Since this topic is getting a lot of attention, please allow me to provide some perspective.The fact that your effective damage can go down after a level-up is a bug. The idea was that your effective damage stays the same in case of weapons, since weapons are supposed to apply bonuses according to
their level. For skills, the effective damage is supposed to stay the same since their damage automatically increases when you level up, negating the reduction of the bonus.
Attribute bonuses where designed with following aims in mind:
1) We wanted to avoid small cumulative bonuses like "1 point in Strength gives you 1% damage increase" since they are unnoticeable during early game, which is important for Early Access content. We want attribute points to matter immediately, and not 10 hours later.
2) On the other hand, keeping large percentage bonuses (10%+) would lead to increasing Vitality gaps between levels, since we need to keep difficulty constant. In turn, this leads to more linear and rigid progression where players cannot take on fights 1-2 levels higher and must look for fights of their level before proceeding.
3) We also wanted to keep the door open for hybrid classes. It is important to point out that addition of Physical and Magic Armour and also high ground bonuses have made hybridizing a lot more potent. For example, if you split your points in INT and STR, you will get 15% damage decrease compared to pure INT or pure STR characters. It is not a big price to pay for ability to attack the weaker of two Armours of your opponents (and many enemies have only one type of Armour). Similarly, if you put some points in STR for your ranger you can continue to enjoy high ground bonuses, while not being completely defenseless when a 3-ton crocodile teleports on your head.
Regardless of the above, the current system is going to be changed, since it ended up feeling counter-intuitive and unrewarding.
The following is the new system that we want to try out in the near future:1) Each new point in STR, FIN or INT provides a flat amount of damage to corresponding attacks and skills. This amount grows with levels. The numbers will change, but currently an attack with a 2H or an average 2AP skill would receive 3 damage per attribute point on level 1, 4 damage on level 2, etc.
2) The bonus is applied to the total damage of the skill or attack. Hail Strike receives same bonus as Fireball, despite dealing 4 instances of damage.
3) The bonus is multiplied by the AP cost of the attack or skill. When dual-wielding you will receive double bonus compared to wielding a single 1H weapon.
Please let us know what you think of this new system and thank you for sticking with us through Early Access
