Dexterity, We Have a Problem.

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YoMicky wrote:

Let's cut to the chase. Dexterity needs help, I'm here to offer suggestions on it. We need to first begin by looking at Strength and its benefits.


Strength's benefits
-Adds Life
-Adds % based Melee Damage
-Allows characters to wear heavier armor
-Iron Grip can benefit % damage of ranged weapons instead of just melee(more viability)
-Strength's Passive Branches provide % Resistances

Strength's weaknesses
-The only real con I can see from Strength is the % Movement Speed reduction, discouraging some ranged classes to get Str. without Movement Speed. And this can be avoided by not wearing (as much) heavy armor.

Analysis
This stat seems to be the most powerful of all 3. It doubles up on offensive and defensive capabilities while still be incredibly useful for builds like Bowrauders and Bow Duelists. At this point, it almost discourages me from using characters who do not invest moderately into strength since it seemingly outshines the other primaries so much.

The problem with this stat is that it is so well done compared to the other 2 primaries that, even though it's supposed to discourage ranged classes from wearing the heavy armor it provides, it still is a necessity since the other 2 can't compare on the offensive and defensive fronts.

Dexterity's benefits
-Adds Accuracy
-Adds % based Evasion chance.
-Dex's Passive branches provide %Movement Speed
-Dex's Passive branches provide a % chance to avoid ailments(nowhere near as defensive as damage reduction from elements)

Dexterity's weaknesses
-Accuracy is a dull stat that is in no way beneficial to stack past probably 85% for most players.
-% Chances to avoid and no damage reduction from any source nor + Life means if and when you get hit, you will die.
-You still receive Movement Speed reduction on pure Evasion armor.

Analysis
People have already vocalized their problems with Evasion and I hear that GGG is reworking it, so I will keep this part very minimal. I advocate high evasion ratings providing % based damage reduction to simulate near misses. This idea has been mentioned plenty of times beforehand, so I'll move on.

Accuracy, as we all know, is a must have for weapon-using builds. This is currently the only thing that still draws me to Dex aside from the occasional stat requirement on gems and some items. It is a very lackluster stat at the moment, and is reluctantly grabbed out of very minimal necessity.

My recommendation with Accuracy is that it provide a 'Head shot' on ranged weapons (could potentially be reworded for melee weapons.) A head shot would be a % chance to hit a target for a higher % damage than a regular weapon-based attack and function as an additional and smaller form of critical hit strictly on weapon-based attacks. I would also suggest adding % Head shot chance and % Head shot damage in very minimal numbers as gear affixes of their own.

Theoretical 'Head shot' Numbers

85% Accuracy - 8.5% chance to Head shot for 125% weapon skill damage.
90% Accuracy - 9% chance to Head shot for 140% weapon skill damage.
95% Accuracy - 9.5% chance to Head shot for 160% weapon skill damage
98%+ Accuracy - 9.8% chance to Head shot for 185% weapon skill damage.

*Note*

Spoiler

Resolute Technique would have to be reworked with the addition of 'Head shots.' Maybe by undoing all of the Head Shot % chance that is given by Accuracy but not from gear? Seems reasonable to me since RT disabled critical hits already.

Keep in mind, these numbers are completely speculative and theoretical. I tried to keep crit chance and damage in mind when scaling these numbers, but I am in no way a game designer so I would not know how to actually balance the values of this.

However, my idea would make people actually want to stack Accuracy and feel good about grabbing big keystones with +Dex on them, or grabbing smaller passives with +Accuracy and %Damage before their % Attack Speed and Damage instead of feeling like your 2 handed Marauder just spent a boring skill allocation this level. It would make full Dex builds much more viable.

Conclusion
With mechanics like these added in, it would make Dexterity be on-par with Strength. It's to my understanding that each primary stat should be as useful as the others in their own right, so this would give Dex 2 specialized offensive benefits and 2 universal defensive benefits to match Strength. It would distinguish Str as the more defensive of the weapon-based stats and Dex as the more offensive of the two.

Spoiler

Bored and want to read some more ideas of mine? Head over to http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/34877/page/1/#p484555

I hate to put one since I want people to read this idea that I've been formulating for the past week but heregoes.
Tl;dr - Proposed ideas above would balance Dex and Str and make them both independent stats and ones that are beneficial to hybrid builds.

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Mortal321 wrote:

Isn`t int currently related to crit? Not directly but weapons with more crit chance usually require int to be used.

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Torin wrote:

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Mortal321 wrote:

Isn`t int currently related to crit? Not directly but weapons with more crit chance usually require int to be used.

It is, but it is a badly designed as it is.
Str should be about adding more damage.
Dex should be about criticals.
Int should be about weakening enemy defenses and in that way doing more damage.

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Guadagno wrote:

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Torin wrote:

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Mortal321 wrote:

Isn`t int currently related to crit? Not directly but weapons with more crit chance usually require int to be used.

It is, but it is a badly designed as it is.
Str should be about adding more damage.
Dex should be about criticals.
Int should be about weakening enemy defenses and in that way doing more damage.

Actually, I think it should look more like this:

Str should be about adding more damage.
Dex should be about attack speed/accuracy.
Int should be about criticals.

Also, while accuracy is a kinda weak stat (too easy to build up). Dex can increase armor through iron reflexes and is the only stat that can do that. The dex part of the tree has more block chance passives as an added defensive stat. It is important to note that the dex part of the tree is more about ranged damage being safer than melee damage too. That is why it does less physical damage.