Armor+5 or HP+30?

Ah, the classic old tale of messing with what people call "perfect" with the +30hp. I have to agree - go with the +5 armor for sure. I'm getting rid of all my +30's - whether they be on staves, bows, swords or axes. Another thing that influences my decision is because I run consumables - cupcakes, candy apples, etc - that give extra hp's, so taking up a mod space with just another +30hp seems like a waste, might as well take the armor buff.

Huh? How does that help. The lower your health, the faster you die from degen, among other things. Besides which, you should be using BotM in combo with a healing spell anyway.

Ha, trick question. You go with the two +7s!

I know you guys say that +30s are expensive, but last i checked +30s for staffs sell for only 1k-2k max. Not too sure bout for wands and for focuses. They are only extremely expensive on melee weapons where a +30 goes for 5-10k, depending on weapon. I also think that even if it is extra cost, the +30 is more common to find. Much more common to find actually. I think since +30s have a rep of being worth something, people generally keep them and spam to sell em. +5 armors on the other hand aren't very common to find being sold, although they are sometimes found on some spellcasting weapons...

Im not saying +30 is better, but those of you who think that ts way too much in price its really not all that much ...anymore. Of course +5 is better when you are hit by melee weapons, but id consider +30s when staying in the far back.

I guess this debate will never end.

Bilateralrope already did the math, but I want to add some more factors to take in consideration:

Low HP makes you a more attractive target for the AI.
So check your team setup! The consequence would be PvE "tanks" having lower HP and higher AL than other team members.

While it is no longer as important as during the time around the release of Factions and before (which was also leading to the fatal chain that the guy that got DP got even more and more by getting targetted and killed over and over in the worst case), it is still one of the major factors besides position and hitting the target and whatever.

The exact aggro-formula can possibly never be really gotten by experiment, only ANet knows (or better: made) the parameters and I guess they have more of a rough idea about this, too, not too different from us actually.

My observations: Dire Pets with only 420 HP make excellent tanks - they draw aggro a lot.
My 590 HP Warrior... mobs pass him by too often, if I cannot get them at a corner. Which I of course usually do.

This is why I suggest +5 AL and ideally a superior rune for PvE - if you are the tank. (And still use +30 HP weapons myself... doh)

Giving your monks high health on the other side is a smart trick to make them less attractive targets. But just another example, the mobs in the Deep e.g. go for caster equipment (which can be checked by giving the monk a sword, then they do not cast chaos storm on them).


To put it bluntly:

1.) +5 AL for PvE (you can switch to +30 HP if need arises)
2.) +30 HP for PvP (Degen, less "mobs" bashing on you and in general spike damage, high HP is a good buffer)
3.) Never go below 480 HP. Ideally stay above 500.
Switch weapons or to a minor rune if this happens. A certain healthy BASE level of Hitpoints is vital and cannot be replaced by armor!

It does not seem to make much sense to give a MM Hero (Olias) a +60 HP staff, after all he usually has Blood of the Master in the build and sacs life.

The reason for me giving him Vitae Runes (I kept MM insignia for armor) and a +60 HP buff was the Superior Death rune and having LOWER HP than any other of my chars. Buffing Health to some 525 made Olias a much more survivable and less attractive target.


This is almost subject for another thread, but is it no supporting the recommendation to have +AL mods for PvE? +30 mods on greens are the norm, as is public opinion in favor of health mods.

Microing Shelter and Warding mods is a waste of time for an additional 2 AL.

Isn't this tread about spellcasting and +5/-30 mods? Anyways i respectfully disagree, maybe i didn't read right but it seems you are saying a +5 armor mod for a war is better then a +30. I personally think that +30 is better for a war at least since armor effects are eventually ineffective, or just little compared to a benfit of +30. This will lead to a WHOLE nother discussion, so im not going anymore into it.

Anyways, spellcasters and warriors are completely different since they have 20 lower AL than normal war armor...

If you increase the HP, the +hp becomes less effective. So realistic situations are worse that what my calculations say.

With all saccing skills, they take a percentage of your hp. With more hp, this means they take more points of hp. And most healing skills heal for x points of hp. So unless you have overhealing, increasing your hp will mean that your going to need to be healed more from your saccing.

And +armor reduces the amount you need to be healed for because it reduces the points of damage taken. While this results in a reduction in the energy monks need to use, I doubt it makes much of a difference.

As far as modding an item for sale is concerned lets look at the possible buyers:

- The person buying it with the intent to mod it to the exact stats your selling it for. He will be willing to pay, at most, the price of the skin plus whatever it would cost him to buy the mods.

- The person planning to strip and resell the mods with a perfect salvage kit, while keeping the weapon for himself. He will pay the price of the skin plus what he expects to get for the mods, minus the cost of the kit and a profit margin.

- The person planning to change the mods. He will only be willing to pay the cost of the skin, since he doesn't like the mods that its being sold with.

So I'd say that if you plan to sell a weapon, either remove the mods with a perfect salvage kit, or just sell it with the mods currently on it. Adding new mods will, at best, break even.

Armour +5 is the most effective, but +30hp looks a lot better

Yes, I know all that, but that still says nothing about degen damage.

In the long run, it all depends upon the total make up of your build, and that of the team, and what enemies you are facing. It doesn't make sense to make blanket statements either way, actually.

