A Statistical analysis of Charm Duration

[charleski]

Ok, I levelled up to 53 and got Boltran's to test against a higher-level mob: Corundium, one of the L50 golems guarding the passage in the Overthere wall. An earlier attempt to use a guard at the East Cabilis gate failed miserably as it seems these are now 'newbie guards' and resist virtually everything. Many thanks to @bcbrown (Lakemist) for his help in acquiring these data (it would have been almost impossible to do solo).

TLDR: Charisma is now has a very significant effect.
Initial cast is disregarded and stats computed solely with regard to charm breaks.
Input data 1:
File: L53 Corundium CHA115.txt
Total trials: 92
p charm success (per tick): 0.7737
Wilson Score lower bound: 0.6609
Wilson Score upper bound: 0.8847
Input data 2:
File: L53 Corundium CHA226.txt
Total trials: 457
p charm success (per tick): 0.9454
Wilson Score lower bound: 0.9176
Wilson Score upper bound: 0.9726

probability difference: 0.1717

Newcombe-Wilson difference interval: -0.1161, 0.1144
Significant at 99% level

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You'll notice that the number of trials is far fewer than in the previous example with the EJ spurbone. This was largely because attempting to keep the mob charmed with a CHA of 115 was almost impossible. A charm was attempted 32 times for each condition (CHA 115 or 226). With CHA 115 the maximum charm length was 10 ticks, and charm frequently broke after only 1 or 2 ticks, meaning we had to keep it rooted while I medded up to cast another expensive (400mana) Boltran's. With CHA226 the maximum charm duration was 60 ticks and I was frequently able to med up to full in between charm breaks.

Another notable feature is that in both conditions I noticed a significant number of resists on the initial cast of charm. There were 13 initial resists with CHA115 and 10 initial resists with CHA226 (out of 32 attempts for each). This difference was not statistically significant, but a lot higher than seen in my previous data set on the EJ Spurbone (2 resists out of 30 attempts at CHA115; 0 resists out of 18 attempts at CHA226).

Clearly some charisma modifier has been switched on when attempting to charm this L50 mob. This was either turned off for the lower-level mobs, or had such a weak effect that its presence was insignificant. For comparison, I plotted the 95% interval ranges for the orc pawn, EJ spurbone and L50 Corundium, all at a CHA of 115. There is obviously a very non-linear effect at play here:
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The question now is whether this is a function of the absolute mob level or the level difference between mob and caster. Since this is a static and repeatable mob, I'll go back and repeat the test when I get to 60, whioch might provide some answer.

I've updated the parsing programs (attached) to accommodate Allure and Boltran's, and also added a boolean switch in each of them which allows you to include the success or failure of the initial charm cast in the statistics. For the purposes of this analysis, this was turned off.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Originally Posted by charleski [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Ok, I levelled up to 53 and got Boltran's to test against a higher-level mob: Corundium, one of the L50 golems guarding the passage in the Overthere wall. An earlier attempt to use a guard at the East Cabilis gate failed miserably as it seems these are now 'newbie guards' and resist virtually everything. Many thanks to @bcbrown (Lakemist) for his help in acquiring these data (it would have been almost impossible to do solo).

TLDR: Charisma is now has a very significant effect.
Initial cast is disregarded and stats computed solely with regard to charm breaks.
Input data 1:
File: L53 Corundium CHA115.txt
Total trials: 92
p charm success (per tick): 0.7737
Wilson Score lower bound: 0.6609
Wilson Score upper bound: 0.8847
Input data 2:
File: L53 Corundium CHA226.txt
Total trials: 457
p charm success (per tick): 0.9454
Wilson Score lower bound: 0.9176
Wilson Score upper bound: 0.9726

probability difference: 0.1717

Newcombe-Wilson difference interval: -0.1161, 0.1144
Significant at 99% level

[You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

You'll notice that the number of trials is far fewer than in the previous example with the EJ spurbone. This was largely because attempting to keep the mob charmed with a CHA of 115 was almost impossible. A charm was attempted 32 times for each condition (CHA 115 or 226). With CHA 115 the maximum charm length was 10 ticks, and charm frequently broke after only 1 or 2 ticks, meaning we had to keep it rooted while I medded up to cast another expensive (400mana) Boltran's. With CHA226 the maximum charm duration was 60 ticks and I was frequently able to med up to full in between charm breaks.

