I feel like most damage boons are underwhelming (and some balance problems)

[deadbus]

If short I need more charms to be useful on start of run - Ares charm is most useful because of his great damage.

Right from start I found that Ares boons with execution are so powerful. Least damage there is 50-60 on common boon. It's actually twice more than most weapons deal with one hit. And time it takes to active I usually able to make 2 hits on enemy. So basically it doubles my damage. More levels and better rarity deals even more damage.

Zeus' boons for example gives you 10-20 flat damage on each hit, which is meh. Main bonus on Zeus boons is chain lightning which attacks nearby enemies, but on higher levels 10-20 damage attacks dealt on nearby enemy - it's almost nothing. Rarely it can be useful when enemies have blue shield, but still - enemies not always that close enough, and if you have slow charging weapon chainlightning will shoot too rare.

Poseidon and Demetra boons can be great but if you have fast range weapon.

I understand - in roguelikes balance is not that important, because player is supposed to have bad and good runs. But in this game player is able to summon gods he needs, and in most situations I don't see why I shouldn't summon Ares as first god.
If I can start with fast weapon I may prefer Demetra with her slowing attacks. But for slow weapons there is nothing to choose except Ares. And it feels frustrating - so many charms to choose from and nothing to choose really.

I'll make overview for options (Zagreus aspects only):
1. Slow weapon
- Ares must have, because of huge flat damage. If lucky enough then there will be boost from Ares and crit from Artemis.
- I've tried to play with Demetra slow on charging weapons (bow and spear) - first fast hit for slowing and second hit with charged attack. However result sucks - why bother if you can use Ares for same damage without any headacke.

2. Fast weapon
- Demetra with her at least 50% boost and nice slow is great especially on range weapon when you can just stand and shoot, but with bow you'll need lot of luck.
- Ares with his execution is still amazing. Even while you attack fast executions still doubles your damage.
- Artemis arrows shooting on every hit is great but rare, so meh.
- Zeus lightnings can be great but from Elysium they start sucking because of low damage.
- Poseidos is tricky because his water attack pushes enemies and witout fast and precise reflexes enemies will be simply pushed out of your attack range.
- Athene simply boosts damage by % and has ability to reflect enemy attacks, but it's so tricky so doesn't worth to bother, so it's just % damage.

The rest of boons are boost main damage ability or work as utility (charm, enemy damage reduction, slow, resources) or as additional damage (poison etc) or as impoving survivability (dodge, healing, incoming damage reduction etc).

Rarely game can suggest you unpredictable build, but still it's random so I can't rely on it.

My best result is just 1 heat, so I don't know if my opinion is important.

[lifetake]

I'll be honest man your ideas are a bit wack.

Zues attack with the rail is a huge damage increase as it is the fastest attacking weapon in the game and doubles the damage at base power and can hard carry you though the early game for you to make your build.

Next your conception that ares doom is good with slow weapons is also kinda funny since usually its the opposite. Doom is pretty lackluster in damage output as you can just compare it to Artemis who can stack damage on a part to high heaven way over anything ares could do.

Ares doom is actually really good when you get doom on a fast hit and then athena dash with the ares Athena duo boon allowing you to attack dash attack dash for big damage.

Next Demeter is really good just overall, especially in duo boons. Curses in this game are huge because not only do they apply their curse, but also go towards putting priveleged status up on the enemy which is huge.

I think you might be missing the mark on the power of duo boons and you should look into them and trying them out. Not all are good, but say getting a Poseidon cast and getting the duo boon of demeter with that is game winning.

[deadbus]

Originally posted by lifetake:

I'll be honest man your ideas are a bit wack.

Zues attack with the rail is a huge damage increase as it is the fastest attacking weapon in the game and doubles the damage at base power and can hard carry you though the early game for you to make your build.

Next your conception that ares doom is good with slow weapons is also kinda funny since usually its the opposite. Doom is pretty lackluster in damage output as you can just compare it to Artemis who can stack damage on a part to high heaven way over anything ares could do.

Ares doom is actually really good when you get doom on a fast hit and then athena dash with the ares Athena duo boon allowing you to attack dash attack dash for big damage.

Next Demeter is really good just overall, especially in duo boons. Curses in this game are huge because not only do they apply their curse, but also go towards putting priveleged status up on the enemy which is huge.

I think you might be missing the mark on the power of duo boons and you should look into them and trying them out. Not all are good, but say getting a Poseidon cast and getting the duo boon of demeter with that is game winning.

I mentioned that Zeus can be good in early game, but what the point? Anything is good in early game.

