Heeeeello. I've done some new theorycrafting I wish to share here. During last pvp games I've noticed few things. Ok, not only me. Tele + ww combo from barb is too hard to perform on teleporting 105 fcr sorc to catch her with that first hit from whirlwind before she escapes. Sometimes you can do it, most of the times you perform whirl on her and she teles out before first ww hit connects. Then came the ghost. What I noticed is how much easier it is to properly start whirlwind sequence on sorc in comparison to barb, so I've been wondering why is that so. Just to be clear, I don't talk about locking sorc into traps to whirl her, I talk about sorc teleporting and you tele+ww on her just like barb does, but unlike barb, assassin has much easier time connecting firt whirlwind hit before sorc manages to escape. Maybe it is due to her oak being dead from mindblast, but I can't really say I killed oak with barb either meaning my hits simply didn't connect in time.
Inspired by that experience from last PvP games I tried to answer simple question:
why does barb have so hard time connecting his whirlwind and why does assassin have so much easier time doing it? WARNING: explanations are theoretical, and diablo has rather chaotic behaviour and is not perfect. Ping delay affects everything mentioned in here for example.
First, facts. Diablo is the game that has frames that everyone know: hit recovery frames, faster cast frames etc. Diablo also has less known frames: action frames. Action frame is frame at which some character actually casts the spell or performs the action. For example, 105 fcr sorc has 8 frames cast rate for teleport, but she also has 5 action frames meaning that after she starts to cast teleport, 5 frames later she really teleports to location, and that is followed by 3 frames backswing animation. In total, 5 frames action frame + 3 frames backswing animation equals 8 frames cast rate we all know of. Not only spells, but physical attacks also work the same way.
Characters we are interested in:
1. 39 fcr barb (usually 20 fcr gloves + mesh, standard barb) which has 10 frames cast rate and with action frame of 7. I'll spell it as 10(7).
2. 37 fcr barb (gloves + 17 fcr amulet for example) which has 10 fcr and action frame of 8, or 10(8)
3. 63 fcr barb that has 9 fcr and action frame of 7, aka 9(7)
Those barbs are trying to kill 105 fcr sorc, she has 8 frames cast rate with action frame of 5, aka 8(5). Let's assume barbs have tons of AR that they have ~70% chance to hit versus 5000 defense sorc.
Situation: sorc is teleporting, barb has her in namelock and wants to perform tele+whirl. Will he kill her and what are the odds? For that, we also need to know that whirlwind has action frame of 4, meaning first hit from whirlwind comes 4 frames after you cast it. Also, after sorc lands with teleport, she will always have 3 frames backswing animation, and it will take her 5 frames to cast another teleport if she holds teleport down all the time. That means she will be on the spot for 8 frames, logically. That means you must hit her inside those 8 frames or she is gone.
Let's see standard 40 fcr barb
He starts to cast teleport, which is cast at frame 7 which is action frame for 39 fcr breakpoint, and then barb has 3 frames of backswing animation. Then he starts ww immediately which hits 4 frames later. So, from the moment barb lands on his target to the moment first whirlwind hit can connect it takes total of 7 frames. Good! As we said, sorc is still on spot for 8 frames, so barb has a chance to hit the sorc before she teleports further. Out of 8 possible frames to do it, fastest he can hit sorc is at 7-th frame after she landed or 8-th frame after she landed (though as explained, at 8-th frame she performs another teleport).
So, randomly cast tele+ww on a teleporting sorc has 2 frames out of 8 possibility to put sorc to hit recovery before she teleports further, or
1/4 aka
25%. Fair to say I'm not sure whether to count 8-th frame or not, but I do have a reason to include it which I will explain a bit later. On top of that, barb has 70% chance to hit sorc and that check must also pass, so chance for him to actually catch sorc is
17.5%. On top of that we can include the fact sorc has oak, but I'm not really sure how does whirlwind pick targets, does it always hit namelocked unit first or is target always randomly selected from area, because that would cut our chance to half further.
This means, if whirlwind always targets sorc first, that barb has only 17.5% chance to actually catch teleporting sorc, or he will succeed once in 5.7 tries.
Is this theory real in practice? I'm not 100% sure, but I know I couldn't catch 105 fcr sorc with tele ww, she always seem to tele further before first whirlwind hit connect, and I had over 12k AR against her too, and given my experience with other characters, barbs really do have hard time catching something with tele+ww combo.
Let's see 37 fcr barb
You might ask what the hell is difference between 40 fcr and 37 fcr barb, they have same teleporting frame?! Yes, they do, but 37 fcr barb has action frame of 8, while at 39 fcr he gets action frame at 7. Does that make a difference? In theory actually it does make a difference. Let's see what kind of difference.
