Reasons to Limit Expertise to 20 (20% crit damage)

[Flashlight237]

Okay, so for many months, I have been vying for limiting expertise to 20, which would equate to a 20% chance. Now that I had managed to get a good discussion with Artemis on the subject of limiting expertise, I think it's about time I wrote all my reasons as to why Expertise should be limited to 20.

Expertise is a Crit Chance Stat

It went without saying that Expertise had always been a critical chance thing. The mechanic simply works like this: 1% of crit chance for every point of expertise. Crit damage is fairly high for an RPG: 3x base damage; 4x base damage with maxed crit damage skill (which everyone would've done anyway). This can hit 8x base damage with Devastating Hit. Most RPGs stop at 2x or 3x base damage for critical hits.

100 Expertise means automatic crits, which this game is not suited for given that I already have a very fair chance of one-shotting Scorpees with my H2 Lunatic Set, H1 Back Igneous Rock, and S3 E1 Lunatic Hammer (which is just a tiny bit less powerful than a basic Big Mace). I have 70 strength, and I'm at Level 49 (which is more or less where players are expected to fight Scorpees, Leaflings, Night Stalkers, and Mandrakes). I only needed skills to fight against Stalagmites, and I'm pretty convinced that Auroch Beetles were intended to be fought in small groups cuz I don't see myself being capable of fighting them without any help. Bear in mind, my expertise is 10 (which equates to 10% crit chance), which is considered high by most RPG standards (Pokemon had moves with a high critical hit ratio like Slash increase crit chance from 4.167% to 12.5%).

I'm suggesting a limit of 20 Expertise because I do think it's still very generous as far as critical hits go without making Expertise OP. RPG critical hit ratios tend to be fairly low, which made critical hits all the more rewarding. Here are several examples I got from varying RPGs.:

Pokemon: 4.167%
Final Fantasy 6: 3.125%
Epic Battle Fantasy 4: Typically 10% (http://prntscr.com/ywi2xh )
Dragon Quest: Varies, usually very low: https://dragon-quest.org/wiki/Critical_Hit

Expertise is Currently Very Skewed

People say that expertise is OP or that its broken, but I think that expertise also had this going against it: skewed priorities. It takes 100 stat points, or around 34 levels worth of stat points, to max out expertise. Let me put it into perspective.

Say, in your first 10 level-ups, you equip a full Bowman set and an Elven Bow (28 weapon power) and you put 15 into archery 5 into defense, 5 into MP, and 5 into expertise. Each piece of Bowman set provides 12 archery, with 6 for the shoes. This works as the control value as the Bowman Set serves as a middle-ground set that works for nearly every player. I've made a graph where Y is the base damage output.

What 5% crit chance means is if you have 100 attacks, five will be crits (4x damage) and the other 95 will be normal hits. This would lead to an average damage multiplier of 1.15x

Our control value with the stats given is 1964.2 and our target value is 4000.: http://prntscr.com/10cv0qb

There will be two test players for this: Player A and Player B.

Player A is an honest player who used the stat points he gained fairly by putting just 5 into expertise with the rest being distributed into other stats.

Player B, on the other hand, is a dishonest fool who puts each and every point into expertise until it gets maxed out. Cheating cow.

Now, let's add two more lines. One would represent honest Player A while the other would represent the dirty cheater that is Player B. Here's what the graph looks like.: http://prntscr.com/10cv8vg

The blue line represents Player A while the green line represents Player B. The two lines intersect at x=17.264 before the green line zips past them. This shows that the expertise-cheater would overtake the honest player who kept his expertise at 10 if both players put just 18 points into expertise and archery respectively. A player with 19 archery and 23 expertise is more powerful than a player with 10 expertise and 37 archery.

What's crazier, assuming a target average damage value of 4000, Player B just needs 40 more expertise than the starting 5 points while Player A needs 49 more archery beyond 19 to reach that point: http://prntscr.com/10cvgax

A 19 archery, 45 expertise archer reached 4000 before a 68 archery, 10 expertise archer.