Spikes. It is much easier to spike a person with 500 hp than a person with 600.

For my ranger i go with 525hp and +35 energy.
I don't wanna go under 500 so +30hp for me.

And LOW ARMOR also makes you attractive for the AI/
So either is good, tho there arent any statistics available on which is better on this regard.
Plus this wouldnt matter in PvP.

You could approach the problem this way: Depending on your base armor level, you should choose the mod. There has been a study on this a long time ago.
The result of the study was, if you are having an armor level lower then 70ish, you should go for the +5 armor, since it would generally reduce more damage then +30 hp. But if your armor is higher then 70 (warriors and paragons), the damage reduction that +5 armor does will have a very small effect compared to 30 health.

But if you are comfortable with itemswap, I suggest +5 armor for normal and swap to +30 when you are running low.

To summarize: low armor characters (including skills) with armor below 70, should take +armor, high armor level characters should take + health. Or use itemswap.

Only exception is when you are a warrior or something and you are trying to minimize damage, in which case +armor makes it a lot easier to reach the -0s.

If you happen to run into a lot of physical damage, why not use the appropriate +7 vs. physical?(shelter)

1 - My question was asking how many times you actually reached the point where the +hp mods were taking effect and survived, so you didn't answer my question.

2 - Lets do some calculations on spike damage on a 485hp character with either a +hp or +armor mod.

First we take the character with +30hp. So they simply need to take 515 damage to die. Throw in a deepwound and this is only 412 damage.

Now for the 485hp character. But because of the damage reduction if you hit the +hp character with the same attacks, you would deal 485/0.917 = 529 damage to it. Deepwound drops the +al to 388hp, which would be 423 damage on a character without the +al.

If you increase the base hp, then the +amor becomes even more effective. But there are some things I left out. When I say base AL/HP/etc, I mean the value from all sources other than the +hp/AL mod:

- Cracked armor. If your base AL is >=80 or <=55 then my calculations hold. If the base AL is 76-79 or 56-59 then the +AL mod will have reduced effectiveness when your cracked. If its 60-75 then the +AL mod will be useless when your cracked. All ranges are inclusive.

- Armor ignoring damage breaks my calculations. If your facing an armor ignoring spike, the +hp would only help if the spike damage is between your base hp and your hp with the mod, otherwise you die either way. So how much damage do the current armor ignoring spikes in PvP do ? (if they exist)

- Armor penetration reduces the effectiveness of the +al mod. For instance 20% armor penetration would reduce a +5 AL mod to an effective +4AL mod. Some values of armor penetration would mean that the optimal anti-spike setup would be a weapon with a +hp on one end and a +al on the other.

Note that this only applies to spikes large enough to kill you from your current hp. If your facing a more constant dps (degen being the ultimate example of constant dps) then your survival depends on your teams healing. In a pressure situation the +al becomes even more effective because it takes effect every time you get hit reducing the incoming DPS, thus reducing how much you need to be healed. But the +hp means that the incoming dps will merely take longer to kill you.

That would be a good idea. Problem is, I can't think of any such areas except for specialised farming runs. And I doubt the farming build is fragile enough for it to make a difference.

DW has a limit of -100 health.

Cracked armor doesn't do anything if your AL is below 60.

Attack skills and other sources of +damage are armor-ignoring, Mesmer skills are armor-ignoring, and DW is armor-ignoring. It's going to be a significant portion of a spike, and +armor won't save you as much as having a higher HP buffer will.

Additionally, DP doesn't affect +health, so you are much more durable with +health after you get DP.

i prefer +30 hp. Sure +5 armor is nice but it can easily be healed...

Are you sure? Wiki says

Base health = 480 so why are they mentioning 500 hp?

As a PvE melee character, I usually use +5 armor mods - maybe just because I don't trust the monks in my party. But since the day I played a tank with about 200hp (superior rune and 60% death penalty, no vigor rune), I always have a weapon with +30hp with me (and I don't use superior runes anymore). When you're already that low on hp, +30hp is definitely better (unless you have a permanent Protective Spirit available).
As non-melee char, I prefer other mods anyway - things like longer enchantments, +5 energy, halved HRT/HCT, ...

For the sake of AI target preference, I would expect that monsters evaluate an effective HP, or toughness, value which is a combination of base HP and non-conditional armor (thus ignoring any AL vs. specific thing modifiers to keep it simple) roughly as:

H_eff = H_base * 2^((A_base - 60) / 40)

(I haven't tested it out but that is the most rational approach). Thus the gain from a +HP mod is

dH_HP = dH * 2^((A_base - 60) / 40)

and from a +AL mod

dH_AL = H_base * (2^((A_base + dA - 60) / 40) - 2^((A_base - 60) / 40))

As an example, let's consider base HPs 330 and 600 and base ALs 60 and 100. The gains for different cases are:

330 HP / 60 AL: dH_HP = 30, dH_AL = 30
330 HP / 100 AL: dH_HP = 60, dH_AL = 60
600 HP / 60 AL: dH_HP = 30, dH_AL = 54
600 HP / 100 AL: dH_HP = 60, dH_AL = 109

Since I never run anywhere near the breakpoint HP of 330, +AL is certainly my choice, and for the rare PvE spike, that's what prot monks and goons are for