The truth about anathema

[ZaranilShadowfie]

From what I have been seeing, I think anthema doesn't do anything at all.  I use this skill all the time and I just assumed it worked (of course in EQ2 you really can't assume anything :p ), but now I'm thinking it either never worked or is currently not working.  I was messing around in OOLS today and testing out my auto attack dps and such and I decided I would try and see just how much buffs like anathem and cripple help out ( I just got cripple master 1 lastnight.... joy :/ ).  Well to my suprise casting these two skills did nothing to my dps.  So I tested a lot more, and in just about every case the fights I didn't cast anthema I actually did higher dps. Now a buff like this that basically lowers the targets level in defense by almost 2 whole levels and chops off a good 260 ac should show some significant improvement in dps, but it does not.  And even if it is working, it obviously isn't scaled right to match the combat system.  And I guess the same goes for cripple, just about worthless.   So, it would be nice if some others could cast an eye to this and share some thoughts. Here is how I set up my tests.  I killed the ^^ nightblood in OOLS which come in level 38, 39 and 40.  I kept seperate parses for each type.  I then removed all gear with procs, poison, and things like that to remove randomness in the numbers.  So basically only had merciless villiany on.  I used 2 ebon spatha, and just walked up to a nightblood and started wailing on it with autoattack manually starting and stopping the parse.  I then did the same thing, but this time casting anathema everytime it needed refresh, not everytime it recycled.  Usually fights with anethema were about 5-10 dps less than fights without.  I proced bloodscent pretty much constantly, so I don't really consider this to be a random factor.  Give it a shot, but make sure you have no procs or poison to keep things accurate.  i have adept3 anathema btw. <div></div>

[Putka]

<DIV>I can't say this surprises me.. I won't even test it, I beleive you. One less skill to worry about keeping up on a raid, woot!</DIV>

[khalysta]

All of those mobs are severely gray though.  Gray mobs are really easy to hit to begin with due to the gap between your offense and their defense.  In return they can't hit you very much at all because your defense is higher than their offense.  With such a huge gap trying to make them even grayer by debuffing defense should really have little return.  Now on the other hand and easier to test high level might be to try out the mobs in nek2 without your group debuffing.  These start out yellow to you and therefore higher defense and the combination of debuffing 54 defense by punch blade, cripple and anathema should have some more noticeable effect since you take the mob from a yellow and higher defense than you to likely gray defense.  If it doesnt help in that case then its not just anathema but all defense buffs that are not working out too well at all.

[Putka]

Yes on the defense part youre right. If you debuffed defense of a mob that you hit 95 out of 100 times by any amount, you'd see no difference. But I'm worried about the mitigation debuffs. I guess they're just too insignificant to bother with unless you can debuff over 1k. I definitely won't be using Insidius Cut that costs a lot of power and seems to generate high hate for such a tiny effect. <DIV> </DIV>

[ZaranilShadowfie]

i'll try it later on mobs that con blue or something to me just to be sure, however I feel it's important to have this test done solo because in a group just too many factors are present.  On another note, just because a mob is grey to you does not mean you'll hit for full damage, you can test this by trying to land a condeming blade on a grey mob, it will never hit for max damage even if the mob is lvl 20.  Although I was likely landing most of my hits ( i should turn the spam on to make sure), the mobs would still be mitigating my damage.  This could be true, but like i said, previous experiances with testing combat arts on low level mobs has always proved that they will not land for full hits unless also debuffed. <div></div>

[Putka]

<P>I don't see anyone saying grey mobs don't mitigate. All I'm saying is you won't see defense (not mitigation) debuffs doing anything, because you're almost always hitting them anyway.</P> <P>I don't really like how the system currently works, for example it's very obvious on my brawler alt. If I attack a green heroic mob with no defense buffs on, he'll be hitting me fairly often and I'll end up with about 35% hp left after the battle. Then I'll put up a +6 defense buff which will now put him in grey con range as far as avoiding hits go and he'll be completly unable to land a single hit, and I'll finish the fight at 100%.</P> <P>But if I use the same buff on a mob who's 1 level higher than me, it'll just make him white and he'll be hitting me a lot in any case, rendering the buff worthless.</P> <P>So stupid.. but supposedly the combat revamp's gonna change how defense works or something like that.. whatever. I won't be around by then anymore anyway.</P>

[ZaranilShadowfie]

<span><blockquote><hr>Putka wrote:<p>I don't see anyone saying grey mobs don't mitigate. All I'm saying is you won't see defense (not mitigation) debuffs doing anything, because you're almost always hitting them anyway.</p> <p>I don't really like how the system currently works, for example it's very obvious on my brawler alt. If I attack a green heroic mob with no defense buffs on, he'll be hitting me fairly often and I'll end up with about 35% hp left after the battle. Then I'll put up a +6 defense buff which will now put him in grey con range as far as avoiding hits go and he'll be completly unable to land a single hit, and I'll finish the fight at 100%.</p> <p>But if I use the same buff on a mob who's 1 level higher than me, it'll just make him white and he'll be hitting me a lot in any case, rendering the buff worthless.</p> <p>So stupid.. but supposedly the combat revamp's gonna change how defense works or something like that.. whatever. I won't be around by then anymore anyway.</p><hr></blockquote>yeah I was just trying to say the mitigation debuff part of the CA should be making a difference though. Putka leaving the game??</span><div></div>

[big da]

hmm well if you find out it doesnt work as advertised I guess we re left with an HO flipper <div></div>

[pczry]

it won't hurt to use the spell though, its only one click away ;p <div></div>

[Kokus]

<DIV>Anathema is useful as it can interrupt the mob.  The mitigation decrease it puts on the mob will hardly be noticeable by itself, but when combined with punch blade, infected wound, and bloothirster, your auto attack damage increases noticeably.</DIV>

[ERROR]

Aye, I don't use that scroll for it's debuff, I use it for it's interupt, as Elvan said. It's great on raids because it's got a 10 second recast and a 30 second duration. That means that we can keep the mob interupted indefinetly, which is great on caster mobs or mobs that stun the MT. I realize that the interupt probably doesn't last for the 30 second duration, but even still, an interupt every 10 seconds is pretty good if you ask me. Try spamming it between your other arts on raid mobs like Zalek in CL, your MT will love you for it. Anyway, IMO it's welcomed utility for us assassins, a class that has very little. <div></div>

[Kokus]

<DIV>The interrupt is on the initial cast to interrupt a mob's spell.  Bloodthirster and Faltering Blast can do the same, but are much harder to time to spell being cast. heh.</DIV>

[HuxleyS]

<DIV>I use it for its interupt also. But Ive also seen mobs cast though it, im unsure if i just hit them a tad too late, or they channeld though or resisted or what. Im wondering if the mob goes though the "down to its knees" animation if that means you successfuly interupted? But then Ive never seen a giant type like Drayek hit his knees and I dont know if its ever worked on him either. </DIV>

[Putka]

<DIV>Ok no offense but using this to actually interrupt anything is ridiculous. Lol. Come on how much can you interrupt once every 10 seconds.. not like you're lucky enough to win the lottery and interrupt that ice comet or distortion. I suppose it's just a nice addition to the debuff.. but tbh I'd dump it to cut the aggro.</DIV>

[Kokus]

<DIV>You've never been on raids where the raid leader tells everyone to spam their interrupts?</DIV>

[ERROR]

aye. Interupts are a pretty important factor on a lot of endgame raid mobs. <div></div>

[Putka]

yes its usually the monk's job <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />, I just don't see myself interrupting much of anything with it..