ATKFollow

Recently acquiring an item with Vengeance II on it I happily accepted that it raised my ATK. After feeling all rosy for a while though I began to wonder what this means.

What is the practical result of increases in ATK?

Is there a practical "soft cap"

It can't do anything for attack speed - that would be Haste. It cannot change the stats on my weapons and I've never seen ATK featured in any modal damage formula.

The only thing I could think of was being used to calculate mob mitigation.

Did I guess right and win the cookie or would someone like to enlighten me

My understanding is that on every swing there is a calculation based on your ATK versus the mobs AC, then about 50 more calculations. But my understanding is the only variables in the entire calculation are ATK and AC. Avoidance being something different entirely.

There have been some recent impressive parses and analysis done recently by a beastlord. It showed that an increase in attack results in a mostly linear gain in dps. You can see the parses, graphs and analysis here. http://www.eqbeastlord.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=10317

Some info aside:

Vengeance I counts for 5 pure ATK points, and that it caps at 250 worn ATK.

Avatar procs from Primal weapons, would you aquire one, DO count for this cap. The spell Avatar does NOT.