Damage Calculation

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

Overview[]

Condition	Effect
Modifiers
Sleeping	4.5x damage
Grapple (on foes)	2.33x attack power
Attacks on grappling undead	No change
Out of battle stance	1.2x (foe attacks) 2x (attacks on foes)
Knocked-down	~2x †
Head shots	1x damage ‡(usually)
Armored foes/tough skin	~20-40% damage
Blinded Torpored	No change
Staggered	No change
Climbing	+50% physical damage † (extra +66% for Strider)
Ghost possession (broken)	+50% all damage
Drake possessing pawn	+33% damage
Completely Frozen	2x damage next melee hit
Partially frozen †	~1/5th damage next melee hit
† Giant creatures only ‡ Head shot damage often corresponds to the creature's base defense

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.

The physical and magickal attack and defense 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, which is the loadout amount. The numerical effects of Invigorations or Debilitations are not shown numerically; however, if present, the relevant Status Effects are registered in the individual's "Condition" sub-menu.

Attacks by the Arisen and allies on foes are calculated differently from those made by foe on the party. For attacks on foes, defense is subtracted from attack power; for foe attacks on the party their attack power is divided by a function of the ally's defense - with core defense counting twice as much as that coming from armor and other equipment.

Once the attack has been mitigated by defense by either method the resultant damage is subtracted from health - once health reaches zero creatures die, and pawns become Unconscious.

Mixed physical and magickal attacks[]

For physical attacks with enchanted weapons only the magic of the weapon matters, not the wielder's core magick.

For most spells, there is generally no physical component at all. A few magickal skills have an additional physical component. For such spells, the physical and magickal damages are calculated separately.

Such skills and spells include the Mystic Knight's Magick Cannon, and Perilous Sigil. These scale only with weapon strength, and not core strength; however, some spell enchanted perfect blocks have an initial shockwave that scales with all magick and all strength.

Sorcerers have a few spells with a physical component that also scales with total strength including core strength (e.g., Gicel). Mages have no spells that do physical damage. Of Magick Archer's non-melee skills only Immolation does physical damage.

Enemy Armor[]

For foes the Defense, Magick Defense, blunt and striking resistances, and elemental resistances, and stance are not the only factors that affect damage. In addition there is a final damage modifier that affects damage taken: this can be assumed to corresponds to the 'armoredness' of the point being hit, be it scales, hide, or otherwise. This armor values varies for different parts on a creature's body.

Often damage to the head corresponds to unmitigated (ie 100%) damage at a creature's Defense (eg Goblin, Undead, Cyclops) though the exact spot and angle of attack can be a factor.

Generally the enemy armor modifier is less than one and reduces incoming damage. It can be as low as 0.075x (7.5%) as with a Drake's tail, but generally is between 20 and 50%. Most attacks that do not hit a weak spot will be affected by this armor value; for example Undead bodies have an armor value of 2/5ths (only 40% of expected damage is inflicted). Some especially vulnerable spots like a Cyclops' eye can result in greater than 1x damage.

This damage modifier is calculated at the same time (and if applicable, multiplicatively) with weak spot and some stance modifiers like when a creature is sleeping.

"Defense Break"[]

When an attack's power is less than a foe's defense a fraction of 1 Health point of damage is done. Thus at lower levels or when facing strong foes a more powerful attack may make the difference between this "nominal" damage and good damage.

As attack power crosses the defense threshold the relative increase in damage is far greater than the absolute increase.

As well a choosing powerful skills and spells, other ways to boost attack power past defenses include magick and strength boosting Augments; use of Invigorations that cause Strength Boosted or Magick Boosted, or weakening defense by grappling or using an element to which the enemy is weak to.

Effects such as Blunt or Slash resistance; attacks to weakpoints; vocation specific climbing boosts, and stance or status effects such as attacks on frozen foes only modify final damage, and so don't help break through defenses. Lowered attributes (such as Curse or Lowered Defense) also alter final damage and so don't help break defense thresholds; however being afflicted with lowered attack (such as Curse or Lowered Strength) affects attack power and so can make it more difficult to break thresholds.

