Unarmed and Mele levels

[killette2]

After obtaining recent information, I have become confused about them. Are they just defence bars or do they affect how much damage you deal at all?

[TeckXKnight]

Unarmed determines Delta, unarmed defense, and how much defense bar you break with unarmed attacks.
Melee determines Block defense and how much defense bar you break with swords and axes.

Neither affect damage directly.

[killette2]

Delta also confuses me. I heard you should get your unarmed to 100 or something like that?

[TeckXKnight]

Delta is the multiplier that Maneuvers use.
delta = sqrt(Your UA/Their UA)

So if someone is using Bloodlust against you and you have 100 UA and they have 400 UA, then they have a Delta 2 while your delta is pretty much 0.
So Bloodlust gives 10% Red Bar * Delta, so every time you use an action against them, they gain 20% Red Bar.

[Sitting_Bill]

I was going to type out my understanding of the system, but I think this page:

http://ringofbrodgar.com/wiki/Combat:_A ... _Maneuvers

explains quite a lot of what is confusing you. You should also read:

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=6518

which is awesome.

[MagicManICT]

Unarmed determines Delta

Ok, I'm not too experienced at PvP combat, so I'm going to pop in here about this. My understanding is thus: Delta is determined by the maneuver being used and the skill being used against it. Thus, if a person has Block up and a person throws a Sting, it was MC vs MC. If it's Oak Stance vs Sting, its UA vs MC. The whole reason for the imbalance between melee and unarmed is because melee ONLY gets Block, while unarmed gets Bloodlust, Oak Stance, and Death or Glory. (Not to mention the unreasonable fact that a punch can do damage through a steel plate..., but if I recall right, that was a change to balance unarmed against heavily armored opponents.) However, if Delta is determined solely by unarmed, that makes a huge balance problem. At least, this is what I gather from Dataslycer's guide. (One of the downsides of playing hermit.)

[TeckXKnight]

I can understand where you're coming from. It's not called Delta at that point although it's the exact same phenomenon of a skill modifying the weight based on your combat advantage against your opponent. Delta is specifically a modifier for unarmed combat and is Always determined by Unarmed vs. Unarmed. It doesn't matter if your opponent is using Block; if their Unarmed is 1 then your Delta is built against that.

The block skill is not modified by a delta in its wording, it is actually strictly based on your own melee skill. The way you're describing shows a strong grasp of the concept but confusing a step. This is an important difference because Delta is modified by your opponents skills whereas Melee and Unarmed are not. It's good to note that all Maneuvers offer defensive capacities separate of delta based on Unarmed/Melee.

Edit: I think I can explain it now without it being a convoluted piece of shit!
Weight: What you described, skill against skill based on move, maneuver, and attack
Effect: What delta modifies on maneuvers
Delta: Strictly Unarmed vs Unarmed skill

[MagicManICT]

Good! I just wanted to make sure I understood things correctly. I just need to change some of the terms in the way I'm thinking of it.