Let's talk about combat!

Color me confused. Its too much? or you are disappointed if they dont do it?

 

Please, no. We already have enough problems trying to solve the UI issue with the new combat system, we don't need yet another plate to spin. I'll take it if we go entirely twitch combat.

 

After further thought I have other issues with the combat system too. This highlights it most of all:

"First, players will still have an “auto” attack that just uses their equipped weapon. That equipped weapon can be a sword, axe, shield, wand, etc. For simple encounters, this will be sufficient for most people to achieve victory."

So infact we don't actually need to interact with the convoluted card combat system for basic encounters which would presumably be "trash" mobs, and anything below our "level". The system hasn't managed to move away from the typical "click on enemy, stand there until it's dead" approach. That alone is hugely wasted potential.

I'm not calling for "twitch" combat, but where are our basic attacks besides "hitting"? There are plenty of ways of making mundane combat interesting from various types of stances (aggressive, normal, defensive - there would change whether you sacrifice attack speed/accuracy for defence and such) to specific basic maneuvers one can use. And there is no mention of how position or moving around affects combat - does it even? Do enemies even have a front and back?

And then you have to give consideration to what you can play. Can you play a pure "melee" class and a pure "mage" class? How do they compare? I have no idea - we'd need to see in alpha I guess.

I don't like to be so critical. I want combat to be fun. But from what I am reading and seeing this just makes me want to go out and... harvest plants. As long as they are plants that don't require a house plot - I don't have one of those. =P

 

Well... we're going to need a basic attack to begin with anyway so we can build up the Combat XP in order to learn the Combat/Magic skills we want to use.

Also, I'm sure you can take the path of pure melee or pure mage based on the skill trees provided, or you can mix the two accordingly. Maybe a mix of the two will allow for a combo such as Fireball + Sword = Flaming Sword?

The biggest portion I'm unsure about is the constant reshuffling of skills on the skill bar during combat. Personally, I would ditch the timer-based portion and drop size of the bar (maybe down to a max of 4 slots with programmable hotkeys) and have it give you an initial randomized batch of skills to start, then as you use one of the skills (aside from basic attack/dodge/block), THEN it gets replaced with the next one from the "deck" and keep the ability to "discard" unwanted skills and combine wanted ones accordingly. That way you have an initial glance at the skill bar, know what's where, then only have to re-glance when you use one of the skills to see what replaces it.

 

Why can't we begin with a suite of "basic" attacks, stances and maneuvers which are expanded based on the weapons equipped and such? Why is the "basic" attack simply a case of stand next to enemy and click? That was my point. There are no aggressive or wild attacks, no defensive postures, no throwing dirt in the eyes of the enemy, no feinting or simply forgoing offence to block attacks while a friend circles to the side of the opponent to attack. This isn't "special skill" stuff. This is just using your sword and shield or whatever to do more than "attack".

 

Seems to me there is too much crap going on at once! Reminds me of playing a mage character on mmos with a bunch of slots and icons, I have always disliked the card system and being a mage because of that! But being a devout follower of RG and his games, ill give it a shot before i say no way, not fun!

 

I'm hoping we at least get a basic Attack, a basic Dodge, and a basic Parry to start with. Some of the other things like trowing dirt and whatnot is something I would expect to be more towards the advanced area. Of course, we MIGHT get a few Skill points to work with to start with a Skill or two beyond the basics... who knows at this point. I agree though, I would like to see combat a bit more engaging than run up and hit things (although I that's basically how I tend to play as a pure melee... run up and start wailing away).

I do also have to hope that we DO get a certain amount of "auto-defense" so that you don;t have to always be hitting the Defend/Evade/Parry button(s) in order to not take full damage from something, but by doing so, you raise the chance for success by a significant amount.

 

there is a basic attack,

players will still have an “auto” attack that just uses their equipped weapon. That equipped weapon can be a sword, axe, shield, wand, etc. For simple encounters, this will be sufficient for most people to achieve victory.

 

I knew that. It's the other two (Dodge, Parry) that I hope are part of the basic skillset as well.

 

Most all of these seem to be covered in the existing combat skills. Auto-attack is pretty basic. Each of the 4 offensive schools start off with a basic attack at the top of the tree. You need to learn that before you can learn more in that tree.

The 4 defensive schools seem to cover most of the stances, maneuvers, defensive posturess, and blocks.

Aggressive attacks could be handled just by burning focus on various attack skills. There is a perry skill and a reposte skill under blades, but I didn't see much for feint. You will have to pretend that stun and knockback effects covers the throwing of dirt in the eyes of the enemy - same basic effect.

Wild Attacks? Just learn some Chaos Magic and see how wild things get.

It looks like different play styles are going to require different weapons or armors. You can't be all big and tank like in light armor, but your basic sword and shield should give a mix of offensive and defensive skills. Bludgeon weapons and medium armor seems to be for crowd control. Doesn't look like you can just pick up any weapon and armor and be able to take on various roles like tank, dps, crowd control, etc. You'll have to get custom tools to do the job.

