GDoH... Which Hand?

[Aanak]

<p>I started with my GDoH in primary hand, but am being told that I'm losing a ton of DPS from Blade Chimes and other procs with it being slow... </p><p>The question is, does it matter which hand it's in? Running with GDoH and DoNegativity right now. Should I have GDoH in off hand or does it not matter?</p>

[Computer MAn]

Main hand imo, the procs lost from blade chime are made up for in the increased chance to proc poisons and all your other procs.

[Jayad]

Main hand. Whoever is telling you that doesn't understand.

[CyriexVTZ]

Mainhand main hand main hand!

[Aanak]

<cite>Jayad wrote:</cite><blockquote>Main hand. Whoever is telling you that doesn't understand.</blockquote><p>Doesn't understand what? Please elaborate because I don't understand neither (hence the post asking the question)?  Blade chimes procs 220 damage every hit, not a percentage, but only on the main hand. So it made sense to me when I was told that, that a fast weapon would benefit greatly from being in the primary hand...</p><p>Why would having a longer delay weapon matter in main hand? I thought all proc's are now normalized to 3 seconds? Which effectively should equal the proc percent of slow and fast weapons. Isn't this the case?</p><p>I thought the magic of the GDoH was the damage low to high ratio 1:10. With the way critical hits work this gives the GDoH a .89% bonus per % Crit chance (ie @ 30% Crit chance ~ 27% damage bonus), compared to the .58% bonus per % Crit that a normal 1:3 ratio weapon gives (ie @ 30% Crit ~ 16% damage bonus). My understanding is GDoH is king, but only if you push the heck out of your Crit% and get it into the 30%+ range.</p><p>The only bonus to the long delay that I am aware of is that swinging slower means less swings are interrupted by CAs compared to faster weapons. </p><p>The bonuses I'm getting from Crits still happen in my off hand, and the "less missed swings" should also still happen in my off hand, and procs are supposedly normalized.  There were several very quick "main hand" responses, so I'm thinking there's gotta be something I'm missing here... What's the benefit to running with GDoH in main?</p>

[Jayad]

There are two reasons to use the GDoH: the damage spread, and the delay. The GDoH is unique in that it has very high values for both. The damage spread benefits yours crits, as you have outlined. The delay benefits procs. Yes, the dirge proc goes on any attack, but most of your procs are normalized. The proccing *rate* (the % chance to proc) is normalized, but the actual number of times you proc is affected by more things than that. If you look at a raid-geared ranger with a huge delay bow and some haste they are a proccing machine. You put on a faster bow and you see their proc damage amounts drop. Going from an 8s delay bow to a 6s delay bow has an affect on their proc numbers as well as their damage. That's why you see a lot of rangers using the Sarnak bow instead of others with similar damage ratings. I'm not 100% sure of the mechanics involved, but I believe it's due to the combination of a higher % chance to proc on a single attack and missed/delayed attacks. It just hurts you a lot less to have a bunch of small delays with a higher delay weapon than with others. By delay I mean, you would have attacked but didn't due to some factor. It adds up to be significant.

[Siclone]

could someone tell me what GDoH stands for so I can look it up and see what everyone is always talking about?

[HellRaiserXX]

Grinning Dirk of Horror

[Traxor789]

<p>Best weapon in the game for duel weild scouts.... 4 second delay and high crit ratio make it proc every item you have more frequently while the 10 crit ratio makes you do a lot of damage ... that and the high end damage is the highest in the game.</p><p>Just wondering .. who will be using GDoH and the blade off of rumbler in their secondary ... two 4 second delay weapons would be easier to get off CA's without interrupting auto attack right</p>

[SageGaspar]

The delay is the reason it's better for procs. Ya you obviously get more procs per hit but that doesn't matter quite so much, you're looking for procs over time which is normalized as you said. Procs per hit would matter more if you don't hit a lot of autoattacks (I mean autoattack is literally turned off for long periods of time), which obviously we're autoattacking most of the time. Look at it this way, you have a 1.6 speed weapon and enough haste to halve the speed, it's hitting every .8 seconds. The quickest CAs have something like a .5s casting time. Even if you're pretty good at timing it you're likely to be delaying autoattack. Let's say you on average hit a CA at .5 seconds into your current autoattack cycle. That means that you're delaying your next attack by an extra .2 seconds at least. So you're hitting an autoattack on average every second instead of every .8 seconds, which means that every four seconds you lose one attack, or that you lose 20% of your attacks. Now on a hasted 2 delay weapon, if you delay your attacks on average by .2 seconds it's like having a 2.2 delay weapon, which means in 22 seconds you'll hit 10 attacks instead of 11. So you'd only be "missing" roughly 9% of your attacks, not taking into account that it's easier to time with a slower weapon. I'd wager that most people aren't super awesome at timing their CAs versus their autoattacks even in raiding guilds, especially with two weapons swinging and a delay down to .8s, so you'll see some improvement right away just switching to a long delay weapon. It also means you can fit in more CAs per autoattack cycle and thus get their refresh timers popping up faster if you time everything. Also I forgot to mention that some people experiment flipping out long delay weapons for short delay when one of the big short-term 100% procs pops up. You might lose more than you gain, I honestly haven't cared enough to try in a long time, but it's worth keeping in the back of your mind as a potential strategy.

