Starr Long Discusses Chaotic Aspects of SOTA Combat

I have to say thank you to Mr Garriott for once again taking his time to post on the forums in one of the most controversial arguments out there.

This is especially why I believe they just have to make this skills/combat system work. Since when WoW came out, every single MMO has been a memorize combo/mash buttons yawnfest. Someone has to try and do something new, something better, and I believe the inventor of the computer RPGs like we know them can do that.

Now I don't know every detail of a combat system which hasn't even be shown yet, but if I'll get to do something more strategic than remember and then repeat a key combination then that's good enough for me.

 

I think the ultimate PvP vs. PvE difference it that PvP simply has a lot more meta-game to it. You simply don't engage and go all out every time. I despise duals because that's not how PvP is played. You're supposed to bluff someone into blowing their c/ds, engage someone at half health, look for 2v1s, etc. Skilled opponents will generally disengage from a fair fight. I want the UI simple because the opportunity (or threat) is generally not found on my list of skills but rather another player or a mob or an escape route. I’m happy to kite 3 people away from an important objective so that my allies can get an unbalanced fight where it matters.

The gw2 combat system was pretty good. ‘1’ was always an auto-attack chain. ‘6’ was always a heal. You had active avoidance. Even “easy” PvE fights were a challenge. Basing skills off weapon types and having the swaps was good. The problem was really that skills 2-5 weren’t thought through. So it became too much “hit whatever is off cooldown” rather than a set of conscious choices.

 

This has been debated in IRC a few times.
The short version of the discussion is: If skills can't be relied upon, players will bypass the random nature of combat by using charged items, ONLY. This means you can get your fireball when you want it, and your heal when you want it. Who cares what your deck is randomly not providing, you just use your fireball or heal or recall or purify wand.

Unfortunately, the likely response from Portalarium would be a global-charged-item-use-cooldown in the order of many dozens of seconds and/or minutes, after players started to use this in a widespread fashion. This would then lead to potions being used the same, and a similar global-potion-use-cooldown. After that, any other mechanic in the game that could be used, would be used and 'nerfed' 'adjusted' in the same fashion.

Basically, the attempts to gain some kind of role reliability in combat would ultimately lead to less flexibility for item use. And yes, this has happened before in many other persistent multiplayer online games.

 

Random combat for the Player = bad [except for 'Chaos' combat, which makes sense with randomness]

The 'world' is random. The adventurer needs options/opportunity to do what they can to balance out the randomness that is against them.

• Randomness has it's place. Random encounters, random actions (rather than repeated actions) by NPCs and monsters, Random dynamic world events, Random weather, all good.

• NPCs and monsters that have AI to keep them from being predictable robots is good​
  • Example: One time this enemy summoned helpers, the next encounter they used earthquake, another time some of the cave roof falls on me, another time some lava comes up through a crack - much more interesting than known attack.​

• Opportunity = good suggestion [instead of 'random']
  • If I am fighting skeletons, for example, 'Great Cleave' works. If I am fighting a 'bog troll', it is too fat for the Great Cleave skill to be effective, so it doesn't come up as an attack option.
  • If I am fighting only the undead, only skills (not archery, etc) effective toward undead are options.
    • If I have trained the skills, that is.
  • If someone in my party dies, the opportunity to resurrect appears (if I know the skill).
  • If I am poisoned, and know the 'cure' skill, it appears.
• Repertoire = good suggestion [instead of 'deck']
  • Players want to create a repertoire 'heavy with opportunity' for the random things that happen in New Britannia.
    • Players grouping could specialize their repertoire toward being a damager, while another specialized in healing, while another specialized in battling the undead, while another specialized in destroying insects and spider enemies

*Note: Magic, the Gathering, (since the card/deck idea keeps being presented, and Magic has been mentioned as the popular reference) as it was pointed out to me by a long time Magic tournament player, gives you time to decide what to play. Also, it's composed of 18,000 cards, and around 20 years of design. The design of Magic is to let the Player be heavy with opportunity. Even on the face of some cards there is more than one choice for the Player's turn. The cards in your deck are drawn (so that's the 'random' part, I guess that could be referred to) into your hand. Some cards --only 'spell' cards -- let you draw certain kinds of cards from your deck. All Players are Planeswalkers -- magic users -- none are not magic users.

