VR attribute comparisons

[Sixfortyfive]

It came to my attention recently that different stages have different levels of gravity, so I decided to do a little bit of testing.

The Abandoned Quarry stage seems to have the lowest gravity, so first I calculated how much height each VR gets from one jump on that stage, then compared it against Cypher. Alternate forms (Hyper Fei-Yen, Winged Angelan, Giant Dordray, Mobility-5 Ajim, etc.) don't get any kind of boost in their jump.

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Cypher      84.6  100.00%
Bal-Baros*  --.-   98.11%
Angelan     77.6   91.76%
Temjin      74.6   88.23%
Apharmd C   74.6   88.23%
Specineff   73.8   87.33%
Apharmd B   73.5   86.88%
Apharmd S   73.5   86.88%
Fei-Yen Kn  66.7   78.90%
Grys-Vok    66.7   78.90%
Stein-Vok   66.7   78.90%
10/80 Sp    66.7   78.90%
Raiden      62.3   73.65%
Bal-Bados   59.4   70.26%
Dordray     58.0   68.64%
Ajim        55.0   65.03%

*Bal-Baros obviously isn't playable on this stage, but I put him at this position because that's where he falls on the Undersea Plant stage, the only one where he's playable.

Then I checked Cypher's jump height on each stage to see how gravity varies between stages:

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Abandoned Quarry      84.6  100.00%
Floating Carrier      79.8   94.35%
Blank Frank           79.8   94.35%
Unholy Cathedral      79.8   94.35%
Public Port           79.8   94.35%
Storage Depot         79.8   94.35%
Sanctuary             79.8   94.35%
Airport               79.8   94.35%
Autobahn              79.8   94.35%
Water Front           79.8   94.35%
Vertebrate Shaft #05  79.8   94.35%
Space Dock            71.9   85.05%
Ascent Corridor       63.8   75.44%
Undersea Plant        59.9   70.79%

I might add some other quantitative VR analysis to this thread as other ideas come to mind.

EDIT: Trying to make sense of this chart. Seems that the first column is the amount of damage taken while crouch-attacking, the second column is damage taken during close combat attacks, and the third is damage taken during crouching close combat. So (in v5.45 anyway), Fei-Yen only takes 50% of the normal damage from enemy attacks if she's in the middle of a close combat attack command?

EDIT 2: Hm, I took a Raiden laser to the face while stationary and got the full 420 damage, then took another while in mid-CC motion and lost 336 (80%). Seems these values might have changed for 5.66. EDIT 2.1: Hm, seems Raiden's lasers are a bit inconsistent. Sometimes I only take 40% damage from them... Testing against Temjin's attacks now and most of them seem to be cut down to about 50%... Only took 100 damage from Temjin's RTRW instead of 250 (40%). Huh.

EDIT 3: Went ahead and checked damage resistance for every VR myself. Seems like just about everybody got a slight defense buff in close combat for 5.66.

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        crouch - CC - crouch CC
Fei-Yen Kn  80%  40%  32%
10/80 Sp    80%  40%  32%
Cypher      80%  60%  48%
Temjin      80%  70%  56%
Apharmd B   80%  70%  56%
Raiden      80%  80%  64%
Grys-Vok    80%  80%  64%
Stein-Vok   80%  80%  64%
Apharmd S   80%  80%  64%
Apharmd C   80%  80%  64%
Bal-Series  80%  80%  64%
Dordray     80%  80%  64%
Angelan     80%  80%  64%
Specineff   80%  80%  64%
Ajim        80%  80%  64%

Need to check if this defense boost applies to melee attacks as well.

EDIT 4: V Armor values for 5.66!

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Dordray     1300
Angelan     1250
Raiden      1100
Bal-Baros    900
Apharmd B    850
Apharmd S    850
Apharmd C    850
Grys-Vok     800
Stein-Vok    800
Temjin       775
Ajim         750
Bal-Bados    700
Specineff    550
10/80 Sp     550
Fei-Yen Kn   500
Cypher       350

These are the armor values when the VR is stationary. In general (according to v5.45 tables I looked at), crouching gives a slight boost in V Armor, while jumping gives a significant decrease. Some notable exceptions (5.45):

- Giant Dordray has 1100 in all situations (stand/crouch/jump).
- Angelan's armor is slightly reduced while crouching and drastically reduced while jumping (1250->400).
- Bal-Baros's armor is 900 in all situations.
- Ajim has no V Armor while crouching. His armor value in the above list is for mobility 3, the default level.

