I've always hated how details can't be viewed when choosing your loadout. So here is a database of damages, along with some more in-depth calculations. Obviously, spoiler alert for equipment you might have yet to unlock or master. My personal style (or is it everyone's?) is using critical extinguish to deal massive damage with single hits, so this guide will be biased towards that. I also haven't figured out how armor works, so this guide is about dealt damage.

All info are determined empirically. Tested on v1.1.7.4. I very likely made some mistakes, so feel free to comment any corrections.

I have given up trying to figure out how rounding works. There does not seem to be a global rule, especially when it comes to 0.5. I am going to chalk it up to the displayed damage being fractional to begin with. So all values in this guide are subject to rounding error.

When weapons and lucid attacks are upgraded, the damage increase scales with their current damage. It is not the same rate, though, so it would be inaccurate to call it exponential. Anyway, it is easier to just explain with the actual numbers.


This table can be used to calculate damages for all levels and all attack types (within rounding error), so only level 1 stats are provided in the later sections.

I use this in my personal playstyle, and I suspect others do too. The game barely mentions this mechanism, despite how powerful it can be and how entire playstyles can be based off of it. Critical extinguishes open up the opportunity to deal massive damage, but require setup. I may henceforth refer to them as elemental extinguishes.

Extinguishes can be triggered by dealing elemental damage while an enemy is affected by an elemental status effect from a different attack. The status effect(s) involved will be removed after an elemental extinguish, with the exception of effects applied by keepsakes, which occur after the extinguish. Not all combinations result in an elemental extinguish. I will refer the reader to the wiki[dreamscaper.wiki.gg] for a chart, since it seems that someone has put more effort into verifying this than I have, or has access to source information. Keep in mind that bosses can't be frozen. A successful elemental extinguish can be easily identified with the unique animation and sound effect. The damage will also be bold, but that is the same as for natural criticals.

To reiterate, elemental extinguishes must be status effect, then elemental damage. Here are some examples to illustrate various scenarios.

• Applying burn, then dealing lightning damage will not trigger an extinguish, because it is not a valid combination.
  
• Dealing ice damage, but failing to freeze, then dealing wind damage will not trigger an extinguish.
  
• Wetting an enemy, then dealing non-elemental damage that applies burn will not trigger an extinguish.
  
• Wetting an enemy, then dealing fire damage that does not apply burn will trigger an extinguish.
  
• Applying shock, then applying wet with a roll will trigger an extinguish. But you dealt 0 damage and cancelled the status effects. Congratulations.

Additionally, repeated hits from the same type of attack (melee, ranged, or lucid slot) will not trigger an extinguish, even if it applies a status effect that would normally combo. On the other hand, different attacks (including two different lucid attacks) can stack the same status effect at the same time. In other words, you can double-burn an enemy with two different attacks. A keepsake will not double the status effect if an attack already applies it (e.g., Raijin + Plasma Ball will not double-shock).

As you might have inferred from all of the above, yes, you can deal double, triple, and even more simultaneous elemental extinguishes with appropriate strategy. I can think of a theoretical 11x stack, however impractical that might be. Feel free to comment theoretical combos and builds.

Now for the fun part: damage calculations. At max meditation upgrade, a critical extinguish deals an extra 1.65 * critical damage bonus, per extinguish. This stacks with perfect damage, but not with natural crits (which also stack with perfect damage). For those who prefer formula form, here is the comprehensive equation:


With a default critical bonus of +100%, a 1x elemental extinguish will deal 2.65x "normal" damage (usually higher than the listed value if you have rare equipment; see formula above). Paired with a lucid attack with high single-hit damage, this is well over 100 damage at level 1. This may not seem all that impressive, but that's without a developed build, and it is still enough to one-combo all but the heaviest grunts right from the start (for those that play on higher intensities). Having been playing for a while (lots of permanent upgrades), I have found it fairly easy to reach +200% critical bonus and 2x extinguish by endgame. This is a 7.6x multiplier, and an appropriately leveled lucid attack will deal several thousand.

For the sake of example, I fished for a high-combo build and reached +199% critical damage with 5x critical extinguish, equating to a 17.4x multiplier. It was less usable against standard enemy mobs, but great at assassinating bosses. I will save the actual damage number as a present at the end. I could probably go higher with more attempts, but I prefer shorter (faster), more versatile combos for use against standard mobs.

A quick explanation regarding weapon elements: Some weapons have a default element associated with them. This element will not and cannot ever be changed. However, weapons that are default non-elemental and of sufficient rarity can have a random element assigned to them (restrictions may apply; not verified). The element, including non-elemental, can be rerolled by reforging modifiers. It's a literal gamble, though.

I don't think any of this applies to lucid attacks.

A quick note about the mastery bonuses in the following sections: Generally, these bonuses only affect the weapon or attack itself. (FYI global effects are denoted by an extra circle.) Exceptions are elemental damage and elemental status durations, including freeze chance but excluding shock chains (unverified). Buff durations are claimed to be non-global, but that doesn't make any sense, since those attacks do not provide any buffs by default.

I personally have not paid too much attention to single-hit melee damage, so I can't be bothered to test out and calculate each hit's damage in a combo per weapon. I think that range and combo timing matter more than DPS, although that can be said for ranged weapons and lucid attacks as well, so probably I am just biased against melee.

Generally speaking, alternate attacks deal more damage than the first hit, but less than the last in a combo. You can roll-perfect alt attacks, but not standard attacks.

Anyway, here is a table of level 1 DPS for reference.

tl;dr I prefer Gale Blade for guaranteed wind element, and because I don't like Whirling Current as much. You choose what you like.

Ranged attacks do more damage the longer you charge them (up to a maximum, of course). Furthermore, perfectly timed attacks deal max damage, plus the perfect bonus scaled by the max damage. This means that perfectly timing a shot can do way more damage than a quick draw. Yet somehow these details were deemed too trivial for the game to mention. No, continuous-fire weapons cannot be charged nor roll-perfected.

Since ranged attacks cost lucid and are not spammable, I feel that damage per shot is a more useful value than DPS (except for the continuous-fire ones). And also because I am biased towards elemental extinguish. Here are the damage values at level 1. A reminder to expect rounding errors, particularly for this section.

tl;dr I use Finger Gun and reroll for an element, for massive elemental extinguish damage.

No, lucid attacks cannot be roll-perfected. Here are the level 1 damage values.

tl;dr I prefer Power Chord. Geyser and Skyfall are also good candidates for massive elemental extinguish damage.

Sorry, but you'll have to come up with that yourself. I've already shared my preferences.

Again, feel free to comment any corrections, questions, or builds.

Here's putting those numbers to use. Spoiler alert!