Combat

Combat in Neverwinter is based on a version of fourth edition Dungeons and Dragons rules modified to be more action-oriented and faster-paced than either the pencil-and-paper roleplaying game on which it is based or even most other MMORPGs. Battles in the game are similar in some ways to the combat in third-person shooters, especially with the unique key and mouse bindings for the action bar and active targeting based on moving a reticule in the middle of the screen over foes.

Another notable difference is that there is no automatic health regeneration outside of combat except at campfires, or when the character has some stats in Regeneration. This makes Health Potions much more important than they would otherwise be.


 * please note that the numbers below relate to content at the time that the max player level was 60. That cap has long since been raised to 70, and stat inflation has ensued. The general priciples are correct and the gist of the calculations remains. The caps and specific numbers however have changed at the higher levels.

Action Bar
The action bar is divided in sections for the following types of actions:
 * Two slots for At-will powers that can be used at any time, having little or no cooldown, bound to the left and right mouse buttons.
 * One slot for a defensive or evasive Utility power bound to the Shift key.
 * Three slots for Encounter powers that can be used at any time, but which have varying cooldowns (typically around 10 seconds). These are bound to the "Q", "E" and "R" keys.
 * Two slots for Daily powers that can only be used after charging the Action Points meter.
 * Each class charges the meter through performing class-specific actions. For example, a Guardian Fighter does so through defensive actions and holding aggro.
 * Three more slots for items.
 * Two slots for passive Class Features.

Damage Floaters
The combat events can be shown on the screen with floating combat text. The type and nature of the action is indicated with colors and icons.
 * Green = Healing.
 * Yellow = Damage dealt.
 * Orange = Critical damage dealt.
 * Red = Damage taken.
 * White = Damage taken (companion).


 * Sword = Combat Advantage. (Combat Advantage is only received when players are on either side of an enemy)
 * Lightning = Critical Hit.
 * Bent Arrow = Deflected attack.


 * Also note that landing a Critical Hit is dependent on the percentage shown in the character stats. The amount of damage done in a critical hit is dependent also on the amount of Critical Hit Severity listed in your characters stats.

Character Stats Coefficients
Information gathered from the official Neverwinter forums, many thanks to solsol1337, l0th4ri0 and freehugs9.


 * Power
 * Power Tooltip = Power*0.04
 * This formula is largely irrelevant, you can convert power directly to ability damage without multiplying it by 0.04 first.
 * The power coefficient varies per damaging ability (see Ability Damage) but they all scale in a linear way with one exception that has been found so far: the Control Wizard's Ice Storm has diminishing returns from power. Therefore the value of power depends on the abilties you're using and how often you use them.


 * Critical Strike
 * Critical Chance Tooltip = 28.8*CriticalStrike^1.2/(LevelConstant+CriticalStrike^1.2)
 * Critical Chance % = 0.05+StatBonus+FeatBonus+0.288*CriticalStrike^1.2/(LevelConstant+CriticalStrike^1.2)
 * ...where the level constant for level 60 is between 10185 and 10187.


 * Armor Penetration
 * Armor Penetration Tooltip = 35.72*ArmorPenetration^1.88/(LevelConstant+ArmorPenetration^1.88)
 * Targets Mitigation % = Mitigation-StatBonus-ArmorPenetrationTooltip*(1+FeatBonus)
 * ...where the level constant for level 60 is between 1225377 and 1225660.
 * The combination of your % of Armor Penetration and class-dependent ability score modifiers (like Strength for Hunter Rangers) subtracts directly from the target's mitigation to a minimum of 0 mitigation. Abilities' (eg feats, companions' active bonuses, or enchantments and NOT class-dependent ability score modifiers) effects stack, are applied after Armor Penetration, and can reduce the target's mitigation into negative numbers.  See PvE mitigation info below.


 * Recovery
 * Recovery Tooltip = 36*Recovery^1.5/(LevelConstant+Recovery^1.5)
 * Encounter Ability Cooldown Time = InitialCooldownTime/(1+StatBonus+FeatBonus+0.36*Recovery^1.5/(LevelConstant+Recovery^1.5))
 * Action Point Gain % = 1+StatBonus+FeatBonus+0.36*Recovery^1.5/(LevelConstant+Recovery^1.5)
 * ...where the level constant for level 60 is between 102309 and 102311.


