Talk:Armor penetration

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Contents 1 Test results 2 Clean up 3 A completely new discussion regarding armor penetration. 4 Primal Rage 5 Retesting... 6 Question 7 Stoneflesh aura 8 Confuzzled 9 Negative armor 10 How much armor penetration? (stack)

[edit] Test results

• Date: 13:34, 16 June 2006 (CDT) (minus 30 minutes for typing up this report)
• Build: Level 20 Me/Mo, with Healing Breeze
• Equipment:
  • Performer's Gloves from Prophecies Campaign with 60 Armor and gives 15 armor while casting spells.
  • Peppermint Shield
• Location: Old Ascalon
• Test subject: Flash Gargoyle (level 3 = Damage Level 9)

• Lightning Orb expected damage to 0 AL (naked):
  • Assume Air Magic 0: 11.69 (round to 12)
  • Assume Air Magic 1: 18.70 (round to 19)
• Actual damage taken when naked: 12

Level 3 Flash Gargoyle is extrapolated to have 0 rank in Air Magic

• Lightning Orb expected damage to 15 AL:
  • Assuming 25% armor penetration: 9.61 (round to 10)
  • Assuming no armor penetration: 9.01 (round to 9)
• Actual damage taken while casting spells: 9

Armor penetration does not affect the "Gives 15 armor while casting spells." bonus from Virtuoso's Armor

• Lightning Orb expected damage to 10 AL:
  • Assuming 25% armor penetration: 11.53 (round to 12)
  • Assuming no armor penetration: 9.83 (round to 10)
• Actual damage taken while wearing shield: 10

Armor penetration does not affect the "Armor: 10" from Peppermint Shield

Conclusion: Armor penetration only affects BaseAL.

Note: This is in direct contradiction with the test reported in December of 2005 at Talk:Damage/Archive4

-User:PanSola (talk to the ) 13:34, 16 June 2006 (CDT)

The following are assumed to also not be affected by armor penetration, but were not verified in the above test.

• Armor piece bonus of the syntax "+x armor"
• Primary weapon bonus of the syntax "+x armor"
• Primary weapon bonus of the syntax "-x armor"
• Secondary weapon bonus of the syntax "+x armor"
• Secondary weapon bonus of the syntax "-x armor" (doesn't seem to exist, listed for completeness sake)
• Shield armor value of the syntax "Armor: x (requires y Attribute)" when requirements are met
• Shield armor value of the syntax "Armor: x (requires y Attribute)" from collectors when requirements are not met
• Shield armor value of the syntax "Armor: x (requires y Attribute)" from dropped loot when requirements are not met <- This is stated by Kuntz to be counted for armor penetration, but the current article assumes it is not affected by armor penetration.
• Skill bonus of the syntax "+x armor" (outdated teste result from Descember suggest this is not affected by armor penetration)
• Skill bonus of the syntax "-x armor" (outdated teste result from Descember suggest this is not affected by armor penetration)

-User:PanSola (talk to the ) 13:48, 16 June 2006 (CDT)

I also just performed some tests, though they are by no means exhaustive. I took a warrior with 12 axe, 16 strength, a PvP axe without a damage mod (besides customization), and wild blow and whacked a target with two different sources of +armor while enchanted (monk armor for +10 and a focus for +5). The purpose was to see if the AP (from strength while using wild blow) modified either +armor.

Armor	Observed damage	EAL if AP affects total	"Total" AP damage	EAL if AP affects base	"Base" AP damage
60	57	60 * .84	~56.11	same	same
60+10	49	70 * .84	~48.52	60 * .84 + 10	~47.19
60+15	45	75 * .84	~45.11	60 * .84 + 15	~43.27

To compute the damages from the EALs, I did 28 * 1.2 * 2^((60 + 20 - EAL) / 40).

Kuntz's argument seems to be incorrect for the case of monk armor with +10 armor while enchanted and focuses with +5 armor while enchanted. This of course says nothing for any of the other sources of +armor Pan listed above.

