So...Let's talk Damage Avoidance

Day 6 now with no dev response other than changing a topic title to something irrelevant and moving it out of a more public eye but I digress......

I would still like an explanation as to why damage avoidance is still displayed as a percentage on the character sheet and equipment.

And an explanation as to why it justifies a massive jump in fizzle with little to no real difference in defensive capabilities.

 

And I'd like to see some numbers that justify what you just said..........
Show me.

 

Are we talking chain vs. platemail avoidance rates here?
If so, yes, there's very very little difference to justify the significant fizzle bump - in avoidance, in resist, and in max resist, plate vs. chain has always seemed 'negligible'.
Even Scoffer's wearing chain now. And for anyone that knows Scoffer, they know how ridiculous that statement is.

 

I am just trying to keep a wider focus so that there is less reason to change,move,delete, etc. this thread because a dev doesn't having the decency to respond. But yeah plate vs chain is definitely a difference.

 

Be careful how you say things here, better if you ask nicely, because with the way you've worded things here they won't deign to respond to any negativity. Odds are they wouldn't respond even if you asked nicely as they are really busy. There are a great deal of issues that haven't been addressed like the health bug (will be fixed next patch fingers cross) and the Masterwork/Enchanting bug, many masterwork bugs for weapons and shields, combat balance issues like you're facing, quest bugs and quest log tracking bugs, the state of PVP, and many more things. Give them some time to work it all out first. Most MMO's don't seem to get good until after they've been out for a few years.

 

2018, a launched game, this is a pretty straightforward question about basic mechanics. Why is it still so difficult to obtain feedback like this?

 

Day 7 still waiting.....

 

@DAKelam1 are you going to post this every day until you get an response? If this the way you show patience to the Devs who are working their nuts off?

If you try to formulate your patience/issues a bit better, you will get a decent response. Also PM seems to help getting questions answered!

V

 

Yeah, you might want to tread lightly. Few posts like this have gotten flamed by the devs and locked. Like Half said above, everything is in the hopper to get fixed, eventually, future releases, many years from now, etc.

 

Why are you waiting instead of doing your own testing?

 

The combat math got changed 2 months before release and used to reflect an actual percentage, but Chris felt that the high avoidance took all the power out of the hands of the attacker leaving it nigh impossible to kill people in some cases, allegedly. He said avoidance was moving more towards a point based system and never removed the % symbol from the character sheet and I think he's still afraid of the Min/Maxers trying to do what they do and get the most out of the system, so we don't have an understandable explanation as to how it all works. No way of telling if Plate is actually "better" than Chainmail other than a defunct percentage on your character sheet and now all the base stats are intermingled with it as well to a certain degree. Believe me I understand your frustration, when I pop a 5 stack glancing blow my avoidance goes above 220% and I still get hit by attacks that aren't glancing blows. It's all incredibly frustrating. Maybe in six to eight months or so they'll have an improved UI and character sheet with trustworthy information that will allow you to make more informed decisions on how to develop your character, but as it stands right now just go with what you think appears to be working or just go play something else while you wait. I've heard they might make double xp a permanent thing so you could be caught up in a few months after coming back if you decided you didn't want to continue playing atm. Or if they keep giving double xp as stretch goals on livestreams and get burnt out for that week and come back when they do it again.

 

2 + ___ = x now solve and test for x. You cant because you do not have all the nessecary information. Having avoidance display as a percentage when that is not what it actually does anymore is like only having half the equation. You cant test something without the right information, that is what I am asking and will continue to ask for.

 

Wouldn't testing tell you what _ is?

 

Day 8.......

@Baratan testing would tell you what x is. Unless you know what __ is you are only guessing and making stabs in the dark as to what __ is. Even if they told us what avoidance actually does now and it were wrong, at least we could then test it to prove it is wrong.

