written
by: Wendeego LaMort
date: Nov '03 current patch: 1.66
In DAoC, as your characters gain
experience and rise in levels or “seasons”
they are given specialization points to spend
training those skills available to their class. The
number of specialization points gained at each level
is dependent on both the character class and the
character level. For instance, the scout class
receives 2 spec points/level for spending on training
in the various skill lines available to that class.
However, at levels 1 through 5, before the character
becomes a Scout, the character is a Rogue and only
receives 1 skill point/level. This is true of all the
beginning classes, elementalist, fighter, disciple,
rogue, mage, and acolyte. Upon joining an advanced
“guild” or class, the character may start
gaining more than 1 skill point/level. Therefore, our
example Scout gains 2 skill points/level and at level
6, is granted 12 skill points, at level 7, 14 skill
points and so forth.
Wait,
how come I don’t get 10 skill points for my
level 5 Scout?
In order to become a Scout, you must
first be a level 5 Rogue. Since points are awarded
the instant your character’s level changes, upon
reaching level 5, your character is still a Rogue and
thus receives points as if it were still on the
beginning class schedule (rogue, fighter, disciple,
mage, elementalist, or mage). Until you go and speak
to the Scout trainer and join their ranks, you are a
Rogue. Also, it should be noted that your character
will not be allowed to advance to level 6 without
choosing a so-called “advanced guild”.
Thus, if you are out adventuring and get enough
experience to become level 6, you will not actually
have your level increased to 6 nor receive your skill
points, nor receive the additional hit points or
increases to your base abilities (strength,
dexterity, etc.) until you go to an advanced trainer
and choose a class. You may continue to get
experience even though you have not leveled, but it
will not show up until after you’ve trained and
become whatever advanced class you wan to.
Right!
I get it, so how should I spend my skill points?
This is the primary question for all
classes! How indeed? First it is a good idea to
understand what spending skill points does for you.
Let’s look at combat skills first and discuss
this from that perspective:
The effect of specializing your
weapon is primarily one of reducing the variance in
your damage output. This damage variance is a factor
of your character’s level compared to your
actual specialization in a particular weapon. Thus,
at level 50, with 50 levels of training in thrust
style for instance, you would be said to have 100%
thrust, or “thrust specced at level”.
Some characters can use a weapon, but
cannot train or specialize in it (clerics and cloth
casters for instance). Essentially these characters
use their weapons “unspecced” or at 0% of
level. The variance in their damage output is 25% to
125% of their standard damage. Thus, if they would
normally do 20 points of damage with their weapon,
they could do as little as 5 to as much as 25 points
of damage, for an average damage output of 15.
The lower end of the damage output
variance increases as your weapon spec/character
level ratio increases. Thus, the closer your weapon
specialization level is to your character level, the
higher minimum damage you will do.
When your weapon spec is at 2/3 of
your level, your damage output variance is 75 to 125%
of your maximum. The upper range of your damage
potential does not increase from unspecced up to this
point. Thus, the same character whose base damage
output is 20 points but is now swinging with 2/3
weapon specialization will be generating from 15 to
25 points of damage or an average of 20 pts of damage
or 100% of base damage.
If weapon specialization increases
beyond 2/3 of your level, your upper limit starts to
also increase along with your lower limit of damage
variance, until at weapon specialization of 100% of
your level, your damage output is between 100% and
150% of your base damage. Using our 20 point damage
model, a character with 100% spec in that weapon
would do from 20 to 30 points of damage for an
average of 25 pts of damage or 125% average damage
output.
This progression of damage variance
is relatively linear in that there are no large jumps
in the variance at any particular level, except at
that 2/3 level point at which your upper limit of
damage variance starts to increase where it had
previously not.
Note also that your base damage is
determined by many factors including your character
level, your weapon, your weapon quality, weapon
condition and the ability scores your character has
(strength, dexterity, and quickness).
For slash and crush melee
specialization, strength plays a role in determining
base damage output, for thrust, it is a combination
of dexterity and strength that help to determine base
damage output.
OK I
think I get all that… what about spell casters?
