Skyrim talk:Block

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Archive 1: Sep 2011 - Feb 2012
Archive 2: Mar 2012 - Sep 2012

Shield Charge Exploit

If you go into sneak, block with a shield (Spellbreaker used), and then sprint (unknown what happens if you have the sneak roll perk), you will charge while still technically in sneak mode (I know this because of sneak skill gains and the sneak eye still changes), and you will continue to charge when you have 0 stamina.

tl;dr:Infinite, offensive sneak/block/sprint. Exploitable, but amusing. Please confirm. Could use specifics and technicalities to understand why/how glitch happens.— Unsigned comment by 98.88.141.227 (talk) at 23:52 on 5 May 2012

torches

are torches affected by perks such as disarming bash and power bash? — Unsigned comment by 70.187.89.178 (talk) at 02:36 on 9 July 2012

Elemental Protection Applying First!

Okay so tested this over a dozen times now on 360 and it appears that as of 1.7 with DG and HF that Elemental Protection isn't stacking on top of other resists but is instead applying first and then the remaining damage is being affected by your other resists. I've done the math on multiple damages I've taken with this against multiple enemies and for example with my Male Imperial with Elemental Protection, Lord Stone and Blessing of Mara for a total of 40% general magic resist a Forsworn Ravager Shaman's Icy Spear does 90 damage, I take roughly 30 damage which is nearly equal to the results of this formula. 90-50%(EP)=45 45-40%(GMR)=27. Can anyone else confirm that as of the most recent versions that Elemental Protection does indeed apply its resistance BEFORE any othe resistances come into play. Lord Eydvar ^{Talk | Contribs} 00:37, 17 September 2012 (GMT)

I can. Elemental Protection is not, technically, the same as Magic Resistance. It only reduces the amount of Magic damage you take by 50%. The other half (the half that actually hits you) is then resisted after you're hit. This appears to be done intentionally. VycDarkshadow (talk) 23:14, 20 February 2013 (GMT)

Staggering a giant with shield bash

Discovered this after fighting my first giant. Apparently, all you need to stagger a giant 100% of the time with a shield bash is timing.

Using a Redguard's Adrenaline rush and a vegetable soup to keep my stamina topped up, I shield bashed as soon as he started to perform any attack. The timing was achieved by shield bashing during his power attack, swinging normally once, and immediately shield bashing ASAP. From a very difficult fight which I had little chance of winning, I won without a scratch this way.

Seems that as long as you shield bash relatively early in the enemy attack, you'll stagger your enemy with 100% certainty. Most regular enemies have swing normal swing speeds that are too fast, but giants can be kept in perpetual stagger quite easily. Gotta try this on two-handed weapon enemies later.

-Mrbunnyban — Unsigned comment by 175.143.216.118 (talk) at 11:21 on 8 December 2012‎

Block Dragon Fire

When you're fighting a dragon on the floor, if you powerbash (or just bash I didn't have any perks) it stops fire attacks by staggering them. Worth a mention? 2.103.118.34 17:13, 26 December 2012 (GMT)

I think it is, because many people (including me) wouldn't think to bash a dragon. And since players battle so many of them, some will enjoy experimenting with a wider variety of tactics. Added. --JR (talk) 03:07, 28 December 2012 (GMT)

Important but not answered

Hi guys, what is the limit of Block effectiveness? Is there a "cap"? The Notes section states that most of the damage will be cut by half. Now, what does that mean? Blocking with anything, be it an Iron Dagger or Daedric Battleaxe or Shield of Ysgramor, will be cut by half mostly? What are the percentages? How much percent on Fortify Block is required to reach the maximum effectiveness? There is also the Shield Wall perk(s) which proves that it must be different than just 50% reduction globally. Would be nice to clear this up, thanks. — Unsigned comment by 88.132.45.92 (talk) at 01:50 on 29 December 2011

I don't think there is any real cap. One of my character got around 500 armor rating and almost every Block perk, and when I block an attack from an Ancient Dragon (a physical one, that is) I take almost no damage; if I don't block, I lose nearly 100 hp. Blocking with a two-handed weapon, however, isn't as effective, since none of the perks work for them. Elakyn 23:04, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

yeah I had the same question, I'd really appreciate more information, especially with regards to perk'd vs. unperk'd blocking. On the harder difficulty settings the damage you take can be beastly, and if active blocking helps, I want it, but I don't want to invest the perks if it isn't helpful beyond the standard 80% cap for armor. — Unsigned comment by 65.23.113.146 (talk) on January 9, 2012 12:07

This is not answer at all. The "cap" must exist obviously couse 100% blocking damage is just... :D

For example - I have all shields perk and enchanted ring with 40% block. Does ring really matter anything?