Commonly used skills and spells that may be too weak against formidable foes include Mystic Knight's Great Cannon; Sorcerer's Miasma; magick user's Focused Bolt or Magick Bolt; Warrior's Indomitable Lunge; shortbow users' Fivefold Flurry; and ranger's Tenfold Flurry.

Immunity[]

Certain foes are immune to types of attack. In terms of damage calculation immunity can be equivalent to a 100% resistance, or an extremely high defense, or both.

All ghosts are immune to physical attacks except when possessing. This seems to be due to 100% blunt and slashing resistance.
- In the special case of Phantasms immunity to attacks with a lightning element also will nullify any physical component that would have otherwise done damage.
Golems are immune to the Five Archmagicks, and also have near immunity to Neutral Magick through very high Magick Defense.

Bypassing defense, and other damage forms[]

Some attacks and damage bypass allied and enemy Defense. This includes some mundane temporal damage sources such as Burning and Poison, as well as Fall Damage. These types of damage aren't mitigated by Invigorations nor generally by Damage Reducing Augments (excluding Resilience).

The Maker's Finger arrow can 'one-shot' almost any foe. However in extreme cases it has been show to have finite damage; it does limited damage to Cursed Dragons which is boosted by Invigorations.

Additionally the damage from the spell Exequy is so high as to be practically unlimited, and its efficacy only limited by the spell's cast time. The 'riposte' damage from Act of Atonement and Act of Vengeance is thought to bypass enemy defenses (but some Debilitation weaknesses still factor), and directly reduces Health without a Defense reduction. Combining knowledge of both allows the power of foe-cast Exequy spells to be indirectly measured and 'riposted' with Act of Vengeance when the augment Tenacity is equipped (see 'Act of Execution').

Calculations[]

For a complete list of skill and spell attack power modifiers, see Skill multiplier data.

The calculations used to obtain damage have been discovered with a good degree of reliability from testing. The formulas used are explained below.

Arisen and Pawn attacks[]

Physical[]

A damage formula has been suggested which matches with real world data.

First the 'attack power' needs to be calculated :

{\displaystyle AttackPowerPhysical = ( StrSkill+(StrChar \times SkChar \times A) + (StrWeap \times SkWeap \times A) ) \times I \times G }

Affects physical power :

StrChar = Character's Strength
StrWeap = Weapon's Strength (includes equipment strength boosts)

StrSkill = Skill's base Strength (depends on skill)
SkChar = Skill's Character Strength modifier (based on skill used)
SkWeap = Skill's Weapon Strength modifier (based on skill used)

A = augment multiplier (eg 1.2x with Clout)
I = Buff multiplier (from Raised or Lowered Strength on the attacker, including the lowered attack from Curse)
G = Grapple power boost

The 'attack power' can be used to calculate actual damage received :

{\displaystyle DamagePhys = ( AttackPowerPhysical - Defense ) \times BS \times AM \times CB \times FM \times Other }

Modifies damage:

BS = Blunt/Slashing resistance modifier
AM = Armor modifier - armored creatures have reduced damage, eg cyclops takes 20% damage to legs
CB = Climbing boosts - Creature specific, with only dangerous foes gaining boosts. Also multiplies with Strider climbing boost
FM = Fauna modifier - Fauna take extra damage specific to each species
Other = Other damage boosts includes Possession effects (Pf), and stance modifiers ; also includes the effect of raised or lowered Defenses on the defender including the weakened defenses from Curse.

Magick[]

For magick, the suggested formula is very similar, but differs slightly.