 * Defense
 * Defense Tooltip = 49.99*Defense/(LevelConstant+Defense)
 * Damage Resistance % = (0.005*(ArmorClass-10)+0.4999*Defense/(LevelConstant+Defense)*(1+FeatBonus))+AbilityBonu s
 * ...where level constant for level 60 is 1643.6.
 * The combined Damage Resistance from AC, Defense and abilities cap at 80% mitigation, with the exception of those abilities that always mitigate 100% of the damage.


 * Deflect and Deflection Severity
 * Deflect Tooltip = 30.8*Deflect^1.4/(LevelConstant+Deflect^1.4)
 * Deflect Chance % = StatBonus+0.308*Deflect^1.4/(LevelConstant+Deflect^1.4)
 * Deflected Amount = 50% of damage remaining after Damage Resistance is applied. (Deflected amount varies by class)
 * ...where level constant for level 60 is between 41957 and 41977.
 * Deflection is not affected by the 80% Damage Resistance cap mentioned above and as such can increase total mitigation to 90% on deflected attacks.


 * Regeneration
 * Regeneration Tooltip = 20.77*Regeneration^1.3/(LevelConstant+Regeneration^1.3)
 * % of Lost Health Regenerated Every 3 Seconds = 0.2077*Regeneration^1.3/(LevelConstant+Regeneration^1.3)
 * ...where the level constant for level 60 is 12938.
 * Regeneration heals a % of the health you have lost, not your total health. It is also capped at 50% health lost, so you will never gain more than half the amount on the tooltip.


 * Life Steal
 * Life Steal Tooltip = 20.5*LifeSteal^1.3/(LevelConstant+LifeSteal^1.3)
 * % Of Damage Gained As Hit Points = 0.205*LifeSteal^1.3/(LevelConstant+LifeSteal^1.3)
 * ...where the level constant for level 60 is between 12710 and 12713.


 * Movement
 * Movement Tooltip = 31*Movement^1.4/(LevelConstant+Movement^1.4)
 * Run Speed % = 1 + 0.31*Movement^1.4/(LevelConstant+Movement^1.4)
 * ...where the level constant for level 60 is between 42286 and 42340.


 * Ability Damage
 * Abilities Damage Tooltip Minimum = (BaseDamage+Power*PowerCoefficient+MinWeaponDamage *WeaponCoefficient)*(1+StatBonus)*(1+FeatBonus)*(1 +BonusFrom#OfPoints)
 * Abilities Damage Tooltip Maximum = (BaseDamage+Power*PowerCoefficient+MaxWeaponDamage *WeaponCoefficient)*(1+StatBonus)*(1+FeatBonus)*(1 +BonusFrom#OfPoints)
 * Abilities Minimum Damage = (BaseDamage+Power*PowerCoefficient+MinWeaponDamage *WeaponCoefficient)*(1+StatBonus)*(1+FeatBonus)*(1 +BonusFrom#OfPoints)*(1-TargetsMitigation)
 * Abilities Maximum Damage = (BaseDamage+Power*PowerCoefficient+MaxWeaponDamage *WeaponCoefficient)*(1+StatBonus)*(1+FeatBonus)*(1 +BonusFrom#OfPoints)*(1-TargetsMitigation)
 * The BaseDamage, PowerCofficient and WeaponCoefficient varies per damaging ability, and there are some rare exceptions where the scaling in non-linear (just Ice Storm so far).


 * Critical Severity and Combat Advantage
 * Critical Severity = 0.75 + RaceBonus + FeatBonus + AbilityBonus
 * Critical Strike Damage = AbilitiesDamage*CriticalSeverity
 * Combat Advantage Damage = AbilitiesDamage*(1+0.15*(1+StatBonus))
 * Critical and Combat Advantage Damage = AbilitiesDamage*((1+0.15*(1+StatBonus))+CriticalSe verity)

The information above is a work in progress.

Link to above information.

Mitigation and Armor Penetration in Tier 1 and Tier 2
Enemies are Level 62 in Tier 1 and level 65 in Tier 2. This does not affect their mitigation. (Have not yet tested Castle Never)


 * Bosses 24% mitigation
 * Brutes 20% or 22% mitigation
 * Strikers and Leaders 16.2% or 18% mitigation
 * Minions 14.4% mitigation
 * Controllers and Ranged Strikers 12.8% or 14% mitigation

So in PvE Armor Penetration starts to soft cap at 12.8% and hard caps at 24%. Other effects that reduce the targets mitigation don't seem to have a cap, I've so far seen enemies go as low as -132% defenses (2.32 times base damage).

