CombatAdvanced
{Please Note: The following information is the result of a single player's subjective testing and should not be considered authoritative, however much effort was involved.}
Section 1: Rugia's Tests
Introduction
The most interesting part of the Advanced Manual is the section dedicated to Rugia's tests. Rugia, a former member of the Hundred, has exhaustively collected data on the combat system with the help of a few friends. His first test was to determine which base red stats affected his combat to-hit chances the most during brawling on an unarmed opponent. This data will be interesting for characters built to serve as punching alts, but may also indicate the most favorable stats for fighting with spears; his next tests explored certain combat and training situations such as attacking from behind, attacking an opponent who has dodge off, and .
Testing Procedures
Test 1: Red Stat To-Hit Effects
The test involved rerolling a character called Adela multiple times with different base stats and then testing the hit rate on another character, Rugia.
For each reroll, Adela was trained up to 99 in brawling. Then she would stand in front of Rugia and hit his right hand. Rugia had all bars zeroed except for Stamina and would have dodge on. His dodge was 99, block 93, and parry started at 82 and ended on 86. The result of each hit was recorded on paper as either D, P, or H coresponding to a dodged, parried, or hit attack. Each test consists of about 1000 attempts.
The results are reported as a normalised hit rating which is the number of hits recorded within a certain time period.
Test 2: Front/Back To-Hit Effects
An attacker maxed in brawling punched at an unarmed defender's head, sometimes from the front and sometimes from the back. The defender had low INT and maxed AGI. DBP were 50/50/50 and going up throughout the test. In order to counter this increase, the attacker switched between front and back attack positions every 100 clicks.
Test 3: Dodge On/Off
This was a small test to see what effect autododge had on the To-Hit percentages. The defender was hit in the head by an attacker maxed in brawling.
Testing Results
Table I: Red Stat To-Hit Effects, Normalized
| Hi INT | Hit Rating 1.0 |
|---|---|
| Hi AGI | Hit Rating 1.6 |
| Hi VIS | Hit Rating 3.0 |
| Hi DEX | Hit Rating 2.8 |
Table II: Front/Back To-Hit Effects, Percentages
| Frontal | Dodged | 35% |
|---|---|---|
| Blocked | 11% | |
| Parried | 3% | |
| Struck | 51% | |
| Behind | Dodged | 34% |
| Blocked | 12% | |
| Parried | 2% | |
| Struck | 52% | |
Table III: Dodge On/Off To-Hit Effects, Percentages
| Dodge On | Dodged | 51% |
|---|---|---|
| B/P | 18% | |
| Struck | 31% | |
| Dodge Off | Dodged | 0% |
| B/P | 58% | |
| Struck | 42% | |
Analysis
Test 1: The Hit Rating above is basically comparing the builds against each other. High INT was found to be the worst at hitting, and High VIS was three times better at hitting than High INT. A mixture of high VIS and high DEX in one character might add together for the best attack rating. There are, of course, other considerations besides attack rating in a build, however.
Test 2: The differences between hitting from the front and back are insignificant.
Test 3: It appears as though one attack roll is generated and then compared against individual DBP rolls. A high dodge skill filters out the low attack rolls if dodge is enabled, however the other defenses seem to pick up the slack if dodge is turned off. The initial analysis is that turning dodge off is not a crippling deficiency in battle. It also has implications for training. It is probably best to train parry with auto-dodge on.
Tests on best stats for defense have not been completed, but are being performed.
Section 2: Character Builds
Empty.
