Talk:Damage
I remember reading in a thread somewhere, that weapons do up to double damage at all times, not just on X-COM soldiers. This means that the rated in-game values are actually the averages. I think it was in Zombie's "Damage Modifiers" thread. Can anyone confirm or deny this, because the formula at the top of the page, with the 0.5 and 2 in it, is confusing to me?
In my understanding, it was simply like this:
A rifle, rated as 30 damage, will actually do anywhere from 0-60 damage. Then you multiply this by the damage modifiers and then subtract the armour...
--Danial 18:08, 23 Oct 2005 (PDT)
That's the impression I'm getting from what I've seen... that actually it's the average that's being shown in the game. So I'm with you. Want to ask Zombie? Or I can. --MikeTheRed 11:17, 24 Oct 2005 (PDT)
Exactly correct guys. All damage numbers listed by the game's UFOpaedia are averages. I believe I mentioned this fact in my 3rd or 4th post in the Damage Modifiers thread at the StrategyCore forums. For most weapons/ammo, the Minimum is 0 and the Maximum is Average * 2. The weapons/ammo in this category include Armor Piercing, Laser, Plasma, Stun Rod and the Small Launcher's Stun Bomb.
The types of ammo that don't quite follow that category are Incendiary and High Explosives. The HE Minimum is AVE/2, while the Maximum is AVE*3/2. However, if you average the min and the max, it is still what the game mentions. Overall, it's a smaller range of damage that can be inflicted, and that means the probability of the higher damages showing up is greater than an ammo with the same max.
Example 1: HE ammo with 100 listed strength Min = 50 Ave = 100 Max = 150 Probability of max showing up = 1/(150-50+1) = 0.990% AP ammo with 75 listed strength Min = 0 Ave = 75 Max = 150 Probability of max showing up = 1/(150-0+1) = 0.662%
Conclusion: if you have the choice between HE with 100 listed damage and a normal weapon with 75, choose the HE. However, if you have two types of ammo with the same average, things become different.
Example 2: HE ammo with 100 listed strength Min = 50 Ave = 100 Max = 150 Probability of max showing up = 1/(150-50+1) = 0.990% AP ammo with 100 listed strength Min = 0 Ave = 100 Max = 200 Probability of max showing up = 1/(200-0+1) = 0.498%
Unfortunately, we are comparing apples to oranges in this case since the max for the AP is much greater than HE. In reality, AP ammo will out-perform the HE according to this: 1 / (AP max - HE Max + 1), or 1 / (200-150+1) = 1.961%. That's almost double the HE doing it's max of 0.990%. By this you would be tempted to outfit all your troopers with AP instead of HE with the same listed damage. But wait. HE will actually out-perform AP according to this: 1 / (HE min - AP min + 1), or 1 / (50-0+1) = 1.961%.
Conclusion: Is either ammo better? Nope, it's a crap-shoot. The probability of the AP under-performing the HE's min negates its probability of out-performing the HE's max. But there is one fact than still remains: the HE always does a minimum damage > 0, and it's damage affects an area instead of a single tile. This might be beneficial to soldiers since every shot that connects (or even falls a bit short) will damage the target.
Incendiary weapon strength is theorized to determine the area of flames, not the damage inflicted. Damage for that type is either 0 or between 5 and 10 depending if the unit catches fire, or between 1 and 12 if the unit is standing in fire. Hope this helps. --Zombie 15:06, 24 Oct 2005 (PDT)
Great stuff, Z! Thanks for clarifying. Danial or I will move this to the Damage Formula page soon. It's great to have sweeping generalities in black and white :) -MikeTheRed 17:39, 24 Oct 2005 (PDT)
I'm just making a quick note:
We seem to be missing an explanation on fatal wounds received from penetrating damage. Can anyone recall where we tucked this information away? I know we got down to the bottom of this somewhere... and it's not under health or fatal wounds.
- NKF
Melee damage ranges
What's the damage range used for melee attacks (stun rods/alien terrorists)? 0 to x2, x0.5 to x1.5, or something else?--Ethereal Cereal 00:36, 14 March 2007 (PDT)
For Stun Rods and HTH alien attacks the range is 0-2x.--Zombie 08:45, 14 March 2007 (PDT)
Cool Table, Zombie
Thanks so much for making the time to put that there. It must have taken some tweaking.
To me, though, the mind's eye notices differences more quickly. Which is to say, here, to have made all the 100s be "-" and then the rest be +20 or -10 or whatever.
Just a thought. Please delete this after reading it! - MikeTheRed 00:14, 6 July 2007 (PDT)
Probabilities
So weapons may do anything from zero to twice their nominal damage. I have the impression that this isn't totally random, but sort of a bell-curvish distribution. Laser Rifle vs Floater should require two hits about 1/3rd of the time and it feels as if one-shot kills were a lot more common. However, I don't have any actual data to back this up.
Also, can it be that the soldier's firing accuracy does matter? That good marksmen not only have a higher to-hit chance to begin with, but also receive a bonus on their damage roll? --Schnobs 18:45, 10 November 2007 (PST)