Of interest is the mismatch in the "control" test where there wasn't any +armor going on. Likely, I did something wrong, but I don't see my mistake. Otherwise, perhaps there's some sort of mid-calculation rounding. --68.142.13.99 01:08, 17 June 2006 (CDT)

Your theoretical values are correct, barring rounding effects. Instead of getting PvP monks, use PvE monks and have them buy cheap armor from Lion's Arch or earlier. This way the damage will be bigger, and the difference will be more appreant. Actually, with the PvP monks, you can test the focus bonus by having the monks strip. The difference should (theoretically) be really clear. -User:PanSola (talk to the ) 02:18, 17 June 2006 (CDT)

Spears Sample:

Used A/P for convenience of easy crits. Used almost the highest armor penetration I could think of combining Spear of Lightning (air), Sundering upgrade (sund), and Judge's Insight (holy) for a total of 65% penetration (66% W/R was the highest). The -18 you see is for the armor ignoring damage done by Spear of Lightning at the time of the test. In the top, "sp:" is just my redundant shorthand for spear; "cust" means customized weapon.

I did this mostly to get a better grasp on vamp vs. sundering. I assume results for other weapons will lean more in favor of sundering for higher base damage weapons (like hammers), and less for lower base damage weapons (like daggers). The bold red numbers are for when sundering does more damage than vampiric. I figure it has to do more to outweigh the vamp advantage of passing that part of the damage through protections. The 15 for vamp is because vamp does it's effect 5 times as often as sundering. If you want random minor damage spikes instead of consistent damage, you may also lean in favor of sundering.

Interesting how a little AP actually does more additional damage to low armor targets, and a lot of AP does more additional damage to high armor targets.

Personal Conclusion: Vamp is more universal and predictable damage. Sund is more effective in specialized circumstances: when you can stack with other AP sources; or for spikes (depending on your spike philosophy). While the choice to use vamp vs. sund is pretty much the same regardless of enemy armor, the impact once sund is more advantageous is greater on high armor opponents. --Mooseyfate 00:47, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Clean up

i'm taking up the project of cleaning and vetting this article. test results to come soon. --Honorable Sarah 11:25, 11 July 2006 (CDT)

Perhaps I could buy you a new shift key, Sarah? Anyway, I fixed up what you wrote, with two changes: I removed primal rage as "bonus" since I don't think it is (the article's talk ony mentions stacking with sundering, which doesn't tell us anything) and I commented out the "AP only affects base AL" since I've shown it false. However, we don't know what exactly AP does or does not affect. I'm unsure how to phrase this for the article. --68.142.14.78 18:41, 11 July 2006 (CDT)

I think talk pages are a nice place to let ones hair down a little, you know ditch the perfect grammer/spelling and it gives me the opportunity to use Commonwealth English as much as possible! Still I've just done some capitalisation on User:Honorable Sarah/Multiminded was Sarah so maybe you're onto something! --Xasxas256 18:54, 11 July 2006 (CDT)

would you prefer proper information or proper capitalization? i work with UNIX all day, so my caplitization quickly becomes overtaxed. nah! --Honorable Sarah 09:51, 12 July 2006 (CDT)

I'd think working with *NIX would mean you have tons of capitals to spare at the end of the day. If you're "rewriting for clarity," please rewrite for clarity. --68.142.14.98 15:41, 12 July 2006 (CDT)

[edit] A completely new discussion regarding armor penetration.

As I have been delving into the information available on this subject, it is still unclear to me as to whether or not bonus Armor Penetration items such as a sundering bowstring and JI will stack. I do read that base AP and bonus AP stack, but am finding a lack of emperical confirmation one way or the other on the question of bonus AP items stacking. A simplistic version of this hypothesis would be " would JI applied during the use of a Sundering Longbow (20%/20%) provide any additional damage percentages or volume? Does it give you two 20% chances, for example? " I look forward to reading the input provided on this subject.Greabow- 21:33, 16 June 2006 (EDT)

i'm working on testing that now. the current theory holds that the sundering string as bonus AP will stack with the JI bonus AP, so you'll have 80% chance of 20% penetration, and a 20% chance of 40% penetration. this ties closely with damage, and those equations were written with one AP in mind. --Honorable Sarah 09:28, 17 August 2006 (CDT)

[edit] Primal Rage

Used wild blow to test it out on the suits of armor......The damage from critial hits didn't increase when I changed my strength from 0 to 14.

Becase Primal Rage says "have 20% armor penetration", instead of "+20% armor penetartion". So you need a strength of 21 to override the armor penetration from Primal Rage. -User:PanSola (talk to the ) 04:05, 3 September 2006 (CDT)

[edit] Retesting...

Test 1: Naked monk, +5 while enchanted sword with +5 armor. Warrior with 14 axe mastery, JI, and Wild Blow.

