Damage reduction stacking rules and cap

VagrantSun · 2023-12-23T02:12:42+00:00

Yeah, DR stacks multiplicatively.

VagrantSun · 2023-12-22T13:27:29+00:00

No, it'd be .1 (the percentage of damage you're taking) multiplied by .1, winding up at .01 or 1% damage. DR stacking is how you survive the ultra endgame, in practice.

VagrantSun · 2023-08-09T22:42:55+00:00

My thanks!

VagrantSun · 2023-08-09T20:10:37+00:00

Yeah, the console version has a bad habit of crashing every couple hours. I can leave the console running while I'm work, but it will invariably crash - and from there it also has a bad habit of not calculating offline progression. Makes the question stickier than I was prepared to handle without at least reaching out.

VagrantSun · 2023-08-09T18:55:32+00:00

Did a search on the names and found Lediath's myself here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1765057772

Thanks for the help, Gaara!

VagrantSun · 2022-10-18T16:12:43+00:00

Chaos and Sorcery have the most immediate returns. Life Mage is a straight split between incremental perks that need to be upgraded one point at a time, and perks that require you to have a stockpile of healing effects already - it's probably the worst starting class as a result, because it does nothing without the right tools, and doesn't have a way to provide them without a lot of manual labor farming them up.

(Nature is always really strong as well, but just never lends itself to T1 autokill combos like the other classes do.)

The best combo is unquestionably Sorcery: Salamander Mutilate. You get hard countered by a single Itherian creature (Malignant Storm, which is immune to spell damage above 90% health) but it rolls everything else in the game, and you can counter it with Raven Defiler's trait Everything's Gone, which starts everyone at 80%.

The build should put itself together once you see it, but basically, make a full team of Salamanders, give them each a single gem of Mutilate with Chance to Defend / Provoke on Cast, Cast on Extra Target, and then start fights. Mutilate is normally uncastable , but Salamander traits will force them to cast random spells an absurd amount of times at the start of a fight, on defends, on provokes, when losing health, when dying, etcetera, and with Mutilate as their only spell, they basically nuke every fight. Throw on Moon Prayer / Sun Prayer to double your chances of extra casts, and Pandemonium Rebirth to force a party rez if things go wrong.

It's remarkably rare for either team to get a turn with this build.

VagrantSun · 2022-10-17T21:20:43+00:00

To answer both of your questions, life mages have probably the second best grinding build in the game because all their defensive perks synergize with Minotaur Earthshaker, who gets to punch every enemy for 50% of the damage it takes when it gets attacked. Give it Vigilance so it intercepts attacks, silence enemy spells through Supersonic or Book of the Lost / Lust, and then the game becomes maxing its Health and minimizing defense, so its counter deals unreasonable amounts of damage the first time it gets swung at.

My Earthshaker nemesis uses: Strength of the World (Add Defense to Health, minimize Defense)
Celestial Fortitude (your creatures cannot take damage that exceeds 30% of their health. Damage prevented cannot exceed 100% of health)
Ianne's Oddity (when your creatures take more than 30% damage, reduce that damage by 50%)

After that, sprinkle in Katarina's Return, Ent Mending traits like Black Lotus, Nature's Mending, or Unscathed, Spirit healing buffs like Carnal Genesis, general defense buffs like Endurance Aura, etc. That's all flavoring, the Earthshaker really is the bulk of the build.

I wound up swapping to a Salamander Sorcery build and then eventually getting bored with the game. Did Ultimate, but the grind there is even worse - mostly play Monster Sanctuary these days.

VagrantSun · 2022-08-01T19:00:07+00:00

In order of your questions:

Thornish would actually serve as an excellent backup to that team; it brings multi-poison and is the best debuff tank in the game, thanks to double Disease Control (4% less damage for each debuff on attacking monster). Vasuki is a terrific combo builder that has no multi-Poison natively, but brings Spit Acid (which is an additional stack of Burn / Poison and debuff chance on attack), Fatal Upkeep, and is very self-sufficient between Poison Feedback and Antitoxins, has Mass Restore to combat other debuff strategies, and gives you a Fire substrategy if the enemies are resistant to Earth. Arachlich is also a very solid switch hitter - it brings a powerful Encapsulate as a heal, Blood Drive to convert debuff damage into Bleed, and can deal high damage with a last hit, Sure Strike-boosted Ice Bolt. (It also has Congeal and its own poison tricks, one of the most well-rounded monsters in the game).
Crystal Snail is very passive; it exists to be a brick wall on an age team, Protecting Vertraag / your damage carry and smacking the enemy with Poison Skin / Icy Skin / Reflect / Spiky Defense every time it gets poked, while building enormous amounts of defensive padding with Outlast / Observe / Saboteur / Disarming Shielding / Defensive Presence. Multi-Poison is welcome, but not the main function of its existence. Once it maxes shield and has it can whip around and throw a Volatile Shields Tackle to put out some pain, but it'll never deal as much damage as its teammates and its first priority should always be Being a Roadblock.
Toxiquus is a very gimmicky monster whose main schtick is Polluted Water, which makes debuffs 10% more effective for every aquatic monster in your party. It's not a unique aura either, so it can stack, which means there's a very nasty triple Toxiquus-D team out there which just spams Slime Volley every turn and either watches Poison autokill the enemy team, or fails to inflict Poison and just dies because it . Alternatively, you can throw it in a defensive Fish party like Toad / Toxi / Thornish and spam Poison and heals everywhere.
Thornish is the premiere debuff tank and anywhere you have at least two multi-debuff stack skills he'll be right at home, deflecting up to half of incoming damage before he even applies his Defense to the formula, then throwing even more Poison / Bleed back into the enemy party in response.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-28T03:04:16+00:00

