ELDEN RING Understanding Attribute Scaling

Scaling Letters

Scaling is shown to use in-game as a letter score: E, D, C, B, A, or the highest, S.

Each of these letters represent a range of different numbers. We can't see these numbers at any point, anywhere while playing Elden Ring, but thanks to some hard-working data miners, we know the ranges are (roughly):

E: 0.01 - 0.25

D: 0.251 - 0.59

C: 0.6 - 0.9

B: 0.91 - 1.4

A: 1.41 - 1.74

S: 1.75 +

These numbers are used in an equation to determine the "scaling power" of a weapon.

For example, a standard affinity Lordsworn's Straight Sword +0 item card will say its attack power is 115 + X, where X is our "scaling power".

As you can see, not all letters are the same range. B covers twice the range the other scaling letters do, so most weapons under most affinities end up with a B as their highest possible scaling power.

And in some cases, a weapon with B scaling will always do more damage than a similar weapon with A or S! Why? The answer, dear reader, is math. Let's take a look.

Scaling And Base Power

This is the essential equation for determining a weapon's Attack Power (or more commonly in the community, Attack Rating / AR):

[Base power x Attribute modifier x Scaling modifier]

Let's unpack this formula with a pretend Tarnished and three different weapons. Our Tarnished has 54 strength, 60 dexterity, 55 intelligence, and 40 arcane (she may have spent some time in Mohgwyn Dynasty Palace), and will wield weapons in one hand (gotta have a shield!). First, we'll see her wield the Hand of Malenia +10.

Base power is exactly that. It is the attack power of the weapon as it is. For Hand of Malenia, that's 286 physical.

Attribute modifier is a value that is hidden to us players, but is based on how high your attribute level is. I'm sure you've noticed that sometimes, raising your dexterity will cause your weapon to gain 5 more attack power, but sometimes it won't increase your attack power at all, even though your weapon scales with dexterity. Not all levels are equal. This modifier is increased more significantly at lower levels, and stops seeing meaningful gains after certain breakpoints, often called "softcaps".

Scaling modifier is also partially hidden. It is shown to us players as a letter: E, D, C, B, A, or the highest, S. But there can be drastic numerical differences between weapons with the same scaling letter. For Hand of Malenia, it has an E (0.09) strength modifier and B (1.35) dexterity modifier.

Like many weapons, Hand of Malenia scales with two stats, strength and dexterity. So we have to include both attributes in the equation.

As such, Hand of Malenia's attack power is [286 x Str modifier x 0.09] + [286 x Dex modifier x 1.35]. Those Str and Dex modifiers will change with your attribute scores. But as we can see, any increases in strength are going up against a 0.09x multiplier. Strength attribute levels do not add a lot of power to Hand of Malenia. Conversely, every increase of our Dex modifier is being multiplied by 1.35x, meaning it responds strongly to high dexterity. I would hope so, it requires 48 just to wield! At 54 strength and 60 dexterity, this amounts to 594 attack power, 306 more than the base power.

Now let's look at a slightly more complicated weapon: a Magic Lordsworn's Straight Sword +25.

When we put a Magic affinity on Lordsworn's Straight Sword, its base power changes. Instead of 317 physical, we end up with 220 physical, 220 magic. The scalings change too - instead of the D (0.54) strength and D (0.54) dexterity scalings of a standard affinity sword, we have E (0.07), E (0.07). But we also get C (0.8) intelligence scaling. (An 80% was a B when I was in school.)

So just like with Hand of Malenia we add up the base damage, times the hidden attribute modifier, times the scaling coefficient. Our physical damage will be much lower than the standard affinity - any strength and dexterity values are reduced to 7%. But for the magic damage, we add 80% of our intelligence modifier, which could be quite high. At our Tarnished's stats, she ends up with only +20 physical damage from her strength and dexterity, but +125 from her intelligence, for a grand total of 605 attack power. Even higher than Hand of Malenia?! That can't be right. (We'll come back to this later.)

