042 - Calculating your characters strength

On request :

A character has a defensive strength and an offensive strength.

Defensive :  How many hitpoints can it take before it dies.

Offensive : How many damage can it do per second.

I've made an excel file where you can calculate both.  This makes it possible to compare different setups.

You can download the file at : http://www.fileswap.com/dl/Wgz0WydUjX/
or at http://www.fileswap.com/dl/xGpFireweF/DSO_calculating_character_strength2.xls.html



Greetz
Perrush - on heredur -

034 - Damage vs Attack Speed vs Critical Hit Value

The 3 Offensive Gemstones (@ a 25% reduced price)

Question :

Which of the 3 offensive gemstones is the best to add ?

I hope to answer this question in this post.  Let me first say that a polished offensive gemstone normally costs 6400 Andermant and not 4800 like in the image above.  But today gemstones were on a 25% reduced price, that's why they are labelled as 4800 Andermant.

I will try to answer this question by adding 3 polished offensive gemstones (ruby, onyx and sapphire) at a time to my character and calculate total damage for each gemstone.

In that way we can see which gemstone has to most influence on total damage done.  But first let us make a formula to calculate that total damage done.

Formula for total damage per second done

Character values with no gemstones

In the image above you see my dragon knight's statistics.  The Legendary Horns have no gemstones inside, I call this my 'basic' character.   Mind that there are 3 (actually 4) values important to calculate damage done.

1) Base Damage :  Gemstone -> Ruby
This is the damage done with 1 stroke.  It has a minimum and maximum value.  So you damage done with a single stroke can vary between those 2 value.  For my calculation I use average damage which is the average of the minimum and maximum value.

avg dmg = (min dmg + max dmg ) / 2


2) Attack Speed :  Gemstone -> Sapphire
The attack speed value gives the number of strokes per second.  When we combine the avg dmg (which is the damage on average done by 1 stroke) with the attack speed (number of strokes per second) we get the damage per second.  In formula it looks like this :

avg dmg/s =  [(min dmg + max dmg ) / 2] * Attack Speed


3) Critical Hit Rate (CHR) : Gemstone -> Onyx

While damage and attack speed is pretty straightforward, CHR maybe needs some explanation.

To explain this we introduce the term 'Critical Hit'.

A critical hit is a hit where the normal damage is multiplied by the critical damage. The Chance of delivering a critical hit is given by the critical hit rate.

Now back to my basic character to explain this definition.  My CHR is 24.90% and the critical damage (CD) is 200%.  This means that in 24.90% a hits of mine does 200% of my avg damage.

This also means that in 100% - 24.90% = 75.1% I deliver a normal hit.  This 75.1% I refer to as Normal Hit Rate (NHR).

Calculating for total damage per second done :

part A : NHR

(100% - CHR)  *  [(min dmg + max dmg ) / 2] * Attack Speed

part B : CHR

CHR  *  [(min dmg + max dmg ) / 2] * Attack Speed * CD

Total formula = part A + part B
{(100% - CHR) * [(min dmg + max dmg ) / 2] * Attack Speed} + [CHR * ((min dmg + max dmg ) / 2) * Attack Speed * CD]

Explanation.  Part A gives the average dmg/s for normal hits.  Part B is the equation for a criticit hit.  Mind that the critical damage is added in this part.

Our Base Character

As we calculate the dmg/s for our base character we get :

- {(100% - 24.9%) * [(317 + 375) / 2] * 1.18} + [24.9% * ((317 + 375) / 2 * 1.18 * 200%]

- (75.1% * 346 dmg * 1.18 attack/s) + (24.9% * 692 dmg * 1.18 attack/s)

- (306.61 + 203.32) dmg/s

- 509.93 dmg/s

Although my character has only 375 maximum damage per swing, it does almost 510 dmg per second.  This is possible because it delivers more than 1 attack per second (1.18 to be precise) and because in 24.9% of the cases the damge done is dubble the normal damage.

Offensive gemstones compared

Now that we have our formula for calculation dmg/s, we can compare the effect of adding different gemstones.  As you can see in the image underneath, I added 3 polished gemstones (or a equivalent of that in case of the ruby) at a time.

Values for each gemstone

In the table you can see the values for the different characters.

Calculations for different gemstone additions

Adding 3 polished sapphire with a total of +15% attack speed seems to give you the most value for money.  It raised the dmg/s from 510 tot 583, that's a raise of 71 dmg/s or 14%.

Adding for 19200 Andermant 3 polished Onyx gemstones raises you dmg/s with 'only' 32 points !!  That's roughly half (read : -50%) of the effect of the sapphires.

The rubies or somewhat in between.  But there is still a 22% difference between the effect of the sapphires and those of the rubies.  Pretty significant imho. 

