Black Cat gear any good?

[Ozzina Arcane]

I see lots of really expensive stuff at the Black Cat but their stats don't look that great. Do they not show their true potential until upgraded or something?

[msterswrdsmn]

To answer the original question:

Most of the weapons and armors are only good against a very specific enemy type, and even then, i'm not sure exactly -how- effective they are (ex: one sword is strong against spirits...which are strong against physical attacks)

A few that stick out are the caged fury/force hatchet, which multiply your damage each time you land a successful strike, but resets the buff if you get hit. Sorcerers should avoid getting hit anyway, so the caged fury can boost your spell damage by a considerable amount (miasma is the fastest way to trigger the buff). Force hatchets are tricker, but can be used with a fighter if you're exceptionally good with perfect blocks/i-frame dodging (fighters have 2 i-frame moves). The force hatchet can also be used by an assassin to charge up their bow for powerful shortbow attacks.

I know some people build around the iraksis greatsword for critical strike damage, but I don't personally have any experience with this kind of build.

The ancient robe set has powerful status resistance bonuses.

I believe there is a shield that drains all of your magick defense and turns it into physical defense, which could be a very powerful boost if you're going against a physical boss.

[JtDarth]

msterswrdsmn eredeti hozzászólása:

To answer the original question:

Most of the weapons and armors are only good against a very specific enemy type, and even then, i'm not sure exactly -how- effective they are (ex: one sword is strong against spirits...which are strong against physical attacks)

A few that stick out are the caged fury/force hatchet, which multiply your damage each time you land a successful strike, but resets the buff if you get hit. Sorcerers should avoid getting hit anyway, so the caged fury can boost your spell damage by a considerable amount (miasma is the fastest way to trigger the buff). Force hatchets are tricker, but can be used with a fighter if you're exceptionally good with perfect blocks/i-frame dodging (fighters have 2 i-frame moves). The force hatchet can also be used by an assassin to charge up their bow for powerful shortbow attacks.

I know some people build around the iraksis greatsword for critical strike damage, but I don't personally have any experience with this kind of build.

The ancient robe set has powerful status resistance bonuses.

I believe there is a shield that drains all of your magick defense and turns it into physical defense, which could be a very powerful boost if you're going against a physical boss.

A bit of clarification on the sword you mentioned? The one 'strong against spirits'?
The exact text is 'especially strong against spirits beyond the ken of man'. That implies ghosts, to most people, but the actual meaning is related to one of the other meanings of spirit. Specifically, read it as 'will' and you will get your hint as to what it actually effects. Also read 'ken' as sight, rather than understanding. It's look, particularly the glow could also be seen as a hint. It's not dragons, but it is something related to THE story dragon.
It's very much a useless weapon, beyond it's looks, only applying to a single enemy, one that's not a hard fight to begin with. Fortunately, with Dark Arisen, every weapon is usable, just GDF it and it is somewhat viable.

Most the weapons from the Black Cat are more valuable for looks than practical effect. Except the gold weapons, but those are sold as replacements for certain one-off quest replacements, iirc.

[Darkside99x]

I remember when that DLC was coming it, they called it the Monster Hunter pack.


Massively disappointed when there was nothing from actual monster hunter.

Was hoping for a bowgun for my ranger lol.

[Guh~hey~hey~♫]

Iralkis does 0.1% of the weapon attack power with a normal strike (then you add affinity buff, core strength, skill damage, etc...), but has a chance to do up to 10 times (at gdf) the damages when scoring a critical strike.
The trick here is that the critical multiplier affect your total attack when the weak hit only affect the weapon attack power.
So you basically hit like if you were bare handed (plus any afffinity buff) most of the time, but when a critical proc the multiplier turn your hit into a deadly blow able to KD or OHKO almost anything.
Extremely powerfull when combined with multi-hits skills (for more chance to proc).

Those that have a damage boost against a specific type of ennemy kinda work the same.

You can make them even more usefull by using skills that dont scale with your weapon strength, since the multiplier is applied to the total damage.

Extrem example is the hydra tusk (double your damage against hydras and arch hydras) used with great gamble (damage mostly depend on your stamina).

You should also try shooting a holy focus bolt at Gazer with a GDF evil eyesight in hands, for the laugh....

[JtDarth]

Guh~heh~heh~♫ eredeti hozzászólása:

Iralkis does 0.1% of the weapon attack power with a normal strike (then you add affinity buff, core strength, skill damage, etc...), but has a chance to do up to 10 times (at gdf) the damages when scoring a critical strike.
The trick here is that the critical multiplier affect your total attack when the weak hit only affect the weapon attack power.
So you basically hit like if you were bare handed (plus any afffinity buff) most of the time, but when a critical proc the multiplier turn your hit into a deadly blow able to KD or OHKO almost anything.
Extremely powerfull when combined with multi-hits skills (for more chance to proc).

Those that have a damage boost against a specific type of ennemy kinda work the same.

You can make them even more usefull by using skills that dont scale with your weapon strength, since the multiplier is applied to the total damage.

Extrem example is the hydra tusk (double your damage against hydras and arch hydras) used with great gamble (damage mostly depend on your stamina).

You should also try shooting a holy focus bolt at Gazer with a GDF evil eyesight in hands, for the laugh....

The problem here, is that with the Dark Arisen expansion, the BBI Lvl 2 weapons basically remove the advantage to overall damage output that these weapons have situationally. Only Iraklis remotely holds up, and even there, it winds up falling behind BBI lvl 3 weapons. Also, ALL skills do scale with your strength, magick or a combination thereof. Some just don't have as much scaling relatively, or have caps on how much the stat can affect.