First 'magick attack power' needs to be calculated :

{\displaystyle AttackPowerMag = ( ( MagSpell + (MagChar \times SpChar \times A) + ( (MagWeap + MagEnchant) \times SpWeap \times A) ) \times I \times EW \times G }

Affects net magick power

MagChar = Core Magick
MagWeap = Weapon Magick (includes worn equipment magic boosts)
MagEnchant = Magick added by Weapon Enchantment

MagSpell = Magick skill's (spell's) base Magick (depends on skill)
SpChar = Character's Magick modifier (based on skill used)
SpWeap = Weapon's Magick modifier (based on skill used)

A = augment multiplier (eg 1.2x with Acuity)
I = Buff multiplier (from Raised or Lowered Magick on the attacker, including the lower magick power from Curse)
EW = enemy elemental weakness modifier
G = Grapple effects

The actual damage received is given by :

{\displaystyle DamageMag = ( AttackPowerMag - MDEF ) \times AM \times FM \times Other }

Modifies damage :

AM = Armor modifier - armored creatures have reduced damage, eg cyclops takes 20% damage to legs
FM = Fauna modifier - Fauna take extra damage specific to each species
Other = Other damage boosts : includes Possession effects (Pf), and stance modifiers ; also includes raised or lowered Magick Defenses on the defender and the lowered defense from Curse

Weapon enchantment Magick boost[]

The Magick boost from Weapon Enchantment is thought to be given by the equation :

MagEnchant = WeaponModifier \times ScaleSpell \times (\frac{ 100 + CharacterMagick}{7.5} +  Level )

Spell	ScaleSpell †	Maximum magick boost ‡
Spell	ScaleSpell †	Unenchanted Weapons	Enchanted Weapons *
Boon	3.25	336	134
Affinity	3.5	361	144
Pact	3.75	388	155
Enchanter	3.5	361	144
Trance	5	517	206
Invocation	6.5	672	268
* Includes staves, archistaves, and magic bows † See equation ‡ ie at above Level 50 and over 300 core Magick

Where :

MagEnchant is the magick boost
WeaponModifier = 1 for unenchanted melee weapons, 0.4 for permanently enchanted melee weapons and magick weapons
ScaleSpell = modifier dependent on enchanting skill used (see table)
Character Magick = Magick of the caster of the enchantment spell (This has a cap at 300 magick and a lower limit of 50)
Level = Character Level of the caster of the enchantment spell (This has a cap a level 50)

The additional magick is counted as weapon and equipment magick, not character magick

Final Damage[]

The outputs DamagePhysical and DamageMag are the final damage numbers of the attack. This number is subtracted from enemy Health.

Some attacks damage in separate stages. For example, Ingle is calculated in two steps: the initial damage from the fireball strike, and then a second reduction from the small explosion after. This two stage effect can be seen in the Arisen's health gauge on screen.

A key difference between physical and magickal attacks is that with magick, elemental weaknesses can be exploited to "armor break" a foe, whilst with melee attacks blunt or slashing resistance only modify the final damage.

The effect of Iraklis is to modify both SkWep and SpWep to ~ one ninth of their proper values - when it crits those multipliers are increased to nine times their proper values. Thus the power of weapon enchantments as well as equipment boosts are also affected by the longsword.

Foe Attacks[]

A completely different formula is used when calculating damage from attacks from foes and monsters on the Arisen and allies.

It is thought to be calculated using :

FoeAttackPower = FoeAtk \times FoeSkill \times HM \times Other

and

DefenseReduction = \frac {100 }{ 100 + DefChar + \frac{1}{2}DefEq }

Where:

FoeAtk = Foes attack power
FoeSkill = Foe Skill Modifier
HM = Difficulty Modifier (eg Gransys Hard Mode is 4.5)
Other , includes :
- Stance (out of battle, sleep, etc.) modifier
- Debilitation/Invigoration modifier; i.e., Defenses Lowered, Magick Defense Lowered, Defenses Boosted, Magick Defenses Boosted, lowered defense from Curse, but not lowered attack from curse.
- [Also includes Possession effects (Pp)]
DefChar = Character core Defense (or Core Magick Defense)
DefEq = Defense (or Magick Defense) provided by equipment

