Adaptability

Adaptability is a Stat in Dark Souls II.

General Information

Adaptability is the combination of Resistance and an Agility stat (from the beta tests). Raising Adaptability increases Poise and more importantly raises the substat called Agility.

Improving Adaptability also raises all status defenses (i.e. Poison, Bleed, Curse and Petrify), whilst also raising the player's HP and Poison Attack Bonus slightly. Finally, Adaptability is also complementary with the Endurance stat, in that raising the two stats at the same rate will grant extra natural Poise.

Agility

• Increased by both Adaptability and Attunement, where Adaptability is more beneficial. ADP levels Agility three times faster than Attunement.
• Hard-capped at 120 with both Adaptability and Attunement at 99.
• Improves Estus consumption animation. The item consume speed multiplier only changes between 90 and 100 Agility. At the lowest possible Agility your Estus consume speed is 2.5 seconds, at 100 Agility it takes just over 2 second to complete the Estus consumption animation.
• Improves Weapon swap speed. This multiplier scales from 120% at minimum Agility up to 145% at maximum Agility.
• Improves speed of guard raise animation. This multiplier scales from 100% at minimum Agility up to 150% at maximum Agility.
• Additional invincibility frames while rolling and backstepping - see charts below.

Invincibility Frames - iFrames

Invincibility frames (or i-frames) are the frames during rolls that a character are invincible to enemies' attacks, measured in 1/30ths of a second (or about 0.0333... seconds each).

Invincibility frames are increased in a non-linear way, affected by Agility rather than Equip Load, with Equip Load only affecting distance when rolling.

Agility has specific breakpoints in which you gain iFrames, they are the stopping points you will want to meet as you level. The only breakpoints worth caring about are 92/96/99 Agility, these are important because you do not gain additional rolling iframes between breakpoints. This means that having 95 Agility is the same as having 92 Agility in terms of iframes.

Compared to Dark Souls, 96 Agility will give you 11 i-frames which is the same as all roll types except for Dark Wood Gain Ring roll type which is 13 iframes.

Rolling with insufficient stamina will cause iFrames to be reduced on those rolls.

Dark Souls 2 iFrame Charts

"Investment" tiers exist to compensate for the overlapping menu display values of Agility in different tiers. For example 110 AGL is the menu display for 7 internal values, the subindexes on AGL numbers accomplish the same function (x).

"Investment" = ADP x .75 + ATN x .25 rounded down to the nearest whole number. ADP levels Agility three times faster than Attunement does.

The Agility displayed in your player status screen might not always accurately reflect the in-game math and iFrames the player character has. As an example, when Agility is calculated to be less than 85 it will be set to a value of 85 regardless. When players start the game before picking a class and character name, they will be at soul level negative 44, but Agility will still be displayed as 85. This correlates on the chart with tier 1 investment 85(a) AGL.

Bandit, Warrior and Cleric class all have 85 Agility displayed in the menu, though Bandit class has a lower amount of iFrames. Bandit class starts with 2 Attunement and 3 Adaptability which calculates to Agility investment tier 2 giving 7 iframes on rolls, this is reflected on the above chart as 85(b) Agility. Warrior and Cleric class are calculated to tier 5 investment 85(e) which is 8 iFrames on rolls, though all three classes have in menu values of 85 Agility. This means that when starting as Bandit players will need to invest more points to get to 86 agility compared with these other classes that start with higher Adaptability and Attunement. It is important to note that the crucial breakpoints of 92, 96 and 99 Agility will always accurately match with the menu display, In addition, the less important breakpoints of 88 and 105 will also match menu values when calculating your agility investment tier.

There are several more points where the menu display will remain at the same display value but iFrames are gained between them, such as the displayed value of 110 which can be 13 or 14 iFrames on rolls, or the display value of 112 which can be 8 or 9 iFrames on backsteps. Agility investment was made to describe these true iFrame values since they are not displayed in a meaningful way by the game. The above chart only shows points at which the player character gains iFrames, to see the raw data for all AGL investment visit this spreadsheet.

Resources

Dark Souls 2 iFrame Visual Helper - created by Qui, make a copy to use.