Blocking is a subject frequently debated in the forums and evasion too, although for less extent. In the last issue of Popolion Post released a few days ago, IMC said they’re working on it:
But, is changing the formula the best solution or just a bandage? What will happen when we get another level expansion or Rank 10? Will we need the block/dodge formula to be changed again?
In this regard, I bring a suggestion of a new mechanic: glancing hit. What if, instead of only two possible outcomes for physical attacks (hit/miss, hit/block), a third possibility was present? The purpose of glancing hit is to reduce the power of evasion and block rate without making them completely useless stats, adding a second roll to decide if the incoming attack is completely nullified or if the resulting damage is mitigated instead.
Now, going in-depth with glancing hit:
- Attacker A attacks target B with a physical attack
- The game checks if the attack will hit or if it’s evaded (dodge chance) or if the attack will hit or if it’s blocked (block chance)
- If B wins, a second roll is done to check if the attack is completely evaded/blocked or if the damage’s reduced by 50% (glancing hit)
So what’s the chance of a glancing hit happening?
Normally, glancing happening or not would be at a 50% chance. However, depending on A and B stats, B is more likely to avoid the attack or A is more likely to inflict half damage if they fail to deliver a direct hit, but the chance of totally blocking or evading an attack can’t go below 25% in this test (the same applies for the chance of dealing a glancing hit), at least under normal circumstances. To decide where the scale will be, a simply algorithm is used to calculate the glancing hit chance:
- Calculate (ACC / EVA) * 0.5 or (BLKPEN / BLK) * 0.5
- If the result is less than 0.25, then glancing chance = lower threshold (LT) instead
- If the result is greater than 0.75, then glancing chance = upper threshold (UT) instead
Another possibility could be using STR / DEX and DEX / CON instead of the above formulae.
Under normal circumstances, LT and UT are 0.25 and 0.75, respectively. Since pretty much all mechanics in the game can be affected by other factors, the same could happen here. Some examples:
- High Guard (Peltasta C2 buff) reducing LT to 0
- Guard (C button for many classes with Guard attribute) reducing glancing hit chance for incoming attacks to 0
- Sneaky Hit (Rogue C1 buff) increasing UT to 1.0 and glancing chance to 100% when attacking from behind
- Glancing chance isn’t taken into account with Non-Invasive Area (Templar C3 skill) and Enchant Earth (Enchanter C2 buff)
- Shields, accessories and other equipment that affects glancing hit chances
Now, a little test with A (150 Accuracy and 300 block penetration) and B (180 Evasion and 900 block rate). Reminder:
- evasion chance = (max(0, evasion – accuracy)) ^ 0.65
- block chance = (max(0, block – block penetration)) ^ 0.7
B has only 9% chance of evading A’s attack, but 88% chance to block them! With glancing hit, if B wins in the block chance test, A has 17% chance to deal a glancing hit, but since it’s less than the LT, they have 25% chance of dealing half damage instead. Not that bad, don’t you think? Now, if A gets 600 block penetration, B will have 54% block chance and A will have 33% glancing hit chance.
Conclusion: with the current formulae for evasion and block chance and a new mechanic called glancing hit, block and evasion are still powerful, but the attacker gets an opportunity to deal reduced damage instead of having their attacks completely nullified.
