I don't understand Mastery

I know that typically, skill mastery is what makes the largest difference in attack power but I do not understand what the actual percent represents. I have thought about it many times and I just don't get what the heck it really is. I mean, I understand the language but the formula's that language represents are beyond me. Can someone explain it without getting too into complex math formulas?

It basically means your minimum damage is Mastery%*0.9 of your maximum damage. It's a little more complex than that but you can always closely approximate your minimum damage by 0.54 (0.6 * 0.9) of your max damage, or what have you if you have more mastery.

I still don't understand. All skills seem to end up at 60% mastery; if it goes by the players min and max attack shouldn't they all end up hitting for the same amount of damage?

I still don't understand. All skills seem to end up at 60% mastery; if it goes by the players min and max attack shouldn't they all end up hitting for the same amount of damage?

This is about magicians? Their formula is a bit more complicated, and the mastery ends up not mattering quite as much. 15% mastery means your minimum is about 0.5~0.6 your maximum, and 60% mastery gives you 0.7~0.8 of your maximum depending on your stats. 90% mastery is about 0.8~0.9 of the max. The largest contributor to damage variance is stats.

I still don't understand. All skills seem to end up at 60% mastery; if it goes by the players min and max attack shouldn't they all end up hitting for the same amount of damage?

Mastery creates the minimum out of the maximum: Min = (PrimaryStat * 0.9 * Mastery + SecondaryStat) * WeaponAttack / 100
You either make direct use of your damage range, or you think of your range as (54%~100%) output. It's just that non-magicians have their mastery shown, while magicians don't (Theirs is always 60% anyway). I don't exactly remember if skills of other classes have built-in masteries, but I'm under the impression that most of them are by default 10% (subsequently brought up to 60% by the universal Mastery Skill).

For Magicians, I believe they only have 1 type of Mastery that's built-in within the skills themselves, except for Evans, this number is always "60%". As for how that "60%" affects your actual damage range is JoeTang's place to elaborate.
Evans, however, have both types of built-in local masteries and a universally governing Mastery Skill, so I'm unsure how they interact with each other.

Alright, new plan. Explain this to me without using any numbers. Or like I'm 5. And assume I don't know anything (because I don't). None of what either of you have said makes any sense to me, still.

More mastery makes you do less lower damage...?

Err.. Mastery means the consistency of your attacks, soemtimes you punch hard, sometimes you punch weaker. The higher the mastery, the more consistent the attacks are (up to the point of uniform damage output). There are 2 types of Masteries:

• [SIZE="4"]Weapon Mastery[/SIZE]:
  1/ Hey check it out, I just got a new knife but I'm not familiar with it yet.
  > Low mastery.
  2/ Hey after 10 years of using I finally got used to it, check this out, -flips knife in one hand-.
  > High mastery.
  
  
  
  
• [SIZE="4"]Skill Mastery[/SIZE]:
  1/ Hey I just learned the Retrograde Barrow Wheel position, it's so awesome but so hard to perform.
  > Low Mastery.
  2/ Man, my GF digs it so we've been practicing it hourly, now I'm a pro.
  > High mastery.

Err.. Mastery means the consistency of your attacks, soemtimes you punch hard, sometimes you punch weaker. The higher the mastery, the more consistent the attacks are (up to the point of uniform damage output). There are 2 types of Masteries:

• [SIZE="4"]Weapon Mastery[/SIZE]:
  1/ Hey check it out, I just got a new knife but I'm not familiar with it yet.
  > Low mastery.
  2/ Hey after 10 years of using I finally got used to it, check this out, -flips knife in one hand-.
  > High mastery.
  
  
• [SIZE="4"]Skill Mastery[/SIZE]:
  1/ Hey I just learned the Retrograde Barrow Wheel position, it's so awesome but so hard to perform.
  > Low Mastery.
  2/ Man, my GF digs it so we've been practicing it hourly, now I'm a pro.
  > High mastery.

Ah, so mastery determines consistency relative to damage output. And the damage output is calculated based on your characters stats and the base stats of the skill? Or just one of the two and if so, which?

Again, I don't really remember for all instances, but most non-magician skills are an "upgrade" of your actual damage range, that is to say:

- Approach A: Damage range: 200~300 => Uses Power Strike (260%) => actual damage output: 520~780.
- Approach B: Instead of just stabbing, I will now combine a body slam and a stab to hit you harder!

As for Magicians, there's a thing called Basic Attack which is combined with your Magic stats (the combination of Int and Matk) to form the actual damage output. Same deal technically.

A large portion of your max damage is multiplied by the mastery percentage to determine your minimum damage. If your mastery is 60%, your minimum damage will be about 60% of your max damage. The actual number depends on formula stuff. Obviously if your minimum damage is higher and your max damage stays the same, your average damage will be higher.

Ok, imagine this. 10% mastery rolls a dice that lets you land any hits from 10% your potential damage to 100% your potential damage. Potential damage is 100%. If you have 60% mastery, you can only roll from 60% to 100%, and therefore, can't hit tiny 10% damage hits.

