New Relics, What They Do.

[Gorilla Grip]

Here's a description of what the new relics do. Opinions below the main post.

📜 A new Relic: Fist of Support
Your Damage is increased by 10% each time you help revive a teammate.

📜 A new Relic: Bountiful Quests
Your Armor is increased by 10 each time you successfully complete an Objective.

📜 A new Relic: Offensive Defense
Your Damage is increased by 1% for every Armor you have.

📜 A new Relic: Savior Focus
Your Critical Damage is increased by 25% each time you help revive a teammate.

📜 A new Relic: Alchemic Pull
Your Pickup Distance is increased by 20% each time you infuse a Spell.

[Gorilla Grip]

Relic: Bountiful Quests
Your Armor is increased by 10 each time you successfully complete an Objective.

Simply put trash tier relic. If you get this when you have completed 4 objectives you will get NOTHING.
This is completely outshined by the other relic that gives you 1 armor per your level. Needs to be buffed to 50. If the wording is changed to "Your Armor is increased 25 each time you have successfully completed an Objective" meaning you get the buff retroactively.

[Gorilla Grip]

Relic: Savior Focus
Your Critical Damage is increased by 25% each time you help revive a teammate.

For solo play, trash tier. Playing with friends, it moves up to one step up from trash teir. If you never revived a teammate back to trash tier. The main issue with this one is you are hoping your teammate play really bad and need to be revived many times after you have picked this artifact. Unless you increase your crit chance (base 12%) this is a 3% dps increase per revive.

[Gorilla Grip]

Relic: Alchemic Pull
Your Pickup Distance is increased by 20% each time you infuse a Spell.

Late game this is trash teir, as you have already infused most of your spells. With friends this is also trash teir, since your friends can pick up xp orbs you can't get to. Solo early on, this is just bad, as there are much better relics than this one, also you can just pick up a magnet.

[Gorilla Grip]

Relic: Offensive Defense
Your Damage is increased by 1% for every Armor you have.

S tier relic, most player should have 80 Armor base(80% damage bonus right away) plus this one takes effect retroactively and actively. See a legendary card for 50 Armor later in the game, that's a 50% increase to your base damage.

[Gorilla Grip]

Relic: Fist of Support
Your Damage is increased by 10% each time you help revive a teammate.

This one is similar to Savior Focus, except this one provides more damage on average, unless you have more than 40% crit chance. Otherwise this has exactly the same issues as Savior Focus.

[Scr(A)tch]

Your mostly right, but don't underestimate crits.

Their numbers seem low for two reasons:

- They become better as you stack chance and damage together, as they multiply each other. This is quite easy to get.

- They become better as you stack base damage buffs - the marginal gain from additive bonuses diminishes each time you get another one. This is rather unintuitive except for mathematicians and taoist masters :)

Say you have 100 base damage. Getting +10% damage increase it to 110, so yields a marginal gain of 10%.
But if you already have +100% damage, and get another 10%, your damage increases from 200 to 210, which is a 5% marginal gain.
Whereas crit damage applying multiplicatively on the total damage, and not the base, its marginal gain is the same in both cases - for 25% it's ~2,4% without skills, ~5% with (so 22% crit chance).

As such there is a tipping point where the crit damage relic becomes better than the base damage one, depending of your crit chance but also how many base damage buffs you already have.

Note this could also be true the other way round (marginal gain from crit damage buffs also diminishes) but in practice base damage buffs are more common than crit damage buffs, and better at baseline stats so you generally pick more, and earlier.

You should strike a balance between them.

[outer_silence]

Offensive Defense is broken. It gives too much damage.

[Scr(A)tch]

Originally posted by outer_silence:

Offensive Defense is broken. It gives too much damage.

Indeed. 0.5% should be enough.
Many other relics are crap, making it stand out even further.

[Gorilla Grip]

Originally posted by Scr(A)tch:

Your mostly right, but don't underestimate crits.

Their numbers seem low for two reasons:

- They become better as you stack chance and damage together, as they multiply each other. This is quite easy to get.

- They become better as you stack base damage buffs - the marginal gain from additive bonuses diminishes each time you get another one. This is rather unintuitive except for mathematicians and taoist masters :)

Say you have 100 base damage. Getting +10% damage increase it to 110, so yields a marginal gain of 10%.
But if you already have +100% damage, and get another 10%, your damage increases from 200 to 210, which is a 5% marginal gain.
Whereas crit damage applying multiplicatively on the total damage, and not the base, its marginal gain is the same in both cases - for 25% it's ~2,4% without skills, ~5% with (so 22% crit chance).

As such there is a tipping point where the crit damage relic becomes better than the base damage one, depending of your crit chance but also how many base damage buffs you already have.

Note this could also be true the other way round (marginal gain from crit damage buffs also diminishes) but in practice base damage buffs are more common than crit damage buffs, and better at baseline stats so you generally pick more, and earlier.

You should strike a balance between them.

TLDR: Balance is bad, best DPS is to specialise in "spell cooldown reduction" both in singular spell choice and "all spells" choice.

