Alright, time to unpack some of this.
The Rambling Midget wrote: Fri Jul 17, 2020 6:50 pm
Seven Sons of Sin wrote: Fri Jul 17, 2020 6:28 pmI thought the prevailing sentiment is that this gap has narrowed significantly? To the point where it's become something of slight concern.
It's definitely closing, especially with the addition of alternate damage stats, but it hasn't closed completely. DEX still relies on situational damage while STR can usually walk up like a big dumb oaf and be as effective as it would in any other situation. I only see it as a problem because medium/heavy armor hasn't been able to provide comparably useful, if not functionally similar, protection.
As long as STR and DEX are still wearing different hats, I'm not going to cry too much over them having a little more overlap in terms of party roles.
The past 2-3 years have seen a huge shift in the overall DEX v STR paradigm. Additional damage is part, but only part, of that shift. Some additional things have happened as well.
DEX builds have become stronger in the following ways:
1) As previously mentioned, more damage is available generally. More new weapons, swashbuckler damage, spellsword damage, assassin damage, etc. While most of these are sources that STR characters can avail themselves of as well, they will represent a larger fractional increase on a DEX character.
Also note that it's not quite true that the gap has not closed all the way. Archer path ranger closes that gap. Its damage numbers were calculated prior to the addition of templates or the ashwood bow, and were designed to be a one-stop damage fix for ranger archers (which at the time were sort of bad). They've since gained two additional sources of damage in templates and ashwood bows, and the lore meta has allowed them to pick both fighter and a div damage source, rather than one of the above + a UMD dip, so their damage output is at the highest it's ever been. On top of this, archers do not need to spend any of their DPS time closing with targets or chasing them around, so will frequently outdamage their melee counterparts in practice even when it does not seem like they ought to on paper. End result: there's a high dps DEX archetype out there with the potential for very good AC, solid AB, high HP, good mobility, the ability to kite, no need to chase, and HiPS in case all of the above is not sufficient.
2) Blinding speed. Instant action haste is very good. Functionally this eliminates or drastically reduces the windup time of many dex builds because it can be activated in the middle of other actions like movement, casting buffs, and even attacking. It also is not dispellable, which means dex builds are the only ones in the game with a non-dispellable source of haste. This is significant, because loss of haste in the middle of a fight is one of the most debilitating things that can happen to any build, but is not a concern for dex builds for the 3 minutes during which they have blinding speed up.
3) HiPS added and then made stronger. While HiPS is available to both dex and str based SD and ranger builds, it is a far more useful tool on dex builds due to the higher overall hide/ms scores. The ability got much much stronger when true seeing was nerfed, and a little stronger again as more BiS or near-BiS items were added to the module (penumbral vestments, rings of hiding, nightmare undies for shadow mages). While the ability has recently taken a small hit to its cooldown, it is still more powerful than it was a year or so ago before the TS nerf.
4) Balagarn's nerf, KD nerf. Lumped together because these two features serve basically the same function: they're a spammable source of crowd control that works well against dex builds but badly or not at all against strength builds. Vanilla balagarn's is a superb dex-buster, but str-based characters just about always make the check. When the opposed check went from STR-based to STR- or DEX-based, dex characters were also functionally immunized. KD was also more of a threat to dex builds due to the difficulty getting safe levels of discipline against high AB (particularly true strike fueled) KD attempts. With the 2 rounds of immunity that follow a successful KD attempt, however, the feat is no longer useful for keeping players in combat. It can make them take a round of damage, but after that a solid press of the w-key and some healing items will fix whatever was done to them. Prior to these nerfs, balagarn's pots and KD provided a good option for lots of builds to punish dex-based opponents. They no longer really do this.
5) Monk update items. They're still probably too strong. They make the monk dip trivial to gear, and the monk dip is always an attractive pickup for DEX builds.
6) Timestop gutted. On average, DEX builds tend to have lower HP pools than STR builds. This is especially true for dex/cha builds which tend to sacrifice a little con to get their charisma scores up. Traditionally, this meant that these builds were vulnerable to a properly executed evo combo, and could often be executed by mages if they took much unanswered damage at all. This is no longer a thing, so lower HP pools are safer now than they ever have been. (relatedly, DEX builds also worry a lot less than STR-based counterparts about getting 2-shot by Barb/WM, the other big "explode unprepared targets" build, because of high passive AC, epic dodge, and free action haste to minimize their windup window).
In the same time window, STR builds have lost the following:
1) Summer 2018, timestop removed as a way to secure alpha damage for str builds. Still viable as a positioning/chasing tool or a way to apply debuffs on those STR builds which apply such, like spellswords. (This change absolutely needed to happen. 2h timestop alpha wm was not healthy)
2) Fall 2019, timestop removed as an option for str builds other than spellswords, for the most part.
3) Summer 2020, timestop removed as a useful option for spellswords too.
Timestop is a tool that's always been most useful to STR builds. It answers a lot of their unmet needs. It lets them position, it lets them force a target to sit there and take damage, it lets them force a flat foot on high-AC builds, and it lets them set up for a truestrike into KD combo when the timestop ends. They don't care too much that the duration is short, because they get a lot of work done in those 9 seconds. It fits very nicely with how STR builds like to play. Dex builds benefit too, but not quite to the same extent because their use of that 9 second window is not as good. Making someone sit down and take 9s of damage is a lot more useful when you do lots of damage.
4) Loss of KD as a tool to make DEX builds sit there and take damage. See above for reasoning.
