Elemental weapons...WTH (mini rant)

so i never played a caster or Faith build till recently so never paid attention to Enchanted/magic/Occult/Divine weapons..

take Iaito for example, at 40str/40dex/50int/50faith Iatio does the following damage.

Chaos: 500
Fire: 492
Lightening: 488
Magic: 487
Enchanted: 484
Divine: 482
Occult: 480

something is seriously wrong with this picture.

/end rant.

What about other weapons? Is Chaos (with no stat scaling) still the best upgrade path?

It's getting fixed in PTD, the enchanted/magic/divine/occult paths will be stronger than elementals even with base stats and 40 Faith/Int.

BrotherBob wrote:What about other weapons? Is Chaos (with no stat scaling) still the best upgrade path?

if you compare the AR of the Great axe the Chaos path has 40-50 damage over the Int/Faith scaling paths

Ghadis_God wrote:It's getting fixed in PTD, the enchanted/magic/divine/occult paths will be stronger than elemental even with base stats and 40 Faith/Int.

i know the Ele weapons are getting nerfed, i think the other ones need a buff though, i just can't believe FROM didn't see a problem with this when they released the game.

You're right, it's a bit ridiculous a character focused on faith would be doing more damage with a weapon not designed for faith and requiring no stat investment :/

Magic weapons have always been underpowered. Not only do you have to take into account that their AR is lower, but that you have to invest stats into it to work AND that magic is the second most defended attack type in the game. So, they are far weaker than they seem in the AR. In addition, GMB might see more play in the coming weeks.

The only redeeming factor is that magic is the least generally guarded attack type by shields, but that's it...

GMB is gonna be epic agianst the new int spells, just tank them

Seignar wrote:The only redeeming factor is that magic is the least generally guarded attack type by shields, but that's it...

I disagree. All these alternate scaling paths provide a top-notch weapon for taking down Dusk Crown users, and, with the tighter point restrictions for SL100, that will include almost every serious caster. While a Darkmoon Blade (Crystal Magic Weapon) buff will certainly outperform an Occult or Divine (Enchanted) equivalent for the time it's on, it's important to remember that if the opponent doesn't want to play "fair" with the Lightsaber, then the Arena is very conducive to running away. If it isn't an Arena fight, it'll depend on how bold the opponent decides to be when facing down the law (wizard). I'd say it has usage as an alternate weapon for when your buff runs out, and you're facing a Caster, on a build like this. (It'd switch to a Chaos or Lightning against others) Other than that, you are right in thinking it'll generally be a sub-optimal choice except on a few very specialized anti-mage builds that just can't spare the points to attune a buff, like here.

Post Script

What do you need to when your buff runs out?:

i just think it is poor design that a scaling weapon that requires stat investment is out performed by a weapon a level 5 can weild

Is this damage or AR glute, because I've tested several times divine/occult vs chaos/lightning @50 Faith and divine/occult wins by around 30 more damage. It was a Claymore vs reim I remember, and the other one was a Great Scythe vs 2 guys that let me test it. I was surprised that the magical ones were doing more damage than the elemental to common heavy armor set ups. I thought about the auxiliary "AR" they have but I doubt that's the reason. Will have to test magic/enchanted paths as well.

It could possibly be due to the fact that the magic ones are more magic lop sided and not a 50/50 split the like lightening and fire. The only however chaos is fire heavy also.

Fire is better defended against than magic, especially with heavy armor. I've never found the magic weapons' damage to be that lacking, they're certainly viable.

Glutebrah wrote:It could possibly be due to the fact that the magic ones are more magic lop sided and not a 50/50 split the like lightening and fire. The only however chaos is fire heavy also.

That's definitely the reason. The magical scaling is huge compared to the physical part. Chaos fire scaling difference is not as big. Thing is you have to get to 50 for max AR, and the scaling is pretty bad (2~3 AR per stat). Thanks to the patch it will be more worth it.

Seignar wrote:Magic weapons have always been underpowered. Not only do you have to take into account that their AR is lower, but that you have to invest stats into it to work AND that magic is the second most defended attack type in the game. So, they are far weaker than they seem in the AR. In addition, GMB might see more play in the coming weeks.

The only redeeming factor is that magic is the least generally guarded attack type by shields, but that's it...

Hmm, when I made my sorcerer with 50 int his enchanted scythe blew my mind. I was running around destroying people in pvp with it (yknow, a sorcerer not using spells) honestly wondering why people say the faith spells are OP (WoG, TWoP, etc.).

Also, when they say elementals will be nerfed, does that include chaos? I've been using a chaos server for a while now and I feel like i've been overlooking something for a long time!

