UC: The Good, The Bad, The Hideous (in General)

A Recent discussion about the "Oh Yeah's" and "O Crap's" of using UC recently elbowed its way into a thread about Fireball and Fire Familiars, and I figured it'd be nice to make a new thread for it. It's been discussed before, but has every angle been covered?

BrandonLP has mentioned in the past that the only way to go is with High Dexterity. (Reference)

GentlemanLoser Says the only way to go is to unlearn it in favor of a DD spell. (Reference)

I think that both of them have their ratios in a twist.

I'm sure that Brandon and GL will have plenty to chomp about in this thread, but I hope to include as many opinions/facts from others as possible, so rant away.

To clarify my position: I think that UC should be trained at a relatively low level compared to ST and DX. It should be treated like BL and Archery, 1/4th of your ST.

PTH will be low for the most part, but that will not be an issue in the long term.

at 1/4th of your ST what stats would the UC then have? (some numbers would be nice)

Don't forget that the UC skill stat (the number in here) is the damage and to hit modifier:

so an UC of 50 would mean [??x50] (+50) with an unknown base damage.

My opinion would be to treat it like if it was a real weapon. If you need more damage then train UC, if not then let it be.

Yup, that's how it works shade.

Not pumping UC is like using a Tulwar... And I know no one does that! :P

High Dex + UC s Evasion (Which might or might not be meh) leads to you be not hit much by Tanks. But you need to use a ToA to keep up with ToA Tanks. UC seems like it could be the perfect anti-tank set up, but it just deals so little damage.

Oh, and GA hurts.

I've been thinking about this UC modifier. The Wiki says it's both PTH and Damage mod. I've said it in chat. Everyone believes it is true. But is it?

I've used UC for a long time. Pretty much since it was introduced back in CB1. I remember that back then it was accepted that the PTH value was related to the effect, but the damage mod was just as "Unknown" as the base damage of UC.

Now, I'm pretty sure that I helped start the rumor that the effect of UC is both damage and PTH mods (I wanted to believe that back in the day and used to talk about my "theory" in chat all the time), but I don't think that it has ever been proven or confirmed by Jon.

So where does that leave us?

Jon confirmed it in CB1. The UC weapon looks like;

[VBD x UC] (+UC)

VBD = An as of yet unknown Virtual Base Damage UC = UC skill effect

UC is just for the laugh of it :)

Btw, beat this !!!

Unarmed Combat: 888,374/196,063 (80)

Jyuuken tapped Mage [10409] -- WOOHOO !!! GO GO UC !!
Jyuuken tapped Mage [7384]
Byakugan's familiar's Magic missile hit Mage [175539] -- As expected from my fine , 470k MM

Ah. Thank you. I've wondered about that for a while.

Now for another use of the UC tank: An Archer.

So, you cannot fire all three rounds without Archery... But you aren't putting any net worth into a melee weapon, leaving the surplus to be pumped into a ranged weapon like an Axbow or Elbow.

(BTW, weapon NW/PR ratio is not independent. What I mean is, there isn't a cap for a ranged weapon and another cap for a melee weapon--it's all one big cap. Hehe. I think.)

And, your evasion bonus in ranged makes you pretty darned hard to hit, even against ToA tanks.

Your absolutly right on the weapon cap.

If your cap is 5 mil, it's 5 mil. Not 2.5/2.5. Your PR from weapons will be the same with a 2 mil morg and a 3 mil elbow or a 5 mil elbow.

So you have a TON to throw into a bow.

A UC archer always remind me of Keiser from Resident Evil 4, if you've played it.

I don't dare to say we have a TON to throw into Axbow. Do you know how important armour is to UC tanks ? And do you know the cost of upgrade of Helm's gauntlets ?

Knight, I'm pretty sure that the weapon cap and armor cap are independent.... but I've been full of crap lately, so I'd love it someone could confirm this.

Some numbers for Nonsensical Knight

Your PR / MPR: 652,611 / 434,006
My PR / MPR: 147,963 / 109,389

Your UC is trained to equal levels of your ST and then boosted by items.

