Patch 2 Druid IAS

PTR Feedback
62

If other classes turn into wereform (barbarian into wolf, sorc into bear etc), do they pull data from that class’s manform’s fram data as well? like Barb pull barb’s, sorc pull sorc’s?

Also for Maul, it now grant 3% ias buff per charge…is that 3% added directly to SIAS like fana and BoS does?

Lastly, Hunger does seems to have it’s own IAS table as well, right?

63

I don’t see how anyone can argue this being an improvement over previous configurations for BIS weapons/gear…

You now need IAS from gear just to hit the same frames as before.

1 Like
64

@chthonvii

I used you formula in excel.
As well as i made a calculated eias table there, and then ias requirements is calculated bases on the set skillias and wsm.
But it have some few deviants and i would love to know why :stuck_out_tongue:

If we look at 1 handed swing fury.
My eias table started like this.
10/7/7/15 - 0 eias
10/7/7/7/14 - 8eias
9/7/7/7/14 - 12eias
Totally different from yours.

Meanwhile staff started like this:
9/7/7/7/14 - 0 eias
9/7/7/7/13 - 8 eias
9/6/7/7/13 - 12 eias
8/7/7/7/13 - 13 eias(same total frame as above)
8/7/6/7/12 - 15 eias
8/6/6/6/12 - 17 eias
8/5/6/6/11 - 25 eias
7/6/6/6/11 - 29 eias

So on staff all matches 100% all the way to 150eias, With exception you did not list the 13 eias break.

This leads me to believe the formula i used is correct. I pretty much copied it from you. But since im not an american amazon basin is unable to open for me.
So i cannot go to that to see what u refered to about frames per direction.
I also opened your list and scrolled true the 3000+ lines without finding anything that looked like the actionframe. I would ecspect to find 9 value for dz__stf.

So my formula uses (baseframesperdirection+1)/2 which is inside the ceiling command and will be rounded with the ceiling command.

Since im not able to find them in ur posted anim.d2 file which by the way sorted perfect on phone, not like on the pc where it was a chaos ^^
And also aint able to enter amazon basin.
As well as cant find the actionframe here:
h-t-t-p-s://www.mannm.org/d2library/faqtoids/animspeed.html

Could you be so kind to list them for me, and maby also their codename: dz__stf, 1hs,1ht, bow, xbw, 2hs, 2ht?

I know their base frame per second is:
1hth - 16
Bow - 16
Stf - 17
1hs - 19
1ht - 19
Xbw - 20
2hs - 21
2ht - 23

For me its easier to have them in excel always easy available on onenote.

65

Your 1HS data is wrong because you used (baseframesperdirection+1)/2 which is 10 instead of the actual action frame which is 9.

I’m missing that staff BP because I accidentally deleted it when preparing the tables. I’ll go fix that right now.

You can just copy/paste the frame data from my calculator spreadsheet; the frame data is in the tab called “FrameData.”

Or, if you want to get it from animdata.d2:

The rows you want in animdata are DZA1___ . DZ is manform druid. A1 is the normal attack animation. (By the way, 40 is werewolf and TG is werebear, in case maybe they’re still using their own frame data for Hunger or something. (Hunger is S3.))

To find the action frames, look in the columns named FrameData000 - FrameData143. If there is a non-zero value in one of these columns, it means the corresponding frame is an action frame. (I believe 1 means “melee hit connects” and 2 mean “release missile.”)

66

If other classes turn into wereform (barbarian into wolf, sorc into bear etc), do they pull data from that class’s manform’s fram data as well? like Barb pull barb’s, sorc pull sorc’s?

I have no idea. We’ll have to do experiments to find out.

Also for Maul, it now grant 3% ias buff per charge…is that 3% added directly to SIAS like fana and BoS does?

Presumably, yes. Every other skill that adds IAS adds SIAS (which goes directly towards EIAS with no diminishing returns). It’s hard to imagine they’d do the extra work to make this one skill different.

Lastly, Hunger does seems to have it’s own IAS table as well, right?

Hunger uses a different animation (S3 rather than A1), so it’s got different frame data. The big question is “where is that frame data coming from?” And I do not know the answer. Manform druid’s don’t have a S3 animation, so there’s nothing to copy. Maybe the bite animation is still using the original frame data. Or maybe Blizz is deriving something from the manform’s A1 data. Again, I don’t know.

