Damage Reduction?

[TheoAllen]

Generally, the damage reduction is based on the defense point. In default formula, it was

a.atk * 4 - b.def * 2But you can also use physical damage rate and magical damage rate to reduce the damage by percentage

Another option is to use element damage rate. It also use the percentage

But those have pros and cons

If you're using the defense point which is fixed value, at the some case, you could nullify the damage to zero. (I'm well aware that you could use formula or script to prevent this to happen. But that is not my point). In other case, increase the defense point don't really feel reduce the damage. Perhaps, the character defense point increased by 10 or 15, but it only reduce the damage by 20 or 30. While the damage could have 3 digit or maybe more.

If you're using percentage, let say, energy barrier reduce physical damage by 45%, you could feel that the damage really reduced by 45% regardless how many digit the damage has. I thought, it was better. Then, if it's better, what's the point of using defense point? Can I just completely get rid the defense point and use health point instead? Armor and accessories increase health point instead of def.

Then I feel like the damage reduction are redundant at this point. 

In DotA if I recall correctly, they use def to reduce physical damage by 3% per point. If you have 10 defense, then it would be 30%. I might be wrong.

Now, the question, how do you manage the damage and damage reduction in your game?

 

[Warpmind]

Wandering peasants for human shields, mostly.

But srsly, working on a total revision of the combat system, largely based on the mechanics from White Wolf's Storyteller system: Attack "roll" is random up to Attack value, defense roll is random up to Defense value, damage rolls versus the relevant soak, adjusted for physical/magical resistance...

Yeah, I have a lot of math to crunch before it's done.

 

[kerbonklin]

http://dota2.gamepedia.com/Armor

- Dota2 armor mechanics

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Usually I find it that games get really tricky (in a bad way) when they try to have two types of Damage Reduction stats for the same damage type. (Let's say Physical Damage for this example) Some games try to make use of both normal Defense values, which are kind of formulated, and then a Static defense value that is absolute, either in terms of a percentage reduction or a static number reduction. When it comes to this, it's hard to tell which is more important, and how much one defense type matters more than the other.

In an MMO I play, there's Defense stat which can be like +500 defense on an armor piece, but the the armor piece also gives +33 "physical damage defense" which is a static damage reduction. However the normal Defense value has an unknown formula to us players, but it's still important, but apparently the static "physical damage decrease" ranks higher in important according to skill trees and other items that give it.

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Of course you can always opt to not using Defense stats at all, which means less time spent balancing, easier to manage mathematics, but at the sacrifice to Armor equipment not seemingly as important unless they provide a bunch of other features in your game. An example of a game that doesn't focus much on a Defense stat is Paper Mario. Damage in that game is purely static with no variances between all characters and all enemies/bosses. Throughout the game though you can get Defense Plus badges that give you a static -1 damage taken, which is super good. And then there's Action Commands when getting attacked to potentially shave off 1 damage taken if timed right.

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I am quite a decent fan when it comes to purely using % damage reductions, as it is more simple and the dev+player doesn't need to worry about formulas and balancing too much. However it still has to be carefully balanced with the damage creep of your enemies, because if your player ends up fighting without a source of that % damage reduction, it can spell easy death via taking tons of damage.

 

[ArcaneEli]

I'd like it if there was just damage reduction and Health, would be kinda fun and I haven't seen if before. It's just that the numbers might get quite high.

 

[Wavelength]

I use a damage reduction system very similar to League of Legends' damage calculations (though I calculate the attacker's/caster's strength in a different way).

Attacks and physical skills do (Fixed Skill Power: 10 for a basic attack, e.g.) * (Attacker's ATK) / (10 + Target's DEF) damage.  So 10 DEF would mean you take half the damage you would if you had 0 DEF, and 70 DEF (an extremely high amount in my games) would be 1/8 of the damage as if you had 0 DEF.

Magic deals (Fixed Skill Power: 25 for a Fireball, e.g.) * (Caster's MAG) / (10 + Target's MDF).

I tend to like such formulas better than the classic "add/subtract damage" because it's much harder to confidently say that one stat is strictly better than another when raising MAG by 10 might be more advantangeous than raising MDF by 5 at high levels, but worse at low levels.

