chargecheese

[Dimers]

What is chargecheese?

I understand there are plenty of items, paragon paths, races, feats and so on that improve charge attacks. But really, you're still just making one attack on your turn, right? Even if that one attack is at +4 to hit and +8+3d6+d8 damage, or whatever, I wouldn't think that's unreasonable for play in 4e when your character is focused on any one thing.

So is there something I'm missing about charging that can make it just sick overpowered? Like, I dunno, making a charge as an opportunity action with the trigger "when any enemy within 10 squares starts their turn", or something similarly over-the-top. What makes chargecheese "cheese"?

[Firebug]

In general, you are only making one attack on your turn anyway (at least at lower levels). Unless you are a Burst/Blast controller or have a Twin-Strike like power usable often.

Charging is powerful because it also gives you the ability to move. If you were dazed and no enemies in reach? Charge. If you are slowed and the closest enemy is 4 squares away? Move + Charge. At higher levels daze and other conditions are thrown out a lot more often, so it stays useful.

If you have a power that attacks a single enemy 2-3 times or an Area burst that hits 2+ enemies, by all means use that. But not all classes do.

Charging generally gets all of the MBA-cheese as well, unless you are using a different power usable on a charge. Which makes it very attractive for Essentials classes.

Also, lets look at the math a little. Normally, you are expected to hit 60% of the time (as a semi-op striker anyway), so you hit on a 9. A +4 bonus means you are now hitting on a 5. You just increased your accuracy by 33%. If it was a hard to hit target (hitting 40% of the time perhaps) so hitting on a 13, a +4 would make you hit on a 9. Or a 50% increase in accuracy.

So assuming you had the option of a double attack instead of a charge, and that double attack did 1W with a Gouge so 2d6b1 + 20 to each hit. So with a 60% hit rate, each target would take 16.8 damage on average, or 33.6 total damage. If the double attack did 2W instead, it would be 21.6 and 43.2 respectively. Three targets at 1W would be 50.4.
And the charge did 2d6b1 +20 (+8 +3d6+1d8 the mods you said before). At the 80% hit rate, it would be 42.4 total damage.
Against hard to hit targets the 2W 2 targets condition is less damage then a charge, and the 1W 3 targets condition is only 3 more damage then charging.
Using a smaller weapon (d10 or smaller) the Charge wins the 2 2W condition. Or with less static damage (+10 instead of +20) Charge wins the 3 1W condition!

Oh, did you include targeting Reflex instead of AC in paragon for your +4 accuracy number? Deft Blade for martial classes (or multi-classes) anyway.

[Kurald Galain]

Part of what makes it so cheesy is that it's almost completely independent of class. Want to make a barbarian more powerful? Get the charge package. Want to optimize a vampire? Take the charge package again. Playing a scout? Charge package. Heck, you can make a wizard do respectable melee damage with the charge package. See the pattern here? It's kind of boring if most classes, when optimized, do pretty much the exact same thing.

[Kurald Galain]

You just increased your accuracy by 33%. If it was a hard to hit target (hitting 40% of the time perhaps) so hitting on a 13, a +4 would make you hit on a 9. Or a 50% increase in accuracy.

It remains funny every time people say that. No, a 33% increase is not a 50% increase. Math doesn't work that way.

[Dimers]

Oh, did you include targeting Reflex instead of AC in paragon for your +4 accuracy number? Deft Blade for martial classes (or multi-classes) anyway.

Heh, no, I just made up that whole line. I've read a couple webpages with feats and items listed for adding chargecheese to a build, but I haven't looked into specifics of what each of them does. Just talking outta my butt.

I can appreciate the point you make about adding movement, though I usually make fairly mobile builds anyway. But in terms of damage and accuracy ... there are so many interesting and effective ways to hit harder and more often. Does charging give higher numbers than most other optimization paths?

[Kurald Galain]

Does charging give higher numbers than most other optimization paths?

Yes, it does. There's also frostcheese, radiant cheese, and poaching twin strike; several of these can be combined in the same build, and most optimized builds feature two or more of this list.

[NecroRebel]

It remains funny every time people say that. No, a 33% increase is not a 50% increase. Math doesn't work that way.

