PSA about Arts damage

[Jotari]

Slightly off topic, but are all you guys new users or something? I don't think I've ever seen so many accounts without an avatar post in succession 0.0

[LukeB]

9 hours ago, Scaramuccia said:

You won't. Let's take your example - 18 str and 14 mag. If you use brave weapons you get 18 atk if you use arts you get 16 atk. But arts are much better stat wise. Braves are 4,5,6 mt with +5 max forging, silver art is 8 mt with +6 forging. So even axe will be slightly lower damage at max forging. On top of that other stats are much better for art user - silver art has sword level accuracy, better economy(it is cheaper to forge than braves) and much lower weight (7->5 fully forge vs  13,14,16) And I am not even talking about A and S arts. Dire thunder is a bit different story - it has huge advantage of 1-3 range, but stat wise it will also be worse than arts.

If you want to use a concrete example, lets take the unit who is statistically one of the best at dealing damage with Arts - Mauvier. When he joins, his stats if we remove class bonuses are 14 Str and 18 Magic. So he starts with mixed bases and growths, and his bases lean more to magic then to strength.  Which feels like The Unit that would maximize Arts, and to be fair he will do more damage with arts then anyone else at a comparable level. Now lets choose between reclassing him to take advantage of Arts or to take advantage of a brave weapon. 


Martial Master with Silver Arts
Mauvier will have 20 Strength and 23 Magic [and 19 Speed and 12 build]

Using Silver Arts, at max upgrades, he will do [(21+14) or 35] x 2 physical damage, with an attack speed of 19.

Now, lets take that same guy. They guy with mixed stats that lean more towards magic, and make him a Warrior.

Warrior with a Brave Axe
He now has 26 Strength [and 21 Speed and 14 build]

Using the brave axe, at max upgrades, he will do [(26+11) or 37] x 2 physical damage, with an attack speed of 19. 


The guy who uses arts better then anyone else, with stats leaning towards magic over strength, would do more damage trying to capitalize on the Brave Axe then trying to capitalize on Silver Arts. 

And this is before you even consider the diminishing returns of stat increases. For the Brave Axe every single point of Strength you can stack on him, it translates to +2 damage. But with the Arts, it is just +1

Brave Axe user gets an energy drop? 4 damage
Arts user gets an energy drop or a spirit dust? 2 damage 

You give them Roy, since he has the highest + Strength bonus of any emblem ring, and the brave axe gets +12 damage, while the arts user gets +6. 


 

[LukeB]

9 hours ago, Scaramuccia said:

Dire thunder is a bit different story - it has huge advantage of 1-3 range, but stat wise it will also be worse than arts.

For thoroughness, lets also see what he can do as a sage with Dire Thunder. 

Sage with Dire Thunder

He now has 27 Magic [and 21 Speed and 11 build]

Using Dire Thunder, at max upgrades, he will do [(27+10) or 37] x 2 damage, with an attack speed of 21 (note, this option cannot double, so while the speed is higher, that only matters for not getting doubled here).

Admittably, this option is much less of a one to one that the brave vs arts was, because it locks you both locks you out of using an emblem ring but is also ranged. So a bit harder to compare.

But, we found a mixed stat unit, and he did more damage with BOTH alternative options lol

[Scaramuccia]

1 hour ago, LukeB said:

Which feels like The Unit that would maximize Arts, and to be fair he will do more damage with arts then anyone else at a comparable level.

He has high build/low speed. That fixes the main penalty of brave weapons straight away. Sure if you have 12+ bld levels silver art low weight isn't a big advantage. But for  other characters for a big part of the game it's not the case. Arts are odd. They are good option for very specific users (Framme, Celinne, Cloe maybe Rosado)

[LukeB]

19 minutes ago, Scaramuccia said:

They are good option for very specific users (Framme, Celinne, Cloe maybe Rosado)

The numbers just really don't work out this way.

Again, I like arts, they have an interesting niche, but they are just not optimal if you want to maximize a units damage. 

I ran the numbers for Framme, Celine, and Cloe (skipped Rosado because he starts much later, so I could not match him to the control). 

Here is each of them at level 10/20, in Martial Master wielding silver weapons vs 10/20 in Warrior wielding a brave axe vs 10/20 in Sage with Dire Thunder - To stay consistent, I kept each of them in their base class to 10, promoted, then second sealed. 

Celine
Martial Master 31.4x2 at 18.1 Atk Spd
Warrior 37.5 x 2 at 17.1 Atk Spd
Sage 32.2x2 

Chloe
Martial Master 32.1x2 at 22 Atk Spd
Warrior 36 x 2 at 22 Atk Spd
Sage 35 x 2

Framme
Martial Master 31.6 x 2 at 22 Atk Spd
Warrior 36.1 x 2 at 20.2 Atk Spd
Sage 34 x 2


Celine has +6 damage for -1 speed
Chloe has +4 damage and the same speed
Framme has + 5 damage for -2 speed. 

All three do more damage with Dire Thunder. 

The only one even worth debating the merits to here is Framme... maybe? I mentioned before, that super balanced units will approach breaking even with arts vs brave weapons, and here are those units. They are approaching breaking even. And so yeah, they can do about the same, but they are not surpassing themselves, and therefore are not coming close to the damage of units with a dedicated attack stat. And once again, this is before factoring in diminishing returns on stat bonuses from meals / energy drops / ring bonus / + Str skills. 

[Scaramuccia]

1 hour ago, LukeB said:

The numbers just really don't work out this way.

