Isolytic

Concept · Damage and defense

In short: A second damage pool every shot carries, sized from its standard damage. It skips standard mitigation; Isolytic Defense cuts it, then it merges with the standard remainder for Apex Barrier, critical mitigation and the shield split.

Isolytic damage is dealt on top of a shot’s standard damage, never taken out of it. The attacker’s Isolytic Damage sizes it: two brackets, the plain bonus and Isolytic Cascade Damage, each starting at ×1, so whole shot = standard × (1 + bonus) × (1 + cascade) and isolytic is what that adds to standard. Either bracket alone makes isolytic damage. The calculator on that page shows how the two trade off.

The defender’s Isolytic Defense is the counterpart of standard mitigation for this pool: mit = def / (1 + def), so 100% defense takes off half. Standard mitigation never touches isolytic damage. Some hostiles can only take isolytic damage (Isolytic Invulnerability): a shot’s standard damage is removed in full against them, and only its isolytic part counts.

After Isolytic Defense the isolytic remainder joins the standard remainder, and the merged pool runs the rest of the pipeline: Apex Barrier, critical mitigation, then the shield split. On a critical hit, critical mitigation cuts isolytic twice: its first cut comes off the gross pool before Isolytic Defense, and its second comes off the merged pool, isolytic remainder included.

The calculator below follows one fight’s isolytic damage through every stage. Damage Flow has every other mechanic beside it.