I. D.E.T.A.I.L.S. OVERVIEW

There are 7 attributes for player characters in Purge - four physical attributes (Dexterity, Agility, Life, and Strength) and three mental attributes (Energy, Tenacity, and Intelligence). Collectively they are known as the D.E.T.A.I.L.S. System.

Attributes points start from 5-25 (in increments of 5) or "poor", "fair", "good", "very good" and "excellent" respectively.

The tables below the descriptions of each attribute are here only to provide exact numbers to the people who want them. Understanding them is not necessary in order to understand the use of each attribute.

II. ASSUMPTIONS OF ATTRIBUTE

None of the characters in Purge are "human". Every member of the Order is genetically altered and/or designed with robotics. The followers of the Chosen have been enhanced with supernatural abilities. Their practices and beliefs have freed them from normal human limitations.

With that in mind, D.E.T.A.I.L.S. are actually scaled 1-10 for regular humans. Given enough training, a person could reach 15 at their peak. This is further illustrated by the chart below.

Characters in Purge Jihad, being enhanced beyond human ability, cannot start with any attribute lower than 5 and can start with attributes as high as 25. Characters earn a +1 to every attribute for each time s/he levels.

III. DEXTERITY

Physical attribute. A character's precision, accuracy and steadiness in controlling objects.

Dexterity controls how accurate your character is when s/he fires. Running, strafing and jumping have a cumulative effect of decreasing your accuracy, while ducking increases accuracy . There is also a Burst Penalty for auto-firing (holding down the trigger) which is determined on a per weapon basis. Dexterity not only makes an attack more accurate, but also lowers the penalties. With a high enough Dexterity you can strafe, run, and fire all at the same time with no penalty. Also, if you lack the Dexterity, the Chosen's and Order's military will not assign you a finesse/medium weapon. Dexterity must be "good" (or 15) to obtain this weapon. Additionally Dexterity aids in the "lock-on" ability of homing weapons (the Cyborg's SCRUB and the Fighter's Snakeblade).

Dexterity is modified by movement. Strafing, walking, running, and jumping each have Dexterity penalities. Crouching improves Dexterity. All modifiers are cumulative and limited to logical possibilities. Different weapon also have modifiers, making some weapons easier to use with low Dexterity than others. Walking, running, and crouching modifiers cannot be combined with each other. Dexterity also has the ability to soften weapon recoil and any penalties related to burst (automatic) fire. Different weapons have different weapon recoils and rates at which the burst penality will grow.

Additionally, Dexterity increases ranged weapon damage for all classes. Bonus damage is exponential - if you have 25 dex your bonus will be exponentially higher then if you had 5 dex; it does not go up linerarly.

(See below for further explainations.)

IV. ENERGY

Mental attribute. A character's mental endurance and power.

The amount of energy you have controls how often you can reuse a skill. Every time you use a skill, your energy level depletes. Energy controls how fast it recharges. The more points you have, the faster your energy bar recharges. First level skills use 1/3 of your energy bar, second level skills use 2/3 of your energy bar and third level skills uses 3/3 (or 100%) of the bar.

V. TENACITY

Mental attribute. A character's persistence, luck or unwillingness to die. Also reduces to "blinding pain" and stunning.

Tenacity has several unique abilities.

First, Tenacity has a chance of reducing damage via Saving Throws. Due to Mechanical and Spiritual Enhancement the characters no longer have to take full damage. With quick thinking and extreme determination, it is possible to "shrug off" damage from explosions and non-vital attacks so that the damage is reduced. The greater ones Tenacity, the greater the chance and the amount of damage that will be reduced.   A master of Tenacity have great divine favor from Evod or Mabus, giving the character a chance to be immune to critical attacks. This means that head shots do no extra damage. As these skills are slowly mastered, a character gains superhuman power to withstand death itself! Although you'll be reduced to one hit point you won't die immediately.

