Elemental Weapons

[diablo1ks]

I have recently being curious of elemental weapons and what they do

Could someone please explain them in detail ?

Thank-you !

[--Pete]

Hi,

In D1 elemental weapons add fire or lightning damage. In principle this damage is added to the basic damage and follows the same rules as spells as far as resist and immune monsters are concerned. In practice, there is a bug that often causes these weapons to do excessive damage or none at all. This is especially true with bows.

If you really want detail, look in Jarulf's and do a search for "fire" or (better) "lightning". You'll get more detail than you probably want ;)

--Pete

[diablo1ks]

Thanx for the advice i hope to meet with you again

[Yogi_Baar]

I've been wondering about something for a while now.

I've heard that using Lightning (probably Fire too) weapons (usually of Speed or Haste) is generally considered dishonorable in duels because this way you dish out some damage with every swing, even if you don't actually hit your opponent with the base weapon, which you probably won't due to the low to hit (warriors) or opponent's blocking (rogues).

What do the Lurkers think? Is this true or is it bollocks? I don't duel, so I don't know much about the issue, hence my question here.

[the Langolier]

Well, when two people are dueling, they usually agree upon the rules before hand, so it is unlikely it will be considered dishonorable until that issue is specifically discussed. Either way, the elemental damage on weapons is nearly negligable. The only weapon that would do noticable damage would be Schaffer's Hammer (1-50 lightning damage). Even this is very small when you consider maximum lightning resistances and the PvP penalty.

On a side note, warriors actually have quite an easy time hitting their opponents. Most warriors will have enough dexterity for perfect blocking; along with a kings/strange weapon, they have plenty of to-hit to keep an opponent in block lock.

[Yogi_Baar]

That's another thing that's been on my mind. I've never duelled with an opponent who had perfect blocking. What happens when two warriors with perfect blocking get at it? Will they ever hit each other or will one (probably the first one in game order) get the other in block lock and that's it? (excuse my lack of duelling knowledge, I'm very con-duel and pro-coop, but I thought this would be good to know to defend oneself against the plethora of PKs)

[Nystul]

My actual dueling experience is very limited. But I have done testing on some of the things you are asking in this thread. First of all, regarding the elemental damage, it is only elemental bows that do extreme damage. Elemental melee weapons do exactly what their description says, which frankly isn't much. Now in PvP, there are a lot of aspects to this. One is the question of whether you miss because of the opponents AC. Using a lightning sword, this might be a problem. If your to hit is high enough and you hit, now you have both the regular damage and the elemental damage. Now if the opponent has resistance to the element, he will block the physical attack and take a small amount of elemental damage. But if he has no resistance to the element, he may sometimes block the elemental attack, allowing the entire physical attack to get through! Assuming he has Player Hostile on, that physical attack may stun him, possibly preventing him from blocking the next swing and putting him in big trouble.

When two players have perfect blocking and there are no magic/elemental weapons in play, it's the person who tries to move that usually gets screwed over. You can't block while walking. In a warrior vs. warrior duel, I suspect it is to your advantage to wait for the other guy to step into your range. Trying to walk away from a warrior whom you have been blocking is probably suicide.

Getting perfect blocking for a duel is extremely easy. I can't imagine any shield-wearing not having perfect blocking for a duel against someone the same level. You need what, 100 DEX? Mostly if someone fails to block it will be because they are trying to do something other than blocking or swinging.

[Walkiry]

That's another thing that's been on my mind. I've never duelled with an opponent who had perfect blocking. What happens when two warriors with perfect blocking get at it? Will they ever hit each other or will one (probably the first one in game order) get the other in block lock and that's it? (excuse my lack of duelling knowledge, I'm very con-duel and pro-coop, but I thought this would be good to know to defend oneself against the plethora of PKs)

Two words: Sparking Mail :)

No matter if pots are allowed or not, if you can safely and securely dent your opponent's health while keeping him in blocklock, you can win.

My S/S Rogue used to surprise a few people with that trick.

If you are a Rogue yourself, grab a Lightning sword of haste and Scavenger's Carapace. With that -15 damage your opponent won't be able to pull that trick on you ;)

When both parts know each other's tactics well enough (as it happened with me and the two friends I used to duel with all the time) it's kind of funny to see all of the people involved cycling through their inventory items every 2-3 swings :lol:

Generally due to Diablo's lousy MP architecture, you cannot blocklock your opponent permanently and not allow hit to swing, as the two clients will argue about who's in blocklock or not. Yo will not hit each other though, unless someone moves. Stunlock does coordinate better though.