 

You're going to be waiting a long time my friend. Had a friend get suspended at the beginning of May and is still waiting on a response as to why he got suspended. If you want answers get Benjamin Hroth to invite you to his Blood Bay home owners chat Discord channel, Chris will sometimes answer questions there and reveal new game mechanics there, why he does it there and not on the official forums I don't know, but you can try. There's a select group of people there whose brains he likes to pick for some reason, the biggest supporters of PVP from our guild have left the channel already as it smells too much like favoritism. But don't go with a negative tone as he will not respond nicely to you and you will be removed from the channel.

 

You're asking for the behind the scenes math that most MMO developers never reveal. The best I've seen is what's figured out and put together by the players themselves.

 

I am asking for an update to information they have already provided in the past but due to necessary balance have changed

 

I'll admit that I would like it if they would do a pass and just make sure that everywhere they put info about something, all the different spots point in the same direction, now even though Kelam's approach isn't the right one, he does mark a point, and it doesn't just affect Damage Avoidance, but a lot of things in the game which need to match between tooltip, Description and reality, and this should happen fast, considering we are now in a "Launched" state, having contradicting information within the boundaries of the game does not leave a good taste for neither experience or newer players, leaving us experienced players confused with all the info we've been given since we started playing, and the newer players just looking at numbers and comparing it, feeling like it makes no sense (ex.: My Armor is giving me [19% Damage Avoidance] meanwhile my skill Glancing blow is giving me [55 points of nDamage Avoidance for 2 seconds, and 19 points of Damage avoidance for 48 Seconds]... so how do each affect each other?)n

 

I put this in the dodge thread but it's relevant here too so...

Here is my current understanding:

SHORT VERSION
Your dodge score is: dodge from skills and armor + your dex/2 - attackers dex /4
Your % chance to dodge is about half your dodge score

Edit: The same goes for damage avoidance (glancing blow). If you don't want to do all the math a rough rule of thumb is your glancing blow % chance is probably about half your glancing blow score.

This is also part of the reason that people are complaining that plate doesn't protect any better than chain but has much higher fizzle chance. The main difference between plate and chain is the avoidance score and its effectiveness was roughly halved when @Chris changed the combat math. IMO the avoidance score on plate probably should be increased a bit to account for the changes in combat math.


LONG VERSION
DS = dodge score = dodge from skills and armor + dex/2 - (attackers dex)/4
NHS = normal hit score = base weapon skill (or character level whichever is higher?)
GBS = glancing blow score = avoidance on armor + avoidance boost from 2 skills (glancing blow, fortify def, evasion, etc)
CS = crit score = This one is complicated. It is a percent chance that is converted to a score

• % chance = [base weapon crit chance + armor weak points + vital points + dex /20 (dex /10 for archers) ] * (1+ crit chance modifiers from weapon materials and/or masterworks)
• CS = (DS+NHS+GBS) * % chance

Blocks and parry are then determined by a second roll (so you can get things like a crit hit from first roll that is blocked by second roll)

chance of normal hit = NHS / (DS + NHS + GBS + CS)
chance of glancing blow = GBS / (DS + NHS + GBS + CS)
chance of dodge/miss = DS / (DS + NHS + GBS + CS)
chance of crit hit = CS / (DS + NHS + GBS + CS)

EXAMPLE
Attacker: 100 base bludgeoning combat skill, 80 dex, 80 armor weak points skill (5% crit), uses a normal mace (6% crit)
Defender: cloth armor (0 base avoid) with 90 dex is using 100 evasion (10 avoid?), 100 fortify defense (15 avoid?) and 100 dodge (20 dodge?)

DS = 20 + 90/2 - 80 /4 = 45
HNS = 100
GBS = 0 + 10 +15 = 25
CS: 6%+5%+4% = 15% so we get .15 * (45+100+25) = 25.5

DS + HNS + GBS + CS = 195.5

chance of normal hit = 51.2% (100/195.5)
chance of glancing blow = 12.8% (25/195.5)
chance of dodge/miss = 23.0% (45/195.5)
chance of crit hit = 13.0% (25.5/195.5)