The idea (though one that's very misleading) is that if you used to need a 12 or better to hit (45% chance), and you improved that to 9 or better (60%), the chance to hit, while only 15% better (60-45) in absolute terms, is 33% better (60/45) in relative terms. And that same 15% absolute improvement would be a 50% increase in relative terms if you originally hit on a 15 (30%), so 15% can be 33% and 50%!

This is, of course, stupid reasoning and no one should use it. The relative improvement is totally unimportant for virtually all purposes - the only place where it might be relevant is comparing a numerical bonus to a double-rolls effect.

[Firebug]

Sorry, I used the reason where if your average damage increased by 33% from only changing your accuracy, that it was a 33% increase in 'accuracy'. Or to put it in other terms, you were hitting 60 out of 100 times. You are now hitting 80 out of 100 times. What % of hits did you add relative to what you were doing before? 80/60 = 133%. 'Hits now' divided by 'hits before'.

I have 1 cup of sugar, I need 2 cups for this recipe, how much more (as a percentage) sugar do I need? 200%, or an increase of 100%. 2 / 1 = 200%. Or an increase or 100%.

How about, you have a 1% chance to hit, your hit chance increased to 2%. Did you double your chance to hit (an increase of 100%) or did you only gain 1%? The difference is, I am talking multiplicative, and you are talking additive. So technically we are both right. However, I find multiplicative to be vastly more useful when comparing numbers. With multiplicative, its all relative and the numbers are always meaningful because they can then be compared. With additive the numbers need context, or more information, and cannot be used on their own without said context.

Relative increases are used everywhere in real life. Running statistics and need to sum it up for the board? We increased our profits by 8% this quarter! Would it be more useful to state "our profits this quarter were 0.00000000000000000000000000108% of the worlds total currency! Up from 0.00000000000000000000000000100%!" If you weren't being relative... you need more information.

TLDR: Math does work that way.

[NecroRebel]

Sorry, I used the reason where if your average damage increased by 33% from only changing your accuracy, that it was a 33% increase in 'accuracy'. Or to put it in other terms, you were hitting 60 out of 100 times. You are now hitting 80 out of 100 times. What % of hits did you add relative to what you were doing before? 80/60 = 133%. 'Hits now' divided by 'hits before'.

The trouble is that you're talking about percentages of percentages, and it gets really confusing. When you say that you're getting a 25% increase in accuracy,for instance, do you mean that you got +5 to hit, or that you hit 40% of the time and now hit 50% of the time? The latter would be only a +2 to the attack roll, a big difference. Further, you have to assume a particular hit% to even determine the relative improvement anyway, which will often be inaccurate, whereas the absolute improvement is always the same (except in very rare cases where you're hitting 5 or 95% of the time).

The fact is that, in all relevant discussions on this section of the board, relative percentages aren't useful. As such, that's stupid reasoning and no one should use it (here, at least).

[Akodo Makama]

Relative increases are used everywhere in real life. Running statistics and need to sum it up for the board? We increased our profits by 8% this quarter! Would it be more useful to state "our profits this quarter were 0.00000000000000000000000000108% of the worlds total currency! Up from 0.00000000000000000000000000100%!" If you weren't being relative... you need more information.

TLDR: Math does work that way.

But even in this example, the 8% is a percentage of a direct number: Last Quarter's profits. That number can be used to create percents like "percent of GDP", but it isn't derived from GDP, so it isn't defined as a percent.

When interest rates change (a number that is defined as a percent) you never talk about it changing 3%, you say it went up 3 percentage points. This language evolved to avoid precisely the ambiguity that NecroRebel is describing. Bankers can't abide sloppy language.

Hit chance is already a defined as a percent. It should follow the same language rules as other defined percentages, like interest, rather than simple numbers, like profit.

Note: Profit can be defined as a percent of income (properly called "profit margin"), but when it is, lo and behold, economists and financial officers use the same language as bankers talking about interest. (eg "Our margins were up three points this quarter")

The only people who don't are news anchors, who know nothing about the subjects they report on anyway, and are just paid to be pretty faces that can smile while talking about how many children were on board the airliner when it crashed.

ETA: There is one time where calling a 5% chance to hit to 10% chance to hit can lead to a 100% increase: the number of times per day that the bard gets to do his happy dance because he actually hit something. In a day with 100 rolls, he used to hit 5 times, now he hits 10 times. But he's still useless with only a 10% change to hit, which is a perfect explanation of why percentages of percentages just lead to confusion.