[Yogi_Baar]

Using a lightning sword, this might be a problem.

So the spawned effect is a charged bolt spark equivalent? IIRC those can be blocked with no resistance...

If your to hit is high enough and you hit, now you have both the regular damage and the elemental damage. Now if the opponent has resistance to the element, he will block the physical attack and take a small amount of elemental damage.

Clear so far.

But if he has no resistance to the element, he may sometimes block the elemental attack, allowing the entire physical attack to get through!

So the order of damage application/hit checking is elemental damage before physical? I thought it was the other way around, so maybe that's where I was wrong and the reason why didn't understand why using a lightning sword is so good against warriors sporting duel equipment (Gotty & Co.). Did you mean that he may sometimes NOT block the elemental attack? Or am I wrong in all sorts of ways here? I can already tell I'll have to check with JG at home. <_<

Assuming he has Player Hostile on, that physical attack may stun him, possibly preventing him from blocking the next swing and putting him in big trouble.

Why does the Player Hostile setting matter? I know there's stun capability without having it on, at least for Rogues, because I keep stunning arties that walk into my line of fire when we're coop-ing.

You can't block while walking. In a warrior vs. warrior duel, I suspect it is to your advantage to wait for the other guy to step into your range. Trying to walk away from a warrior whom you have been blocking is probably suicide.

This is exactly what's been bothering me all the time. If two warriors with perfect blocking and no elemental weapons just swing at each other without moving, will the duel EVER end (assuming none of them is willing to start walking or casting)? If it's not possible, how can you expect to defeat a PK who has perfect blocking if you have a non-elemental weapon and what's the point of melee-only warrior duels in the first place?

[Yogi_Baar]

Two words: Sparking Mail :)

And always always always hit first, right? With such a low AC, I mean. OK this is based on the assumption that permanent blocklock (permablock?) is possible, which goes against your statement below.

Generally due to Diablo's lousy MP architecture, you cannot blocklock your opponent permanently and not allow hit to swing, as the two clients will argue about who's in blocklock or not. Yo will not hit each other though, unless someone moves. Stunlock does coordinate better though.

Och aye? I have problems stunning warriors with my rogue (clvl 48, over 100 average damage). Since I have no problems stunning arties, is it possible that I keep missing the warriors despite the fact they're only around 5 squares away? AFAIK it's the distance and dex that matters more with non-magical ranged attacks, not the to hit value. Is that where I'm wrong and THAT's why I can't stun warriors properly?

[Walkiry]

And always always always hit first, right? With such a low AC, I mean. OK this is based on the assumption that permanent blocklock (permablock?) is possible, which goes against your statement below.

No, not really. Permablock is impossible in the PVP setting due to, as I said, the lousy MP implementation. It's easy to go out of sync. But it doesn't matter, basically you and your enemy will alternate blows, and with both having perfect block, the one with elemental damage will be denting health away faster than the other. A Rogue, with its naturally high dexterity, will be able to block anything you can throw at her.

Edit: To be clear, when I say permablock, it means block-lock, as in being busy doing nothing but block. It is entirely possible to achieve 100% chance of blocking, which is the root of all this after all. But even with 100% blocking, due to the lack of sync, your opponent won't be able to have you permanently blocking and doing nothing (and vice versa)

I think I found the problem with your next paragraph. Here I'm talking Sword/Shield vs. Sword/Shield, whereas I think you're thinking about bows:

Och aye? I have problems stunning warriors with my rogue (clvl 48, over 100 average damage). Since I have no problems stunning arties, is it possible that I keep missing the warriors despite the fact they're only around 5 squares away?

The reason why you have problems stun-locking warriors is that their hit recovery speed is the same as your fire speed (with a vanilla bow, you might have better luck with a bow of swiftness but don't sweat it), and their block speed is insanely fast (well, as fast as a Rogue with a shield of blocking). The reason why you seem to miss more with the bow is that there's a bug in Diablo that makes all characters and monsters unhittable by ranged attacks when they're moving horizontally on the screen, so a warrior can simply recover from your hit, sidestep and avoid getting hit by your arrows.

