Carbineer Archive

In the thread on weapon boost compared for the 3 weapons, I wondered what +10 speed boost really means: is it 0.1 descreased speed or 10% faster reload because it makes a big difference. For instance. 0.2 faster reload on a 4.5 second carbine is nothing yet 20% faster means 3.6 reload.You need to do the experiments on rifles which fire slow since the difference between 10% and 0.1 will be large and easy to detect with a stopwatch.

I got out my Laser Rifle that is 7.0 sec reload. I am a Master Marksman, so I have +30 to rifle speed. So, either I am going to fire the rifle at 6.7 speed (if its +10 = 0.1) or 4.9 (if +10 = 10%). All I used was simple /attack since specials add time. I used a stop watch and I tested this over and over again. I was consistantly firing my rifle at around 4.9 seconds. Essentially, I could type /attack and fire, fire and fire and my stop watch be under 10 seconds. Please note that lag is going to make things longer and not shorter. I am fairly convinced that +10 = 10% faster.

To verify I got out my laser carbine which is 3.3 speed (it was sliced for speed). I am +40 speed so that means either 2.9 (if +10 = 0.1) or 2.0 (if +10 = 10%). This one is clearly going to be trickier since the difference is really only 1 second. I used /attack again and it is very clear that I am firing every 2 seconds. To double check, I used how many times can I fire in 6 seconds? I should fire 4 times in 6 seconds if the reload is 2 seconds and only 3 times if its 2.9 (both these values include the firing at time Zero). Fired 4 times in 6 seconds every time I tried.

Feel free to try these experiments yourself. Just please, don't use pistols as they fire too fast to take accurate measurements - or atleast use some low quality pistol with a 4.0 second reload.

Well that's pretty lame then. Using HountyBunter's numbers from his pistoleer/carbineer/rifleman comparison test, and the formula

100/(100-percentagespeeddecrease) - 100 = percentagedamageincrease (basically calculating the percentage increase in number of hits per a given time period)

we get the following for damage increase due to mastering the elite profession (we'll include master marksman and non-master marksman for those that don't require it):

Master Marksman/Master Pistoleer (79 speed points) -- 376.2% increase

Bare-bones Master Pistoleer (75 speed points) --284.6% increase

Master Marksman/Master Carbineer (65 speed points) -- 185.7% increase

Bare-bones Master Carbineer (60 speed points) -- 150.0% increase

Master Marksman/Master Rifleman (95!! speed points) -- 1900% increase

Bare-bones Master Rifleman (90! speed points) -- 900.0% increase

Master Bounty Hunter (75 speed points, pistol or carbine) -- 300% increase

Basically, I hope that this isn't linear -- that there's some cap on the skill somewhere. Look at what the rifle gets at master compared to what the carbine does -- 4 times the damage of the listed values -- which we thought seemed sort of balanced dps-wise on paper (or 6 times the damage increase over the listed damage, depending on how you want to look at it). Worse yet, even riflemen have a huge balance problem in an uncapped world -- getting the master marksman (not even something in their profession!) box doubles their damage with a measly 5 points.

That's not even to mention what would happen to a master pistoleer (or carbineer)/BH combat line mix would do -- it would either reduce down to zero or wrap around, lol.

So I'm thinking that logically (well -- assuming there's any logic in this game) there has to be a cap of some sort in place. It's either in the form of a maximum rate of fire (I've heard rumors of 1 second -- but I heard those in EQ and it was clearly not the case despite timestamp precision of 1 second, so I don't know how much stock I give rumors like that) or it could be a cap on the maximum effective speed modifier, in which case riflemen at the least would have useless speed points at the top of their tree.

So, what are the consequences of a cap? Well, as mentioned, in the event of a cap beyond which additional speed points are ineffective, this makes riflemen less powerful than the sum of their skill mods since they're probably wasting some by the time they reach 80 or so (just a random number, based on quintupling the base damage of a gun via speed bonuses, which seems pretty strong and thus conservative on my part). If it's a cap on the modified real-time speed, then pistols lose out because they reach it faster, and carbines and pistols alike should focus on damage slices and powerups rather than speed (which I do for my carbine anyways because upgrading speed just means I kill myself with HAM faster, rather than squeezing more damage out of the HAM points I do spend).

