Personally I prefer to dance, but when it comes to berserk I don't use nightmare often unless I'm swarmed and need to clear the room. If I want to hunt and use I berserk it's stone/blood all day, one man killing spree clean up aisle 2 thank you. Wolverine does have a nice defensive bonus can only dance it back to back 1 for right now working on that.


We are all mere shadows and dust.

~Craetos~

>>Does anybody have/know a breakdown of what stats effect what dances and how?
>>I've heard that Eagle gives a 1 rank perception boost per discipline point. Beyond that, I don't know much so I'm curious.

Dances are affected by concentration, which is determined by discipline and circle, so the only real stat that affects dances as far as I know is discipline.

As far as a break-down of how it affects dances, that is pretty difficult to say, because it will be variable for a lot of people. Like I said, dances are determined by circle and discipline, and everyone will have different discipline at different circles (ergo different concentration).

I can tell you, though, that 1 rank of perception per discipline point for Eagle sounds pretty incorrect to me. I don't think dances are nearly that linear. A dance's duration and power will be determined by your concentration. When you first get Eagle it seems to me a meager boost (like 10 perception maybe) and steadily grows as you raise in circle and discipline.

To offer you some anecdotal evidence, I've noticed Eagle Dance's perception boost has grown substantially (I would estimate it has grown from a 10 rank boost to a 40 rank boost) over the past say, 15 circles, and I've only raised my discipline about 6 times since I first got it.

>>I thought Reflex also affected dances somehow.

It is possible but I have not seen or read anything that indicated such.

Because of the way bonusing works, you won't often get the full boost without enough of the base stat/skill. So any stat that dances affect could theoretically be a factor, although more so on the low end.

>>Because of the way bonusing works, you won't often get the full boost without enough of the base stat/skill. So any stat that dances affect could theoretically be a factor, although more so on the low end.

I do not believe Barbarian dances work this way.

Many spells function like this but from my testing the impression I've gotten is that a dance's length and power are pretty much a direct function of concentration. There is a low end (e.g., Bear Dance boosts strength 5 points at minimum) that functions independently of your physical stats. Assuming you keep your Barbarian pretty well-rounded (e.g., you aren't power-training discipline) you should notice that your dance's growth is pretty linear and raises regardless of which stats you train.

>I do not believe Barbarian dances work this way.

Probably right, they seem to break caps in a lot of other ways anyway.

>In what ways, exactly?

The BMR boost comes to mind.

But also, they break the spirit of caps. For instance, with 80 reflex, 510 evasion, and 475 shield, plus SOP, SEER, and IOE (2 capped evasion boosts and a capped reflex boost), a barbarian with 40s agility and 400s in his melee weapons could not touch me. He dances wolverine and 1 shots me every time.

There are other ways that dances break caps, but I don't remember any specifics off the top of my head.

Strength is also a factor to some.

>>Strength is also a factor to some.

Which dance specifically and from where did you hear this?

Since I don't have the code I can't outright say you are wrong but there seems to be a lot of misinformation about Barbarian abilities. Strength affects berserks; I have never heard of it directly affecting dances.

http://phiiskeep.homestead.com/Dances.html

Phii's Site owns as a directory for Barb abilities. Basically, I've heard lectures by Maulem, had conversations with Navak, really discussed this with a lot of knowledgeable and smart Barbs and never heard anything about reflex or strength affecting dances.

Many dances BOOST strength and reflex, but I've never seen or read anything indicating that physicals enhance a dance's power.

>Just curious what you mean by bottom end/top end of inner fire? I've apparently completely missed something here. What factors contribute to bottom end/top end? This might turn out to be very interesting for myself if it's what I think you mean but it's a completely new one on me.

He means at high circles and at low circles. To give an example of it being broken at high circles, consider the average 150th circle barbarian in TF. You can easily MB or WD them, but then even while they're stunned/asleep on the ground you cannot hit them with a fully aimed, capped, top tier targeted spell. Even with 1200 TM from what I understand, vs hundreds of ranks less evasion.

<<khri spar's power caps almost immediately. A Barbarian's Dragon Dance won't cap till almost 100th circle.>>

I don't think khri spar is anywhere near the cap when you first receive it. You can tell by periodically carving longbows with spar up as you progress in concentration.