At 100 skill points, let's say Archer A put 60 points into archery, 20 points into defense, 5 points into MP, 5 points into HP, and 5 points into expertise (79 archery and 10 expertise) while Archer B put all 95 extra points into expertise. If we give them 10 more levels (30 points) we can simply have Archer B put 15 points into archery and defense respectively. We can also have Archer A try catching up by putting 30 points into strength. This is what we would get.: http://prntscr.com/10cvp0o

Player A would be far behind Player B while Player B basically gets away because in the end the 95 points that should've been used on more important stats just meant naught in the end.

TL:DR, The trade-off that was supposed to come with putting points into expertise is easily rendered naught so long as you're a ranged class like an archer or a gunman. This is especially annoying when those who shove everything into expertise just get away with it.

Expertise Leaves Other Stats Behind

Okay, so because people think exploiting the lack of an expertise limit is cool, they often leave their more important stats behind. I'm talking HP, MP, Defense, and their attack stat. Anyone with 100 expertise and 50 of their attack stat, for instance, could've had 110-130 of their attack stat depending on how many they put into other stats instead should Expertise be limited to 20 instead. This alone should make their attack stat more useful.

Expertise Makes Runes Seem Useless

Currently runes are based off a player's damage total, which I think is a good thing. Thing is, rune damage doesn't crit. I think it's a good thing because giving runes crit damage would've made runes OP since expertise is not limited to 20. On the other hand, 100 expertise rendered runes useless since it feels like runes did only a quarter of the damage they should as a result. Really, limiting expertise to 20 would be a really huge buff to runes.

And no, Robby, tethering runes to the player's base attack stat won't work well. I would know; I checked the formula.

Limiting Expertise to 20 Helps With Skill and Item Variety

Okay, being real, not only are critical hit chances low in RPGs, but they also had it so that certain items or skills provide higher crit chances. Let's look at Pokemon for example:

Pokemon: 12.5% (with increased crit moves ex. Slash), 50% (with Focus Energy (which takes up a turn), Dire Hit (which again takes up an entire turn))

In pokemon, you have a 1 in 8 chance of landing a crit with moves like Slash and Air Cutter and a 1 in 2 chance of landing critical hits when a Dire Hit or the move Focus Energy is used.

Should expertise be limited to 20, I had thought of making up for it by giving archers an increased crit chance passive skill (I would think 2% additive for each level up to 10% for a total of 30% crit chance) given archers are meant to be sharp shots. If need be, there could be an equippable necklace or even set bonuses that would provide crit chance (albeit multiplicatively; e.g. 1.2x for a 24% crit chance).

Crit-damage items or skills would also come into fruition should expertise be limited to 20.

Because expertise is limited to 20 as opposed to being left unlimited, crit-chance items won't be rendered completely useless and crit-damage items won't be rendered OP.

Conclusion

Really, limiting expertise to 20 will be the smartest balancing move you will ever make for the game. Trust me on this; I do everything I can to make sure things go well.

[CrazyVanilla]

I mostly agree and support this (as long as I get my expertise points back and don't have to buy another dang stat reset). I do however think the damage formula itself needs some tweaking.

As you can see below from my screenshot comparing my stats to Active--'s stats, it doesn't seem right (in terms of damage). We both are wearing the same exact set, though he is wearing a Feather Mantle (+32 Archery) vs. my Spectral Pack (only +13 Archery). Active-- Has 70 more Archery stat than me (2.75x more than me), he also gets an extra +19 Archery from his accessory compared to mine (not sure how that fits into the formula, but the point is he has a significant amount more than I do). My bow is S3 F2 P2 E2, and I am going to assume Active--'s bow is maxed based off of the look (S3 F2 P3 E3), but even at the minimum say our bows are the same.