(Also, if you’re planning on using Hunger to get around the awful attack speed nerf to bears, it won’t work unless this bug is fixed: h-t-t-p-s://d2mods.info/forum/viewtopic.php?t=65798 Due to the bug, every other Hunger attack does not happen on the server, and the attack speed is effectively halved. :frowning_face_with_open_mouth: I suppose I’d better go make a thread asking for it to be fixed.)

1 Like
67

@slomo not at all, this change is an improvement, yes you need Gear IAS now, but that’s relatively easy to get, and makes a lot of weapons now usable for Fury, some of them can get to 3 frames now, including Tomb Reaver which was capped at 4 frames before.

68

You do realize that 3 frames is because of Fury changes, not the IAS changes…

Grats on watching a streamer build an eth zoded reaver druid and thinking it’s a viable build. Grief does more damage as a 1h weapon :rofl:

2 Likes
69

Yes tomb need really high ias break, i would use gt or maby gpa.

There are some nice stats like up to 50@ res which tomb gives.

70

I’m not using that ever, minimum damage is meh, but is more than viable, now almost everything is hitting 4 frames like no gear ias almost, it’s kinda crazy, 5 frames i’s slow now.
They did the opposite. Then ias was way too important, no ias on weapon not viable. Now you don’t care about ias weapon, its all the wolf skill and other pieces, in fact, go for max damage cause speed now is a guarantee. They flipped the thing backwards.

Grief used to be so slow, which led to other choices, i found that interesting i like using a stormlash kicksin, a tombreaver or gt ebotd on a shapeshifter. If calculations are ok Grief can hit the 4/3xx frames easily, with average damage better than most 2H (dunno if more than a decrep eth tolls tho, maybe) and some good mods.

But what about that ebotd thundermaul going like 4/3? I also gonna try cranium basher (when you have it there laying lol), i’m tired of no crushing blow from tomb and then using old ribcracker on ubers. I don’t like this in exchange of nullifyng the bear builds, but what can you do lol.
We’ll have some fun (which for me includes not using grief haha, it’s the last thing i’m wanting to try).
Reapers toll? I think its good, more than viable, not close to best (i don’t know how are we going to beat 1300 dmg ebotd tm for players 1-3 at least or nonubers, its the best damage with now absurd speed, now everything seems to attack the same speed easily, so max damage it is now. What about that death decapitator or something, maybe).

Youtubers are also hyping now the Bear, i already commented on some videos i saw, bear is now like 50% power i’m not even exagerating (mine was 5 fpa now is 9), funny thing is, it was such an unpopular build everyone thinks is buffed now lol. It’s now a fun build, a handicapped build (which then wasn’t the fastest build in the block but now, oh well).

1 Like
71

[Further edit: Errors in the calculator render even more of this post inaccurate.]

[Edit: 2 issues have come to my attention that render this post somewhat inaccurate:

  1. There’s a bug in my spreadsheet that’s giving werebears the IAS from level 1 Werewolf.
  2. It’s come to my attention that a large number of 2-handed weapons use the staff animation, while I assumed they were 2-handed swinging. The staff animation is much faster. So my analysis of specific 2-handed weapons may be wrong.
    I’m working on a java calculator that will correct these issues and use a dropdown to autofill the animation type and wsm by weapon name.]

Some analysis and notes for specific weapons (cross-posted from reddit):

Now that PTR is out, and I’ve had a chance to do some experimentation and extract some files from the game data, I’m able to give a somewhat better answer. Some of this is confirmed and some is still speculation, but it’s fairly plausible speculation now.

How the IAS changes work:

  • Wereform’s basic attack, and skills using that animation, take their frame data from manform’s basic attack animation for the equipped weapon class.
    • Still unknown: Do other classes using Beast or Wolfhowl use the manform druid’s frame data or their own human class’s frame data?
    • Still unknown: Where does the frame data for the bite attacks come from now?
  • The EIAS cap is raised to +150.
  • The rollback on Fury is reduced from 100 to 70. This is confirmed by extracting skills.txt from the game data. The “40% faster” in the patch notes is just wrong.
  • Maul gives 3 IAS per charge. (The max charges on Maul is Floor(skill_level/2)+3, so you might get 50ish IAS out of it.)

I struggled to find a source with the equations for dealing with rollback when it’s not 100%. Ultimately what I found was this (h-t-t-p-s://www.utplay.com/news/2006–diablo-2-resurrected-attack-speed-calculation–fps-ias-fcr-fhr-fbr–weapon-attack-speed-calculation–explained). Obviously, this site copy/pasted this treatise from somewhere else, possibly passing it through Google Translate along the way. If anyone knows what the original source is, please tell me. In any event, this is detailed enough that it looks like it probably came from examining the rollback function in legacy D2 in a debugger, so I’m thinking it’s probably correct.

