Let's settle this once and for all. Card combat, Good or Bad

That is very generous of you.

But I wont play shroud with its current combat system. Im no holy man.

 

By the time I get through a fast-paced workday, and they are all fast-paced, I want to play to unwind a bit, but my brain doesn't have the juice left to deal with the deck system. I tried it, as did my spouse, but we both decided it was not for us. I need my icons on a bar, change them if I want to try a new skill, but control what I'm clicking on. I have accepted the fact that I will never have any combos because the only alternative is to check the box to use only locked glyphs, which does not allow using combos, but it does enable me to play. No matter how much I level up, I never seem to put the enemy down much faster, if any, but I get the job done and go on about my harvesting. I won't be worrying much about some else killing me because they use the desk system and I don't because I don't care for PVP and if I discover I'm in a PVP zone by accident, I'll be leaving as fast as my virtual legs (or ghost) can take me. If my locked glyphs are not enough power to take down an enemy, I simply find somewhere else to adventure. But if they take away that checkbox to use only locked glyphs, I don't think I could adjust to the deck system to successfully play. (No, I'm not stupid, I'm just getting old.)

 

Isn't this the sole purpose of alpha and beta tests??? To figure out what works and what doesn't? Tighten up what does work and fix what doesn't?

And we can even take this 10 steps deeper to a philosophical level. Do you think a dev studio who's using crowdfunding really wants to go against its backers? If they ever want to use crowdfunding again they have to keep in mind of their backers. This isn't your typical situation where the studio is published. Yes, they have been handed money up front and can literally do anything they want. But now they have a very close relationship with their CONSUMERS to which they make pledges to and to which they take feedback from. Do you think they will have an easy time being crowdfunded a second time round if they scorned a good percentage of their backers the first time?? I can guarantee you they won't.
If they can make the combat fun without scrapping it then that's fine by me and I'm sure fine by a bunch of others. We just want something everyone can enjoy.

 

There are a lot of difference of opinions here all going the complete opposite direction. Agreed there is no middle ground.
I for one don't want to see the combat system dumbed down like WoW.
This system is unique I think what we need is probably a little more guidance from the Dev's which in my opion has been lacking in a lot of ways. on a lot of areas. This being one of the most difficult aspect of the game. There have been Events created to teach all the Avatars how to cope and learn what these techniques are, and how to build them. Mad Hermit has made excellent step by step videos on how to build one. Lum took a stab at it. Net is culminated a class BUT you what the problem is we get out there and go to the skills trainer and think no... I want it this way and that way... so then we try our hand in PvP and we suck.
It's not all the systems fault
Half the problems is US
Pride
ID = I want what I want
Don't force the DUMBED DOWN SYSTEM
JS

 

I think that you are forgetting that not only do "they" get the "perks" of combo's, faster cool downs and less focus cost but on top of that it costs skill points to lock glyphs and even more skill points to reduce the focus cost of them. So not only do "they" get perks but those who choose to use locked glyphs are further penalized in skill points.

Is it 200% focus cost for locked glyphs? (not sure) but if it is then it costs me 29 skill points to lock 5 glyphs and reduce the focus cost by 25%, so they still cost way more focus to cast, it cost me 29 skill points to do it (how many levels is that?) and I can only use 5 skills.

 

its by design that way, you can have the comfort of knowing your glyphs and having them ready, but at a cost, vs wild and unsure rotations with the bonus of combos. Its a trade off.

 

Uh, no. I do want a fun a game. I don't want to come home from work and play a frustrating game. I don't have to deal with anything. I can just not play it. That's been the case for video games for decades, if not forever. I have games in my living room that I put an hour into, realized it sucked, and never played them again (or returned them for store credit).

Id? Pride? Really? It's a bad game mechanic, and they should feel bad.

 

For a game that is a single player story driven game with multiple player options, I for one think combat is important, but I dont really think it should be defined as a combat centric game. The world will be selective and there will be many modes of play. I plan on playing mostly friends online mode. I will do some pvp combat but mostly in guild warfare and role play. For me combat is not about the twitch, its about the coming together as a community to try to get uniform immersion. I understand that combat is the main goal for some people, and I hope that they get what they are looking for. One of the reasons I like the random glyph system is that its hard for people to macro it, unlike the locked system. with the locked deck system you can eat a bag of popcorn, watch a movie, drink your super sipper, just mashing the same key over and over again, not even paying attention to the game.

 

Yep, this website:

http://www.surveysystem.com/sscalc.htm#one

so with 52492 backers, the forums don't give us enough of a sample size to have any confidence in the polls.

 

Alright, For the locked combat bars. Those negatives to using it are only by temporary design. It is intended to make people want to use the random system to test it out. In the future, the plan is to make it balanced so you can go either way and be competitive in pvp. I see no reason to scrap the random system if people are saying they want a locked system. - In the future that will be fixed, but is now intentionally not balanced.