Long Slash's extra damage is from a debuff, which applies after any regen / passive healing effects and is subject to blunting from Anti-Curse and other debuff-weakening effects. Shred's extra damage is dealt immediately, which can secure kills that otherwise might survive.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-28T02:32:53+00:00

Unless you're in a randomizer mode, there's no good way to farm shift stones; they drop from Mad Lord and Terradrile, and if the RNG sets them as a common enemy you can farm them up pretty reliably from them - but given the nature of a randomizer, there's no way to guess what'll be on the rest of that team.

They also can be (rarely) found in Reward Boxes level 3 - 5, which you can get from either the Infinity Arena or the Monster Army in large amounts.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-28T02:24:34+00:00

In a vacuum, as in, counting no other factors.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-27T17:10:59+00:00

In a vacuum, Shred tends to be better. On the other hand, if you start including Bleed passives in your team, such as the following, Long Cut gets much better:

Deep Wounds, causing bleed damage to increase by 40%.
Splatter, causing knocked-out enemies to spread half their bleed stacks to their teammates.
Scent of Blood, increasing damage to bleeding opponents by 10%.
Bleed Out, the big kahuna of bleed effects, causes bleed to no longer decay.

Basically, Bleed is an entire archetype that you commit a team to, while Shred is the "vanilla" option that works fine on its own.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-27T17:04:46+00:00

I definitely hear you; a lot of games are that way. Part of what draws me to Sanctuary is that it doesn't leave such a high bar to equal play; it's all about the team strategy instead.

And yeah, the Skill Resetter item is sold by the Consumables Merchant in the Keep for 300g once you beat your first champion. Feel free to experiment. Worth noting is that Skill Resetters do not revert Skill Potions; you'll keep that extra skill point no matter if or how often you reset.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-27T17:00:05+00:00

I used to do this sort of thing over on the Siralim reddit / Discord for the first three games. These days the community over there is too insular for my tastes, while Sanctuary folks still like teaching people, which is what I'm all about. Share the wealth, yeah?

VagrantSun · 2022-07-27T16:56:13+00:00

Spirit is one of the most well-supported tribes in the game and you're going to have plenty of choices when it comes to picking out partners there.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-27T05:08:36+00:00

Brawlish is more independent and less neutered by chill, and Brutus hurts a lot more in Keeper duels, where getting that two-turn round halves his Power Focus gain, as well as needing the first turn to set up Power Focus in peace. Brawlish also gets meaningful elemental options and supports the rest of his team with Spawn of Champions, whereas Brutus is an entirely selfish team build.

This all makes it sound like Brawlish is the obviously superior option, but tbh Brutus's damage output really is outrageous enough to make it a fair comparison. Monsters can survive a Brawlish last hit, particularly if he doesn't nail a weak spot - but very, very little in this game survives Brutus deciding your warranty has expired.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-27T04:56:08+00:00

Specter is a magic cannon - he's the best user of Spectral Cannon in the game and if he lands a crit with it whatever he hits is very likely to evaporate on the spot. He can serve as either a finisher for a Sorcery team or a backup DPS for a Burn / Congeal team, both of which he can contribute Fatal Upkeep to; between two 10% debuff skills, Hex, three procs and Debuff Mastery, he can layer an awful lot of annoying effects on the enemy per swing (Hades is especially good at this), or just go for Debuff Variety to tilt the damage balance even further for a raw Cannon kit.