For a 40 fcr barb, after he lands it takes 7 frames to connect first ww hit as explained above. See, difference is 37 fcr barb has 8 action frame on 10 casting frames meaning he has only 2 frames backswing animation, which further means his whirlwind starts 6 frames after he has landed, which is 1 frame faster than on 40 fcr barb! BUT, in return you sacrifice amulet slot, meaning no highlord's wrath and you also lose 1 frame for zerking.
So, this barb has 6 frames till first whirlwind hit connects, and sorc is on ground for 8 frames. There are 3 frames space to hit sorc, or 3 out of 8 meaning
37.5%. 40 fcr barb has 25% chance to hit ideal frames. Since he has 70% chance to hit sorc, his final chance to catch sorc is
26.25%, not including she has oak too. This barb will catch sorc whooping 50% more times than his 40 fcr companion. In theory. So, if we take that as a fact, could it be worth it to think about going strictly for 37-38 fcr to make this happen sacrificing some damage and 1 frame zerking? You also sacrifice angelic combo if you want that mad AR and will go with dual ravenfrost instead.
Let's see 63 fcr barb
He has 9 cast frames with 7 action frame, meaning it takes 6 frames for his whirlwind to connect after he lands. So, he is similar to 37 fcr barb, but has faster teleporting. On top of that, his warcry obviously connects a bit faster.
What about 65 fcr WW assassin?
She has 11 frames cast rate with action frame of 7. It takes whooping 8 frames for her whirlwind to connect, so she has only 1/8 chance to hit ideal frame. Terrible. BUT, answer is in using mindblast. For that, we must assume sorceress in question has natural 86 faster hit recovery, or she recovers after 7 frames.
Situation: assassin casts mindblast on sorc, she is put to hit recovery, assassin immediately casts teleport then whirlwind while sorc is trying to teleport as soon as she is out of hit recovery. Will assassin manage to hit sorc? For this we must go frame by frame to check whole situation.
Assassin casts mindblast on sorc. Sorc is put to hit recovery that lasts for 7 frames, and it takes another 5 frames for sorc to cast teleport (at frame 12). After that it takes another 8 frames for her to manage another teleport. Total of frames till second teleport: 7+5+8 = 20
Assassin after casting mindblast is in 4 frames backswing animation. Then it takes her 7 frames to cast teleport on sorc (at frame 11), and when she lands, she again has 4 frames backswing animation. After that it takes 4 frames for whirlwind to connect. Total of frames taken: 4+7+4+4 = 19
PROBLEM: assassin lands at frame 11, sorc teles out at frame 12, so in ideal world assassin would never be able to hit sorc this way. But! Diablo is not ideal game. If you miss teleport by a single frame or if you have single frame delay for teleport, imagine what. Then you land on sorc exactly at ideal time to catch her before she teleports away. With 1 frame delay, you land on sorc exactly as she teleports out, and then if you start whirlwind, you will catch her exactly at ideal frame.
FUN IDEA: if sorc has 142 faster hit recovery instead of 86, she recovers in 6 frames, meaning she also teleports at frame 11 as does assassin. In that case assassin should always IDEALLY land along with sorc and in perfect world her whirlwind will always connect. So if you play ghost and your opponent tells you he has 142 fhr on sorc, you should thank him, he theoretically made your job easier as incredible as it sounds.
A lot of theory. Does it work in practice? Well, I don't have any other explanation why my ghost had so much easier time connecting whirlwind with mindblast combo in comparison to barb. Catching sorc with traps is nearly impossible, I just did mindblast + tele + ww and it worked ok. Sometimes sorc escaped, sometimes not. With barb I basically gave up on namelock + tele + ww since sorc escaped all the time. I'm not sure did my opponent sorc have 142 fhr or 86 fhr.
Anyway here is fcr table including action frames in case you wanna check theory for yourself versus other opponents. But beware diablo is not ideal game and strange things happen.
In theory, if assassin has 11 frames cast rate and sorc has 86 fhr with 105 fcr, sorc shouldn't be able to teleport at all if mindblast is spammed at her. She is in 7 frames hit recovery, then it takes 5 frames to cast teleport aka total of 12 frames, and assassin puts her to hit recovery every 11 frames, right before sorc should be able to teleport... and she still manages to teleport. Not perfect game, what else to say. 1 frame delay on either side and everything is different.
Also as last thing, what do you think theory says about 99 fcr windy telestomping 105 fcr sorc, can he made it?
Answer is "no", in theory that windy can't telestomp sorc. It takes whooping 11 frames for his tornado to connect after he has landed, and sorc is at spot for 8 frames. So he is short 3 frames to even damage teleporting sorc, unless she teleports into tornado. Does this really work like that in practice? I managed to catch that sorc with windy, but I can't be sure did she stop her teleport or is it really possible to telestomp teleporting sorc with windy. 163 fcr windy is still 2 frames short at doing that, and still windy somehow manages to kill sorcs around. Is that because that kind of theory doesn't work due to ping or whatever delays between casts (especially noticeable at worse hosts) or they stopped their teleporting sequence I can't tell.