Without JI: 139 damage. With JI: 139 damage.

Test 2: Monk with Acolyte's Armor and Mending. Warrior with 14 axe mastery, JI, and Wild Blow.

Expected value/all armor reduction: 51 Expected value/base armor reduction: 53

Without JI: 41 With JI: 53

Test 4: Monk with Shepherd's Armor, +5 AL while enchanted focus, Mending. Warrior with 16 axe mastery, JI, and Wild Blow.

Expected value/all armor reduction: 72 Expected value/base armor reduction: 71 Without JI: 59 With JI: 72

Test 4: Monk with Shepherd's Armor, 16 AL shield, 0 tactics. Warrior with 16 axe mastery, JI, and Wild Blow.

Expected value/all armor reduction: 69 Expected value/base armor reduction: 67 Without JI: 56 With JI: 71

Test 5: Monk with Shepherd's Armor, 16 AL shield, 9 tactics. Warrior with 16 axe mastery, JI, and Wild Blow.

Expected value/all armor reduction: 62 Expected value/base armor reduction: 59 Without JI: 48 With JI: 63

My best guess is that there's a bug where the AP isn't calculated at 0 AL. Further testing would be nice. -Savio 09:54, 15 September 2006 (CDT)

Your conclusion doesn't make sense to me. Are you saying versus 0 AL something with +AP should more damage? In your first case, I'm assuming the monk is naked besides the sword, which is providing no AL. --Fyren 16:46, 15 September 2006 (CDT)

[edit] Question

Let me get this right - All bonus AP stacks, so that means a Sundering string, Judge's Insight, and a Hornbow's inherent AP all stack together (for a potential of 50% AP) and I can stack this further with one of the listed Base AP items like max ranks in Strength for an additional 16% AP when using attack skills (like Barrage) making the AP total a potential 66% for each Barrage. Is this correct? If so, then if I used Penetrating Shot instead of Strength I could achieve a potential of 70% AP? This would then be the highest AP combo known right? I guess I'm wondering if:

• 1. Is this true as I described it?
• 2. Is there an AP cap? (I'm already aware AP doesn't add damage to a target with no armor)

Thanks. Vallen Frostweaver 12:41, 5 October 2006 (CDT)

In the setup you described for 70% AP with 16 marksmanship, a customized bow, but no +15% damage bonus, a critical hit should deal 111 damage versus 100 AL (= 1.2 * 28 * 2 ^ ((68 + 20 - 100 * .3) / 40) + 19). After several tries, I did produce 111 damage on the isle of the nameless. Unless there's something I'm missing at the moment, 70% AP appears to be attainable. --Fyren 16:14, 5 October 2006 (CDT)

Batfan just changed it to read that Penetrating Attack and a Hornbow's +10% AP don't stack. This changes the above to be a max potential of 60% now since the 10% AP from a horn bow would not stack. Can anyone verify if this is true or if prior was? Vallen Frostweaver 15:03, 23 October 2006 (CDT)

He's wrong. It still stacks. --Fyren 23:51, 23 October 2006 (CDT)

Ty very much. Vallen Frostweaver 06:25, 24 October 2006 (CDT)

In this calculation did you take into consideration that JI also converts damage to holy? If you were testing this out against a warrior opponent this would cause your attack to ignore their +20 armor buff versus physical damage That Guy 08:51, 23 April 2007 (CDT)

As I said, I was testing against a dummy, not a warrior. --Fyren 09:08, 23 April 2007 (CDT)

Well you never actually said what you were attacking, only where. I've never been there myself though That Guy 09:16, 23 April 2007 (CDT)

It's connected to the temple of Balthazar. It has dummies with 60, 80, and 100 AL (among other things). --Fyren 10:43, 23 April 2007 (CDT)

Just "double confirmed" this using only penetrating attack and hornbow variables at 16 marksmanship on isle dummies. Penetrating attack did +26 armor ignoring damage. Final damage results are for critical hits. Bows had no damage upgrades. Recurve bow with no attack skill vs 80 armor = 32 damage. Hornbow with penetrating attack vs 100 armor dummy = 58 damage. 58 - 26 from the skill = 32 damage. 100 armor - 20% = 80. Note: test will not work comparing 80 to 60 armor because 80 - 20% = 64. The hornbow page states 10% armor penetration. It should state +10% armor penetration to be consistent with claims all over the site and in game that xx% is base unstacking value, while +xx% is stacking. --Mooseyfate 19:29, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

