Are four-stats combinations universally better than three-stats combinations?

[Erasculio.2914]

A Soldier Exotic greatsword gives:

• 239 Power
• 171 Toughness
• 171 Vitality

...In a total of 581 stat points.

A Celestial Exotic greatsword gives:

• 113 Power
• 113 Precision
• 113 Toughness
• 113 Vitality
• 113 Condition Damage
• 113 Ferocity
• 113 Healing Power

...In a total of 791 stat points. But, no one is going to claim Celestial is better most of the time (or even half of the time) than the three-stats combinations: by being average at everything, you're not good at anything. In a game in which players tend to specialize, Celestial is often the worst option.

But, a Marauder Exotic greatsword would give:

• 205 Power
• 205 Precision
• 113 Vitality
• 113 Ferocity

...In a total of 636 stat points. Notice how it's 55 points more than the greatsword with only three stats; and, now, we have so many options of four-stats combinations that players can often (if not most of the time) specialize in a given role while using four stats.

So are the four-stats combinations universally better than the three-stats combinations, and the game has actually received a subtle kind of power creep?

[Obtena.7952]

You have to look at the impact on the build ... Berserker is just 3 stats ... but it's still the highest direct DPS you can get. Just bean counting doesn't really make sense.

[Cyninja.2954]

4-stat combinations always give more total stats. That's it.

Damage calculations in this game favor Stat stacking heavily. Given no damage type (power or condition) relies on more than 3 stats at most, there is currently no reason to splash in a 4-th Stat at the expense of the other 3-stats.

On the contrary, if there was a max level two Stat combination for condition builds (condition damage and expertise) it would outperform other stats combinations for pure condition damage in pve.

For power as a specific example:Full Marauder will net aproximately a 10% damage loss versus full berserker for pure damage output.

Obviously game modes where defensive stats are of more value (say WvW) will see greater benefit from 4-stat combinations.

The same reasoning applies to celestial (and it lacking expertise and concentration) which is the reason why it only sees use in some few WvW builds currently (and bad pve builds).

[Khisanth.2948]

Not in PvE. The vitality on Marauder is a wasted stat unless you need it. If you don't need it then you have just sacrificed 5-15% damage for nothing. Nobody would count losing 5% damage for nothing(and yes it is nothing if you don't actually need it) as "better".

[rng.1024]

You also need to take into account that while yes you get more points in total, investment into each specific stat goes down by approximately 12,5% for your majors and 38% for your minors.

As for celestial, condition and power stats they are highly dependent on what weapon skills your profession has available and what traits you choose, it's definitely not a universal thing.

[Auburner.6945]

It depends on the game mode. In WvW for example, a full berserker Weaver doesn't differ much than a Weaver with some Marauder, this makes quad-stats gear better in this situation, as hitting a Meteor Shower with 10k meteors, doesn't differ much than 10.5-11k. I believe trio-stats gear are only better when going for one-shot builds. This makes quad-stats gear a lot better imo. Also, there are some stats goals that are not achieved ever unless by quad-stats, something like full Minstrel Firebrand, no matter what you do, the trio-stats in the game will never allow you to reach the same values.

I believe quad-stats should be toned down a bit in WvW as they seem a lot better than trio ones, since in WvW, min-maxing to every bit isn't needed (don't start talking about amulet system in WvW, I am totally against that system).

[ChronoPinoyX.7923]

The flaw in this particular calculation (OPs one) is that your taking to account stats numbers as a whole, not how they are distributed.

A full Berserker armour set for a Power build will do more in terms of overall damage as the stacks on the specific stats needed calculate to the total damage output of the power build. Non essential stats on a Power build such as Condition Damage, Healing etc won't contribute to the Power build as Power builds focus on providing DPS, and not much else.