Using the FoeAttackPower and DefenseReduction give received damage using this equation :

Damage = ( ( FoeAttackPower \times DefReduction \times (\frac{100-RES}{100}) \times I ) - DRA ) \times Other

Example (Defense against a 1000 power attack)
Effective Defense †	Damage	Hits survivable
0 ‡	1000	1
100	500	2
200	333	3
300	250	4
400	200	5
† Core defense is twice as important as equipment defense ‡ Using Brilliance

Where

RES = Resistance - either Blunt/Slashing (BS), or Elemental (EW)
DRA = Flat damage mitigation value from augments and equipment.

The equation also means there are numerically diminishing returns at higher defenses : according to the equation the first 100 (or 200 of equipment defense) should reduce damage by half, but it takes a further 200 (or 400 of equipment defense) to reduce damage by a further quarter; however because the Defense reduces incoming attack by dividing in practice this means that the number of hits survivable increases linearly with defense.

The same equation is used separately for both magick and melee attacks, but with the creature's magick or physical power used, and the Arisen's or ally's Defense or Magick Defense interposed. Elemental or Bludgeoning or Piercing Resistances (or weaknesses) reduce (or increase) the foe's attack power by a percentage related to the resistance.

Damage and Attack power factors[]

Class	Type	Effect	In equation
Skills	Skill	Each skill scales differently with the user's core, weapon, and equipment strength or magick.	Sk / Sp
	Core power	Each skill or spell has a core power. It is generally small for rapid attacks, but may be extremely high for charged skills such as Arc of Deliverance Core power isn't increased by boosting augments.	StrSkill / MagSkill
	Character Magick	Affects the power of spells only	MagChar
	Character Strength	Generally only affects melee and thrown attacks	StrChar
	Weapon Magick	Affects spell power, and also melee attacks with an enchanted weapon	MagWeap
	Weapon Strength	Generally only contributes to non-spell melee attacks, with a few exceptions	StrWeap
	Equipment Boost	Equipment magick and strength boosts are added to weapon magick or weapon strength	EB
Stance	Grapple	2.33x (seven thirds) attack power multiplier for both physical and magickal attacks When Undead creatures grapple allies attacks on them are unchanged in damage. Giant's grabbing allies also does not alter their resistances, unless they are possessing an ally.	Other
	Out of battle (party)	Damage with weapon sheathed : 1.2x Damage
	Out of battle (foes)	Attacks on unaware foes : ~2-3x Damage_phys and Damage_mag
	Knocked-down	2x damage only certain giant foes including Dragons and Chimera but not Ogres or Cyclops Smaller foes don't take increased damage
	Staggered	No change	-
	Climbing	When climbing certain dangerous foes a physical damage multiplier (+50%) is applied. Damage to lesser foes isn't improved Striders get an additional damage boost (+66%) Magickal damage doesn't receive climbing boosts	CB
Possession	Possessing ghosts	When ghost possession is broken +50% damage is taken	Pf
	Dragon possession grab	When Drake's attempt to possess pawns they take +33% damage	Pf
	Possession (pawn)	Possessed pawns have their physical melee power substantially reduced so that they can do little more than a few hit points of damage. Attacks with enchanted weapons also have their magick power reduced to negligible levels. However Bow attacks are un-changed. Magick power of purely magickal attacks is unchanged.	Pp
Debilitation	Sleep	4.5x damage (1.5x for Arisen and pawns)	Other
	Blinded	No change	-
	Torpored	No change	-
	Frozen	If completely frozen - 2x damage next melee hit. If a large creature is partially frozen damage is reduced to 1/5th on the next melee strike. Magick attacks are unnaffected.	Other
	Drenched	2x damage from a single lightning or ice based attack. Half damage from a fire based attack.
	Tarred	Double damage from a fire based attacks.
