Marksman with Jelkhor's knife: Lightning or Melee Lightning?

Rogue
1

Hi guys,

I came across the Detonating Arrow (DA) Build with Explosive Trap (ET) using Jelkhor’s knife to a discussion whether Lightning Damage or Lightnig Melee Damage is a better choice for affixes on the knife and the relict. I would assume that LD > LMD because ET also benefits from.

Thanks in advance!

2

there are rumors in the theorycrafting community that Melee Lightning Damage is better in early game and with better gear % lightning Damage gets better. But I didn’t see any calculations for this thesis yet.

Both stats are useful for this build…

3

The only build I know only uses one node in the Marksman tree and then flicks through all the other melee skills.

4

The incremental benefit uou get from either flat or % increased damage modifiers depends on how much of both you have. Flat damage is usually relatively harder to get than % increased, but the incremental benefit if both drop off late game as you’d have more of both, so it just depends which one you have least of compared to how much the proposed passive/affix would add.

5

As @Llama8 said, the distribution of your stats is important to maximize results.

Let’s assume A represents your flat damage, and B your total percent including the 100% base value (100% + increased percent). X is your resulting damage.

A is 50.
B is 400%.
X = 50 * 400% = 200

To double your damage from this point, you have to double one of the two factors A or B.
+50 flat damage is worth +400% increase in this case.

Lets say the two mods you can now choose from are called Delta_A and Delta_B:

Delta_A = +10
Delta_B = +100%.

To see what is more effective, divide Delta_A by A and Delta_B by B and compare the result. The higher is the better one. In this case:
Effectiveness_A = Delta_A / A = 10 / 50 = 0.2
Effectiveness_B = Delta_B / B = 100% / 400% = 0.25

So, Delta_B is worth more than Delta_A from your current standpoint.

If you have multiple mods, add all Delta_As with each other before dividing by A and all Delta_Bs before dividing by B.

Since A and B are multiplied, you want to distribute your mods so your effectiveness_A and effectiveness_B are as close as possible.

If you can have Effectiveness_A = 1 and Effectiveness_B = 2, you end with 2
If you can have Effectiveness_A = 1.8 and Effectiveness_B = 1.2, you end with 2.16
If you can have Effectiveness_A = 1.5 and Effectiveness_B = 1.5, you end with 2.25

3 Likes
6

All of the above is 100% true and accurate, two notes though.

  1. Given that as Llama said flat is relatively more rare in available sources, just make sure you plan out what’s on your gear long term, and calculate which adds more weight from there, rather than just looking at current state. It would stink to add increased because you don’t have a lot currently, end up getting a bunch more elsewhere, and now flat would be better but no other slots can take it and you need to craft a new one to optimize your damage.

  2. As you alluded to, you’ve got to consider the overall damage of the build, not just DA. But for ET, how much damage is it really doing on its own anyway? Do you have sources of flat throwing damage to pump it up, or is it barely doing any damage anyway (comparatively) and increasing its damage will barely move the needle on the overall build?

Happy to help run some calcs if you link your char in a build planner, as the tl;dr answer is, of course, “it depends” XD

1 Like