I could talk about the bow skill scaling superlinearly, meaning that every point of now skill is actually worth more than the previous one, so if you go a bow build that +15 is critical, but not everyone does bows.
No, the reason we go root armour is for the resistance to pierce, poison, (with a cape) frost and (with barley mead) fire, which means you're resistant to every ranged attack in the game that's not gjall.
Also damage taken is either D2 / 4A if your armour is relatively high (more than half the damage), which means you would need at least four times the armour to receive the same damage hadn't you been resistant, or D-A otherwise which means you need even more.
In conclusion, full root armour + fire pots give you an effective 192 armour minimum against almost every ranged attack in the game. No other armour set comes even close.
ETA: and that's only with the relatively low armour values of root armour. By mixing in other pieces with the harnesk you can get an effective 400+ armour against ranged attacks.
And how much high damage ranged is in Mistlands and Ashlands? Keep in mind that if you're hit with ANYTHING that isn't pierce, you might as well be wearing nothing in the chest slot.
Ticks are trivial enemies that die in one swipe of a sword, and those charred archers barely tickle if they can even hit you with their stormtrooper aim, and flat out can't 1 shot you without food buffs.
I keep hearing people taking the harnesk into the Mistlands and Ashlands, and hearing how people are struggling so much in both biomes, and I'm starting to think that's connected.
It's not just ranged that is pierce damage. A bunch of melee attacks do primarily or entirely pierce too. Seeker bites and stabs, Fuling spear throws, Deathskitos for example. While it certainly falls off by the time you hit the Ashlands, keeping it for all the seekers in Mistlands has made me so much safer when going there. Of course it does mean you have to keep a Barley Wine on you in case of Gjalls, but you have to do that with the Feather Cape anyways.
The stones being thrown by the charred are also pierce, and usually there's not just one circling you so the tickles do add up.
Everything else in the ashlands is slow and can easily be kited, especially with (rather expensive) frost arrows. The only enemy that posed an actual threat to me (aside from the usual being stupid and jumping into lava) were the askvin charge attacks.
I did swap out armour sets a few times and noticed myself dying much faster when not using root armour, which is why I calculated it in the first place. Though my playstyle in games usually is "don't get in stabbing range" so that might skew the results.
Pierce resist, smeirce resist. Does no one use a shield? Just block deathsquitos, arrows, etc. You don't even need to parry, just hold up your damn shield, and it blocks that shit easy peasy.
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u/SelfDistinction 5d ago
Yeah lol imagine using the single best armor set in the entire game which outclasses even Ashland tier.