How Doom is can be lackluster? Do you have any number to prove your point?
Lets take bow - on start max charged it deals 60 damage. Ares' doom (not sure how it's called properly I'm using my own language in game) on basic attack deals 60 damage with common rarity. So it doubles your damage, and if you can't charge bow properly it triples your damage. So it 100% and 200%. What Artemis has? I'm not sure - 80% bonus damage on attack after dash. Or 35-50% increase on basic attack + 15% crit chance. 80% is already less than doom.
Let's count with crit:
60 *1.5 = 90
90 + 90 * 0.15 (crit deals 200%, so basically it adds 100% damage to basic attack) = 103.5
Vs 60 + 60 on Ares' doom which is also much more consisten and easy to proc.
You can take second Artemis skill with bonus damage from dash, but same way you can take it for Ares doom or you can take any other skill to improve Ares doom.

My point was about what to take on start - Ares doom is easy to use with high damage. It's realiable and predictable. If later game gives you other options you always can change it. But other gods are more risky. Zeus (greatest on Olympus) for example is most useless, because his low damage multihit becomes weak after first world and it totally useless on bosses.

I didn't get what is about Athena dash? It's simpy increases dash damage and gives it ability to reflect enemy attacks? Maybe you meantiones Artemis dash which increase damage of next attack after dash?

Duo boons are pretty rare, I can't rely on them.

[C4RNIVOR3]

It's really hard to gauge general usefulness of boons because people who play low heat will have difference preferences over those that play high heat. Your thread is an excellent example of that because your opinions of Ares and Zeus contradict consensus of players that run high heat, in that Zeus is considered to have more utility over Ares, because doom doesn't scale well in higher heat. If you aren't getting duo boons, that matters a lot because duos are important. Artemis is generally a top pick on any weapon because of her critical, you can make builds dealing thousands of damage per hit using Artemis crt if you get the right boons. Athena synergizes well with most aspects too.

[lifetake]

Originally posted by deadbus:

Originally posted by lifetake:

I'll be honest man your ideas are a bit wack.

Zues attack with the rail is a huge damage increase as it is the fastest attacking weapon in the game and doubles the damage at base power and can hard carry you though the early game for you to make your build.

Next your conception that ares doom is good with slow weapons is also kinda funny since usually its the opposite. Doom is pretty lackluster in damage output as you can just compare it to Artemis who can stack damage on a part to high heaven way over anything ares could do.

Ares doom is actually really good when you get doom on a fast hit and then athena dash with the ares Athena duo boon allowing you to attack dash attack dash for big damage.

Next Demeter is really good just overall, especially in duo boons. Curses in this game are huge because not only do they apply their curse, but also go towards putting priveleged status up on the enemy which is huge.

I think you might be missing the mark on the power of duo boons and you should look into them and trying them out. Not all are good, but say getting a Poseidon cast and getting the duo boon of demeter with that is game winning.

I mentioned that Zeus can be good in early game, but what the point? Anything is good in early game.

How Doom is can be lackluster? Do you have any number to prove your point?
Lets take bow - on start max charged it deals 60 damage. Ares' doom (not sure how it's called properly I'm using my own language in game) on basic attack deals 60 damage with common rarity. So it doubles your damage, and if you can't charge bow properly it triples your damage. So it 100% and 200%. What Artemis has? I'm not sure - 80% bonus damage on attack after dash. Or 35-50% increase on basic attack + 15% crit chance. 80% is already less than doom.
Let's count with crit:
60 *1.5 = 90
90 + 90 * 0.15 (crit deals 200%, so basically it adds 100% damage to basic attack) = 103.5
Vs 60 + 60 on Ares' doom which is also much more consisten and easy to proc.
You can take second Artemis skill with bonus damage from dash, but same way you can take it for Ares doom or you can take any other skill to improve Ares doom.

My point was about what to take on start - Ares doom is easy to use with high damage. It's realiable and predictable. If later game gives you other options you always can change it. But other gods are more risky. Zeus (greatest on Olympus) for example is most useless, because his low damage multihit becomes weak after first world and it totally useless on bosses.

I didn't get what is about Athena dash? It's simpy increases dash damage and gives it ability to reflect enemy attacks? Maybe you meantiones Artemis dash which increase damage of next attack after dash?

Duo boons are pretty rare, I can't rely on them.

Athena dash deals something called deflect damage and if you get the Ares Athena duo boon is huge in damage

See something I can already tell is that you take a keepsake and you try to force a build this just isn't good. What you can do is let the game give you boons to which then you can push a build around those boons. For example if the game gives you Zeus and Dionysus you can take Dionysus Cast and then Zeus whatever as long as its a tier 1 boon and then force Demeter into your run this gives you two options of duo boons to hit both Scincilatting feast or Ice Wine. Both of these duo boons are huge upgrades to achieve and increase you damage output dramatically with the cast.

Doom is lackluster because it just doesn't scale hard enough unless you hit the athena duo boon with it.
Lets not use the bow as a framework and use any other weapon. You are attacking way faster. The gun attacks like 6 times before a doom procs. Fists are about the same.

Now lets look at Artemis yes her damage looks lower then ares doom if you're looking at the bow, but what if I told you her crit includes all damage upgrades for that attack. So if you get Chaos upgrades to attack doom does nothing with that Artemis does.

