Soft caps?

Adhamh · April 2014

So I've heard that phrase tossed around several times and each time I'm confused. I'm aware of what a cap is in terms of game terminology, but I'm thrown off by it being "soft." Especially when referring to armor in this game. Can someone explain to me what the soft caps in this game mean and the penalties of hitting/going over the caps(if possible)?

Darrett · April 2014

A hard cap means that once you reach it, you can't gain any more benefit from additional values above the cap. If the hard cap on armor were 500, then having 650 armor is the same as having 500. 500 is the hard cap.

A soft cap means that you suffer diminishing returns over the cap value. If the soft cap was 400, then going over the cap would take more and more armor value from your items. Going from 400 to 450 might take an item with +100 armor rather than one with +50, as the item is contributing less of it's written bonus to your character.

This game has both soft and hard caps, where you reach soft cap before the hard cap to make it more difficult to reach that hard cap. Reaching the soft cap is relatively easy, and many people believe that there is no point in continuing past them because of the large diminishing returns for doing so. It remains to be seen if that's true or not going forward.

Castielle · April 2014

Soft caps are break points where the investment in that stat start diminishing heavily. For example, let's say for every point you put into Max Magicka you gain 5 regen. There will be a point where it becomes 2. That is called the soft cap. It doesn't completely eliminate the benefit from putting points into Magicka, but reduces the value considerably to the point it may not be wise to put more points into it. Hope that clarifies.

Cas

driosketch · April 2014

A soft cap gives you diminishing returns on gear upgrades and boosts.

Say I have a full set of heavy armor, all green with some traits that further boost the armor rating. (Experience talking here.) And say this causes me to hit the soft cap for my level. If I add a boost or replace one of the pieces with a higher armor rated piece, I'll still increase, but not for 100% of the value I would have gotten had I not hit the soft cap.

Adhamh · April 2014

Huh...that's actually very helpful. All questions I had about it have been solved. Though, now I have a new question. When you pass the soft cap and your returns are diminished, would that mean that any stats you currently have are affected or any additional stats past the soft cap are lessened? For example, in the case of armor, would the amount of armor you currently have upon reaching the cap be diminished or only the armor bonuses from any additional armor boosts after the soft cap?

Nevermind! I began typing this out before @driosketch replied. That answered any doubts I had. Thank you all

I appreciate the help!

driosketch · April 2014

It's whatever puts you over and beyond. If you check your character sheet, you can see if any of your stats are over charged.

Xionar · April 2014

Now, I don't actually know the exact soft cap calculation formulas. However, let's say your armor, without any soft cap present, is around 800, if the softcap begins at 700, your actual visible armor rating in your character sheet would show it is overcharged, However the overcharge only applies to your armor rating that is above the soft cap, in this scenario you're 100 armor over the softcap, I think the % that diminishes is either 40% or 60%, I'm going to say 60% of this example, meaning if you're 100 over the soft cap, you'll lose around 60 armor, and thus you'd have 740 armor rating on your character sheet. This of course also applies to buffs, or anything that takes you above your current level's soft cap.

Castielle · April 2014

If anyone knows when overcharging begins for any of the stats at level 50 would be great to add that info to the Wiki

Jessabella · April 2014

Softcaps hit you fairly low, I hit mine on PTS at lvl 7 by adding all point to magicka, but I continued adding them all there anyway and eventually the soft cap disappeared, if that makes sense. As I started adding enchants to gear focusing on health instead of magic the points in magic were no longer over charged.