What Counts as a Critical Hit in Elden Ring?

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A critical hit in Elden Ring is a successful attack that deals significantly more damage than a normal blow, and it can be achieved by either breaking an enemy’s stance through a series of attacks or by using specific moves or abilities that guarantee a critical hit. In Elden Ring, critical hits can be landed by exploiting an enemy’s stamina system, where after a certain number of attacks, the enemy becomes momentarily vulnerable to a critical hit, or by using certain skills or spells that have a critical hit effect.

Understanding Critical Hits

To understand what counts as a critical hit in Elden Ring, it’s essential to know how the stamina system works and how critical hits are calculated.

Critical Hit FAQs

General Questions

1. What moves guarantee a critical hit?: Moves like Storm Throw, Frost Breath, Zippy Zap, Surging Strikes, Wicked Blow, and Flower Trick, along with any move used by a Pokémon that is under the effect of Laser Focus, will always result in a critical hit.
2. How do you calculate critical damage?: The chance of landing a critical hit is represented by the variable r, and when the hit is critical, the damage is calculated as b×[1+c].
3. How does crit damage work?: Crit damage is basically double the damage dice rolled, with any additional non-dice damage applied only once.

Critical Hit Chance and Damage

4. What is a good crit damage?: A recommended ratio of CRIT Rate and CRIT DMG is 1:2, with CRIT DMG being double the CRIT Rate.
5. Is 100% crit damage good?: Having at least 50% crit rate and 100% crit damage is considered ideal, with anything above that being a bonus.
6. What does over 100% crit chance do?: When a weapon achieves a crit chance higher than 100%, every attack will crit, and it also gains a chance to deal an even stronger crit.

Comparison with Other Stats

7. Is it better to have crit damage or strength?: It depends on the ability to apply vulnerability consistently or the critical strike chance, but in both cases, more damage is seen from crit/vulnerability if the chance is high enough.
8. Does crit damage affect elemental mastery?: Crit damage does not affect elemental mastery, as transformative reactions create individual damage that does not replace the triggering damage and scales from elemental mastery and the character’s level.

Specific Game Mechanics

9. Is a guard counter a critical hit in Elden Ring?: A guard counter in Elden Ring can trigger critical hit opportunities, making shields and melee builds more viable.
10. What armor has the highest focus in Elden Ring?: The highest known Focus values on armor are found on the Greathood, Corhyn’s Robe, Mushroom Arms, or Fire Prelate Gauntlets, providing a total bonus of 233 Focus.
11. Does crit chance increase damage?: Increasing raw power or critical chance always results in more damage, so players will pick what sounds cooler or is mathematically more efficient.

General Critical Hit Information

12. What is a critical hit?: A critical hit is a chance that a successful attack will deal more damage than a normal blow.
13. Does a crit automatically hit?: Yes, in rules as written, a critical will always hit, ignoring AC, while a natural 1 will always miss, ignoring bonuses.
14. How often do critical hits happen?: Critical hits occur randomly when striking enemies, with a default 4% chance of being a critical hit that deals approximately double the usual damage.
15. What damage is doubled on a crit?: On a crit, the damage of what you rolled is doubled, or the game rolls double the dice, with most tables rolling the usual dice and then doubling their values.