Another notable feature is that in both conditions I noticed a significant number of resists on the initial cast of charm. There were 13 initial resists with CHA115 and 10 initial resists with CHA226 (out of 32 attempts for each). This difference was not statistically significant, but a lot higher than seen in my previous data set on the EJ Spurbone (2 resists out of 30 attempts at CHA115; 0 resists out of 18 attempts at CHA226).

Clearly some charisma modifier has been switched on when attempting to charm this L50 mob. This was either turned off for the lower-level mobs, or had such a weak effect that its presence was insignificant. For comparison, I plotted the 95% interval ranges for the orc pawn, EJ spurbone and L50 Corundium, all at a CHA of 115. There is obviously a very non-linear effect at play here:
[You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

The question now is whether this is a function of the absolute mob level or the level difference between mob and caster. Since this is a static and repeatable mob, I'll go back and repeat the test when I get to 60, whioch might provide some answer.

I've updated the parsing programs (attached) to accommodate Allure and Boltran's, and also added a boolean switch in each of them which allows you to include the success or failure of the initial charm cast in the statistics. For the purposes of this analysis, this was turned off.

Charisma does have an effect on the initial cast of charm, and golems tend to have higher MR. That coupled with your significantly less data for the 115 CHA testing could explain the difference. I'd advise testing on a mob with less MR, as MR will affect charm breaks quite a bit. That specific mob you are testing is going to break quite a bit probably due to it's MR whether or not CHA affects charm breaks, which can muddy the data.

There probably isn't a level 50+ special check of some kind, there's no evidence of that in the EQEMU code. Unless someone has a P99 patch note or some in-era evidence of that.

[charleski]

Originally Posted by DeathsSilkyMist [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Charisma does have an effect on the initial cast of charm

I found no evidence of that. Resist rates on the initial cast were equally high in both conditions.

That coupled with your significantly less data for the 115 CHA testing could explain the difference. I'd advise testing on a mob with less MR, as MR will affect charm breaks quite a bit. That specific mob you are testing is going to break quite a bit probably due to it's MR whether or not CHA affects charm breaks, which can muddy the data.

The number of trials compiled only affects the sensitivity of the test. The relationship between sensitivity and number of trials is effectively an inverse square law:
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Sensitivity is, as a rough estimate, around twice the value shown in the graph. So the 1100 trials used for the EJ Spurbone gave a little under 2% sensitivity. But it rises rapidly for lower numbers of trials (this is one of the benefits of the Wilson Score). This test produced 92 tick-trials for the CHA115 condition and 457 for the CHA226 condition, and after adjusting for the change in p_hat this gives a sensitivity estimate of around 10%, comfortably under the difference that was found. So I feel confident in the result.

The goal here was to test on a mob with a fixed level that was easily accessible to allow repeatability. If you can think of another candidate with lower MR, please let us know.

There probably isn't a level 50+ special check of some kind, there's no evidence of that in the EQEMU code. Unless someone has a P99 patch note or some in-era evidence of that.

I think that, after 10+years of operation, it would be an error to assume that the code running p99 is identical to the EQEMU base.

[kjs86z2]

the nerd boners are raging

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Originally Posted by charleski [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I think that, after 10+years of operation, it would be an error to assume that the code running p99 is identical to the EQEMU base.

This is an incorrect assumption. The EQEMU codebase and the P99 codebase have been updated in tandem by the same programmers. P99 is just a branch of the EQEMU source code. This means you want to keep the codebases as similar as possible, so it is easier to update both codebases when you make bug fixes or other changes that apply to both codebases. The EQEMU code also has "legacy" versions of some variables and calculations to make it easier for people to make their own classic servers. This means EQEMU is already built with P99 type servers in mind out of the box.

Most of the P99 only changes probably deal with turning on/off bits of code and changing variables based on what patch the server is on, rather than significant changes to base EQEMU code.

My DPS calculator proves P99 is using the same EQEMU code for the calculations, due to how similar the calculator's results are to P99 parses:

https://www.project1999.com/forums/s...0&postcount=41

My streak calculator in this thread also matches your data quite well:

https://www.project1999.com/forums/s...4&postcount=38

Originally Posted by charleski [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

The goal here was to test on a mob with a fixed level that was easily accessible to allow repeatability. If you can think of another candidate with lower MR, please let us know.

Honestly just don't pick a golem/construct type mob. As I said they tend to have higher MR from my experience.

