stunlocking and hit amounts

Alright, so, once I stunlock somebody how many more hits do I get in before they come out of it? Is it poised based or poise is just there till you get stunlocked?

Depends on the weapon you use and if the guy is gonna try toggling out of it. UGS your only gonna get 2-3 hits tops, I think with the murakumo and greatswords you can keep them them locked till your out of stamina.

On a side note Has anyone ever prolonged a lock by using a spell midlock? Like CSS or GC?

A msgs. Reason for asking, got parried in mid stunlock after about two swings in. So, three swings, my fourth was parried. Not mad, mind you, was impressed. But led me to ask so I could keep it from happening again.

Depends on the speed of your sword.

MLGS has an indefinite stunlock, although backstepping is effective at getting out of stunlock.

SOmetimes they can do stuff in between the swings of an MSGS. You can flip out after the second or third hit sometimes.

What buggy said. There's also a way to escape them, though I'm not too clear on what exactly it is.

The best way I know is to toggle your weapons (I prefer my left hand weapon) between swings.

Here is a good place to post this chart:

Spoiler:

I don't know what Wikidork is, it isn't on the wikidot website. To see some text that isn't visible right click an choose view image.

Hmm. I thought it was 56 poise to avoid stunlocks from Greatswords.

It is important to double check information yourself, but the charts I pick up tend to be mostly correct. I am not sure if it is 56 or 54 to avoid stunlock from Great-swords as most times I am using either 77 or 0 poise.

The Video below from 2:55-6:52 will provide relevant information towards stunlocking and toggle escape. Especially for the MSGS.

Thx roan, exactly what I was looking for. I +1 the wrong post, but the effect is the same. Mad bro hugs!

I'm pretty sure the way poise works is like an invisible status-ailment meter. So, the same way as you build bleed, you build "stun-lock". Also the same way as bleed slowly drains if the meter isn't filled before you're bled, so will your stun-lock meter drain.

Where it differs from the bleed meter, though, is once stun-lock is in effect (which is the question you asked). For this, I think it acts like the poison and toxic meter, where they deplete slowly while you're affected.

I gathered these two observations just from experience, so they could be inaccurate. But what led me to believe that is, when you have enough poise to tank 1 hit (whatever it is) and you take that hit and roll away, if you take another hit soon enough you will be stun-locked. So if you only have enough poise to tank 1 hit, to be able to tank hits indefinitely, you need to wait long enough in between hits for your invisible meter to drain. Potentially, we could test how long this is... but it would be difficult!

What I'm not so certain about, is how the meter drains once stun-lock is activated. If you take poison and toxic, for example, regardless of your resistance to those, once they're in effect, they last the same amount of time. So:

- Does "stun-lock" go away like bleed, instantly?
- Does it go away like poison and toxic, a fixed amount of time?
- Or does it have its own formula that is determined by your poise or other stat?

Also, how do we explain toggling-out of stun-lock? Either it's part of the explanation of how stun-lock works, or it's an actual glitch.

Am I way off base, or does any of this sound plausible?

It sounds plausible but I dont think we can test it. We'd need to be relly accurate with the time between swings and lag kinda prevents that.

It sounds plausible to me. The guy never switched weapons, which leads me to believe its more so based on swing time. He had the aplit second to parry (I was constantly swinging (another lesson in pvp for me)). So he may have been hitting his parry constantly for that split second reaction. Which means, it isnt a build up, as much as instant like bleed. Atleast, from that experience.

I lean more toward the gradual build-down, like poison and toxic. You say he parried you on the 3rd hit, so my guess is his poise didn't allow him to tank a hit, but it was enough to be free from stun-lock after 2 hits. He parried you on the 3rd, but I bet if he'd missed the parry he'd have been stun-locked for another 2 hits.

I lean toward thinking that all poise is useful, whether it's at a break-point or not (the all-important 53 and 76). I think, if you have more than those amounts, it'll either allow you to tank more hits or, short of that, will reduce the amount of time required to drain the stun-lock meter in-between hits.

Example:
- You have 53 poise. You tank 1 Greatsword hit, roll away, then get hit again 2 seconds later and you're stun-locked. Your meter did not have enough time to drain.
- You have 60 poise. You tank 1 Greatsword hit, roll away, then get hit again 2 seconds later and are not stun-locked. The GS hit filled less of your meter, therefore you were able to tank the 2nd hit without filling your meter. If you got hit a 3rd time 2 seconds later again, though, that time you'd be stun-locked.