[LoreLady]

Generally - main hand.. But if you have a dirge in your group - go offhand..Get a quick weapon in your main hand.. CoB procs off every attack in your primary + combat art.. Your going to get alot more damage out of CoB if you can do 200 extra damage every second, than the extra damage you get from gdoh being in your main hand.

[Topan]

I'm not an assassin and don't know your CA cast times, but as a dirge we have some that are real short cast times .45 secs.  Under CoB haste dirges can still safely spam them between auto attacks and get blade chime procs off the 3-4 CAs and GDoH auto attack swings.  It clearly is advantagous that I can see my recasts on the short spells and plan accordingly with casting CoB, where as an assassin would just be counting on the dirge dropping CoB promptly so as not to miss cycles of their short cast CAs.  I'm under the impression some of your CAs are slower cast times too, but if you have some short cast ones, you could main hand GDoH and drop the fast cast CAs down when CoBs is up. Anyway just an idea maybe it could be useful. I know that I really like keeping GDoH MH for Beserker's War Cry, My Tomb's Calm, and Aura of Strength (imbued ring).  I can imagine assassins having poisons, and the Rallos Zek cloak, on top of such external buffs would want the 12% proc percent that GDoH gives MH even more so then myself.

[judged_one]

Mortred@Befallen wrote: <blockquote>Generally - main hand.. But if you have a dirge in your group - go offhand..Get a quick weapon in your main hand.. CoB procs off every attack in your primary + combat art.. Your going to get alot more damage out of CoB if you can do 200 extra damage every second, than the extra damage you get from gdoh being in your main hand. </blockquote> Why you should never listen to a ranja: 1.) GDoH MH - Proc, Crit + Poison Proc 2.) When Dirge put up CoB, just switch to Windrazor or other 1.1 DW, and throw on your self haste buff, and watch the numbers fly off the screen 3.) Or macro remove weapon on both hand and equipe Windrazor and hopshredder and sit back and enjoy the show

[Brizlyn]

<p>Primary Hand.</p><p> and I know this is a little off topic, but I have raided Lyceum approximately 40 times and I still am without the GDOH - 40 times and no drop.</p><p> We've received countless mugs, periaphs (or whatever they are), and everything else...</p><p> I am tired of seeing complete nubs running around with GDOH because it CAN drop off one of the easiest mobs in the game, but it drops by total luck.  A weapon like GDOH should be dropping off Mayong etc, while a weapon like Oblivions Edge should drop off Essence....it's completely unbalanced.</p><p> So does anyone have any pre-raid enchantments or routines they went through to get the drop?  I am thinking if I zone in and out of TT 3 times, jump down the waterfall and miss the pond purposely, skip repairing, and then fly to each island once running backwards whenever on foot, that maybe I'll get the [I cannot control my vocabulary] thing to drop...</p><p> Lyceum raid# 41 for the win?</p><p> Edit: truth is it may be 38 raids, it may be 44 raids, I've lost count...but you get the idea...just about weekly since KOS release, I don't know if I even wanna know.</p><p> -Briz</p><p>Shoukin</p>

[khufure]

I gave up hope.  I stopped caring, assumed it wouldn't drop.  Then it did.

[Jayad]

Raided lyceum almost a year without seeing them (and wasn't an assassin for a bunch of that), then I've seen 4 in the last 4-5 months. Guess you gotta keep doing Lyceum til you get it. And make sure you have enough loot points to win it. The odd thing is, the guy who designed it probably didn't think it was any better. I wonder if they understand the effects of delay and damage spread versus damage rating.

