Making Damage-Up Actually Viable?

[Luddoj]

I wanted to buy the Inkling Boy Amiibo because of the Samurai Armor. The sad part is, that the helmet has Damage-Up as main ability. Other Gear in the game also has Damage-Up as main ability, and they look really dope.

However, after spending time reading the forums, I have come to realize that both Damage-Up and Defense-Up abilities are pretty useless... Or are they really?

I'm trying to understand how they work exactly, and the threads dedicated for them don't talk about my main weapon: the Carbon Roller.

Is the Damage-Up ability really useless? Can it make any diference when spraying ink with the Carbon Roller?
What about other weapons? Are there weapons that actually require less hits to kill when they have a set amount of Damage-Up abilities on the clothes?

 

[Remillo]

Damage Up also increases the secondary damage from attacks, like the pop from blasters or the spray from Rollers. Having damage up WILL ramp up the damage you get from your ink spray, even to the point where it can one-shot, if I'm not mistaken.

However, Damage Up will never decrease the minimum Hits-to-Kill on primary shots, like rolling in to people.

 

[Aweshucks]

Damage up is only useful when it decreases time to kill. Because there's a cap on damage up so that it never decreases shots to kill (except for one or two exceptions, I think), it is very rarely useful.

The exception here is chargers, where it's super useful.

 

[Power]

Chargers/burst bombs? Reduced splat time for chargers

 

[Blue24]

Doesn't carbon roller come with burst bombs? Damage up defiantly affects that.

Defense and damage up arnt useless skills. In general damage up can potentially reduce time to kill in situations where the enemy has been standing in your ink or taken other residual damage.

 

[Agosta44]

Anything with Burst Bombs
Chargers
.52
Dynamo

 

[Deleted Member]

Chargers, Blasters and Rollers benefit the most from Damage Ups.

 

[Elecmaw]

It's certainly true that Damage-Ups can't decrease the shots to splat. But it can increase the total damage done up to 99.9 with some weapons, meaning that if your target took any damage beforehand it WILL decrease the shots needed to splat. And don't forget that standing in enemy ink causes damage on it's own, meaning it might pull off splatting a target with full-health in less shots even if the statistics say otherwise. I'd love to see some more research done on it since i don't think the test dummies are affected by ink damage??

Chargers benefit the most of it, since they need to charge less to deal lethal damage. Their panic shot(mashing the fire key instead of charging) is an odd exception to the whole 'less shots to splat' rule, stacking 3 main and 2 sub damage-ups will reduce it from a 3 hit-splat to a 2-hit. Not that it is really useful, of course.

 

[TehRealSalt]

If I'm not mistaken, one Damage Up can zero out one Defense Up on an enemy. This means you can not worry about your enemies using one to try and stay alive longer.

But yes, as nearly everyone else said, it's typically Bombs, Blasters, Rollers, and Chargers that benefit from Damage Up. Regular Shooters without bombs will likely see no difference in Time-To-Kill.

 

[Katastrphik]

It's certainly true that Damage-Ups can't decrease the shots to splat. But it can increase the total damage done up to 99.9 with some weapons, meaning that if your target took any damage beforehand it WILL decrease the shots needed to splat. And don't forget that standing in enemy ink causes damage on it's own, meaning it might pull off splatting a target with full-health in less shots even if the statistics say otherwise. I'd love to see some more research done on it since i don't think the test dummies are affected by ink damage??

Chargers benefit the most of it, since they need to charge less to deal lethal damage. Their panic shot(mashing the fire key instead of charging) is an odd exception to the whole 'less shots to splat' rule, stacking 3 main and 2 sub damage-ups will reduce it from a 3 hit-splat to a 2-hit. Not that it is really useful, of course.

Think this would be best tested in a private lobby where you can control everybody's gear. I quickly ran through the damage numbers at launch, and the dummies definitely don't take damage from ink on the ground. It would be worth seeing how exactly the DoT stacked up with the extra damage. However iirc damage from ink on the ground has some weird properties also.