See you make a point about what to take at the start but Tartarus is the easiest zone in the game. Don't build for the early build for the late game. Thats why Zeus is very nice because by taking a Zeus attack boon in Tartarus you can be fully effective in the area but also build yourself going forward towards what you want in the late game. The Poseidon duo boon with him Dionysus duo boon with. Getting jolted boon and using tat to get priveleged status up.

Play around Duo boons and the late game man not the early game because that's how you don't make a good build to actually win

[deadbus]

Originally posted by lifetake:

Athena dash deals something called deflect damage and if you get the Ares Athena duo boon is huge in damage

See something I can already tell is that you take a keepsake and you try to force a build this just isn't good. What you can do is let the game give you boons to which then you can push a build around those boons.

You can let game give you boons and suck. Without enough damage Elysium can become really hard because enemies there are respawning and there is lot of aoe damage.

Originally posted by lifetake:

For example if the game gives you Zeus and Dionysus you can take Dionysus Cast and then Zeus whatever as long as its a tier 1 boon and then force Demeter into your run this gives you two options of duo boons to hit both Scincilatting feast or Ice Wine. Both of these duo boons are huge upgrades to achieve and increase you damage output dramatically with the cast.

Duo boons have just 15% chance and it still has lots of requirements. Duo boons are more like uber chance to make your run smooth and nice, not something like you rely on. I can be wrong here and if you have something to proof that 15% chance can be turned into 100% chance - I will accept it. Right now game numbers are against your theory. In 40 runs I had only 3 duo boons. And I maxed mirror to 15% chance 20 runs ago.

Originally posted by lifetake:

Doom is lackluster because it just doesn't scale hard enough unless you hit the athena duo boon with it.
Lets not use the bow as a framework and use any other weapon. You are attacking way faster. The gun attacks like 6 times before a doom procs. Fists are about the same.

Any real number proofs? Actually Zagreus is not attacking that fast and in most cases Doom will deam more or same damage than autoattack in same time frame. Plus in game there is rarely appears possibilities to attack enemies non stop without needs to dash or reposition.

Originally posted by lifetake:

Now lets look at Artemis yes her damage looks lower then ares doom if you're looking at the bow, but what if I told you her crit includes all damage upgrades for that attack. So if you get Chaos upgrades to attack doom does nothing with that Artemis does.

Any numbers? I've did counting above what do you have to anwer on it? 15% crit on auto + 3-5-7% crit from passive, it's not that huge. It can be counted like this:
total avarege damage per attack = base damage + crit damage * crit chance
Doom on attack upgrade if about 35% if its common rarity. But still you see - just to make Artemis boons better than Doom you need so much stuff: Chaos upgrades etc. Don't forget you can take same upgrades for Doom - Artemis passive crit affects it, and Chaos attack upgrade.
Artemis crit build relies on stacking buffs from Chaos, what can be difficult sometimes.

Originally posted by lifetake:

See you make a point about what to take at the start but Tartarus is the easiest zone in the game. Don't build for the early build for the late game. Thats why Zeus is very nice because by taking a Zeus attack boon in Tartarus you can be fully effective in the area but also build yourself going forward towards what you want in the late game. The Poseidon duo boon with him Dionysus duo boon with. Getting jolted boon and using tat to get priveleged status up.

I've picked Zeus many times - in most cases his chain lighting on main attack becomes useless in Elysium because of too low damage. Other Zeus boons can improve it, but they are rare - once I had double proc and once improved proc (not sure what the difference). Another time I had Hermes attack speed boost + Hammer attack speed boost + Adamant gun, and that improved Zeus lighting a lot, but it's very luck dependant.

Originally posted by lifetake:

Play around Duo boons and the late game man not the early game because that's how you don't make a good build to actually win

Not sure what problem is - I didn't dig into wiki, took info only just from game. Still beat game three times in a row with heat 1-2 and three different weapons.

However I must add I've tried Charon's Aspect Bow with Zeus boon for additional attack (which deals more damage than boon for basic attack) and that is a blast!

Still I think Ares Doom is da best boon for game start and can win you a run. Maybe it's scales less than Artemis boons, but still scales (with Artemis boons too). Plus its safe - you can hit and run away, and affects multiple targets.

[lifetake]

Yes Elysium can suck if your damage is lackluster. But you've gone through two areas to get upgrades by then. You can start forcing builds the moment you walk into Asphodel. And start pushing for better things that fit with the gods you've been given. And personally Elysium isn't all that crazy. If you take your time you can get through there even with low damage numbers.

Duo boons odds are not 15% odds. The mirror upgrade increases the odds of getting a duo boon by 15% so it adds to the preexisting odds(which are unknown but not low). You most likely don't get duo boons because you either don't know how to get them/you don't try. I consistently get at least 1 duo boon every run unless I don't try to go for it because I'm going for something else like a crit build or something. Duo boons require getting prerequisties to your boon.