Currently the meta is get your spells with elemental augments ASAP then stack as much "spell cool down reduction" as possible. Proof of this is the nerf to "ice element" slow effect on the boss. With "solar pulse" you could stack the slow debuff so quickly the boss would barely move.
Every instance of elemental damage adds a stacking layer of debuff on enemies. That's why currently the best spells are, in no particular order: rune burst, solar pulse, and necro whirl. Next best are star fall, astral orbs, and moonerang.
You will notice that the top three have a very low CD to start, or in necrowhirl's case the aoe ticks very quickly.
Most of the time you can't afford to waste a level on "increase to crit chance" and/or "increase to crit damage" due to RNG and since when you play coop you will notice you don't get as many levels as you would as a solo player.

[Gorilla Grip]

Originally posted by outer_silence:

Offensive Defense is broken. It gives too much damage.

I look at it this way, it's not that Offensive Defence is broken it's the fact that the other relics are so bad. I don't understand the Dev's thought process in creating these relics.

Are they just a fun bonus that makes a tiny difference or are they something of a game changer that turns a losing run into a winner.

Pretty much I want to know if the players are suppose to care about map hunting for these relics.

Here's how I would fix
Relic: Fist of Support
Your Damage is increased by 10% each time you help revive a teammate.

For solo play, your damage is increased by 10% for every chance you have to revive.
That would give you 40% damage increase.
For coop, you and your team's damage is increased by 5% each time any one has revived a team mate. Depending on how many of the team has +2 to revives the damage increase would vary. Could lead to an interesting strategy where you gamble on dying on purpose and stacking this buff.

Sadly I can see Offensive Defence getting the "luck treatment" hammer nerf, and you only get .2 damage per armor, so 80 armor will get you only 16% damage increase.

[Scr(A)tch]

Originally posted by Gorilla Grip:

Originally posted by Scr(A)tch:

Your mostly right, but don't underestimate crits.

Their numbers seem low for two reasons:

- They become better as you stack chance and damage together, as they multiply each other. This is quite easy to get.

- They become better as you stack base damage buffs - the marginal gain from additive bonuses diminishes each time you get another one. This is rather unintuitive except for mathematicians and taoist masters :)

Say you have 100 base damage. Getting +10% damage increase it to 110, so yields a marginal gain of 10%.
But if you already have +100% damage, and get another 10%, your damage increases from 200 to 210, which is a 5% marginal gain.
Whereas crit damage applying multiplicatively on the total damage, and not the base, its marginal gain is the same in both cases - for 25% it's ~2,4% without skills, ~5% with (so 22% crit chance).

As such there is a tipping point where the crit damage relic becomes better than the base damage one, depending of your crit chance but also how many base damage buffs you already have.

Note this could also be true the other way round (marginal gain from crit damage buffs also diminishes) but in practice base damage buffs are more common than crit damage buffs, and better at baseline stats so you generally pick more, and earlier.

You should strike a balance between them.

TLDR: Balance is bad, best DPS is to specialise in "spell cooldown reduction" both in singular spell choice and "all spells" choice.

Currently the meta is get your spells with elemental augments ASAP then stack as much "spell cool down reduction" as possible. Proof of this is the nerf to "ice element" slow effect on the boss. With "solar pulse" you could stack the slow debuff so quickly the boss would barely move.
Every instance of elemental damage adds a stacking layer of debuff on enemies. That's why currently the best spells are, in no particular order: rune burst, solar pulse, and necro whirl. Next best are star fall, astral orbs, and moonerang.
You will notice that the top three have a very low CD to start, or in necrowhirl's case the aoe ticks very quickly.
Most of the time you can't afford to waste a level on "increase to crit chance" and/or "increase to crit damage" due to RNG and since when you play coop you will notice you don't get as many levels as you would as a solo player.

You seem oblivious to the fact elemental damage is proportional to hit damage.

It is especially easy now with Offensive Defense to delete enemies with an alpha strike or two, making Ice pointless - "best crowd control is death".

Moonarang lmao you made my day.

[Gorilla Grip]

Originally posted by Scr(A)tch:

Originally posted by Gorilla Grip:

You seem oblivious to the fact elemental damage is proportional to hit damage.

It is especially easy now with Offensive Defense to delete enemies with an alpha strike or two, making Ice pointless - "best crowd control is death".

Moonarang lmao you made my day.

I am well aware of the fact that spell damage is proportional to the initial damage, on fire. I have to test lighting. Acid and ice do no damage, but ice's debuff can stack.

Not all spells pierce through enemies.
Moonrang is one of the worst spells but if you had a choice between, hex bomb, rocky road, and moonrang. Moonerang is the least worst.
Ideally you get necrowhirl 2nd, and for 3rd spell get Falling stars or solar pulse, assuming you started with Rune burst.
You still don't understand the underlying maths that faster hits even at a much lower damage are better than slower hits at a larger damage. Spell cool down the way it is currently calculated gives a much higher dps bonus the further you stack it. Damage is linear, and progressively gets worse in proportion to your current damage.
Base 100, 10% more damage, new damage 110 a 10% increase. Damage later is 200, 10% more damage (remember you only get that 10% on your starting base damage) is 210, this is now only a 5% increase to your relative damage.