 

A lot of people seem to focus on saying that having non-random skills on keys you memorize is dull/not-challenging and repetetive. I just have to say that this is only true if there is no means of variety and no tactic thought behind the different skills. Another aspect is that the skill-system can be as simple or advanced/randomized you can dream of, but it won't make a fight fun if your enemy is a pushover and not tactical at all.

Furthermore, having memorized your skills means you can pull off tactical descisions almost without thinking if what you're doing isn't good enough to kill your enemy. Let's say that your enemy is strong, tactical and you try your 1-2-3-4-5 button-mash and behold.. Your enemy did not take any (or very little damage) because he either interrupted your skills, or because he healed or something else entirely. Now you're forced to do something else, like using faster skills with less damage or of a different damage type. Maybe you need to change your timing of what you use when, there's just tons of options as long as the skills are designed in a good manner. There should be room for feints, trickery and interruption which can upset the balance of anyone's simple button-mash.

Making a fight fun and fluent won't happen by randomizing what skills you have available, which to me sounds like a terrible idea to be honest. Imagine your weapon is just a hilt and on a moment's notice you don't know if it's going to appear as a spear, sword, dagger, mace or what not.. How can a trained fighter relate to that kind of weapon? He couldn't use tactics and would just end up hitting with it and hoping whatever pop's up would do some damage. Any kind of combat expert uses weapons they can rely on and draw upon their experience to figure out what to do with the options the weapon, situation and enemy gives them.

If the combat/skill/AI systems are good, then you won't be button-mashing mindlessly. If those systems are bad, then randomizing skills may add a bit of spice, albeit poorly in my opinion.

 

There's a lot of good ideas in here. I really like the systems in Age of Conan (combo skills) and The Secret World ('builder' and 'consumer' skills). TSW has a lot of opportunity for player choice, and some variation on the abilities. Being able to have two weapons at once allows for opportunities to build up and consume charges with one or both weapons.

I'm curious what possible "other means" there might be. Points allocated to anti-virtues? Non-combat skills that build up charges, like hurling insults?

 

I am all for "shaking" things up and making it different..but the card/random spells is not going to keep the hardcore PvPers attention..I want to cast/cycle kill..not guess..there must be a better way to achieve this..

 

Richard, while a game designer that I have great respect for, is by definition employed by US. We are the ones paying his bills. We are the ones this game is being built for. Seems to me if you KNOW from the start that something is going to be THIS controversial you might steer clear of it.

Yes, it is definitely controversial DarkStarr. It's controversial because it makes no sense to take control away from the player and let that control reside in some random 'draw of the card'.

That involves both practice and player skill. You PRACTICE until you DO remember everything perfectly. The skill is knowing what spells to cast when. The skill is knowing when to hold a spell until just the right second to cast it for the maximum damage. The skill is knowing when you need to heal and when you can wait. The skill is knowing to watch what spells the opponent is casting and how best to counter those spells. The skill is knowing when to be offensive, when to be defensive and when to mix offense and defense.

However, what DarkStarr is talking about building is an out of the box PvPer that requires zero skill. It takes no skill to push a button that randomly gives you a spell. Hell that 1 button may be a fireball this time and a flamestrike the next time and a curse the following time. [sarcasm]WAIT, your right, Yeah that takes TONS of skill. [/sarcasm]

Yeah? What happens when you think that all hope is lost unless you can get a greater heal off and that "one all-powerful spell that you need" does NOT show up? I will tell you what happens, you have absolutely NO hope and you die. Rinse and repeat that a few times and suddenly you don't have much interest in playing this game anymore. Why? Because you cannot control your own destiny. It is left to a random "luck of the draw". I don't care for random, at all. I prefer to be in control of my skill set.


What is wrong with a player dominating? You know what that means? It means he spent hour upon hour LEARNING HOW TO PLAY effectively. It means that he practiced and practiced until he became the best at what he does. "One player getting the upper hand" is what PvP is all about. There are no "Lets call this a draw" instances in PvP. No, there is WIN or LOSE. Somebody is going to Live and somebody is going to Die. Period. If you won, count your lucky stars that the guy you were fighting didn't practice and learn as much as you did. If you lost, rez up and fight the winner again. Because the ONLY way you’re going to get better is if you keep practicing and learning. What better way to learn than from someone better than you?