[CrazyPaladin2]

Brizlyn wrote: <blockquote><p>I am tired of seeing complete nubs running around with GDOH because it CAN drop off one of the easiest mobs in the game, but it drops by total luck.  A weapon like GDOH should be dropping off Mayong etc, while a weapon like Oblivions Edge should drop off Essence....it's completely unbalanced.</p></blockquote><p>Yeah, the GDoH does drop off a pretty weak mob.  That could be why it seems more rare.  I think it's really luck tho.  I have seen it drop 3 weeks in a row after many months of it not dropping.  I was stoked to get it.  </p><p>Now there is a GDoH caliber weapon out there that is super rare and tough to get.  Bisected Saber.  Maybe half a dozen out there worldwide.  It drops off the Segmented Rumbler in Emerald Halls.  Not only is it in a tough time consuming zone, you have to cross your fingers that the mob is up in the instance you enter.  The encounter is a long one and very challenging.  The saber is sick tho.  GDoH paired with BS is my wet dream.  I have started to raid almost entirely with my chanter so I doubt I'll ever get the chance to bid on that.</p><p>GDoH step aside! There is a new king.  That ain't no b.s.  Oh wait, it IS BS.</p><p><a href="http://eq2.xanadu-community.com/eq2_loot.php?BrowseNPC=1&exp_id=7&pack_id=17&zone_id=73&target_id=239" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">http://eq2.xanadu-community.com/eq2...p;target_id=239</a></p><p>Higher minimum damage than GDoH, slightly lower max damage, 2% crit and high stats ftw!</p><p>Gratz Shaix of AM for getting a sweet dagger and seemingly being the only assassin with one of these (seems bards got the others).  Now go get the GDoH and let us know how the 2 parse together!  </p><p>Resplendant Robe of Battle with GDoH and BS.  That will be an ultra rare combo i'd like to see.  Who knows if that will ever happen. </p>

[Jayad]

I dunno, with all the mobs requiring high melee skills, I'm not sure I'd want a split pierce/slash requirement. Guess it depends on how well it parses <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

[CrazyPaladin2]

<cite>Jayad wrote:</cite><blockquote>I dunno, with all the mobs requiring high melee skills, I'm not sure I'd want a split pierce/slash requirement. Guess it depends on how well it parses <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> </blockquote><p>Normally those would be my thoughts as well.  In my main dps gear with adept 3 whirling blades I'm sitting on 426 pierce and 416 slashing.  With a decent amount of strength that's a pretty high attack rating.  I run +5 pierce adornment in my offhand and proc in primary.  If I ended up with BS I would throw a +5 slash on that and +5 pierce on GDoH.  Then I would be 421 slash and still 426 pierce.  Very little difference.  I'm starting to think the arguement against slashing is just alot of hype.  At my current skills I see little difference against orange raid mobs, especially with a +skill buff class or swindlers.  </p><p>My main point is the difference between slashing and piercing is not huge.  If I had dark bangle, assassin gloves, band of darkness, and a few more +piercing items or those +5 items were +10 I might see a reason to lock-in with piercing only.  </p><p>Atm I only get +3 inherent pierce off my weapons (from GDoH).  I'd love to get RoD or even DoN.  Another option is Thurneg's Thorn <a href="http://eq2.xanadu-community.com/eq2_loot.php?BrowseNPC=1&exp_id=7&pack_id=20&zone_id=85&target_id=287. " target="_blank" rel="nofollow">http://eq2.xanadu-community.com/eq2...t_id=287. </a> I'd imagine the thorn would parse roughly equal to DoN or RoD.  We have yet to see weaponsmith recipe, but it will most likely be awhile before I see a bark of growth on my assassin.</p>

[Jayad]

Your slashing is quite a bit higher than mine. If the Bisected is really as good as the GDoH, then I'm thinking it'll be worth using even if you lose a few % hits. I use GDoH and RoD and my pierce is quite a bit higher (like 20 points) than my slashing.

[Graton]

<cite>Jayad wrote:</cite><blockquote>Your slashing is quite a bit higher than mine. If the Bisected is really as good as the GDoH, then I'm thinking it'll be worth using even if you lose a few % hits. I use GDoH and RoD and my pierce is quite a bit higher (like 20 points) than my slashing.</blockquote>it's nowhere close to the gdoh. it has a slow delay but the max / min ratio is less than 3 as i recall. the 2 % crit is nice but it's a slasher and a lousy ratio one at that.

[Jayad]

Yes its spread is lower, but that's mainly because the lower end is higher. This means the crit boost isn't as good by itself but because the DR is higher it's about the same as the GDoH in terms of damage output. If the DR were the same as the GDoH then it would be worse.