So - how much is at max ? --156.17.226.219 12:11, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

85% cap i think. combine with 80% damage resistance cap from armor rating = 97% damage resistance (98.5% damage resistance with berserk). sorry for bad english.

--Alcyone 05:21, 12 March 2012 (UTC) (←) A question I was unable to find answer for: How is the blocking effectiveness made? Does the shield quality matter? What is the equation for that? 95.82.185.235 01:00, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Hi everybody. I've been running around Skyrim with a shield, hoping I can protect myself from dragon breath and magic by blocking. The Elemental Protection perk should reduce my damage from dragon breath, but it soesn't seem to work. Why? I took damage, I started blocking, and I wasn't taking less damage. Is it useless to try to do this? — Unsigned comment by Kylaen (talk • contribs) at 18:24 on 18 June 2012

It should work as advertised, but maybe you have to face the dragon?Sergio Morozov (talk) 12:09, 17 January 2013 (GMT)

So, to the matter of block effectiveness, what is the formula? From what I've read in various sources, it can be assumed that it is something like

EFF = (SHEFF + SK*SKMULT)*(1 + PERK)*(1 + ENCH)

or (less probable) EFF = SHEFF1*SK*SKMULT*(1 + PERK)*(1 + ENCH), or any other variant, capped at 85%?

EFF is [%] effectiveness,

SHEFF is [%] weapon/shield effectiveness (not listed anywhere here),

SHEFF1 is dimensionless weapon/shield effectiveness (not listed anywhere here),

SK is skill,

SKMULT is [% per skill point] skill multiplier (not listed anywhere here),

PERK is [%] increase from perks,

ENCH is [%] increase from enchantments.

Now, if we assume it is the formula, who is willing to verify it, list SHEFF for every shields and find out what SKMULT is? Sergio Morozov (talk) 12:09, 17 January 2013 (GMT)

So, I've taken upon myself to test Block effectiveness formula. Used commannds ForceaAV damageresist 0, Forceav Block XX, restoreactorvalue health 1000, Getavinfo health and Lydia to damage my character. Her damage was 100(+- 2) hitpoints, but it is a coincidence, could be 90, or 180, does not matter. Also used two shields - Light Imperial Shield and Spellbreaker. I've compiled results into an .xls file here http://vk.com/doc30198056_150358600?dl=fcec84dd52ed2238a6

It seems, that formula is EFF = (A + B * Skill) * (1 + Perk) where

A is effectiveness at 0 skill, looks like it slightly depends on the shield;

B is effectiveness increase per point of skill, also depends on the shield;

Skill is, well, block skill;

Perk is increased block percentage from perks, I've tested with 5 perks, so it was 0,5.

A was 50 for LImSh and 52 for Spellbreaker (but I am not sure, maybe equal for both)

B was 0,03 for LIMSh and 0,12 for Spellbreaker

I'd really appreciate if someone with CK could look into item parameters for shields and tell if indeed they are like that. Because I can imagine different formulas giving the same results. Oh, EFF is capped at 85% (I got 86% due to rounding errors, it seems) and I did not test enchantments. Sergio Morozov (talk) 19:38, 19 January 2013 (GMT)

So I've conducted even more research. I was unable to run CK, so used SkyEdit. Shields have no any "Blocking Effectiveness".

So A and B values from my previous formula should be derived from some of other shield's paramenters. Most probable parameter is Armor Rating. I've conducted experiments with various shields. And got some data, which is shown in .xls http://vk.com/doc30198056_150509538?dl=fcec84dd52ed2238a6 below my older data.

Looks like EFF = (Some_Base_Value + Armor_Rating * AR_Multiplier * (1+Skill * Skill_Multiplier))

That is, EFF from base_value is not increased by skill, but EFF from AR is.

Also when blocking with weapon, skill has almost no effect.

For skill 000 with a shield I got EFF (AR) = 43,4 + 0,23 * AR

For skill 100 with a shield I got EFF (AR) = 42,5 + 0,57 * AR

For blocking with a weapon I got EFF(0)=27,5 EFF(100)=30 (maybe both are 30, actually)

So I suspect the formulae are

For blocking with a shield EFF % = 100*fShieldBaseFactor + fShieldScalingfactor * AR * {fBlockSkillMult - [(100 - Skill) / 100]}

For blocking with a weapon EFF % = 100*fBlockWeaponBase + Something_insignificant

For a shield this will net EFF % = 100*0,45 + 0,2*AR*(1+Skill/100)

For a weapon this will net EFF % = 100*0,3 + Something_insignificant.