Always use Sword(of haste)/Shield(of blocking, Stormshield or Holy Defender) against Warriors with a Rogue. And never against a Sorceror :)

[Moldran]

Why does the Player Hostile setting matter? I know there's stun capability without having it on, at least for Rogues, because I keep stunning arties that walk into my line of fire when we're coop-ing.

Your hostile setting does not affect your ability to stun other players. It affects your ability to be stunned by other players. If you are in player friendly mode, you cannot be stunned by other players, so dueling while in friendly mode can be called cheating IMO.
Also, note that the attacker sees a stun animation on his screen, but the friendly-mode victim experiences no stun effect on his side. Another example of Diablo´s poor MP architecture. I know why I never bothered with PvP :P

Moldran

[Yogi_Baar]

No, not really. Permablock is impossible in the PVP setting due to, as I said, the lousy MP implementation.

Thanks, that's one question solved for me.

...the one with elemental damage will be denting health away faster than the other.

That's why I called it dishonorable in my first post in this thread. You are doing damage even though you don't actually hit the opponent. Now I see it's not dishonorable, it's the only damn thing you can do to hurt a perfect blocker. BTW, how fast will the one without elemental damage be denting away the opponent's health, if both have 100% percent block? Not at all, I'd say.

I think I found the problem with your next paragraph. Here I'm talking Sword/Shield vs. Sword/Shield, whereas I think you're thinking about bows:

In the last paragraph I was talking about bows vs S/S, aye, but in the previous ones it was all S/S.
And as for the warrior stunning problem, I do have a bow of swiftness. I didn't know about the horizontal moving bug though, thanks for clearing that one up as well.

[Nystul]

And the player friendly bug/feature applies strictly to melee attacks, which is why strict coop players wouldn't be likely to notice it. Warrior PKs who really understood game mechanics (all 3 of them? :P) hated this, for obvious reasons. Warrior vs. mage duel seems like a guaranteed win for the mage unless he is honest enough to duel in Player Hostile.

Also, in addition to not being stunned, IIRC your character does not make blocking animations against pvp melee in Player Friendly mode. All blocks on your end just look like the guy missed.

[Elite]

As a member of the LurkerLounge, I don't bring out dueling into the forums. However, now that it's become part of the question, I'd be glad to give out my extensive knowlege on the dueling subject.

Myself, I don't consider Lightning as dishonorable. Personaly, I find it humorous. Assuming you have two warriors hand at hand, you must have about 10% more cth than the opponents ac to hit him nearly 100% of the time. So, if you have a lightning/hase sword, you'd have to pack on the gold/perfs like crazy only to hit someone. Meaning you'd have pathetic dmg, mana, and life; giving the other guy a huge advantage. Furthermore, if you enjoy that dreded (personal opinion, I didn't care for sparky) sparkling mail, then you will have such low ac, the other guy or myself, will have huge damage, mana, and life for against you. Also, if you like schafers hammer, well don't, the 50 lightning dmg is nice, but it lacks speed for within a duel.

[Cytrex]

I know why I never bothered with PvP :P

Yet I'm pretty sure I have your rogue's ear from a 2v2 duel :lol:

AS for the topic - I've once been in a warrior vs warrior no-spells-allowed duel. With first 2 minutes no damage was taken by either side, so I guess that applies for the rest of the minutes out there :P

If the rules hadn't disallowed spells then I'm sure a premptive firewall would have made these two minutes awfully long for the warrior standing in it :D

edit: sorry, I don't understand how the quote feature works :unsure:

[Moldran]

Yet I'm pretty sure I have your rogue's ear from a 2v2 duel&nbsp;

That´s possible. I think I remember that duel. I did maybe 20 duels during my entire D carreer, but I never really cared for PvP (didn´t build any chars for it, etc) :)

Moldran

[Yogi_Baar]

Your hostile setting does not affect your ability to stun other players. It affects your ability to be stunned by other players. If you are in player friendly mode, you cannot be stunned by other players

This I'll just have to try. Now all I have to do is find a rogue I trust to try to stun my arty. <_<

[Moldran]

This I'll just have to try. Now all I have to do is find a rogue I trust to try to stun my arty.

It doesn´t work with ranged attacks... see Nystul´s post.

Moldran

[Yogi_Baar]

[nt]