For spell casters, specialization in
the various schools or types of magic works in the
same way as specializing in your weapon does for
melee damage output. Thus, at 2/3 of your level magic
spec, your spell damage output will be 75 to 125% of
the spell’s base damage and at 100% of level
magic spec; your spell damage output will be 100-150%
of the spell’s base damage. So a wizard with a
spell that is listed as doing 100 points of damage,
if they had their skill specced at 2/3 of their level
for that type of spell, would do from 75 to 125
points of damage for an average of 100, and if they
were specced at 100% of their level, would do from
100 to 150 pts of damage with that spell for an
average of 125.
Cool! Now my 8th level
character has a thrust spec of 8 and it has a little
+2 next to it, does that mean my effective thrust
spec is 10?
Yes it does, however the way it is
currently understood, melee damage spec ABOVE your
level does not provide as much of an increase in
damage output as it does as your modified melee spec
APPROACHES your level. Same goes for spell casting.
There are diminishing returns to be had for
specializing above your level.
Let’s address the concept of
that little +2 though. That is a bonus provided by
some piece or pieces of equipment on your character,
a weapon, piece of armor, or a cloak, ring, necklace,
bracelet, jewelry, belt, etc.
The maximum bonus you can get from
all “items” is equal to (your character
level divided by 5) +1, rounded down. This translates
to +2 at 5th level, +3 at 10th
level, all the way up to +11 at 50th
level. It should be repeated that this rounds down,
so at 49th level, the maximum bonus from
items is only +10 (49/5 = 9.8) +1=10.8, rounded = 10)
Also of note is the fact that when
attempting to achieve a weapon specialization as
close to or above your level, these bonus points are
factored into the equation, thus having 39 thrust +11
(from items at level 50) would be treated as a level
50 thrust specialization for the purposes of
determining damage output. Having an 11+5 thrust at
level 24, would be treated as a 2/3 spec and thus
would result in a damage variance of 75 to 125% of
base damage output.
By the way, there is another way you
can get bonus points to your skills, and that is by
increasing your realm rank through killing enemy
realms’ players in RvR combat. At each
successive realm rank above 1 your character gets an
additional +1 to ALL your skills. Thus, at Realm Rank
2, you would get +1 to all skills. The Realm Rank
bonus to your skills stacks with item bonuses based
on your level, so it is possible to have actually +20
to all your skills (+11 from items and being level 50
and +9 more from being realm rank 10)!!!
For the sake of discussion, your spec
plus any bonuses from items is known as your modified
spec. So, at 35 spec in a given skill with +11 from
items, and +4 from being realm rank 5, your modified
spec would be 50.
Most people when planning their
eventual level 50 spec template only count on being
realm rank 2 or at most 3 when they reach 50. Bear
this in mind as you create your own templates.
COOL!
So if I spec my thrust to level 39 and get all item
bonuses maxed out, I will have Dragonfang, the level
50 thrust style right?
Well, not exactly. Skill bonus points
from items do not grant the special combat style,
ability, or spell associated with having actually
trained to that level. However, that modified spec is
used, as stated above, to calculate your damage
variance. There is one exception to that rule, with
respect to assassin classes. They get to use their
modified spec in the Envenom skill to determine how
high level a poison they can use. Thus, a 50th
level assassin (Infiltrator, Nightshade, Shadowblade)
with a 39 +11 envenom spec could use level 50
poisons.
So, OK
want to start planning how to spec my character
now… how the heck do I do that… the math is
CRIPPLING!
Well, there are a few character
builders available out there that you can use to
figure this stuff out. There are even ones that allow
you to put points into your template based on
autotraining. The one I use most of the time is http://daoc.catacombs.com
WOOT!
I’m off and running... cya at 50!
Oh, one more thing I forgot to
mention – when your character reaches level 40,
and from there until your character reaches level 50,
you will get specialization points at each halfway
point between whole levels. So at level 40, if you
get half the experience you need to get to level 41,
you will get what is known as a
“mini-ding”. For your mini-dings, you get
half the number of spec points you got at the
previous level, rounded down. So if your character
gets 2 spec points per level, at level 40.5, you
would get 40 spec points to spend. At 41.5, your
character would get 41 points and so forth. Also,
upon achieving a mini-ding, your experience losses
from dying will never drop you below that mini-ding
point. Further, for the purposes of figuring out how
many points of constitution you lose per death, your
character’s “number of deaths this
level” is reset at each mini-ding as it is when
you hit a full level.
COOL!!!
