Are actual Lions and Tigers as large as ours? "no"

Are actual Lions and Tigers as large as ours?


Actor Richard Harris who is 6 feet tall or 1.85m in the 1999 movie "Walking with Lions".


This is a Monk in Thailand, where the average hight of a male person is 5 foot 5 inches.

I think the size of ours are inappropriate to our needs being larger than they actually are in real life.

We have skills which allow for more damage to be done from behind targets, but if players cannot see the target due to these over sized animals, then those skills become far less usefull than they once were. When attempting to find the rear of a target, it's the obstructed view which cause these rear melee attacks to be as much as 25% to 50% less effective to have, due to having to first to "find or guess" which way the target is facing before menuvering the character to effect a rear attack posture.

If our lions and tigers were more in line with real world size, then just as with the pictures above, it would be no problem in finding the rear of the target at all if it were of human size.

I have dropped my rear attack inate skill "Backstab" as a result of the obstructed view these oversized animals create. Those skill points invested in Backstab were quite allot to have been nerfed due to these new obstructions.

That's just way way I see things, or can't see things and I did put those exp points to better use elsewhere.

Comments Welcomed
~Time Lord~

*Note (and yes I miss the Backstab skill. I started missing it as soon as i started missing where to be able to place such an attack even before removing it from my character's skill build. Costing so many exp points and time spent developing the backstab skill, it's no longer worth it around these new oversized animals.)

 

Ligers are pretty large but they don't occur in nature and the cats in-game are still much larger.

 

There are many things we have in game that we don't have in rl - because... magic !
That's why it's a game - rl is the last thing we need here.
Sorry.......

 

Yeah, I already know about real life. I don't do games or shows or movies that mimic real life.

 

I find the model and hit boxes for tigers and lions too big. Sometimes I just can't target a mob without resorting to TAB.

 

So we sacrifice a skill's effectiveness for the sake of a visual toon.

and we also sacrifice our game's touch to target option.

That seems like allot to sacrifice for a visual that enhances nothing, yet blocks the view of everything.

Our newest sota melee skill,

animal proctology ~TL~

 

What skill is less effective because your pet is "too big"?

 

Yea its pretty weird how large they are in game. That was my first reaction.

Whether or not your intent is to imitate real life, if a players first reaction is "whoah, why are they so huge?" you have to think about whether or not your intent is to make them seem huge... or even if so, whether you intended that kind of reaction.

Its not that I have a lot of experience with lions tigers in real life, but its something that really jumps out to you in game. Especially how huge they are in comparison to say, stags and bears. Why are not stags and bears also huge?

Are there meant to be super lions and tigers in Novia that are superhuge in proportions compared to lions and tigers Earth? If so, OK, then. But its still a bit weird and jumps out at you. I mean, yea, rl is always going to be a reference for people when they're watching a movie or playing a game whether consicously or instinctually, which is something I think writers understand.

 

They have to be big enough to carry all that loot.

 

It's the size of the costume, since they're all wolves larping as big cats.

 

A player must first find the front or rear of the target to effect a front or rear attack. When subtracting the time it takes to identify what the front or rear of the target is, this adds up to time off target due to the obstructed view of the target. So If you have Backstab, you now have the effeciency of half that amount because you are 50/50% off target. Any melee weapon becomes useless when it cannot be brought to bare on the target, thus targeting in the blind due to these large view obstructing toons reduces that skill's abilities. Further more, short or medium range melee weapons also have their effectiveness reduced due to these view obstructing toons, not having the ability to tell when they are close enough to be striking the target. So, being half way into the toon, the only way of seeing whetther or not your character is striking the target through melee attack, is to possibly catch a glimps of a piece of your character that is not obstructed that may indicate that it is swinging it's weapon, which is impossible if your character is using daggers.

So let's review:

• The shorter the melee weapon the player is using, the more likely they cannot tell if they are hitting the target, or just standing there.
• The inate skill "Backstab" requires that the target's back and front can be identified.
• Both of the above are hindered, weakened, less effective or caused to be useless by not being able to see the target due to these oversized toons obstructing the combat view.

