Damage Calculation

This page discusses the method of damage calculation used by Dragon's Dogma and Dragon's Dogma:Dark Arisen.

Overview
There are two types of damage in the game, physical and magickal. The two damage types never combine; they are separately and respectively applied and then defended, in turn, by the imposition of the character's or enemy's Defense (DEF) or Magick Defense (MDEF) stat. When damage exceeds the target's DEF and/or MDEF thresholds, then the remaining points of damage are applied to, and reduce the target's Hit Points (HP). When the victim's HP is exhausted, it dies.

The physical and magical attack and defence stats of the Arisen and Pawns are viewable in the "status" screen from the 'Pause Menu' - the values shown incorporate the base value, plus modifiers from augments; a second higher value shows the value after weapons or armors are factored. The boosts or decreases from from periapts, potions, or debilitations are not shown numerically, but appear in the status effects screen.

Physical modifiers
Physical damage is modified by the type of attack - either blunt or slashing, and different Armor pieces have different slashing, blunt damage stats. Most weapons and/or physical attacks are either 100% blunt, or 100% slashing.

Magickal modifiers
Archmagick (elemental) resistances and weaknesses affect magic damage, and, as with physical damage armour can have resistance (or weakness) to particular elements.

Other modifiers

 * Main article debilitation.

Spells and attacks with an elemental component may inflict a related Debilitation (eg ice may inflict frozen); there are also non-archmagick debilitations such as poison that may be inflicted as a result of special weapons, attacks, or spells.

An enemy with a debilitation may take additional damage as a result of it, or have its behaviour altered, or make it more susceptible to damage from other attacks. For example torpor slows, but curse weakens, whilst fire and poison add additional damage over time, and may cause panic or disorientation. The likelihood of these status effects being inflicted is based on the the number of times the 'blow' strikes the victim, and further modified by the victim's resistances or weaknesses.

"Armour Break"
For attacks on weakly defended or poorly resistant enemies an increase in either physical or magickal attack causes the related damage to increase roughly linearly with the stat's value.

For highly resistant enemies, such as a Drake, the monster's defence may almost completely block weaker attacks, and only the strongest attack cause significant damage.

For example a low level warrior may do triple damage on an Ox using Blink Strike than with the light attack of Onslaught, but when attacking a drake, the low attack power of Onslaught may be too low to cause more than a few HP of damage, whilst the more powerful strike of the Blink Strike attack will do noticeable damage. Because the defence of a dragon is much greater than an ox both attacks will be relatively less, but the ratio of damage will be much higher, with the stronger attack doing 10x damage or more relative to the light attack.

For heavily armoured foes it may be necessary to rely upon the heaviest attacks to "break" the defence of the foe.

Certain skills have much greater attack strength and are certain to break any damage barrier - eg Warrior's Arc of Deliverance, or Ranger's Deathly Arrow.

In addition to using strong attacks in preference to lighter faster attacks there are other tactics to break a strong enemy's defences - increasing strength (or magic attack) is one way to break a strong defence, either by use of periapts (eg Demon's Periapt), or augments (eg jumping attacks with Eminence), inflicting stance of debilitations effects such as curse or sleep are also very effective at weakening defence.

Effect of skill used
The skill used to carry out an attack has a major effect on the damage done - not only do different skills do more or less damage, but the way the damage scales with strength also varies.

For example a Warrior using the core skill hack has damage multiplied by an approximately seven to five ratio (1.4x) of the wielder's total strength (More accurately the  value). The longer charging skill Arc of Deliverance, however, scales better at a five to two ratio (2.5x). The skill Pommel Bash scales at a much lower four to five ration (0.8x) - this skill also converts strength into stagger.

Strength boosting periapts and potions ignore this scaling, and give about the same increase in overall damage, independent of skills or attack used.

Other factors
Many other factors affect damage. The stance of the foe - ie knocked down, grappled, or incapacitated (eg sleep) will multiply damage caused.

Armoured Cyclops wear armour that mitigate almost all damage until destroyed, Saurians become much weaker when their tale is severed, and so on.

Calculations
In the case of a Physical attack the attacker's physical weapon's base STRENGTH is incorporated into the character's attack, modified by Augments, further modified by percentages representing blunt or slashing weaknesses and/or resistance.
 * Physical

The value so obtained is the modified (multiplied) by a factor representing the strength of the attack - eg Dragon's Maw has a higher multiplier than the core skill light attack Onslaught.

Attacks with multiple strikes are calculated multiple times, once per strike (eg Compass Slash.)