In regards to Marauder v Berserker, this is a situational viewpoint. Depending on how you play and how you manage your survivability, the extra Vitality will either be useful enough to ensure you can dish out the damage while staying alive or it will be completely wasted stats bonus as you are already more than capable of keeping yourself alive. Both have viability on a Power Build as they still fulfill the essentials (Power, Precision, Ferocity) but Berseker sacrifices potential maximum HP for the best damage output whereas Marauder does the reverse and sacrifices the best damage output for extra HP for Survivability

[Astralporing.1957]

Basically, as people already mentioned, the stat points total is misleading. It is so, because the worth of each point is different depending on which stat it is applied to. You could see it as some kind of weight: for example, let's take Marauder. For one person, running a build in WvW, each point of vitality might have a weight of .8 - having more hps is kinda worth it. Power is worth 1.1, as this is still mostly a dps build, so power is a most impotant stat (let's assume precision and ferocity stays at 1, for the sake of simplicity).

Now, the same greatsword gives:

• 205 Power x1.1 =222.5 points
• 205 Precision x1 = 205 points
• 113 Vitality x0.8 = 90.4 points (~90.5)
• 113 Ferocity x1 = 113 pointstotal: 631 points

For someone running a PvE dps raid build however, vitality will have a worth of 0, while power might have a value of 1.2, thus:

• 205 Power x1.2 =246 points
• 205 Precision x1 = 205 points
• 113 Vitality x0 = 0 points
• 113 Ferocity x1 = 113 pointstotal: 564

at the same time, for berserker it would be:

• 239 Power x1.2 = ~287 points
• 171 Precision x1 = 171 points
• 171 Ferocity x1 = 171 pointstotal: ~629

As you can see, in such a case the worth of a berserker set for the second person would be higher

Of course the exact weight values are just an example and do not really represent the real worth of those stats. Still, they are a good visualization to show why just adding points together can be really misleading and why sometimes stat sets with lower total point value can be more valuable than those with theoretically more points.

[Tzarakiel.7490]

The value of a stat is dependent on how much you invest into it. If you half ass every stat like celestial does then the stats have a lot smaller payoff. That's why the sets with more different stats need more points total to be comparable to 3 stat sets.

[Tommo Chocolate.5870]

@Astralporing.1957 said:Basically, as people already mentioned, the stat points total is misleading. It is so, because the worth of each point is different depending on which stat it is applied to. You could see it as some kind of weight: for example, let's take Marauder. For one person, running a build in WvW, each point of vitality might have a weight of .8 - having more hps is kinda worth it. Power is worth 1.1, as this is still mostly a dps build, so power is a most impotant stat (let's assume precision and ferocity stays at 1, for the sake of simplicity).

For someone running a PvE dps raid build however, vitality will have a worth of 0, while power might have a value of 1.2

Where have you got those weights from?

Of course the exact weight values are just an example and do not really represent the real worth of those stats.

What are they an example of? And if they don't represent the real worth of the stats, why did you do the calculations?

I really hope I'm missing something here, because it seems like you've just plucked some numbers out of the air...

[Astralporing.1957]

Yes, those specific numbers were plucked out of the air. The real worth of each stat after all would be different for every player and situation. They are still good enough to make an example.

Example of what, you ask? Why, of the fact that the stats are not equal (and thus, the points are not equal, and cannot be just added up for comparison). The exact weight values are not important for that. What is important is that some points can be worth more than others.

Seriously, for a dps char, Berserker set is worth far more than Soldier, even if both of them have exactly the same point total. What i am talking about is just an extension to that. It's not a deep philosophy or anything.

I hope its now more clear to you?

[Einlanzer.1627]

The main problem is that, in general PvE, neither support nor defense carry anywhere near the same value as offense does due to the game's mechanical idiosyncracies (why they still have done nothing to address this is beyond me), and that 4th stat is almost always a defense or support-oriented one.

Take a situation where you'd intuitively think it makes sense, such as using Marauder on Thief to shore up their low health pool. In reality, giving up offensive stats for defensive stats actually makes you worse because Thief's attrition is tied to their damage output even more than it is for other classes due to the effects on various skills and traits.

[Ensign.2189]

The worth of different stats depends on your objective. To calculate relative worth, you have to specify your use case, and then calculate how much an additional point of each of the stats helps you meet your objective. The relative value of each stat can then inform the 'worth' of each stat set.