Second, Tenacity can reduce pain and shock from injury: "blinding pain" and stun time. The "blinding pain" screen flash occurs you take damage. The greater the damage, the longer and more opaque ("blinding") the flash. High Tenacity can greatly reduce the duration and opacity of the flash. Just as importantly, very high Tenacity also greatly reduces the base stun time duration each time you take damage. The base stun time is futher modified by the damage type. The minimum screen flash, after adjusting for damage and Tenacity reduction, is 10% opacity for 0.3 seconds. Otherwise, you might not notice you took damage.

Recovery, or more formally Damage Recovery, is final ability of Tenacity. It is related to the "never give-up attitude" of a character with high Tenacity. Whenever damage of any kind is inflicted on a player, a certain percentage of that damage can be converted into temporary damage and recovered. A character needs to stop taking damage for 2 seconds. Then his life will slowly begin to recover. More HP at first and less as time progresses. The amount of time depends on the amount to recover and how high your Tenacity is. Two numbers are important here. The first is damage recovery percentage. This is the percentage of each damage delivered to HP that covered into temporary damage. The second is the maximum number of HP "bufferable". That means that at any one time, you can recover no more than his amount of HP. As the HP are recovered and put back into your normal HP, the "buffer" will empty can be filled with temporary damage again. Note: Damage Recovery does not apply to damage inflicted to Armor, only Health.

VI. AGILITY

Physical attribute. A character's overall speed, nimbleness and balance. Agility improves a character's movement, sneaking, and gives a Reflex Saving Throw.

Agility allow you to move faster, jump higher and fall further (before taking damage, aka safe fall). Running, walking, & crouch walking is how fast one can move at each action respectively. Agility increases one's Safe Fall, the distance you can fall before you take any damage, and Death Fall, the distance at which you will automatically die.

Sneaking is a special skill directly releated to the Agility attribute rather than Intelligence. It will also determine whether crouching/walking/running will hide you on the "radar" (motion detector/sound detector in the upper left of the player's HUD). A "sneak check"' will be made at a frequent interval against your Agility, if you fail the check you will show up on the "radar" of players within hearing distance. It's far easier to sneak while crouching than while walking. Sneaking while running is nearly impossible, except for those with the highest Agility and few levels under their belt. Note that, as in real life, you cannot personally tell if you are successfully sneaking. However, your friends can inform you because you will also be hidden from their "radar".

With high enough Agility, at the last moment, one could have a dodging reflex -- the Reflex Save. The Reflex Save ability is similiar to the Resist Save of Tenacity. If the Saving Throw is successful, damage from non-vital or explosions are reduced. The amount of damage that is reduced and the chance of making the Reflex Save depends on the character's Agility rating. Like Resist Save, this has no effect on Critical Hits.

VII. INTELLIGENCE

Mental attribute. A character's mental comprehension and perfection of skills.

Intelligence controls the effectiveness of your skills. The higher your Intelligence is the more skills you get, and the better you are at using skills. The gaining of new skills is automatic - as you get more Intelligence through leveling skills go up and eventually new skills come in at their lowest power. Note: All characters always start with full profiency in their Minor Skill; it is not dependant on Intelligence.

VIII. LIFE

Physical attribute. A character's endurance and ability to take damage before dying.

Your Life is what determines how many hit points you have. For every 5 points of Life you get 50 hit points. Life also effects the amount of time you get "stunned" after being shot. With a base life of 5 you are stunned for 0.5 seconds. Stunned means you are slowed to the slowest possible movement speed (aka, crouch walking). The amount of time you're stunned goes down when you increase your life. Life also effects the "jar" amount when you get hit. (when you get hit your screen moves "up" a given amount depending on the damage type you were hit with and your Life). Very high Life also helps minimize the slowdown effect of cold weapons (Mage's Frostbolt and Wastelander's Chemical Thrower).

IX. STRENGTH

Physical attribute. A character's raw physical power and his ability to control it.

