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Thread: Sheerkya's Debuff Guide

  1. #1

    Default Sheerkya's Debuff Guide

    This is among the most useful guides from old forums, made by Sheerkya. Note that it's quite old and some stuff, especially about rangers, is probably outdated, but general info about debuffs/mitigations is correct.

    This game is very complex. I am trying to decipher this complexity and provide some of my findings to the community to make us all better players. My perspective is PvE Raiding. But this information is applicable to both PvE and PvP. This post is focusing on debuffs that different classes provide. My hope is that Raid Leaders and players will gain a better understanding to increase their effectiveness.

    My definition of a debuff is “a buff placed on an enemy target.”

    Prior to getting into the details of debuffs, it is helpful to understand the damage mitigation layers that you are impacting thru your debuffs. Looking at your character sheet, you might think there is only one layer of physical mitigation and one layer of magical mitigation. However, if you mouse over that number, it breaks it down into the two layers, showing you the benefit of each layer.

    Damage Mitigation Layers

    There are multiple layers for damage mitigation, both physical and magical. The layers are Damage Deflection, Directional Shielding, Invulnerability, Armor, and Protection. These layers are multiplicative in effect rather than additive. I will provide examples below.

    Damage Deflection is a mitigation against all damage, both physical and magical. One point in Damage Deflection is one percent less damage making it thru this layer of protection. Penetration Rating negates Damage Deflection on a one to one ratio. The only class that gets Penetration Rating is a Ranger feating talents in the Waylayer Tree (Piercing Stance, Piercing Shots, Absolute Precision).

    A few examples. A PoM casts Hand of Mitra that gives them 100 damage deflection expecting to negate all damage, except for that Ranger who is specced with Piercing Stance and Piercing Shots, providing 15 penetration rating while in Piercing Stance. They would do 15% of their damage thru the damage deflection layer. However, the Conqueror using Blessed Conquest ( 200 damage deflection) laughs at the silly ranger and destroys them with their incredible Lumbering Hulk abilities. Because someone would have to have over a 100 penetration rating to start doing damage to a Conqueror while Blessed Conquest is up. And currently, the maximum penetration rating a Ranger can have is 40, and that is only for a brief time.

    Directional Shielding is another layer of protection for physical damage.

    No directional shielding = plus 20% damage [I always thought this is %33, ALSO back always counts as unprotected]
    1 directional shielding = no modifier
    2 directional shielding = minus 33% damage
    3 directional shielding = minus 66% damage

    Penetration rating also goes thru directional shielding. It is only useful when going thru 2 or more directional shielding.

    More useful on this layer of protection would be to eliminate the shielding, which is what Rangers and Assassins can spec into. The assassin feat is very lackluster compared to the Ranger feat. As the Assassin feat only shatters directional shielding up to 8 seconds with a long reuse timer, the Ranger feat can keep shielding shattered thru a proc that can refresh the timer, making it more effective. The Ranger’s Shattering Shots feat enables them a chance on each hit to eliminate all directional shielding. IMHO, that is why you bring a few Rangers who feat this talent to a PvE raid. Hint: they are usually the ones with crossbows.

    Another layer is the Invulnerability that you have (physical/poison/holy/unholy/fire/electric/cold). This is the only layer that can go under zero. Here is how it works.

    Invulnerability less than zero is increased damage applied at this layer. So if a target has 10% Invulnerability to all physical damage types and your raid debuffs it the full 25%, then it would have -15% Invulnerability to physical damage types, increasing all physical damage by 15% at this layer.

    Invulnerability more than zero is damage mitigation applied at this layer. 50% Invulnerability is 50% less damage making it thru this layer.

    Invulnerability greater than 100 is complete damage mitigation and a healing effect for each point over 100. So 133 Invulnerability (fire) would negate all fire damage and 33% of the fire damage that makes it to this layer would be passed thru as healing.

    Bonuses given by having a Guild City are applied at this layer. Defensive and Frenzy stances impact this layer as well.

    Armor is the physical protection you have and decreases the physical damage you take. The Armor rating you get from equipment and talents reduces damage from the physical and poison damage. Armor Penetration lowers the armor rating of what you are attacking and is applied at this layer. The Armor layer is not additive with the Invulnerability layer, but rather it is multiplicative.

    For example, we have a Conqueror with enough armor to mitigate 40% of the physical damage based strictly on their armor rating. Defensive Stance adds 7% damage invulnerability to all damage types when not feated. When not in Defensive Stance, the Conqueror will mitigate 40% of all physical damage, but while in Defensive Stance, he will mitigate 44.2% of the physical damage going thru those two layers. Which is 40% at the Armor layer plus 60% of the 7% at the Invulnerability layer.

    So... the better your armor, the less impact defensive stance has on mitigation.

    Protection decreases the magical damage that you take in the same manner as armor does for physical damage. Protection is broken into Holy/Unholy (Spiritual, impacted by Wisdom) and Fire/Electric/Cold (Elemental, impacted by Intelligence).

    Now that we have the layers of protection explained, let’s move onto the debuffs in the next section.

    Debuffs

    The primary debuff types impact the Invulnerability, Armor and Protection layers. Additional debuffs primarily impact Physical and Magical damage, Healing, and Movement. And finally, some debuffs provide what I will call a reverse proc. The reverse procs put a beneficial short term buff on the attacker.