Debilitation (Lowered Attributes)	Lowered Defense	For the attacks on the Arisen, allies and foes increases damage taken by 30%, stacking up to four times for a maximum of 286% damage taken.	Other
	Lowered Magick Defense		Other
	Lowered Strength	For the Arisen and allies reduces attack power to 70% (-30%), stacking up to four times for a maximum of 24% (-76%)	I (allied attacks)
	Lowered Magick		I (allied attacks)
	Curse	Effect on Offense For creatures that have been cursed, the damage from their attacks (physical and magickal) is reduced by -40% (to 60%) When the Arisen and allies are cursed their attack powers (physical and magickal) are reduced by -40% (to 60%)	I (ally on foe) Other (foe on ally)
	Curse	Effect on Defense For attacks on creatures or allies that have been cursed the damage (physical and magickal) is increased by +40% (1.4x)	Other
Invigorations	Strength Boosted	Increase attack power by 20%, and stack up to four times, for a maximum 207.4% increase in power.	I
	Magick Boosted		I
	Defenses Boosted	Damage reduced by 20% damage (80% damage). Stacks up to 4 times (ie up to 0.8⁴ = 41% damage). [No effect on the Defense stat] Same effect for both foes and allied attacks	Other
	Magick Defenses Boosted		Other
Blunt and Slashing	Blunt	Modifies final damage from Warhammers and Maces. Unarmed Combat, physical bow attacks, shockwaves, and almost all throwning items cause blunt damage	BS
Blunt and Slashing	Slashing	Modifies final damage from Daggers, Swords, Longswords. Foreign Knifes and the spell Gicel can also do slashing damage	BS
Archmagick	Neutral	Neutral magick bypasses elemental resistances. Only a few skills including unenchanted Magick Bolts, Focused Bolts, Ruinous Sigil, Great Cannon, and Miasma are neutral magick. Additionally some magick shockwaves are neutral including Magick Billow and that from Great Sacrifice	-
	Fire Ice Thunder Holy Dark	Magick power modified based on creature resistance. Ice, Fire, and Lightning elements can also modify the damage of drenched or tarred foes	EW
	Weapon Enchantment	Adds elemental damage, and can change a enchanted weapon's element. Higher tier spells add more Magick, and the amount added increases with the caster's core magick and level up to a limit. Magickal and permanently enchanted weapons receive lower Magick boost than purely physical ones.	EW MagEnchant
Weak spots and armor	Weakspots	A creature's most vulnerable part usually represents its given defense (DEF) value. Other parts of the creature show less than than would be expected from defense.	AM
	'Armor'	Most foes receive reduced damage when not hit in the head or other weakspot. For example a cyclops' legs, back and arms have damage reduced to two fifths
	Crippling Arrow / Invasive Arrow	Dangerous foes take +25% damage to the body part hit with the arrow. Does not stack. Only dangerous (Dragon, Cyclops, Death etc) foes affected
Augments	Damage Reducing Augments	Certain augments reduce damage further after all other effects have been taken into account. They reduce either Magick or Physical damage, or both, and stack together additively.	DRA
	Sanctuary	Sanctuary's unique damage reducing effect. Only physical damage is affected.	Other
	Magick Boosting Augments	The effects stack multiplicatively (up to a maximum of 1.8x in Dark Arisen) boosting core, weapon, and equipment magick, but not core spell power.	A
	Strength Boosting Augments	The effects stack multiplicatively (up to a maximum of 1.8x in Dark Arisen) boosting core, weapon, and equipment strength, but not core skill power	A
Difficulty	Normal	1.0x	HM
	Hard Mode	4.5x in Gransys, 2.25x on Bitterblack Isle
	Easy	0.5x (50%) damage from both magick and physical attacks (compared to normal mode)

Graph[]

For an Attack Power of 100, Damage vs. Defense :

Damage vs. Defense

Red line - : Arisen or Pawn damage. Blue line - : Creature damage
(graph via www.desmos.com)

Graph showing the percentage of damage the Arisen and Pawns take from enemy attacks with increasing effective defense.

