The major problems with the combat system.

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Poor game design, Oct 23, 2017.

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  1. Drocis the Devious

    Drocis the Devious Avatar

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    1. We don't have a 'classless system', we have a ONE class system. Everyone is an avatar.

    This lack of specialization presents two problems:
    A. It makes the combat system very difficult to balance.
    B. No one is really different.

    2. We have two delivery methods for combat. The HEAT system and the DECK system. These two systems are currently unbalanced, the HEAT system is superior in almost every practical way.

    3. There are still not enough counters in the game. For example:
    A. Trip. Nothing counters it.
    B. Poison. Nothing counters it.
    C. The entire schools of water and earth magic. Yes there is attunement, but that doesn't really work as a counter so much as a resistance.

    Ideally, we would have as many skills as possible work similar to Opportunity Strike, where a player needs to first Dodge before the other player can land a successful Opportunity Strike.

    In the case of Trip, it makes sense that another player would be less likely to be tripped if they were in a defensive stance, or if they were moving around.

    In the case of poison, it makes sense that a player could either built up a resistance to poisons, cast protective spells against poisons, or mitigate poison in some other meaningful way.

    4. Endless power curves. The players that play the longest get all the power. This creates an unfair playing field where only the top 5% of XP earners have a legit chance of being successful in pvp, and only the top players get access to high end content in pve.

    Decay is not preventing or even slowing down the top 5%. Decay needs turned up on these players, like yesterday.

    5. Buffs are redundant and exploitable. In order to make buffs both meaningful and fair, we can't allow players to use them without sacrificing something in return. The idea that everyone should get a strength, intelligence and dexterity buff at the same time is ludicrous. It only creates a situation where players need all three buffs to compete. And that's the problem with buffs in general, you need as many as you can get because there's no practical downside to using them all.
     
  2. Halvard

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    because defensive stance with 2 chopsticks makes sense? or parry for that matter
    If I use both Berserker stance and Berserker (leaving me with 0 dmg resist and less than 0 avoid) I get up to the same amount of damage as if I just drop that giant axe and pick up my 2 chopsticks... which also makes me a lot tankier :/
    combat has a great way to go before I'll even call it decent.

    I agree with your post just think there are way way way more that needs to be looked at regarding combat
    Decay hasn't slowed me down enough to notice ever and no matter how much you turn it up the gap will be the same. Decay needs to go but for different reasons than why most seem to hate it ;)

    It's not unfair but that something shouldn't be the power it currently is, a lot of people should have been capped ages ago and by playing more they should get more wealth/items oh and fun.


    Whoever thought that being able to GM everything was a good idea should get a smack on the head.... @Lord British I know it was you, now fix it!
     
  3. Cora Cuz'avich

    Cora Cuz'avich Avatar

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    I actually like mixing the heat and deck systems. Figuring this out made a huge improvement in my combat ability.
     
  4. Stundorn

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    I say you something.
    There will be no balance other than caps and a seriously reworking some skills.

    What is Trip? a Skill?

    There is also a great difference between a Tournament, a Duell or sandbox PvP encounter.
    For example, i think no one will have allways all buffs ready when surprisingly encountered in a pvp scene.
    You need to have some counters in your deck, i doubt people switch decks while having an open sandbox PvP encounter.
    So what to counter Torpid Torment?

    What about the Moon Wisp or Confusion.
    I once made a Duell and my opponent wasnt able to do anything because of the Wisps debuff. He couldnt even cast and i need only 2 shots.

    Gear is way too powerfull. To get the skills and gear for pvp takes way too long it's not an average.

    We need diametral effects back.
    We need Fireskills lock out any Water and vice versa and same for all the others.
    Decide what you want or need more.
    Do you want Air or Earth. Life or Death, Sun or Moon... etc...
    Sure then you will also have weaknesses you have to deal with.
    Sun is great, but then you wont have celestial blessing.
    And sure that some trees then need some more love.
    And if you skilled wrong or build crap then you need to reskill.
    There is then maybe a good pvp build, but then it should be counterable.

    Whats about a flee build, something to avoid any encounter and just flee.
    I'm trying to build one to explore PvP scenes and when i have a encounter to clear out efficiently.

    So many things to consider to make it a great MP and PvP game.
    But then i allways think of SP and thst this is a sort of hybrid and no side will ever be satisfied.
    The development would need to decide wether it's a MP Game or a SP game with MP option and then develop.