    Invulnerability Debuffs

    You can have one of each Invulnerability debuff on a target an any time. The debuff’s duration timer is refreshed when another of the same type is applied to the target.

    Physical Wrack is -10% Physical and Poison Invulnerability for 30 seconds.
    Physical Ruin is -15% Physical and Poison Invulnerability for 15 seconds.
    Spiritual Wrack is -10% Holy and Unholy Invulnerability for 30 seconds.
    Spiritual Ruin is -15% Holy and Unholy Invulnerability for 15 seconds.
    Elemental Wrack is -10% Fire, Electric and Cold Invulnerability for 30 seconds.
    Elemental Ruin is -15% Fire, Electric and Cold Invulnerability for 15 seconds.

    Armor and Protection Debuffs

    These apply a debuff that stacks up to 5 times, increasing the benefit linearly with each stack. After reaching 5 stacks, each additional application of the debuff will refresh the duration. Another thread estimated the benefit of a full stack to be between 10 and 25% more damage, depending on the Armor and Protection ratings of the target.

    Physical Torment is -900 armor per stack for 30 seconds. Fully stacked is -4500 armor.
    Spiritual Torment is -250 Holy and Unholy Protection per stack for 30 seconds. Fully stacked is -1250 Holy and Unholy Protection.
    Elemental Torment is -250 Fire, Electric, and Cold Protection per stack for 30 seconds. Fully stacked is -1250 Fire, Electric and Cold Protection.

    Healing Debuffs

    These apply a debuff that stacks up to 5 times, increasing the benefit linearly with each stack. After reaching 5 stacks, each additional application of the debuff will refresh the duration.

    Blistering Wounds is -20% natural health, mana, and stamina regeneration and -5% received healing per stack for 15 seconds. Fully stacked it eliminates all natural regeneration and 25% of received healing.

    It is difficult to ascertain the impact of this on raids, as you cannot see the natural regen of a target in your combat logs. But everything has natural regen and it is easy to quickly apply this debuff with either a Fire Stance feated Ranger or a Scorch feated Demonologist.

    Debuff Spreadsheet [NOTE: sadly the link appears to be dead]

    The spreadsheet linked below is a listing of most debuffs. It does not include all the snares nor does it include debuffs whose proc rates were so low they were completely useless, such as the Havoc Demos proc from their Cursed by Heavens debuff. I went thru each class, trying out their combos, abilities, spells, and feats whilst taking notes for the spreadsheet. One more note. “Damage Multiplier” seems to be only physical damage since there is a separate “Magical Damage Modifier” for magical damage.

    Sheerkya's Debuff Spreadsheet

    This info is not up to date with the changes with all the classes, but it is all correct in how the layers are impacted by debuffs and the names of the debuffs.
    .......

    Some extra notes from me:
    Enemies in PvE can also apply wracks, ruins and torments. And their debuffs are much more deadly than puny player abilities, such as Sodabeh's killer ruin in Ardashir or exploding Jiang Shi torment in Celestial Necropolis. Luckily AA perks clear them (this works in pvp too), which is the reason they're mandatory for hardmodes.

    Resolve (soldier perk): Removes all Wracks from the player. Wracks applied by bosses to tanks can stack and some are also heavy dots. Wracks are always either on a single target (which should be tank) or a cone attack that can be avoided. A wrack that also does damage can usually kill anyone who's not a tank. It may be possible to survive certain wracks without resolve but I wouldn't recommend attempting it.

    Steadfast Faith (healer perk): Removes all Ruins from everyone in a cone (exactly like blue heal cone). It also removes Torments depending on healer's class: pom removes Spiritual Torment, tos removes Elemental Torment and bear removes Physical Torment. Ruins are wipers because they like to spread to nearby players (usually the whole group gets ruin at once) AND they're also huge dots that'll kill everyone in a few seconds. Ruins must always be cleared by healers asap. Unlike wracks, it's definitely impossible to survive if ruins aren't cleared.

    Unbinding Charm (mage perk): Removes all Torments from the mage and the targeted player at close range. This is mostly useless because Torments are very rare and UC is hard to use in combat. Most groups take correct priest class for the specific Torment in a dungeon rather than depend on mages. Only exceptions are Abyss of Kun Whu, where mages are used to remove charm and Coppice of the Heart, where mages remove root from themselves.

    Any new rogue player who feels left out after reading this: you get two AA perks that has nothing to do with mitigations but are just as vital. This means rogues has to have 2 perks before they can do hardmodes, which sort of screws them over.
    Tainted Weapons (rogue perk): Removes heal over time effects from target. PvE bosses who can heal themselves do so in extreme amounts and are virtually unbeatable without TW. Healing icons on bosses are usually blue or green and TW must be used as soon as they appear.
    This removes hots in pvp too.
    Finely Honed (rogue perk): Removes "bubbles" from target. PvE bosses get two kinds of bubbles: invulnerability that must be removed by some mechanic, damage reflection shield removed by FH. This second kind of shield is always very nasty and will wipe the group quickly if not removed asap.
    In pvp, this can remove soldier/healer bubbles.
    Last edited by cins; 25th March 2013 at 17:47.

  2. #2

    Default

    This is helpful info.

    Perhaps the forums could have a "Guides, Tips and 101's" folder and sticky it.

  3. #3

    Default

    Nice guide. Sadly assassins as of 1.6 cannot remove active shields.
    Retired

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