My UC is currently a little less than half of my ST and boosted by a Gi.

I do about half of the amount of damage you do per hit.

It's obvious to me that if you retrained UC to say, 1/4 of your ST and put the rest in core stats, you'd see a huge increase in damage.

There is no armour Cap. All armour increases PR, it just does so now at 1/3 the rate it used to.

:)

NK highlights my point. Not taking into account his Str and Dex, he has the equivalent of over 800K worht of xp trained into his UC weapon.

And it does about 5% damage his 470K MM does...

UC Archer is pretty terrible as well. I'm still testing out UC damage with a Gi and ToA. I think the ToA is a temporary route, as using an EC with enough DX will eventually outweigh using a ToA, plus the Gi is granting me about 55 AC right now.

VK, doubling your strength (to around 50K?) will not double your damage.

Besides, that posted UC damage from NK was low, possible hitting a ToE minion. So don't base your damage from it.

The last thing I want to do is sound like a broken record--or to offend anyone, for that matter--but I disagree with you, GL. I think it illustrates my point. UC is just way too high for his level right now. I think UC has a sweet spot (not sure what exactly it is) compared to your other stats, and that sweet spot is definitely LOWER in relation to the rest of your stats. Once you pass this target, excessive amounts of UC are just wasted.

Brandon, I'm not so sure about a ToA being temporary.

A level 200K Tattoo gives (it's 60% in dex isn't it?) 120K worth of dex. You would need a 12% dex increase from items and a natural 1 million dexterity to equal that.

By the time anyone has got 1 million in dex, I think ToA s will be giving at least double that. So 24% increase to break even.

*Shrugs* I guess we'll have to wait! ;)

;) No offense taken VK, but I still disagree with you. Strength does less the higher it gets. You're at the low end of the curve, so for you it makes sense to pump your str.

UC is just like a weapon.

You don't hear *any* tanks being told to keep their weapon X or + at a static level.

But I understand what you're saying.

Tanks can just spend their xp on str and dex, UC has to split that xp between UC as well, so there must be a sweet spot.

Up your weapon by another plus 1, or boost your strength by 10/20/50/100K.

Still, it's damage sucks. No one can deny that. And the only other bonus from using UC (The inherant Evasion for dodging) is now ruined with the skill/item stacking.

*Shrugs*

Missed this;

"Once you pass this target, excessive amounts of UC are just wasted."

Never.

It's not like Archery or BL that have a realtionship with your Str. The bigger your UC the better. Period. Points in UC are never wasted.

But, you might get more damage if you use your xp to increase your str instead of UC.

"you might get more damage if you use your xp to increase your str instead of UC."
--GL

That's what I meant by wasted. I suppose "wasted" is the wrong word for what I was trying to convey.

Well that example was indeed TOE :P This is what a normal dude would take from :

Jyuuken fractured Orphan blood [42249]
Jyuuken draws strength from his weapon! [13311]
Jyuuken crunched Orphan blood [61730]
Jyuuken draws strength from his weapon! [15491]
Byakugan's familiar takes damage from his own Magic missile (41654)!
Byakugan's familiar's Magic missile hit Orphan blood [141357]

Notice the MM damage has already been weakened by AMF, but still outdo my UC tank in totality :P

I was totally expecting this post to have originated from GL. I was wrong.

Hey....

Where did I get such a reputation from? ;)

If GL had started this post it would read UC: I luuuurve you all

UC Blows folks, anyone and everyone who has tried it knows this. I tried it with a ToA, ToE, wall infront of UC minion with ToA, ToJ, ToE, and huge UC bonus eq on the UC minion. It could not compete with the same characters at its MPR much less its PR. Until it is boosted tremendously or the DD spell damage lessened, it is just not a viable option.

I have to agree with GL, there is not really a "sweet spot" for UC. For now, it's more worth my time to pump DX and HP, but I guarantee you I'll be heading after UC once I get those up a bit more. The damage, evasion, and to-hit bonus are just too nice to pass up.