[MentholMoose]

Nice analysis. I haven't really considered the varying gravity that much.

[Porcupine]

Jump height has a pretty minor effect on gameplay, and varying gravity would have even less of an effect since both VRs fight on the same stage and the same advantage/disadvantage is applied to both.

That being said I'd recently been doing a test where the effect of gravity actually had a direct effect on the results. The idea was that I was trying to look for a way to prediction laser a Cypher or Angelan player who is floating around for timeout. But prediction lasers don't usually work against aerial floaters and I wanted to find out why. So we took Temjin as a test dummy and just kept jumping up and floating straight down, making no attempt to move sideways to dodge anything. On the way down, his opponent with various VRs would fire various attacks at him, including prediction lasers. We found that in general, no prediction lasers could hit the Temjin, his straight and slow floating down is enough to make the beam pass over his head, even at close distance. Further, even generic attacks of low homing would miss over Temjin's head. Only decent or good homing attacks could even keep up with the default descent speed.

But, in the two or three stages with high gravity, the jump heights are lower, and this slows down the descent speed, enabling more attacks to hit the Temjin. (You might think the descent would be sped up because that's how high gravity would work in reality. But in VOOT all it does is lower the jump height, and the duration of your jump is the same, so actually you get slower. Therefore jumping in water is a slightly better way to describe this physical phenomena. That makes sense in the underwater stage, but not the other two stages).

I think most anti-air prediction lasers are still a guaranteed miss on these stages, but low homing attacks did become enabled to hit Temjin in the head. A few of these attacks are pseudo-prediction lasers (imperfect, may be just a single shot or have some undesirable horizontal homing, yet may still have some of the lock-on disregarding properties of prediction lasers) so they potentially could be used to shoot down a running-away Cypher or Angelan, on these high gravity stages only. I'll try to experiment with that in the coming months if I get the chance.

[Viper2]

EDIT 2: Hm, I took a Raiden laser to the face while stationary and got the full 420 damage, then took another while in mid-CC motion and lost 336 (80%). Seems these values might have changed for 5.66. EDIT 2.1: Hm, seems Raiden's lasers are a bit inconsistent. Sometimes I only take 40% damage from them... Testing against Temjin's attacks now and most of them seem to be cut down to about 50%... Only took 100 damage from Temjin's RTRW instead of 250 (40%). Huh.

At least in VOOM, Raiden's lasers only do the full damage if the full beam hits you. If any sliver of the beam misses you, the damage will be lower. Also, the angle of your VR relative to the beam is of importance, and if you are making certain motions while getting hit, the damage will also be lower. On the other hand, timing a CC attack against Raiden wrong will cause max damage if he fires his lasers right when you are least protected. So the amount of damage depends on whether or not you are 'protecting' yourself with your arms. Standing still will have the arms alongside the body (=> max damage), moving will have the arms protecting the body (=> less damage).

[Porcupine]

This thread is old and the question has been answered elsewhere, but we already know that in VOOT it's not due to any of that. Several factors are in play here, mainly two lasers whose damage adds together, plus a damage cap phenomena (the damage cap of Fei-Yen is only slightly more than damage from one standing laser beam). If Fei-Yen gets hit while doing CC she will take 40% damage but this will not be realized against twin lasers because the double lasers will mostly go back up to the damage cap. The "inconsistency" noted in the topic post was due to a third possible factor, that one laser beam may hit a frame before the other one, in which case Fei-Yen would fall down taking half damage.

I haven't played VOOM in ages but that will be something for me to test out when I get around to buying it.

[Porcupine]

Now that I have bought VOOM and several of us have gotten together to test Raiden's lasers, your description seems to be completely incorrect. They just do a set amount of damage, for example against Temjin they take off exactly half of his health. It could not be any simpler, and it doesn't even matter if you are hit by one beam or multiple beams.

If you move so that only a part of the beam hits you, the damage is still the same.

Furthermore, damages in general in VOOM are quite consistent and do not seem to be affected by what part of the body they hit, or what direction they hit from. The idea of being protected by your arms seems especially ludicrous. It is possible for certain attacks to randomly miss entirely due to small issues with body shape, but I've never seen anything cause a change in damage, other than perhaps state-based damage modifiers (crouching, etc, no idea what they might be in VOOM).