The resultant figure is applied to the victim's PHYSICAL DEFENCE (DEF). If the attack value is greated than the defence then the difference is then subtracted from the victim's HP.

The victim's stance, status, and any debilitations also affect damage taken, or base defence.

In the case of magickal attacks the calculation is as with a physical attack, except magick attack and defence replace physical attack and defence. Blunt/Slashing resistances are replaced by weakness or resistance to the relevant Archmagick
 * Magical

Mixed physical and magickal attacks
Many magical skills inflict both magickal damage, plus an additional physical component. For such spells the physical and magickal damages are calculated separately and the combined.

Such skills and spells include


 * Mystic Knight : Magick Cannon, Ruinous Sigil, and Stone Grove based spells.
 * Sorcerer : Gicel, Bolide, and Seism based spells, as well as the core skill Magick Billow

In the case of spells, the extent of dependance on physical and magic stats can be expressed as a percentage - for example, the skill Great Cannon scales from 40% of the Arisen's Strength and 60% of the Arisen's Magick stats (which also incorporates the stats of the weapon in use). Gicel is 30% Strength, 70% Magick.

Enchanted Weapons also combine physical and magickal attacks. They don't scale with character status like skills. Instead the stats are just added. For example, a character with 200 Strength and 100 Magick equiped with a permanently enchanted weapon of 50 Strength and 50 Magick, will have 250 Strength and 150 Magick for that weapon. If he had equipped a non enchanted weapon of 50 Strength and 0 Magick and then received an enchantment, his attack would then deal an additional 100 Magick damage. These numbers are of course prior to other Strength or Magick boosts and enemy defence and resistances calculations. In effect, each strike with such weapons produces a physical and a magick hit, like two seperate strikes. At least until enemy DEF and MDEF are calculated.

That is, because It is thought that if the physical componenet of the two part attack is sufficient to break the defence of the foe, then the second magickal attack will not be reduced by the foes MDEF This makes these skills extremely dangerous as, typically, monster MDEF values are significantly lower than DEF values.

Example
This is a sample simple calculation using a single strike of a with 100% Blunt and Slash damage - the calculation ignores the specific strength of the attack type.
 * Simplified Physical attack

In any situation where an enemy's physical weakness is 100%, a character's Strength stat and the enemy's DEF are the only factors concerning damage. Additionally, Augment bonuses take effect before the enemy's DEF is factored in.

An Arisen with 200 Base Strength possesses a Sword with 100 Str, wears a Golden Belt (+20 strength) and also equips Vehemence (+10%= 1.1 times), and Clout (+20% = 1.2 times)= on their Augment list. Total attack Strength is calculated as:


 * (All the augment strength boosts are multiplied) 
 * (All the augment strength boosts are multiplied) 

So the value is



So the total attacks strength value is 435. This is the same number that shows in the subject Character's status page under Strength.

The damage is calculated as (approximation)


 * The "Skill Multiplier" is specific to each type of attack, and has different values for Hack, Arc of Deliverance and so on. (In this example it is ignored)
 * The "Skill Multiplier" is specific to each type of attack, and has different values for Hack, Arc of Deliverance and so on. (In this example it is ignored)

Let's say that the enemy's DEF is 75 and its HP is 150. The Arisen has the previously calculated 435 Strength. So the damage is:



360 is then subtracted from the enemy's HP as a result of this blow. Since 360 is greater than the target's HP of 150, congratulations! --the Arisen's target is a bloody mess on the floor.

Base Magical Damage ...is calculated separately in exactly the same manner, using the magick attack and defense values, and the appropriate augments such as Acuity, Attunement, Emphasis and so on.
 * Magickal Dmage

Base Stat Modifiers
Certain armor pieces have minor stat bonuses, such as the Golden Belt's strength, the Laurel Circlet's Magick; certain Master Rings and/or Preceptor Rings provide additional base Strength and/or Magick to its bearer. These affect damage calculations by inclusion in the character's combined base Strength or Magick and weaponry stats prior to multiplication by its Augments.

NOTE: '' A player will only be able to determine exactly how powerful a pawn may be by reviewing its Rings while still in the Rift. When a pawn is reviewed in the Rift, base stats are not affected by Master or Preceptor Rings with +STR and/or +MAG. Once the pawn exits the Rift its full damage capacity will be recalculated in the Pawn's Profile, in accordance with its equipped augments.''

Tactics

 * For creatures with high defence, use the strongest attack to break the defence barrier.
 * Exploit the enemies elemental and other weaknesses
 * Co-operated with the pawns, encourage the use of grappling, suitable enchantment and item use.
 * There are a wide range of skills, items, and spells that can weaken or debilitate and enemy.