Again, I like arts, they have an interesting niche, but they are just not optimal if you want to maximize a units damage. 
 

Ouch, wasn't expecting the speed to go that bad that fast. As far as I understand the problem is not in the arts themselves, the problem is in the terrible speed growth of Martial Master, but as this is the only real class for arts it becomes arts problem. Let's hope to get better arts classes in dlc. For now Martial master should be run only if you need its utility. 

[LukeB]

It is less that the class itself is at a huge speed detriment (it is only 1/2 speed slower then warrior/berserker) but Axe Classes give your units more build, which then help offset that weight difference. 

But the thing is that the arts calculation IS the limiting factor here. The Average of two stats can never be more then the best of those same two stats. So, if you are looking at a unit, and think "their strength is middling AND their magic is middling" then the average will be middling. 

In order for the arts calculation to be good, you would need a unit with Great Strength and Great Magic, but units are not made that way. In general, you are getting units with Great Strength and Bad Magic, or Bad Strength and Great Magic, or Passable Strength and Passable Magic. Which makes the average... Passable. 

Even if we stop for a minute, and imagine a DLC class that shows up. It uses arts, and it has higher bases in both Strength and Magic, and has a better Speed.  Yeah, that will probably be Chloe's best offensive class at that point, but that is just not going to catch her up to someone with a Great Strength score. 


 

[Scaramuccia]

30 minutes ago, LukeB said:

But the thing is that the arts calculation IS the limiting factor here.

It isn't limiting. Sure arts formula makes it weaker option than single stat weapon if everything else is similar. But everything else is not similar - there are two important things that affects weapon performance - weapon stats and class stats. Knowing that formula is weak you could make stronger weapons in that class - it is already implemented in game, imagine S art as a sword. It would be the best weapon in the game hands down. Also class is very important - just replace warrior with Halberdier in your calculations and do the same math - it will change a lot.

The problem with arts as far as I see it is mostly with class stats(also the way build work in the game) it should be a fast weapon (spd bonus on an A art supports this idea) also light weapons are traditionally a fast option. But it's class is painfully slow and build mechanic promotes heavier weapons as a result we discuss 6 wt weapon with 16 wt weapon as a similar option on a speed based unit.

[Jotari]

Funny, I see class as the biggest thing arts have going for them. Like, sure, a Berserker with a Brave Axe is great! But they can't use staves (unless you use Micaiah). Arts are not designed as a primary offensive weapon. They are a sub weapon for staff bots so they're not stuck being staff bots (or they're on Alear...in which case they don't exist). They let you break enemies or do a bit of damage if your staff bot doesn't have any healing to do. And the whole averaging thing, in theory, should make it so you can send any character into staff bot should you need a replacement staff bot, and they can still do some damage no matter their stat line. The problem is...they actually can't. Arts suck so much that on maddening you will see them deal 0 damage on pretty much everything. In addition, the game is kind of just really well made. Which in general is a great thing!...But for your staff bots that means the times in which you aren't healing or using obstruct, or chain guard with them are almost non existent. The game, somewhat amusingly, is so well done that given staff bots an attack option that doesn't just make them sages, normally a good idea, is completely wasted.

Arts don't need to be good, they need to be useful, that's the issue. A brave axe will be better than arts, just like a brave axe will be better than iron sword. That's not an issue, because Iron Swords are still useful by their hit/availability/(in other games)durability & cost. The issue is that, despite breaking three weapon types, they just have no niche, as they're never going to deal real damage and your staff bots are already busy as they can be keeping your army safe.

Edited February 6, 2023 by Jotari

[haarhaarhaar]

Arts start bad, absolutely, and basically require refinement to be useful. And people who can use them early are limited (for lack of Second Seals/only Tiki gives arts proficiency at this point).

But even though it's technically possible to pick up and refine brave weapons in the first half of the game, it's much easier to find and refine arts in this period. It's practically your only brave option for half the game, which explains why the game forces them to start bad - but the effects once you do refine are at least competent. Comparisons with Lvl 10 Warriors and beyond are cool, but they don't cover a significant portion of the game (even if we were to accept that Brave Axe Warrior is the only legitimate point of comparison, which I'm not sure we should). 

The complaint against Martial Master more generally (that despite being built around arts it can't make use of them well enough on Maddening) seems fair, if a little harsh. Brave axes are less accurate, arts users can only be broken in very specific circumstances, Martial Master's combined Def + Res seems competitive for a frontliner. And as mentioned, you sacrifice attack power for staff access. In the first place, Martial Master is probably only warranted if you plan on using A/S rank arts (since people with innate Arts proficiency can just go High Priest to use the silver arts, and then have tome access and better all-round offense/support). And those might change the calculations above.

[Xylaugheon Daily]

I'm just saying that my Mauvier+Eirika does great damage. With the A Rank Arts (cheap as hell to upgrade compared to Silver, too) that give +5 speed, +3 speed from Lyn, a Speedwing, and good food he is quad hitting most enemies, something he'll never do with Brave Weapons. And this is on Maddening. Refine it with I think Fate (whatever gives the 40 Avoid) and position him correctly and you'll get a ton of use out of him offensively, with the option to use up to A Rank Staves. If you're less worried about bulk (Eirika does have Gentility and Ephraim heals) you can run Veyle as an Arts Unit with superior speed, giving more flexibility in the Arts you equip. Just another addition, I run Resolve as my second skill to help with survivability, especially nice since the Art makes you take additional damage.