Some ability scores are additive to you Armor Penetration %, for Great Weapon Fighters it's Con and for Guardian Fighters it's Dex, for Hunter Rangers it's Str. They reduce an enemies mitigation by an additional 1% per point of Con (GWF), Dex (GF), or Str (HR) over 10.

Example:

Tier 2 boss, 24% mitigation. You have 15 Constitution on your Great Weapon Fighter so that reduces his mitigation to 19%. =24-(15-10)

You also have 1853 Armor Penetration? Great, that's another 19% reducing the bosses mitigation to 0. =24-(15-10)-35.72*Armor Penetration^1.88/(1225520+Armor Penetration^1.88)

Your enemies in PvE have mitigation ranging from 12.8% (e.g. archer trash mobs) to 24% (e.g. all bosses), so how much Armor Penetration do you need?

For every class except GWF and GF, between 1271 and 2536 for 12.8% to 24%
 * Con (GWF) Dex (GF) or Str (HR) of 15, between 879 and 1854 for 12.8% to 24%
 * Con (GWF) Dex (GF) or Str (HR) of 16, between 802 and 1747 for 12.8% to 24%
 * Con (GWF) Dex (GF) or Str (HR) of 17, between 724 and 1646 for 12.8% to 24%
 * Con (GWF) Dex (GF) or Str (HR) of 18, between 643 and 1550 for 12.8% to 24%
 * Con (GWF) Dex (GF) or Str (HR) of 19, between 559 and 1459 for 12.8% to 24%
 * Con (GWF) Dex (GF) or Str (HR) of 20, between 467 and 1371 for 12.8% to 24%
 * Con (GWF) Dex (GF) or Str (HR) of 21, between 364 and 1287 for 12.8% to 24%
 * Con (GWF) Dex (GF) or Str (HR) of 22, between 233 and 1206 for 12.8% to 24%
 * Con (GWF) Dex (GF) or Str (HR) of 23, between 0 and 1126 for 12.8% to 24%
 * Con (GWF) Dex (GF) or Str (HR) of 24, between 0 and 1048 for 12.8% to 24%
 * Con (GWF) Dex (GF) or Str (HR) of 25, between 0 and 971 for 12.8% to 24%

Additionally the Great Weapon Fighter Heroic Feat called Constitution Focus gives a 15% bonus to their Armor Penetration bonus from Constitution. e.g. 15 Con gives 5.75% Armor Penetration instead of 5%.

Link to the above information.

Block Mechanics for Guardian Fighter

 * Holding the Shift key raises your shield to protect your Guardian Fighter in a 180 degree arc centered slightly forward from the center of the character.
 * You need to face the point of origin of an attack to block it, which will be the center point of some AoE attacks.
 * While blocking you can only attack with left click (Aggravating Strike) and right click (Shield Slam).
 * The Guard Meter work as a HP Bolster. It's a fifth of the unmodified Health of 21600 HP mean 4320 HP as Guard Meter HP.
 * Some abilities increase the HP of the Guard Meter like Strength Stat of GF.
 * Increasing your health does not increase the amount you can block.
 * If the Guard Meter is reduced to empty you take any excess unblocked damage and can no longer block.
 * The Guard Meter starts to recharge after 3.5 seconds of not blocking an attack, unless the Guard Meter is broken in which case it takes 6.5 seconds.
 * Once it starts recharging the Guard Meter recharges from empty to full in 16 seconds.
 * Your Damage Resistance is applied before the blocked amount is subtracted from the Guard Meter.
 * Blocked attacks can Crit but are never Deflected.
 * Attacks with a red indicator are blocked with an additive 50% bonus to Damage Resistance, up to the 80% Damage Resistance cap.
 * The consume of the Guard Meter is calculated with the HP drain of the Guard Meter after mitigated attack.
 * Very large attacks can remove at most 18% of your Guard Meter, giving you the capacity to block about five and a half very large attacks regardless of how big they are.(*)
 * Blocking an attack prevents that attack's effects (e.g. stun) from affecting you. There are some exceptions though like the Wight Commanders life steal.
 * The Iron Warrior ability recharges the Guard Meter in 3.5 seconds from 1% to 100%, or if the Guard Meter is broken, from 0% to 50%.
 * The Enforced Threat ability regenerates 20% of your Guard Meter over 8 seconds.
 * An attack of the Tide of Iron ability regenerates 10% of your Guard Meter within 2s.
 * An attack of the Shield Slam ability regenerates 5% of your Guard Meter within 2s.


