Guide : Stratics Magery and Weapon Combat Damage and calcs

[Guyjeb]

I have found other instances in the old stractics pages in which row datas were clearly swapped. This is likely the case here. I agree, from what I remember from even reading stratics back in the day, daggers were much faster than a kryss or a kat

Will the stats, or have the stats been changed to reflect this?

[Derrick]

This conversation was going on somewhere else too, I couldn't find the thread, but I was convinced again that I might be wrong. I can't go off my memory of this, so it's still up in the air.

[LargePiece]

You could change it so krysses and daggers are faster than kats and see how people react. Fencing is a little pointless at the moment.

Of course I am a bit biased.

[Artemis]

Again this is another case of everyone is right. At one point in T2a the katana was faster, then later weapons had some changes during T2a and the kryss was then faster. Or it was kryss was faster then katanas became faster.
Daggers though? They always sucked ass, always, even against a naked opponent let alone someone wearing armor. If any faster weapons existed, even if they had gimp damage, they would have been abused for their spell interruption, the katana and kryss were the fastest followed by the quarter staff. Every other weapon in the game were slower than these weapons during this period.

[Slade]

What are all of you smoking?

Fencing was always a terrible skill to have because it had no true benefits over the other two.

Katana was the fastest weapon, halberds hit the hardest, and maces had stamina drain + Qstaff.

Fencing just had poisoning going for it, but swords could be poisoned as well, so that wasn't really a true advantage. At least in KoC on Chessy, there were VERY few fencers. I like to think we knew what we were doing.

Fencing was the bastard child of the weapon skills.

[Slade]

Again this is another case of everyone is right. At one point in T2a the katana was faster, then later weapons had some changes during T2a and the kryss was then faster. Or it was kryss was faster then katanas became faster.
Daggers though? They always sucked ass, always, even against a naked opponent let alone someone wearing armor. If any faster weapons existed, even if they had gimp damage, they would have been abused for their spell interruption, the katana and kryss were the fastest followed by the quarter staff. Every other weapon in the game were slower than these weapons during this period.

I would be more inclined to believe this explanation over anything else. I recall fencing just being pointless. They may have changed the kryss/katana speeds to give fencing the edge there, thus re-balancing the weapon skills against each other. But I quit OSI around the time that EQ came out, so I might have missed this change.

However, being primarily a macer on OSI, I wouldn't be likely to pay attention to the sword/fencing changes.

[Mirage]

Anyone know how to make a program so you can enter your str, int, dex, weap skill, weapon used, and get a dmg for the weap? A couple of these for weapons armor, and magic would be useful.

[Butt Pirate]

I played a fencer on Chesapeake on OSI and I remember that fencing had the ability to stun the opponent with 'paralyzing blows' with long spears. This was totally clutch against mages. This was actually added at the end of T2A/release of UO:R I thought. I think it would be good to add here because it would make fencing relevant:

http://update.uo.com/design_159.html

Fencing Weapon: Paralyzing blow, victim is paralyzed for 4 seconds. Once paralyzed, the victim cannot fight back (s/he wont auto-defend) or cast spells, however s/he can still use potions and bandages. The paralysis will not break by any means, even if the victim takes damage. Once paralyzed, the victim cannot be paralyzed again with another special attack until the paralysis wears off.

[Slade]

I played a fencer on Chesapeake on OSI and I remember that fencing had the ability to stun the opponent with 'paralyzing blows' with long spears. This was totally clutch against mages. This was actually added at the end of T2A/release of UO:R I thought. I think it would be good to add here because it would make fencing relevant:

http://update.uo.com/design_159.html

Fencing Weapon: Paralyzing blow, victim is paralyzed for 4 seconds. Once paralyzed, the victim cannot fight back (s/he wont auto-defend) or cast spells, however s/he can still use potions and bandages. The paralysis will not break by any means, even if the victim takes damage. Once paralyzed, the victim cannot be paralyzed again with another special attack until the paralysis wears off.

Then you'd have to add concussion and crushing blows, so no.

[Ronk]

What are all of you smoking?

Fencing was always a terrible skill to have because it had no true benefits over the other two.

Katana was the fastest weapon, halberds hit the hardest, and maces had stamina drain + Qstaff.

Fencing just had poisoning going for it, but swords could be poisoned as well, so that wasn't really a true advantage. At least in KoC on Chessy, there were VERY few fencers. I like to think we knew what we were doing.

Fencing was the bastard child of the weapon skills.

Thats so weird. I remember the majority of the Bloodrock rolled with fencing. I was always annoyed fencing was better because I thought swords looked cooler. Granted, Bloodrock orcs are not allowed to use katana's.

But, in addition, my brother played as a stealth fencer. He'd always have his kryss for armored opponents but if he was up against a mage (with no armor) he'd switch to dagger because the speed had superior interrupt ability.

Most everyone I can remember used fencing over swords, even outside of the Bloodrock. So I find it hard to believe that everyone on Great Lakes was retarded and noobish

For the record, I played from like 99 (I believe...def before T2A existed) up through just after trammel was released. Just to give an idea of my play period so my 'memories' can be put into perspective.

[Ronk]

I got bored and decided to play with the 'way back machine'. Here are some of my findings...

