3 questions: hero skills, proficiency, damage vs armor

[Virmin]

So question 1
Is there a way to change the skills that the heroes have when you first come across them? If so, how? And if so is it possible to make it so that every game I start they will have these same modified skills that I gave them?

question 2
Does anyone know exactly what the proficiencies do and to what extent? For instance I know proficiencies can increase your swing speed with weapons but by how much per point? I also read that it increases the damage you deal, and if that is true by how much per point?

question 3
I've been trying to find out the full calculations for damage dealt to opponents versus the armor they are wearing. So far I have found these 2 sources through searching:
http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/topic,26790.0.html
http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/topic,60145.0.html
However I have reason to believe that there is more to the calculation then what amargan's post says, in the top link, since damage does seem to have some sort of random element to it beyond that of the speed multiplier. In the bottom link someone quotes a post where someone mentions that there is a random roll made both on the damage dealt and a roll made on the armor amount of between 50%-100% of the actual values. So for instance if a weapon says it does 30 damage then if you hit someone with 0 armor it it will do a random roll between 15-30 to decide how much damage is actually applies and the same thing is done for the armor that is being hit. The problem though is that when I have written out some examples I get some extremely varied results due to the random roll being applied to the weapon and to the armor which I don't think is correct. Here is an example I made:

Assumed Power Strike skill of 4, so damage is increased by 32%.
Cut damage example against armor of 20:

      Sword with 30 cut damage, 30 * 1.32 = 39.6 effective damage plus Random roll between 50%-100%
      Applied damage = 19.3-39.6, (39.6 * 0.5-1.0)
     
      20 body armor plus Random roll between 50%-100%
      Applied armor = 10-20, (20 * 0.5-1.0)

Armor Soak Factor(0.65): applied damage - (applied armor * 0.65) = soaked damage
                          19.3-39.6 - 6.5-13 = 6.3-33.1
Armor Reduction Factor(1.0): soaked damage * (1 - (applied armor / 100 * 1.0)) = final damage
                              6.3-33.1 * 0.9-0.8 = 5.04-29.79

So with no speed factors or proficiencies taken into account your damage with 4 skill points in Power Strike and a weapon with a cut damage of 30 against someone with a body armor of 20 would be anywheres between 5.04 and 29.79.

So can anyone verify whether these calculations are indeed correct?

 

[Æon]

So question 1
Is there a way to change the skills that the heroes have when you first come across them? If so, how? And if so is it possible to make it so that every game I start they will have these same modified skills that I gave them?

No.

question 2
Does anyone know exactly what the proficiencies do and to what extent? For instance I know proficiencies can increase your swing speed with weapons but by how much per point? I also read that it increases the damage you deal, and if that is true by how much per point?

question 3
I've been trying to find out the full calculations for damage dealt to opponents versus the armor they are wearing. So far I have found these 2 sources through searching:
http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/topic,26790.0.html
http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/topic,60145.0.html
However I have reason to believe that there is more to the calculation then what amargan's post says, in the top link, since damage does seem to have some sort of random element to it beyond that of the speed multiplier. In the bottom link someone quotes a post where someone mentions that there is a random roll made both on the damage dealt and a roll made on the armor amount of between 50%-100% of the actual values. So for instance if a weapon says it does 30 damage then if you hit someone with 0 armor it it will do a random roll between 15-30 to decide how much damage is actually applies and the same thing is done for the armor that is being hit. The problem though is that when I have written out some examples I get some extremely varied results due to the random roll being applied to the weapon and to the armor which I don't think is correct. Here is an example I made:

Assumed Power Strike skill of 4, so damage is increased by 32%.
Cut damage example against armor of 20:

      Sword with 30 cut damage, 30 * 1.32 = 39.6 effective damage plus Random roll between 50%-100%
      Applied damage = 19.3-39.6, (39.6 * 0.5-1.0)
     
      20 body armor plus Random roll between 50%-100%
      Applied armor = 10-20, (20 * 0.5-1.0)

Armor Soak Factor(0.65): applied damage - (applied armor * 0.65) = soaked damage
                          19.3-39.6 - 6.5-13 = 6.3-33.1
Armor Reduction Factor(1.0): soaked damage * (1 - (applied armor / 100 * 1.0)) = final damage
                              6.3-33.1 * 0.9-0.8 = 5.04-29.79

So with no speed factors or proficiencies taken into account your damage with 4 skill points in Power Strike and a weapon with a cut damage of 30 against someone with a body armor of 20 would be anywheres between 5.04 and 29.79.

So can anyone verify whether these calculations are indeed correct?

I have no idea about these other questions though, however I bet there is a thread that might help you with that. I'll try and dig it up for you.

EDIT: I was wrong. This thread only tells what they are about but I thought they had the math on it. Sorry.

 

[Moss]

So question 1
Is there a way to change the skills that the heroes have when you first come across them? If so, how? And if so is it possible to make it so that every game I start they will have these same modified skills that I gave them?

Yes. Download the troop editor (you'll find it in the forge) and tweak their stats. You'll have to start a new game before you see the changes though.

question 2
Does anyone know exactly what the proficiencies do and to what extent? For instance I know proficiencies can increase your swing speed with weapons but by how much per point? I also read that it increases the damage you deal, and if that is true by how much per point?

It does increase the damage dealt, but only by a small margin. Increasing your strength also increases damage.

As to the rest of your post I'm afraid I can't say. The number's you've got are clearly incorrect, try whacking one of the stationary straw men in the tutorials, you'll get almost identical damage rolls each time. Although I think there is a small random number component I don't believe it's a major influence.

Things I know effect damage:
Strength
Weapon skill
Speed of blow (on foot, or on horse with a minus value for opposite speed of opponent i.e. if they're walking backwards blow will be lighter than if they're walking towards you)
At what point of the weapon the blow lands (towards the tip will cause more damage, too close to the pommel and it's not much more effective than punching)
Damage type
Armor value
And of course the three different armor zones.

 

[Lord Shields]

You might ask the original thread creators for those ones you linked. They probably have more knowledge as to exact calculations. But if Armagan is telling you it's something... and everything is working as intended... then what he says goes. He's after all, one of the Dev's. Keep in mind that thread was started over a year ago so things may have changed since.

With that said... my damage while standing still and swinging is always fairly equal. The only effect difference I've noticed is where you strike. The head/throat obviously seems to deal more damage. I don't know if you're taking that into account.

 

[Virmin]

Thanks for your replies. I'm inclined to agree with you guys about the calculations. The seemingly random variable is probably which part of the weapon actually makes contact and at what point during the swing/thrust. So the person who was quoted as saying that there is a random roll between 50%-100% either didn't know what they were talking about or they were missunderstood as to what they meant.

Now hopefully someone around here knows what the proficiency details are as to the exact amount of change each point contributes.

On a side note I was experimenting with a character I edited to have 300 strength and agility and came to find out some rather interesting things about what they do that the in-game descriptions make no mention of. The biggest damage increase caused by the increase in strength was by far to fist damage. I was punching people for over 80 damage lol. Oddly enough moving towards your target while punching was consistently resulting in negative speed modifiers for some reason. So running in to punch was resulting in very low damage while standing still would result in allot more damage. Having 300 agility makes running far superior to riding a horse which is actually allot of fun. Going that fast I could solo entire armies while on foot, which I thought would be lame but it was actually allot of fun.

 

[Mabons]

I think it's about 3% speed bonus for proficiences.