Dodging

Version 0.31: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

The Dodging skill will affect your chance of dodging an attack, be it melee, ranged or magical. Certain types of attack cannot be dodged, however, such as enchantments (which must be resisted) and explosions.

The Dodging skill determines how well your character can avoid blows, beams and missiles fired by monsters.

Aptitudes

At	Ba	Co	DE	Dg	Ds	Dj	Dr	Fe	Fo	Gr	Gh	Gn	Hu	Ko	Mf	Mi	MD	Mu	Na	Op	On	Sp	Te	Tr	Vp	VS
-3	1	-1	2	-1	-1	1	-1	3	-1	-2	-1	8	0	2	3	1	-3	-2	-2	0	-1	3	1	-2	1	-2

Useful Info

Dodging skill provides a bonus to EV, equal to:

(8 + 0.8 × Dodging × Dex) / (20 - size)

Size is a factor dependent on your species' body size. Humans are 0, Spriggans are +4, and Trolls are -2. (See Evasion for a full list.)

This bonus is then reduced by encumbrance, if any.

Encumbrance

Armour encumbrance will directly lower the bonus from Dodging. This factor is not reduced by Armour skill, but it is reduced by strength.

• If (encumbrance - 3) ≥ strength:

Modifier = 0.5 * Str / (encumbrance - 3)

• If (encumbrance - 3) < strength:

Modifier = 1 - ((encumbrance - 3) / (2 * Str))

In either case, the modifier is multiplied directly with Dodging bonus, to get the final EV bonus.

If you are paralysed, your Dodging skill is completely ineffective. The only thing that contributes to EV in this case is your size.

Strategy

The usual skill advice in Crawl is to "train your killing skills to competency first, then train your defenses". Dodging an extra attack won't help if you have to use a consumable to beat every other fight. It's perfectly reasonable to turn Dodging off at the start, then turn it back on later on when you feel skilled enough at killing stuff.

Dodging is more effective when you have higher dexterity and you are wearing lighter armour. Still, even a brute in crystal plate armour will eventually want to train a few levels of Dodging, since the early levels of a skill are cheap.

See also

• Evasion

History

• Prior to 0.27, there was a stepdown on dexterity: if dex >= 24, adj_dex = 14 + 10 * log2(1 + (dex - 14)/10). This reduced the impact of dexterity at high DEX values. Also, there was a separate stepdown if EV >= 30, documented in Evasion.
• Prior to 0.6, characters could only train Dodging when wearing light armour and would train Armour only when wearing heavy armour.