Armor =/= flat damage reduction (updated)

[herflik]

This is updated version of the post, after more tests that I did today. Disregard this post mostly, the enemies actualy have % DR not flat one.

1)Armor of enemy is % damge reduction. Ancient infected on pluto have around 87-88% DR, depending from their exact level.

2)Critical hits act in wery weird way. Usualy they are the exact critical damage you have (stack multiplicativly).

So if you deal 100dmg on crit with 200% dmg, you will deal 200dmg. On the other hand its irregular damage on headshot critics and even some normal critis, dealing more or less dmg than it should.

In example I can regulary hit mob for 55 damage, crits will do usualy 110 damage, where one will deal 250 and other 83 damage. And no the 250 dmg is not HS crit, hs dmg is 480 and hs crit around 780 damage or so. Thats all with 200% critical damage.

Edited January 21, 2013 by herflik

[aTaVaX]

or maybe its something like critical damage isn't mitigated by armor at all...

[KGeddon]

Armor, at least the one used by mobs/monsters, sems to be flat damage reduction from what I see in my tests.

The tests are easy, I was actualy comparing with mods are most effective to my weapons, and it hit me the second I saw the results. The tests were made on ancient infected on pluto, they are actualy pretty heavy armored units, also on normal infected.

I came up with those numbers (no elemental damage included, just normal melee damage):

Around ~1500 dmg on normal infected (thats an overkill, and its not even critical, that must be the bonus damage from scindo).

Around ~50 dmg on ancient infected (thats a massive damage drop).

Around ~450 dmg on ancient infected on critical hit.

50 non-crit with 450 crit hit. That can explain alot in terms of damage reduction calculation.

To make from 50 non-crit a 450 crit with damage % reduction you would need 900% damage on crit. Since I was runing with barely 200% critical damage, my crits should deal 100 dmg if it was % dmg reduction. Its simple math...

100 dmg - 50% reduction and then x2 on crit, it will end up with 100dmg.

Though with flat damage reduction, meaning X armor reduce damage taken by Y amount of points its possible to have such result. Its also simple math case. Lets say that I deal 400dmg per hit, now enemy reduce incoming damage by 350 dmg. I will end up with 50 dmg per hit, but on crit I get additional 400dmg. So its 800-350= 450 dmg.

The only question is, do monsters have seperate armor/damage reduction mechanics from player characters?

If not, whats the correct ratio of armor to flat damage reduction, 1 armor =1 less damage or something different?

Will need to test more or get simple answer for devs, but its some step ahead already.

42nd level infested ancient body armor reduces normal damage by 90%. Yes, it is considered armor, so any armor ignoring melee will do full damage.

edit:Note, critical hits take whatever damage the number would have been, and multiplies it by the critical damage multiplier. It doesn't ignore armor, but rather calculates armor before critical.

Edited January 21, 2013 by KGeddon

[nzzero]

I think the mosnters have the same damage reduction mechanics that players have. The thing is, armor does not work for shields, but for health only. So if you stack up armor mods, you are not going to see difference how long shields last, but health is going to be dropping much slower. As most monsters dont have shields, you only see straight damage reduction.

I however agree that armor stat should be more informative. How much % of damage does each % of armor mitigate?

[herflik]

or maybe its something like critical damage isn't mitigated by armor at all...

Thats possiblity too, though I would need orokin catalyst to really test it propertly, and ofc some more mods.

This might take a while haha, everybody waits for ? alert with orokin catalyst, but RNG god dont have mercy upon us.

[Ced23Ric]

Regardless of the effects and pros/cons of this system, I'd like to thank herflik for the done investigations. Good job!

PS: This also means that I'll probably end up with the Furax or Fragor as my melee, and I'll experiment with more AP heavy loadouts.

Edit: Just did some quick math - using 2x +70%, 1x +68% and 1x +40% armour mods on my 50 base armour would mean that my Rhino has a base DR of 174.1 (50 Base +35 +35 +34.1 +20). If it works just as the enemy armour does. That raises the question why Armour is not converted into a similar way as Shield Capacity was, with flat values - in this case, even more so, as we have no way of pushing the armour statistic. If armour mods are multiplicative, the value would be ~340.

Edited January 21, 2013 by Ced23Ric

[herflik]

Ok I see I made few mistakes in the observations, but oh well we learn from mistakes.

I have more data now, yet it is so weird that it will be hard to decode or either the game is nicely bugged in dmg calculation.

Also what are RED damage numbers?? I had one hit like that in the test and it was for 999dmg on ancient infested.

[Ced23Ric]

Maybe it is a critical proc for armour ignore? "You find the chink", kind of thing?

[herflik]

Cant be, this run was without any mods equiped in weapon. So there was no elemental nor armor-pierce mods in it.

Also you can do nice headshots with melee weapon from what I see, or maybe its some hidden proc damage on infested, but it deals from x7 to x9 times the normal damage.

[Ced23Ric]

I have seen it on the other factions aswell. Yet, there is a x10 damage bonus on midair Leapers - can you recall when that red number came up?

[herflik]

100% sure it was on ancient infested, last hit on him.

Also the 10x damage on midair Leapers, yeah that explain why I did 22020 dmg on them lol.

I will need to do few more runs also on other factions to see something.

But for now I can say that critical damage from upgrade in weapon are multiplicative +15%.

If you got all scindo upgrades and 7x 100% critical damage mods in it, your crits will do ~38400% dmg lol.

Also the critical hit dont sem to ignore defence, but i need further testing on that.

Personaly I would go 5 or 6x 100% crit damage mods and rest max critiral rate possible, proc one crit = insta kill boss ?

Edited January 21, 2013 by herflik

[Arcalane]

Melee weapons can definitely 'headshot' if they hit the head hitbox, but it's obviously difficult given the angles sometimes. My Fragor does about half a rank 10 Corpus Crewman's healthbar with a normal hit, but if I manage to catch him in the head with the hammer's head during the jump-slam attack? It's an instakill. But, if I only catch him in the shoulder or arm, then it's a fairly weak knockdown.

Moas, on the other hand, only get their shields wiped (since the hammer counts as hitting the gun, not the tiny head) and take three hits (or one charged hit) to kill either way.

Edited January 21, 2013 by Arcalane

[herflik]

Ok I am totally loost in the critical hits damage calculation , its give so random numbers that its hard to calculate them back with any common sense lol :P