[Firebug]

So you are saying it comes down to syntax. Percentage points vs percentage.

Too bad I used percentage exactly like you were describing instead of using percentage points.

Percentages (non points version) like I was using them are useful for comparisons much like correlations are. Just like correlations they are unitless, and therefore can be used to compare things that are completely different. Read any scientific journal. They use correlations to describe the data. Saying the rats in the test group for a drug spent 0.5 percentage points time drinking more water then the control group is almost meaningless. Saying that rats in the test group spent 75% more time drinking water is useful.

I can add a feat that adds +1 to all my attack rolls or +1 to all my defenses. If I was hit on a 6 anyway, but had a low chance to hit, hit on a 14, looking at the percentage increases will tell you a whole lot more then percentage points would. In this case both the attack and defense bonus is 5 percentage points. But if you were hit on a 6, adding +1 to your defenses means you are now hit on a 7, a 7.7% or 5 percentage points. On your attack if you were hitting on a 14 but now hitting on a 13, you are adding 16.67% or 5 percentage points. So which is the largest benefit for your character? So telling someone that adding one feat or the other increases their attack/defense by 5 points isn't that useful. But telling them that it increases their attack/defense by 17%/8% respectively is useful. To be fun lets throw in a few other things. Lets say you have a +5 to attack rolls feat, and a feat that increases your damage per power by 25% (say, +5 to damage rolls). With percentage points, how much damage did you increase? Well you can't say that you increased your total damage by 50 points, because that would be incorrect. It would actually by 56.25 points, because increasing the accuracy increases the damage indirectly. Because these values depend on each other using percentages makes the math much easier. With percentages you are hitting 25% more then you were before and when you do hit, 25% more damage. 125% * 125% = 156.25%, or 56.25% more then you were before. One calculation and it works great with excel.

So I still stand by that percentages are useful. Percentage points are also useful, but in a different way. Percentage points are useful in communicating, but I find percentages more useful in the actual math. Maybe I am coming at this from a research angle and you are coming at it from finance.

[Ashdate]

I think at a certain point, you need to be speaking the same language as everyone else if you want to communicate effectively. There's a basic simplicity to equating "+1/-1" to 5% increments that is simple to communicate. Having to examine a spreadsheet to find out what an ability is worth is not a great way of communicating.

Turning it into "this feat gives you a 7.3 (repeating)% bonus to damage, and this one gives you a 10.275% bonus to damage as long as you have x, y and z feats/powers and are attacking someone with an AC of 23" simply muddles the conversation. Save talking about "percentages of percentages" for the stock market.

[Kurald Galain]

So you are saying it comes down to syntax. Percentage points vs percentage.

No, the difference is that one method uses "percentage chance to hit" and the other uses "percentage of percentage of chance to hit". The latter is, well, needlessly complicated.

[Yakk]

I don't find it all that complicated. And it simplifies a bunch of analysis mathematics.

The decision "do I get feat A, which increases my average damage on a hit from 20 to 21" or "do I get feat B, which increases my chance to hit by +1" is a pretty common one when optimizing a character, and is very much simplified by using percentages-of-percentages.

It is true that people who are marginally mathematically inclined -- enough to grasp percentages, but not percent changes on percentages -- will find this tricky to deal with. But people who lack mathematical inclination might find "each +1 is worth about a 10% increase in damage" rule of thumb easier to deal with than having to recalculate their DPR to make a given decision. And those with enough mathematical inclination will be able to deal with percent changes of hit rates without breaking stride.

In short, there is basically a window where percent changes in hit rates causes confusion. Saying people who neglect the people in that window are doing something stupid is uncalled for. Negligent of a certain demographic? Sure.

[Raimun]

Most bonuses in 4e are situational. Charge is an easy situation to arrange.

Charge bonuses are many and strong.

You can easily make the charge more powerful than a Standard Action Encounter power. That means damage and extra effects.

You can fill your Class Encounter powers with Immediate attacks = More damage.

The best part? You can't run out of charges. :smallsmile:

[Dimers]

"Run out of charges? What do you take me for, a 3.5 wand?"

:smalltongue:

EDIT: You can't run out of at-wills, either, but that doesn't make them valuable. Still, point taken. Something that's both powerful and frequently applicable is at least pointed in a cheese-ward direction.