 

[Luddoj]

Think this would be best tested in a private lobby where you can control everybody's gear. I quickly ran through the damage numbers at launch, and the dummies definitely don't take damage from ink on the ground. It would be worth seeing how exactly the DoT stacked up with the extra damage. However iirc damage from ink on the ground has some weird properties also.

I think I read somewhere that you take 50% damage for standing on enemy ink for 3 full seconds (assuming you don't have Ink Resistance Up)

My question regarding the Carbon Roller was:
Does Damage-Up (used in whatever quantity) can actually make the INK you SPRAY at a distance cause a OHKO?
I've been running tests on the Training Area and it seems that with 1 Main Damage Up + 1 Sub Damage Up, at a mid distance and with proper aim to the full body of the dummy, the ink the roller sprays kills in one hit. It even kills the one with 3 Main Defense Up Abilities. I don't know if I'm too close for it to matter, because I can just kill them with the fling as such a close distance, or if it is really worth it because of extra range.

For those that don't know, Carbon Roller needs 2 sprays of ink (normally) to kill at a distance. At point blank, even if flinging fails, the ink kills (assuming the opponent doesn't have any Defense Upgrades)

 

[Deleted Member]

When Rollers use the ink fling, the farther away the opponent is, the less damage the ink fling does. There is RNG factored into the damage formula. You could hit an opponent twice from the exact same position and they will take slightly different damage each time, sometimes just short of a 1HKO if they're outside the killing range. Damage Up basically increases the 1HKO range of a roller's ink flick and turns those 84%s into over 100%s. Its most useful on the Dynamo and Carbon Rollers.

 

[Teshie U]

Where is the testing the proves you can't reduce TTK with damage up?

In my personal testing I was able to get a good variety of weapons to kill in 1 less shot/swipe.

 

[Aweshucks]

Multiple reputable, trustworthy sources have independently tested it and come to the same conclusion. We've known this for a long time

 

[Teshie U]

Was this testing done before all the patches? Is there a link to it? Have all the newer weapons been tested?

 

[LMG]

Aside of what other people said here, I'll add that Splattershots (standard ones, not the Jrs. or the Pros) can benefit from having Damage Ups as 2 main Defense Ups will increase the shots required to splat enemies. I can confirm that Damage Ups cannot decrease the weapon's natural shots to splat (if the weapon with no Damage Ups takes 4 shots to splat an undamaged enemy with no Defense Ups, no amount of Damage Ups will make it take 3 shots instead)

 

[Citrus]

Damage up is a must for eliter

 

[Blobface]

I've found that Brushes can actually decrease their "Swipes-to-kill" at close range with Damage up, due to the way the blobs work. Doesn't do much at further ranges but the faster kills at close range are a huge help.

 

[TheMH]

I fiddled around with the Splattershot Pro and Damage Up perks for a few days. I thought a Pro dealing >49 damage per shot would be top tier, but in the end I had to give up so many other perks that I don't think it's worth it. First, the number of shots to splat will never decrease. Sure, you can take out wounded enemies, but this situation actually occurs way more rarely than you might think. Second, it can easily being countered by Defense Up.

My most viable setup had 1 main + 4 subs giving the Pro a base attack of 49.5. Maybe I'll go for 8 subs and keep Ink Resistance at some time and give it another try with the full 49.9.

On the Tentatek I like to use 3 Damage Up sub perks on my grey anchor sweat. As it's base damage (36.0) is rather close to 33.3, it's really comfortable to have a little boost for max range shots and against Defense Up users to keep it 3-shotting all the time.

In conclusion I think on shooters you should only go for Damage Up if your weapon's damage is very close to 33.3 or 50 (TTK, .52 gal yes, Pro, .96 gal no etc.) and only go for 2-4 sub slots at max. If it's above you will counter Defense Up and improve your max range damage, if it's below you will get close to splats without wasing too many slots.

 

[TheMH]

I actually went with 7 Damage Up subs on the Pro lately and it's way better, as I'm able to keep Ink Resistance with this setup. 8 with one final Run Speed sub would be best, but a hassle to get.

Check out my thread for more details if you like: http://squidboards.com/threads/themhs-gear-and-loadout-compendium.7451/