[220 x Str modifier x .07] + [220 x Dex modifier x .07] + [220 x Int modifier x .8]

The physical damage was improved by strength and dexterity, but not by much. The magic damage was improved a lot, but only by intelligence. These attribute modifiers must be really low values for a base power of 220 to get dropped down to only +20 bonus damage, even at such high strength and dexterity.

Lastly, let's see a really weird one: Marais Executioner's Sword, again at +10.

Like the Lordsworn's magic straight sword, Marais Executioner's Sword has both physical and magic damage - but the magic damage is much lower than the physical damage. It also scales with three stats - strength and dexterity, but instead of intelligence, arcane.

For strength and dexterity, we can do as we have done. [203 physical x Str modifier x 1.13] + [203 + Dex modifier x .12]. Simple enough.

As we saw with Lordsworn's Straight Sword, the physical damage was raised by strength and dexterity, but not at all by intelligence, and the magic damage was raised by intelligence and only intelligence.

However!

The Marais Executioner's Sword, like only a few other weapons, has a very special and hidden property. The arcane scaling does not only affect the magic damage. It also further increases the physical damage.

So, our next part of the equation is [203 physical x Arc modifier x 54] + [149 magic x Arc modifier x 54].

[203 physical x Str modifier x 1.13] + [203 + Dex modifier x .12] + [203 physical x Arc modifier x .54] + [149 magic x Arc modifier x .54]. Our hero ends up with 508 physical, and 204 magic attack power for a whopping total of 712 attack power.

So while arcane had that stinky-looking D scaling, when it's applied to both damage types, it almost affects the power almost as much as strength does with its big scary B scaling. (0.54 x 203) + (0.54 x 149)=190.08, which is close to (1.13 x 203)=229.39. Because of the way attribute modifiers work, there will be points where increasing your arcane attribute will add more attack power than increasing strength. Arcane is certainly more helpful for your overall power than dexterity is. Despite the modifier being 4 times as high, the arcane scaling is represented by only one letter score higher, D rather than E.

A few other weapons behave like this, including Erdsteel Dagger (when given a Sacred or Flame Art affinity) and Rivers of Blood. But by and large, affinity damage will scale only with the corresponding attribute (strength for fire, dexterity for lightning, intelligence for magic, faith for sacred and flame art. Arcane is weird, and most powerfully influences occult affinity weapons, but also greatly increases the status ailment buildup of poison and blood affinity weapons, while also marginally boosting their attack power. Special weapons that scale with arcane and have multiple damage types almost always scale both physical and affinity damage with arcane.)

And this is, basically, how scaling works.

Scaling And Base Power, Pt 2

Remember when I said there would be three examples? I lied. Time for more.

Remember our brave Tarnished's Hand of Malenia? The super cool high-dexterity sword of a legendary hero / goddess that you get from one of the toughest fights in the game? A lot of people were really disappointed that its dexterity scaling stops at B. That doesn't feel like an endgame godslaying weapon.

But let's take a look at why its scaling power seems to be so low. Let's compare it to another katana - Keen Nagakiba +25.

To start, Nagakiba shows a higher letter score than Hand of Malenia - A dexterity scaling instead of B. If I equip Hand of Malenia and then use the menu to switch to Nagakiba, both scaling letters will turn blue, indicating that Nagakiba has higher values in both scalings, even though for both weapons the strength score is E. And it's true: Nagakiba has 0.1 and 1.6 multipliers, compared to Hand of Malenia's 0.09 and 1.35.

So Nagakiba must end up with more damage, right? Its score is higher!

Nope.

Because Hand of Malenia has much higher base power.

At our aforementioned attribute levels, 54 strength and 60 dexterity, Nagakiba only has 550 attack power compared to Hand of Malenia's 594. (In fact, a standard affinity Nagakiba would have 551, overtaking the keen affinity by one point!)

But hold on. Maybe our attributes are just too low. With higher scaling, higher stats will mean higher damage. That only makes sense. So let's try ratcheting up the dexterity to 80.

