Why are Proxima and Captain Sam suffering Armour Break through block?

TL:DR - There seems to be an inconsistent interaction between champs who inflict armour break through block, and champs who cause 'AAR' when blocking

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So, I just (slightly reluctantly) took on Annihilus in AW using Captain America (Sam Wilson), because someone else had taken the mutant/Prowess path I had my eye on.

Oh well, I thought. Actually Captain Sam should do pretty well against Annihilus there. He was on node 27: gain Unblockable when the opponent has three or more debuffs. Since Annihilus inflicts a lot of debuffs through block, he can be a pain there.

But despite class disadvantage, Captain Sam has a huge ace up his sleeve: when he has a Bulwark buff, he reduces the opponent's Ability Accuracy by 100% whilst blocking. So he should be fine, right?

Well, I opened with a few dodges and intercepts until I gained the Bulwark buff. Then I blocked a couple of hits and immediately picked up Armour Break debuffs. But no Stifles, interestingly.

Well, at least that cut the debuffs by half, so actually Annihilus never went Unblockable; Sam did pretty well and got the solo. Nice one, pillow-hands :-)

Still, I don't like it when abilities fail, so I did some testing.

First I checked that Annihilus doesn't have some Immunity to AAR that I'd forgotten about. He doesn't.

Then I did the same fight in Practice mode against my own Annihilus, to avoid nodes. Same result: picked up Armour Breaks through block, but no Stifles.

Then I did the same fight with Proxima. She's even better than Sam at this: she's got permanent -200% OAAR when blocking, so you don't have to worry about losing your Bulwark buff. Same result for her though, picking up Armour Breaks (but not Stifles) through block from Annihilus.

Who else does stuff through block, I thought? I went into quite a few Practice Duels:

Yondu: Prox worked perfectly. No bleeds through block. Tried Yondu Vs Sam; and Bulwark seemed to work perfectly too, preventing bleeds or Armour Pilfer.
Shang-Chi: Prox prevented his block-penetrating 'Master of Kung-Fu' ability. In fact, he can't actually trigger any of his Wushu strikes into block - they become unreadied, but nothing happens
Red Hulk and Hercules both inflict burst physical damage through block; but Prox and Sam successfully prevented it.
Masacre: Prox didn't grant him Charges when she was blocking, and tanked his SP2 effortlessly; Masacre was clearly not benefiting from his usual insane 'damage through block' bonus on his SP2.
Spidey-2099: Pushed him to SP2 and let him inflict a Wither on Sam. That should enable Spidey to inflict Rupture through block; but Sam prevented it.
Rogue: Can usually Life Steal through block on SP1. Happily, it didn't work with these two opponents.
War Machine loves throwing his SP1 into block. Usually he can inflict Suppression debuffs that way; but Prox and Sam prevented them.
Captain Marvel Movie: In this fight, AAR when blocking didn't work again - when she was in Binary form, CMM very quickly started inflicting Armour Breaks through block on both Sam and Prox. Oh dear...
Sentinel: Can inflict Special Attack debuffs through block once he's at 100 Analysis; including inflicting Armour Break on SP1. Interestingly, nothing got through...
Fractured Guard: Valkyrie - in current EQ - has this node, letting her inflict armour break through block. Prox shuts it down from the start. Sam shuts it down with his Bulwark buff

So it seems that Proxima and Sam's ability to reduce Offensive Ability Accuracy works for most things, which is good. I had been thinking that Armour Break was the issue: was there something about Armour Break that bypassed the OAAR? But then Sentinel doesn't seem to do that, and nor does Valkyrie in EQ.

Anyone else have an explanation? Or is this one the mods should move to the Bugs thread? I didn't start it there, since the Bugs thread is basically a graveyard of unread posts; and I thought this one was at least worth being read by a few people.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

Comments

Theretic

Maratox

Typing: 100
Reading: 0

odishika123

OP seeing this after the write up

Riptide

Very well done write up though!