So good work, novamarine, but let's get some more corroboration and some data points at higher speed mod values to make sure it's linear and try to find a cap.

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Kaelle_DB wrote:
Umm 2-3 seconds for a T21? It has a speed of like 8 or 9 starting, so slice it down to 6 + the 95 speed mod that's 5. Where the heck is 2-3 coming from?

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Wish I could edit the post above me. I realized after I submitted that I was coming off a little harshly. I did not mean to jump down your throat, Kaelle -- you've got a bunch of other good posts that I respect you for.

However, I think it's pretty clear that you didn't read the original post thoroughly.

There's no way +10 = 10% off, the riflemen would have 95% reduction and be firing at the minimum speed of 1.0. That's not the case.

I have master carbine assault tactics and BH carbine 4 that's +105 speed, my weapons don't fire at 1.0.

Ok, but that just means that the 10 pts = 10% doesn't extend across the whole range linearly. It doesn't invalidate his findings, only imposes restrictions on them. Instead of ignoring him, or calling him a liar, maybe you can do a few tests and tell us what your speed mods come out to be?

In the second post on the thread, I posted a few speculations about ways it could be capped. Let's figure out what's going on rather than just assume incorrect stuff that sounds reasonable (your persisting belief that 10 pts = .1 speed) rather than refining what is clearly a ridiculous extension to a potenially sound (at the range tested) tested theory (ie, extending the rifleman bonus of 95 pts to = 95% reduction, which I agree, is not happening).

I also have 105 carbine speed but honestly they do fire close to 1 second, with even 4.6 speed carbines I clock in around 20 shots every 20 seconds. My specials fire just as fast as my regular shots.

My freaking 4.6 speed carbines shoots as fast as my 2.1 speed scatter with 80 pistol speed.

The increase to speed has to be greater than 10= 0.1 second reduction.

It's hard to compare those high speed mods because there's a point where they simply just somehow roll over, it has to be a bug of some sort. About the master riflemen, yes they DO fire rifles that are 7.0 speedat 1.0 seconds. When a friend made master rifleman wetested it withall the specials we could think of with a 6.9 rifle, nothing fired slower than 1.0.

Carbines and pistols fire the same speed when you go to high enough mod, and that seems to be the speed cap for all the weapons. (tested this with a master pistoleer/maxed bounty pistol spec, 1.8 pistol = 1.0 fire rate, also been testing myself with carbines between 2.8 and 5.0 speed or so, all fire at 1.0 whatever specials I use)

+10 = -10% sounds reasonable, all the way till +70-90 something speed mod where it totally gets out of control, that's around when it happens.

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Kaelle_DB wrote:

There's no way +10 = 10% off, the riflemen would have 95% reduction and be firing at the minimum speed of 1.0. That's not the case.

I have master carbine assault tactics and BH carbine 4 that's +105 speed, my weapons don't fire at 1.0.

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Wow mine do. I fire 1 for 1 with my buddy who is Bounty Hunter Pistol IV and almost Master Pistoleer

I am Bounty Hunter Carbine IV and Master Carbineer and I am firing on the order of 1 second a shot, its great my laser carbine is like a garden hose.

+10 speed = +10% speed to weapon seems consistent with what i have seen in OTHER skills in-game. for example, as i was trekking up the scout tree, my /maskscent (i'm a human, with no bonus) at first worked VERY rarely, hard to tell exactly how often, with the +5 modifier. i grab explor3, and it started working with noticeable effect...i could tell that it was doing something, total mod of +15. at master scout, it fails less than half the time, skill mod +50. ranger, with wayfaring 4, and it fails as often as it succeeded with explor2 and the +5 mod...new mod? +90.

other skills, such as the artisan/crafting ones tend to support the 1 pt = 1%, esp. with experimentation. at a guess for a 'cap', would be 99. i just counted all teh skill mods for speed that marksman/pistoleer/carbineer/rifleman/bh get, and the breakdown like this (sorry if someone else did this already, i'm tired and i already forgot):

marksman (master): pistol speed +30 (5 each box, plus 5 novice and 5 master)