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Great Cannon is a skill available in Dragon's Dogma.

Description[]

"An advanced form of Magick Cannon that conjures a sphere of magickal power, and fires more rounds of spellshot at foes."

Great Cannon conjures a magickal floating orb or sigil, which, when struck by a wide variety of attacks, including both friendly and enemy attacks, emits balls of magick that target and seek out enemies to damage them.

The Great Cannon sigil takes on the enchantment of the equipped sword or mace - if the weapon was temporarily enchanted, the sigil will take an appearance appropriate to the relative Archmagick.

A Great Cannon sigil persists for 19.5 seconds, 50% longer than Magick Cannon. Each orb is no more powerful than the single Magick Cannon orb, though there are three generated instead of one.

Damage[]

Magick
Cannon
Great
Cannon
Duration 13s 19.5s
Orbs per hit 1 3
Orb power Identical

Great Cannon does both physical and magickal damage and scales very approximately with a 2:3 split of the caster's Strength and Magick stats. Thus both strength and magick boosting potions and charms increase damage. Enchanting the summoning weapon prior to casting the sigil increases the sigil's damage.

  • The magick damage is thought to depend in a ratio of 3:1 on the caster's base and weapon magicks.
  • The physical damage depends only on the weapon's attack strength, omitting the wielder's base strength.
  • The physical portion always deals Blunt Damage.
  • Since the Great Cannon scales from both magick and strength, it performs a split-damage attack against both damage thresholds.

Due to Great Cannon's mixed damage it can strike any enemy in Gransys, from Ghosts to Golems. However, when targeting magick-resistant objects such as Metal Golem discs, only weapons with high physical stats will cause damage; a low level weapon such as Obliteratrix may do no damage even if used by a high-level, powerful Arisen - this is a consequence of the attack power being independent of the wielder's own strength.

Each single strike of the sigil produces a set of orbs (just one orb per set with Magick Cannon).  Skills with multiple strikes will produce multiple sets of orbs. For example, a single blow of Onslaught produces one set of three orbs; whilst a single use of Full Moon Slash produces five sets .

Orb power from a sigil struck with the weapon used to incant it is independent of the skill used - thus the key factor in damage is the number of strikes during the sigil's existence. On terms of rate of fire :

  • With Onslaught, 24 strikes can be made before the sigil dissipates
  • With Compass Slash, 15 combos can be made to produce 30 sets of orbs
  • With Full Moon Slash, 9 combos can produce 45 sets of orbs.
  • With Antler Toss, 12 uses can produce 48 sets of orbs.

Thus skills such as Full Moon Slash can produce more orbs and damage, but at a cost of higher stamina use.

Range and Targeting[]

Great_Cannon,_Blessed_Riposte_combo_(demonstration)

Great Cannon, Blessed Riposte combo (demonstration)

When combined with a Blessed Riposte or Frost Riposte, a Perfect Block executed in front of one or more Great Cannon sigils will produce a rapid-fire "Burst" combo. In this demonstration, a single Perfect Block (with Blessed Riposte) fires two Great Cannons to slay a Griffin outright. The Prescience augment was not equipped for this demonstration.

  • The Cannon orbs have good range, similar to standard shots from bows or longbows. Unlike arrows, and like most spells, damage is constant over distance. The range limit is over one Drake length from head to tail tip, but not as great as the same measure of the Ur-Dragon.
  • A Great Cannon bolt can target foes that are too far away for them to reach. The orb will travel along the trajectory towards its target, but fade before striking - and thus do no damage.
  • If multiple Great Cannon sigils are set, bolts from the nearest cannon may be absorbed into the second, negating the advantage from multiple sigils; chained cannons can, however, single-fire in sequence around corners, target the other side of a large enemy, or be used to extend overall range.
  • The orbs are generally produced in a spread around the path from the weapon wielder through the sigil. Each orb will target the nearest object along its own path; if nothing is in view they can make sharp turns to target other foes.
  • Orbs may not target certain things until struck by a genuine physical attack; an example is Metal Golem discs.

Tactics[]

Up to three cannon sigils can be summoned at one time, however, summoning and firing two spheres in conjunction with each other is the most effective use of this spell. One sphere often does lesser damage, whilst the time to place three means that by the time a third is placed on the field, the first sphere is likely about to fade. If a fourth sigil is cast the earliest existing sigil will vanish.

