Defensive strength
Defensive Strength (DS) is the numerical value subtracted from an attack roll due to a character's defenses. This includes bonuses from the defender's skills in evading, blocking, and parrying attacks, their combat stance, their active spells, any enchantments that may be on their equipment, as well as environmental factors such as exceptionally bright or dark rooms.
Formulas
Defensive Strength Formula:
Total Defensive Strength = General Defense + Evade Defense + Block Defense + Parry Defense
To calculate a character's Defensive Strength, one adds the values from the categories listed above.
- Evade defense is a function of the Dodge skill, and therefore the formula can be found there.
- Parry defense can be found in either the Parry article or no various other pages, such as Two Weapon Combat where it lists the parry defense formulas for both primary hand and off-hand weapons.
- Shield defense calculations can be found on the Shield Use page.
General Defense
General defense consists of the defender's active spells and the environmental conditions of the room.
Active Spells
Defensive spells vary in how they contribute to DS.
Some spells, such as Elemental Defense I, add a flat DS bonus against all attacks. Other spells, such as Spirit Warding I, add a bonus against specific types of attacks (in this case, against magical bolts). And still others contribute instead to evade, block, or parry defenses: for example, Mass Blur adds to evade defense, which can result in a different final bonus based on whether the defender is wearing heavy armor or holding a shield (less evade defense for larger shields).
Environmental Conditions
| Condition | Effect | LM SENSE messaging |
|---|---|---|
| Average | +0 DS | pretty average lighting |
| Bright | -10 DS | extremely bright |
| Dark | +20 DS | rather dark |
| Foggy | +30 DS | pretty foggy |