Help needed: Damage calculator

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Good point on #5 and #6. Didn't think that far.

 

I've put together an Excel-based calculator to easily compare single-wield, dual-wield and using two-handed weapons side by side in all imaginable situations. However, some minutiae details remain unanswered.

1) What portion of damage gets doubled in a critical hit? I'm assuming that everything else besides weapon's extra damage (i.e. 'adds +1 cold damage' and the like) is doubled on a critical hit, based on how the game displays done damage on screen.

2) Based on some testing I did yesterday, Haste spell doesn't always add +1 attack. In fact, it only adds a half attack if your normal attack rate isn't a whole integer. Therefore, if you have 2.5 attacks per round normally, you'll only get 3 attacks with Haste, not 3.5. Can anyone confirm this, or is it just a display bug?

3) How do the following effects stack: Belm's extra attack, Haste, Oil of Speed, Improved Haste? AFAIK Oil of Speed and Haste aren't cumulative while Belm and Haste is. Does Hasted and Improved Hasted character get just double attacks or more?

4) If dual-wielding, does Improved Haste make the off-hand attack twice per round or is the attack rate of the main hand adjusted to match the expected total?

5) In case you're using a two-handed weapon with 2 stars in two-handed style, you get a critical hit by rolling either 19 or 20. However, if you enemy has extremely good AC and you'd need to roll 20 to actually hit it, is rolling 19 still considered a critical hit or is it just a miss?

6) If you need to roll 20 to hit your enemy (either due to bad THAC0 or enemy's excellent AC or both), is rolling 20 still considered a critical hit? That is, is it possible to end up in a scenario where you either miss your target *or* critically hit, meaning that you'll never be able to land a normal hit?

Details, details... I love'em.

 

IIRC there was a related thread a bit (okay, waaaay) back.
AFAIK only a natural 20 means a hit-per-default, and if rolling 19 means you won't hit, it won't hit even though it *would* do critical damage.
Don't string me up if I'm wrong, but I'm quite positive it is that way.

 

@BBR - that could very well be true. The point I was making is I don't see how such a situation could arise. i.e. a fighter-type needing a 20 to hit something. Even early SoA, something would have to have an AC of -7 for this to apply. Obviously, with every level a character gained following the first, the AC value in question would decrease by one more. By the time you got to around level 20, you'd literally need to find an enemy with a -20 armor class to test this on, and there are no such enemies in the game.

 

1) Everything is multiplied for a critical hit/backstab except the strength bonus and additional elemental damage.

2) I did a clean install with ToB, patch, and latest Baldurdash fixpack a few weeks ago. Oil of Speed and Haste worked in the same way, adding one full extra attack.

3) Haste, I-Haste, Oil of Speed, and Boots of Speed stack in terms of movement but not extra attacks.

6) Rolling 20 is always a hit, regardless of THAC0 or target AC. Likewise, rolling 1 is always a miss. That's why you'll still get hit sometimes even with ridiculously low AC (-24 is the game limit).

 

1. Your description is correct. I believe critical hits are calculated like a backstab (although only times 2 instead of up to 7). This means that things like strength bonus, proficiency bonus, etc., are doubled, but that elemental damage, or secondary weapon effects besides direct damage are not.

2. I have never noticed that. It could be possible, but I've never bothered to look at the character box after casting haste. It could be true.

3. Something like Belm gives your character +1 attack on his main hand, even if using it in his offhand. This effect certainly stacks with everything else you listed. Haste and Improved Haste do not stack. I do not know if Oil of Speed stacks with either of these, mainly because I always use the spell, and it never even occurred to me until you mentioned it that you may be able to use both at the same time. My thinking is that Belm stacks with everything, and nothing else stacks with anything, but that's just my gut feeling.

4. I think one attack per round in the offhand is hard coded, so you would only double the main hand attacks.

5. I have no idea on this one, but I find it difficult to imagine that such a scenario really exists in the game. If you're talking two stars in two handed weapon style, I'm assuming you're talking about a barbarian, paladin, ranger, or fighter, and not a thief (more specifically a swashbuckler) with a quarterstaff. Even at the level in which you start the game (which is 7 for these classes) you'd have a base THAC0 of 13. That's assuming no strength, proficiency, or weapon bonuses. This is already extremely unlikely, but for worst-case scenario, let's just say our fighter is using a two-handed weapon that he only has one proficiency point in, the weapon isn't magical, and the fighter has a strength of 15 or less. In that situation, you'd still have to run into something with an AC of -7 to have that scenario play out. There are only a handful of enemies in the game with an AC that low, and certainly none of them are found at such a low level. So while I don't know the answer, I think the question is entirely hypothetical as you'll never encounter it in-game.

6. Don't know again, but I'm inclined to think this is also irrelevant using the same reasoning as in #5.

 

Aldeth said pretty much what I would have said, except for this:

2. This sounds similar to the boots of speed bug that the SP fixpack corrects (I'm not sure about Baldurdash) (boots of speed aren't supposed to add any extra attacks, but do in the way described). I've never noticed it with haste, but the two might be related.