SOTA's new melee combat view due to the size of these toons.


Not to mention that combat screenshots will now be nothing but....
~Time Lord~

 

The size of many of them is probably to account for them also being a mount at a later time.

 

I can't agree that such pet animal sizes are good SOTA game design, as all you would see of combat in confined corridors such as in Tartarus, is litterally nothing if one of these large toons is hunting with you.

Our developers will do as they do as it is thier livelyhood, yet as popularity grows in these new toons, so also will endearment and thus reluctance for change. This means that it will grow more likely that SOTA will accept a lack of combat screenshots to advertize our game, due to all our attractive, well programed combat animations being sacrificed for the sake of the size of these new toons.

We have allot of great combat animations which will and are now seen only as long as one of these creatures is not there blocking the view.

It's not the creature, it's not their abilities, it's not their artwork's colors, it's thier current size that is horrible for our game in so many ways, including losses in hard won skill's effectiveness.
~Time Lord~

 

Maybe, but they don't really need to be that huge in order to be a mount.

Some ancient depictions of Dionysus on a panther

 

Those are great illistrations of size effects on screenshots/game visual combat views.

If the creatures within these pictures had SOTA sized lions/tigers, then they would push out or just outright obstruct the view of all the other images within the scene...
"immages that those animals enhance, only when in proper sizes".

The animal sizes should accent the characters, not hide them.
~TL~

 

@Time Lord - Have you tried backing your camera off a bit (or a lot) ?
You love pics, post a ss of what you're seeing - during a fight where you say you can't tell head from arse ..........

 

You are an experienced player, so you do know the narrow corridors of the likes of Tartaris and you have fought in melee along side, or should I say for a better description "inside" these large creatures?
Have you fought with them in "The Breach?" or on the deck or below deck on the popular "Airship"?

I have heard many players with far more than hundreds of GMs speak of this as well as "they" having targeting issues when these creatures are within the party, even to the point of outright telling party members not to use them when in thier hosted parties.

Images copied from FaceBook...

So, which way is the bad guy facing in this screenshot? and for that matter, why is this tiger sitting on top of the target?

They are much larger and taller than any of our horses. We now shoot our arrows, cast our spells, attacks or melee swings at "tabs not targets", thus rendering any facing of the target totally guess work.
If player "Ythak" visable here in the screenshot were just a bit to his left as player "Tsumo" is, them he would not be visable.

"And, this is a picture with only one cat in the party fighting in it". As the popularity of lions and tigers grows with all those cats all facing different directions, then that only compounds the blocking and negating of facing attacks such as the Backstab skill, thus reducing it's combat effectiveness to a 50/50% chance of being viable due to not knowing which way the target is facing.

*OT Cute Side Note : Notice the character named "Auto Swing's" low argo outfit+ 2 mouse rings and easy hand low argo operating deck. That's the way he first began training so nothing would hit him eccept AOE, before becoming the bad#ss, easy hand demend, chr build he is today ~Time Lord~

A blowup of the same screenshot example...

*and on that special OT side note mentioned above: (This is one of the Character named "Auto Swing"s baby pictures just after he was first born)
You can count all the little numbers adding them all together and they beat Tsumo's single critical in the 70's and amount to 1/5th of the a 440 critial of Ythak "within the same time period", as the character named Auto Swing is auto swinging enhanced with the Flurry skill. Even when his skill build was in it's beginning phases, he was able to contribute at a respectable amount for being the very new character he was in this screenshot, which is why I saved it in my collection. I love chr baby pictures ~TL~

 

I personally have no issues attacking mobs in those situations. A back attack is nice to get but it's pretty rare even in the best of circumstances. There's nothing about this game that guarantees you will be able to always get back attacks. If you were playing alone then you would possibly be able to get one shot before the mob turns around. Not being able to see the mob in a group is simply a hazard of being in a group, regardless of the pet size. Also, if I'm say standing on the top of the stairs of the Airship in Lamech's Bazaar, and all the people and pets are crowded into that corridor so that I can't see, then I'm still getting extra damage from the height advantage.

