Type of damage, spell attack and effects
Attack or spells and associated effects Diablo 2: I explain the differences and the associated effects, such as adding damage or stealing life
Preamble
I've had a lot of feedback on how spells or attacks work, for example can a spell take advantage of added lightning damage, or do a crushing blow. So I give you the list of possible effects depending on the type!
Types of damage
Here are the types of damage with associated examples:
- Physical: direct and projectile attacks and certain spells such as Tornado (druid) or Body Blast (necromancer)
- Enhanced Damage (ED) only works on anything based on your weapon
- just like Defense (chance to dodge) and attack (chance to hit)
- you can resist it with the damage reduced in% (damage reduce)
- no matter the type, you can increase the damage received by Amplifier from the Necromancer
- on the other hand, Fanaticism and Power, two Paladin auras only work on attack types
- beware the converted projectiles (like the javelin converting 100% damage to lightning) remain attacks
- Elemental: Fire Lightning Ice Poison
- improvement via elemental damage,% lightning or cold for example
- you can resist it quite simply
- Magic
- certain types of spells, such as Paladin's Hammer, or Amazon's Magic Arrow
- you cannot resist it, only with "decreases magic damage received from X"
Attack or Spell
Understanding the difference between attack and spell is crucial, here's how:
- Attack: anything that consists of giving a blow with a weapon or a projectile, anything that is therefore related to the attack speed
- Spell: anything created, and related to spell speed
Some examples :
- assassin traps: spell
- druid tornadoes: spell
- amazon fire arrows: attack
- Amazon's lightning javelins: attack with a spell on it
- the barbarian whirlwind: attack
Associated effects
So there are three categories to understand:
- Physical attacks
- Elemental attacks
- Physical or elemental spells
Health Steal, CB, DS, Added Damage,% Elemental Damage
| Effet | Physical attack | Elemental attack | Physical or elemental spell |
|---|---|---|---|
| Attack speed | Yes | Yes | No |
| Spell speed | No | No | Yes |
| Steal life and mana | Yes | No | No |
| Added damage | Yes | Yes | No |
| % damage | No | Yes | Yes (elementary) |
| ED | Yes | No | No |
| Death blow | Yes | No | No |
| Stinging blow | Yes | No | No |
| Open Wound | Yes | No | No |
Note:
- Ranged slashing effect decreased by 2 (compared to melee)
A (complicated) example with the Javazon, if you understand this one you have understood everything!
- Lightning Ball and Fury Lightning have two types of damage, that of your weapon + that of the skill
- It's a projectile type skill on your weapon and an elemental addition, so columns one and three
- If I put an added damage charm only the damage related to your weapon will increase, that of your spell will not move
The case of converted physical damage
I end with probably one of the more complicated sections, the converted damage. Here's what you need to know:
- the critical hit calculation is applied before the transformation into elemental damage, so you can do an "elemental" critical hit
- life steal calculation applies after transforming to elemental damage, so you cannot steal life
Example with level 24 cold arrow:
- this spell converts 51% of physical damage to cold damage
- you will therefore only be able to steal life on 49% of the damage inflicted
- however you will be able to critically hit 100% of the damage value
With this guide the types of damage and how to apply the effects will no longer have any secrets for you! You will therefore be able to know if adding damage to summons is possible or what your life steal will be with lightning javelins!
By Alchemists, October 2021