That test confused me and I can't really tell what you're trying to say. So I did the easiest test possible: A/R, 16 Crit, 12 Marks, Crit Eye, Way of Master, and Penetrating with a Hornbow and a Longbow. Both tries hit, and the one with the hornbow did more damage. Case closed --Gimmethegepgun 23:01, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Stoneflesh aura

I think Ive figured out why Stoneflesh doesnt work well with Protective Spirit, its because stoneflesh is cosidered an, "armor" and any armor penatrating attacks will still make it through. It isnt randomly chosen to go before or after PS. ANet and their weirdo descriptions....--— Hyprodimus Prime 03:54, 21 December 2006 (CST)

That doesn't make sense. It's just stacking order, much like other enchantments (notably, it works the same as shielding hands and prot spirit together). --Fyren 09:43, 21 December 2006 (CST)

[edit] Confuzzled

Consider this situation:

A warrior with 15 strength that is wielding a Hornbow with a 20/20 sundering bow string (which is triggered), uses Sundering Attack against a warrior wearing AL80 armor.

How much armor penetration is achieved? Is it only the 10% inherent in the bow plus the 20%? Or would the 15% from Strength+10% Hornbow+20% from the string+ the 20% from the attack stack? If not, what stacks and to what degree?

This makes no sense to me. I've always thought they stacked... --Old Man Of Ascalon (T/C)

As the article says, all but strength. Sundering attack and strength are "base" AP and sundering is higher. Feel free to disprove it and improve the article, though. --Fyren 06:15, 21 January 2007 (CST)

So technically it would be the 20%from the attack+20% from the string+10% from the bow=achieving %50 AP?--Old Man Of Ascalon (T/C)

Yes, everything that's a bonus (says "+X%") and only the highest base value (says just "X%"). But I'm just reporting what the article says, I've never verified myself. --Fyren 02:42, 22 January 2007 (CST)

See Talk:Armor_penetration#Question above. --Heurist 01:47, 31 January 2007 (CST)

[edit] Negative armor

What happends if someone hits a naked warrior using healing signet (for an effective -40 armor). Would the armor be reduced to -30?

The armor gets penetrated before being reduced IIRC. So nothing (different) happens in that scenario. --Kale Ironfist 19:29, 15 May 2007 (CDT)

[edit] How much armor penetration? (stack)

If I use a ranger with a sundering hornbow, with penetrating attack, sundering weapon (cracked armor). 10% of hornbow, 20% for sundering, 10% for the other sundering, 20% for attack skill, 20% for cracked armor. So do I have 80% armor penetration now? And if I use Judges Insight aswell, do I have 100%? - Niphadora

Cracked Armor isn't the same thing as armor penetration. AP maxes out at 70-80% iirc. (T/C) 00:21, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

• Constant 10% from a Hornbow-type bow
• +20% from Judge's Insight
• Chance of +20% with a Sundering upgrade

Total so far: 30-50% AP (added)

• Penetrating Attack or Sundering Attack for +20%

Total so far: 50-70% AP (base+added)

I don't know if Sundering Weapon counts as added AP or base AP. If it's base then it has no effect. If it's added then you can max out at 80% AP. (T/C) 00:25, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

If you read the list, penetrating/sundering shot don't stack, so you can take that out of your equation. Justing6 02:33, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

16 strength (16%) + sundering bow string(20%) + primal rage(20%) + horn bow(10%) + judge's insight(20%) + sundering weapon(ritualist skill)(10%) = 96% armor penetration? pretty sure I added correctly, does this all stack? if so..it leaves squishies with like 2 armor [assuming sundering skills dont stack, as someone mentioned....but if they do continue to stack, HO HO HO...]

They stack multiplicatively. For example, Aegis and Guardian give a 75% chance to block, not 100% chance. --Shadowcrest 18:06, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

Highest possible combo for AP is:

• W/R with 16 strength (16%) and wielding a hornbow (10%)
• Judge's insight (20%)
• Sundering mod (20%, 1/5 of the time--we'll say it is that 1/5 of the time, thus granting 20%)
• Warrior's Might (10%).

Now, if these stack additively, it will be 76%. If they stack multiplicatively, it'll be 56.4544%. Either way, that is a lot of AP. 70.126.107.48 15:54, 31 May 2008 (UTC)