Using those equations, here is a calculator spreadsheet (h-t-t-p-s://www31.zippyshare.com/v/vVx4lsH8/file.html) and here are EIAS tables (h-t-t-p-s://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/d2r/t/patch-2-druid-ias/111923/61).

General Impressions:

  • Werebears are totally screwed. Even at +150 EIAS, the fastest possible attack speeds are still painfully slow. (Fastest speeds are 6 - 9 FPA, depending on weapon class.) Werebears are doubly screwed because it’s very hard for them to get anywhere near +150 EIAS in the first place. Pala-bears and bear-sorcs are triply screwed because they don’t have access to Maul, which is critical to even getting close to +150 EIAS. It’s so bad, I’m really hoping this doesn’t go live in this state.
  • Fury is very, very fast. It’s borderline overpowered even. A huge variety of weapons are now faster than the fastest traditional options.
    • This gives rise to the paradoxical situation where a weapon can be faster in PTR than it is now, and faster than any current options, and yet still slower than other options in PTR2.
  • A shield is now totally viable with Fury. Until I extracted skills.txt, I was some 85% convinced that it had been stealth buffed to be uninterruptible. As per the extracted file, it’s still interruptible, but it’s so darned good at suppressing monsters that it might as well be uninterruptible. Shael’ed Stormshield is likely optimal.
  • The new importance of the equipped weapon’s class shakes up the established weapon choices. Two-handed thrusting weapons, two-handed swinging weapons, and crossbows are now slower than the others. Bows and staves are slightly faster.
  • Similarly, on-weapon IAS is less important than under the old formula, while base speed is more important.

Specific Options for Bears:

  • (Note: I’m assuming level 30+ Maul for all of the below.)
  • For Fire Claws, the best option is probably a Faith bow. A good rolled Faith Great Bow + Highlord’s + 20IAS gloves should hit 6 FPA. Add Nos’s Coil or an IAS jewel in your helm and you can use WSM 0 bow types. Add Treachery and you can use 10 WSM bow types. Bows are the only weapon class that can hit 6 FPA. (Actually, staves could reach 6 FPA too, but you’d need a Faith merc to get you there.)
  • For Maul, a Grief Phase Blade is likely the best option. A perfect Grief can hit 7 FPA with Highlord’s + 20 IAS gloves. Nos’s Coil or an IAS jewel in your helm can make up for a non-perfect Grief.
  • A Beast Berserker Axe can hit 8 FPA easily. Hitting 7 FPA with Beast requires either Treachery or using a War Spike.
  • The only other way to get reasonable attack speeds on a werebear is to give up Reaper’s Toll/Infinity from your Act2 merc and switch to an Act1 Faith merc.

Specific Options for Wolves:

  • (Note: I’m assuming level 33 to 37 Werewolf for all of the below.)
  • The Grief Phase Blade is probably king. (I’m sure that’s just what everyone wanted to hear.) It easily reaches a 19 FPA Fury with Highlord’s + 20 IAS gloves (and the IAS roll on the Grief doesn’t matter).
  • If you want to spam crushing blow, three options look good:
    • Stormlash can hit 19 FPA Fury with Shael + Highlord’s + 20 IAS gloves + Nos’s Coil + IAS jewel in your helm.
    • Fleshripper can hit 19 FPA Fury with the same setup as Stormlash. Or it can hit 18 FPA if you’re willing to use Treachery.
    • Beast Berserker Axe can hit 19 FPA Fury with just Highlord’s + 20 IAS gloves.
  • Faith bow is the fastest possible choice. It can hit 18 FPA Fury fairly easily, and even 17 FPA Fury without needing to use Treachery.
  • Griswold’s Caddy can hit 19 FPA Fury with a number of configurations that leave several on-weapon sockets free and don’t require Treachery. This is as useful as the open sockets are.
  • Tomb Reaver can hit 21 FPA Fury (and doesn’t need Treachery or 3 Shael’s to get there), but no faster. This is faster than Tomb Reaver is in the current patch, but slower than the other options here.
  • Likewise, Ribcracker suffers from its slow base speed mattering more in PTR2. To get to 19 FPA takes Highlord’s + 20 IS gloves + Nos’s Coil + 15 IAS jewel in helm + Treachery + a Shael rune (painful because it precludes ethereal + Zod). You can skip the Shael rune if you can get werewolf up to level 38. (Still, if everything else is running around in Fortitude and Ribcracker needs Treachery to match their speed, it’s not a top choice.)
  • A number of other runewords with IAS and high ED% could likely hit good breakpoints. But the fact that neither two-handed swinging nor two-handed thrusting weapons can reach 19 FPA Fury means that they’re going to be inferior to Grief Phase Blade in speed, damage, or both.
  • Again, switching to an Act1 Faith merc will make a lot of weapons able to hit good breakpoints, but at the cost of losing the Decrepify from Reaper’s Toll.