 

I hope (and currently expect) to be getting skill points to use when you create your character (or has soon as you arrive in town). I expect enough skill points to fill out a level 1 character's Deck with all action skills and not have any slugs in it.

I'm also half-expecting your will get some basic starter equipment and pre-set skills to go with it. Problem is how to build a custom mage that way. Pure fighters wouldn't be a problem, but selecting a good set of starting skill could be. Though now that I think of it there was a magic diagram with 4 characters in the corners, each with an arc covering three schools of magic. Those could be the basic mage starter kits.

I'd much prefer to just get the skill points and spend them how you see fit. That might mean tutorials and the like to get players started, or the setup where you slowly get more and more of the full UI and functionality as you do basic starter quests.

 

Dodge is currently in the Light Armor skills, and Parry is second level of Blade Combat skills. Doesn't look like the current system will allow those to be used with any generic weapon. Currently you will want to plan your equipment bases on the skills you want access to. I think changing that in the current system would really throw off the current skill slots and allotments and skill points gained at each level.

Spoiler

Wonder how many people would be happy with such a change. So far I haven't been able to come up with an alternative.

 

This is a lot of how UO character creation was (pick 3 skills, set them up to a certain level with a limited number of skill points to put between the three). Later on, they added in several "starter builds" (pre-set skills based on certain themes) to help in this regard. Maybe that would take place as well here?

I agree though that there IS going to have to be some tutorial/buildup in regards to using the UI to get people used to it.

 

Ok, so the following will be a variation on my hybrid combat system proposal, which I originally posted here. In that post, I proposed that players be given both combat systems: the "traditional" one, whatever that means to you AND the new combat system.

It seems with the introduction of the Focus skills, they are giving you some means to lock skills, but it's still a random deal which a lot of players don't like, not to mention the whole plate spinning aspect, and you only get 4 locked skills at most currently.

So with this variation, I say the new combat system is primarily a combo combat system. If you want to deal with building skill decks, random deals, random skills popping in your UI, then you will benefit from that by getting to use combos. If you don't care for it, swap out your "combo hotbar" with your traditional hotbar which you can configure however you like with whatever skills you want. If you get sick of traditional combat, swap out your "traditional hotbar" and your "combo hotbar" slides into place and starts dealing skills for you to use and make combos with.

Perhaps you can still make combos with the traditional hotbar but you are limited to the 12 skills you've configured. Since the new combat system allows up to 30 skills in a deck while traditional is limited to 12 skills max, perhaps a new skill could be added to help traditional combat players unlock more traditional hotbars to balance things out a bit. This would mean perhaps traditional hotbars also only start with 6 slots.

 

I was wanting combat like in Ultima III and Ultima IV!

 

Fine with me.

 

If the planned (a.k.a. Deck system) is the "combo hotbat" and allows for making combos (at the added cost of randomness), then would the "tradational hotbar" completely disallow combos? You mention it as a possible option.

One question is would the "tradational hotbar" force all skills on it to be Noble Skills (and Locked Slots)? This mechanism would prevent the use of combos, but increases the cost of those skills. Would players be willing to pay the extra cost to avoid the randomness?

I see no reason why the size of the "traditional hotbar" could not use the same existing mechanisms for number of slots. Start at 6, gain 1 at level 10 and 1 at level 20, and use Versatility to add more. There would be no benefit from Instinct while using the "traditional hotbar". Also, no discarding of skills.

You could still use the Deck building UI for designing "traditional hotbar" setups. The difference is the "traditional hotbar" Decks have exactly the number of combat bar slots available (and automaticlly fill in with slugs when you add more slots, and use a fixed order). Swapping rules still apply - pick the active deck, and apply a penalty of some kind to switch decks in combat (or switch between "traditional hotbar" and "combat hotbat").

Probably a good fallback mechanism if the Deck system fails to work out. It should be less work for the devs to implement since it re-uses existing mechanisms. (Assuming the devs haven't already implemented it to remove randomness for testing and balancing of specific skills.)

 

I created a poll in the Skils and Combat (Dev+) forum.

 

One thing that can be considered is putting no limit on your locked skill slots, so all 12 can be locked. If you choose to go that route. No combos, some higher costs associated. For alpha they want us to try it as is though... give feedback then. These guys making this game are all gamers too. They are also aware of issues people have and can have. We aren't all a bunch of game geniuses that can see things they can't. But they are interested in our opinions as different people like different things and if most people don't like it they can make enough changes so most do.

They are giving us early information on this system as people have requested and they said they'd be open with that. They also do welcome feedback and will make changes if they agree with your good arguments for things. So obviously good to discusss some stuff now. But many things are being brought up and proposed that I think would be premature. Yes, march seems like too long to wait. But lets trust that they know what they are talking about when they say they can change it to a system people will enjoy if it isn't we don't like it in alpha.

Just something to keep in mind for those who are making statements like, "I won't play this game."

 

I cant view that section, many cant, so a poll would have been better placed in the sections all can view i think.