Magrailothos

OP seeing this after the write up

LOL 😂

That's presumably a partial explanation, so (genuinely) thanks @Theretic and @odishika123

I appreciate I missed that line in his abilities, so thanks, except: why no Stifles? Shouldn't he be inflicting those, too?

Also, very happy to hear what's your explanation for Captain Marvel doing the same thing?

Theretic

OP seeing this after the write up

LOL 😂

That's presumably a partial explanation, so (genuinely) thanks @Theretic and @odishika123

I appreciate I missed that line in his abilities, so thanks, except: why no Stifles? Shouldn't he be inflicting those, too?

Also, very happy to hear what's your explanation for Captain Marvel doing the same thing?

Stifle is an ability that triggers simultaneously with obliterating strikes but is not a part of them so it can be affected by AAR

Magrailothos

OP seeing this after the write up

LOL 😂

That's presumably a partial explanation, so (genuinely) thanks @Theretic and @odishika123

I appreciate I missed that line in his abilities, so thanks, except: why no Stifles? Shouldn't he be inflicting those, too?

Also, very happy to hear what's your explanation for Captain Marvel doing the same thing?

Stifle is an ability that triggers simultaneously with obliterating strikes but is not a part of them so it can be affected by AAR

There's a distinct lack of clarity about that in his in-game description, but I suspect you're right.

Current in-game screenshot (the text of which suggests that Obliterations trigger Stifle directly, but it's clearly a bit garbled):

However, going right back to his original Spotlight I think you're right:

So Obliterations trigger the armour break (and are immune to AAR) and armour break triggers Stifle (but this is then susceptible to AAR).

That would make this not a bug; but the in-game text describing Stifle could certainly benefit by being tidied up.

Cool. That's Annihilus sorted (really quickly! That's why I posted here - you don't get this kind of feedback in Bugs and Known Issues!)

Can you explain Captain Marvel Movie also inflicting Armour Break through block on Prox and Sam?

Bhavesh2k

As far as I recall, her beam attacks are unblockable in binary form that's what is removing your blocks and inflicting armour breaks. I may be wrong though !!!!

Magrailothos

As far as I recall, her beam attacks are unblockable in binary form that's what is removing your blocks and inflicting armour breaks. I may be wrong though !!!!

No it's her basic attacks.

I think I might have the explanation, though; having thought about it overnight, and experimented some more with CMM/Prox.

I can't get CMM to inflict Armour Break through Prox's block except in Binary mode.

So, I think the issue is that Captain Marvel can Enhance her ability accuracy in the same way as an Enhanced Abilities node, because of the way she's coded. She has this Passive (always on) ability called Super Strength:

The Super Strength is then augmented when she's in Binary mode:

I think the reason Prox doesn't work here is for the same reason why Falcon can't shut down Mr Fantastic's evasion, or Spidey on an Enhanced Ability node:

Prox applies -200%AAR to CMM's basic 15% Armour Break.
This reduces it to a modified chance of either zero (maybe) or to -15% (either of these sounds plausible, tbh).
Binary mode then adds a bonus of +45%, most likely as a flat +45% chance.
This is added to CMM'S modified Armour Break chance of 0/-15% to produce a final total of either 45% or 30% chance of inflicting Armour Break.

Does that sound like an explanation that fits?
@Theretic

Magrailothos

Porthos, did you move this thread to Strategy and Tips?

Why?

I mean I can understand moving it to Bugs & Known Issues (I half expected that to happen); but Strategy & Tips? Was that intentional?

Anyhow, it probably isn't a Bug at all. I think it's increasingly clear that what I've described is probably to do with (1) Annihilus's Obliterating Strikes being immune to AAR, and (2) how AAR is applied to CMM's Super Strength; rather than being a bug. So that's good.

However it would have been easier to work out if Annihilus's in-game text was accurate and made clear that the Stifles aren't actually triggered by Obliterating Strikes themselves.

In-game:

Spotlight:

Any chance the in-game text could get tidied up to at least slightly resemble his Spotlight? And I'm pretty sure that Stifles haven't been buffed to reduce Defensive Combat Power by 100%...