    I cant hear the UO comparisons anymore.
    People who love UO should play UO. Simple as that.
    No SotA is not UO 2, play LoA or whatever, but i bet, this wont satisfie you also.
    Why not, because this time is gone.
    It allways feels like one saying: the good old days, former everything was better.
    Whats not true, but people only remember the good and forget about the bad.
    This game is actually nor fish neither flesh and thats the problem.
    And that they are concentration on developing the beginning content and we are almost all at the end of midlevel and most in high level endgame.
    But we need to polish early game and all suggestions are good, but about new features, better endgame, and whatnot.
    When i asked for tips some Month ago and you can still see the recomendations people do to New players it us very clear that most if us have no idea of playing without any knowledge of the game or what it feels with level 20, 30, 40, 50
    and then get Tips like, go in a mine, do this, hunt there, but 1 Million xp or 1GM a day is no Problem ****.
    Mr Blight or Mac one said 25 GM in a week is possible, people get to level 80 plus in 2 weeks and beat some level 100 in pvp Tournament.
    What was neccessary to do that?
    No answer.
    I say you what, give a **** on immersion, story, rpg and run with Highlevels 24/7 killing Trolls, Dragons, Sondern Shockmonkeys in Krul or do this mage room for some hours a day and these 2 wees. Then get good gear gifted and you are ready.
    Wait for the Russians, i'm very interested in what sort of russian players are coming. I would wish for the Russians from Darkfall, really. They should exploit the game like no other and crush everything down in PvP so that people cry for hardcaps and balancing.
    If the right people come SotA is history in less then a month.

    So back to topic, i believe things can be balanced and i think it's not the problem if some skilled crap and need to rebuild his char.
    And i also believe that they will do it over time, but it's absolutely nit the focus atm. Because the concentrate on early game and balance of levels 1-50.
    The 0815 Gamer / casual without the knowledge of the veterans will, if he won't give up after some hours, need 3-4 Month to reach level 50plus.

    Yes you can do that in 24 hours maybe, but who wants that?

    @Bulveigh today said to me, the problem is, in all the games of the last decades i tend to quick rush /level to enter endgame and then RPvX.
    This is not the case here and the wrong approach imho.
    But if you want to pvp it's actually the only way to do it.
    Significant fact, to do so in SotA you need to grind so much and so extremely hard that 80% of the players who want to do that burn out.
    Or you do it with help from said people who are already very highlevel and grind with or for you, because it is their passion and only thing they want to do.
    But this is not playing an rpg or enliving the world, this would just be working and optimizing the rpg elements.
    That's totally 2 different things.
    It's like building a motorcycle and tuning it, but not able to push the envelop on the Track.
    The best builders arent necessarily the best drivers and vice versa.
    I am a driver, i play RPG and i dont work on optimizing the rpg elements.
    I need a good mechanic and he does what i say i need to optimize my race.
    What we have is, mechanics want to tell me how to race!
    Thats the issue imho.
     
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  5. Halvard

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    Yes I'm aware that you can do massive damage with backstab (isn't it sneak something?)
    My earth magic is also very much AOE and more damage & more defense than my warrior build, warrior build also has a lot more skill points in than earth magic A LOT doesn't seem fair to me that I should be weaker in all aspects.

    and I cant be a sneaky berserker that's even worse than being a mage :/ well to be fair I'm a Warrior earth/water/fire/air/death/moon/sun mage with all the other skills as well <--- this here is my biggest issue, i don't want to be any of that but I kinda have to
     
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  6. Drocis the Devious

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    You're not alone. But that doesn't mean that someone like myself should've be able to use only the DECK system (I hate the HEAT system) and be competitive. The two systems are not balanced in a number of important ways.
     
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  7. 2112Starman

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    Meh...

    Ive changed my opinion and I really dont care any more.

    I've now created a great build as an Earth mage, as a Blunt melee, as an archer and now I hit the blade GM's. Im loving it. I can pick and choose what to go out as and specialize in those fields. I cant wait to try more. Im collecting gear for each build to maximize it.

    I just hit only 25 GM's.

    Here's the skinny, I can only legitimately go out as one build. I go out with blades, archer, bludge or earth. I GM'ed (or close) most defensive stuff a year ago and have not changed those much.

    Im perfectly happy with this now and I cant wait to move to the next tree, its time for me to try a new class like an air mage (I hate death magic so Ill probably never work on it).

    In the end with all these builds, for the past 1.5 years... I still farm the same areas with a +- 5% difference based on the build I choose so it really... really... really does not matter.
     
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  8. Curt

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    I like the fact you can charge a locked glyph.
    I don't like the Heat system
    And not that found of of stacking the same glyph.
     
  9. Drocis the Devious

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    Those are not counters.

