Didnt say you weren't aware, which is why i chose to say "We" and while some of us cannot create the combo exactly, i think it would be remiss to pretend its not happening. On a side note the best part about what this guy did is he masks his gear rating by swapping gear and maintaining his bolster. he'll draw no outward attention with a 246 rating.

There is no explaination for what is happening with his gear and bolster. I have been messing around with bolster for a long time and I never had anything like that happen that drastically. No one else I have worked with has ever had that happen. No one can explain it, to my knowledge he doesn’t even know either when asked. Could be he did it himself or could be a bugged augment or item or mod or whatever you think of. Could be an exploit or not. Who cares?

Regardless, no one can recreate what happened with his gear so I don’t feel the need to bring it up into the discussion. Whatever is happening it doesn’t work in the confines of the relationship that is shown here with how gear tiers work. That screenshot is a clear outliner and pointless to discuss. While our statistics shows a clear pattern that makes sense and that is what is addressed in data and analysis. Focus on that.

Rambol, I've got to question the timing of the article. particularly when we aware that this is going on

I'm not sure what you're trying to imply.

I'd certainly like to know what's going on there too. However, as Hottie says, our attempts to replicate it effect have failed and—as far as I know—this is the only instance of it happening. If anyone has an explanation, I'm all ears.

Regardless, no one can recreate what happened with his gear so I don’t feel the need to bring it up into the discussion. Whatever is happening it doesn’t work in the confines of the relationship that is shown here with how gear tiers work. That screenshot is a clear outliner and pointless to discuss. While our statistics shows a clear pattern that makes sense and that is what is addressed in data and analysis. Focus on that.

yes, standard gear tiers have plausible and predicable bolster patterns. but I would expect the Devs to get at least that right before going wild. your data corroborates that notion. understandably, people reading your article and this thread are concerned about the "outlier" effects of non -standard/non-current gear and their relationship with the bolster mechanism. the data you provide makes "Sense," while observations, random inspecting have shown quite the opposite, outside of the standard tier.

Please do not take this as a criticism of your work. my disappoint is that work here does not go far enough, but thats my problem not yours.

yes, standard gear tiers have plausible and predicable bolster patterns. but I would expect the Devs to get at least that right before going wild. your data corroborates that notion. understandably, people reading your article and this thread are concerned about the "outlier" effects of non -standard/non-current gear and their relationship with the bolster mechanism. the data your provide makes "Sense," while observations, random inspecting have shown quite the opposite, outside of the standard tier.

 

Please do not take this as a criticism of your work. my disappoint is that work here does not go far enough, but thats my problem not yours.

If you want to talk about that one time something weird happened in the .00001% of pvpers there is nothing more we can say about it. Till there is evidence that this is even bolster related I don’t care.

I don’t care.

you've said that multiple times. i get the point. moving on.

you've said that multiple times. I get the point. Moving on.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

while observations, random inspecting have shown quite the opposite, outside of the standard tier.

I've got gear and item modifications of mixed item rating on several of my characters and I haven't noticed anything obviously out of the ordinary.

This isn't to say that there hasn't been craziness with Bolster in the past (there has). Nor am I ruling out the possibility that there is craziness with Bolster right now—but I have seen no evidence beyond the one instance you cited, which is most likely some kind of exploit.

I'm happy to be proven wrong but hearsay isn't evidence. That was the whole point of this exercise: collating hard data.

I appreciate what you're saying about the scope of our analysis and yes, I'd love to dig deeper in future. The fact remains, however, that most players will be wearing gear between 208 and 248 item rating, i.e., what we tested.

They provide no hidden advantage over 248s and are in most cases worse. The only thing that makes them favorable is that you can buy them on gtn. How is this any different then buying a crafted 246 relic off gtn?

 

Relic slot is broken yes, but it’s not game breaking at all.

And who would know that a L10 relic is best? Sure it is not hidden, but what kind of rational game design has endgame players buying L10 relics off the GTN?

I'm not saying it is unfair, I am saying it is stupid

And who would know that a L10 relic is best? Sure it is not hidden, but what kind of rational game design has endgame players buying L10 relics off the GTN?

 

I'm not saying it is unfair, I am saying it is stupid

No question about that.

The thing about (most) RPGs is that, if you want to be competitive, you have to be willing to put in the hours. Beyond playing and practising (important), the best players spend a lot of time asking questions, being self-critical about their performance, reading widely, theorycrafting, testing, watching streams, etc.

In the case of Wind Crystal relics, yes, they are nearly best in slot but they don't confer that much of an advantage over the 230–246 relics that most people will be using.

My point is that, while I agree it's dumb from a design standpoint, it ultimately won't make a difference to most players. They will benefit much more from learning better positioning, how use their DCDs most effectively, how to maintain maximum uptime, etc. I'll take an undergeared but skilled and knowledgeable player over an average player with BiS gear any day of the week.

I think it is a huge problem that gear doesn't bolster the same specifically because "Everyone" does not know.

 

Being competitive in the game should not require all sorts of meta data from the web to identify odd item combinations that no one would ever normally use.

 

It is all well and good to have the data, so that it can be sent to the devs to fix.

Word has spread far and wide. Many people know about it and others are trying to inform them. The problem is the noobs who tell you to $%#@ off when you try to help and tell you Bolster takes care of everything

They’re usually the ones who don’t have relics equiped, have no crystals and empty shells. There is no helping those people.

Personally I hope they don’t fix it because then I can upgrade my relics to 248 last and not be worried about the grind till I’ve equiped every other slot. It’s also handy so that you don’t waste components. It seems every time I upgrade something, the same thing drops from CXP box.

Didnt say you weren't aware, which is why i chose to say "We" and while some of us cannot create the combo exactly, i think it would be remiss to pretend its not happening. On a side note the best part about what this guy did is he masks his gear rating by swapping gear and maintaining his bolster. he'll draw no outward attention with a 246 rating.

I think if we can get more than one more person to recreate this, it would be worth investigating. But I’ve not been able to get it to work.

Do we even know if it was just that one slot?

Do we know if they might have had 248 with 236 Augments in every other piece?

That one pic of the chest doesn’t really show enough to go on.

After leveling up a few toons in the last month, I’ve discovered two things about Bolster pre 70.

Wind relics are actually worse than the blue relics you get from the first mission reward. (That changes at lvl 70)

Wearing item level 70s in all armor slots and main weapon and with item level 46 relics, ear and implants and with your off hand you can mess around with higher stat items as you level up and you can get better results by only your offhand having higher stats than item level 70.

I’m not sure why it happens like that. One good thing is it’s cheaper than upgrading and trying to min/max yourself because Bolster takes care of it all and you can squeeze a little extra out of the tank by using the off hand method.