Weapon attack speed and proficiency and not agility

[WaltF4]

I have conducted some testing on the effects of weapon proficiency and agility on weapon attack speed. The basic test was conducted by recording the number of two-handed polearm thrusts that could be executed within 60 seconds. I preformed the tests with a number of polearms of different weapon speed and with different polearm proficiencies. All of the reported values were taken from the averages of 3 individual time trials conducted at each condition. The following plot shows the time per thrust verses polearm proficiency. I have also noted the agility that the testing character possessed at the time of the trial.

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The most obvious feature of this data is the linear relationship between  time per attack and proficiency. The slope of each weapon line gives the reduction in time per attack per point of proficiency while the y-axis intercept of each weapon line gives the time per attack with 1 proficiency (technically 0 proficiency but the difference is inconsequential given the small slopes.) The time per attack at 1 proficiency has a linear relationship with weapon speed as seen in the following figure:
 

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The slopes of each weapon line are such that 100 proficiency results in a ~6.5% reduction in time per attack relative to the 1 proficiency time per attack. Therefore, weapon proficiency has a greater absolute reduction in the time per attack for slower weapons than for faster weapons. Additionally, these results show that agility has no observable impact on the time per attack for a weapon as there is not a significant change in the slope of time per attack verses proficiency between the different agility test conditions.

To put this in perspective, a level 30 character with 3 agility, no weapon master, and 110 polearm proficiency would attack ~5% slower than a level 30 character with 27 agility, 9 weapon master, and 180 polearm proficiency if both characters were to use a speed 94 polearm. The absolute difference in time per attack between these two characters would be ~0.06 seconds. This is significantly less than the 12% difference in attack speed one would expect if agility was providing the purported 0.5% reduction in attack speed per point and the difference of 70 proficiency was ignored.

Another interesting result was that all of the polearm attack animations (thrust, overhand, and slashes) take the same amount of time to execute completely. However, this does not necessarily mean that the time between releasing an attack and landing an effective hit is the same for all of the polearm attack animations.

[Mr_Moe]

Thats what theory crafting is all about!
Great post, thanks for the work, very interesting.
Do you know in which way Power Strike attempts the attackspeed?

greetings

[Blackstone]

agility has no observable impact on the time per attack for a weapon

Interesting post patch change. I wonder if an identical test with a 2-handed weapon would be comperable or not to polearm, thus clarifying if animation in fact changes weapon speed.

[corto]

i dont want to say yes or no, just a question:

i play an archer, so i stay at 0 wpf in melee every damn time.
i retired for the 11th time, and it is always like this:

the only thing i can use when lvl 1 is my nordic short sword (103 speed, 28 cut)

so, in one round i have the direct change from

0 wpf 0 pstrike 21 agi

then


0 wpf 0 pstrike 3 agi

and know what?  its damn slow and yes its freakin fast with 21 agi.

(no shield involved)

[ManOfWar]

I always thought 100 proficiency was enough to get by, another question is, how much of a problem is this?

[dontgothere]

Great post Walt!    I wonder if all of your findings reflect intentional settings within CRPG...

[ViiKOLD]

Numbers don't lie but from experience perspective it dosn't make any sence. Agility does effect your movement and swing speed, maybe to that much for polearms but definately for 2h weapons.

IMHO to have a better picture you need to gather data using swings or overhead - one that takes most of the time to complete.
Cause playing str build I don't see a problem in making fast stabs but swings go really slow compared to agi build. WPF in both cases is close to 120.

[Belatu]

/clap

now could be fine to know how affects athletics on that

[Tears of Destiny]

We need to make a sticky with ALL of Walt Analysis Posts in it, an official "Walt" thread.

Seriously.

[Opium.dk]

So what you're saying is that i want WPF and not agility if i want to increase my swings with polearm?

I hope youre correct and i hope nobody reads this thread so i can outspam everyone.

[zagibu]

There's a problem though: you can't get WPF without agility.

[Murrogh]

There's a problem though: you can't get WPF without agility.

But you can get agility without WPF. So it is easy to test, just get a character with lots of agility and use a weapon that you have no WPF in and compare it to another with low agility.

[WaltF4]

I wonder if an identical test with a 2-handed weapon would be comperable or not to polearm, thus clarifying if animation in fact changes weapon speed.

so, in one round i have the direct change from

0 wpf 0 pstrike 21 agi

then


0 wpf 0 pstrike 3 agi

and know what?  its damn slow and yes its freakin fast with 21 agi.

(no shield involved)

I preformed my time per attack test with a practice longsword (two handed and speed 94) and a nordic short sword (one handed and speed 103.)

With the practice longsword,  1 two handed proficiency, and 3 agility:    1.16 seconds per thrust, slash, or overhand
With the practice longsword,  1 two handed proficiency, and 15 agility:  1.15 seconds per thrust, slash, or overhand
With the nordic short sword, 1 one handed proficiency, and 3 agility:     1.07 seconds per thrust, slash, or overhand
With the nordic short sword, 1 one handed proficiency, and 15 agility:   1.07 seconds per thrust, slash, or overhand

A difference of 12 agility had no significant impact on the time per attack for a weapon. The difference in time per attack was less than 1% and was within the error limit of this testing method. The time per attack for a 94 speed two handed weapon was the same as for a 94 speed polearm (used with both hands) when both are used with 1 weapon proficiency. Holding a shield does not change the time per attack for a one handed weapon.

There's a problem though: you can't get WPF without agility.

True, weapon master currently yeilds ~8 proficiency points per rank for a level 30 character who is placing all of their WPF in a single proficiency. Spending 3 attribute points in agility and 1 skill point for weapon master reduces your time per attack by ~7 milliseconds if you are only training a single proficiency.

[Dravic]

But agility has impact on weapons speed if we fight. With higher agility, i think you can counter attack a bit faster.

[Kung Fu Jesus]

I think the "speed" people are seeing is just timing. I've tried 3 agility and 24 agility. I always feel I am slower than my opponent, in terms of swinging. I think that's because my timing is shit.