    It may be the best part of the game for some people. It's not the best part of the game from a balance perspective.

    Not balanced.

    I'm not entertained by the current combat system and the lack of balance.
     
  10. Cora Cuz'avich

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    Coming into it after the fact, I don't really see it as two separate systems. The deck system offers two ways to use the glyphs. What you're saying feels like an artificial construct you've superimposed on the system. Sometimes you need to turn left, sometimes you need to turn right. If you want to try to get somewhere not turning left, it may be possible, but it's probably not advantageous to do so. Admittedly, I might feel differently had I been here before the heat system. Or if it was a one-or-the-other decision to make.

    But I completely agree on counters. I finally killed a friggin' troll last night, but it might not have taken me an hour if there was some way around getting stunned. (Smelling salts worked once, after that, it was a greyed out option? I suppose a cooldown makes sense game-wise, but if so, the troll should have a cooldown on throwing boulders.)
     
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  11. Drocis the Devious

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    It's simple.

    If you're counter to something like Trip is that you can't get close to someone or you have to mez them, that's not a counter. It's actually giving Trip an incredible advantage because it's just removed all forms of close ranged combat from your opponent.

    A counter is something like Douse. Douse counters fire magic DOT's by removing them, and lowering the impact of future fire DOT attacks. If there were not a Douse spell, there would be no counter to DOTs.

    What you described are tactics, but they're not counters.
     
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  12. Drocis the Devious

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    Well that logic could've been used on people that hated the Deck system, and then we've have no Heat system. It's not a good argument because it assumes the Deck system (or at best a hybrid of the deck system) is just as good as the deck system and no neat system. In other words, it fairly dismisses the want to have a viable deck system.

    Sure, I could just use a hybrid system or just the Heat system and that would balance out. But people that didn't like the deck system before could've done that too. Yet we made an entirely new system for them because they didn't like the Deck system, and now the Deck system is gimped. Not really a fair way to do things.
     
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  13. Halvard

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    Unless you plan on doing pvp, not training death(and all others mind you) to get atleast the defensive abillity from it is just insane with this current system
     
  14. Drocis the Devious

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    What is the counter to Blink? That's a great question.

    The counter to sprint is obviously spells that slow people down, also caltrops.

    Autoattack isn't a skill or a spell. That's a design component.
     
  15. Halvard

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    bare minimum doesn't get you all the defense does it? and you still need this for all mage schools that makes it a problem
    or why not make all mages HAVE to get swords bludg and polearm to be able to defend against them
    I already have all so doesn't matter to me. system is stupid this is my opinion
     
  16. Cora Cuz'avich

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    It seems to me that your main issue is that you got to see under the hood. It wouldn't be a "hybrid system" if you didn't see the development up to this point; it would just be a system with multiple options as to how to use it. (And to be fair, you might still not be happy with it.)

    At any rate, this particular argument isn't likely to go anywhere. I like it; you don't. I'm content to leave it at that.
     
  17. Drocis the Devious

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    Everyone is eventually a tank mage.
     
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  18. Halvard

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    So everyone should use stealth/backstab if they don't want to mage "how it should be" well you are certainly allowed to have that opinion, I don't agree.
     
  19. Drocis the Devious

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    Exactly.
     
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  20. Nelzie

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    I wouldn't mind seeing a way to counter this. Not a true class system, but sort of a hybrid on top of the pick the skills you want system that exists now.

    Like, if you take Sword, Life, Heavy Armor, Shield and maybe one or two other complimentary magic schools, like Sun, Earth and or Water, you could become a "Paladin" and receive bonuses, ABSOLUTELY nothing over the top, but then be limited to staying focused in that area or risk losing the special bonuses available only to the Paladin. Perhaps even have a limit of certain skills being opened in the various skill trees to unlock this kind of "Path of Virtue".

    So, there could be a series of all of these various "Paths" one could walk and over time via dropping skills that should have some Gold and or Obsidian Crown Costs to accomplish, players could gravitate towards different specialized builds until they get bored of a given build and move onto some other combat build.

    If the bonuses are appropriately balanced, it could offset the Build of the Moment that was super common in SWG and UO. Kind of like how I've recently been seeing piles of people in heavy armor, wielding long bows. That all seems very anachronistic.

    Bows should be used primarily by light armored, MAYBE chainmail armored, but usually only cloth and leather clad fighting types.

    It wouldn't force anyone to be in a class, people could still branch out like we do now, but if the bonuses were right, a near endless layout of "Paths" could be built that have their own reasons for being that people could gravitate into, if they want and see benefits in staying focused for some time, but ONLY if they want to.
     
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