My base damage is 16,574 and his base damage is 26,153, only ~1.58x greater than mine! Even though he has 2.75x more archery than me, (very likely) a better bow, and a larger archery stat bonus from accessories (with the same from our armor).

Screenshot of stats: https://gyazo.com/9cde5391dd3d799a73f60c4af829fc42

[masnam]

Go ahead but make the regular hit numbers the size of crits and crits bigger because tiny numbers are kind of lame :/

[Jakub34]

Expertise definitely does need to get nerfed, but the damage formula really needs to be fixed before this change is made. Also, skills need to be changed so it doesn't revolve around eating food 24/7

[troopas]

Personally I think the cap should remain at level 100 for 100% crit. BUT I do think changes should be made for example: Buffing the actual skills by slightly and nerfing the crit damage slightly. It may not do much but it would be a start. Another thing is to add mobs that deal insane damage. This would add incentive to upgrading HP and Defense because rn HP is the most ignored stat because there's no reason to use it.

Look at Mario & Luigi: You can upgrade stash which boosts crit chance (well actually it's 'lucky hit' and crits are different but they do the same damage and are both rare) And before you say it's random in mario & luigi don't lie to yourself like that we all know you can time it to always get perfect stats.

Also pokemon. You bring up how you can't specifically level up the stats which is semi right. Breeding and EV and IV training can occur to make your stats go up and crit can be boosted too with abilities and items to GIVE your pokemon to heighten CRIT CHANCE! There are also moves that 100% crit!!

Another problem you face is the Robby can't simply just remove this. This would be to controversial and would have to stat reset everyone. Some people might not notice and instantly die. This would also allow for people to switch classes for no cost.


Will edit or reply when I think of more reasons but gtg

[Artemis]

Expertise definitely does need to get nerfed, but the damage formula really needs to be fixed before this change is made. Also, skills need to be changed so it doesn't revolve around eating food 24/7

I agree with jakub here.

[Flashlight237]

Look at Mario & Luigi: You can upgrade stash which boosts crit chance (well actually it's 'lucky hit' and crits are different but they do the same damage and are both rare) And before you say it's random in mario & luigi don't lie to yourself like that we all know you can time it to always get perfect stats.

I've played Bowser's Inside Story, Dream Team, and Paper Jam all the way through and I can say with plenty of confidence that timing had nothing to do with lucky hits. Lucky hits are NOT Good, Great, or Excellent hits; they're just crits. I would know; I've overleveled against Dark Bowser (ya only need like Level 25-30 to fight fairly against him and my Bowser was Level 40) and used Broggy against him and the damage he dealt was randomized. Horn stat was 85 btw. I've even seen Lucky hits being random when I used Magic Window constantly during Challenge Mode, and that move is essentially "time it right or you're screwed."

Also pokemon. You bring up how you can't specifically level up the stats which is semi right. Breeding and EV and IV training can occur to make your stats go up and crit can be boosted too with abilities and items to GIVE your pokemon to heighten CRIT CHANCE! There are also moves that 100% crit!!

I already addressed that. I'm well aware of crit-boosting skills and items, even listing out their rates. No need to repeat that. Those are, again, optional aside from maybe abilities (pokemon can't help it); base crit is, as of Gen VII, 4.167% (1 in 24).

Expertise is a base crit chance stat, not an optional ability, item, or skill. Why did you THINK I was trying to nerf that?

Another problem you face is the Robby can't simply just remove this. This would be to controversial and would have to stat reset everyone. Some people might not notice and instantly die. This would also allow for people to switch classes for no cost.


Will edit or reply when I think of more reasons but gtg

I was well aware of the playerbase issues, which was why I've listed out three options for handling the nerf.:

Idea 1: Returning stat points to players with more than 20 expertise. This is the ideal way of handling this important balancing fix, though this one may be a smidge difficult. The best way I can think of is running a script that removes excess expertise points and hands them back over as free stat points.

