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Damage Types are damage modifiers that apply to all Marine and Alien weapon/ability damage, which determine the amount of damage inflicted on players, units, and structures' Health and Armor values.

Health

Icon health Health is the primary indicator of a player, unit, or structure's well-being. Players and units spawn with full health, and lose health when hit by attacks from enemy players or structures such as Sentries, Hydras, and Whips.

Unbuilt structures start with a low amount of health that gradually increases as the structure is being built. Unbuilt structures will only be healed or repaired if they receive damage, otherwise health will increase along with the building progress.

Note: Health shown in parentheses for Aliens mean the maximum amount of health for matured Structures.

Death

Once the player, unit, or structure's health reaches to 0, regardless of the amount of armor still intact, the player, unit, or structure will collapse and die. A Marine will then respawn at an Infantry Portal and an Alien will hatch as a skulk from an Egg.

Armor

Icon armour Armor is the secondary indicator of a player, unit, or structure's integrity. Armor reduces the amount of damage dealt to health by 70% by default for players. The only exceptions to this rule are Crush (increases armor percent by 7% per level), Nerve Gas and Bile (Bomb and Mine) and Tunnels (100% Armor Damage), Heal Spray, Spores, and Lerk Bite poison (0% Armor Damage).

Players and units spawn with full armor and lose armor when hit by attacks from enemy players or structures.

Unbuilt structures start with a low amount of armor that gradually increases as the structure is being built. Unbuilt structures will only be healed or repaired if they receive damage, otherwise, armor will increase along with the building progress.

Note: Armor shown in parentheses for Aliens mean the maximum amount of Armor for matured Structures.

Effective Health

Due to the nature of different damage types, armor can be considered an extension of health. For example, using the Normal damage type, that causes 1 armor point to absorb 2 points of damage, a Marine with 100 health and 30 armor can be considered to have effective health of 100 + 2(30) = 160 EHP against most attacks.

Effective Health formula
Effective
Health
Base
Health
Damage
Negated
Total
Armor

That means a Marine with 30 Armor can be killed with two Skulk Bites and one Parasite 2*75+10=160.

Other Effects and Exceptions

Some abilities and units change the way damage is dealt or received.

  • Mucous Membrane negates all damage a unit receives until a threshold is reached.
  • Exosuits only have armor and only die when their armor reaches 0.
  • ARCs only have armor when un-deployed.
  • Nano Shield reduces all damage by 32% while active.
  • Umbra reduces all damage an affected unit takes from bullet weapons by 25%
  • Spores and the poison from the Lerk Bite bypass armor.
  • Bone Shield reduces damage from the front of an Onos by 100% for most damage sources
  • Map hazards such as the lava falls on ns2_refinery reduce armor and health directly by a percentage.
  • Self-damage from a marine grenade deals only 33% damage

List of Damage Types

Armor typically absorbs 70% of incoming attacks, and the remaining 30% affects health. Damage types typically do not affect this damage distribution.

Basic Damage Types
Type Affects Armor/Health
ratio
Armor damage inflicted Frontiersmen Kharaa
Normal Icon health vs. all

Icon armour vs. all
70/30 1 Armor point absorbs 2 damage
Light Icon health vs. all

Icon armour vs. all
70/30 1 Armor point absorbs 4 damage N/A N/A
Heavy Icon health vs. all

Icon armour vs. all
70/30 1 Armor point absorbs 1 damage


Special Damage Types

All Special Damage Types affect Armour the same way as the Normal basic damage type, unless otherwise specified in the conditions column.

Special Damage Types
Type Affects Armor/Health
ratio
Conditions Frontiersmen Kharaa
Biological Icon health vs Marine

Icon armour vs Marine
70/30
  • Vs. Marine = 100% damage
  • Vs. Exosuit, Robots & Structures = 0 damage

N/A

Corrode Icon health vs Robots & Structures

Icon armour vs Frontiersmen
70/30
  • Vs. Robots & Structures = 100% damage
  • Vs. Marine = 12% damage to armor only
  • Vs. Exosuit = 40% damage to armor only

N/A

Flame Icon health vs Kharaa

Icon armour vs Kharaa
70/30
  • Vs. non-flammable targets = 100% damage
  • Vs. Structures = 200% damage
  • Vs. Flammable targets = 250% damage (multiplicative with Structural bonus, up to 500% and 1400% for Clogs and Cysts)
N/A
Cluster Icon health vs Kharaa & Self

Icon armour vs Kharaa & Self
70/30 same as Flame (doesn't set on fire) N/A
Gas Icon health vs Marine 0/100
  • Vs. Marine = 100% damage to health only
  • Vs. Exosuit, Robots & Structures = 0 damage
N/A
Nerve Gas Icon armour vs Kharaa 100/0
  • Vs. Kharaa = 100% damage to armor only
  • Vs. Frontiersmen = 0 damage
N/A
Puncture Icon health vs all

Icon armour vs all
70/30
  • Vs. Players = 200% damage (Machine Gun = 150%)
  • Vs. Non-Players & Structures = 100% damage
Splash Icon health vs ARC & Structures

Icon armour vs ARC & Structures
70/30
  • Vs. ARC = 100% friendly fire damage
  • Vs. Structures = 100% damage
  • Vs. Players & Units = 0 damage
N/A
Structural Icon health vs all

Icon armour vs all
70/30
  • Vs. Structures = 200% damage
  • Vs. Players & Units = 100% damage
GrenadeLauncher Icon health vs all

Icon armour vs all
70/30
  • Vs. Structures = 400% damage
  • Vs. Players & Units = 100% damage
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