What you’re doing is equal to the Little League teams that now 'play baseball' with no outs and without keeping score. What does this teach anyone? Oh wait, I know... It teaches them to be dependent on a system to fight their battles with virtually zero input or constructive, creative thinking on their own. It teaches them that "Everyone is a winner because we are all equal" That is the biggest load of bull caka that anyone ever spewed. We are NOT all equal. In fact we are FAR from equal. There are those of us who work hard to be the absolute best that we can be in EVERYTHING that we do. Then there are those who won't lift a finger to do anything except to complain that the ones that are working hard, have more stuff and are better than them. And of course there are those who are somewhere in between the two. And as it seems is just par for the course nowadays, along comes someone in charge to coddle the ones who are complaining of 'unfairness' by taking away from those who work the hardest and giving to the ones who won't get off their arse to get a free meal.

The example that sets is that they don't need to learn anything. They can just wait for the random handout from the gods.

 

I have read these threads to absolute exhasution, and here are a few of my thoughts...

I think the biggest problem with negativity to this system is unfortunate early word choices that have gotten lodged into the collective psyche of the forum (and, to a point, even the Portalarium folks themselves). Words like "cards/card game" and "random" are the main problems. I think Fireangel's suggestion of switching to "opportunities" will greatly help combat this problem (pun intended ), and be much more accurate a representation of what is trying to be captured.

I find it ironic, and a little painful, that many people are clamoring for "the next/new best thing", yet so many are trying to insist on their favorite aspects of old games. I had this conversation recently prior to finding SotA... you can't be the next new great thing if you are just repeating what has already been done. You can't seize market share from existing games by copying them. You can take individual ideas that worked well, perhaps, you can build on the foundations, but if it's the same game with only minor tweaks, the original with its already-established following will continue to beat you. This is the major problem with going with "traditional" systems... you will never excel if you merely continue with the status quo.

 

This hits the nail on the head. Critical strike!

 

@NirAntae made me think of what is my basic problem in trying to understand the arguments against trying this system.

For the hardcore PvPers who prefer a traditional system, there are literally dozens of games that you can play. If you are a hardcore PvP'er your enjoyment comes from combat. But I don't understand why you'd want just one more game that rearranges the abilities/stats into a new configuration but is ultimately just the same as what is out there now. I mean, how many games have fireballs?

This question emerged because I'm trying to be sympathetic to the objections and get inside the head of a hardcore PvPer. (Note: I like PvP but it's not my priority) If combat was my #1 priority I never would have supported SoTA unless it was doing something different than the dozens of options out there now.

Really is it just that you want the same old system of almost every other game with a different configuration and graphic set?

Please help me understand your thinking better than this.

 

First off, NirAntae, I agree with your intent. Innovation is key in attracting a demographic entrenched with an existing competing product.

Spoiler: ranting

Unfortunately, Portalarium has not enumerated, in any detail, any other aspect of combat that going to be new or innovative. All we have, in their own words, are vague descriptions of this card/deck system.
In particular, we know almost nothing about the death mechanic, nor any details regarding what, if anything, may or may not make direct player conflict meaningful.
How can we logically deconstruct a combat system without knowing about the death mechanic? If death is a matter of being resurrected 3 seconds after you die, that's an entirely different thing from two realtime hours of temporary hex banishment after death.

All we know is what we can logically determine from what they've described so far.
Same goes for looting, buying, selling, salvaging, ui, crafting, harvesting, guilds, pvp-goals, world plot, travel, effects, traps, perception, invisibility/stealth, zone-line-camping, repair, consumption, RMT, microtransactions, pay-to-win, diminishing returns, loot tables, drop rates, salvaging, non-charged-item enchanting, non-combat luck based success, latency consequences, cooldowns, justice system, procedural content, open world hex repetition/duplication and more.

Ideas that have been presented on these forums that make every other aspect of combat dynamic have been met with silence from the dev team. It's clear they haven't incorporated any of those ideas, and are going ahead with what they've got. That is, by their own admission, random skills, in random hotkey locations, with random time in between appearances, lasting for random amounts of time. The logical determination from such descriptions is the player has less control. With respect, giving the player less control, via the combat UI, is very risky. And not in the "this has the potential to be fantastic" risky, but rather the "we're betting the farm on a blind or lame horse" kind of risky.

Given combat is a cornerstone mechanic of almost all persistent multiplayer online game since 1996, it seems reasonable to be concerned. Again, if ANY OTHER ASPECT of the game had this level of random UI, I could probably get behind it. Anything BUT the combat UI.

Finally, Portalarium is playing this new combat system daily, now. And yet, not a single screenshot, nor a single video of any length, demonstrating how the UI actually works. That is also disconcerting. It's been live for more than two weeks, and no-one had 5 seconds to press Print Screen and post it on the forums? It's better to let us flail with hypothetical and inaccurate models? For how long?