Okay if we have Artemis that at common tier has 20% more damage and 15% crit and Ares that deals 50 doom damage at common level
If using the bow no power shot
Non Crit Bow dmg - 50 * 0.2 = 60
Doom Bow = 50 + 50 = 100
So yes doom does better from a single point
But if we crit
Crit from bow - (50 * 0.2)*3 = 180
Combined Artemis bow dmg - 60*.85 + 180*.15 = 78
So we are still lower than doom but if we get one 25% attack up from chaos
Normal dmg goes to 75 and Crit goes up to 225 we reach 97.5. Were still lower than doom but the point to be made is that any damage we increase to attack jumps our basic damage dramatically. Add in Priveleged status and with a crit we are dealing 315 dmg we almost increased our damage by 100 with just a basic look.
And this is all with the bow the slowest attacking weapon in the game. Look at any other weapon in the game and the crits are just straight better then doom form the get go if you can attack twice with a weapon before a doom proc which you can with literally every weapon except full charge bow you are losing damage on doom.
Now you might say that ares can get doom increses to boost the doom damage but in actuality these are all very bad except Merciful end (The Ares Athena duo boon I was talking about). Dire misfortune requires you to hit the target multiple time to stack minimal more dmg when you could be crit with those attacks. Impending doom makes you doom damage increase by at least 60% which is huge except that it makes your doom effects take 50% longer to proc making that increase in damage way less. Doom just doesn't scale into the late game while with every boost to attack Artemis crit does. If you need more math just ask and I'll do it for you because doom is just very lackluster without Merciful End


Next don't pick god keepsakes at the start. This just leads to a forced comp. The only keepsake that has seen optimal use is Artemis and is used among speedrunners due to her big dmg. Take things like coinpurse as that can allow you to buy more boons from charons shop and get more boons to make both Elysium and Asphodel easier biomes. Force gods after figuring out the pool of gods the game has given you. I know this can be hard to understand since you don't understand the workings of duo boons, but playing around duo boons is huge. and forcing gods that support getting the duo boons that work in a run is huge to the success of your game.

Yea heat 1-2 are very low start going into higher heats (11+) and you need more to beat runs. You need to play around duo boons. I had a 22 win streak and this is how I played all through heat 1-10. (Lost that streak because I decided to greed to get titan blood from charon shop and played against hades poorly and game started to lag but thats besides the point).

You need to push farther then what doom offers you yes it starts the game easy, but it drops off. You don't need to help at the start you need help later in Elysium and Styx to deal with everything. You can beat Tartarus with anything the game throws at you so let the game throw anything at you and then play around it. Don't force doom and then hope to the game has gods that support your play.

[deadbus]

Originally posted by lifetake:

Okay if we have Artemis that at common tier has 20% more damage and 15% crit and Ares that deals 50 doom damage at common level

Doom has 60 damage on base attack

I've tried full crit on main attack build and partly agree with you... I'll write tomorrow.

[lifetake]

Originally posted by deadbus:

Originally posted by lifetake:

Okay if we have Artemis that at common tier has 20% more damage and 15% crit and Ares that deals 50 doom damage at common level

Doom has 60 damage on base attack

I've tried full crit on main attack build and partly agree with you... I'll write tomorrow.

Its for sure 50 at common tier and gets higher with rarity yes

[abarax]

I ran the numbers on my own and came up with pretty much the same - compared common, rare, epic, heroic tiers of Ares and Artemis attack on min, max, and power shots.

Doom is 50 damage base (according to wiki). I get what you are trying to get at deadbus but I think I'm with lifetake in the end.

Depending on the weapon I might take Doom in first zone. But unless I plan to specifically build for it I would rather take something else (e.g. Railgun with Zeus attack and Artemis Support fire, or just general attack + debuff for priv).

lifetake, I was under the impression that all attack stuff was additive, so a 25% Chaos and 20% Artemis would be 72.5 base dmg (not 75) and then ~217 crit.

I'm basing this on:

avg ares common damage: 50 + 50 + 50 over 1 + 1.1 seconds (shoot twice since doom takes over a second to proc) = ~71 DPS
avg artemis common damage:(50*(1+20%))*(1+(1+(100%))*15%) over 1 second = ~78 DPS
Saying that a bow shot takes 1 second is a bit of a guess and I feel it is slightly faster than that.
Note that I start timing from the first attack input, not when the hit lands - I took several approaches to finding this since doom only applying every 1.1 seconds (so bow being able to make two shoots per doom proc can mess with how you see artemis over the same period of time: e.g. 4 seconds is enough for 4 artemis shots OR 4 shots and 2/3 doom but so is anything up to 4.9, changes with dire misfortune...)

Consider some Doom options.

Merciful end is a strong boost to an Athena Dash - instant 15+50 (although I'm sure speccing Zeus could be better if you went deep).
Impending Doom: 50 + base doom 50 becomes 80 over 1.1+0.5 seconds: 50+50+80/1+1.1+0.5 = 69.23077 DPS (this was a strange result but no matter how I went about it, Impending Doom seemed to be a bad choice... someone please tell me what I did wrong here - probably works well with Dire Misfortune, but you could only stack another 5 base doom damage onto it before the curse went off which takes it to ~71 DPS.
Curse of Longing: doom is now 50+13+3+1, over 4.4 seconds from the initial hit for 72 DPS. If priv applies a specific way here it could be interesting since you have weak and doom (doom technically doesn't expire..?)