This can be as simple or as complex as you like. In a relatively simple case - power DPS classes in raids - you can price out power, precision, and ferocity in terms of how much each contributes to your DPS output - and use that to maximize your DPS.

This can get pretty complex very quickly. The objective isn't usually so cut and dried. For instance, how to weigh offensive vs defensive stats. On one extreme, WvW frontline characters value defenses much higher than anything else, due to the huge amount of damage being thrown at them. On the other, PvE raiders value defensive stats lower than most anything else, since raids are generally low damage and you have a dedicated healer to mop it up. Thus you would weight defense very differently depending on what you are playing and why.

Circling back - 4 stat combos are generally more powerful than 3 stat combos, but sometimes you want a specialized precision tool instead of a general power tool - and that is where 3 stat combos excel.

[Tommo Chocolate.5870]

@"Astralporing.1957" said:Yes, those specific numbers were plucked out of the air. The real worth of each stat after all would be different for every player and situation. They are still good enough to make an example.

Example of what, you ask? Why, of the fact that the stats are not equal (and thus, the points are not equal, and cannot be just added up for comparison). The exact weight values are not important for that. What is important is that some points can be worth more than others.

Seriously, for a dps char, Berserker set is worth far more than Soldier, even if both of them have exactly the same point total. What i am talking about is just an extension to that. It's not a deep philosophy or anything.

I hope its now more clear to you?

Ok, I thought as much. In that case, although I get what you're trying to do, your calculations don't actually mean anything. As a result of having picked arbitrary weightings, the numbers you get out at the end are just numbers - they're not measurements of anything, so they don't give you any useful information. Any other choice of weightings would have produced equally valid, though potentially wildly different, results.

I can understand wanting to make your argument look more convincing by including some calculations, but if you really wanted to quantify the value of the different stats, you'd have to look at the calculations the game actually does with stats. Even then, the questions you can answer are things like "which combination of stats yields the highest damage output?" or "which combination of stats allows me to sustain the largest amount of damage?". The type of comparison you're going for can't be quantified in any meaningful way, because the "exact weight values", as you put it, don't actually exist.

[Astralporing.1957]

@Tommo Chocolate.5870 said:

@"Astralporing.1957" said:Yes, those specific numbers were plucked out of the air. The real worth of each stat after all would be different for every player and situation. They are still good enough to make an example.

Example of what, you ask? Why, of the fact that

the stats are not equal

(and thus, the points are not equal, and cannot be just added up for comparison). The exact weight values are not important for that. What is important is that some points can be worth more than others.

Seriously, for a dps char, Berserker set is worth far more than Soldier, even if both of them have exactly the same point total. What i am talking about is just an extension to that. It's not a deep philosophy or anything.

I hope its now more clear to you?

Ok, I thought as much. In that case, although I get what you're trying to do, your calculations don't actually mean anything. As a result of having picked arbitrary weightings, the numbers you get out at the end are just numbers - they're not measurements of anything, so they don't give you any useful information. Any other choice of weightings would have produced equally valid, though potentially wildly different, results.

I can understand wanting to make your argument look more convincing by including some calculations, but if you really wanted to quantify the value of the different stats, you'd have to look at the calculations the game actually does with stats. Even then, the questions you can answer are things like "which combination of stats yields the highest damage output?" or "which combination of stats allows me to sustain the largest amount of damage?". The type of comparison you're going for can't be quantified in any meaningful way, because the "exact weight values", as you put it, don't actually exist.

...yes, precisely. That's exactly my point. The end results are wildly different, depending on the person, build and environment. That's why just adding the points is misleading - because it's "not a measurement of anything, so it doesn't give you any useful information". You are not adding up the same points.

To use a different illustration, imagine that what we're talking about is not stats, but fruits. On one side you have apples, oranges and watermelons. On the other, you have apples, oranges, watermelons and plums.There's no point comparing the overall number of fruits. It doesn't matter that you get more in total, if you don't want plums and care only about oranges.