[Viper2]

Then I don't understand how it's possible for Viper II to get hit by Raiden's lasers full-on and die, while he survives when only one beam hits him...I will test that some more (in the PC version).

[Porcupine]

It could be partially like VOOT, if you get hit while in certain states (crouching, or doing CC) you could take slightly less damage but also have greater resistance to being knocked down. Dashing or walking is always a neutral state I think for the purposes of damage modifiers (though dashing can change certain other aspects in VOOT that I didn't get into, which can affect laser damage of VR's with low-damage lasers).

If you don't get knocked down, then lasers will double-hit in all the VO games, if you stay in them long enough. Maybe that's what you are experiencing.

[guarayakha]

Were you doing a crouch attack? Raiden's lasers in VOOM can one shot light VRs if you're crouching while eating that in the face. Which in essense is like what Porcupine said, a double hit.

[Porcupine]

With Varryochoco's help in testing, I discovered that CC damage reduction only applies to part of the CC animation, specifically the chasing phase where the VR is closing towards the enemy. This is roughly equivalent to the startup animation, everything prior to hit frames. However, because of the way chase mechanics work in VOOT, the precise duration of the chase varies depending on positioning. It can be as little as zero, if the opponent starts out already touching. Or it can be extended beyond the usual startup if the enemy is retreating, and the particular CC attack allows its chase phase to be lengthened (many do).

CC damage reduction does not seem to apply at all to quick-steps, quick-step CC, or dashing CC. It applies to the chasing phase of crouching CC and turbo CC. For guard reversal CC, it applies for the entire startup animation and possibly longer, we didn't test carefully. (In general, guard reversal CC is visually similar to the corresponding regular CC but the chasing mechanics are different. The animation speed and damages may also be different, it varies by VR).

Meanwhile for crouching attacks, namely crouching CC, crouching shots, sliding shots, and dash crouching shots, the damage reduction seems to apply for the entire duration of the crouch, even the recovery period when the VR is starting to rise, and can be hit by attacks such as Temjin's surfboard, that are normally dodged by crouching. (Players should be aware that even though Temjin's homing surfboard is normally dodged with an empty dash, it's actually the fact that the dash animation lowers the VR's head that causes the surfboard to miss). So dash crouching shots get the damage reduction up until the freeze begins, sliding shots get the damage reduction up until you are able to freely do something else, and crouching CC gets the crouching component of damage reduction even after the chase period ends.

The main reason all this is important isn't so much the damage reduction itself, but the fact that any damage reduction in turn makes your VR harder to stagger or knockdown. So using properly timed CC protects your own VR from typical CC combos attempted by your opponent (staggering LT shot, followed by CC). One of the scenarios where you are in danger of being hit by a CC combo is when you are landing from a jump in close range. But if you cancel your landing freeze into CC of your own, you won't stagger from a LT shot and can't be comboed. Another scenario where you are in danger of being hit by a CC combo is when you are attempting your own offensive CC attack, but get interrupted by a LT shot at the last instant. Yet with different timing your CC can plow through those same shots.

A particular tactic I had been using lately was Fei-Yen LTLW into CC CW combo against a landing Cypher. (This particular combo only works on Cypher and Angelan, because Fei-Yen's LTLW is only strong enough to stun those two VR at close range). But Cypher can tank and prevent the stun with a properly timed CC, or possibly any crouching shot. Zaarock didn't believe it was possible, because his offensive CC is often interrupted by Fei-Yen's LTLW at the last instant. However, that only happens when LTLW hits after the chase phase of Cypher's CC ends.

A counter-tactic to tanking can be to use a different LT shot that has greater knockdown power. For example Fei-Yen LTCW normally knocks down Cypher, but will instead stagger a tanking Cypher, and thus can combo into CC CW. However, Fei-Yen LTCW is slow to come out and has bad tracking, so it's not a good alternative. I believe the bottom line is that landing VRs can avoid any instances of CC combo punishment without guesswork by canceling a landing freeze into CC or crouching CC, then immediately canceling that into a dash or jump. The key is to be disciplined. Recognize when you do CC for purely defensive tanking purposes, and don't let your CC progress to hit frames in hopes of a lucky chop.