Like Slicing Shot, you really need to invest for it to be good.

Now Artemis:

Consider Artemis common attack on bow: ~78 dps (see above).
lifetake's point about the attack scaling better lategame is important.


Take 25% Chaos: 94.25 DPS (116 with Zag)
Add Dash attack: 126 DPS (156 with Zag)
Add Priv: 191 DPS (236 with Zag)
etc
etc

Now what if your crit chance was actually 30% because you have maxed Zag aspect bow. (96 -> 116 -> 156 -> 236 from above). What if you had marked or other boons etc.

I think both builds are good if you spec into them, but Artemis has better long term payoff and lower investment required to perform better.
I would like to double check the Curse of Longing priv thing, and have someone do the doom calcs themselves - its sorta late here as well so not sure I got them accurate. I started from 0 seconds with inputting the attack command, assumed 1 attack per second, and doom takes 1.1 seconds (or more) to proc however much.

Interesting discussion but someone please check my maths lol. Difference approach will find different answer but all the things I did showed artemis as being better overall. Maybe there is a reason speedrun switched from Merciful End to Artemis attack railgun shotgun.

[deadbus]

Originally posted by abarax:

avg ares common damage: 50 + 50 + 50 over 1 + 1.1 seconds (shoot twice since doom takes over a second to proc) = ~71 DPS

Doom procs on first shot so you can't count it like 1+1.1, it's total 1.1 sec for two attacks and doom proc. So it 150 damage not 71.

Originally posted by abarax:

avg artemis common damage:(50*(1+20%))*(1+(1+(100%))*15%) over 1 second = ~78 DPS
Saying that a bow shot takes 1 second is a bit of a guess and I feel it is slightly faster than that.
Note that I start timing from the first attack input, not when the hit lands - I took several approaches to finding this since doom only applying every 1.1 seconds (so bow being able to make two shoots per doom proc can mess with how you see artemis over the same period of time: e.g. 4 seconds is enough for 4 artemis shots OR 4 shots and 2/3 doom but so is anything up to 4.9, changes with dire misfortune...)

Ah... ok. But it looks like you overthink it.

1. Your situation is close to perfect - you can always charge bow almost fully and can attack non stop etc
Main power of Doom - his safety. You can shoot and change position. You don't need to risk and stand still just to make Deadly Strike to deal more damage per second than Doom.

2. Your calculations uses small time period with very specific circumstances. In reality there will be tons of different situation, so you need to count average damage over long period. This time you take for first shot - half of second maybe, in long term this will mean nothing because after it Doom will proc every second. Stable. And even if you stop shooting he will still deal damage.

Originally posted by abarax:

Consider some Doom options.

Merciful end is a strong boost to an Athena Dash - instant 15+50 (although I'm sure speccing Zeus could be better if you went deep).
Impending Doom: 50 + base doom 50 becomes 80 over 1.1+0.5 seconds: 50+50+80/1+1.1+0.5 = 69.23077 DPS (this was a strange result but no matter how I went about it, Impending Doom seemed to be a bad choice... someone please tell me what I did wrong here - probably works well with Dire Misfortune, but you could only stack another 5 base doom damage onto it before the curse went off which takes it to ~71 DPS.
Curse of Longing: doom is now 50+13+3+1, over 4.4 seconds from the initial hit for 72 DPS. If priv applies a specific way here it could be interesting since you have weak and doom (doom technically doesn't expire..?)

Again overthing.

All boons you take to boost Artemis basic attack can be taken with Doom. Chaos boons, crit boons etc.

Doom needs just 2 boons to work: Doom and Impending Doom.
Merciful End looks more like cherry on top for Athena-focused build with Doom. It deals damage only when you attacked and damage is low.

Originally posted by abarax:

Interesting discussion but someone please check my maths lol. Difference approach will find different answer but all the things I did showed artemis as being better overall. Maybe there is a reason speedrun switched from Merciful End to Artemis attack railgun shotgun.

Your math shows Artemis build requires fast attack and lots of boons to make it great while Doom requires just two boons, and right on start its super effective with his insane flat damage.

My original post was not about end-game builds - I've reached last boss but didn't kill him yet. I couldn't expect some 'aspects' at that time. This post was about main gameplay experience. So how it was - I sat, met Ares and then was like 'Wow what a damage'. After that I've tried other gods and they didn't have 'standalone' solutions.

[lifetake]

Originally posted by deadbus:

Originally posted by abarax:

avg ares common damage: 50 + 50 + 50 over 1 + 1.1 seconds (shoot twice since doom takes over a second to proc) = ~71 DPS

Doom procs on first shot so you can't count it like 1+1.1, it's total 1.1 sec for two attacks and doom proc. So it 150 damage not 71.

