Do Resists really need Rebalancing?

General Discussion PC
1

Do Resists really need Rebalancing?

First, we need to know how to calculate Damage Reduction in Diablo 4.
The formula is the following:

Total DR = 1 - PROD_i(1-DRi)

In words:
We convert “% Damage Reduction” into “% Damage Taken”
I.e. 20% Reduced Damage = 80% Damage Taken
If we have two sources of 20% Damage Reduction, that means 80% Damage Taken from 80% Damage Taken. Which means we multiply these parameters.
0.8 * 0.8 = 64% Final Damage Taken
And 64% Damage Taken is 36% Damage Reduction.

Now let’s say we have a character with:
6000 Armor = 50% Physical and 25% Non-Physical Damage Reduction
1000 Intellect = 50% Elemental Resists = 25% Elemental Damage Reduction

Let’s suppose we are going to fight an opponent that deals Cold Damage from Range.

Our damage mitigation against this opponent is going to be the following:
1 - (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.25) = 43.7% Total Damage Reduction

Let’s add one item with 50% Cold Resist
1 - (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.5/2) = 57.8% Total Cold Damage Reduction (14.1% gain)

What if we add another one?
1 - (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.5/2) * (1 - 0.5/2) = 68.3% Total Cold Damage Reduction (10.5% gain)

What if we swap the second item with one that has 25% Range Damage Reduction? (doesn’t roll as big as resists)
1 - (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.5/2) * (1 - 0.25) = 68.3% Total Ranged Cold Damage Reduction (10.5% gain)

We get the same result if the conditions are met! (cold range dmg)
At this point, we can say that 50% Resist is equivalent to any sort of 25% Damage Reduction.

So the stats on items seem pretty balanced, if resists roll twice as big as other DRs.

Things change when we move to Torment Difficulty.

On Torment Difficulty, Monsters Overcome 40% of Resistances.
By testing, I found that this is not an offset of 40% (as in Diablo 2), but a multiplicative coefficient of 0.6.
It means that all of our resistances are only 60% effective.

So if we repeat the comparison between 50% Cold Resist and 25% Range DR, we get:

1 - (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.25*0.6) * (1 - 0.5*0.5*0.6) * (1 - 0.5*0.5*0.6) = 53.9% Total Cold Damage Reduction

VS

1 - (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.25*0.6) * (1 - 0.5*0.5*0.6) * (1 - 0.25) = 59.3% Total Ranged Cold Damage Reduction

We see that 25% Range Damage Reduction is much more effective than 50% Resist, since it is not affected by world tier penalties.

In order to have the same amount of DR on Torment Difficulty, items must have 1/0.5/0.6 = 3.33 higher resists compared to other sorts of DR.
To compete with 20% DR, an item should have ~67% Resist :slightly_smiling_face:

In the end, resists are not as bad as we initially thought.
They are just 40% less effective on torment difficulty :slightly_smiling_face:

It might be unfair towards Int classes, but keep in mind that Resists have no other penalties if you’re fighting higher level opponents (High Nightmare Dungeons), while Armor is less effective with each level difference. :thinking:

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At this point, we can say that 50% Resist is equivalent to any sort of 25% Damage Reduction.

You can’t say that.

Elemental Resistance got insane DR (diminishing returns) for example. I am a barb at lvl 70 with 200 int. If i unequip my Amulet i have 23,8% Cold Resi, if i reequip it (it got 21% all resis) i have 31,4% cold resis. So even with low resist i still got like more than 50% diminishing return.

If i equip a item with 20% dmg reduction from distant straight up get 20% dmg reduction. 100% Value.

The real big consideration u forgot, Cold resi is only cold dmg and “x% dmg reduction from distant” is all! DMG wich include Cold, Lightning, Fire, Poison, Shadow and Physical. So u got to multiply it with 6 wich is 120%.

