Is 90% Resistence = 45% Defense?

[EmperorSteele]

Good point. I didn't specify that I was only considering the clamped 5% hit/miss value, or an enemy with massive acc/tohit buffs or whatever. I should probably re-assess my thesis, then!

[biostem]

1 minute ago, EmperorSteele said:

Good point. I didn't specify that I was only considering the clamped 5% hit/miss value, or an enemy with massive acc/tohit buffs or whatever. I should probably re-assess my thesis, then!

Another thing to consider, (and I think someone already brought it up), is that when you dodge an attack, that's it and it's over with.  When you take the damage, even if oyu resisted all the damage, you still suffer any debuffs or other status effects that come with it.

[Troo]

@EmperorSteele @biostem don't for get that pesky villain 'the streakbreaker'.. 20 attacks is guaranteed 2 hit minimum if I remember correctly.

 

[Edit]

turns out I did not remember correctly OR never knew. take your pick.

 

streakbreaker

Final chance of hitting : misses allowed

>.9 : 1
.8-.9 : 2
.6-.8 : 3
.4-.6 : 4
.3-.4 : 6
.2-.3 : 8
0 -.2 : 100

Edited January 28, 2023 by Troo

[biostem]

14 minutes ago, Troo said:

don't for get that pesky villain 'the streakbreaker'.. 20 attacks is guaranteed 2 hit minimum if I remember correctly.

It seems, according to this article that there is more involved...

[aethereal]

Guys, you are literally killing me.

 

@EmperorSteele there is no realistic scenario in CoH as it stands where an enemy hits a Def 0 character 95% of the time and hits a "soft-capped" character 5% of the time.  Like, that's theoretically possible within the mechanics -- for an enemy who has normal (1.0) Accuracy and +45% to-hit, and where your "soft-capped" character has 90% defense (not 45%).  But there are no enemies with +45% to hit and no accuracy, and 90 defense is an insane bar.

 

@Troo streakbreaker is irrelevant to high-defense characters.  It would only kick in after 99 consecutive misses from the same opponent.  That's a vanishingly rare proposition -- the hits you get from normal probability are much more common than a streakbreaker hit.

 

 

 

The basic deal is that 45% defense mitigates 90% damage in ordinary content.  Not 95%.  90%.  Yes, there are exceptions and caveats.  But if the level of nuance that you're looking for is "one sentence," then here it is:  "In ordinary content, 45% mitigates 90% of damage, just like 90% resistance."

Edited January 28, 2023 by aethereal

[Erratic1]

1 hour ago, EmperorSteele said:

Let's say we have an enemy who deals 100 damage on a hit. You can fight him with EITHER a Def-caped toon, or a Res-capped toon.

The bad guy will attack 20 times. Let's see how much damage we take.

For your def capped toon, if the bad guy attacks 20 times, he will probably land a blow once (based purely on mathematics). So, you've taken 100 damage. After 20 attacks and all the time it takes for him to attack you that many times.

If you have the Resistance based toon, the bad guy will hit you 19 times out of 20 attempts (5% chance to miss), but only dealing 10 damage each time. 10x19 =190. Which is almost twice as much damage taken as the def-capped toon.
 

 

Just because you have no added defense does not mean you have a 95% chance to be hit. At even level you have a 50% chance to be hit. So the res cap character above takes 0 damage half the time as he is not hit, and half the time he takes 10 damage for 100 total. Level difference between foe and player modify the hit chance.

[BazookaTwo]

So does logic follow that +/- toHit and Res matter more in conjunction on a character that is mostly reliant on Resistance? 

 

I'm just trying to look at ways to avoid needing Def capping when my build goals are other things. 

[Erratic1]

2 minutes ago, BazookaTwo said:

So does logic follow that +/- toHit and Res matter more in conjunction on a character that is mostly reliant on Resistance? 

 

I'm just trying to look at ways to avoid needing Def capping when my build goals are other things. 

 

I have a resistance-based character with a -To-Hit Aura (Rad armor) who took an epic power which also had -To-Hit for somewhere around -30% To-Hit when both were in effect (subject to whatever resistance foes have to being debuffed that way). It did seem effective, but the second power was something you had to hang on a target and did not apply to things outside the radius of the power shooting in at you.

 

 

[biostem]

4 minutes ago, BazookaTwo said:

So does logic follow that +/- toHit and Res matter more in conjunction on a character that is mostly reliant on Resistance? 

 

I'm just trying to look at ways to avoid needing Def capping when my build goals are other things. 

Frankly, I would say it all depends upon the opportunity cost involved in obtaining those buffs or debuffs.  For instance, would you be giving up damage or recharge, thereby drawing out the fight for longer, in order to get that bit of extra buff/debuff?  If your character has access to a reliable self heal, could that make up the difference?  Just how close to the razor's edge between survival and defeat does your character teeter on?  I mean, if you can casually get like 17% defense on a resistance build, that's like knocking a third off incoming damage, but chasing 45% may hamstring your entire build...

[BazookaTwo]

14 minutes ago, biostem said:

I mean, if you can casually get like 17% defense on a resistance build, that's like knocking a third off incoming damage, but chasing 45% may hamstring your entire build...

 

And that edge is what makes my Savage/Rad scrapper feel fun! Combat Teleport can stack +tohit in a weird mechanic right before Savage Leap into a mob, follow that with Ground Zero and you have a few seconds of safety before things can really hit you very hard. At least, that's my theory. Also I'm talking about solo play almost always when I speak about mechanics like this.

 

I kind of like the "kill it fast because if it gets a chance to hit you" mechanic that blasters get, but on other archetypes. S'fun.

[Galaxy Brain]

As others have noted, in general it is true as 90% res and 45% def will mitigate 90% of incoming damage.

 

The big caveats tho are how they go about this. A res based character will be taking more hits, and thus more secondary effects, then a def based one. However, the def based one rolls the dice per attack and has a higher risk/reward. Ideally you want a mix of both 🙂