Originally posted by abarax:

avg artemis common damage:(50*(1+20%))*(1+(1+(100%))*15%) over 1 second = ~78 DPS
Saying that a bow shot takes 1 second is a bit of a guess and I feel it is slightly faster than that.
Note that I start timing from the first attack input, not when the hit lands - I took several approaches to finding this since doom only applying every 1.1 seconds (so bow being able to make two shoots per doom proc can mess with how you see artemis over the same period of time: e.g. 4 seconds is enough for 4 artemis shots OR 4 shots and 2/3 doom but so is anything up to 4.9, changes with dire misfortune...)

Ah... ok. But it looks like you overthink it.

1. Your situation is close to perfect - you can always charge bow almost fully and can attack non stop etc
Main power of Doom - his safety. You can shoot and change position. You don't need to risk and stand still just to make Deadly Strike to deal more damage per second than Doom.

2. Your calculations uses small time period with very specific circumstances. In reality there will be tons of different situation, so you need to count average damage over long period. This time you take for first shot - half of second maybe, in long term this will mean nothing because after it Doom will proc every second. Stable. And even if you stop shooting he will still deal damage.

Originally posted by abarax:

Consider some Doom options.

Merciful end is a strong boost to an Athena Dash - instant 15+50 (although I'm sure speccing Zeus could be better if you went deep).
Impending Doom: 50 + base doom 50 becomes 80 over 1.1+0.5 seconds: 50+50+80/1+1.1+0.5 = 69.23077 DPS (this was a strange result but no matter how I went about it, Impending Doom seemed to be a bad choice... someone please tell me what I did wrong here - probably works well with Dire Misfortune, but you could only stack another 5 base doom damage onto it before the curse went off which takes it to ~71 DPS.
Curse of Longing: doom is now 50+13+3+1, over 4.4 seconds from the initial hit for 72 DPS. If priv applies a specific way here it could be interesting since you have weak and doom (doom technically doesn't expire..?)

Again overthing.

All boons you take to boost Artemis basic attack can be taken with Doom. Chaos boons, crit boons etc.

Doom needs just 2 boons to work: Doom and Impending Doom.
Merciful End looks more like cherry on top for Athena-focused build with Doom. It deals damage only when you attacked and damage is low.

Originally posted by abarax:

Interesting discussion but someone please check my maths lol. Difference approach will find different answer but all the things I did showed artemis as being better overall. Maybe there is a reason speedrun switched from Merciful End to Artemis attack railgun shotgun.

Your math shows Artemis build requires fast attack and lots of boons to make it great while Doom requires just two boons, and right on start its super effective with his insane flat damage.

My original post was not about end-game builds - I've reached last boss but didn't kill him yet. I couldn't expect some 'aspects' at that time. This post was about main gameplay experience. So how it was - I sat, met Ares and then was like 'Wow what a damage'. After that I've tried other gods and they didn't have 'standalone' solutions.

I'm kinda dead to this whole conversation but

@abarax you are right it is additive my mistake your calculations for artemis is probably correct

@deadbus If you take a doom boon for attack you can't take the biggest crit enhancer for attack being the artemis attack boon. Yes it can scale with artemis base crit scaler but thats like 4-5% not 15%. Next Doom doesn't scale with chaos boons for attack. It does its damage and thats it. Yes your attack scales but crit actually takes that attack boost and times it by 3

And lastly as a new player doom looks absolutely fantastic on paper and I thought the same, but then you learn new synergies that doom just doesn't get or as easily that makes other things far surpass doom in dmg.

[abarax]

“ avg ares common damage: 50 + 50 + 50 over 1 + 1.1 seconds (shoot twice since doom takes over a second to proc) = ~71 DPS

Doom procs on first shot so you can't count it like 1+1.1, it's total 1.1 sec for two attacks and doom proc. So it 150 damage not 71.”

0 seconds: input attack
1 second: first attack lands + doom applied
2 seconds: second attack lands
2.1 seconds: doom from first attack process
3 seconds: third attack lands + doom applied
4 seconds: fourth attack lands
...

Over 2.1 seconds you did 50+50+50. The second attack doesn’t proc doom since it hasn’t applied from the first hit yet (doom takes 1.1 seconds). Therefore you have to take a third shot and wait another 1.1 seconds for another doom. I redid this and it comes out to 81~85 dps over 11.1 seconds. I’m pretty confident in this.

Yeah back when I started out playing, Chaos shield with Aphro Attack and Ares special going for the duo was a super cool and super safe option. But now (with ~240 hours and higher heat experience) I find myself avoiding Ares more than anything.

I wonder if more experience on your end will change your thinking too?

[deadbus]

I will number every damage formule like 1), 2) etc.

