Shining Slash: Open Beta Edition, Part 5!

Featuring Tanking stats in Aion!

I've been intending to make a post on the gear choices a Templar will make from a Tanking perspective for some time, but have had insufficient information at my disposal. That has changed. Since experiencing more of the game in OB, and spending time scouring the web for information on various stats and their effects in game. See, Aion doesn't give much up to the casual observer. Mousing over stats in your character pane will tell you how much of that stat is gained from gear, and that's about it. No readouts on crit percentage gains, block chance, damage reduction. As such, large amounts of testing have been done by various players, and from one French player in particular, we now know the following:

Avoidance stats are dealt with interestingly. When you're hit by a blow, the game rolls for your Evade chance. If that roll fails, then it rolls for Parry. If the blow gets through again, it rolls for Block. If Block fails, the hit lands for full damage (minus physical defense).

Furthermore, Evade, Parry and Block all give 1% chance per 10 points. I don't know about you, but I had over 1200 Block value at level 25, with a few manastones in that direction, giving me, theoretically 120% Block Chance. Of course, two things bring that idea low:

• Evade is capped at 30%, Parry at 40% and Block at 50%. No matter how high your stats, they cannot go higher without the use of specific abilities.
• Accuracy, a very common stat, reduces the target's Evade, Parry and Block point for point. My 1200 Block against someone with 1000 Accuracy would only be 200 Block: 20%.

Now, given that Evade is 100% damage reduction, Parry has repeatedly shown itself to be 30%, and Block is variable between 30% and 65% (based on shield rarity and enchants, might be higher with Orange gear, will need to test), and they're checked in a very specific order:

• Evade caps at 30%, being 30% total damage reduction in a purely physical damage fight. 70% of damage slips through.
• 40% of 70% is 28%, thus capped Parry and Evade proceed to allow 42% of hits through, mitigating a total of 38.4% of damage so far.
• 50% of 42% is 21%, so with all avoidance stats capped, 21% of all hits get through unmitigated. Assuming 65% damage reduction on a block, 13.65% of all damage is mitigated by Block, and 52.05% damage is mitigated all up.

That assumes you're able to max out Evade/Parry/Block, even after your opponent's Accuracy is factored in. I'm placing bets that you'll be able to do this in PvE, but against Assassins you'll have a harder time (Steel Wall Defense is pure gold against them and Rangers, especially since it blocks many snares).

If all that is true, then, my mind asked, what if you removed Parry from the equation? With some quick math, it appears that:

• 30% Evade lets 70% of all hits through, to be mitigated by Block 50% of the time, so you Block 35% of the time with 0% Parry.
• With max DR on your shield, that mitigates 22.75% of all damage through Blocks.
• Total DR comes to 52.75%, with 35% of all hits doing full damage.

Considering further that Templars use many shield based reaction abilities, I see absolutely no point in taking Parry stones or gear as a Tanking Templar, though I wouldn't avoid it for the sake of avoiding it. Removing Parry doesn't result in a particularly large increase in DR, but as noted: shield reaction abilities. More Blocks means more damage, more Enmity, and interestingly more damage reduction at the end of the day. It also frees up some of my gear slots, allowing me to, say, stack Magical Resist or the ever useful HP.

Definitely worth noting (although hard to do anything about) is that physical defense reduces incoming physical damage by 1 point for every 10 points of phys. def. An Assassin hits you for 500 twice, once with each Dagger. You have 1000 physical defense, and so you take 100 less damage on each hit, resulting in 800 damage all up rather than 1000. Plate has huge amounts of phys. def. on it, with low Magical Resist numbers (while Cloth has the opposite). What I found interesting was that Shields don't tend to give physical defense (I haven't seen one that does, but I'm hoping), meaning that without sufficient Block to carry you over your opponent's Accuracy rating, your Shield is nothing but a liability.

I've said it before, but here's a quick tip. Against opponents in PvP with high Accuracy, you can't expect to have good avoidance chances. As such, use Steel Wall Defense while trying to mitigate damage, then switch to your Greatsword for actual hits! Your Shield is obviously also useful for stuns and the such, but without Steel Wall Defense up (1000 extra Block, still capped at 50% to the best of my knowledge) you can't expect any reactive abilities to come up.

With all of that said, I'm writing a column for Templars. Gladiators and Chanters, who actually use reactive Parry abilities, have great use for Parry as a stat, and so should still stack it by all means. This is especially true as Gladiators have the same physical defense as Templars, meaning that they essentially mitigate the same amount of damage. The differences lie in the greater innate HP of a Templar and the vast number of Tanking abilities (for Enmity and defense) that Templars get.

Finally, I haven't found any real use for Attack so far, despite the fact that it would increase Enmity generation. With my largest apparent Enmity ability being Provoke, which does no damage, and with no solid word on whether or not even Provoking Severe Blow/Provoking Shield Counter actually increase their boosted Enmity based on damage done. Damage does Enmity on its own, yes, but if you're struggling with Enmity gen, then you should probably pull less, talk to your dps, take less damage (and so require less healing), make sure YOU are pulling, and not someone else, OR:

socket for Crit.

As one of us may post about in detail later, Crit is excellent up to about 440 rating. If you desperately need more damage or more Enmity, it looks like Crit is the way to go until you're at 440 or so. Attack might help then.

With Live slouching towards us, I'll find myself caught up in the whirlwind of leveling, crafting, Rifting and standing in Sanctum showing off my collector's edition wings. As such, expect a short break from Shining Slash until (at latest) Thursday this week. Perhaps I'll see some of you on Nezekan, whether friend, or furback foe.

Enjoy your weeks, Lewin out!