Resistances and Diminishing returns?

[SapientCrow]

I did not find the answer to this in Strategy Central or it is buried enough that I could not find it.

 

I want to know how resists work more specifically and does the difficulty level affect them?

 

For example I have the ability to gain 10% each level after 7. However when I put a point in that skill in the tree I am given 5% or sometimes even 1% for resists that are already in a higher range.

Where is the soft cap or hard cap where it becomes less. If I total gear together with these skills set in the tree I should have over 100% in some resists.

Potentially the formulae is quite hidden for this but perhaps a general idea of what is happening so I can best plan when I retrain?

 

thanks.

[Slariton]

Your resistance consists of a separate "piece" for every source of that resistance. Those "pieces" are then applied one at a time, rather than being added together and applied at once. For example,

 

Say I had 40% Fire Resistance from a high level skill, and 20% from a shield. First 40% of the damage (on average) would be blocked, letting 60% through, then 20% of that remaining damage would be blocked, leaving me to eat 48%. (That displays on the status screen as 52% resistance.)

 

So, if you already have high resistance and you add to your resistance somehow, your % resistance isn't going to change much. Additionally, there is a hard cap of I believe 90%, that you can't pass no matter what (though it's generally hard to reach anyway).

[Hume]

There is no diminishing return for resistances.

 

If you have two source of resistance each will reduce damage taken by half, they will reduce damage by 75%. The second piece only increase your resistance by 25%, but an improvement from 50% to 75% is exactly the same as from 0 to 50: reduce damage taken by half.

 

There is synergy for resistance from the same source. If a skill reduce damage by 10% each level, the second level will reduce damage by 10% of the remaining 90%, which is 11.1%