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General Discussion / Damage Bonuses
« on: March 11, 2024, 12:38:52 AM »
Just wanted to make a note of this since I did some testing.
Damage bonuses generally modify the base damage. So if the weapon does 100 base damage, Tactical Drills gives 5% bonus damage, and 100% CR gives 10% bonus damage, then the damage will become 100 * (1 + 0.05 + 0.10) = 100 * 1.15 = 115 damage.
However, certain bonuses modify the whole thing instead of the base damage. For example, if you have the above, and then add Tactical Analysis, say against a capital ship (20% bonus damage), you might think it'd be 100 * (1 + 0.05 + 0.10 + 0.20) = 100 * 1.35 = 135 damage. But instead, it'll actually be 100 * (1 + 0.05 + 0.10) * (1 + 0.20) = 138 damage. It basically added +23% of the base damage since it's also multiplying with the other bonuses.
There are a couple of those types of modifiers, but thus far, they all multiply with each other. In other words, as far as I can tell, the damage boils down to (base damage) * (1 + X) * (1 + Y), where X are some modifiers like the CR damage bonus, and Y are some other modifiers like the Target Analysis bonus. Since X is easier to get, I'm going to call them the "regular" bonuses, while Y is more rare, so I'll call them the "special" bonuses. I could probably call them something more descriptive but this is just to organize it. The mathematically astute reader would notice that I could've defined it the other way too, but there are more in X than Y so I think it'll be easier to think of it this way.
Testing is done via the simulator in version 0.97a-RC10, by looking at the damage numbers of weapons against a target from the Practice Targets mod and against a sim Hyperion, and then calculating out what it needs to be for the given bonuses to match the observed damage numbers.
There's probably a way to just look in the code to see the list of all possible bonuses or something, but this is relying on empirical testing instead.
The "regular" bonuses:
CR (assuming CR > 70%)
Ballistic Mastery (regular and elite)
Tactical Drills
Energy Weapon Mastery
Cybernetic Augmentation
High Energy Focus
High Scatter Amplifier (regular and elite)
The "special" bonuses:
Target Analysis (regular and elite)
Wolfpack Tactics
Advanced Turret Gyros s-mod -- note that this also benefits missiles, not just ballistic and energy
Of particular note is that fighters are not affected by any of the "regular" or "special" bonuses above *except* for CR.
Targeting Feed (shipsystem on Heron) seems to be its own modifier, and thus multiplicatively stacks with everything else. Most damage modifiers don't apply to fighters, though.
Graviton Beam's effect is a damage taken modifier by the target ship, as opposed to the above which are damage dealt modifiers by the firing ship, and thus will multiplicatively stack with all of the above.
Since the "special" bonuses multiply all the other bonuses (except each other), and they're more rare, they are in some sense better than the "regular" bonuses. Note also that if the ship is a capital, then with elite Target Analysis and s-modded Advanced Turret Gyros, the ship is basically doing +20% against all targets, multiplying with the "regular" bonuses. On the other hand, frigates with elite Target Analysis and Wolfpack Tactics get +5%/+30%/+35%/+40%, multiplying with the "regular" bonuses.
Damage bonuses generally modify the base damage. So if the weapon does 100 base damage, Tactical Drills gives 5% bonus damage, and 100% CR gives 10% bonus damage, then the damage will become 100 * (1 + 0.05 + 0.10) = 100 * 1.15 = 115 damage.
However, certain bonuses modify the whole thing instead of the base damage. For example, if you have the above, and then add Tactical Analysis, say against a capital ship (20% bonus damage), you might think it'd be 100 * (1 + 0.05 + 0.10 + 0.20) = 100 * 1.35 = 135 damage. But instead, it'll actually be 100 * (1 + 0.05 + 0.10) * (1 + 0.20) = 138 damage. It basically added +23% of the base damage since it's also multiplying with the other bonuses.
There are a couple of those types of modifiers, but thus far, they all multiply with each other. In other words, as far as I can tell, the damage boils down to (base damage) * (1 + X) * (1 + Y), where X are some modifiers like the CR damage bonus, and Y are some other modifiers like the Target Analysis bonus. Since X is easier to get, I'm going to call them the "regular" bonuses, while Y is more rare, so I'll call them the "special" bonuses. I could probably call them something more descriptive but this is just to organize it. The mathematically astute reader would notice that I could've defined it the other way too, but there are more in X than Y so I think it'll be easier to think of it this way.
Testing is done via the simulator in version 0.97a-RC10, by looking at the damage numbers of weapons against a target from the Practice Targets mod and against a sim Hyperion, and then calculating out what it needs to be for the given bonuses to match the observed damage numbers.
There's probably a way to just look in the code to see the list of all possible bonuses or something, but this is relying on empirical testing instead.
The "regular" bonuses:
CR (assuming CR > 70%)
Ballistic Mastery (regular and elite)
Tactical Drills
Energy Weapon Mastery
Cybernetic Augmentation
High Energy Focus
High Scatter Amplifier (regular and elite)
The "special" bonuses:
Target Analysis (regular and elite)
Wolfpack Tactics
Advanced Turret Gyros s-mod -- note that this also benefits missiles, not just ballistic and energy
Of particular note is that fighters are not affected by any of the "regular" or "special" bonuses above *except* for CR.
Targeting Feed (shipsystem on Heron) seems to be its own modifier, and thus multiplicatively stacks with everything else. Most damage modifiers don't apply to fighters, though.
Graviton Beam's effect is a damage taken modifier by the target ship, as opposed to the above which are damage dealt modifiers by the firing ship, and thus will multiplicatively stack with all of the above.
Since the "special" bonuses multiply all the other bonuses (except each other), and they're more rare, they are in some sense better than the "regular" bonuses. Note also that if the ship is a capital, then with elite Target Analysis and s-modded Advanced Turret Gyros, the ship is basically doing +20% against all targets, multiplying with the "regular" bonuses. On the other hand, frigates with elite Target Analysis and Wolfpack Tactics get +5%/+30%/+35%/+40%, multiplying with the "regular" bonuses.