The Dragon is soloable in Grumvald.

...coulda warned me about the wall of text.. fell outta my chair on that tidal wave of wurds. *grin*

 

And take away the surprise?

Sorry i tend to ramble a lot U^^ I try to make my points clear but they end up being big i hope you find it interesting at least.

And for this particular topic... still waiting for behaviors could be cool to suggest stuff that more complex enemies could do.

 

like this?

dragons:
smaller dragons breathe hot air, pushbacks, stumbles, stuns.
larger dragons breathe fire/plasma, fire damage plus pushbacks, stumbles, stuns.

targeted damage response:
hit the dragon enough in the gut, it spits up into the air like a volcano...basically splattering napalm around the combat zone, akin to how the multi-target AOE boss fights tend to work in guildwars 2.
hit it enough in the tail, and it'll do a tail sweep aoe.
hit it enough in the head, and it'll jump up and back down, causing the earth to shake, with stumbling and stuns, and then it'll counter with a fire breath that is dodgable.
hit it enough in the legs, and it could flap its wings causing a pushback with a chance for a stumble/stun at the end of the pushback.

 

Precisely! I specially love the targeted damage response! it's a wonderful way of keeping people on the move so the fights are less static.

It's other of my main worries, that combat feels a bit static. I'd love to see also some skills playing a major role into defeating some enemies so, at least, we need to change our strategy (as Alcedes proposed before). I've been thinking about some actions requiring reactions trough certain skills, but it sounds like too much work regarding animations and skill interactions for almost nothing... i do like better the sequential implementation of combos, think it could help to establish a flow in what now is just a static rotation.

I also want to see more enemies using skills! the only ones that really uses more than a couple of skills are fauns and archers...

 

that in and of itself is an issue, i'd tend to agree. problem is less static, tends to generally translate to active combat, and thats just not the type of system we really have here.. active combat like in gw2 and tera are fantastic.. tera is a completely different system thatn we have had here, ever, but you could take the dodges into consideration in a turn-based system and THAT could work here. -

one big thing in gw2 combat was to always keep moving, but they also had a weapon/skill system that worked in favor of that, and right now there's just way too many months invested in changing it all to meet a requirement of that type...

all that being said, if it were changed to something more active and less turn based, many folks would be much happier with it (combat) as a whole. but this stage in the games dev it is simply WAY too late... i'm just hoping they get it as close to 'right' as they can with the current system, until they have time to dedicate towards fixing it (with a whole new set of systems) in a year or three.

---

for ranged combat, one big problem you'd need to resolve is adding slight aim assists on the back end if you do try and keep the players moving during combat. the current aiming system is fairly clunky..

 

Heh, it's amazing how much two folks can agree when having a nice chat in a recently necroed thread!

I would lie if i said i don't want a more active combat. My "active combat experience" comes from Vindictus, but levels mattered too much and in the end you could just faceroll your way over the top. It was also way too much grindy. There are some things about Blade and Soul (some friends of mine are hooked to that atm) i like, even when i think the game it's just mostly "same thing with cream on top".

That said, i should clarify my "static". What i meant was that, i play with only one deck (PVE only) and i can defeat with it every single mob i face doing basically the same. It's like a wow rotation but even boring, because i don't have CD's (I play with full random) so i just need to stay sharp at what comes up, combine it whenever it's necessary, and then unleash the fury. Even being far from optimal (trying to test some unpopular stuff) once i get the gist of it is a plain rinse repeat. This combat should meant to be a "turn based system" but it actually has zero strategy. I just do my thing, and that's all.

So... it's not really a twitchy combat system what i'm looking for (i agree with your statement above; too late for that!) but in fact to put some sense into this turn based system. I do like how we're changing from targeted to aimed (giving me a reason to actually look at the combat, not just at my bar), but we should also work towards the strategy on the turn based system. That's why i like the concept of sequential implementation of combos; if instead of combining glyphs then releasing the result we get that effects by using a skill then another, then enhance defensive mechanics to have an increased chance of avoiding the hit for the very first second, we could create a turn based dynamic where i save my defensive skills for your big hits and you try to decieve me into using my defense skills before so you can hit me harder then. That's the kind of dynamics i'm looking for, and i think they're totally doable using the current system as a start. It also may fix some issues regarding the combat bar taking too much attention

Also, regarding ranged combat... i think that most of the complains regarding archery "swapping targets" come from the fact that we can both "aim" and "select target using tab". It's certainly not perfect (there's a pretty interesting bug going on regarding height) but i've fighting some mobs using only the aiming system (no targeting and no spells) and i can say it's certainly more fun than tab cycling.

 

You may be n°2., eventually. But you can't be n°1: I am!

 

Are you contesting my fanaticism for myself! How dare you...

Noooo Stop fighting for me you and me!