BLA1NE, if you can figure out a way to test it, I'm down for helping.

roanispe wrote:Here is a good place to post this chart:

Spoiler:

I don't know what Wikidork is, it isn't on the wikidot website. To see some text that isn't visible right click an choose view image.

Every weapon I know of except the MLGS functions as on that chart. It stops staggering at 56 poise, so that's all but necessary in the forest.

Oh, here's another theory about how the stun-lock meter might work:

You know when you've fully depleted your stamina meter, sometimes it takes longer for it to start filling again? It's like it goes in the negatives, and you have to wait for it to get back to 0 before it starts filling up again. An easy way to notice this is to deplete your meter using a dagger. The dagger takes so little stamina that the last attack will barely get your stamina bar into the negatives, so it starts to fill back up almost instantly. But now, try it with an ultra-greatsword; get your stamina bar almost empty, then do an R2 attack, and see how long it takes for your bar to start filling again.

So here's my theory:

Your "poise bar" is as long as your poise stat. Every weapon fills it with every hit accordingly to the chart. In between hits, the meter slowly drains, but fills back up more with each hit, and you're stun-locked when the weapon attacks exceed your meter. So, say you get hit by a greatsword and you have 53 poise: the first hit will fill your meter, but won't exceed it. Say you don't dodge but take the next hit; in between hits your "stun-lock count" (on the stun-lock meter, or poise bar, whatever we want to call it!) may have dropped down to 50, but the next hit shoots it up to 103. Now you're stun-locked for however long it takes for your meter to go down from 103 back to 53. (Edit: while stun-lock status is in effect, your opponent's attacks stop filling your meter, obviously, and it can only go down. Like when you're poisoned.)


Would be hard to test, but it's a theory. Until we actually figure out how to test it, we can at least discuss it!


@Reim:

Thanks for offering! I'll get some sleep and see if my brain can think up some test when I'm more awake.

I dont think that it works like that blaine.... Because the stagger seems to me to be pretty much the same length regardless of previous hits. I think it functions similarly to the bleed meter you get hit it triggers it cannot be built up more until the animation is over and then it empties if you get hit again it fills again.

Could be. But I just feel like there were times when I could get away after 1 hit, and others when I got locked for 3-4 hits. We'll just need some testing to shed some light into it.

Would this work:

1 player strafes while the other hits him (either spamming R1, or at roughly 1 or 2 seconds intervals, that way his stamina can refill and he can continue attacking indefinitely... or both! Would give us more info.). When the strafing player can't walk sideways anymore, it's because he's stun-locked. Simply record the number of hits it took to lock him, and how many free hits you get in on him while he's locked, until he can start strafing again. Ideally, keep attacking and get numbers for subsequent stun-locks (stamina will become an issue for spamming here, but with timed attacks this could be interesting); how many hits to stun-lock him again, and how many free hits?

Repeat the process with different poise amount and different weapons, and optionally with different attack timing.

Specific poise amounts I'd like to test:
52 and 53
75 and 76
Max poise

Weapons:
A dagger
A shortsword
A greatsword
An Ultra-greatsword

(Optional) Timing:
Spamming
2 Second intervals (try to make it roughly consistent)


I think that could get us some info... Specifically: we could see if, once stun-locked, daggers and ultra-greatswords have the same stun-lock time. Also, theoretically 52 and 75 poise should get stun-locked in 1 hit by a greatsword and ultra-greatsword, respectively. We'll know whether the stun-lock duration is the same when you were just barely stun-locked in 1 hit or whether you were thoroughly stun-locked in 2 by having the exact break-point amount of poise. And the different attack intervals would let us know a bit more about the draining of the meter if it takes more hits to stun-lock someone with the same amount of poise while attacking slower. This is a very approximate method, but I think it could possibly be useful.

Surely worth a try! you on xbox or ps3?

and I always thought that the degree of stun depended on weapon upgrade path (so possibly damage, or damage type... maybe physical has perks after all!)
and the speed of the weapon. also if your right at the edge of a weapons range you will be able to get away but in close you wont.

Let me know when you want to try this. I have a good selection of weapons and armor, if you need. We can even do it with different endurances to see if that has a role.

I don't know if I should be involved in the testing. I already know what I would infer from the results, and I have theories on the line, so it's possible I would unintentionally affect the results of the tests. Ideally it should be, you know, a blind study.

i think we can rely on you to be objective. Plus just share your results around to let others critique them to make sure you werent biased.

BLA1NE's right. It's impossible to separate your preconceived notions. That's why all good scientific studies are double blinded.

Well, we need another volunteer then and we can get testing going. This'll be a complicated one.