As an example, 100% mastery would make you hit always the best possible outcome. ALWAYS. Like the same number over and over.

Mastery just creates a wider range of damage, instead of having damage consistent to your damage range.

It's just how efficiently you would perform a skill. There's always going to be a margin for error when you perform a skill, because you can't perform it perfectly. That margin for error accounts for a lesser damage output than if you were to have performed it perfectly.

What Alloy said.

(It's not exact, as some of the more particular have noted. For magicians there is actually a significant portion of the base damage that does not go away if you were to have 0% mastery. Also, 100% mastery doesn't exactly mean you'll always hit full power, because the number lies and pretends it's higher than it actually is. But that's the general idea.)

Ah, makes sense now. Mind going into further detail about the difference between magic and attack masteries? Now that I understand the basics, I'll be able to get the more detailed bits, though keeping it simple like Alloy did would be helpful, too.

For weapon mastery I'll use swords as a typical example.

The primary stat is STR and the secondary is DEX, and together they contribute two terms to the damage. STR, the main contributor, adds some amount to the maximum damage - let's call it X. It also adds some fraction of X to the minimum damage (this is where mastery comes in - it's usually 60%). So if most of your damage comes from STR (as it usually does), then your damage range usually ranges from 60% of your maximum to 100% of your maximum, because that's how STR adds damage.

By contrast, DEX raises max and min damage equally - so any damage you get from DEX pretends that mastery is always 100%. So if you have no STR and all DEX, you always deal the same amount of damage with a sword regardless of the actual mastery.

Magic mastery works the same in principle, but numerically it's a little different. There is a term in the magic damage formula that acts like DEX does for swords - it adds the same damage to both maximum and minimum. It so happens that this term is proportional to Magic * Magic, so as you increase your stats, this term becomes more and more significant and your damage becomes less and less dependent on mastery. This is why magic damage ranges are usually a lot tighter than what the mastery value indicates (minimum being ~80% of maximum, rather than 60%).

So STR doesn't raise minimum damage at all? Is that why DEXless players are so concerned with mastery? I have heard several instances of people speaking of how important it is to them, but never really understood.

What affects this magical... magic term? Luck? INT? Magic attack? A combination of these?

So STR doesn't raise minimum damage at all? Is that why DEXless players are so concerned with mastery? I have heard several instances of people speaking of how important it is to them, but never really understood.

It does raise minimum damage, just less so than DEX.

It's like this. If mastery is 60%, a certain amount of STR will add 60 minimum damage and 100 maximum damage. If mastery is 10%, the same amount of STR will add only 10 minimum damage and 100 maximum damage.
That amount of DEX will always add something like 25 minimum damage and 25 maximum damage.

And remember that these are only for swords. As soon as you equip a bow or gun, STR and DEX reverse roles.

What affects this magical... magic term? Luck? INT? Magic attack? A combination of these?

Magic attack times itself.

Edit: Going to sleep. G'night and have nightmares about numbers Sarah

With the way the magic formula works, Magic Attack also adds a little bit to Mastery for every point. As you get more and more Magic attack, your mastery gets to be higher and higher causing a tighter damage range. This is why high-leveled Evan players that have 90% mastery have VERY tight damage ranges. The base mastery is 90%, and MATK only adds to that.

In a nutshell, for magicians:

INT:
Adds to MP regained per tick
Adds to MP per level
Adds a small, constant amount of damage per point
Base INT gives bonuses to Maple Hero
Includes all the benefits of MATK (because 1 INT also gives 1 MATK)

MATK:
Exponential for damage - each point in MATK is worth a little more in damage than the previous point
Adds a little bit to mastery per point

LUK plays no part in the magic damage formula.

It does raise minimum damage, just less so than DEX.

It's like this. If mastery is 60%, a certain amount of STR will add 60 minimum damage and 100 maximum damage. If mastery is 10%, the same amount of STR will add only 10 minimum damage and 100 maximum damage.
That amount of DEX will always add something like 25 minimum damage and 25 maximum damage.

And remember that these are only for swords. As soon as you equip a bow or gun, STR and DEX reverse roles.



Magic attack times itself.

Well, 60 is higher than 25 so it still explains the concern for mastery.

I understand much more now though, thanks a lot. If there's anything else to know, I'd like to hear it.

With the way the magic formula works, Magic Attack also adds a little bit to Mastery for every point. As you get more and more Magic attack, your mastery gets to be higher and higher causing a tighter damage range. This is why high-leveled Evan players that have 90% mastery have VERY tight damage ranges. The base mastery is 90%, and MATK only adds to that.

In a nutshell, for magicians:

INT:
Adds to MP regained per tick
Adds to MP per level
Adds a small, constant amount of damage per point
Base INT gives bonuses to Maple Hero
Includes all the benefits of MATK (because 1 INT also gives 1 MATK)

MATK:
Exponential for damage - each point in MATK is worth a little more in damage than the previous point
Adds a little bit to mastery per point

LUK plays no part in the magic damage formula.

Well that certainly explains why you're always exclaiming how pointless it currently is to go anything but lukless.