Spell cool down does not suffer from this decline in relative damage.
Simply put more hits means more chances to crit, more chances to proc. elemental effects.
Don't forget not all spells pierce through enemies so much of your alpha hit is wasted damage.

I would like to do more math, but so much is hidden from the player. What are the exact cool downs in milliseconds of each spell and their base damage. And each time you pick up a card it should show you the math of how each spell grows in power.

[Scr(A)tch]

Originally posted by Gorilla Grip:

I am well aware of the fact that spell damage is proportional to the initial damage, on fire. I have to test lighting. Acid and ice do no damage, but ice's debuff can stack.

Not all spells pierce through enemies.
Moonrang is one of the worst spells but if you had a choice between, hex bomb, rocky road, and moonrang. Moonerang is the least worst.
Ideally you get necrowhirl 2nd, and for 3rd spell get Falling stars or solar pulse, assuming you started with Rune burst.
You still don't understand the underlying maths that faster hits even at a much lower damage are better than slower hits at a larger damage. Spell cool down the way it is currently calculated gives a much higher dps bonus the further you stack it. Damage is linear, and progressively gets worse in proportion to your current damage.
Base 100, 10% more damage, new damage 110 a 10% increase. Damage later is 200, 10% more damage (remember you only get that 10% on your starting base damage) is 210, this is now only a 5% increase to your relative damage.

Spell cool down does not suffer from this decline in relative damage.
Simply put more hits means more chances to crit, more chances to proc. elemental effects.
Don't forget not all spells pierce through enemies so much of your alpha hit is wasted damage.

I would like to do more math, but so much is hidden from the player. What are the exact cool downs in milliseconds of each spell and their base damage. And each time you pick up a card it should show you the math of how each spell grows in power.

From 6th best to 3rd worst very quickly. I can agree with this new ranking though :)

High damage rocks dude. My main dps is arcane sword.

This is due to the fact a damage function isn't linear but has a initial spike which is otherwise known as an alpha strike.

A spell with higher dps but lower damage won't outdamage a high damage, low dps spell until several seconds. It the target is dead by then, it won't ever.

I.e. a spell doing 200 every 4 seconds (dps 50) will kill a 400 hp target in 4 seconds, while a spell doing 30 twice a second (dps 60) will take over 6 seconds to do it.

Edit:
There are chances for rate fo fire to increase linearly too. Devs obviously, and rightly, didn't go the cooldown reduction route which has exponential returns. +100% should mean you fire exactly twice faster.
Just like for criticals, the best area to sides ratio is the square.

[Gorilla Grip]

Originally posted by Scr(A)tch:

Originally posted by Gorilla Grip:

I.e. a spell doing 200 every 4 seconds (dps 50) will kill a 400 hp target in 4 seconds, while a spell doing 30 twice a second (dps 60) will take over 6 seconds to do it.

I think you made a typo 400/50 is 8, so 8 seconds.
Where faster hitting spells win is with over damage wasted, since you use the sword and it pierces it does not suffer as big of a loss for over killing the target.

Example would be if you could choose rune burst to fire once per four seconds and do 400 points of damage, 100 dps. Or 4 times per second at 25 points of damage also 100 dps. At any number other than factors of 400(ie 800, 1200, 1600), the faster firing spell would kill the enemy faster. Example: 200 hp target, slow spell 4 seconds, fast spell 2 seconds.
Example: 500 hp target, slow spell 8 seconds, fast spell 5 seconds.
In both examples the faster firing spell beat the slower one and both are doing 100 dps.

Piercing spells also suffer from this but to a much lesser degree.
It's the lighting element that disproportional benefits from faster hitting spells.

[Scr(A)tch]

Originally posted by Gorilla Grip:

I think you made a typo 400/50 is 8, so 8 seconds.
Where faster hitting spells win is with over damage wasted, since you use the sword and it pierces it does not suffer as big of a loss for over killing the target.

Example would be if you could choose rune burst to fire once per four seconds and do 400 points of damage, 100 dps. Or 4 times per second at 25 points of damage also 100 dps. At any number other than factors of 400(ie 800, 1200, 1600), the faster firing spell would kill the enemy faster. Example: 200 hp target, slow spell 4 seconds, fast spell 2 seconds.
Example: 500 hp target, slow spell 8 seconds, fast spell 5 seconds.
In both examples the faster firing spell beat the slower one and both are doing 100 dps.

Piercing spells also suffer from this but to a much lesser degree.
It's the lighting element that disproportional benefits from faster hitting spells.

No, you didn't get the alpha strike concept.

Spells with a 4 second cooldown don't wait 4 seconds before attacking. They attack once immediately, then go on cooldown for 4 seconds.

As such a spell doing 200 damage with 4 seconds cooldown has a litteral dps of 50 (200/4 = 50), but does 400 damage during the first 4 seconds.

A 200 hp target dies instantly from the alpha, 400 hp dies in 4 seconds, etc.

Furthermore you have several spells, so add up their alpha damage - properly an alpha strike is the sum of all weapons first attacks. Fast hitting spells are useful to smooth your total damage function, avoid overkills and kill the few large hp sponges. Fire does exactly that too.