Conclusion : Adding attack speed seems the best option if you want to inflict more damage.  Adding CHV seems to be the worst choice.

Some remarks

1) CHR increases not linear.  When you have an already high CHR, the effect of adding extra Onyx gemstones will be less than when you have a low CHR.  I found the image underneath on the German Forum in this post.

CHR increase is not linear

2) Adding 30 dmg in gemstones increased my damage with 38 points instead of the expected 30.  This the effect of the base damage bonuses you get in the experience and knowledge tree.  The higher you are on those trees, the greater the effect will be.

3) Some items (mainly weapons) have enchantments which increases damage or attack speed percentage wise.  Adding gemstones of those enchantments will also increase the effect of that gemstone.

018 - Tips & Tricks 3 : Killing King Heredur of Duria

King Heredur without Bug

One could get the impression that this boss can only be killed using the bug, this is certainly not true.

First make sure you kill all other mobs around King Heredur.  If the boss comes out, retreat and start killing mobs again until you are alone with King Heredur.

Then you can start killing King Heredur.  When you just go and stand in front of Heredur, you'll certainly get killed.  By using some tactics, things go a lot smoother.  Many bosses get 'confused' when you start running around them.  The program can't 'lock' an enemy and is just shooting in the wild.  Just watch the video underneath where I use this tactic.  Mind how Heredur uses his biggest blow just in empty space, he never really targets me.  In the end I killed him with 22 hits, he only hits me twice.

For hunters and mages this would be even easier because they have a ranged attack.  They don't need to come close to Heredur.

014 - Droprates while farming

In my previous post, 013 - Beginners Guide : Tip 4 - Learn to farm, I explained why farming is important, especially for a F2P player, (to get ingame items without paying) and how to do such farming in Drankensang Online. 

When you take regularly notes of the drops while farming, you'll notice that the droprate is not the same in each dungeon.   In this post I want to show some statistics of several dungeons which I usually farm myself.

Droprates at Wildherz Cave

Droprates at Hailstone Mountains

Droprates at Temple Sector

Droprates in Q5

Above you see the droprates of several dungeon and Ammons Quest 5.  The most important line is the avg / hour number.  How many items can one farm in 1 hour ?

Wildherz Cave

As you see, Wildherz Cave is the best to farm in general.  It gives the highest number for CoT (Crystals of Truth), andermant and gemstones.  Sweeping time is just over 15 minutes (from town to town).  But keep in mind a dungeon has a reset time.  If you farm only Wildherz Cave you can only farm it around 3 times an hour.

Hailstone Mountains

Hailstone Mountains is the best for farming Gold (almost 4 gold per hour) while the other stats are still decent.  The high amount of gold farmed comes partly from the 3 quests you can easily do while farming.  The first 2 can be done in 1 run and are also good to do your daily quest quickly.

The 3 quest are :

1. Gnome Mining @ Torild -> 7 silver 83 copper
2. Soul Saving with Axe @ Sverre -> 16 silver
3. Din of Trolls @ Rikke -> 9 silver 53 copper

3 Quest at Hailstone Mountains

Temple Sector 
The Last dungeon I often farm is the Temple Sector.  Droprates at the Tempe Sector are certainly lower than in the other 2 dungeons, only Ancient Scrolls of Wisdom do drop here more frequently (because scrolls only drop from worthy monsters).  Yet at farming 10 scrolls per hour, this isn't a real alternative for the daily quest which gives 250 scrolls. 

Besides the lower droprates, sweeping time is, with a little over 30 minutes, also a bit long.  Still I continue the farm the Tempe Sector because of the chance of getting a unique drop.   At the German wiki page, someone wrote the he found Keens Steps in the Temple Sector.  I think this is the only place where you can farm solo for a unique item when you're level 40.

Note that the high amount of gold farmed at Temple Sector also comes from 3 quests.    

1. Caught in the Snare @  J'Ulda -> 37 silver 66 copper
2. Jitterjelly Invasion @ B/Elbial -> 31 silver 71 copper
3. Zorlobb Hunt @ B'Ala -> 59 silber 32 copper

3 Quest at Temple Sector

Ammons Quest 5
Finally a word about Ammons Quest 5.  Normally droprates  at Ammons Quests haven't been that good.  But Q5 looks to be an exception.  Q5 seems a good compromise between farming for CoT, andermant and the like and still having a chance for a unique to drop.

 Underneath a map of all the dungeon I spoke about.

Dungeons to farm

010 - Tips & Tricks 2 : Lost Truth Event - Tactics

Yesterday a Lost Truth Event started.
You can see the announcement on the Drakensang Online forum here.

Lost Thuth Event

I farmed 550 pure viscanium in the first 9 hours, including making up my tactics, eating and having a break.  Once I had my tactics I farm around 80 (60 to 100) pure viscanium per hour.  In this way the whole event will take me around 40 hours of playing time to complete ... sic

I want to share the way I do this, solo, probably it helps others.