[Shaialit]

Thanks Frodogorn. Yes I believe pierce/slash argument is a lot of hype as well. I have been using Long sword of Perfection for a long time. Currently I'm using Bisected Sabre with Long Sword of Perfection and I'm sitting at 423pierce and 423slash, ungrouped self buffed... If I switch bisected sabre for Rapier of Darkness I'll be at 435pierce and 418slash... That's what I was using before BS. And my zonewide accuracy according to ACT is usually around 90-91% with yellow mobs (of course that includes CA's too.) And about 89-90% with orange mobs. Accuracy remains the same with BS... I would like to see what happens with BS and GDoH, but that will probably never happen to me <img src="/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> I've seen GDoH drop twice so far, first time with the ww disco by Layla (a ranger! OMG!!! <img src="/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />) I was playing a monk then so it didn't matter... And second time on the famous Sepentius pickup raids on Blackburrow <img src="/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> And I miserably lost the random with super low single digit...

[HellRaiserXX]

<p>Once you get over 420 or so you are so deep into diminishing returns that another point isnt going to matter.  I have about 415 pierce and like 395 slash and the difference is a bit more noticeable if Im using a slashing weapon. Then if you keep Swindlers Luck up and have buffs to those skills than it doesn't make a difference really. </p><p>To the OP you want GDoH in mainhand.  </p>

[CrazyPaladin2]

<cite>Graton wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Jayad wrote:</cite><blockquote>Your slashing is quite a bit higher than mine. If the Bisected is really as good as the GDoH, then I'm thinking it'll be worth using even if you lose a few % hits. I use GDoH and RoD and my pierce is quite a bit higher (like 20 points) than my slashing.</blockquote>it's nowhere close to the gdoh. it has a slow delay but the max / min ratio is less than 3 as i recall. the 2 % crit is nice but it's a slasher and a lousy ratio one at that. </blockquote><p>What does ratio have to do with anything?  My assumptions about what made GDoH and BS good were the max damage and the delay.  Is a critical damage hit not determined by a weapons max damage as base?</p><p>My praise of BS was based on the minimum damage being 65 compared to the 24 on GDoH.  Not counting crits, the avg base of BS is 131 and GDoH is 120.  GDoH has the edge on BS for high hits, but overall I would assume they would not be far apart in dps they provide.  Add the 2% crit and higher stats and I figured BS had the edge.</p><p>Now this is just an assumption.  This is also based on crit % that assassins can typically get.  Going with balls out crit gear we can get in the high 20's maybe low 30's then add buffs/potion we may be able to push over 40.  The higher the crit % we have the worse BS would fare vs. GDoH.  Regardless I would have to put BS as at least the second best weapon in game (even with it being slashing).  The high int/str and other stats certainly cannot be overlooked either.</p><p>Point me to a thread where I may have missed why max / min spread (ratio) is important vs. the avg. hit / max on a weapon.</p>

[Graton]

<cite>CrazyPaladin2 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Graton wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Jayad wrote:</cite><blockquote>Your slashing is quite a bit higher than mine. If the Bisected is really as good as the GDoH, then I'm thinking it'll be worth using even if you lose a few % hits. I use GDoH and RoD and my pierce is quite a bit higher (like 20 points) than my slashing.</blockquote>it's nowhere close to the gdoh. it has a slow delay but the max / min ratio is less than 3 as i recall. the 2 % crit is nice but it's a slasher and a lousy ratio one at that. </blockquote><p>What does ratio have to do with anything?  My assumptions about what made GDoH and BS good were the max damage and the delay.  Is a critical damage hit not determined by a weapons max damage as base?</p><p>My praise of BS was based on the minimum damage being 65 compared to the 24 on GDoH.  Not counting crits, the avg base of BS is 131 and GDoH is 120.  GDoH has the edge on BS for high hits, but overall I would assume they would not be far apart in dps they provide.  Add the 2% crit and higher stats and I figured BS had the edge.</p><p>Now this is just an assumption.  This is also based on crit % that assassins can typically get.  Going with balls out crit gear we can get in the high 20's maybe low 30's then add buffs/potion we may be able to push over 40.  The higher the crit % we have the worse BS would fare vs. GDoH.  Regardless I would have to put BS as at least the second best weapon in game (even with it being slashing).  The high int/str and other stats certainly cannot be overlooked either.</p><p>Point me to a thread where I may have missed why max / min spread (ratio) is important vs. the avg. hit / max on a weapon.</p></blockquote>http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/posts/list.m?topic_id=353709 essentially crit dmg is not simply a 30% bonus. it's 30 % bonus or max dmg +1 whichever is greater. because of this a weapon with a high ratio gets better as your crit %age increases. this is one of the reasons that the gdoh is so fantastic. i'd try and explain more but this thread does a much better job than me.