More Potent: Virus or Disable?

[Sidra]

So today in chat, I made the comment: "Disable was always more potent than Virus for reducing a single big hit, it's just a bit easier to use now with a duration as opposed to next attack only."

A lot of people seemed to disagree with that. I was always under the assumption that 10% potency reduction would take of more dmg than 15% of the corresponding stat would. As the stat itself is only a piece of the equation - where attaching it to potency is a true overall reduction. However, I am not sure we actually know the dmg mechanics of enemies, or what their Weapon Damage versus str/int is to even go ahead and do the calculations.

Anyone know the answer to this, or can think of a way to devise a good test?

[Vlady]

First boss Fractal seems like a decent test for the aoe.

[RaeyFonzur]

Well if you consider me at 988 mind healing for 3059 average with Benefic (400 potency), I lose about 132 average every 40~ mind and Virus would reduce me to 840 mind, that's around 488 healing lost. Disable would make it 360 potency which would end up causing the heal to be reduced by about 306. Therefore Virus is quite a bit better, however Disable doesn't work on anything except damaging abilities (according to patch notes anyway) and doesn't last as long. Even though I know healing and dps follow the same formula... I tested it anyway. Malefic 2 is about 1640 average for me at 988 int and 1570 at 948. Virus would reduce it by about 259 and Disable would be about 164.

[SuzakuCMX]

Disable only worked on one attack while Supervirus was 15% over the entire duration.

Supervirus probably worked out to more than the 10% off one attack over the duration. I'm not sure how INT/DEX/MND/STR factor into Boss damage though so I don't know how they compare now.

[Ghishlain]

So, since this was asked I wanted to do a test on it and figured I'd post the results here:

Testing Methodology
Gravity, Holy, and Flare have the property that their damage reduced by a multiple of 10% for each additional enemy the spells hit. Assuming that this 10% reduction = 10% reduced potency from Disable, I started to Gravity two Lv.1 training dummies close together in that training ground near Bentbranch Meadows.

Afterwards, I removed X gear and lowered my MND until I was 15% lower MND and repeated the test on a single lv. 1 dummy to see the results.

I also acquired the results of Gravity on only the main target as well to compare.

I did all there iterations for a total of 50 times to get a decent (still small) sample size.


Stats

MD = 102
DET = 380
Mind (Normal) = 978
Mind (Virus'd) = 832 (Floor of 15% of 978 = 146 | 978 - 146 = 832)


Results

Single Target Average = 1,619.56
Disable Average = 1,458.38 (9.95% Reduction)
Virus Average = 1,372.88 (15.23%)


So, by the looks of it, and assuming my assumptions are right, Virus > Disable.

[Lyrica_Ashtine]

I did the same in another topic. I can verify that virus is more potent than disable in effectiveness and duration

Well, I tried it on my monk:
914 str, 492 det - Auto attacks hits on average: 359.78 (based on 50 auto attacks without critical damage)
776 str, 417 det - Auto attack hits on average: 304.70 (based on 50 auto attacks without critical damage)
Difference: 15.31%

Regardless of the fact how small the sample size is, -15% strength does translate into roughly -15% damage. Even if we were to consider a relatively large error margin, give or take 5% off the results, it's still ranging between 14.54% and 16.08% difference. So yes, a normal virus on physical attacks is more potent than 10% reduced action damage.

[Adrasteia]

Opponents don't actually have stats in the same way that players do, so the -15% STR/DEX/INT/MND of Virus is essentially saying "-15% damage". Virus is still superior