Strength increases melee damage for the Fighter as well as increasing the amount of ammo you can carry for every class. The encumbrance system has been refined multiple times and is simplified to be easy to understand. Regardless of which weapons your character can carry, Strength controls the amount of ammo you can carry for that weapon. There is an ammo cap to the "light weapon/sidearm", but there is no ammo cap for the "medium/finesse"(2nd) or "heavy/explosive"(3rd) weapon. Generally you will carry some "light/sidearm" ammo which usually reaches its cap early, lots of "medium/finesse" ammo, and little "heavy/explosive" ammo (e.g. Proximity Mines for the Commando and Fireballs for the Mage). Additionally, if you don't have high enough Strength ("good" or 15), you don't get your heavy weapon.

Strength also affects any slowdown that can occur when wielding a weapon. Every weapon has weight, and a few weapons weigh so much that a player's movement will slow down if s/he is not strong enough while using the weapon. Weapons can slow a player down by 25%. Note: only a small minority of weapons actually weight enough to slow down a player.

Strength also gives bonus melee damage and armor penetration (weapon 1) for all classes. The Strength bonus works is differently than the Dexterity bonus. It is additive instead of a multiplier. (See below for further explainations.)

X. DEXTERITY AND STRENGTH: DAMAGE BONUS SPECIFICS

Characters have multiple ways to increase weapon damage, including aiming for the head and praying for the Penetration Weapon Bless. It is also possible to increase "base" weapon damage, the damage the weapon does normally. This is done by creating a character with high Dexterity or Strength.

Dexterity and Strength damage bonuses work on different weapons and in different ways. Dexterity provides a multiplier to the weapon's base damage. Dexterity damage bonus applies to all light, medium, and heavy weapons (weapon 2, weapon 3, and weapon 4). Generally speaking Dexterity is your best attribute for increasing weapon damage. Unlike Dexterity, Strength adds damage instead of multipling it. The Strength damage gain is virtually the foundation of damage for melee weapons. Remember, no ordinary human being could ever have 25 Strength. It borders on being rammed by a moving vehicle. Strength damage bonus applies to all melee (weapon 1: Mage's Staff, Android's Steel Fist, Cyborg's Combat Knife, Fighter's Magic Mace, Monk's Punch, & Wastelander's Proton Blade).

It is worth noting that, blades tends to have better base penetration than blunt weapons, and with the Strength penetration bonus, can be used against 10 AC constructions with lower Strength than blunt/bludgeon weapons, but they swing about 10-15% slower.

The Fighter has special expections to the above rules. He benefits greatly from the Strength bonus since all his weapons except for the Snakeblade are variants of magical melee weapons.

The Magic Mace the Fighter wields as weapon 1 is the most powerful weapon 1 in the game. While it follows the normal Strength damage rules, it is worth noting the base damage and penetration on the weapon is about 15x times higher. Most melee weapons do 1-5 points of base damage per hit before being adjusted for Strength. The Mace does 15-75. (Note: The Wastelander's radioactive Proton Blade is approximatly as powerful as the Magic Magic. It has does less damage, but swings faster. It has the same armor penetration.)

Fighter's Defender is very unique. Not only is the only weapon that shields the player, but it is also the ONLY that can gain BOTH Dexterity and Strength bonuses. With the Defender's high armor Penentration, when a Fighter has both high Dexterity and Strength, this is can easily be a "one-hit" weapon. To maximize the benefit, the Strength damage bonus is added first, then multiplied with Dexterity damage bonus. Remember, the Defender is "ranged melee" weapon that emits an "energy wave" with each swing of the blade.

The Phoenix Axe is also a "ranged melee" that is send out explosions after being swung with great force. It is the ONLY heavy/explosive weapon (weapon 4) that gains its damage bonus from Strength and not Dexterity. Since the Phoenix Axe emits 5 seperate explosions, the Strength damage bonus is split equally 20% to all explosions.