First, I searched for uo.stratics.com. I did NOT search for uo.stratics.com/arms.htm because searching for that specific site lead to fewer results. So, from uo.stratics.com I navigated to the weapon damage page.

Of the pages I found...
December 12, 1998 *
Jan 25, 1999 *
Feb 10, 1999
Apr 22, 1999 *
Apr 29, 1999
May 08, 1999 *
Oct 12, 1999 *
Oct 13, 1999
Where in the * means the page was updated. I brought up every page in my browser then scrolled to the weapons link and opened them in a new browser tab. This told me the exact URL being viewed to ensure it wasn't showing me the wrong thing.

The URL's came out as follows:
http://web.archive.org/web/199910130704 ... m/arms.htm
http://web.archive.org/web/199905022020 ... m/arms.htm
http://web.archive.org/web/199905022020 ... m/arms.htm
http://web.archive.org/web/199905022020 ... m/arms.htm
http://web.archive.org/web/199905022020 ... m/arms.htm
http://web.archive.org/web/199905022020 ... m/arms.htm
http://web.archive.org/web/199910130704 ... m/arms.htm
http://web.archive.org/web/199910130704 ... m/arms.htm
As you can see, even though the wayback machine labels different ones with updates, the arms page stayed the same...which, ironically if you search just the arms pages you get the two unique results.

http://web.archive.org/web/199910130704 ... m/arms.htm
http://web.archive.org/web/199905022020 ... m/arms.htm

If I just search for arms.htm I get one on May 2, 1999 and one on Oct 13, 1999. If we look at the numbers in the URL...
1999-10-13-07041
1999-05-02-202037

Note: We are currently using the October values. So why does it go from the October values in December of 1998 to the May values from Feb to May then switch back to the October values? This is certainly a puzzle as patch notes don't seem to imply any change or revert.

Lets compare October (in use now) to May for some popular weapons...
Oct Kryss - 3-28 damage, 53 speed
May Kryss - 5-11 damage, 65 speed
Oct Katana - 5-26 damage, 58 speed
May Katana - 1-16 damage, 58 speed
Oct Dagger - 3-15 damage, 55 speed
May Dagger - 3-9 damage, 50 speed
Oct Hally - 5-49 damage, 25 speed
May Hally - 10-35 damage, 25 speed

If we look at February 2000, its a new arms.htm page but its the same stats in regards to the weapons above as October.

Even up until 2002 the October values for those weapons seem to hold. So I guess its a mystery, still, as to why Stratics apparently dipped into a different set of weapon stats for 4 months before reverting back.

Edit:
Here is more from February 12th, 1998: http://web.archive.org/web/199905082158 ... rms212.htm
Feb '98 Dagger - 3-12 damage, 70 speed
Feb '98 Kryss - 6-18 damage, 50 speed
Feb '98 Katana - 4-20 damage, 40 speed
Feb '98 Hally - 4-48, 20 speed
Its interesting to note, these stats here seem to say what a lot of the fencers remember. I.E. kryss being faster than katana, and dagger being ungodly fast.
Also note, it says these stats apply to weapons 'Generated before feb 12, 1998'. Could that mean different weapons, depending on when they were crafted, could have had different stats?

[Kraarug]

Is there going to be any chances made in light of the previous post and recollection of players?

I made a ‘mage killer’ on Chessy (‘fishboy’ Aug '99’ to Feb ’00) for the very reason that Daggers and Kryss were the fastest weapons. He started off as a fisher mule, hence the name, so I can’t recall exactly when he went dexxer.

When I would tear into a mage with a dagger I’d interrupt GM Wrestlers easily and they’d drop fast bleeding to death from a swarm of many paper cuts.

With poison, and before any silly corrosion, a DP dagger was pretty much the thing to have against a mage as long as you were one on one and stayed close. You needed GM Healing and Resist, but given time and skill one would be selling that Mage’s gear in no time.

With GM Parry my character was great against other dexxers but I’d need to upgrade to the Kryss for the best effect. Throw in the poisoned spears and Macers and Swordsmen would start wondering where their choice of weapon profession went wrong.

Fencers were great characters but you had to pick your battles and opportunity because they were a niche fighter.

A fencer, one on one with poison and a little real world tactics, were great. They weren’t mass produced like the old Tank Mages and the spell-hally combo and one could pull off a fast DP delivery by just bumping into their target. That little dagger/kryss would pull off a lightening fast delivery. You could then switch to poison spear and finish them off while they were writhing in pain.

And, BTW, poisioning skill of the fighter had NOTHING to do with delivery of a poison charged blade. That was one of the silly changes that made me log off OSI for good.

[Savagefire]

Does having the Lumberjacking Skill at GM along with Swordsmanship add a Damage Bonus When using Axes?

[Faust]

No, lumberjacking bonus did not happen until the UOR publish.

[julesontherocks]

Hey sorry if this seems like a dumb question...but I really am confused.

"Accurate" magic weapons, according to the Stratics guide you posted, affects Tactics. Yet in the guide it shows that Melee Skill effects accuracy (% chance of hit).

So my question is does Tactics Skill increase damage dealt? or % chance of hit, because the title of "Accurate" would seem to effect your % chance of hitting if it was to be more Accurate....

So will an eminently accurate weapon increase your damage inflicted?

Thanks