Any feedback? Specifically, about adding formulae into the article. ^_^ Sergio Morozov (talk) 12:56, 20 January 2013 (GMT)

My feedback is this looks like precious data for us, and what a great contribution.

I'm not much of a layout person, but my thoughts are:

Go from very simple to details: Blocking effectiveness is (generally) most importantly determined by x and w.

(Perhaps another line or two of information in narrative form.) Then, "Data from in-game testing suggests that block effectiveness is determined by the following formula: Then, whatever. Just put it, put it in a table, put it in a show/hide. I dunno. But put it!!! Someone else way re-arrange it once it's there. If they mess it up, raise again here. Awesome work! --JR (talk) 15:04, 20 January 2013 (GMT)

I've made an edited version of "defensive blocking" section here http://www.uesp.net/wiki/User:Sergio_Morozov/Sandbox_Miscellaneous_Perks and will wait a bit until editing the article itself... Because I am sure I've read somewhere, that weapons block better than hide shield, but I can not find where, nor do my guessed formulas show it. Sergio Morozov (talk) 16:50, 20 January 2013 (GMT)

Sergio: I think this info is better moved to the article as is. It contains a lot of useful info. Let's not let it stay buried on the talk page. If there is a detail or two you're not sure about, then either place a vn tag in the text, or add a new talk section asking for input. For th formulas, I recommend show/hide. If a minor detail is not 100% correct, let it be corrected on the page instead of consigned to Oblivion. My opinions. --JR (talk) 01:52, 21 January 2013 (GMT)

For the sake of future generations, I must confess, that my .xls files contain a slight error - damage was found to be 106 rather than 100. this changes things a bit. My edit to the article was done according to these new values, not the old ones. Of course, more data would be welcome. Sergio Morozov (talk) 06:07, 21 January 2013 (GMT)

So wait... you are saying that all the values that you just put in the article are all incorrect? Jeancey (talk) 06:12, 21 January 2013 (GMT)

Why would I put them in the article then? =D No, I am saying, that values in .xls are a bit off (should use 106 damage instead of 100), but in the article edit I used corrected values. Of course, they are not "100% correct", just an approximation of what was written into game code as seen from the outside. Sergio Morozov (talk) 07:44, 21 January 2013 (GMT)

Actually, with corrections mentioned above, I got DR = 0,5625*AR + 45 and DR = 0,5357*AR + 45,747 for skill 100 (first is when I fix "45". second when I let Excel decide) and DR = 0,2771*AR + 45 and DR = 0,2186*AR + 46,628 for skill 0. But in-game test are not reliable when it comes to precision, so in the article values are (somewhat roughly) rounded. Anyway, I think this is better than no formula at all. Sergio Morozov (talk) 15:47, 23 January 2013 (GMT)

Just wanted to mention the "Game Settings" that are probably related to blocking:

• fBlockAmountWeaponMult=1.0
• fBlockMax=0.7
• fBlockPowerAttackMult=0.66
• fBlockSkillMult=2.0
• fBlockWeaponBase=0.3 -- this is probably the base weapon block amount
• fBlockWeaponScaling=0.2
• fShieldBaseFactor=0.45 -- main page says this is the base shield block amount
• fShieldScalingFactor=0.2

Theqmann (talk) 04:35, 20 February 2013 (GMT)

Blocking Skill and Percentage of Blocked Damage

The second paragraph of subsection "Defensive Blocking" needs to be removed. I recently ran several tests on normal difficulty settings using a Bear and my character with no armor other than an untempered Hide Shield in one series and an untempered Dragonscale Shield in another series with 100 Block skill no Shield Wall perks and no Fortify Block enchantments. The damage blocked was consistently approximately 17-18 points with the Hide Shield and Dragonscale Shield from the 45 point damage attacks. Taking the minor physical damage resistance afforded by the armor rating from the shields it would appear that the blocked damage is roughly 15 points out of 45 or 33.333%.

That also invalidates the last two sentences of the last paragraph in the same subsection, as the only way you could cap blocked damage without several items of Peerless Blocking is by having most or all of the Shield Wall perks, and "medium" Block skill combined with Shield perks clearly won't get you to 85% blocked damage as not even 100 Block skill with 5 Shield Wall perks will do that (also tested under the above conditions but with 5 Shield Wall perks).

Unless someone can produce contrary test results under the same conditions I'll make the edits by the end of the week unless anyone can provide reason to do otherwise. --DagmarH (talk) 06:33, 7 January 2013 (GMT)

It's noted DagmarH has thus updated the article. Great contribution! --JR (talk) 07:04, 8 January 2013 (GMT)

85% or 80%?