That still wont improve combat as it is today. A lot of that has to do with AI and creature abilities. As I've said before, I'd like to see most creatures to have abilities that you should move around for, and for us to have abilities we should either need to move for, or put ourselves in a vulnerable position to execute the attack. I'm not particularly interested in activated blocks/dodges(hit this key at this time to dodge), but moving your character during combat I like.

Combos that aren't combos. I'd like to see an ability that has a follow up ability. example, a 2 second stun followed by a backstab -position yourself behind them for bonus damage. Things a long those lines. For magic maybe a fireball followed by a fire arrow equals a 1 second stun. or a combo'd ability followed by another combo'd ability = 1 second stun. - alright, let's not get too hung up on too many stuns, that gets annoying... just throwing out ideas for additional affects when you use certain abilities one after another. -This would further help locked deck combat have some more meaning/timing.

It would give locked decks an edge because they could more easily execute those kinds of combos, while the random deck has it's own combos.

 

I hope the developers really listen to this feedback right here. I believe this reflects the heart of the issue we are all having!

 

You're probably right to some extent. I've seen them go both ways. Although so do opinion polls for politicians. People can change their minds based upon current events.


The rise and fall of Shroud of the Avatar peaked in Pre-Alpha release 8 for me. Keep in mind I've been a supporter from the beginning and have believed in this project, and still have hopes that it can be better than a niche game. Although in the beginning I had hopes of SotA being revolutionary some how, but I've lost some of that vision at this point.

I'm not one to give up on a project just because it may not be as good as I once thought though. I want to see this to the end. I'm hoping that episode 1 is not the end. My goal is for this game to launch well, and that we see the story progress to episode 5.

Combat has been mediocre at best for the last few months. This is why I would rather they just do whatever is needed to work on the rest of the project, and make the other features good, and give us the simplest, least micromanaged, and out of the way combat system in favor of spending more time on the other features.

 

I find the glyph system as it is to be really clever and it would do well for this game... assuming they polish it.

Right now the combat is clunky but I don't blame the glyph system for that, I'd blame the current execution of it.

 

Please explain. What is executing right? What is clunky?

Are you sure that what you perceive as clunky isn't a major feature that will remain or is it something that is very likely to be fixed?

 

Isaiah I don't get it. At first you were really against the glyph system, then you were a champion for it, now you are against it again? I'm having trouble keeping up here. What made you like it after you hated it at the beginning and what has changed to make you hate it again?

 

They did state quite clearly that it is here to stay for those who don't watch the hangouts. It will evolve and change but will not be replaced (yay).

 

Well they will have a very large refund bill when episode 2 fails to get made because this combat system makes episode 1 flop and as such they can't provide what they promised during kickstarter and have to refund everyone royal artisan and above

 

Yeah that makes no sense at all. You are not in danger of dying and struggling to remember how to do that parry you learned right before your head gets cut off while you are crafting. There is plenty of carefree time to grab your tool from your bag, scratch your butt a bit and think about what goes on the table next with no fear of the "glyph disappearing". Nothing like combat at all :/

I for one like the "dynamic" rotating deck. My toon is better at killing things with the dynamic deck up. It has been said in this thread that if you want to PvP you need to run the dynamic deck to survive. When I play I kill things faster, exit combat with more health, and more focus using a dynamic deck. The reasons given by Port for implementing the deck in the first place are very reasonable. Combat is not do move 1, move 2, move 3, move 4, move 4, move 4, move 5, repeat... Combat is extremely fluid and random. The people I notice as the most upset about the dynamic deck are the people who's play style is... "I am wearing ABC and he is wearing XYZ so if I press 1,2,3,3,2,4,7,1 I have a 92.34% chance of winning". I enjoy the randomness and Chaos of combat. The system as a whole needs better MOB AI and a few attack range tweaks. For me tho it works I enjoy it.

 

Glad you like it Zeke. Your experience doesn't discredit By Tor's experience.

Also he has given lots of great points and you chose to quote this post?

I hope the devs don't think like this and trivialize those who are against this system at this point of development.

 

I've noticed this also. It seems to be mainly the "hardcore" PvP guys that are really upset about what they feel is an effectiveness disparity between the random and locked/hybrid bar options. I'm not saying we should marginalize their input, just that I wish their focus was more along the lines of balancing the options instead of routinely making forum ultimatums and divisively taking shots at Portalarium and those of us who love the random glyph option. Constructive people are constructive

Also I don't want to write off the idea of expanding the random glyph paradigm into crafting. Most of us already know crafting mini-games are coming soon, let's see what they came up with. Whether that is an extension of the random glyph system or not shouldn't matter as long as it is fun and creates variety in the resulting crafted items (nor does it matter to me if it matches how real life crafting works to large degree).