In short? Any other place in the game, I would say innovate without limit. Not this.

 

The difference wasn't exactly explained, except to say in your rant that you feel combat is the centerpiece of online games. Considering that there is a fallback position to the same ol' same ol' combat system of every other MMO, what really is the risk of trying to innovate here?

If it is the worst idea ever, that will be proved and you will get your traditional system. What really is the problem then? Just that they are spending time trying to be creative?

 

First of all, the only effective real PvP system that I have seen in any game was in UO. Granted, I haven't played all the flavor of the month games but WoW, GW, GW2, DarkFall, Conan etc are definitely not effective real PvP systems.

All those games dumb down PvP to such an extent that you have little control over your own character. Some giving you a bar with only 3-4 spells that you can cast during any given combat session, out of your possible 20 spells. And then of course you cannot change your spells while in combat. In other words, they are all very player limiting.

I don't care for limits. Just because you can't be bothered to learn to use more than 3 spells at a time why should I have to suffer because of your inept ability?

Random... gives away control. It means that I may not be able to cast what I want to cast when I want to cast it because some Dev didn't think I should be casting that particular spell at that particular time.

You know what wins fights? It's often the unorthodox. The 'Outside the box' thinking of a fast thinking player. It may just mean that I cast something that normal people would not even dream of casting at that moment.

Don't take away our control. Don't force me to sit and wait for some magical roll of the dice or shuffle of the cards to get a spell that I want to cast. Just give me a way to assign EVERY SINGLE SPELL to a separate hot-key if I so choose. I am the one who has to remember what spell is on what key after all, not you. If you choose to ONLY play with 4 spells, so be it. Load those four spells on a hot-key and have a great day. If I choose to play with 20 spells leave me alone to play the way that I want.

Why does everyone want to force the 'LESS IS BETTER' thing? If you want less then by all means play with less. But at least give me the option to play with more.

 

Yes.
IMHO, the time spent trying to be creative would be better spent on a combat system that is MORE dynamic in every way, without a random UI. Especially with such a small team with such an aggressive schedule.

 

I for one can't wait for the game in general and this new combat system. I think the description they have described can be a great enhancement to your standard MMO combat scenario. As Vyrinor said, there are hundreds of games with the standard system in place. I love the direction this is headed and believe it can work.

 

Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
Watched the video. No. Hell no.
This removes the competitive element from PvP. Randomness is the worst enemy of competitive gameplay.
This way I can never be sure that I'm facing an equally strong opponent in a duel. I may be equipped well but he gets to cast 3 firestorms in a row and I die. Why? Because f... you templar, that's why!

Now Parrying is a random thing (for example, the way it was in UO) and critical hits are random. But thats about all that was random about UO's PvP. And UO's PvP was highly competitive. It was easy to get into but hard to master.

So, to the video in the OP: No.Hell no.

 

1. I think the big problem is you are mischaracterizing what is being described to make your point. It's not "less is more" to bring in deck mechanics, it adds another layer of strategy and preparation. Just because its strategy and preparation you don't like doesn't mean its not there. Other people aren't boiling your opinion down to unfair characterizations, so there is no need to do that to make your point.

2. I think people should at least take a look at it before saying its horrible. They will change it based on feedback, but it really sounds like they want to stay away from the "bind every hotkey to every spell" scenario because there are so many games like that already that people aren't playing. What they may end up with is a mix of set skills and hot-key options and a deck mechanic for special abilities, basically akin to PROC gear that almost every MMO has had at some point or another. Who knows until we see it?

 

Your spells could fizzle, you could be interrupted randomly, etc. What you guys are describing is something that you haven't even seen yet, and you are presenting a worst case scenario, then using that to try to prove a point? What did you draw in his three turns? Do the same spells cast in a row have diminishing returns or increased cooldowns? Is there a defensive/cc card and offensive card being played at the same time?

The answer to all these questions is you don't know...but they can balance the game through some of the mechanisms I just described. Why not wait to see it...I mean its not like UO, EQ, WoW, SWG, SWTOR and every other MMO didn't have an unbalanced class at some point in the history of PVP. What do they do in every case? Balance the game.

If we are going to discuss this lets at least have a level playing field of our comparisons.

 

With out going into a complete wall of text, my big concern here is, is this a card game simulation? Taking away choice is a good thing? I would really appreciate a more thorough presentation of this idea.