(Aside: Tried out the new Act5 Frenzy merc with Last Wish + Law Bringer. Works poorly I’m afraid. It just demolishes everything except non-undead phys immunes. It handles those very poorly because it keeps overwriting Decrepify. Back to the Act2 merc I’m afraid.)

2 Likes
72

Not sure if this video will be any help

It does seems like wolf barbarian attack slightly slower in 2.4 under the same setup

74

Not really. But here’s something that would help:
If wolfbarb using using the human druid frame data, its regular attack with a staff should always be faster than its regular attack with a spear, assuming the same base speed and same IAS. However, if a wolfbarb is using the human barb frame data its regular attack with a staff or a spear should be the same, again assuming the same base speed and IAS. This should be an easy test to set up. (If someone wants to send me a single-player save file with a Wolfhowl, I’ll test it myself.)

75

https / / drive google com/file/d/1E0YZXmeWORPj3Ls_lx7h88mVIyVQy3Kj/view?usp=sharing

Here’s the d2s file, even both weapons are unique, they do have the same WSM and no IAS attached, so it shouldn’t affect the result

76

They appear to be the same speed. Which means that wolfbarb is using the human barb frame data.

So I need to go revise the calculator. It may be time to port it into javascript, since doing the spreadsheets for every class would be a pain.

1 Like
77

Thank you for the test. I assume the change would not affect current ss druid’s calculation?

78

Should you be trying to bring the speed back though?

It seems to be they’re trying to separate the wolf from the bear and give them their own unique identities.

The wolf is fast but doesn’t hit as hard.

The bear is slower but hits harder and can’t be stopped.

I actually like the fact that the two are different now and have different goals to work towards.

Could they use further tweaking? Sure. But I don’t think making the bear faster is what should be done.

1 Like
79

Should they really be making those kind of decisions when we’ve had the FC WB for such a long time as basically the unique/staple build as WB? This change is a massive dps loss, and I find it hard to see people building one after the patch.

They have always been different.

The ww can now also use weapons with low or no ias with fury (like Reaper’s Toll) and was more points left to spend on other goodies. And also reach even faster frames than before with fast weapons.

1 Like
80

If he gained a charge, some splash damage or some roar or whatever, then i would be happy for the build, even if attacking slow is boring for me, but he would make up for. After all, he does not even have a lvl 30 skill, would not seem unfair for me. But designing new skills is a compromised idea, don’t counting on that.
If we hit slower we could hit more enemies, thats the only thing that would compensate damage, the rest is ok, i like 40 liberated points, i like armageddon and summons are better now, in the sense that is fun, not more powerful thats for sure, numbers are weaker but i understand people seem to appeal more. Not having played the build before and have nothing to compare to also helps, lol, i can’t help but compare, and it’s a bad trade.

And i agree with Ice, even if it was fair trade, we lost something, was unnecesary, there will never be a fast fireclaw bear, and to be honest, slow fireclaw it’s not a thing, it depends directly from speed (when a 6soc shael phase blade is slow as a lvl 30 old bear lol) . Wolf has speed, so no point. How many of us played that build? Not many, guess it’s doable loss lol.

Quirky builds that use bear transform? I don’t know about that, but several frames slower it’s a worse version , i guess you use the same breakpoints, so not promising.

81

Changes are great for Fury Wolf, and go in line with their original intend in 2.4 - Make Shifters much better and top Melee; as mentioned not so great for Bear, but he does get uninterruptible attacks which helps a lot, increased damage and defense.

BOTD Thunder maul, BOTD GPA, BOTD GT and Tomb Reaver by themselves all have higher average damage than Grief BA, Main difference being the range and in the case of Tomb Reaver the All resistances which is huge. Range is not very relevant in PvE as opposed to PvP, so I would probably just use eBOTD Thunder Maul (range 3) for PvE with Treachery as a relatively cheap but effective build

82

Someone just posted a video playing with hunger with IK set…definitely seems interesting.