 * Block is not reported accurately in the Combat Log which makes it difficult to test so some of the numbers above are approximate rather than exact, although they are still accurate enough to be useful.
 * Lord Gallen the combat designer has reported that both Shield Talent and Shieldmaster are working correctly, with the following quirks:
 * Since the amount of the Guard Meter removed from blocking very large attacks is a capped percentage (~18%), increasing the size of the Guard Meter does not improve the number of very large attacks you can block. They will still cap at 18% of the new total.
 * While Shieldmaster does work, it in not actually bound to Shield Talent. You do not need Shield Talent to gain this bonus.
 * (*)Some single hit attacks consume still more than the 18%. It need to be confirmed if it's a bug or intended.

Stealth Mechanics for Trickster Rogue

 * The Stealth Bar to the left of your character indicates how long you can Stealth and when Stealth can be used.
 * Pressing Tab activates Stealth if the Stealth Bar is full.
 * Activating Stealth will make you invisible to most enemies in PvE, and invisible at range in PvP. You will show up as a silhouette to any player facing you at close range.
 * Once Stealth is activated, it will drain your Stealth Bar over 5 seconds (6 seconds with the Improved Cunning Sneak feat).
 * While stealth is active, taking damage and activating most Encounter or Daily powers will drain a portion of your Stealth Bar (see exceptions below).
 * At-Will powers drain a small portion of Stealth.
 * Once drained, your Stealth Bar takes 5 to 6 seconds to recharge.
 * While Stealth is recharging, taking damage will drain a portion of your Stealth Bar.
 * The Stealth Bar cannot be diminished by damage once it is full.
 * The Twilight Adept feat restores 10% of your Stealth Bar when you dodge roll.
 * The Class Feature Tenacious Concealment reduces the loss of Stealth from incoming damage by up to 90%.
 * The Class Feature Invisible Infiltrator refills your Stealth Bar when you activate a Daily power.
 * The At-Will power Gloaming Cut restores 25% of your Stealth Bar when you kill an enemy with it, and restores 10% per hit with the Sneaky Stabber feat.
 * The Encounter power Bait and Switch can be used during Stealth to refill your Stealth Bar.
 * The Encounter power Shadow Strike refills your Stealth Bar.
 * The Daily power Lurker's Assault causes your Stealth Bar to rapidly recharge for 10 seconds, often allowing you to take damage and/or use Encounter powers without draining your Stealth Bar.

Combat Log
All Cryptic games include an option to log your combat statistics. Many online games have combat logs, although it is practically impossible to read these logs without a parser. The same is true with Cryptic combat logs. To view a raw combat log; The combat log is coded to save space as this text file can consume a few megabytes in just a few battles. To make sense of the data given it is necessary to download and run a parser. The parser will only interact with this text file and nothing else within the game.
 * 1) In chat type /combatlog 1 then press the Return/Enter key. This will seem to have no effect but it is now logging combat to a text file.
 * 2) Go start a fight with something.
 * 3) After the battle is over look for a new text file found in ...Neverwinter\Live\logs\GameClient\Combatlog_ .Log

Parsers
Parsers take input data and builds structure, giving a clear representation of the input, checking for correct syntax in the process. Advanced Combat Tracker (ACT) is a generic game parser that requires a translation script for each game. You will need someone to either; A) help you make such a script, or B) hope that someone has already made the script. The most current version of this script can be found here in the Neverwinter forums.

Sourceforge has CombatLogParser specifically geared to operate for Cryptic's games. Since this program is written in Java, it is a cross platform tool. Here in this screen shot it is working in real time as the user plays the game in Linux OS. The issue is the source code hasn't been update in years (2011) and new skills change often.

Both parsers mentioned above can analyze your combat log in real time (while you play) or after you are finished and have even logged out of the game. The data they provide allows one to track damage per second (DPS) among other aspects of all entities within gaming area. This gives the player a clear picture into what aspects of their character needs to be developed.