Slawbug

car 54, where are you.

"Geneforge Gaiden"

Out of curiosity, what game did s/he think was doing the spying? And was it anything particular about the game ("Adze-Haakai is really a spycam!")?

Yes, Jeff was pretty clear about that. Also, if armor effect really was random as you suggest, then that means we would expect to see HUGE damage variances when a character wearing lots of armor is hit, much huger than the variances when an unarmored character is hit. And that's not the case at all.

 

Also, about Hardiness: Hardiness does not give 1% armor per point. It gives 2% armor per point, BUT this bonus is not displayed, AND it is subject to the 10-cap many skills have, so 10-11 hardiness gives 20% armor, 12-13 gives 22%, 20-22 gives 30%, 23-25 gives 32%, and so on. That means that your test at 20 Hardiness is really providing 30% damage reduction. So reducing the range max from 11 to 8 makes perfect sense. Reducing the range min from 5 to 1 makes less sense, but because the numbers are so tiny, I really think it's a min value or rounding issue. To clarify this issue, tests with bigger damage values are needed.

 

Also note that Luck displays a 1% armor bonus per point, but Luck does not actually provide any armor at all.

 

Protection reduces all damage by 25%. Steel Skin does as well. They are cumulative. Prismatic Shield reduces elemental damage by 0-50% determined randomly for each attack.

You're right. Err, not sure how I missed that part. Sorry!

 

So, you're right, this is pretty weird. Now I am thinking these results may be affected by some kind of minimum value requirement imposed at some point in the calculation, or by a weird way of dealing with remainders. The data would probably be easier to interpret if it dealt with a much stronger attack (say, ranging up to 50 damage). Obviously, such data is also more of a hassle to collect.

You're making a false assumption here. You cannot directly see the amount of decrease in damage hardiness causes. Why? Damage is rolled randomly EACH TIME an attack hits. So, unless you have more information than you are giving (for example, if the attack had a damage range of 5-10 against 0 hardiness and 1-2 against 20 hardiness, over many trials of each), you can't draw that conclusion.

I've never seen anything to discount the conclusion the damage is random, but armor % reduction is consistent. If you have new data I'd love to see it, though.

There IS a level cap, but it's NOT 55. It's level 60.

 

It is, however, highly unlikely (and possibly impossible) to get your level anywhere near this high without cheating. Singletons have been around level 45 at the end of the game, IIRC.

No. Well, yes; Fast on Feet does give you a 10% bonus to dodge (which does not go up with your level).

 

Fast on Feet is useful if you are really desperate to get to 20 AP. You can get +3 from items, +2 from Quick Strike, to get to 13. With the +1 Fast on Feet gives, you will sometimes have 14 AP, and when hasted that gives you 21.

 

However, there's really no situation when all the effort (particularly the massive number of skill points going into Quick Strike) would be at all worthwhile.

 

If you are simply going for the best advantages, you're better off with others.

Armor (from Hardiness or equipped armor) DOES decrease by a % of the damage. It's just that this % is often small, and pretty much all forms of damage in A4 have a very wide variance for how much damage they can cause before armor reduction is applied.

That's awesome. Wow, that almost makes the game more playable right there.

That's awesome. Wow, that almost makes the game more playable right there.

Magical Efficiency is AWFUL. I did tests on it which are somewhere in this forum, too. Even with a maximum skill level of 30 magical efficiency, the mana saved is relatively low and inconsistently applied.

 

HOWEVER, since priest spell skill is responsible for damage from Divine Retribution AND dodge % from the enduring spells, I'd argue that a ridiculously high one is rather more useful than in mage spell skill.

Magical Efficiency is AWFUL. I did tests on it which are somewhere in this forum, too. Even with a maximum skill level of 30 magical efficiency, the mana saved is relatively low and inconsistently applied.

 

HOWEVER, since priest spell skill is responsible for damage from Divine Retribution AND dodge % from the enduring spells, I'd argue that a ridiculously high one is rather more useful than in mage spell skill.

I did out the math once. The short answer is NO, NEVER. You will only get a net bonus from blademaster counting the wasted points of your unused fighting skill if you buy an absurd amount of melee+blademaster... I forget how much, but it will never happen in any normal game (and few if any abnormal ones).

Somewhere on this board, I did out a complete explanation for the defensive effects of all of these stats.

 

Parry does not make you harder to hit, it's a separate check which is much less useful than the Dex/Gymnastics/Luck check since it does little against spells and missiles.

 

Endurance is mostly a bad deal, especially compared to the HP-boosting priest spells. Boosting resistance stats is generally not that useful. The manual actually has a good explanation of how those stats work.

Sluggish increased? I didn't see any level-based increase to Fast on Feet when I tested, so that's pretty weird...

Sluggish increased? I didn't see any level-based increase to Fast on Feet when I tested, so that's pretty weird...

Yes, the stick is the most powerful melee weapon in A4! Shameful.

 

I guess the bonus damage from Demonslayer is on the small end. That's a pity, especially given the emphasis it's gotten once again.

 

Did anyone else wish they could have Minddueled Rentar, as in E2?

 

Shine --

I'm glad the list is helpful! I put it together for my own edification in Excel. I realized it might be useful to others, but didn't really want to take the time to convert it to html tables, so I just did a quick Save as HTML from Excel. I found it somewhat shameful, advocate of simple HTML that I am, but it was fast and painless.

 

Anyway, if you want to edit the HTML, I'll gladly replace it with your corrected version, but A4 items are thankfully not center stage in my life right now

Also, I don't think anyone has investigated how the disadvantages work. If their hindrances increase with level, the same way the bonuses from advantages do, then you could be in real trouble later on.

Also, I don't think anyone has investigated how the disadvantages work. If their hindrances increase with level, the same way the bonuses from advantages do, then you could be in real trouble later on.

Demonslayer gets special bonus damage against demons and demonic creatures. I haven't used it much, but I would guess this is a simple addition to damage, and not an extra damage multiplier. Against non-demons, it is almost the same as the Flaming Sword -- it does 1-3 more damage, but is 5% less likely to hit.

 

I haven't actually used it much, but it's surprising that it wouldn't do bonus damage against demons. You sure about that?

Cute, Tyro.

The drama is really worse than the grama.

*applause*

That's quite an accomplishment. Nice work!

It would take weeks of dedicated work just to convert one town in that direction. Ugh. Just play Exile 2 again and live in solipsistic bliss.