Here it says the cap is 85% but over at the Fortify Block page it says its 80%. I'm assuming the 85% is correct but I can't verify that myself.  Valadez   Talk  Contributions  21:02, 10 January 2013 (GMT)

You can find out how the 85% was determined by reading the Deflect Arrows and Shield Wall section above on this page. --DagmarH (talk) 03:32, 11 January 2013 (GMT)

Note: DagmarH has updated the current page to show the correct cap as 85%. --JR (talk) 13:10, 13 January 2013 (GMT)

Perk descriptions that say "with a shield" to be taken literally?

The descriptions of Deflect Arrows, Elemental Protection, Block Runner (in my game v1.8, though not on the wiki here), and Shield Charge imply that their effects are only applied when blocking with shields, not weapons or torches or fists. Is this true? — Unsigned comment by 67.71.128.222 (talk) at 06:08 on 13 January 2013

Aside from Block Runner, which also works with weapons, yes, they only apply if you have shield equipped. Elakyn (talk) 08:58, 13 January 2013 (GMT)

I'm inclined to take Elakyn's word for it, based on our prior interactions, and have updated the article with this information. I took a guess at the best/right way to do this, so someone might change how or where the information is provided. How about Quick Reflexes? Anyone know? --JR (talk) 12:06, 13 January 2013 (GMT)

Thanks, JR. After a bit of testing I can now confirm that Elemental Protection only activates with a shield equipped. Shield Charge doesn't normally work with weapons alone. HOWEVER, I just found out that repeatedly pressing the block button while sprinting does trigger the same effect (that is, throwing people in the air). This is most likely a glitch, but pretty useful with a two-handed weapon. Quick Reflexes works just as well with or without shield. Elakyn (talk) 13:45, 13 January 2013 (GMT)

FYI, the Perk entry for these are:

• DeflectArrows says it needs: WornHasKeyword(ArmorShield)==1 and IsBlocking==1

• This perk will set the arrow blocking amount to 100%

• ElementalProtection says it needs: WornHasKeyword(ArmorShield)==1 and IsBlocking==1

• This perk will multiply the Incoming Spell Magnitude by 0.5 if it is MagicDamageFire or MagicDamageShock or MagicDamageFrost

• QuickReflexes says it needs: player IsBlocking==1 and enemy IsPowerAttacking==1 to apply the PerkQuickReflexes spell

• The PerkQuickReflexes spell applies a PerkQuickReflexesEffect mag 0.05 (Slow Time)

• BlockRunner says it sets: bPerkShieldCharge=1
• ShieldWall multiplies "Mod Percent Blocked" by 1.X where X is 1 to 5 for rank
• ShieldCharge has no usage requirements, and gives the shieldChargeSpell ability

• The spell/ability has these requirements: IsRidingMount==0 and IsSprinting==1 and IsBlocking==1
• The spell/ability will reduce the target Stamina by 10

• DisarmingBash says it needs: IsAttackType==PowerAttackBash to apply the PerkBashDisarm spell

• The PerkBashDisarm spell has a 50% effect chance to apply a 99 mag Disarm, and has the flag "No Absorb/Reflect"
• The Disarm effect requires HasKeyword(ActorTypeGhost)==0

Theqmann (talk) 05:11, 20 February 2013 (GMT)

Deflect Arrows Hit Box

I've read that the size of the "hit box" for all shields for the Deflect Arrows perk is the same regardless of the size of the shield mesh. Can someone provide an independently verifiable method of determining this via the Creation Kit or game data?--DagmarH (talk) 07:13, 5 February 2013 (GMT)

in game testing data

this is from another forum http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/615803-the-elder-scrolls-v-skyrim/65509623 search block can we use this, or would that be plagiarism? the hoops i had to dump through to post that link :p Dawn (talk) 06:26, 28 February 2013 (GMT)

Traditionally I do not believe we use information from other fora on this site, both for accuracy concerns and for attribution reasons. Anything we did use would require verification in-game or via the Creation Kit before adding it to the page. This message was written by Rosalia ^{Tell her what you think...}_{...of her work here.} 06:28, 28 February 2013 (GMT)

The current formula is definitely wrong, for example the fBlockWeaponScaling with value of 0.2 isn't used anywhere in the formula Dawn (talk) 07:41, 28 February 2013 (GMT)

And fBlockWeaponBase value is 0.3, not 30 Dawn (talk) 07:43, 28 February 2013 (GMT)