I use
https://wiki.project1999.com/Mentrax_Mountainbone
And
https://wiki.project1999.com/Eldak_Howlingbear

For my DPS calculator, and their AC matches nicely with the expected AC value for a level 50 mob.

Originally Posted by charleski [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I found no evidence of that. Resist rates on the initial cast were equally high in both conditions.

You potentially did on both tests, you just dismissed them as insigificant.

Originally Posted by charleski [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Another notable feature is that in both conditions I noticed a significant number of resists on the initial cast of charm. There were 13 initial resists with CHA115 and 10 initial resists with CHA226 (out of 32 attempts for each). This difference was not statistically significant, but a lot higher than seen in my previous data set on the EJ Spurbone (2 resists out of 30 attempts at CHA115; 0 resists out of 18 attempts at CHA226).

For both the spurbone and the golem, you got more initial resists with less CHA. +3 initial resists on the golem and +2 initial resists on the spurbone at 115 CHA. Granted both datasets are small, so you really need to run a larger test on initial charm resistance before declaring CHA has no effect on the initial resist.

[Goregasmic]

I don't think golem MR matters since it was the same for all tests? If anything, with no tash and high MR it helps mitigate the possibility that charisma is hidden behind already squelched resists. You'd just have to keep in mind you'll get lesser returns on mobs with low MR if tash already nullified all potential resists.

It is known mob level and MR has an effect on charm duration, here I think the level difference really shows and makes some "room" for charisma to do something. I hypothesized you might see no return on charisma on very low level mobs since the level difference is so big it nullifies any possible resists anyway. On a higher mob with resists that aren't buried under tash/level difference charisma could help. It seems to follow the logic of AC mechanics too so it wouldn't be a wild idea.

It is also known charm duration seems to nosedive past 50 due to level gap closing in. This tracks with what we already knew; past that point you can't squelch the mob's resists entirely.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Originally Posted by Goregasmic [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I don't think golem MR matters since it was the same for all tests? If anything, with no tash and high MR it helps mitigate the possibility that charisma is hidden behind already squelshed resists. You'd just have to keep in mind you'll get lesser returns on mobs with low MR if tash already nullified all potential resists.

It is known mob level and MR has an effect on charm duration, here I think the level difference really shows and makes some "room" for charisma to do something. I hypothesized you might see no return on charisma on very low level mobs since the level difference is so big it nullifies any possible resists anyway. On a higher mob with resists that aren't buried under tash/level difference charisma could help. It seems to follow the logic of AC mechanics too so it wouldn't be a wild idea.

Yes and no. Based on the EQEMU code, there is a minimum resist chance. This means the MR and level difference of the mob can't be so low that you hit the minimum resist chance. In that case you are correct that the effect of CHA would be hidden, because you would be at the minimum resist chance already.

However, if MR is too high, you may not notice CHA's effect either.

In my streak calculator:

https://www.project1999.com/forums/s...4&postcount=38

You can see that once you get to a certain resistance chance, the average duration of a charm doesn't change much. For example, you'll only get an average difference of 2-3 ticks per charm when going from a resist chance of 70 to a resist chance of 90 when rolling against a d200. If the CHA scaling is correct, you only get -18 to the resistance chance at 255 CHA.

My streak calculator is doing millions of dice rolls, so it can be hard to see an average 2-3 tick difference on a smaller set of data.

[Goregasmic]

Ah ok, we don't disagree.

I have the feeling if you'd have 115 cha @60, mobs around lvl45 would start making charm quality decline. With maxed cha you could probably keep that charm quality maxed on mobs until level 49 or so then it declines drastically (with tash always applied).

I'd be curious to know what's the average MR on a 50+ mob and is MR its own thing or the level gap also chips into the +resist pool of the mob. Would something like malo and/or -resist gear prop charm up to make an ilis froglok (53) close to a level 49 mob in charm quality or if its MR is already bottomed out level gap alone will keep charm quality declining? That's probably the biggest implication at this point if you intended on keeping cha maxed anyway.

[Duik]

Originally Posted by kjs86z2 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

the nerd boners are raging

Thats called a brainer.

[Goregasmic]

Not sure how accurate that is but according to this eqemu npc scaling chart lvl52 named has 32 MR. Outside of mobs with abnormally high MR it would seem you could bottom out resists with tash on almost anything you can boltran. We don't know if the NPC resist floor is 0 or if going under 0 provides additional benefits to charm.


https://docs.eqemu.io/server/npc/npc-scaling/