Idea 2: Allowing players to reset their own stats for free. This is the easiest out of the three compromises. An old feature planned for the game is a one-time free reset for stats. This will allow players to adjust the stats themselves without having to resort to complex database-manipulation. An alternative to this would be a “free stat reset” sale where the stat reset feature would be made free in the Payvault for a limited time. This alternative, however, is riskier.

Idea 3: Resetting stats from the database. This is the riskiest move out of the three compromises as the database likely believes levels are stats as well. Only use this as a last resort.

[troopas]

I've played Bowser's Inside Story, Dream Team, and Paper Jam all the way through and I can say with plenty of confidence that timing had nothing to do with lucky hits. Lucky hits are NOT Good, Great, or Excellent hits; they're just crits. I would know; I've overleveled against Dark Bowser (ya only need like Level 25-30 to fight fairly against him and my Bowser was Level 40) and used Broggy against him and the damage he dealt was randomized. Horn stat was 85 btw. I've even seen Lucky hits being random when I used Magic Window constantly during Challenge Mode, and that move is essentially "time it right or you're screwed."

By timing I meant this:
https://youtu.be/edecILyLhck?t=1797 (He times it to get perfect stat gains which if done with horn/stache can greatly raise chance though would obviously come with TONS and TONS of grinding which is currently what I'm doing in elia for increased crit chance (though much harder and less game breaking I'll admit in BIS and yes I am aware its a TAS but is perfectly possible with a human)

Another solution is replace it with dexterity again. People already need to go faster. This would be great. Another solution to add onto what you said is to make it so 100 points in dex/expertise is a 33.33333 chance to crit like in HH but prevent the user to go to 300 for the full 100% or maybe one of the skills that boost crit damage also decrease crit chance. This way everyone benefits and the crit chance isn't ridiculously low.

[Robby]

Thanks for the big breakdown here! I've read it all and read through your comments, some useful things here. So here is some of my feedback.

Expertise Crit Chance
The does indeed sound like critical hits need some balancing then. The 20 limit cap sounds like it could work. However, there is one small issue I have with it. That is that after investing 20 points, there is no use for the skill anymore. Ideally, I'd like the skill to always be upgradable so that there is always that door open for players to make their character different and it gives them more choice in their character build.

I'm thinking of a slightly alternate solution that could be as follows. (this is a rough estimate, not official or final values, just brainstorming for right now.)

1. Make each point in expertise increase the crit chance by 0.5% instead of the current 1%. So you'd need to upgrade it too 200 before it would become 100% chance. (If this is still to much, I could lower it to 0.33% chance per point instead, or even lower.)
2. Additionally, expertise could be used to enhance special skill damage. So for example, each point in expertise could increase damage from special skills by 2% per point. (just throwing that value out there as an example.)
3. (Not sure about this one yet) But it could also be used to increase movement speed SLIGHTLY. Say 1% per level.

Additionally, it could give any other small boosts you can think of. I'm good with the idea of nerfing its crit liklihood, I just think ideally it'd be better if it could be upgraded indefinitely like the other skills so that it doesn't get closed off once it reaches 20.

Skill MP Usage
I noticed skill MP mentioned once or twice here. I do admit I'm not completely satisfied with how much MP/HP healing items need to be used, so if I could improve this department it'd be nice. Two easy changes that come to mind are either reducing the amount of MP skills use even more, or increasing the amount of MP you get per point. Any feedback here or other solutions what you all would like to see?

[troopas]

3. (Not sure about this one yet) But it could also be used to increase movement speed SLIGHTLY. Say 1% per level.

I find this the best solution because moving is very slowly even with running.
But to add onto this maybe each point of expertise would account for 0.5%+ crit chance and 0.5%+ movement speed so everyone benefits and expertise is much harder to upgrade.

What this means
This means that the amount of points used is doubled which is controversial but that now people who spent tons of points in it get a return of movement speed. This also means that investing in expertise would be much less worth it especially if you tone down the critical hit damage abilities.