is beyond the scope of this work. I just thought it would be good to get the numbers out there so we can debate this knowledgeably.
rop: