Critical Analysis - How do critical hits really work?

Didz

Having concluded that the Spell Damage and Weapon Damage stats are complete twaddle and should be ignored. I have moved on to look at Spell Critical and Weapon Critical, to see if they make more sense..

Initial surprises.
The first surprise I got when I began to focus on these critical stats is that there is no such thing as +critical damage. Even though it appears repeatedly in item tooltips there is actually only one way to increase critical damage and that's by taking 'The Shadow' mundus stone. 'The Shadow' will increase your critical strike bonus from +50% to +62%, or +68.3% with 7 Legendary Divine Traits.

What's less certain is 50% of what damage?

So far my testing has not really resolved this question. One would have assumed that a critical hit would simply increase the normal damage that would have been delivered by the attack by 50%. But that doesn't seem to be the case. My guess is that it only increases the 'Base Damage', (however, that might be defined) e.g. the damage that would have been done without other bonuses such as item and set bonus etc. The reason I think this might be the explanation is that, as you can see from the tests, the actual difference between normal and critical damage was 2% shy of the stated bonus of +62% despite the fact that the percentage of critical hits was 4.6% higher than the 22.4% expected. e.g. 27% of the attacks were critical, but in total they only achieved +60% damage above normal.

Test Results

One hundred light attacks against a target dummy.

Questions explored.

[*] What is the conversion between +Critical Damage and Critical Hit Percentile.

When naked Ma'Histaba has a base Critical Hit chance of 10% for both spells and weapons. Because he has the skill Dexterity 2 every item of medium armour he wears adds +219 Critical Weapon Damage to his Weapon Critical, which seems to increase his Crit chance by 1% per item. He also gets +592 Weapon Damage from the Nights Silence Set bonus and another +592 from 4 pieces of Ashen Grip.

Source Weapon Critical
Dexterity 2 (7 x Medium Armour @ +219 each) = +1,533
Set Bonus Night Silence (+592) and Ashen Grip (+592) = +1,184
TOTAL WEAPON CRITICAL BONUS = +3,717
e.g. +12.4% Weapon Critical costs +3,717 +2717 Weapon Critical Damage

As Asayre has corrected noted below there is a mathematical error in the above calculation, which i failed to spot. The correct TOTAL WEAPON CRITICAL BONUS is +2,717, which if divided by +12.4% means that +219 Weapon Damage (Rounded Down) produces +1% Critical. Still less than the +71 suggested by the ESO Build Editor but it does make a lot more sense given the way the Dexterity skill works.

This suggests that 'In-Game' +300 Critical Damage = +1% Weapon Critical. A lot less than the amount suggested by the ESO Build Editor. Which explains why in the Build Editor Ma'Histaba has +38.9% Weapon Critical, whereas In-Game he only has 22.4%. However, whether this is affected by 'One Tam' Scaling is hard to say without testing on multiple characters.

[*] Is the Critical Hit Percentile shown on character sheet actually used to determine a critical hit, and is it accurate?

In one hundred light attacks 27% were critical hits, 4.6% more than the 22.4% Critical Percentile quoted on the character sheet. That could just be luck of course, but is worrying when compared to the damage inflicted.

[*] Comparing Normal and Critical hit damage to verify the percentile bonus awarded for a critical hit.

In the test 92,785 damage was inflicted by 73 normal hits, whilst 54,945 was inflicted by 27 critical hits. That's an average of 1,271 damage per normal hit, and 2,035 damage per critical hit.
e.g. Critical Hits inflicted just over 60% more damage than normal hits.
NOTE: This character is using 'The Shadow boon' and so should be inflicting +62% damage on critical hits.

Overall it has to be said that the Spell Critical and Weapon Critical stats are more useful than the damage stats. But one should still not expect your character to actually perform in accordance with the information they contain. At best they seem to be a rough guide.

Asayre

Could you elaborate on your first sentence?

Waffennacht

Meh nvm

Reorx_Holybeard

Regarding the first sentence I believe he's referring to his other post.

Contrary to what you say in that post and this one we actually have a very good understanding of the mechanics behind virtually all stats. For more details check out Asayre's theorycrafting thread on TF (http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/introduction-to-pve-damage-calculation-homestead/) or our Build Editor (http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Special:EsoBuildEditor) which implements these formulas.

If you're wondering why our build editor or a calculation is giving you a "wrong" answer there are a bunch of reasons:

1. Complex Formula -- If you're looking skill tooltips and actual damage numbers there are a bunch of variables you have to consider and using the correct formula/order to get the right results.
2. Coefficient Estimates -- The numbers we use to calculate skill tooltips (damages, healing, shields, etc...) are based on estimates and are close but not always exact.
3. Rounding -- The game rounds numbers in "strange" ways throughout the calculation.

For example, I'm guessing your critical calculations above aren't correct due to the omission of your target resistance and penetration which you don't mention at all.

Brutusmax1mus

You know what's funny, ritual of retribution either crits everything, it nothing. Fun to put in on a beach and have it crit every enemy it hits.

Asayre

I am hesitant to reply but...

Didz wrote: »

Questions explored.

[*] What is the conversion between +Critical Damage and Critical Hit Percentile.

When naked Ma'Histaba has a base Critical Hit chance of 10% for both spells and weapons. Because he has the skill Dexterity 2 every item of medium armour he wears adds +219 Critical Weapon Damage to his Weapon Critical, which seems to increase his Crit chance by 1% per item. He also gets +592 Weapon Damage from the Nights Silence Set bonus and another +592 from 4 pieces of Ashen Grip.

Source Weapon Critical
Dexterity 2 (7 x Medium Armour @ +219 each) = +1,533
Set Bonus Night Silence (+592) and Ashen Grip (+592) = +1,184
TOTAL WEAPON CRITICAL BONUS = +3,717
e.g. +12.4% Weapon Critical costs +3,717 Weapon Critical Damage

This suggests that 'In-Game' +300 Critical Damage = +1% Weapon Critical. A lot less than the amount suggested by the ESO Build Editor. Which explains why in the Build Editor Ma'Histaba has +38.9% Weapon Critical, whereas In-Game he only has 22.4%. However, whether this is affected by 'One Tam' Scaling is hard to say without testing on multiple characters.

Total Weapon Critical Bonus should be 1533+1184 = 2717. Since this gives you 12.4% weapon critical I would conclude that 219 weapon critical = +1% weapon critical. You state in the first paragraph of quote that +219 weapon critical seems to increase crit chance by 1%

Didz wrote: »

[*] Is the Critical Hit Percentile shown on character sheet actually used to determine a critical hit, and is it accurate?

In one hundred light attacks 27% were critical hits, 4.6% more than the 22.4% Critical Percentile quoted on the character sheet. That could just be luck of course, but is worrying when compared to the damage inflicted.

The 95% confidence interval based on your data is [19.27, 36.43]. 22.4% is in that interval. There is no reason to believe that the observed 27% critical chance is unusual at this statistical significance level.

Didz wrote: »

[*] Comparing Normal and Critical hit damage to verify the percentile bonus awarded for a critical hit.

In the test 92,785 damage was inflicted by 73 normal hits, whilst 54,945 was inflicted by 27 critical hits. That's an average of 1,271 damage per normal hit, and 2,035 damage per critical hit.
e.g. Critical Hits inflicted just over 60% more damage than normal hits.
NOTE: This character is using 'The Shadow boon' and so should be inflicting +62% damage on critical hits.

You have a Berserker uptime of 56%. That buff changes your weapon damage... So you have the effect of critical chance and Berserker buff to solve. Either repeat it without the berserker buff, look at a non-crit and crit damage with the same buffs active or design a fancy test method.

Ultimate_Overlord

The op doesnt understand how weapon/spell dmg work, cant find a sum of 2 numbers and tests with a multitude of unnecessary variables such as mundus, passives, weapon glyph and a nonvet character.
Just another inaccurate misleading forum test, nothing to see here folks.

Didz

Reorx_Holybeard wrote: »

Regarding the first sentence I believe he's referring to his other post.

Contrary to what you say in that post and this one we actually have a very good understanding of the mechanics behind virtually all stats. For more details check out Asayre's theorycrafting thread on TF (http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/introduction-to-pve-damage-calculation-homestead/) or our Build Editor (http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Special:EsoBuildEditor) which implements these formulas.

Hi,

Yes! you're right my first sentence refers to my other post which you kindly linked.

In that I proved that the Spell Damage and Weapon Damage stats shown on our character sheets are complete and utter twaddle. This was first demonstrated to me by the ESO Build Editor which you also mentioned. It's actually quite easy to check this using the editor simply by creating a Level 50 test build and adding any random weapon of your choice.

I've just knocked up a quick example on your behalf to prove my point.

Here we have the Great Sword of Truth, which does 912 Damage according to its tooltip. However, notice that I have added a glyph that deals a further 453 Magic Damage on every attack.


Now look at the Spell Damage stat, as calculated by the ESO Build Editor shown below.


As you can see the Build Editor has ignored the glyph damage, and its also ignored the fact that this is a stamina based weapon, and has simply posted the damage value printed on the swords tooltip directed into both the Weapon Damage and Spell Damage stat. Ignoring all other item and set bonus' that affect damage ouput.

In fact, just in case there is any doubt I've post the relevant section from the ESO Build Stats, and I have highlighted the calculated Spell and Weapon Damage stats just to prove that the amount shown in both is simply the damage printed on the sword.


When I first noticed this my first reaction was that there must be an error in the ESO Build Editors calculations. So, I immediately logged into ESO and performed a number of tests in the actual game environment to verify that the build editor is correct. The conclusion I came to was that ignoring a few rounding errors in the 'One Tam' scaling that produced spurious default values, all the game was doing was copying the damage printed on whatever weapon your character happens to be holding into both spell and weapon damage.

In other words as I said above these stats are complete twaddle, and should be ignored as they mean nothing.

Now, you also mentioned Asayre's theorycrafting thread, which has been a source of a lot of useful information for me in trying to make sense of our character stats.

However, its worth pointing out that Asayre's calculation are based upon what really happens in game, not on what values appear in the character stats. So, for example in calculating Spell and Weapon Damage Asayre has looked at our characters real damage output and how it is calculated, not at what appears in Spell damage and Weapon Damage. The fact, that he has used the same labels is probably confusing, but the point is that the actual damage out of our characters has no dependency on the value shown on our character sheets, despite the wording of the tooltip for those stats.

Re: The Critical Damage Tests
You mentioned the reason why my critical damage tests are coming up with results that differ from expectations.

First of all let me say that the tests were performed against a target dummy. So, as far as I know the results should not have been affected by any target characteristics as target dummy's don't have any defences.

The Complex Formula excuse is of course valid, I have no doubt that the code that calculates damage in game is very complex, and probably full of coding errors. Which in part is why I set about trying to verify that what we were being told it did, was actually what it did.

Seeing is believing, as they say, and so being told that 'The Shadow' mundus Stone adds 12% to critical damage can either be taken on faith, or you can test it and find out what it really does. I prefer to check and make sure that what I'm being told is the truth. Which is what I'm doing.

Likewise 'Rounding' is a common cause of spurious values in complex formula. Not just in games, but generally in commercial software. It is undoubtedly the reason for the spurious values that remain in the Spell Damage and Weapon Damage of naked characters, and the fact that these values disappear once the characters reach Level 50 suggests that the rounding errors must exist somewhere in the scaling code applied by the 'One Tam' system.

Either way what we are seeing is the difference between what Zeni says is happening, and what is actually happening, and any theorycrafting needs to be based upon the actual results not what Zeni says they should be.

Ultimate_Overlord

Yes, weapon/spell dmg values in no way represent actual ability dmg. Congratulations, youre 3 yrs late!

Merlin13KAGL

The damage tooltip on a weapon is just an arbitrary number that is part of a much larger formula.

The easy, intuitive correlation you're looking for does not exist.

TL (Really?); DR It's not quite that simple.

Didz

Thank you for taking the time to reply.

Asayre wrote: »

I am hesitant to reply but...
Total Weapon Critical Bonus should be 1533+1184 = 2717. Since this gives you 12.4% weapon critical I would conclude that 219 weapon critical = +1% weapon critical. You state in the first paragraph of quote that +219 weapon critical seems to increase crit chance by 1%

Yes, you're right, my mistake, and that makes a lot more sense.

So, +219 Weapon Critical Damage = +1 Weapon Critical

Asayre wrote: »

The 95% confidence interval based on your data is [19.27, 36.43]. 22.4% is in that interval. There is no reason to believe that the observed 27% critical chance is unusual at this statistical significance level.

Yes, as I said in my notes it was probably just luck, it could just as easily have been less than 22.4%.

Asayre wrote: »

You have a Berserker uptime of 56%. That buff changes your weapon damage... So you have the effect of critical chance and Berserker buff to solve. Either repeat it without the berserker buff, look at a non-crit and crit damage with the same buffs active or design a fancy test method.

Which seems to confirm my assumption that the increased damage caused by the Berserker buff is not included in the calculation of the damage bonus for a Critical Hit, or at least not in the calculation of the additional +12% provided by 'The Shadow' mundus stone. So, strictly speaking the mundus stone tooltip is misleading in that it suggests it will actually increase your characters damage output by 12%, but in fact, its unlikely it will unless your character has no other damage bonuses.

GilGalad

Didz wrote: »

Reorx_Holybeard wrote: »

Regarding the first sentence I believe he's referring to his other post.

Contrary to what you say in that post and this one we actually have a very good understanding of the mechanics behind virtually all stats. For more details check out Asayre's theorycrafting thread on TF (http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/introduction-to-pve-damage-calculation-homestead/) or our Build Editor (http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Special:EsoBuildEditor) which implements these formulas.

Hi,

Yes! you're right my first sentence refers to my other post which you kindly linked.

In that I proved that the Spell Damage and Weapon Damage stats shown on our character sheets are complete and utter twaddle. This was first demonstrated to me by the ESO Build Editor which you also mentioned. It's actually quite easy to check this using the editor simply by creating a Level 50 test build and adding any random weapon of your choice.

I've just knocked up a quick example on your behalf to prove my point.

Here we have the Great Sword of Truth, which does 912 Damage according to its tooltip. However, notice that I have added a glyph that deals a further 453 Magic Damage on every attack.


Now look at the Spell Damage stat, as calculated by the ESO Build Editor shown below.


As you can see the Build Editor has ignored the glyph damage, and its also ignored the fact that this is a stamina based weapon, and has simply posted the damage value printed on the swords tooltip directed into both the Weapon Damage and Spell Damage stat. Ignoring all other item and set bonus' that affect damage ouput.
[...]

The glyph deals a flat amount of magic dmg. Its does not increase your weapon or spell dmg, like the other glyph. Glyph and set procs will only show in the character sheet while they are active, but you can use the average value from combat metrics.

For the magic and spell dmg: Weapons you equip add their tooltip value to your weapon and spell dmg. The value shown in the build calculator is therefore correct.

All the dmg calculation formulas are well understood and documented (e.g. in the build calculator) and you can verify them if you do well designed experiments.

Didz

GilGalad wrote: »

All the dmg calculation formulas are well understood and documented (e.g. in the build calculator) and you can verify them if you do well designed experiments.

Actually thats what I'm trying to do.

I've already studied all Asayres mathematical analysis both on this forum and the Tamriel Foundry, and I've uploaded all my current builds into the ESO Build Editor.

It was the later exercise that triggered my current interest in trying to verify the stats on the character sheet, as it became obvious as soon as I uploaded my builds into the editor that the character stats it produced did not match my characters in-game values.

The question therefore arose, 'How much value can I put on the my characters stats?' and that has led to me trying to test the results I get from various modifications, and the conclusion that some stats are just twaddle and can be ignored.

@Ultimate_Overlord : Yes, quite true. I'm late to the game. I've actually been playing for little over a year and so far I've been concentrating on trade and crafting. My highest level character is only Level 40, and so I've never really paid much attention to end game builds. My expectation therefore was that much of the theorycrafting I needed would be readily available, but apart from Asayre's excellent mathematical analysis that hasn't proven to be the case. I find I'm having to do a lot of my own research and testing to work out what the character stats actually mean and how they work (if at all)

It's not exactly my idea of fun, and its actually putting me off playing the game, but if I'm going to move on and start planning my builds I need to understand how things work.

msetten

I always thought that the critical damage percentage referred to the chance that critical damage would take place. So the higher the percentage, the more likely it is that critical damage takes place. But in this discussion it is seen as referring to the amount of additional critical damage. Was I mistaken?

Reorx_Holybeard

I think you have some very fundamental misunderstandings about some basic things which then throws everything off. When a weapon tooltips say "912 Damage" this does *not* mean it does "912 Damage" when you hit something with it. This really means "Adds +912 Spell/Weapon Damage to your Character Sheet" which is exactly what you get when you equip the weapon in game as well as in our build editor. It doesn't matter what the weapon is or stamina/magicka...what you see is what you get (ignoring all the complex things that multiply spell/weapon damage or the offhand DW weapon).

The actual damage you do with a weapon is a completely different and hidden stat and is only indirectly related to the "912 Damage" stat you see on the weapon.

Character sheet stats are not "twaddle" and are well understood at this point.

Also from another thread:

3M Health Dummy= 18,500 Spell resistance, 15,620 Physical resistance.
6M Health Dummy= 18,200 for both Physical and Spell resistance.

Reorx_Holybeard

As an aside...this is exactly why I've been saying that "Spell/Weapon Damage" should be renamed to "Spell/Weapon Power" to avoid the confusion between "Weapon Damage" the stat and "Weapon Damage" the damage a weapon does with a LA/HA and similarly with spells. Weapon tooltips would read "912 Power" instead of "912 Damage" to avoid the exact confusion the OP has.

For experienced theory crafters the subtle differences between forms of "damage" and their context may be obvious but will be confusing to new players.

kylewwefan

Makes no sense wasting time with not max level toons on this stuff because everything beforehand is scaled. How much s it scaled? IDK? Doesn't really matter to me, as toons won't be staying there for long.

Didz

msetten wrote: »

I always thought that the critical damage percentage referred to the chance that critical damage would take place. So the higher the percentage, the more likely it is that critical damage takes place. But in this discussion it is seen as referring to the amount of additional critical damage. Was I mistaken?

No! I think your understanding is correct.

My understanding originally was that the tooltips meant exactly what they said. e.g. +438 Critical Damage actually mean't that if your attack proc'd then your character would inflict an extra +438 damage. One of my early surprises was to discover that this wasn't the case, and as we have just confirmed above +438 Critical Damage actually means +2% to your chance of inflicting a Critical Hit (e.g. 2 x 219 Critical Damage = +2% Critical Hit)

The only other issue is whether the Critical Hit % quoted on your character sheet is actually used to determine how many critical hits your character delivers, and so far it seems performance more or less matches the value quoted on the character sheet. But as Asayre has explained there is something he calls 'The 95% confidence interval' which means that over the course of any given combat the actual performance could vary by about 5% above or below your expectation.

Reorx_Holybeard wrote: »

I think you have some very fundamental misunderstandings about some basic things which then throws everything off. When a weapon tooltips say "912 Damage" this does *not* mean it does "912 Damage" when you hit something with it.

No! I don't think I have a misunderstanding at all

What has been shown quite clearly is that the value that appears in the Spell Damage and Weapon Damage on your character sheet has absolutely nothing to do with the actual damage your character will inflict in combat.

It is nothing more than a filler, based upon the value printed in tooltip of the weapon your character has in hand.

Asayre has done a lot of work confirming the actual mathematics that go to calculating the damage output of a character, and those formula are completely separate to the numbers that appear in the character sheet.

The simple fact that any type of weapon updates both types of damage stat really confirms this, as does the logic that given all the different types and sources of damage a character can do, actually summarising it in a single value would be pretty much impossible.

So, basically you can gain no insight into your characters potential damage output by reading their Spell or Weapon Damage. You either go through the complicated formula described by Asayre, or you go and hit something and make a note of what actually happens.

kylewwefan wrote: »

Makes no sense wasting time with not max level toons on this stuff because everything beforehand is scaled. How much s it scaled? IDK? Doesn't really matter to me, as toons won't be staying there for long.

It's amazing how often I've heard this, and it always strikes me as rather sad that some players don't consider the early content of the game worth playing, Personally, it doesn't bother me that some players prefer to power-level to CP160 (or whatever) as its really up to them and at the end of the day they are often my best customers as they rarely have the skills to craft their own gear, or if they do they pay through the nose for the materials I stock that enable them to do so.

Personally, I've never really been interested in this style of play, and rarely ever reach the end game in an MMO. I like to experience the full content of the game so if anything I avoid levelling up until I've completed everything at the level I'm currently playing. However, that doesn't mean I don't want my characters to perform as well as they can at whatever level they are, so I still have an interest in how the game works.

Also because my characters are all Master Crafters they obviously have to make sure they make the best of the skill points they have available for combat skills, as first priority will always be their crafting ability. Likewise because most of them are rich they can afford to craft epic gear and replace it every ten levels, but they still need to know what is the best gear for their build.

So, I think this idea that everyone has to rush to CP160 before they start playing the game is rather sad, especially since One Tam ensured that all the content is available to everyone at any level.

Waffennacht

Just fyi Weapon Damage is not the same as weapon damage (yes capitalization matters...)

I'm also amazed people keep confusing damage stat with damage dealt.

The earlier content is worth going through, though I wouldn't consider slaughtering 1000s of NPCs "playing"

Reorx_Holybeard

Didz wrote: »

What has been shown quite clearly is that the value that appears in the Spell Damage and Weapon Damage on your character sheet has absolutely nothing to do with the actual damage your character will inflict in combat.
...
So, basically you can gain no insight into your characters potential damage output by reading their Spell or Weapon Damage. You either go through the complicated formula described by Asayre, or you go and hit something and make a note of what actually happens.

There's your misunderstanding right there...Spell/Weapon Damage *do* have an effect on the damage your character will do but they are not the *only* effects. It is entirely possible for your Spell/Weapon Damage to go *up* but for you to do *less* damage. They are only one part of many and if you want a good understanding of your damage output you have to know everything that goes into it.

In particular, look at the Spell/Weapon Effective Power stat in our build editor. This is a custom stat but people have been using similar formulas to gauge a build's potential damage output in a single number. It is not perfect but gives you a general idea of your damage potential. Our formula uses the following variables:

1. Spell/Weapon Damage
2. Magicka/Stamina
3. Spell/Weapon Critical
4. Spell/Weapon Critical Damage
5. CP Magic/Physical Damage Done
6. Damage Done modifier (eg: Minor Slayer)
7. Flat Penetration
8. % Penetration
9. Target Level (50 for PVE)
10. Target Spell/Physical Resistances
11. Target Spell/Physical Resistance Debuffs
12. Target Defensive Bonus (0% for PVE)
13. Target Damage Taken modifier (100% for PVE)

You can see this is a long list and if you're just looking at #1 you're missing most of the effects that go into your damage output.

ShedsHisTail

Just to be clear... "Twaddle" is bad, right?

Berenhir

OP knows even less than Jon Snow.

Didz

ShedsHisTail wrote: »

Just to be clear... "Twaddle" is bad, right?

Definition of twaddle in the Oxford English Dictionary
NOUN informal
Trivial or foolish speech or writing; nonsense.
‘he dismissed the novel as self-indulgent twaddle’

Berenhir wrote: »

OP knows even less than Jon Snow.

I'm sure that's true.

Reorx_Holybeard wrote: »

There's your misunderstanding right there...Spell/Weapon Damage *do* have an effect on the damage your character will do but they are not the *only* effects. It is entirely possible for your Spell/Weapon Damage to go *up* but for you to do *less* damage. They are only one part of many and if you want a good understanding of your damage output you have to know everything that goes into it.

I don't see that as a misunderstanding. In fact, what you go on to explain is exactly why I consider the value in the Spell and Weapon Damage field of your character stats to be meaningless twaddle.

As you quite correctly point out, the true damage output of your character is the produce of a wide range of elements in your build, not just the damage value printed on the tooltip of the weapon you happen to be carrying.

The ESO Build Editor attempts to calculate a more accurate value for Spell and Weapon damage which it calls Effective Spell Power and Effective Weapon Power. Which includes the damage done by the weapon or spell being used but that particular stat doesn't even appear on the in-game character sheet, and I haven't attempted to verify how accurate these values are as the Build Editor doesn't calculate the One Tam battle scaling so it's impossible to compare the values it generates with a characters in-game performance.

For example: Rosy's Effective Spell Power is quoted as 912, but in game her staff does 1,730 damage for Light Attacks. In addition, the enchant deals 1438 Magic Damage. So Total damage was 3.168.


As you can see her In-Game Spell Damage shows 1,788.

GilGalad

Didz wrote: »

ShedsHisTail wrote: »

Just to be clear... "Twaddle" is bad, right?

Definition of twaddle in the Oxford English Dictionary
NOUN informal
Trivial or foolish speech or writing; nonsense.
‘he dismissed the novel as self-indulgent twaddle’

Berenhir wrote: »

OP knows even less than Jon Snow.

I'm sure that's true.

Reorx_Holybeard wrote: »

There's your misunderstanding right there...Spell/Weapon Damage *do* have an effect on the damage your character will do but they are not the *only* effects. It is entirely possible for your Spell/Weapon Damage to go *up* but for you to do *less* damage. They are only one part of many and if you want a good understanding of your damage output you have to know everything that goes into it.

I don't see that as a misunderstanding. In fact, what you go on to explain is exactly why I consider the value in the Spell and Weapon Damage field of your character stats to be meaningless twaddle.

As you quite correctly point out, the true damage output of your character is the produce of a wide range of elements in your build, not just the damage value printed on the tooltip of the weapon you happen to be carrying.

The ESO Build Editor attempts to calculate a more accurate value for Spell and Weapon damage which it calls Effective Spell Power and Effective Weapon Power. Which includes the damage done by the weapon or spell being used but that particular stat doesn't even appear on the in-game character sheet, and I haven't attempted to verify how accurate these values are as the Build Editor doesn't calculate the One Tam battle scaling so it's impossible to compare the values it generates with a characters in-game performance.

For example: Rosy's Effective Spell Power is quoted as 912, but in game her staff does 1,730 damage for Light Attacks. In addition, the enchant deals 1438 Magic Damage. So Total damage was 3.168.


As you can see her In-Game Spell Damage shows 1,788.

The effective spellpower ist not a "more accurate" calculation of spellpower. Its a measure to compare different gear setups including all relevant values for dmg output (max magicka, spell dmg, penetration, target ressistances, crit, ...). Its even explained when you click on it: "Effective Spell Power is a custom stat that represents your overall power with spell/magicka attacks and can be used to compare different build setups. A higher number is better.".
The effective spellpower displayed is calculated for average ability coefficients ( c*(magicka+ 10.5*spell dmg)). Light and heavy attacks scale differently (roughly c*(magicka + 40*spell dmg)).
If you enter your exact build into the uesp editor and the values shown for magicka, spell dmg, etc match the results displayed in your character sheet, then you can even read off your light attack dmg in the uesp editor (standard enemy resistance is set to 18200, like all dungeon mobs and target skeletons, but not overland mobs like mudcrabs).

The only thing that is not displayed is the dmg done by your weapon enchant. The reason for this is, that it only scales with CP and some passives, but not with magicka or spell dmg. If you know how much dmg it deals by looking at some parses at a target skeleton you can compare it to other weapon enchants.
The light and heavy attack dmg done by a weapon has nothing to do with the dmg enchant (except the power enchant, that increases your spell and weapon dmg, therefore also increases the dmg of your light and heavy attacks).

I hope that somewhat helps you understand the game. As I said before everything in terms of dmg calculation is understood and documented in the uesp editor. If you want to understand how it works then you have to understand the formulas in the editor.

Didz

GilGalad wrote: »

If you want to understand how it works then you have to understand the formulas in the editor.

The only thing I'm not sure about in terms of the Effective Spell/Weapon Power formula is the Attacker Spell/Physical
Mitigation figure, which seems to be set at 72.6% for all my characters builds.

Is that some sort of default value, or is it picking it up from the UESPLOG when I upload my builds from the game?

Reorx_Holybeard

Didz wrote: »

GilGalad wrote: »

If you want to understand how it works then you have to understand the formulas in the editor.

The only thing I'm not sure about in terms of the Effective Spell/Weapon Power formula is the Attacker Spell/Physical
Mitigation figure, which seems to be set at 72.6% for all my characters builds.

Is that some sort of default value, or is it picking it up from the UESPLOG when I upload my builds from the game?

Attacker Spell/Physical Mitigation is another calculated stat which is found at the bottom of the right in the editor. A value of 72.6% means you are using a build with no penetration values against a target with 18.2k resistances meaning the target takes 72.6% of the damage you deal to it. For example, if your spell does 1000 damage it would only hit the target for 726 damage due to its mitigation.

Didz

Reorx_Holybeard wrote: »

Didz wrote: »

GilGalad wrote: »

If you want to understand how it works then you have to understand the formulas in the editor.

The only thing I'm not sure about in terms of the Effective Spell/Weapon Power formula is the Attacker Spell/Physical
Mitigation figure, which seems to be set at 72.6% for all my characters builds.

Is that some sort of default value, or is it picking it up from the UESPLOG when I upload my builds from the game?

Attacker Spell/Physical Mitigation is another calculated stat which is found at the bottom of the right in the editor. A value of 72.6% means you are using a build with no penetration values against a target with 18.2k resistances meaning the target takes 72.6% of the damage you deal to it. For example, if your spell does 1000 damage it would only hit the target for 726 damage due to its mitigation.

And is that based upon some accepted norm, as far as target resistance is concerned?

e.g. is 18.2% resistance a standard value for PvE mobs (i notice it can be changed in the editor, but that seems to be the default)?

Reorx_Holybeard

Didz wrote: »

Reorx_Holybeard wrote: »

Didz wrote: »

GilGalad wrote: »

If you want to understand how it works then you have to understand the formulas in the editor.

The only thing I'm not sure about in terms of the Effective Spell/Weapon Power formula is the Attacker Spell/Physical
Mitigation figure, which seems to be set at 72.6% for all my characters builds.

Is that some sort of default value, or is it picking it up from the UESPLOG when I upload my builds from the game?

Attacker Spell/Physical Mitigation is another calculated stat which is found at the bottom of the right in the editor. A value of 72.6% means you are using a build with no penetration values against a target with 18.2k resistances meaning the target takes 72.6% of the damage you deal to it. For example, if your spell does 1000 damage it would only hit the target for 726 damage due to its mitigation.

And is that based upon some accepted norm, as far as target resistance is concerned?

e.g. is 18.2% resistance a standard value for PvE mobs (i notice it can be changed in the editor, but that seems to be the default)?

For dungeon/trial bosses 18200 (not 18.2%) is the standard resistance value.

Didz

Thanks I'll leave it as it is then, and work to mitigate it.