 

[Engr. Adiktuzmiko]

What I normally do is have static reductions then apply elemental reductions...So like the normal way... I try to make sure that the static reductions won't cause 0 damage in not so level  gapped enemies. That's also why I sometimes do really prefer just pure percentages, just so I don't hit a 0 damage.

 

[bgillisp]

All this talk of percents reminds me of Krondor's system. In that game, your armor provided a % reduction of all physical damage taken, and better armors provided better percents (I think the best armor provided 70%). Also, if the armor was damaged, the % it blocked reduced as well.

The game also scaled up the damage of the weapons, so the best weapons did about 100 damage if you had no armor on. Needless to say, in a game where 100 HP damage would KO most characters, you definitely wanted to wear that armor.

 

[TheoAllen]

Wandering peasants for human shields, mostly.

But srsly, working on a total revision of the combat system, largely based on the mechanics from White Wolf's Storyteller system: Attack "roll" is random up to Attack value, defense roll is random up to Defense value, damage rolls versus the relevant soak, adjusted for physical/magical resistance...

Yeah, I have a lot of math to crunch before it's done.

Lol, if I understand correctly, you're tryng to say ...

If character has attack value = 10, then the attack could be around 1 ~ 10, so goes the defense?

Usually I find it that games get really tricky (in a bad way) when they try to have two types of Damage Reduction stats for the same damage type. (Let's say Physical Damage for this example) Some games try to make use of both normal Defense values, which are kind of formulated, and then a Static defense value that is absolute, either in terms of a percentage reduction or a static number reduction. When it comes to this, it's hard to tell which is more important, and how much one defense type matters more than the other.

Yeah, happened to me when I was working on my game. When this question came up, it was already late because the game nearly completed.

And thank you for your references

I'd like it if there was just damage reduction and Health, would be kinda fun and I haven't seen if before. It's just that the numbers might get quite high.

It will be quite high indeed. And yeah, I eager to try this damage reduction to my next game and let see what's the result.

I use a damage reduction system very similar to League of Legends' damage calculations (though I calculate the attacker's/caster's strength in a different way).

Attacks and physical skills do (Fixed Skill Power: 10 for a basic attack, e.g.) * (Attacker's ATK) / (10 + Target's DEF) damage.  So 10 DEF would mean you take half the damage you would if you had 0 DEF, and 70 DEF (an extremely high amount in my games) would be 1/8 of the damage as if you had 0 DEF.

Magic deals (Fixed Skill Power: 25 for a Fireball, e.g.) * (Caster's MAG) / (10 + Target's MDF).

I tend to like such formulas better than the classic "add/subtract damage" because it's much harder to confidently say that one stat is strictly better than another when raising MAG by 10 might be more advantangeous than raising MDF by 5 at high levels, but worse at low levels.

Hmm... Interesting. this could be for my next reference. I never thought of using defense point to divide the attacker's attack point. Thank you

What I normally do is have static reductions then apply elemental reductions...So like the normal way... I try to make sure that the static reductions won't cause 0 damage in not so level  gapped enemies. That's also why I sometimes do really prefer just pure percentages, just so I don't hit a 0 damage.

Yeah, the pros of using percentage is you will never get 0 damage. But I thought static reduction is just redundant or just a gimmick. 

All this talk of percents reminds me of Krondor's system. In that game, your armor provided a % reduction of all physical damage taken, and better armors provided better percents (I think the best armor provided 70%). Also, if the armor was damaged, the % it blocked reduced as well.

The game also scaled up the damage of the weapons, so the best weapons did about 100 damage if you had no armor on. Needless to say, in a game where 100 HP damage would KO most characters, you definitely wanted to wear that armor.

Oh, it's nice to know that there's a game implement damage reduction by %age.

I'm planning the similar system for my next game. Though, armor not only add damage reduction, but also HP (Imagine that you got 1000 HP). This idea came up when I'm playing XCOM: Enemy Unknown / Enemy Within where the better armor give you more health point instead of damage reduction. But it was tactical game, I wonder if I could use the concept for turn based RPG. 

You can also stack the damage reduction by skill / buff, though there will be a limit how much you could stack the damage reduction bonus. For example, skill adds 50% damage reduction, and armor adds 50% damage reduction. If damage reduction is 100%, it's ridiculous, I would limit the reduction to 70% or 80% at the maximum guess.