Activating the Sigil[]

Blessed riposte with magick cannon

Blessed Riposte triggering Magick Cannon - the range is too far, so only one orb hits the cannon after travelling a while. With a close sigil all three will hit, for much higher rate of fire

In addition to the Arisen striking the Sigil using any physical skill or attack, the cannons can be triggered in many ways.

  • The Cannon can also be combined with Perilous Sigil or Ruinous Sigil. When an enemy strikes a Perilous or Ruinous Sigil, it will trigger the cannon to fire in that direction and deal additional damage.

Many 'friendly' attacks can trigger a cannon sigil, including:

Some enemy's actions can fire the sigil :

  • Most enemy physical attacks will not strike the sigil, but some will such as Ox charge.
  • Shockwaves, such as a cyclops' stomp will fire the sigil
  • Enemy spells do not generally fire the sigil, even when the equivalent spell would (e.g., Miasma)
    • However the eye of a foe's Maelstrom has been observed to repeatedly fire a cannon sigil.
  • A falling foe may trigger the sigil once. However the sigil acts as an immoveable object and so the creature will usually fall in such a way so that it does not fire the sigil again.
  • Rather curiously however, Harpy song will fire the sigil.
  • The Arisen's thrown objects, including pawns, will trigger the sigil. However thrown foes will not, nor will objects thrown by foes.

Other[]

  • Use with Holy enchantment for long range damage plus healing.
  • The sigils and orbs can also transmit debilitations from the weapon used to strike it, such as Silence from Golden Weapons or Torpor and Poison from Rusted Weapons.
  • Single-use magick items, such as Jewels will activate the sigil. Any debilitating effect of the Jewel will not transfer to the orbs however.
  • Melee pawns with a Utilitarian inclination are likely to shoot or strike a Cannon sigil with physical attacks and fire it.
  • Overlapping the area of effect from two spaced-out Ruinous Sigils and then placing a Great Cannon sigil in that overlap increases damage output of these spells by tripping all three even if an enemy only crosses the border of one Ruinous Sigil. This allows the Mystic Knight to control or choke off a greater area of the battlefield.

Notes[]

Cyclops Club and Great Cannon Sigil glitch

Club & Great Cannon Sigil glitch

  • The Gazer's Eye sigil, supported by four tentacles that charge it to full power, is a Great Cannon. If this sigil is struck by Arisen or pawn—regardless of their vocation—the Gazer's Great Cannon orbs automatically target its creator. The Gazer is extremely vulnerable to those orbs.
  • All conjured Cannon sigils will disappear instantly if the player switches from sword or mace to a staff.
  • When using a permanently-enchanted elemental weapon, one may notice that the orbs it produces do not take on the appearance of the element of the equipped weapon like it does when a temporary buff is applied via a spell. This is purely visual: the orbs can be witnessed to do elemental damage and effects.
  • There is a limit as to how many Great Cannon orbs can be in flight at one time.  Once the limit is reached, the oldest orbs will disappear as new orbs take their place. Thus, it is strategically more effective to have two Great Cannon sigils in place rather than three so orbs are not subsumed by successive blows on the Great Cannon.
  • Abyssal Anguish has no effect on Great Cannon sigils. Its shockwaves are equally inactive.
  • Demonswrath will fire the sigil, producing mulitple orb sets, but not a vast amount.
  • Thundershock will chain to a cannon sigil, firing it. For example : a thunder enchanted orb can strike a foe, produce thundershock, which can then chain to a second sigil, triggering it.
  • Sometimes, after a creature is struck by a dark enchanted orb, sufficient to trigger a Dark Critical Hit, the critical will appear on the sigil itself, instead of the creature, triggering a second orb when the critical dissipates. (Observed sometimes on Ox charges colliding with sigils) The creature is still damaged from the critical, but may not receive the usually powerful stagger or knockback effect. The exact conditions to trigger this effect are not fully understood.
  • (Glitch) The club of a disarmed Cyclops interacts in an unexpected way with a Great Cannon sigil - causing an force on the cyclops via the club. For example, if the sigil is placed on the NE side of the club the cylops will be forced to slide in a SW direction.

Damage notes[]

Total Damage = Physical Damage + Magick Damage
Magic Damage = 38.5 + 1.5xMAG + 0.5xWeapon_MAG - Foe_Mag_DEF
Physical Damage = 0.5xWeapon_STR - Foe_Phy_DEF
Note that this does not include other factors like elemental resistance

Gallery[]

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