So even in my case with low ass int and resis “dmg reduction from distant” is more than 15 times better than 1 source of ele resistance, of course the diffrence get’s smaller with a high single stat like +60% cold resi but the diminishing return gets so aswell. Im pretty sure it will still be at least 10 times stronger to use “dmg reduction from distant”

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idk where you got the information. Is poison any different? I’ve got more poison resistance than any others, yet poison puddles are 10x more damaging than other effects

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4

You are wrong. All sources of Damage Reduction work in combination.
So Range DR has the same diminishing returns as Resists when you take into consideration all your other sources of damage mitigation.
If your final Combined DR from armor, resists and any other sorts of damage mitigation is x%, then your next increment in DR of any kind, is going to be 1-X effective (multiplied by 1-x).

In example, your total combined DR is 90%. If you add 40% Resist, it will increase your final DR by 2%.
If you add 20% melee DR instead, your final DR will rise by the same ammount, 2%

As I demonstrated in my previous post:

What if we add another one?
1 - (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.5/2) * (1 - 0.5/2) = 68.3% Total Cold Damage Reduction (10.5% gain)

What if we swap the second item with one that has 25% Range Damage Reduction? (doesn’t roll as big as resists)
1 - (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.25) * (1 - 0.5/2) * (1 - 0.25) = 68.3% Total Ranged Cold Damage Reduction (10.5% gain)

We get the same result if the conditions are met! (cold range dmg)

The real big consideration u forgot, Cold resi is only cold dmg and “x% dmg reduction from distant” is all! DMG wich include Cold, Lightning, Fire, Poison, Shadow and Physical. So u got to multiply it with 6 wich is 120%.

Damage reduction from distant is not all dmg )) it’s only distant dmg reduction ))
Both cold Resist and Range DR are conditional.
But if you’re fighting a Range opponent that deals Cold damage, both conditions are met and there is no difference :slight_smile: I mentioned that, so I didn’t forget :slight_smile:

And no, you don’t multiply resistances by 6. As you don’t multiply range DR by 2, to compensate for melee DR. Since these are separate events under separate circumstances.
A hit can’t be range and melee at the same time.
And it can’t be cold and fire at the same time. If a hit does both, it counts as two hits.
You rarely meet opponents that do all 6 types of damage equally high.

So u got to multiply it with 6 wich is 120%.

100% resist on single item is a joke. You stack 100% of each element on different pieces of gear and you’re immune to everything :slight_smile:

It’s designed so you have to make a choice based on your opponent.
If you’re fighting against a cold sorc, both cold resist and range dr are equally valuable! And things like poison resist and melee dr are going to be useless :slight_smile:

And you can have all Resist on items! Which is basically unconditionall all DR if you don’t know who you’re going to fight. Rolls usually up to about ~30% which is equivalent to about ~10% all damage reductuon. But you have to make a choise here as well. Lower unconditional DR vs higher conditional DR.

What you’re asking for, would be OP :slight_smile:

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I agree with your math. That’s totally right.

The thing i talked about is realistic itemization. Yes in your case of cold dmg and dmg from distant enemies got the same DR that’s right.

And no, you don’t multiply resistances by 6. As you don’t multiply range DR by 2, to compensate for melee DR. Since these are separate events under separate circumstances.

Maybe what i wrote wasn’t very clear. What i ment was, you have 1 stat slot on your gear and it’s going to be either +cold resistance or x% dmg reduction from distant enemies.
In the case of only cold damage from a distant attack your math is correct, but what i wanted to say is that x% dmg reduction from distant enemies also provides DR from the other sources (Poison, Lightning, Fire, Shadow, Cold and Physical) yes of course only from ranged attacks. That’s why i multiplied it with 6. The worth of the stat x% dmg reduction from distant enemies is far higher than any x% resistance.

It’s designed so you have to make a choice based on your opponent.

It’s so far better that right now you don’t even have to consider in no scenario of the current game are you ever going to pick x% ele resistance over x% dmg reduction from distant enemies.

The deminishing return on ele resistance are aswell much higher because you already always have ele resistance as base stat.

What you’re asking for, would be OP

I didn’t ask for anything. It’s the actual state of the game right now.

If you are still not sure what i’m trying to tell you just watch Kripparrians video.