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If there's any idea for damage reduction, I'm glad to hear more

 

[Warpmind]

Wandering peasants for human shields, mostly.

But srsly, working on a total revision of the combat system, largely based on the mechanics from White Wolf's Storyteller system: Attack "roll" is random up to Attack value, defense roll is random up to Defense value, damage rolls versus the relevant soak, adjusted for physical/magical resistance...

Yeah, I have a lot of math to crunch before it's done.

Lol, if I understand correctly, you're tryng to say ...

If character has attack value = 10, then the attack could be around 1 ~ 10, so goes the defense?

Basically, yeah.

And the scaling isn't much of a problem, either - someone with 678 Attack will likely hit someone with 560 Defense most of the time, as they ought to. Just make sure your stats exceed those of the Boss Monster before the fight, or you'll have a Really Bad Time.

 

[Lowell]

VX Ace uses an extremely simplified damage formula that can easily cause problems near end game without proper balancing. If you've looked up damage formula's for other games, you'll notice they use extremely complex formula's for calculating damage, often having additional factors & variables that the player often has no control over.

I know for Persona 4, the damage formula has absolutely no (That is they don't use any) subtraction based mathematics to calculate damage. Everything is either multiplied or divided by something with the aggressors offensive stat divided by the defenders defensive stat at it's core. The formula is designed in a way that makes it so that 0 damage is never an issue in the game unless you're in an area that is clearly outside of your ability range (Can't say I've ever came across such a scenario given how controlled area access is for the player).

On a side note, Damage Reduction Rates usefulness depends on the type of damage system the game uses. In a game like paper mario, a 50% Damage reduction would be next to useless due to the extremely small values the game uses, whereas damage reduction rates shine in games such as Disgaea (not sure if it has any) due to the astronomical damage range the game has.

Sample Damage Formula

This is a damage formula I use for my own game. In addition to including the aggressor/attackers level, I have two additional stats called Base and Pow with Base representing the skills base power and Pow being a weapon exclusive modifier. In case you're wondering the formula's loosely based on Persona 4

(5 * Math.sqrt(a.atk/b.def * (base + a.xstat.pow) * a.level / 16) * 1.20).to_i

 

[Wavelength]

On a side note, Damage Reduction Rates usefulness depends on the type of damage system the game uses. In a game like paper mario, a 50% Damage reduction would be next to useless due to the extremely small values the game uses, whereas damage reduction rates shine in games such as Disgaea (not sure if it has any) due to the astronomical damage range the game has.

I'm curious about why you think this is true?  The way I'm looking at it, a 50% damage reduction should double the number of hits it takes to kill a character whether the numbers are high or low.  Whether that reduction is 5 instead of 10 or whether it's 500 instead of 1000, it should mean the same thing to whoever is trying to withstand those hits: twice as many turns before being KO'ed.

Sample Damage Formula

This is a damage formula I use for my own game. In addition to including the aggressor/attackers level, I have two additional stats called Base and Pow with Base representing the skills base power and Pow being a weapon exclusive modifier. In case you're wondering the formula's loosely based on Persona 4

(5 * Math.sqrt(a.atk/b.def * (base + a.xstat.pow) * a.level / 16) * 1.20).to_i

You can simplify that to (1.5 * Math.sqrt(a.atk/b.def * (base + a.xstat.pow) * a.level)).to_i to make things clearer and easier - you'll get the same result every time.

What do you feel makes this a good damage formula?  I don't know what your Base and Pow values look like so it's a little tough to judge whether it's a good formula, but my initial instinct when looking at this formula is that it probably overcomplicates things (thus obscuring cause and effect from the player) - if Level and Power can contribute to ATK anyhow, why do we need to use them in the damage formula?

Hopefully this doesn't come across as too critical; I'm genuinely curious about what makes your game design cogs tick and maybe I can learn something here.

 

[TheRiotInside]

I'm a little late to this topic, but I felt like I should leave this here anyway. I mentioned this in another post quite a while back, but it seems applicable here too:

a.atk * a.atk / b.def

It's just your attack times the ratio of your attack to their defense. Ratios are incredible!

Here's my previous post about why this is an amazing formula.