>He means at high circles and at low circles. To give an example of it being broken at high circles, consider the average 150th circle barbarian in TF. You can easily MB or WD them, but then even while they're stunned/asleep on the ground you cannot hit them with a fully aimed, capped, top tier targeted spell. Even with 1200 TM from what I understand, vs hundreds of ranks less evasion.<

What kinds of mentals are we looking at here on the Barbs behalf. I might be confused here, but I believe charisma is a heavy hitter in BMR. I know alot of folks tend to neglect charisma but if this particular Barb had high charisma, then I could see where the successful MB/WD is questionable. I know circle is a big factor too but BMR is a will versus will action so plays on mentals a fair bit.

However, I can also see how rediculous it is that a stunned or sleeping Barb can "still evade". That's way out of kilter to offense vs defense. There's obviously some work that needs to be done on this. I would think a high circle Barb that can evade TM while stunned or slept should easily overpower a spell with BMR and vice versa.

Bavest

>If we're not neglecting the power that mentals factor into BMR here, then I can completely agree with this statement.

It really isn't relevant.

>>I used to look forward to getting Dragon, now I could care less as the other dances appear to be more powerful overall from what I'm hearing.

You should still look forward to it. It's still our best dance. Discipline training as a Prydaen can be rough, but it's worth it.

I'd say that you really won't start noticing the BMR factor from 0-75th circle. Maybe a little higher. Spells will pretty much win in that area. I'd say from 75th to 110th is where BMR becomes very, very noticable and the BMR effects from Dragon dance are very nice. 110th + is where it starts to get crazy.

I for one would hate to see any downtweaks, but if it is needed, then so be it. And I wouldn't even consider what will happen to BMR a downtweak, just a re-scaling. One thing I like about our guild is that you hardly see many people complaining about stuff on the forums like in some of those other guild folders. So however it goes, if you're not a 100+ Barb, the change to BMR will probably help you more than hurt you. Eventually we'll probably get some more upper circle abilities including a possible change to War Stomp (since it sucks).


Vinjince

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"There are five possible operations for any army. If you can fight, fight; if you cannot fight, defend; if you cannot defend, flee; if you cannot flee, surrender; if you cannot surrender, die."

- Sima Yi

>I might be confused here, but I believe charisma is a heavy hitter in BMR. I know alot of folks tend to neglect charisma but if this particular Barb had high charisma, then I could see where the successful MB/WD is questionable.

Just a side note. From what I remember (some testing was done on Smelly Cat), all mentals play a bigger role in MR than physicals. Intel, Wisd, Disc, and Char (mentals) all increase MR equally - Str, Stam, Agil, Refl (physicals) all increase MR equally - Mentals increase MR more than Physicals. I'll see if I can find what the presumed formula was and post it.


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Re: Life mana Spell preps

You raise your hands in the air. You wave them like you just don't care. Somebody says, "Hey!" Somebody says, "Ho!" Somebody screams.

((str + stm)/2) * ((agi + ref)/2)) + (int * wis) + (dis * cha) = BMR


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Re: Life mana Spell preps

You raise your hands in the air. You wave them like you just don't care. Somebody says, "Hey!" Somebody says, "Ho!" Somebody screams.

>Interesting. Where is that formula from?


http://smelly-cat.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=8175&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=45


Read through the thread. Testing was done that sort of confirms the idea.

Ironically, according to that formula Togs and S'kra (two of the most common races for barbs) are the worst races when it comes to BMR.

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Re: Life mana Spell preps

You raise your hands in the air. You wave them like you just don't care. Somebody says, "Hey!" Somebody says, "Ho!" Somebody screams.

>((str + stm)/2) * ((agi + ref)/2)) + (int * wis) + (dis * cha) = BMR

Oversimplified because you're neglecting to account for certain other boosts or penalties... but basically that's one snip of a larger picture, yeah.

At least until it's changed so mages can be happy and the high end barbs have to go back to being overglorified slave gladiators.

>Who are we talking about here? I certainly haven't participated in any tests like this and I think its over-simpliflied and the numbers exaggerated and/or made up.

Mors couldn't touch Achilles, and he has less evasion than you. Mors isn't around to test though, and I know I couldn't touch you.

Interesting. My BMR is 7162 by the formula given. I thought circle also factored in. Does it?


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Kertig Heart Magdar Bluefletch, Legendary Barbarian of M'Riss