Nagakiba jumps up to 608 power... still far behind Hand of Malenia at 653. In fact, the gap is one point bigger now - a 45 attack power difference instead of 44. And it stays that way all the way up to 99 strength and 99 dexterity - Nagakiba, 635, Malenia 680.

Now let's compare this warrior goddess's blade to the highest dexterity scaling weapon in the entire game - the Keen Urumi. At +25 it has E 0.1 strength scaling and S 1.85 dexterity scaling.

But thanks to its low base power of 225, it stops at 645 attack power - higher than Nagakiba, but still short of Malenia.

Higher scaling != higher damage.

Base power is a crucial element of the equation.

Split Damage

Those are high numbers and all, but the magic Lordsworn's Straight Sword and Marais Executioner's Sword seemed to have much higher power. Why would anyone use heavy or keen weapons when magic affinity gives you so much more attack power?

The truth is, affinity damage is always generous because it is what we call "split damage". Lordsworn's magic straight sword deals two types of damage - physical, and magic. While the two values combined are high, on their own, they're lower than the standard affinity physical damage would be.

Every character and enemy in Elden Ring has two types of protection: defense, and damage negation. Damage negation comes from armor and buffs, and reduces incoming damage by a percentage. 54% damage negation means you take 46% of the damage thrown at you. Defense comes from attribute levels, and reduces all incoming damage by a flat amount. 70 physical defense means every instance of physical damage is first reduced by 70, and then by your physical damage negation.

Split damage suffers under this system. Let's say our Tarnished (who was reborn by Rennala and is back to 54 strength, 60 dexterity) attacks an enemy with 100 defense against all damage types and 30% negation. She will try the standard affinity lordsworn's sword and the magic sword.

The standard sword has 502 physical power. Defense drops that to 402, then we remove 30%. 281 damage.

The magic sword has two damage types, so we'll calculate them separately. First, the physical damage, 240. Minus 100 is 140, and minus another 30% is 98 physical. Magic damage is 365, down to 265, down to 185.5, which we'll round to 186. 186 plus 98 is 284.

So even though the magic sword had a total power of 605 compared to the standard sword's 504, it barely did any additional damage. With a quality affinity, we would do even more damage than the magic sword.

So, when your weapon has a really high attack power, but it's split across two or more different damage types, your actual damage output might not be as crazy as you expect. Don't be too tempted to add flame art affinity to a clayman's harpoon, or sacred to a fire knight's greatsword, just because the overall number ends up higher. Consolidating the power into one damage type is generally more efficient - which is why when we use magic affinity, we should primarily level up our intelligence and not worry too much about adding more physical power.

Attribute Scaling And Character Optimization

Now if you're like me, then when you see a big ol' S scaling on your item card, it makes you want to raise the corresponding attribute up as high as you can take it. Let's see what this weapon is really capable of!... Right?

Well, sure, that can be fun. But like we saw before with Hand of Malenia and Urumi, not even S scaling means you will reach some transcendent level of Tarnished-slaying strength. High scaling is often compensatory for low base power. And, I can tell you from experience that a character with 80 dexterity, S scaling Keen infused weapons, drawstring dragonbolt grease, and four talismans dedicated to damage output is going to have a pretty tough time fighting other players. With relatively worse armor and lower stamina, that character can get easily pressured and afflicted by status, and struggles to stun enemies with heavy poise armor. High damage sounds fun, but investing attributes in scaling (that is, beyond the requirements to wield the weapon) has severely diminishing returns.

If you watch the content of any prolific Elden Ring PvP creator, you will likely notice that their damage stats are often fairly low - 54 strength at level 150, for example, using Heavy-infused weapons. This is because there is really no significant gain to be had past that point. Suppose that at 54 strength, two-handing a +25 Heavy weapon, the content creator killed an opposing player, on average, in four attacks. Said player could put another 26 levels into strength, and still kill in four hits. It's not as if at 80 strength you suddenly become so powerful that you can kill other players in half the hits you could at 54.

