Mob Scaling Findings: Higher Armour is not better

[Serancha]

Introduction

We all know mob difficulty scales both by player level and the number of players in the zone. It is widely accepted that a party of 3 is the most optimal for running most elite zones. (as relates to mob difficulty).

• If you look at the leaderboard, you will notice that 90% of the time, there are no warriors on the speed run records.
• If you are in a map with a rogue and a mage, and a warrior joins, have you ever noticed that it gets a lot harder? The run time increases?
• Have you ever wondered why Legendary and Arcane players can play the same maps without it being overly difficult for the first, and extremely easy for the second?

Well for the past 5 months I have been running tests and gathering data. These findings are consistent and conclusive. I welcome anyone to test for themselves. (Note: if you plan to test this, please do so on fully scaling maps - ie. not elite brackenridge - as the low level maps have stunted scaling that may skew results)



Summary of the testing results:
The amount of damage mobs deal and how hard they are to kill is scaled according to both the amount of armour you are wearing (number value) and the rarity level of your gear (epic, legendary, mythic, arcane).




First example: Attempting to get a mythic warrior his haunted ap last season.
We had a party of 4 and in 8 runs never managed to get faster than 1:38. I had the warrior remove his mythics and put on Hellish gear that I had available. The first run with him in the reduced armor, and we cleared the finish line at 1:26. The only thing that was different was his armor. Both the rarity and the number value were dropped significantly. This result was repeated with multiple parties.

Second example: A party of 4 in Elite Caves
This was an experienced farming team who knew the map well. Run times were always consistent (within 30 seconds). Once we had a solid base time done, we switched from mythic to legendary (Tarlok) gear. Even with the reduced damage of the legendary items on the entire party, our run times were exactly the same as when we were in full mythics.

Third Example: Solo hauntlet, no pet.
Hauntlet runs with mythics, mythic ring and talisman amulet yielded identical times as runs with tarloks with epic jewlery.
Using tarlok helm and magma armor caused death / near-death experiences.


Findings from a wide range and high number of solo tests:

Mobs hit significantly harder if you are wearing mythic or high-armour gear as opposed to normal Tarlok / Conquistador equipment.

Epic jewlery makes mob difficulty significantly lower than with mythic jewlery.

Mobs are much more difficult to kill if you are using high armour or high rarity gear (magmatic / mythic) as opposed to normal legendaries. (Conquistador / Tarlok). Example: I can one-combo kill the first witch in hauntlet in legendaries, but it usually takes an extra 2 hits in mythics.

The change in mob difficulty is so significant that it actually removes the whole damage benefit from using higher-end gear, allowing those in normal legendaries to do runs the same speed or even faster than those in full high-rarity gear.

Mixing and matching mythics and legendary is not usually great, since the only time Mythic can achieve the same run times as Legendary (with epic jewlery) is when the full set of mythics is used. If you use a partial set of mythics, you will find yourself taking a lot more damage and having more trouble killing the mobs.

To use mythic is only beneficial if all your protective gear is mythic. Using just a mythic ring or just a mythic amulet will increase the mob difficulty without increasing your damage or armor, making you need more pots and more hits to get through the map.


Conclusion:

A player wearing tarlok-like legendaries and epic jewlery will find most maps no more difficult (and in some cases easier) than running the same maps in full or partial mythics and/or magmatic gear.

The number value on armor directly affects the mob scales, meaning more armor = harder and slower runs. However you DO need high enough basic stats for survival. ie: you can not run with level 20 armor at level 41 and expect to survive. This is due to the basic scaling to character level that we are all aware of. High damage / medium # armor (like conquistador or tarlok) seem to be the best for optimizing mob difficulty.

Therefore, the new armor-heavy gear will only be useful in pvp where mob scaling is not in effect.