Poise | |
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Poise is a Stat in Dark Souls.
It's an in-game statistic that increases your resistance to being staggered or stun-locked as an effect of taking hits from opponents.
- Staggered: an enemy's attack interrupts your action. High poise will allow you to perform an action to completion despite being hit by enemies in their course (example: swinging a slow weapon, or casting spells).
- Stun-locked: an enemy's attacks causes you to temporarily be paralyzed, leaving you vulnerable to consecutive hits. Poise will allow you to soak up heavier hits and increase the number of consecutive hits you can take before getting stun-locked.
How it works
- Poise is a passive trait that is raised by wearing armor that gives you poise, equiping theWolf Ring, casting Iron Flesh and/or using the Havel's Greatshield stoneskin buff. Note, however, that both Iron Flesh and the stoneskin buff are personal buffs and cannot be used concurrently.
- Poise works, in essence, as the maximum value of an invisible "poise bar". Whenever you're hit by an attack, that attack/weapon has an invisible "poise damage" value, which decreases your poise bar by that amount. Consecutively receiving attacks will continue to decrease the bar further. When it hits 0, your character will stagger.
- After 5 second of not being hit, Poise will instantly refill to max for you or the enemy. Wearing armor will reduce the timer to 3.4 second.
Where to view Poise
- You can view your Poise on the Character Stats screen, and is located on the far right.
- Also viewing the stats of armor by pressing Square(PS), or X(Xbox) will show how much Poise that specific item will give you.
Poise in PvE and PvP
Poise in PvP
- In PvP,poise is important toengage in trades without being ripped out of the offensive by the stun animation. This applies to trading with attacks or trading an opponent's attack with a backstab.
- The most important breakpoints are 32 to take all the quickest attacks, 53 or 56 to take one of all the most dangerous attacks (except forBlack Flame) and 61 to take 2x an attack which deals 30 poise Damage.
- Optimal Breakpoints are highly dependent on what build one is fighting. As an example, there is no immediatereason to use 61 poise against a Quality build (Strength and Dexterity), which may use aMurakumoor aClaymore, 53 poise would take a single two-handed light attack of each. However those builds are capable of swapping to a Katana, Spear or Curved Sword, against which 61 poise would give a significant advantage, and having invested into getting 53 instead of 32 poise will instead be a disadvantage.
Poise in PvE
- In PvE,poise is also important againsttank enemies that hit hard. Which usually wear heavy equipment and move slow.
- Creatures' hits tend to do:
- 5, 10 poise damage for weak enemies (Hollow Undead);
- 20, 30, 35 for normal enemies (Silver Knight)
- 45, 50 for stronger enemies or Bosses (Black Knight, Gargoyle, Gwyn, Artorias, Manus).
- 60 is considered the normally max damage by very big enemies preDLC (BoC, Bk strong attacks)
- Mimic's Kicks do 100
- 120 is the maximum poise damage sustainable given in one hit by enemies (Guardian Axe Earthshake).
- Kalameet does 300 poise damage, it will always stagger you.
Staggered
- Becoming staggered is a very serious situation, and can become very difficult when surrounded by numerous enemies.
- Being staggered means that you will not be able to control your character after taking a heavy blow from an opponent.
- It should also be important to remember that two handing a single weapon increases the poise break damage and can be used to stagger opponents unexpectable.
- Note that some attacks cause instant staggering, and is not dependent on your Poise count.
Poise Break Points
It has been found that certain weapon classes will stun people at very specific poise amounts. For example Ultra Greatswords
when used 2 handed, will stun anyone at 75 poise or less. So a poise of 76 will prevent you being stunlocked by a hit from an UGS. However these values will only save you from 1 hit. If you are hit again before your "poise bar" empties completely you will be stunned.
Each time a hit is taken, poise will reduce and remain briefly frozen at the latest value (it does not regenerate steadily like stamina). This means that if a player with 53 poise gets hit by an attack that drains 20 poise, the player will then have exactly 33 poise for the next few seconds. A hidden timer is triggered with each hit that is taken, and if it completes before another hit is taken, poise will instantly refill back to 100%.
| Weapons | 1-handed | 2-handed | Other |
|---|---|---|---|
| Broken Sword | 1.01 | 1.51 | Multipliers are the same for most weapons |
| Ultra Greatswords | 51 | 76 | |
| Great Hammers | 51 | 76 | |
| Great Axes | 51 | 76 | 2h Black knight great axe: 61, 1h: 41 |
| Greatswords | 36 | 53 | 1h running attack: 41, 2h: 56 Claymore 1h R2: 42 |
| Curved Greatswords | 36 | 53 | |
| Hammers/Axes | 36 | 53 | |
| Straight swords | 21 | 31 | |
| Curved Swords | 21 | 31 | |
| Katanas | 21 | 31 | 1h running attack: 22, 2h: 32 |
| Spears | 21 | 31 | |
| Halberds | 21 | 31 | 2h Black knight halberd 46, 1h: 31 |
| Whips | 21 | 31 | |
| Fist weapons | 21 | - | |
| Piercing swords | 6 | 8 | |
| Daggers | 6 | 8 | |
| Bolts/Arrows | 21 | ||
| Spells: | |||
| Great Fireball | 81 | ||
| Heavy Soul Arror/Spear | 81 | ||
| Black Flame | 61 | ||
| Great Combustion | 41 | ||
| Wrath of the Gods | 21 | Always stuns, less than 21 poise gets you knocked down | |
| Dark Bead | 15 x hit | Max 105 | |
| Homing Spell | 15 x hit | Max 75 | |
| Sunlight Spear Gravelord Greatdance Chaos Firestorm | ∞/120 x hit | Funny how the attacks that deal more poise damage are the one representing Gwyn, Izalith and Nito (and Dragon Weapons 2hR2) |
Enemies Poise
If something is not present, they have 0 or infinite Poise health
Undeads, Skeletons, Balder Knight, Frog, Basilisk, Rat, Dog, Bloatheads, Demonic Foliage 0
Crow Demon 30
Man-Eater Shell 30
Channeler 45
Giant Skeleton 45
Great Feline 45
Minor Capra Demon 45
Serpent Soldier 45
Silver Knight 45
Darkwraith 65
Drake 65
Mimic 65
Skeleton Beast 65
Black Knight 80
Chained Prisoner 80 (it wont get staggered by light hitstun) timer 4 sec
Sentinel 80
Chaos Eater 90
Lesser Sanctuary Guardian 90
Andre of Astora 100
Butcher 100
Giant Undead Rat 100
Minor Taurus Demon 100
Vamos 100
Infested Barbarian 110
Bone Tower 120
Crystal Golem 120
Mushroom Parent 120
Golden Crystal Golem 130
Heavy Knight 130
Sentinel(Royal) 130
Mass of Souls 140
Giant Stone Knight 200
Titanite Demon 200
Stone Guardian 200
Bosses Poise
Centipede DemonArm 60
Centipede DemonTail 60
Bell Gargoyles 80
Ornstein(regular only) 90
Sanctuary Guardian 90
Gwyn 100
Gwyndolin 100
Pinwheel 100
Capra Demon 110
Smough 110
Super Smough 110
Taurus Demon 120
Knight Artorias 130/90 when buffing, timer 2 second
Iron Golem 16% hp and 8% when trembling within 10 second
Crossbreed Priscilla 60 when invisible / ∞