 

I did some testing on the various Haste effects, and here's some data I gathered.

I have SoA with official patch and Baldurdash fixpack installed, no mods of any kind.

1) Jaheira at 12th level using club (main, 2 stars) and belm (off-hand, 1 star) gets four attacks normally, five with haste and eight with Improved Haste. Nothing surprising here.

2) Switching belm and club makes the attack rates go down to 7/2, 4 and 7, respectively. Haste adds only a half attack per round.

3) Belm alone in main hand gives 5/2, 3 and 5 attacks per round, respectively. Once again, Haste adds only half attack. Note also how Improved Haste's attack rate doubling is done AFTER the Belm's extra attack is applied.

Also, the rate at which the off-hand swings is most definitely NOT hard-coded to one attack per round. To test it, I boosted Keldorn's AC as much as I could and commanded Jaheira to attack him, while having Aerie work as a 'clocking device' by shooting sling bullets with 1/round attack rate.

Having belm in the off-hand resulted in exactly 3:1 attack ratio between main/off hand. Between Aerie's two sling shots, Jaheira attacked twice with her off hand and six times with main.

Having belm in main hand and club in off-hand resulted in a bit weird attack ratio - it seemed to alternate between 2:1 and 3:1 (mainff). Makes sense, though, as now there's only 7 total attacks per round and 2+1+3+1 is exactly 7.

All ratios and attack rates have been calculated over a longer timespan without pauses to account for minor miscalculations and the difficulty in pausing the game at exact one round intervals.

Edit: Just noticed that Improved Haste just doubles attack rates for both main and off hand. So, off-hand will attack twice per round under Improved Haste, regardless of any other modifiers such as Belm's extra attack.

[ September 09, 2004, 08:51: Message edited by: Jukka Mikkonen ]

 

Everything Drumheller said is true. When I said that Haste, Improved Haste and Oil of Speed do not stack, I was talking in terms of how many attacks per round - as that was what was being asked - not the speed.

@Jukka

Yes, #3 makes sense - that's what I said in my initial response.

In terms of the off-hand attack, I think that is a graphics issue more than anything. It may LOOK like she's attacking twice with her offhand while under improved haste, because the graphics animation doubles in speed of the attack animation. Thus, she looks like she's attacking twice with her offhand, when really it's only once. You can test this with Keldorn again, except stip him down so his armor class is 10 so Jaheira hits him every time. Then give her a weapon that does elemental damage (remembering what hand it's in of course) and then count the number of times she elemental vs. non-elemental damage. I think you'll see she's only swinging the offhand once per round.

As far as timing a round, there's a much easier way to do this other than timing it with Aerie: summon in a few hostile enemies (so you are in combat), and under the autopause options set it to autopause at the end of the round. That way you'll have it exactly.

 

Only one small comment on #4 based on what Aldeth said...the game is hard coded to allow only for one attack in your off-hand, but I have definitely noticed my off-hand weapon hitting twice during a GWW attack.

I don't know what is going on about that, but I thought it prudent to post here.

 

I wasn't counting stuff from the animations, but from the info screen and I could see the attack roll for the off-hand twice in a round. Since I was using the Blackblood club (+3 acid damage), no way I could have mistaken the damage readings either.

 

Yes, I AM talking about the info screen. I had Celestial Fury+3 and Crom Faeyr equipped, with Crom in the off hand. I saw "5 lightning damage" more than once within the space of 10 attacks, including the misses.

I know what I'm talking about mate.

 

Hmmm, is all of this preparatory to a BG2 JUPP?

 

It seems to me that, with enough penalties to your THAC0, the scenario of needing a 20 to hit something is quite achievable. In fact, playing through the Planar Sphere Mod (hideously cheesed), I ran into this problem while dealing with Pain Elementals. You can duplicate the same or similar parameters in a non-modded game. Get your dex to 1/2, get blinded, slowed, and enfeebled, and your THAC0 goes through the roof (in a very bad way, that is). Then the only way to hit is with a critical, and if you succeed you do in fact do critical damage. However, I don't think I had anyone with a 19/20 critical from a weapon style while I was dealing with the Pain Elementals, so I can't speak to the question of rolling a 19.

 

http://members.chello.nl/~j.vanthull/BG2SR/Main.htm

Scroll about 1/4 ways down and read the section on Haste. Explains what you're seeing Jukka.

 

How about Blade's Offensive spin? Is it calculated before or after Improved Haste?

*thinks about equipping Haer'Dalis with Wave Halberd vs Belm/Cutthroat*

 

The extra attack from Offensive Spin is just like the extra attack from Scarlet Ninja-to or Belm. Improved Haste correctly doubles your total attacks, including these modifiers.

Haer'Dalis would probably do better dual-wielding; the extra attack offsets some of the THAC0 shortcomings compared to warrior classes.