At 20 strength, 50 dexterity, Keen Urumi has 514 attack power. If we raise dexterity to 80 (bear in mind this is thirty levels), the attack power goes to 609. That is quite a jump! That's about 18% more damage. But that difference in damage diminishes a bit when one considers grease or other buffs, and the fact that thirty levels can massively increase one's vigor, endurance, and mind. A character who deals 10% less damage, but also takes 20% less damage than her opponent has the advantage. This is before considering the intricacies of hard-swapping to a colossal sword, poise, stamina economy, and so on.

The ability to keep your red, blue, and green bars full, wear heavier armor, and change equipment without heavy-rolling makes your character significantly tougher to beat. Mind is often considered a "dump stat" for melee fighters, but if you ever find yourself out of FP in an arena battle, it can cost you the win - whether it's because you couldn't do your powerful Ash of War attack, or because you needed to drop pressure for an opportunity to drink a flask.

Basically, if you think the solution to beating this tough boss or becoming Golden Combatant in the arena is cranking your intelligence up to 99, you're most likely mistaken. More HP, FP, stamina, and equip load will serve you better in the vast majority of cases. Most damage attributes hit their last "softcap" at 80, meaning there is generally no reason to ever go past that point, unless you want to play at extremely high / maximum level.

Character Optimization At Low Levels

Remember how important base power is in determining scaling power?

At the beginning of the game, like if you start a new character to try a new build, you may get frustrated by how little damage you deal. Raising your Vigor won't make you do any additional damage, but raising Strength will let you wield new weapons and hit harder with them. So we should raise Strength a lot, right?

Well. Maybe.

But generally, no.

At low weapon upgrade levels, weapons not only have much lower scaling, but much lower base damage as well. So our attribute modifiers are being multiplied by low base power and low scaling coefficients.

Let's think about one of the first weapons you can find in the Lands Between: the Greataxe. No character can effectively wield it by the time you reach it, unless you met Melina and then farmed quite a bit in Limgrave. It requires a beefy 30 strength to wield in one hand, but we can manage it in two hands at 20. This can be done by a Hero as low as level 11.

At +0, a Greataxe's strength scaling is a D, 0.55, and dexterity is D, 0.31. At 9 dexterity and functionally 30 strength (20 but two-handing), this adds 39 attack power to the base of 151, for a total of 190. If we scrounge up an Ash of War and apply Heavy affinity to it, that raises the strength scaling to a B, 0.9, but erases the dexterity scaling, and we end up with 6 more total attack power, 196.

A B is pretty good! So maybe it would be fine to raise our strength to 30 so we can use a shield, too. It's just 10 more levels.

Those 10 more levels raise the two-handed Heavy Greataxe to 216 attack power. Only 20 more power for 10 levels (which is really like 15, because we're two-handing). If we one-hand the axe we end up right back where we were at 196.

Conversely, if we stay at 20 strength and refine the axe with some smithing stones, we will see much bigger improvements. Raising the Heavy Greataxe to just +2 will make its attack power 223 - more of a gain than ten levels worth of runes. If we put those ten levels of points into Vigor instead, we would go from 499 total HP to 769 - a 54% increase. You can't do any damage if you're dead!

At low levels, it is highly recommended (by me, your doctor) that your 'damage' attributes be kept to a pretty bare minimum. Just enough to wield your preferred weapons. Your top priority when building a new character should always be vigor, then endurance, and then mind if needed, and keep gathering smithing stones. Then, as your weapons improve and will be more receptive to higher attribute levels, you can begin to pump your damage attributes.

Conclusion

I hope this guide was of assistance in unravelling the mysteries of Elden Ring's inscrutable scaling system. If anything is still unclear, or an explanation doesn't make sense, feel free to leave a comment and I will try to reiterate, or edit the guide for clarity.

May this knowledge help you streamline your character and find victory across the Lands Between, and beyond.

Source: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3299724684

Understanding Attribute Scaling