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As far as game design goes I think the core of the development team are stuck in a different era with many of their idea’s … especially after listening to the live stream fireside chat and their approach to some of the issues. For me it lacked creativity, no new ideas and rehashed old ideas that also have many issues … as far as rebalancing the Resists; Blizz’s approach will mean that all Rebalances will need Rebalancing :slight_smile:

7

And Cold resist is both, melee and range :slight_smile:
If the opponent can do only Cold damage, that’s better than anything else :slight_smile:

Range/Melee DR is a different layer of DR. It’s not elemental resist, it has a multiplicative relation with elemental resist. So if you allready have lots of resists, your combined Range/Melee DR against Elemental Damage is going to have the same diminishing returns as your combined Elemental DR.
1 - (1 - 0.2 Range or Melee DR)(1 - Total DR) = 1 - (1 - 0.2 Element DR)(1 - Total DR)
The only difference is the circumstance.

Range DR and DR from Resist are two independent parameters.
Range DR provides 20% range damage mitigation regardless of element type.
All Resist provides 10% all elemental damage mitigation regardless of range.
And Single Resist provides ~20% damage mitigation against one element regarldess of range.
It’s not easy to compare them.

Yes, 20% range DR and 20% melee DR would be equivalent to 20% All DR.
And in order to have 20% All DR from single resists, you’d need 6 slots with ~60% single resist of each type :thinking:

But if they buff single resists, you’ll just stack different single resists on items (85 cold on helm, 85 fire on pants, 85 poison on boots e.t.c) and will be almost unkillable for some opponents.
If you could get 40% Cold DR from one single piece (double the current ammount), it would be twice as effective as Range DR if you’re fighting a Cold Sorc :slight_smile:
As it is now, you can choose between Cold Res and Range DR :slight_smile:
Both stats have same value under certain circumstances.

I’m afraid that they may nerf other DRs instead of buffing Resists :joy:
But I think they won’t change anything any time soon since it is not proven that Resists are worse than other DRs :slight_smile:
I’d argue, they’re even better than Armor when you go deep into Nightmare Dungeons, since Armor is going to be only about 5% effective if you’re fighting monsters 50 levels above yours, while resists are not affected by monster level, only world tier, and it’s always 60% effectiveness on highest world tier and highest monster level.

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8

x2 on this one some poison dudes and their poison pools damage are way to high

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9

If it’s only with poison, that’s more of a “Incoming Poison Damage” problem rather than “Damage Reduction” problem :sweat_smile:

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Do you not find that all poison enemies hit unusually hard compared to other elements? Take fire, even without resists the damage seems to come in much slower

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TBH, as a Sorc, I don’t really have problems with poison. I have 4 ways to cleanse it. :sweat_smile:
I don’t deny it’s very strong, but I don’t think it’s a Resist problem, since other elements don’t hit that hard as you say.
I’t just poison damage might be bugged or needs some tuning, not resistances :slight_smile:

12

Poison can be cleansed? how?

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Well, it doesn’t directly cleanse poison, but whenever I activate Flame Shield I am immune for 2.3 seconds and I have no more poison when the immunity ends. :woman_shrugging:
Deep Freeze makes me immune for 4 seconds.
Also, when I have Barriers, they absorb poison as well, since barriers work as additional layers of HP. And thanks to Protection Skill passive, I get barriers whenever I use cooldown skills. And I have 5 (+1 charge) skills with cooldown.

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Kripparian has made a very interesting video about resistances, showing the change in damage reduction per %resist and per %dr.
Go watch it.

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That’s actually why I opened this topic :slight_smile:
He’s missing some important things. He should be taking into consideration the Total Combined Damage Reduction. (not just Armor and Resist)

While Elemental DR goes up only by 2-3% and Melee DR rise by 20%, both options provide roughly the same value to your Total Combined Damage Reduction that includes Armor, Resists and any other sorts of Damage Reduction that apply.

If you think your resists are badly affected by diminishing returns, so is your melee DR when you combine it with your resists because they multiply with eachother. :slight_smile:
You just see it as a separate stat.

Yes, Armor is strong, but it’s only strong against monsters of your level.
Its effectiveness decreases exponentially with each level above yours, reaching about 5% effectivenes when you go against monsters 50 levels above. While resists are affected only by World Tier, and have the same effectiveness at any monster level.

