Mechanical Questions Thread

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adghar wrote:

Spoiler

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Dumbledot wrote:

If they took the Avatar of Fire skill, it would convert half of that damage to fire. So attack X would now do 500 fire damage, and 500 physical damage. However, due to the 2nd part of the skill, the character can't deal any non-fire damage, so the 500 physical damage portion wouldn't count. Thus, attack X with Avatar of Fire would only do 500 fire damage, and without it would do 1000 physical damage.

Correct.

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Doesn't this seem like bit redundant for anything apart from fire-based builds (which wouldn't need the skill anyway, as all they do is fire damage unless they use something else to proc EE or use heralds/auras etc - which also get reduced by 50% dmg?)

Am I missing something?

Technically outside the scope of this thread, but I'm not Mark_GGG, so you get treated to extra explanation :P

The benefit of the keystone is contained within conversion mechanics. For one thing, it provides you more base fire damage than you would otherwise get - suppose you had a weapon with 500 fire damage and 200 cold damage, but you only like dealing Fire damage for whatever reason, such as Ignite scaling, which is only based on Fire damage, or picking passives and items that grant "x% increased fire damage" or "y% more fire damage" or "z% fire penetration." The 200 cold damage would previously be wasted in a lot of ways, such as not adding to Ignite base and not benefiting from boosts to fire damage. Avatar allows 100 of it to not be wasted by turning it into Fire.

For another thing, there is this funny little thing I like to call "conversion remembers," which is not quite double-dipping but it can seem like it for those not too inclined towards math. Damage bonuses are allowed to apply based on any damage type a parcel of damage ever was or is. This means that if you have 500 physical damage and 100% of it is converted to fire, it benefits equally from direct-boosts to physical damage or fire damage. Thus, with Avatar of Fire, you have the opportunity to have a fire damage build that scales with bonuses that are not to fire damage, which can grant you a higher total bonus. I can provide a math example if you'd like. Maybe through PM as Mark_GGG wanted this thread to be purely about game physics, i.e. "if I do this, will this happen?"

Avatar of Fire is generally meant to be combined with other conversion mechanics so that you don't lose any damage whatsoever. For example, Molten Strike and Infernal Blow come with 50% physical to fire conversion, which adds with Avatar of Fire's 50% conversion and turns it into 100% physical to fire. In that case, if you only had physical base damage to start with, you would lose absolutely nothing*.

*nitpicky

Technically you would lose the benefit of the final damage type being physical, which are relatively few - Penetration and the Armour formula are based on final damage type and don't benefit from "conversion remembers," so you would be going up against enemy Fire Resistance instead of enemy Armour. Also, defender-side stats also can't be aware of "conversion remembers," so you lose the benefit of stats like those on Maim Support, which say "enemies take x% increased physical damage" - but then you open the door to benefit from stats like "enemies take y% increased fire damage"!

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Aurwangr wrote:

Redirected from the support team via email:

"I do have a brief question about the Cast on Death skill gem and it's multiple uses in a CoD (discharge, firestorm) setup. One on each item gets triggered on death simultaneously, what happens with a +rarity gem added to each item? Do they all get registered and added up to that kill?"

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eboy355 wrote:

Hey Mark,
Just go a quick question about elemental conversions. Im using lightning conversion support gem, so thats 50% of physical to light. If i then use the blackgleam quiver wich gives 50% fire conversion does that mean i deal 0% physical damage? Or does it mean i deal 50% and both the conversions convert the same 50% of physical damage?