Warfare - how does it exactly work in Definitive edition?

[Pimpin Pippin]

I have read many forum threads and wikipedia pages that contradict each other on the topic of how does Warfare's 5% bonus to physical damage actually work, and frankly it is all rather outdated and confusing.

Some say it is similar as, for example, how Strength gives 5% bonus to relevant weapon/skill damage.

Others say that the Warfare's 5% bonus is actually different and ends up being much more valuable than other damage bonuses because it increases total damage instead of some base damage.

Often people claim that Warfare is so powerful that it is better to invest all possible points into Warfare to greatly increase damage instead of investing points into abilities such as Dual Wielding or Huntsman or Scoundrel (aside from a couple to unlock relevant skills).

Can anyone that has factually accurate and true information about Warfare please explain how it works (in the latest version of DOS2 Definitive Edition)?

Also as far as Dual Wielding weapons goes do abilities (like Warfare) use only one of the weapons to calculate ability damage - or do they add weapon damage from both weapons and then base ability damage from that?

And if i add poison damage from an ability or enchantment to my weapon, will the weapon-damage scaling abilities also take into account that added damage?

Thank you for reading and helping out a beginner :)

[Fenix-Venix]

Second these questions.

[Edstyles]

Well they are all spot on in their own way.

Suposedly warfare is more valuable cause the damage has better scaling.
So for that reason you want to avoid stuff like dual wield unless your aim is to get some dodge

At the same time the damage difference is minuscular in the early levels. So dual wield could end up having more value than warfare and at later stages warfare starts scaling better thence the better option. Cause u know people only care about lategame

[Qiox]

Attribute bonuses are not the same as the Warfare bonus. The 5% is not calculated the same way. One is additive, while the other multiplicative.

The damage bonuses from Dual Wielding is also Additive. The only other which is multiplicative is crti damage and temp skills like the extra 10% from Flesh Sacrifice.

Additive bonuses are calculated using the base damage.

If a weapon does 100 damage then the 5% bonus from Dual Wield would be an extra 5 damage.
An extra 5% from Finess would also be based on the 100 damage base to give another extra 5 damage.

The base 100 damage would be the sum of all physical weapon damage.

So, having 1 point in Dual Wield and a Finess score of 11 would increase the base weapon damage from 100 to 110.

These are examples of Additive bonsus. They individually increase the base damage only.

Warfare is different, and better, because is scales the base weapon damage AND all other additive bonuses.

In the above example, also having a 10% bonus from Warfare would not give just an extra 10 damage, which is 10% of the base weapon damage.

Instead the 10% is calculated after the Dual Wield and Finess bonuses have been added. That means it is 10% of 110 damage that is added, which is an extra 11.

Although 1 pt of damage may not seem significant, it scales very quickly as the additive bonuses increase.

For example, lets look at a capped character with 10 in Duel Wield, 10 in Warfare and 40 Finess.

Rank 10 Dual Wield gives +50% additive on base of 100 damage = +50 damage
Finess 40 gives +150% additive on base of 100 damage = +150 damage

Adding those to the base 100 gives a total of 300 damage.

Then, rank 10 Warfare gives 50% multiplicative on that total of 300 damage = +150 damage

Making our grand total = 100 + 50 +150 +150 = 450 damage

If Warfare was like the others and calculated Additively it would only have given you +50 damage for a total of 350 damage.

What was a 1 pt difference earlier has grown to be very significant!

To summarize, all additive bonuses calculate off the base weapon damage, and then the bonuses are all added up.

This new total is then scaled up by all multiplicative bonuses such as Warfare, Crit Damage Bonus, and temporary buff bonuses.

Or to put it in Path of Exile terminology: Attribute and Dual Wield bonuses are an Increase while Warfare is a More.

[Hobocop]

Note that Warfare doesn't benefit any secondary elemental damage you may have on your weapons, while weapon skills do, and such secondary elemental damage is more useful in the DE with the rebalance armor values.

[Fenix-Venix]

Cool, nothing really changed from DOS2, they just cut down progression for lone wolfs, which is good imo.
Thanks!