Chaos is getting a 8% reduction and 10% for lightning as far as I know!

I personally think the elemental weapon were just a gross oversite by From...if you compare what you can do with an elemental build vs reg its not even close....I recently made my 1st sl 125 elemental build for fun.... I barely notice that it does less damage than a reg weapon to start with!

I did a 50 vit 10 att 76 end 28 str 14 dex....I can use a bunch of weapons and they all still hit hard as hell IMO...the big difference is the amount of weapons and armour you can carry!

With that build I can ninja flip with FULL havels and a claymore/halbert with a heater and pyro its disgusting really...obviously I don't I fast roll in full kirks with wolf for 80 poise lol....

Bottom line for my 100 arena builds I have a solid STR build a DEX build kind of a Q build and a gross elemental....IMO elemental builds will eventually take over the arena....rings like the stonepate's may become viable for once lol

ahh 8% doesnt seem that bad at all. Guess i'll just have to wait n see!

Knight Alundil wrote:ahh 8% doesnt seem that bad at all. Guess i'll just have to wait n see!

8% of 500 is 40, so that means a Chaos Iaito would have 460AR, making it much lower then the occult and enchanted ones

Oh ya Glute its going to balance them out with regards to making them finally a little worse that Occult Ench ect

However the 8% redution IMO does not nerf them enough to balance out elemental vs reg builds overall IMO

Let's compare my arena builds:

Elemental 50 vit 10 att 61 end 16 str 16 dex

Dex 40 vit 14 att 43 end 16 str 40 dex

Both with have FAP/Havels so 1590 vs 1800 elemental wins....61 end vs 43 elemental wins by a lot ill be able to carry an extra heavy weapon and have way more armor....and the only thing winning in the dex build is the pure damage vs elemental...but I'm telling ya guys having actually used them a fair bit recently they arnt doing that much less dmg at all!

With all that being said why wouldn't everyone run elemental 100's even with the nerfs?

I like using elementals and magic paths as backups for my sclaing weapons, so for my Str/Fai build, I have a divine Estoc and chaos G. Halberd as backup.

Well that's the funny part Ghadis even with a stat scaling build for certain weapons your still better off to use an elemental....often for a back up for sure like rapier or estoc!

Now don't get wrong I will still be running my stat scaling dex and str builds...but whenever I pull out my 'dirty' elemtal build I always have a lot of fun and success!!

DarkW17 wrote:Oh ya Glute its going to balance them out with regards to making them finally a little worse that Occult Ench ect

However the 8% redution IMO does not nerf them enough to balance out elemental vs reg builds overall IMO

Let's compare my arena builds:

Elemental 50 vit 10 att 61 end 16 str 16 dex

Dex 40 vit 14 att 43 end 16 str 40 dex

Both with have FAP/Havels so 1590 vs 1800 elemental wins....61 end vs 43 elemental wins by a lot ill be able to carry an extra heavy weapon and have way more armor....and the only thing winning in the dex build is the pure damage vs elemental...but I'm telling ya guys having actually used them a fair bit recently they arnt doing that much less dmg at all!

With all that being said why wouldn't everyone run elemental 100's even with the nerfs?

the nerf to DWGR is an indirect nerf to Elemental weapons also, alot more light armor being worn which has higher fire/light/magic resistance

Ya that is very true man there resist can really hurt your elemental weapons in some cases....dingy robe being a prime example!

Maybe the combo of dwgr and elemental nerfs will help balance it out....but elementals IMO still seem pretty lop sided!

I still like a true build and will continue to use the stat scaling builds like I always have....my prob with sl 100 is I like halberts so I really have to pay the price to stat my weapons....my fav new 120 I have been running is 28 str 40 dex with 28 to use the mura and have good halbert scaling....I also will be using that setup for a 100 IMO that's about as close to a qualtiy build as you will be able to make at 100!

In terms of Magic defense, the Dingy robe is like some kind of adamantine cuirass lol.

The poking Halberd doesn't do so well at 100 because of split scaling, but the Scythe scales mostly with Dex unlike the G. halberd so for a Dex build it's pretty strong. The gargoyle tail axe has mostly Dex scaling, as well as the flamberge and no to mention the BSS; dex builds really have a lot of strong options in terms of weapon diversity, not to mention all of the default Dex weapon classes like rapiers, katanas, spears, curved swords, daggers, etc, unlike Str, which is basically one greatsword, one UGS, a lot of axes, and a lot of big smashy things.

Lightning Zweihander +5 pre-patch does 721 AR
Lightning Zweihander +5 after patch does 650 AR

I played the new content with this weapon and it has a lot less bite to it.