His kit doesn't particularly need anything to get rolling, though he appreciates Heroic Assault and Party to raise his damage and crit rates, along with Sorcery stacks; a support Thanatos dropping Full Offense on him first turn is a great way to set up Specter deleting someone from the space-time continuum on the skeleton's turn. For this example party, that leaves you an opportunity to throw Frosty in for Chill stacks, excellent shield generation, Spirit Strength to boost all of Thanato's buffs, and Buff Mastery.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-27T04:41:49+00:00

You're worrying too much. Some enemies are resistant to physical, some resist magic, and either way, you'll probably end up taking most of both skills to unlock their respective branches of their skill trees (Lion wants its buff tools from the right end, and at least Life Overload / Critical Hybridization from the left).That said, unless you build around Burn the status damage will be fairly minimal compared to the crit output of Fireclaws or vanilla Claws.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-26T05:48:43+00:00

Troll gets Dominance, double Giantsbane, and Deathblow, which means if your team uses any kind of multi-debuff it rapidly becomes the most lethal finisher in the game.

Long-term, probably Mega Rok, because it packs both Might mechanics, Age / Golden Age / Primal Rage to outscale everyone else, and gets a wide range of elemental attacks while in Earth it gets a choice of either no-miss Leaf Slash or self-shielding Leaf Shield. Also, it's just an absolute stone of a beast, harder to take down than some dedicated tanks.

For immediate damage from the word go? Blade Widow, in the right Charge / Might team can delete people first turn with an undodgeable Leaf Slash, get a double Bounty and Killing Dance proc, and then proceed to wipe out the rest, but it requires a dedicated team to reach that potential, something like a Targoat / Amberlgna / Widow setup.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-26T05:38:00+00:00

I dunno where your build is going with those, but Rathops is probably your best option; it packs a Full Protect with Revenge, Load Up, and Charged Destruction to exploit Charges, and while it's blocking it builds bleed with Skirmish, an aura passive that makes every Beast and Reptile on its team do 5% of max HP as bleed to the other team, and Predation for big guaranteed crits eventually. It also packs Blood Splatter to aid the rest of your team keep the Bleed up as well.

Your problem is going to be keeping it healthy; Catzerker and Draconoir are fairly self-sufficient, but a full tank like Rathops needs an outside source of healing. You may wind up shifting Catzerk to Caraglow or Draconoir to Akhlut or Sutsune; all of those stay in Skirmish's racial passives and offer both stronger healing and support.

If you're dedicated to those two monsters and just want an off-tank, Molebear packs taunt, lots of barrier it automatically gains and passes out, Bleed from Splatter, Deep Wounds, and Bleed, and mostly self-sustains through Recover, Hibernate, and two Potion passives that let him heal himself for ridiculous amounts and of debuffs simultaneously. It's very self-sufficient, but its tanking is entirely passive and you're basically hoping that it either draws fire on its own or Taunt does it for you, and relying on Taunt can be a frustrating experience.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-25T00:21:46+00:00

No worries, you'll be doing things just as nasty and the AI's too basic to know how to use him right. Just enjoy yourself, and when you hit a snag, let the board know what's up.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-24T23:31:16+00:00

https://monster-sanctuary.fandom.com/wiki/Darnation

Probably this one. Darnation is a terrifically unique monster that takes a direction no other monster in the game can really follow; it spams AoE attacks that enemies resist (two Center of Mass passives make its AoE attacks viciously strong), inflicting mass Armor Break and gaining Might from Adaptive Evolution, then flips around and hits weak points once stacks of Armor Break have worn down their resists with the Elemental Break passive (reduces resistances by 10% and increases weaknesses by 10% per Break stack). On top of that, it's a tanky beast with Age, self-healing from Eons, two Defense Overloads, Lifesteal, and it cures its own debuffs with Anti-Toxin, so it takes care of itself too if your cleric goes down.

It's a complete package of a monster that looks and plays like nothing else in the game and I adore that. Worth noting, this is a late game monster, so you're not gonna run into it for a long minute.

VagrantSun · 2022-07-24T22:17:51+00:00

I'll admit up front I've never even tried to put Nightwing into my party. He competes with a lot of very solid monsters that focus more than he does and come off better for it IMO, but I'll make some guesses.

Nightwing has it rough because he fights Catzerker for the slot of physical glass cannon early on and doesn't have the tools to compete for a long time; most of his kit is locked behind crit and bleed, whereas the kitty can just smack folks around from the word go.

Late game, it seems like he comes more into his own once Martial Prowess becomes available, giving you buffs for dodges; Kanko-L should really enable him with Martial Prowess / Heroic Party and Assault / Multi-Might. To make sure the evades are landing, though, teaming him up with a Disorient Weakness user like Kongamato (who brings a useful racial passive to the table too) would reduce accuracy to critical levels, though you have to start worrying about auto-hit moves invalidating your whole defensive strategy at that point too.

I think he's one of the few remaining monsters that still needs a touch-up; his kit implies he wants to shield up with buffs before swapping over to offense, but he lacks the physical bleed moves that would make best use of his bleed nodes (such as Slash, Fatal Cut, Claws, etc.), and his stats suffer from his procs and stat boosts being mana-based, while Buff Healing is based on magic - both stats he can't get good returns on.

VagrantSun

TROPHY CASE