+ Skill Level

Lord Pantz · 05-23-2007, 09:56 AM

Ok, I don't always claim to know everything and this has been debated with me many times from different people. And I'll be the first to admit whem I'm wrong. Anyways...

Is the Skill level hard cap for crush, slash or pierce 455?

I had someone argue with me a couple of weeks ago in the brig channel that infact 455 was the cap for an even con mob but if you're skill was higher than that it actually had an effect on higher level mobs.

I was of the belief that regardless of a mobs level your effective cap was 455 no matter what and even if your skill was higher than that it would do you no good because you were level 70.

Am I wrong?

Pinski · 05-23-2007, 09:58 AM

Supposedly, the cap for all skills is supposed to be Level*1.5 over the base of Level*5. Which at Level 70 is 105 + 350, or 455.

Whether this is entirely true or not is really really hard to tell.

Lord Pantz · 05-23-2007, 10:15 AM

Yarr. I always forget that extra 5 I edited my post. I know its near impossible to tell via testing. I just wasn't sure if someone else knew anything concrete regarding it.

Choadley · 05-23-2007, 03:36 PM

I think it's another one of those things that no one really knows, but some will have you believe they know all about it. There is no way to judge positively if anything above the cap is useful, but there always be someone trying to say different. Unless a dev weighed in on it, I'm inclined to believe it's plain capped and con won't matter.

Gesari · 05-25-2007, 05:10 AM

Also, level really has nothing to do with the baring on whether or not your skill is high enough to hit someone. As far as I can tell, there's no real diminishing effect in terms of weapon skill vs. higher level mobs like there is with mitigation/avoidance/etc. I'm about 99% positive it's really all about your weapon skill vs. the mobs defensive skills, such as defense, parry, etc.

Snark · 05-25-2007, 05:18 AM

wheres all the slashing mods? Every damn piece has +pierce

i know im grasping for relevance here but god damnit!

Gesari · 05-25-2007, 12:40 PM

To hell with + weapon skill mods, just spec 1h and get coule and be happy

Thus leaving room for a more interesting adornment...like a phantom handle

DoubleUp · 05-30-2007, 03:02 AM

I have been debating this one for a long time.
Most peeps seem to think that having a damage proc is the way to go, but because i am a parse Nazi (ie i am always running the parser), as I imagine most scouts would be, i have noticed a quite peculiar trend as I analyze the parses at the end of the nite in my quest to maximize my dps and determine why some scouts are doing more or less damage then me.

What I discovered is that on the zone wide parses, that majority of the raid, including all scouts (melee scouts), were only averaging a 80-82% to hit rate. This is amazingly low. Now this information is not from just one raid. To ensure accuracy and a good selection I have been examining the data of parses for a couple months now from EOF RAID zones. The results are always the same. I even contacted some rogue buddies in other guilds to have them check their zone wides and they didnt believe it either.

So what I concluded from this data is that it would be much better to get a +5 pierce/slash adornment for your weapon than a proc that only procs ONCE per minute. The damage of ONE extra auto attack is way more than one proc. Additionally, the chances are that you will actually hit more than just one more time as you increase the skill level.

Now with that said, this is all basically theory.
Thou i did finally decide to make myself one tonite, as i have been trying to hold out for the AoNO to drop but it looks like its gonna be a while, so i finally decided to adorn my CDS.
Normally I have approx 429 piercing, well tonite I had a bit of a group change, as normaly I am stuck in the mage group! Well tonite I was in a different group and with the buffs I was getting my piercing was 480. I noticed immediately that my DPS had increased dramatically. In fact some peeps were sending me tells cause i kept topping the parse here and there, which normally doesnt happen when I am in the mage group

As I analyzed the parses after the raid (EH). And noticed that while i was in the group in which I had 480 piercing, my to hit % was 87%. A 7% increase, and by the end of the nite when the groups got reworked for a specific fight, and I ended up in the mage group again, and therefore my piercing dropped back down to 429, the parses showed that my to hit rate also dropped back down to 82%. Wish I had the parse still open to submit the data on how much more melee damage I was doing from the additional 7% and how many more hits that equated too, but already closed the parser. maybe tomorrow.

The bottom line:
I think that any + piercing/slashing skill items are a worth while investment and I think this may suggest that even thou people believe that there is a cap, which i am not sure there is or that there are diminishing returns for it. I think this proves that increasing your skill above the proposed cap still is quite effective.

disclaimer: Unclear what the delta would have been if I had just had the +5 adorn itself without the buffs from this new group setup, but from knowing that my to hit rate was usually around 79 to 80% during previous raids, I can surmise that the +5 piercing may have raised my to hit rate by about 1-2%, which I think is still quite significant.

Gesari · 05-30-2007, 10:56 AM

Interesting post, Ravenus. I'll check it out on my parser tonight

kyros · 05-30-2007, 11:29 AM

how does jumping from 429 - 480 hint or prove that there is no skill cap?
how many fights did you parse at 480?
did you drop some gear to get it around "the cap" and then see if it changed your hit rate?
and finally, did you do any parses without the +5, and then again after with just adding the +5?
then, were you fighting the same mobs the whole time?

i think everyone agrees that adding skill will increase your chance to hit.
i also think you need to go do some more testing.