SK epic vs other weapons, worth?

[jabic]

I'm very fond of using Innoruuk's Curse, and I have had it for about two-and-a-half years on this box, through a wide swath of gear (getting progressively better as my time as casual scum goes by). I have weapons with better ratios that I will use in certain situations (generally for raids), but time and again I come back to the epic because it checks a lot of boxes in one item (read: Very Well Rounded Item)--resists, good melee and casting stats, relatively good ratio for DPS, some anti-caster properties (2h Bash), hard-to-resist magic damage (Soul Consumption), and some moderately good healing (50 hp/tick from Soul Consumption). I don't run a parser, so take what follows with a grain of salt, of course.

For soloing: The epic shines. Stacking dots and meleeing a mob down with the epic is very efficient (try it before you flame me, please), particularly since Soul Consumption stacks with Boil Blood, Asystole, and Cascading Darkness (215 damage per tick). I think it is a fair question whether the added damage and healing from Soul Consumption reduces downtime as much as a higher DPS weapon would, but anecdotally I find that I need to rest between fights less when using the epic than, say, Rocksmasher. Or, if you have aspirations of soloing mobs like hiero (very doable for a 60 SK without tons of ToV gear--hint: be creative, use some of those oft-ignored spells in your arsenal), who can slow you anyway, having the added Soul Consumption DPS (and heals) should not be shrugged off. For many of the same reasons, the epic can be extremely helpful for other solo camps, like frenzy in Velks, NG bugs in Seb, and king in LGuk.

For duoing: Particularly if you have some solid gear and a shaman buddy (even one without Torpor), Innoruuk's Curse is really nice. Frostreaver's Blessing (or spell regen) plus fungi plus Soul Consumption means that you are regenerating a not-insignificant amount of hp even without lifetapping. Assuming you have dex buff(s) on, you can very often be regenerating 75 hp per tick while standing, plus innate regen (50 hp per tick from Soul Consumption, 15 hp per tick from Fungi, and 10 hp per tick from Frostreaver's Blessing). Bottom line: if you want to be duoing things like 6-necks in WW, BM camp (including trash spiders) in Velks, Lodi, and emperor camp in Seb, Innoruuk's Curse at the very least is very, very helpful. As an aside, toss in BE Greaves and Gauntlets and Crown of Narandi, and you can single pull and tank all day while keeping your mana mostly full in this duo, but I digress.

Raids: Situationally useful. For a mob like Zlexak, for instance, Innoruuk's Curse does stick on him fairly often. If you're doing a good job of dodging the AOEs, wearing a fungi, and have either Frostreaver's Blessing or spell regen on, then Soul Consumption (plus a sprinkling of lifetaps, which also often land on him) will help you need fewer heals and stay up through the fight, while still doing some okay DPS. In many other situations, the +15 MR on the epic is also nice--yes, there are 1h/shield combos that can get you better MR (and, for some, a better ratio), but you still have a weapon that has a solid ratio and an appreciable load of stats at the same time.

So, my answer to the OP's question is that, yes, Innoruuk's Curse is worth it. Is it necessary? No. Does it give you significantly more meaningful choices and opportunities as a SK? Yes, absolutely.

As far as the knight DPS side-conversation, I'm not touching that with a ten-foot pole.

Greevtox

[Chardy]

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

You miss more because your offense and weapon skillcaps are lower by level and by class, and you are comparing a piercing weapon to a 2hs. You are going to have more minimum hits and more misses due to those two hardwired aspects.

Idk what your point is about your big hits, thats irrelevant if you're talking about consistent dps. My parse with TSBS on HoT mobs is usually around 60, which is why I rarely use it to dps since Tunare blade and Dagas parse better.[You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Mis-read your post, "numbers" meaning long term DPS as opposed to upper range hits. After I proc primal, I definitely get a consistent upper range hit output on TSBS. I would assume if I keyed my SK, I'd probably see a more consisted 2h dmg output with avatar. I'll have to start parsing, as I'm curious what I could get my SK's DPS up to with Primal, Ntov weaps, aura of battle, and stacking DOTs.


I'm not sure where I'm even going with this...Maybe ill make a DPS cleric next.

[Sonderbeast]

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

I'm not sure where I'm even going with this...Maybe ill make a DPS cleric next.

you're catching on

[Snaggles]

I got my epic on live around Luclin. Ended up picking a Lance if Thunder too. I remember using the epic a lot on raids to help with the supplemental healing (AE’s, occasional hit, etc). Frankly didn’t parse the two though.

It’s still a very viable weapon on P99. Maybe not “the best” but for looks, stats, and self-healing it’s pretty hard to beat. Prob is it’s a time/money sink and possible pain in the ass for people in high end guilds. For filthy casuals like me it’s not possible. You can buy a Reaver from 12-15k and I saw a Narandi on sale recently for 15k. Some people have the option of just looting something on par. I guess it really depends on your capacity to complete a difficult epic quest and how much you want it.

Discounting a sk’s dps completely is a slippery slope because you gear like a toolbox. Since knights aren’t employed to DPS it’s also not worth debating them compared to proper classes. Apples to apples a NTOV monk or rogue will do way more damage and even have the advantage of not facing the mob. We didn’t find some type of 20 year loophole where a class with inferior skill caps is actually a better dps class.

[elwing]

I would be annoyed if I had to choose between my epic and a lance of thunder... Despite the piercing penality its dps is probably better than epic, but stat, resist and proc wise it's much worst...

[drakkan]

I appreciate the conversation about this, a lot of good information. I killed Rharzar and now looking for decrepit hide MQ. Gbank has a leech I believe but the hole kill is going to be annoying to get a group down there - most of my free time is weekends and we know what top tier guilds do on the weekend on this server. The other hurdle is the sky drop because my guild doesn't do it anymore, bigger fish to fry - I guess I'll be looking for another MQ on that too.

[Snaggles]

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

I would be annoyed if I had to choose between my epic and a lance of thunder... Despite the piercing penality its dps is probably better than epic, but stat, resist and proc wise it's much worst...

I had a Eye of the Rigtorgn and Soul Defiler too. Mostly trying to illustrate my odd little anecdote still have the epic some validity even past Kunark. It’s a good weapon and definitely useful but that’s a long and difficult quest (for most) on this server.

[Brut]

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

I appreciate the conversation about this, a lot of good information. I killed Rharzar and now looking for decrepit hide MQ. Gbank has a leech I believe but the hole kill is going to be annoying to get a group down there - most of my free time is weekends and we know what top tier guilds do on the weekend on this server. The other hurdle is the sky drop because my guild doesn't do it anymore, bigger fish to fry - I guess I'll be looking for another MQ on that too.

Solo'd the mimic part back in Kunark, duo'd mummy with a shaman. Worst part about the Hole is getting the ghost to spawns.

[Troxx]

Per p99 wiki 2hpierce caps at same skill level as 2hs and 2hb. Unless these values are wrong there seems to be no draw back to using a 2hp weapon other than the retarded animation of the swing.

[Crede]

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

Per p99 wiki 2hpierce caps at same skill level as 2hs and 2hb. Unless these values are wrong there seems to be no draw back to using a 2hp weapon other than the retarded animation of the swing.

Isn't SK/Pally piercing capped at 210 in lieu of 225 until the 2h bonus patch drops?