 

The skill "Backstab" is not a one hit attack, it is an innate skill that enhances attacks on the rear of the target.

You must be a non-melee player if you think attacking from behind is not important.

I truly can't believe I actually had to respond with those comments to you @Barugon , I would expect even a relatively new player even knows this, as it's clearly explained within our Wiki.

What in the world does that have to do with not being able to see which way the target is facing when it comes to these oversized lions & tigers? No other creature even in this "one off still action screenshot" is as large as the cat. I cannot believe that you have never seen the tight spaces in our game that have combat happen in them, which is much more confined than in the screenshot provided.

We strive to keep our game balanced, yet the size of these oversized pets, which does not add or subtract from their own attack abilities, negates actual skills of the player. They're a grief, a skill blocker and all for the sake of vanity or just outright disregard of the melee player or those without not just any pet, but a "huge pet toon".

Social Effects due to these visual blockers:
When players look for party members, they look for high DPS, and when a DPS rate is checked, that effects the actual player's ability to get into a party again, due to the other players thinking that the player in question can or cannot deliver enough damage onto any target. This makes rear attacking very important.

It's worse than a bug, yet just as skill blocking, because it is a skill blocker:

• If we were discussing a creature which did not have a soft backside in combat, "we would call that a bug" and address it through programing, but since this blocker is a toon, we disregard it's effecting our skill tree abilities.
• If we tried to mount a horse in any of our holes or tight spaces, the game would not allow us to do that, "due to the size of the creature we are trying mount", yet if a tamed creature which should not fit due to it's size can slip right through, "clipping" it's way through solid tight walls and low cielings.

I'm not speaking out against pets, I'm describing a skill blocker and that skill it's blocking is a skill that takes quite allot of skill points invested just to gain a single point in after 110, "Backstab".

It's our resposibility to provide accurate feedback:
Our programers are fine people who do a fine job at making our amazing game. All our players are our game's testers with a resposibility to provide accurate feedback when something is blocking or preventing a skill from being used, and this is an accurate, factual report of a loss in a skill's ability.

Game Advertizing: Much of our game's best advertizing are our combat screenshots displaying our great combat animations which provide immersion apeal.

Without large pet toons we can see and display the action to others instead of obscuring the view into a combat blob. Screen shots are vital to our game's image from a sales perspective. These and the other larger creatures who will follow them, will also change the apeal of hunting areas, as the larger pet toons look much better in wide open spaces tha they do in confined spaces or in hunting parties where they create a blob. Cats could complement this screenshot if they were of apropreate size, yet as over sized as they currently are, adding as few as only 2 or three to this screenshot then takes on a "blob'ish" look to the scene instead of the lovely combat animation seen here.

These oversized pets are like blocking our own advertizing bill board with more blockers coming depending on their popularity as pets. We need to take our game advertizing combat screenshots now, because the future hasn't this wonderful view.

Potion of Growth: Bigger is not better, it's the programing inside the toon that makes it better or worse. Just like our inability to use a growth potions outside of POTs, there's good reasons why, and many of those reasons are disregarded when it comes to these large cat toons.

If we continue along this pathway of ever larger pet toons, we hide all our other artwork of combat, as more of these creatures show up to our hunting parties. We then accept "the blob on the screen", instead of the great animation designs which our game has been enhanced with at great cost within thier programing.

There is no reason at all that Potions of Growth should not be able to be used outside of POTs due to inappropriate size if these cats remain as large as they are.


Our future combat animations looks like this, just add ever larger toons.

Bigger is not better, all boxes contain the same amount of cereal ~Time Lord~

 

I know exactly what the Backstab skill is and if the mob is focused on you then you won't be getting back attacks (unless you can stun or knockdown for a significant duration). From my POV, it's more important to be within a bard's range if they're casting Savage Sonata.

Then again, I'm not playing a melee character. Still, I would just run in, tab target and swing away.