So, it will work like this:

Let's imagine you can hit with bow twice per second

s - shot start (for bow) or doom effect start (for doom after bow hit)
h - arrow hits targets, deals damage (for bow)
p - doom proc

Timeline:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------->
Bow, 10 shots and 10 hits in ~5 seconds:
s---h---s---h---s---h---s---h---s---h---s---h---s---h---s---h---s---h---s---h
----0.5-----1.0-----1.5-----2.0-----2.5-----3.0-----3.5-----4.0-----4.5-----5.0
Doom, 3 procs in ~5 seconds:
----s-------------------p------s-------------------p------s-------------------p------s-------------------p
----0.5----------------1.6---2.0-----------------3.1---3.5-----------------4.6---5.0----------------6.1

So here we got 5 second window with 10 hits. Lets take 50 damage as base.
We got:
1) 10 * 50 + 50 * 3 = 650 (or 130 damage in 5 sec). Doom adds 33% to basic attack damage.
We can add last proc from doom on 6.1 second but if you don't like it then ok, we won't.

But it's a fantastic result - do you really can shoot every 0.5 sec and deal 50 damage? Are you really that godly good? Then no doubt you don't need any Doom.

Let's see what if you shoot not that fast? Like one shot every 0.6 second?

Timeline:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------->
Bow, 8 shots and 8 hits in ~5 seconds:
s----h----s----h----s----h----s----h----s----h----s----h----s----h----s----h
-----0.6-------1.2-------1.8-------2.4-------3.0-------3.6-------4.2-------4.8
Doom, 3 procs in ~5 seconds:
-----s-----------------p---s-----------------p---s-----------------p---s-----------------p
-----0.6-------------1.7-1.8--------------2.9-3.0--------------4.1-4.2--------------5.3

2) 8 * 50 + 50 * 3 = 550 (or 110 damage in 5 sec). Doom adds 37.5% to basic attack damage.

We can calculate it another way.

Let's take second timeline and start calculate damage from 1.7 second. Take 10 second from that position (1.7-11.7 second).
Why we don't take first 1.5 seconds? In your calculations this period has huge effect because you prefer to take short time period. But the period then less this period will affect our average damage. I already gave you huge advantage to deal damage every 0.6 second - do you really able to do it? Plus we ignore last Doom proc which will happens anyway.

We know doom procs every 1.1 second from start of that period. 10/1.1 ~= 9. Doom will proc 9 times in that period.
We know we hit enemy every 0.6 second from start of that period. 10/0.6 ~= 17 (we can round it up because our time frame starts from hit). We will hit 17 times in that period.

3) 17*50 + 50*9 = 850 + 450 = 130 (130 damage per second). Doom increases damage for 53%.

We can make it more realistic, and average bow damage (do you really believe you can always hit with max damage?). (20+60)/2 = 40

4) 17*40 + 50*9 = 1130 (113 per second). Doom adds 66% damage.

If we take epic doom it will be like this:
5) 17*40 + 100*9 = 1580 (158 per second). Doom adds 132% damage.

What we can take from it? Your calculation are too specific. You use short time windows with max attack damage while its far from real.

Let's take same formulas and use Deadly Strike. Common in first four formulas (like doom) and epic in fifth.

We can calculate crit part right from start just to make easier.
15% * 300% its equal to 0.45, so our damage will be increased on 45%. But! You always take so short time period. There is just a 15% this bonus will work in yours two seconds. You can only hope...

We calculate damage with crit this way: attack damage * damage multiplier * crit damage increase (we calculated it above).

Deadly strike:
1) 10 * 50 * 1.2 * 1.45 = 870 (174 damage in 5 sec). Deadly Strike adds 74% to basic attack damage.
2) 8 * 50 * 1.2 * 1.45 = 696 (132 damage in 5 sec). Deadly Strike adds 74% to basic attack damage.
3) 17*50 * 1.2 * 1.45 = 1479 (148 damage per second). Deadly Strike adds 74% to basic attack damage.
4) 17*40 * (120 + 45%) = 1183 (118 damage per second). Deadly Strike adds 74% to basic attack damage. Doom dealt 1130 with 66% bonus damage.
We can see - in this formula Doom is much closer to Deadly Strike. If we take data close to real and average one, not something like very specific circumstances, Doom becomes competitive. Also Deadly Strike depends on our ability to spam autoattack while Doom depends on it much less.

If we take epic Deadly Strike, max we will get 40% bonus damage + 45% from crit.

5) 17*40 * 1.40 * 1.45% = 1380 (138 per second). Deadly Strike adds 103% damage.
While Doom dealt 1580 (158 per second) and added 132% damage.

See - it really depends on how you calculate it.

You guys like to add into calculations different things like Chaos boons etc, so let's do it.

I prefer to use 4th and 5th formulas because they give us much more real picture because of averaging situation. 4th formula will use just common boons and 5th formula will use just epic boons, ok?
I won't calculate Lunge from Chaos because I don't believe you can keep your tempo with 0.6 shot every second and dash whole game. Melee weapon or autotargeting - probably, but without it it's unreal.