Though the minimum effective defense or magick defense is around 60 (at Character Level 1 and naked), it is possible to lower either to zero using either the special effects of the Brutish Wall or Brilliance shields.

Damage on foes from the Arisen and allies decreases linearly to zero as defense increases; whilst damage to the Arisen from foes gradually tails off.

Tactics[]

If a creature has high defense in magick and a weakness to physical attacks, or vice versa, use spells or attacks that target the foe's weakness.
Exploit the enemy's elemental and other weaknesses.
Cooperation with 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 an enemy.

Notes[]

When Magick Boosting Equipment is worn with an unechanted weapon it still adds a magick component to a melee attack. This effect is usually insignificant.
- The addition of the magick component causes unenchanted melee strikes on Ghosts to 'connect', whereas without any magick attacks pass staight through.
- Magick Boosting Equipment also adds a small amount of magick to Unarmed Combat
- The effect can be observed with attacks on tiny creatures such as Rats (1 MDEF)
Thrown Damage and damage from Single-Use Magick Items is calculated in the much the same way as weapon and spell magick.
- In the case of thrown items generally only the thrower's Character Strength and the type of object (corresponding to the base attack power) are factors. Augments and Invigorations are not factored.
- In the case of single use magickal items the magick power is fixed, but may be altered by periapts etc.
There is little or no randomness to the damage given or received. However exact damage figures appear to show some rough rounding, and possible some variation rarely more than 30 health.
- There is an exception: the Critical Hit from the longsword Iraklis appears to be activated randomly.
Magick Archer's Magick Bows are capable of delivering only magickal damage. All other weapons and weapon classes have the ability to deliver either mixed strength/magickal or strength damage, if only via a limited range of attacks.
Fall Damage seems to be increased when falling from a knocked down state.
- The fall damage increase may be +50%
- It's posdible that foes can take increased damage when hit when aerial (from a knock up attack) ^(verify)

Damage numbers and Menu stats[]

Inflicted damage can be monitored by viewing the "total damage done" statistic in the menu. Enter the pause menu, and select "History" >> "Adventure Log" >> "Player"
- Damage to humans, including bandits and pawns, is not included in the cumulative damage number.
- Damage in the menu is capped at 100,000,000
- Higher damage numbers can be recorded (on using the mod "Dinput8.dll Hooks" )
- The maximum damage known is probably 1,153,299,072 obtained by using "Act of Execution" through absorbing three Maneater Exequy spells on an Arisen with 4x Lowered Magick Defense and Curse and returning it to the head of an Elder Ogre afflicted by Sleeping, Cursed, and Drenched using the longsword Iraklis with a lightning enchantment. (See DEAD already its Stooooppp gammav97, www.youtube.com )
Base strength and weapon stats are available in the status and equipment menus. Other factors such as creature defenses and weaknesses are not viewable, and must be learned through experience.
- The second, cumulative strength and magick values shown in the 'Stats' menu may be misleading as it shows the total of both core and weapon powers; however, for physical attacks Character Magick does not factor, and for magic attacks Character Strength usually does not factor.
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 Ring or Preceptor Rings with strength or magick boosts.

Under the hood[]

Dragon's_Dogma-_Correcting_Misinformation_Regarding_Damage — Dragon's Dogma- Correcting Misinformation Regarding Damage

Details regarding how damage is recorded and increased via Augments and Invigoration multipliers.

Modded testing with add-ons to record damage numbers shows that :

The game engine records and calculates damage to a high degree of accuracy (sub-integer)
The damage log (in the history menu) shows a rounded version of this damage
If the Arisen doesn't have enough power to break a creature's defenses then a "pity" damage of 0.5 can be given

Sources[]

Damage formula are derived from :
- Damage to foes : "Science" § Damage
- Damage to the Arisen and allies : "Science" § Mech02 Damage (Party)
Boost from enchantments : Source "Science" [Mech04] Elemental Enchants (WIP)
Other additions include the effects of stance, and creature armor effects