[KnightDragon]

Ozzina Arcane eredeti hozzászólása:

I see lots of really expensive stuff at the Black Cat but their stats don't look that great. Do they not show their true potential until upgraded or something?

only thing worth getting at the black cat is the beastly mantle everything else is garbage as far as stats goes, also generally speaking the chimeric armor is both great and cheap to rarefy once dragon forged.

[Inquizitor]

Mostly early-game gear, despite being somewhat expensive at that time. Some of it however is good even at max level, considering some Gold Rarefied gear, namely the Iraklis.
While technically getting oneshot by everything, the Iraklis is an absolute beast of a weapon when it does what its supposed to.

[Guh~hey~hey~♫]

it's the complete opposite.... most of those weapons only shine at max level because of how the damage multiplier works.... that's why they're sold at a price making them hardly affordable at low level I guess....
All of them are around 30% more powerfull than BBi level 3 weapons of the same type and at the same upgrade level, when used in the right conditions.
Exception being brezel crown, which purpose is to double the exp (useless at max level), and legion might which is usefull at any level on a support pawn (support role isnt to deal damage).

[JtDarth]

Guh~heh~heh~♫ eredeti hozzászólása:

it's the complete opposite.... most of those weapons only shine at max level because of how the damage multiplier works.... that's why they're sold at a price making them hardly affordable at low level I guess....
All of them are around 30% more powerfull than BBi level 3 weapons of the same type and at the same upgrade level, when used in the right conditions.
Exception being brezel crown, which purpose is to double the exp (useless at max level), and legion might which is usefull at any level on a support pawn (support role isnt to deal damage).

That's not really how it works though. All of the 'special damage' weapons deal between 2 and 3 times damage to affected enemies. That's not enough to overpower their bbi lvl 3 equivalents at the same upgrade level. It's enough to overpower BBI lvl 1 weapons, and be roughly on par with a straight damage BBI lvl 2.
Of course, given that the multiplier appears to be on the 'attack damage' stage, and not the earlier parts of damage calculation, It is fully possible that certain SKILLS will see that '30%' increase, but that's more down to the individual skill than it is representative of the weapon's actual utility.
If you can provide hard evidence, please do so. I'd love to see this supposed boost over. To really test if it is a solid general statement, you should be testing with something with a low base damage, primarily the example of a core skill, IE your basic attack, and to ensure you are testing against the SAME hurtbox on the enemy. Use the damage number in the statistics page to record exact numbers.
Even if there was a supposed '30%' boost in damage from these weapons against their specific targets, that still doesn't make them worth carrying considering a lvl 2 or lvl 3 bbi weapon still makes enemies melt plenty fast.

[Guh~hey~hey~♫]

No...

...there's not a "30%" damage bonus.... 30% is, on average (that's what meant "around"), the difference between best bbi weapon and those black cat weapon when used in the right condition.

Looking at them in the black cat inventory isnt enough to figure out what they do....actually read their description and use them before trying to give advices about them....

And the point of the post was "when is it appropriate to use those black cat weapon" and "are they usefull at all".... shoot a HFB at gazer with the evil eyesight, or shoot an endecad shot (or worse.... great gamble) with the hydra tusk at an hydra and check the result for yourself....

[JtDarth]

Guh~heh~heh~♫ eredeti hozzászólása:

No...

...there's not a "30%" damage bonus.... 30% is, on average (that's what meant "around"), the difference between best bbi weapon and those black cat weapon when used in the right condition.

Looking at them in the black cat inventory isnt enough to figure out what they do....actually read their description and use them before trying to give advices about them....

And the point of the post was "when is it appropriate to use those black cat weapon" and "are they usefull at all".... shoot a HFB at gazer with the evil eyesight, or shoot an endecad shot (or worse.... great gamble) with the hydra tusk at an hydra and check the result for yourself....

Do you not bother to read? Do you not bother to pay attention to who it is you are responding to? Earlier in this thread I already covered that I know how they work and what they do. My advice as given earlier in this thread proves that I know what I was talking about. You can ♥♥♥♥ right off with that 'lol go read description and use them before trying to give advice about them' ♥♥♥♥. If you'd bothered to pay attention you'd know that is irrelevant to the discussion of their damage output and your claim regarding how much extra they do.

I already covered this. Numerically speaking, the weapons add a 2x to 3x multiplier to the final damage calculation. I SPECIFICALLY stated that certain skills would benefit from it more than others, and the ones you are using as examples are some of the ones that benefit from the way the damage for them is calculated more than practically any other skill for that class.

That is not enough to say as a general statement the way you did that they have 'around 30% higher damage than their BBI lvl 3, or even lvl 2, equivalents, which is what you stated. And I quote:
'All of them are around 30% more powerfull than BBi level 3 weapons of the same type and at the same upgrade level, when used in the right conditions.'
Right conditions reads as 'used against the correct enemy type' not as 'by using specifically the skills that benefit the most from the way the multiplier is applied'.

The topic was also not 'when is it appropriate to use those weapons', it was:
'...their stats don't look that great. Do they not show their true potential until upgraded or something?'
Indicating he wanted to know what was special about them. Not how to max out damage with them, or how to abuse skill scaling, but what they did.

[Ozzina Arcane]

I realize I never responded in this thread. But I have read all the responses. Thanks everyone who tried to explain all this for me. The amount of thought that goes into getting the most out of these doesn't seem worth it to me. At least not on my first playthrough where I'm just trying to complete the game to move on in my backlog (may come back later for hard mode or new game+)