Pressure Points, common - 3% crit (3% * 300% = 9%)
Chaos boon Strike, common - add to basic attack 25% max
Zagreus Aspect, max - 10% crit to basic attack (10%*300% = 30%)

Doom (50 damage):
4) 17*40*1.25 * (1.3+0.09) + 50*9 * 1.09 = 1182 + 491 = 1672 (167 damage per second).

Deadly Strike (20% attack damage and 15% crit):
4) 17*40 * (1.20 + 0.25) * (1.45 + 0.3 + 0.09) = 1814 (181 damage per second).

Distance between Doom and Deadly Strike is increased, but difference is not that significant.

Now take epic boons and 5th formulas.
Pressure Points, common - 5% crit (5% * 300% = 15%)
Chaos boon Strike, common - add to basic attack 50% max
Zagreus Aspect, max - 10% crit to basic attack (10%*300% = 30%)

Doom (100 damage):
5) 17*40*1.5 * (1.3+0.15) + 100*9 * 1.15 = 1479 + 1035 = 2514 (251 per second).

Deadly Strike (40% attack damage and 15% crit):
5) 17*40 * (1.4 + 0.5) * (1.45 + 0.3 + 0.15) = 2454 (245 per second).

So, here we see Doom is scales much better with boons rarity and can deal even more damage than Deadly Strike. And I didn't even included here Impendind Doom! Plus we still talking about shooting non stop, which is not always possible.

Originally posted by abarax:

I wonder if more experience on your end will change your thinking too?

Trust math bro, trust math.

[abarax]

I'm partially convinced:

I believe in your calculations you mistakenly thought that critical hits were added to every other damage multiplier - they are not, they are an independent "dmg*(1+200%)" (so 3x damage).
e.g. this means your =10*(50*(120% + 45%)) should actually be =10*((50*1.2)*(1+(200%*15%)))

Redoing them with this info should push Artemis actually slightly lowerdown the rankings, but way UP when you start stacking chaos, dash, priv, all that kinda stuff.

Alright so we've looked at the bow. I also think its the same for SoC (which is exponentially amazing with debuffs).

It probably varies slightly depending on weapon speed.

BUT

I still wouldn't pick Ares at the start of a run though, I feel his set tends to be slightly more restrictive than others. This is probably how they thought to "balance" him, because even if he does have all this high damage, his overall set is probably a little worse overall (less utility compared to say zeus or pos, less general use than demeter or artemis or aphro - but I repeat he is good like all goods if you invest).

I did say I used to take aphro/ares all the time but I don't anymore, began experimenting with other combos etc.

I do trust maths. But this isn't a wow raid and bosses aren't really DPS checks (unless Tight Deadline). I also don't tend to pause the game midrun and do calculations on the best boon to take.

So I'm still gonna take Artemis.

[deadbus]

Originally posted by abarax:

I'm partially convinced:

I believe in your calculations you mistakenly thought that critical hits were added to every other damage multiplier - they are not, they are an independent "dmg*(1+200%)" (so 3x damage).
e.g. this means your =10*(50*(120% + 45%)) should actually be =10*((50*1.2)*(1+(200%*15%)))

You're absolutely right, but while you were writing your post, I've already fixed it:

We calculate damage with crit this way: attack damage * damage multiplier * crit damage increase (we calculated it above).

Originally posted by abarax:

Redoing them with this info should push Artemis actually slightly lowerdown the rankings, but way UP when you start stacking chaos, dash, priv, all that kinda stuff.

Actually it works opposite. Artemis is greater than Ares mostly because her crit chance on Deadly Strike doesn't scale with rarity and already has max value on common boon. But if player able to get more rare boons, Doom starts shine.

Let's look on Deadly Strike and Doom itself, separated from other numbers.
Epic quality Deadly Strike have 40% bonus damage and 15% crit.
Crit damage can be translated as 45% increase on attack damage. So totally we will have 1 * 1.4 * 1.5 ~ 100% damage increase from Deadly Strike boon. It's power totally depends on attack damage.

Epic Doom has 100 damage. If you can shoot twice per proc it increases your damage by 50 per shot.

We have this equation (left part is Deadly Strike, right part is Doom):
x * 1.4 * 1.5 = x + 50
2.1x = x + 50
1.1x = 50
So if attack is ~45 and we can shoot twice per second, there is no difference between Doom and Deadly Strike.
If attack damage is bigger or you can shoot faster then Deadly Strike is more profitable.
But Doom scales better with each tier - about 10-20 damage per tier, while Deadly Strike about 5-8% per tier.
Plus we can take impending Doom which will increases our damage by formula:
Base doom damage * (1.1 / 1.6) * boon bonus% (1.1/1.6 = 31.25% damage reduction from 0.5 sec time increase).

So here we can see Doom has better scaling but not that high damage cap comparing to Artemis crit build. Crit build requires better player skill to keep flow of damage constantly (dealt in 1.1 sec damage has to be bigger than Doom damage) plus he relies on lot of additional boons and some luck with Chaos.