Talk:Damage

Edit June 23rd, 2014: Besides some minor rephrasing, I corrected the lower damage cap, which is not 72.5% damage, but 30% damage. I also added that terrain, spells and creature specialties may affect attack and defense skills.-Entelechy 11:26, 11 July 2014 (CEST) (signed later).

I bealieve we mean the same thing here. 70% from 100 is 70, while -30% from 100 is also 70. However, we have a disagreement in wheter it is 70%/-30% or 72.5%/-27.5%. Everywhere it is said that the the reduction is the first one, but to my recollection I tested this out and the vague truth is the latter. Link here. --Kapteeni Ruoska 12:10, 11 July 2014 (CEST)

Haha, that thread looks familiar :-). Actually, when making the above-mentioned edit, I did actually stumble upon your post and therefore I tested it again before editing this page. But again I found a maximum damage reduction of 70% (i.e., attacks do only 30% damage). I am not sure what can account for our different findings. But feel free to let me know if you get the same results when testing it again and then I am happy to try and find out what may be going on. -Entelechy 13:02, 11 July 2014 (CEST)

This page does a good job explaining base damage and how this is modified by attack and defense skills. But maybe it is a good idea to include all damage modifiers here? Perhaps just mention them and refer to their corresponding page, or even provide a full explanation here? User Ecoris from HeroesCommunity compiled a useful list of modifiers in this thread (11th post): http://heroescommunity.com/viewthread.php3?TID=11801&pagenumber=2. Also, a version of his general description (9th post on that page) could be included here. -Entelechy 11:26, 11 July 2014 (CEST)

Go ahead! :) I have just been too lazy to organize this page. --Kapteeni Ruoska 12:10, 11 July 2014 (CEST)

Ok, I will put it on my to-do list ;-). -Entelechy 13:03, 11 July 2014 (CEST)

Wow, it seems this item on my to-do list has just become a lot smaller :-). Great additions so far (also on the Master Genie page by the way)!-Entelechy 20:17, 14 July 2014 (CEST)

Given your great and hard work on editing this page, I felt it would be inappropriate to edit it at the same time. I did find the following thread on HeroesCommunity, though, which might be useful. But I am also happy to incorporate it here myself, of course, once you feel you are done with this page for now. -Entelechy 19:57, 15 July 2014 (CEST)

One is always welcome to do changes and add more contents. Although it is sometimes good to check if another is currently working on article. Personally I like to "save" the changes from time to time. Your article seems (based on quick reading) valid, but I am not sure it has any concrete knowledge. It seems to contain more guesses than hard evidence. --Kapteeni Ruoska 08:19, 16 July 2014 (CEST)

Thanks for the comments. Perhaps it might be an idea then to just add an External Link section on this page and also refer in it to the other above-mentioned thread. I also added some information on spell damage by the way - I hope it is useful. I am wondering about the formula, though. Shouldn't AD be added to the list with As when it is positive and to the list of Ds when it is negative? Also, I believe all Ds should be entered in separate brackets as follows: (1-D1)x(1-D2) etc. As the formula is now, it seems damage may be negative. -Entelechy 23:53, 16 July 2014 (CEST)

I have been wondering AD's place as well. In fact, I origianlly wrote them sparately, but came to a conclusion, that it such a significant factor, that it should stand alone. However, I am still not sure. Lets leave it there for awhile and finish the article. We can then make a decision wheter to put it in the brackets or not.

I believe the formula is right. Your suggestion is incorrect, because (1-x)×(1-y) is same as 1²-y-x+xy. --Kapteeni Ruoska 07:08, 17 July 2014 (CEST)

The formula

Hmm, is it so that the added up A's have a maximum of 3.00 and added up D's have a maximum of 0.70; meaning that if the sum is reduced to those numbers if the sum otherwise would go over it? --Kapteeni Ruoska 07:18, 17 July 2014 (CEST)

Let me just try and write down what I believe is the correct formula. We know that all bonus damage is calculated as a percentage of base damage and that all bonuses are added separately to this base damage. So if base damage is 100, then an A/D difference of +20 adds 100 base damage (A1 = 1) and luck adds another 100 (A2 = 1), for a total of 300. We could say, then, that Total Damage = Base Damage + (A1 x Base Damage + A2 x Base Damage). This can be rewritten as Total Damage = Base Damage x (1 + A1 + A2).