Because I'm level 40, viscanium only drops from worthy monsters.  Playing in a PvE area doesn't seem good because it's too crowdy.  Others can easily take your kills (and viscanium) away.  So I choose the temple sector to farm.

Secondly the Temple Sector is good for farming anyway.  Besides the viscanium it will yield a reasonable amount CoT, andermant, gemstones, health potion and blue essence.  You will encounter some level 40 monsters which give the possibility of a unique drop. (I will do a post about farming and drop rates in different dungeons soon). There are also 3 quest you can do while farming the Temple Sector.  These 3 quests will give you around 1 gold each run, the higest amount of any dungeon.  Because of these reasons I prefer the Temple Sector over a lower dungeon.

1) The first thing I did (and always do with an event) is map the sector I want to farm.

Temple Sector

2) Then I farmed the whole map without geodes.  That gave me 20 pure viscanium.  Because there are 5 geodes in the map which give between 1 and 10 pure viscanium (at average the drop rate seems to be 3 pure viscanium per geode) it was soon clear to me geodes are important.

3) I also located the place where the Gravel-Gobbler Gnome was and confirmed it is in that spot every time.  I takes 200 blue essence for me to kill it. (stats with blue : 770 dmg and 1.5 attacks per second)  I take blue to speed up things a little bit. (and because I farm enough, no need to buy)

Gravel-Gobbler Gnome

4) short route :  When I have less then 5 pickaxes I take the short route.  In this way I try to do as many Gnomes as possible to build up the amount of pickaxes.  No need to go the long way if you can't open the geodes.  This route takes about 10 minutes ( measured from city to city).  I'm not sure how many viscanium it yields me.  I guess it must be around 5.

long route : When I have 5 pickaxes or more I do the long route.  This route gives me 20 to 25 pure viscanium and 80 unpure which can be at Shady John in Kingshill for 4 pure.  This gives me a total of 25 to 30 pure viscanium in a little over 20 minutes.

5) Reset time dungeon.  Every dungeon needs to reset himself before you can start with a new map.  For the Temple Sector this seems to be 4 minutes (probably this is so for all dungeons). 

6) Second gnome.  Because I need to wait around 2 minutes before I can reenter the Temple Sector I go to Mount Suvius and kill the Gnome there for extra pickaxes. (I ride with my horse to the spot, again to speed up things).  On the image underneath the location of the gnome is marked with a yellow star.

Mount Suvius

This map was taken from the wiki page where you can find the maps of all dungeons with the stones, geodes and gnomes marked.

7) Drop rates :
Stones :  40 opened, 16 pure viscanium (33%), 24 unpure viscanium (66%)
Geodes : 39 opened, 21 * 1 pure viscanim (~50%), 18 * 5 pure viscanium (~50%)
Gnome : 27 killed, 17 * 1 pickaxe (63%),  9 * 5 pickaxes (33%), 1 * 10 pickaxe (4%)

8) Thoughts :  I haven't played in group yet. I'm not sure it's better, but I think you can sweep the temple sector in 10 minutes (or less) with a group.  That way will give you 20 pure viscanium in 10 minutes or around 80 per hour (including the reset time of the dungeon) which is equal to my 80 per hour.  This figure ignores the geodes because viscanium only drops for those opening the geode, not for the whole group.

But in groups you have always a lot of dead time (and I hate that).  You need to wait for others to exit the dungeon ect. ....  Probably the real number will also be close to 80 pure viscanium per hour.  But again, I haven't done it, so I don't know for sure.

007 - Tips & Tricks 1 : Increase inventory for free

When I look at images of inventories or vaults of others, I often notice to they have single gemstones in one slot.  Underneath a screenshot of such an inventory (no offense Magicgirl11 ;) ).  You'll see he/she has 6 stones in 6 slots.

one stone in 1 slot

I put my gems inside items and then put those items in 1 slot.  In that way I can hold 4 gems in 1 slot (+ 1 item).  Maybe a screenshot will make it more clear.  The only disadvantage is that you need to pay gold at the jeweller to get the gems out.  But for high level players, gold isn't a real problem I think.

several gemstones in 1 slot

I doesn't really matter which items you choose to store your gems in.  But imo horns are the best because you can store also damage, critical hit value and attack speed gems into them.

It's seems obvious to pick an item with 4 slots.  But writing this article I learned something myself, while reading the wikia page of drakensang.  Adding one slot to a plain item only costs 10 andermant, to an improved item 20 andermant.  So I think it's worthwhile adding one slot to these items.  You can see on the screenshot I hadn't done that (only 4 plain slots).  But after realizing this, an extra slot was added quickly ;)


I hope this helps those who have a shortage of inventory or vault space.