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Advantages of level 65 first age LIs

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Advantages of level 65 first age LIs Empty Advantages of level 65 first age LIs

Post  Psychobabble Thu Jun 02, 2011 4:23 am

I just thought I'd get a discussion about first age legendary items kicked off for a couple of reasons. First because I think a lot of people don't understand what makes first age items special and second because we are contemplating moving to a (relatively simple) loot system for these items which would see our eventual first age drops spread more evenly throughout the raid group than relying on randon chance will.

The general message of this post is - every class will get a noticable benefit from their initial first age item, but a much lesser benefit from their second and subsequent ones.

Why are first age LIs better than second age?

First age LIs have four potential advantages over second age LIs:

  • Higher DPS and +1 extra rank in the default legacy (on some items, this is the same thing).
  • More points to spend. A first age at item level 70 gives you a total of 830 points to spend, as opposed to 750 for a second age.
  • Better quality legacies. Any legacy which is a rating (eg. the captain tactics buff and lore-master resist legacies) will be more powerful at max rank in a first age item (note: this is regardless of the equip level of the item).
  • Better passives. I don't know the details of this for all classes, but for lore-master there is one very useful passive on first ages (+tac skills damage %) that can't exist on second ages and also the values of the other passives has the potential to be higher. I know the latter is true of many classes, I don't know if any other classes have passives which ONLY appear on first age items (please let me know if you know any other examples).

There's a longer explanation of these things on this page if you're interested, although they miss the advantage of better passives.

To quantify this, take a look at the base DPS increase of various second to first age items:

2nd age 65

Champion 1-hander 64.4 DPS
Champion 2-hander 73 DPS
Hunter bow 73 DPS
Lore-Master staff 73 DPS

1st age 65

Champion 1-hander 67.8 DPS (+5.2%)
Champion 2-hander 80.7 DPS (+5.5%)
Hunter bow 76.8 DPS (+5.2%)
Lore-Master staff 76.8 DPS (+5.2%)

The impact of the extra rank of 'heal rating' on minstrel, captain, LM and RK items isn't quite as large, but it works out to about an extra 2% healing on base heals and obviously whatever your crit multiplier is on crit heals - overall, the single extra rank of healing rating probably works out to an extra 2.5% healing which is not insignificant.

Is a level 65 first age necessary?

All of the above benefits of first ages other than the first, relating to the default legacy, are applicable whether the item is equip level 65 or 60. This is a very important factor to note. If it is unimportant to maximise the default legacy on the relevant legendary item, then in many circumstances it is actually better to equip an equip level 60 first age than a level 65 second age and there is no practical difference between a level 60 first age and a level 65 first age.

Note that Minstrels, Capatins, LMs and RKs should never use level 60 first ages in preference to a level 65 second age on their healing items because the difference in tactical heal ranking between an equip level 60 and a level 65 item is very significant (over 10%). Thus, these classes actually get ALL FOUR of the benefits of a first age item by upgrading to a level 65 first age over a level 65 second age item, meaning a first age level 65 LI is a large upgrade for these classes even though the heal rating bonus (as I said, about 2.5%) isn't of itself enormous.

I've gone through and classified the default legacy on all classes' weapon and class item LI as either high, medium or low importance. Note that this is in a raid environment, obviously minstrels would like to do be able to do more tactical damage but they're hardly ever DPSing in raids so it's ranked as low importance.

  • Burg - DPS (high), incoming heal rating (moderate)
  • Captain - DPS (moderate), tactical heal rating (high)
  • Champion - DPS (high), incoming heal rating (moderate)
  • Guardian - DPS (high), shield use rank (moderate)
  • Hunter - DPS (high), DPS (low)
  • Lore-master - tactical damage rating (moderate), tactical heal rating (high)
  • Minstrel - tactical damage rating (low), tactical heal rating (high)
  • Rune-keeper - tactical damage rating (high, if DPS), tactical heal rating (high, if healing)
  • Warden - DPS (high), DPS (low)

Notes:

  • Both burglars and champions have told me that they don't typically max out their incoming heal rating. If that's true then the "moderates" above are actually low.
  • The more damage tanks do, the bigger threat they generate and this increase in threat is multiplied by the effect of their +aggro generating skills. Thus DPS on tank weapons is rated of high importance, particularly taking into account the increased threat generated by DPS classes operating with level 65 first age weapons.
  • I am unsure of the importance of shield use rank for guardians, I believe that it increases the damage from shield skills but I have also heard that most guards don't maximise it in which case it is of low importance.
  • The DPS/tac damage rating increase on a LM staff is quite important in situations where a LM is DPS-ing, but usually in raids that is not their role. There are exceptions to this though, eg. OD wound wing. LMs are also typically doing some level of DPS too even while in a support role. For these reasons i've rated it as moderate, not low.
  • Captain's aren't in a raid as a DPS class, but extra DPS never hurts and they typically do some DPS even while in a support role (like LMs) so i've rated their weapon DPS as of moderate importance.

As you can see from the above list, there is no class that gets a "high" benefit from having two level 65 first age items and many classes should be looking to use level 60 first age items even in preferance to level 65 second age items.

Comments, questions and corrections are welcome Smile.


Last edited by Psychobabble on Thu Jun 02, 2011 8:51 am; edited 1 time in total

Psychobabble

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Post  Jtime Thu Jun 02, 2011 8:35 am

Shield use rank essentially is a direct increase in the damage done by shield skills and in turn as all shield based skills and their associated threat (all shield skills generate threat with multipliers). At best it would be of moderate importance to a guard chiefly because the shield chains aren't constantly proccing and it's use isn't as widespread as the main hand weapons which apply to all other non-shield type skills and ultimately generate more threat overall.

Jtime

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Post  Ciramorn Thu Jun 02, 2011 11:32 am

all good points, just one other thing to keep in mind- extraordinary relics and any tier 2/3 crafted relics (possibly everything above tier 6s actually, i can't remember the specifics) can't be slotted on level 60 items. potentially not an issue depending on what relics you want to use, but definitely something to keep in mind.

Ciramorn

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Post  Anthony Thu Jun 02, 2011 1:00 pm

I so want a 1-handed Sword Very Happy

That aside, on the subject of incoming healing, I don't have that maxed on my Rune, as I'm using other items (relics, armour, etc) to get very near my max 15%.

Of course, if my Rune was a 1st age 65, then I'd have more points to spend and hence could still have other legacies maxed out while bumping up the healing on the Rune as well. Then I could slot some other relic that say improves my DPS.

Anyway, it's mostly a moot point, since even getting one is some time off, getting two won't matter, as we will then have lvl75 2nd Ages anyway Razz

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