How do offhand weapons work?

[Kirise]

You don't actually need to decipher the whole functional damage formula, you just need to see if it is using AbilityDamage(true), which means MH, or AbilityDamage(false), which means off hand. Some abilities use both, whether it be by actually having two hits (i.e. Stormstrike) or by using CompositeAbilityDamage (i.e. Pistol Shot). In either of these cases, basically 2/3 of the damage is calculated using the MH WDPS value, and 1/3 with the OH.

This is immensely helpful -- thank you! Looking at Mutilate as an example, that particular ability has two entries for damage:

Damage = 0.35 * AbilityDamage(true) * TotalDamageMultiplier * ArmorReduction
Damage = 0.35 * AbilityDamage(false) * TotalDamageMultiplier * ArmorReduction

Does the 0.35 at the beginning of both entries imply that both weapons contribute essentially 35% weapon damage for that particular ability?

 

[mirrorbender]

Mutilate looks to be a standard DW ability. It has a multiplier of 0.35 and hits with both the MH and OH. The off hand AbilityDamage(false) has a built in division by 2 in the function. So it ends up being the standard 2:1 MH to OH ratio.

If it helps to understand, this is effectively the same as 0.35*(MH Ability Damage) + 0.175*(OH Ability Damage).

It also happens to be the same as 0.525 times the 2:1 weighted average of MH Ability Damage and OH Ability Damage.

Also it is important to remember that when I say MH ability damage or OH ability damage, what I mean is the sum of your total attack power plus 6*WDPS of the weapon in question. If you are referencing my spreadsheet, that means you would add all the attack power from your non-weapon gear to the MH or OH ability contribution numbers from the sheet. For example, if you had 200 AP before equipping any weapons, and then you equipped a blue ilvl 25 Cudgel in the main hand and a blackout truncheon with two +3 primary gems in the off hand, your MH ability damage number would be 242.07692308 and your OH number would be 234. And for this spell and others like it, the MH number is twice as important as the OH number due to the halving of the output of Ability Damage(false).

Does that help or just make things more confusing?

 

[Kirise]

The off hand AbilityDamage(false) has a built in division by 2 in the function.

I missed the result * 0.5 in the function -- thank you for pointing out the division by 2!

If it helps to understand, this is effectively the same as 0.35*(MH Ability Damage) + 0.175*(OH Ability Damage).

It also happens to be the same as 0.525 times the 2:1 weighted average of MH Ability Damage and OH Ability Damage.

Also it is important to remember that when I say MH ability damage or OH ability damage, what I mean is the sum of your total attack power plus 6*WDPS of the weapon in question. If you are referencing my spreadsheet, that means you would add all the attack power from your non-weapon gear to the MH or OH ability contribution numbers from the sheet. For example, if you had 200 AP before equipping any weapons, and then you equipped a blue ilvl 25 Cudgel in the main hand and a blackout truncheon with two +3 primary gems in the off hand, your MH ability damage number would be 242.07692308 and your OH number would be 234. And for this spell and others like it, the MH number is twice as important as the OH number due to the halving of the output of Ability Damage(false).

Does that help or just make things more confusing?

That helps immensely, and I appreciate you walking me through it!