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The thing is, %Resist on items has insane diminishing returns on how much actual %Resist you get.
He showed that, with enough %Resist already stacked, you can equip an item with 52%Resist, and you only get 4% added, and therefore 2% damage reduction. Of that specific element.
I think Blizzard should have never implemented resistances as % values on items/paragons, and instead as a flat value like in all other Diablo games.
Then you can add %Resist based on that flat value.
Now you have, from how i interpret it, 2 separate values that are displayed as the same.
And it looks as is %Resist is terrible on items from what you get from it.
You can get %Armor as a roll, which gives you far more total damage reduction per affix.

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All types of DR have the same diminishing returns! Don’t isolate your parameters if you want to know their true value. As I explained before, 10% All DR is going to apply in combination with your resists! The more resist you have, the less you get from All DR, since your final DR is allready pretty high, thanks to resists.
The only difference, is that resists have a penalty on torment difficulty, but they roll like 2 to 7 times higher than pure DR.

If your Combined DR is 85%

  • 10% All DR will rise your Final Unconditional DR by 0.1x(1-0.85) = 1.5%
  • 68% Fire resist will rise your Final Fire DR by 0.68x(1-0.85)x0.5x0.6 = 3%
  • 20% melee DR will rise your Final Melee DR by 0.2x(1-0.85) = 3%

And your 40% Non-Physical DR from Armor is going to drop to about 1.25% when you’ll go against lvl 150 monsters! Don’t use lvl 100 Monsters for comparsions. They’re not our main target.
Armor DR halves every ~10 levels (circa). So if you go to monsters that are 50 levels above, your Armor DR is going to have 1/2^5 = 1/32 = 3.12% of it’s initial value!
Your resists and other types of DR are going to be way more effective than Armor!

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But why is %Resist on gear if it is not a percentage of anything?
That is not how percentages work.
They should just drop the % of resistances to give you a flat value, and give you, like with armor, a % damage reduction from that resistance value.
Now it is just a complete mess with DR on percentages, which does not work mathematically.
And from the displayed % Damage reduction value from armor and resistances, armor has far higher effectiveness, because your damage reduction from armor increases far more per stat on item than from resistances.

19

But why is %Resist on gear if it is not a percentage of anything?
That is not how percentages work.

It’s a percentage of damage! It’s literally in the name - “25% Fire Damage Resistance”
25% Damage Resisted = 75% Damage Taken

They should just drop the % of resistances to give you a flat value, and give you, like with armor, a % damage reduction from that resistance value.

That’s how it was in D3 and there was diminishing returns too. And it was less intuitive since the formula was %Resist = Resist/(Resist + Monster Level*5).

Now it’s directly % of damage. Each item is givint you exactly what it says, relative to the damage you are currently taking, with your current gear and stats.
It means that if you currently take 1000 damage from a mob that deals 2000 damage, you will take 800 damage if you put on an amulet with 20% all res.
It is exactly 20% relative to the damage you are currently taking, but it’s 10% relative to the Original Damage dealt by the monster, since it was already halved once by your gear before putting on the amulet.
Simple and clever!
If you want to know how much Relative value you get from your new item, you multiply what it gives with the complement of what you have.

Resists are no more tied to monster level! They don’t drop in efficiency when you go against monsters above your level, unlike Armor!

This is why armor works differently. Each poing of Armor gives you more Damage Reduction than the previous one! It grows exponentially. However, it also drops exponentially when you go against monsters above your level.
So if you have 6000 Armor at level 100, you’ll have about 20% Non-Physical Damage Reduction against level 100 monsters. But if you go to a Nightmare Dungeon where monsters are 30 levels above - your Non-Physical Damage Reduction will be halved about 3 times, resulting in 2.5% Non-Physical Damage Reduction from 6000 Armor!
While your Resists will remain unaffected!

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Thats not what happens.
50% resistance on gear does not equal 50% reduced damage taken.
In his video, Kripp shows that 50% resistance on gear increases his actual resistance by 4? or 8? %, can’t remember the value now. //edit: he got 4% resistance/2% damage reduction in his char sheet from 50% on the gear. And no, he was not at 96% damage reduction from resistance.
Therefor, there are at least TWO separate values for resistance, both displayed in %.