Running and focus

Loss of focus while running appears to have been tweaked quite a bit. Running drains focus WAY too fast IMO. Why should a character completely lose the ability to cast a spell after running for just a few seconds?

 

When you are encumbered you lose focus when you move.

 

Understood but if I'm below my weight limit my focus is still draining very quickly. I assume it gets worse, the more I carry.

 

I agree, i was carrying nothing and it did drain too quickly.

 

Because they're tired?

Why should a football player lose the ability to catch a ball or make a block when they get tired? Because that's how the human body and minds works?

 

A football player can play a whole game at pretty much the same speed he started the game with. A marathoner can run 26 miles worth of sub-5 minute miles. In Sota my big brawny Olympic god-like avatar can't run at a brisk pace after just a few seconds of exertion. Even if he's totally unencumbered.

It doesn't make sense, and it hurts playability.

 

From my point of view, people run way too much as it is. They run EVERYWHERE, they run from one side of the street to the other. Virtually no one walks.

In the world you're talking about, Budner, people just run at max speed forever the moment they appear. I don't subscribe to that style of play. It's immersion breaking. I think the best compromise is allowing players to have a fast run AT ALL. If it were up to me I'd remove running completely unless you were in combat mode. Then I'd make combat mode slow drain focus so people wouldn't sit in it all day.

 

Well the running thing will persist so I guess your immersion is doomed. My beef is the inability to sprint for longer than a few seconds.

If I see you in-game I will walk by slowly so as not to break your immersion, bow in deference to Your Grace and try not to say "Yo yo, what up leet lord?!?! Grindin' your skillz?"

 

My immerssion is based on macro level (not micro level) transactions. So don't trouble yourself on my account.

 

lol, I saw you scuba diving off the southern ferry dock yesterday. I was going to say something, but I thought you might be fishing. Anyway it is hard to break that kind of immersion.

 

Shhh don't tell but I was peeing in the water.

 

I just tried it out, I've consistently clocked it as draining a full focus bar in about 10 seconds (unencumbered in light armor). A little bit more than a few.

Whether its too little time I think depends on whether we want to see this as running or sprinting. The normal pace is really a heavy jog more than a run. (Would be cool to have several paces, walk->jog->run->sprint but that might get a bit complicated).

I agree with Budner anyway that its a bad way to control people running and jumping around, they'll do it anyway.

Will be interesting to see if any of this has an effect on nutrition/hunger later. RG said that he expects the water element in food to play a role in auto-heal. Will there be cases where you want a flask of water around ?

 

I found a Well in Wrymsands yesterday. I'm imagining that it will be an oasis that you'll have to fill back up on water at. We'll see.

 

Oh yea, a slower, sneaking pace would be good too, for stealth and walking in dangerous areas, but that's another topic and another thread.

 

yes it is totally for another thread to have a crawling on our stomach, or crouched stance while sneaking slowly too. Whateer that other thread is, it could use these thoughts.

 

When I combine this ^^ with what I´ve read on encumbrance from Dev+ users, I see horrors unforetold.....
Travelling from Owls Head to Breamar, the inventory full with food and water, at 123% encumbrance penalty... *giggle

 

Hopefully you can eat and drink before going out to play like they mentioned. They said we need to eat a certain amount within a time period to gain the benifit from eating and drinking. I don't think we need to carry all of our meals in our back pack, although maybe there will be light weight rations we can live on if we are on an extended mission, otherwise it might be best to go back and eat in town. Food spoils anyway so it might be good to just keep the coins to pick up a meal the next time you stop by a chef's place. Seems more realistic too.

 

Why would you need an inventory full :> Modest rations just meant to keep you satiated and which don't weigh that much should last a while. You shouldn't need water unless you exhaust yourself and a single flask should be fine.

Plus, not only can you eat in town, but also go hunting any time you want, kill an animal, set up a camp, and do some field cooking.

Seriously, it should be pretty easy.

 

I agree running at this point and losing focus so fast is difficult. Figuring out what to do to prevent this from deterring you so much that you want to log out of the game is important. So far that is sketchy, especially since it's not balanced yet and because we don't
have eating and all that would help us info out there that much yet. Well the devs stated it is not balanced yet, so our feedback is important. I think it has to be mentioned and considered all that you need to carry before you set off on a journey or resource gathering, right now as it stands you cannot do much of this. Can I take reagents and how many, (they're too heavy in my opinion now), how much food can I take?, how many repair kits, potions?, harvesting equipment, not sure what else but there are probably other things, plus the armor and weapon/s you have on.

It does not have to be so totally realistic that you can never accomplish anything. So it should be given thought or there will be a hell of a lot of frustrated players out there. I don't know what that looks like yet. I am still playing around
with the system as it is now, like trying to take every possible thing out of my back pack and adding strength and the new skill 'heavy lifting' to help. If someone cannot go out getting resources or fighting any amount of battles before
they must then go back onto the slow walk, slow load screens, and slow map that will not be a fun game. So it has to be balanced correctly to allow for thoughtful fun. Sorry for derailing a bit but this does tie in with encumberance too.

 

This is going to happen no matter what because players from the release got toys, homes and lots handed to them on a gold platter. Now it feels more like a game. But plenty are simply going to be frustrated because they need to rebuild and it will be more difficult. I am not saying all is good by any stretch of the word. However, those folks that have been complaining about nothing to do, will now find themselves with plenty to do.