Now, we know that defense modifiers simply multiply this whole formula of "Base Damage x (1 + A1 + A2 + ...)" with a number below 1. So if there would be a negative A/D difference of, say, -12 (D1 = 0.3), then damage would be reduced to 70% because 1 - 12 x 0.025 = 0.7. Advanced armorer, which reduces damage by 10% (D2 = 0.1), would reduce this further by multiplying this 0.7 with 1 - 0.10, which is 0.7 x 0.9 = 0.63. Defense modifiers therefore reduce damage as follows: Total damage = damage x (1-D1) x (1-D2). You are right that (1-D1) x (1-D2) is equal to 1 - D1 - D2 + D1D2, but if you substitute the values, you'll see that 1 - 0.3 - 0.1 + 0.03 is indeed the same 0.63 that we arrived at above. The formula in the above-mentioned thread therefore seems correct to me:

Total Damage = Base Damage x (1+A1+A2+A3+...) x (1-D1) x (1-D2) x (1-D3) x ... . It is only a bit tricky that positive A/D difference should be included as an A, and negative A/D difference as a D. The caps of A = 3 and D = 0.7 are applied only to A/D difference though, damage can be increased or reduced further by other factors. Feel free to let me know what you think and then we can decide how to best phrase the formula.

-Entelechy 11:11, 17 July 2014 (CEST)

My reasoning is, that because there cannot be postive and negative AD-differnce affecting the result at the same time, should the factor therefore be sparate from the others. This seems more "beautiful to my mathematical eye". :)

My knowledge about the calculation seems to be wrong appears to be wrong here! I have always believed, that those reductions are added up together, but it seems not to be the case. As Ecoris said here – short and sweet I might add – "damage bonuses are cumulative, while damage reductions are multiplicative". I have never studied or even thought this more closely until now. That is, of course, much more logical. If expert Armorer (-15%) and expert Shield (-30%) affecting at the same time, the correct final reduction seems to be (1 - 0.15) × (1 - 0.30) = -0.595 or -41.5% not -45% (or factor 0.55) as I have believed. My apology. :) --Kapteeni Ruoska 12:38, 17 July 2014 (CEST)

Uh, but this "new" infromation also changes the calculation routine, bummer. --Kapteeni Ruoska 12:40, 17 July 2014 (CEST)

No problem, I agree that writing these articles has been quite educational. I learned, for example, that an ammo cart can be raised as a skeleton :-s. Talking about mathematical beauty, all As are basically interchangeable in the formula (only their weighting differs) and so are all Ds, so we may not even have to bother with linking the numbers to specific variable names. Identifying a modifier as an attack or defense variable and giving its weighting may also suffice. Finally, perhaps my edit about magic resistances and immunities is a bit lengthy - I wonder if it is easier to just say that modifiers of spell damage are only valid when the target does not resist the spell and is not immune to it. -Entelechy 23:38, 17 July 2014 (CEST)

Ammo Cart becomes skeleton. :) With Animate Dead or Necromancy? I think you made good additions to spell damage. Sometimes things just cannot be said shortly. Perhaps a table could help, if you think it is too long. --Kapteeni Ruoska 06:09, 18 July 2014 (CEST)

With Necromancy apparently :). I would also advice against cloning a legion of level 1 units against Necro if you don't plan to win the battle :p. Thanks for the feedback, I will leave it the way it is then. I have just edited the page a bit, but I am a slow writer (the fact that my activities will increase again next week will also not help). A suggestion that I have is to change attack-defense ratio into attack-defense difference. That is, after all, what it basically is. To my knowledge attack-defense ratio stems from HoMMIV, where this was indeed how damage was calculated. -Entelechy 22:57, 18 July 2014 (CEST)