Damage & Stat Formula Guide
On this page
- How Damage Is Calculated
- How Stats Stack
- Critical Hits & Effective DPS
- Fire, Cold, Lightning, Physical & Chaos
- How Armor Works
How Damage Is Calculated
When damage is dealt in TBH, it passes through this exact mitigation pipeline, in order. Each step can reduce or negate the damage before it reaches the next:
- Dodge / Elemental Dodge — chance to take zero damage (full avoid)
- Block / Elemental Block — on success, halve the incoming damage
- Resistance (Elemental only) — reduce by resist%; only for Fire/Cold/Lightning/Chaos
- Armor (Physical only) — diminishing-returns reduction, partially pierced by big hits
- Damage Reduction — generic multiplier: damage × (1 − reduction)
- Damage Absorption — flat subtraction from remaining damage
- Floor — every hit deals at least 1 damage, no matter how much mitigation
How Stats Stack
Every stat in TBH is built from three layers of modifiers. Understanding this stacking is the single most important concept for gearing:
final = (base + Σ Flat) × (1 + Σ Additive) × Π (1 + each Multiplicative)
| Layer | Behavior | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Flat | Added directly to base value | +120 HP from Health Enhancement passive |
| Additive | Summed together, then applied once as (1 + sum) | Multiple "+% damage" stats add together first |
| Multiplicative | Each applies separately, compounding | Crit multiplier, skill multipliers — these multiply each other |
Modifiers come from 8 ordered sources: Base → Item → Attribute → Passive → Account Status (runes) → Status Effect → Buff Skill → Environment. Sources applied later multiply with everything before them.
Critical Hits & Effective DPS
How Crit Works
Each hit rolls a random value r ∈ [0,1). If r < CritChance, damage is multiplied by CritDamage. Crit Damage is a direct multiplier — it's not "add 150% base," it just multiplies by whatever your Crit Damage stat is.
Base crit stats vary by class (level 1, no gear):
| Class | Crit Chance | Crit Damage |
|---|---|---|
| Sorcerer | 5.0% | 165% |
| Hunter | 4.5% | 155% |
| Ranger | 4.0% | 150% |
| Knight | 2.5% | 140% |
| Slayer | 2.5% | 180% |
| Priest | 2.0% | 140% |
Effective DPS Formula
DPS = AttackSpeed × AttackDamage × (1 + CritChance × (CritDamage − 1))
This formula gives your expected damage per second including crits. Note that Crit Damage is used directly (not as "+X% above 100%"). If your Slayer has 180% CritDamage, the multiplier on crit is 1.80, not 2.80.
Fire, Cold, Lightning, Physical & Chaos
TBH has five damage types: Physical, Fire, Cold, Lightning, and Chaos. Physical is mitigated by Armor. Fire, Cold, Lightning, and Chaos are mitigated by their respective Resistances. There is no "Holy" damage type.
Resistance: Linear, Not Diminishing
Unlike armor, resistance is linear — 1 point = 1% less damage of that element. The divisor is 100.
effRes = ElementResist + AllElementalResist
Damage Taken = Damage × (1 − effRes / 100)
There is no built-in resistance cap. The only limit is the Max Fire/Cold/Lightning/Chaos Resistance stat on gear. Negative resistance is dangerous: below 0, damage is multiplied by (1 + abs(resistance)/100). An enemy with −50% fire res takes 1.5× fire damage.
How Armor Works
Armor only reduces physical damage. Its formula has been recovered from the game binary:
Reduction = Armor² / (Armor² + (14 × StageLevel + 12) × (Armor + 0.4 × Damage))
Damage Taken = Damage × (1 − Reduction)
Key thresholds:
- 50% reduction when your Armor equals 14 × StageLevel + 12 (e.g., Stage 50 → need 712 Armor for 50%)
- 75% hard cap — reached at roughly 3× the 50% threshold. Armor beyond this is wasted.
- Big hits pierce armor: 0.4 × incoming Damage is added to the threshold. A 10,000-damage hit effectively ignores 4,000 points of armor value.
Mental Model
For quick estimation: Reduction ≈ Armor / (Armor + 14 × StageLevel + 12) — capped at 75%.
The threshold grows by +14 per stage level, so armor must keep scaling as you progress. This is why tank builds need to continuously invest in armor, not hit a "good enough" number.