Combat skill limitations

[Anonymous]

I think the real question is why do the staff feel that kick/bash/disarm spam needs to be nerfed.  Is it a question of power?  A question of realism?  A question of role-play?

While I can respect the idea that stamina drain during combat is realistic, I have to add my voice to the dozens of dissenters for this one.

In my eyes, it would be far preferable to add more significant delays for kick or bash or disarm to limit the number of times they can be used in a combat rather than imposing a stamina penalty on physical-based skills.

Stamina penalties for non-elves are already pretty harsh in the wilderness.  Adding stamina drain for abilities on top of this, if applied in sufficient capacity, is going to make this worse to the point that people will be discouraged from playing.

Realism is nice, but some of the most fun games aren't realistic.  People come to play a game to escape from reality, not to be saddled with it in such a way that their gameplaying experience isn't any fun.  The entertainment of playing a fighter is to be powerful and do the things you can't do in real life.

Regardless, if there is something that is being abused OOCly or is causing a game balance issue, I am all for addressing it.  I don't agree that a coded solution is the best option in some cases, though.  In this case, I'm distressed that so many things that are implemented are left to the players who we trust not to abuse things, but then things like this are discouraged directly through code.  

Have we already tried to say "look - we consider this bad RP.  Don't kick 200 times over and over in a battle, it doesn't make any sense?" (or whatever other reasoning there is for wanting to discourage this)?  With such a fluid playerbase, constant reinforcement is always going to be needed.

[Tamarin]

I just want to politely warn the staff to be cautious when instigating changes like stamina loss to combat.  While I think it's a good idea, it still seems to me like it's a temporary solution to a greater problem.  The greater problem is the old influence of stock diku combat code, something that is becoming less and less suited to the game as new and exciting changes come in (the watch skill, for example).  Personally, I can see all these changes reaching a point that is so persnickety that it just starts to -feel- ludicrous.  And the feel of the game is very important in my mind.  In other words, while we try and approach realism with these changes, I don't think it can really happen without throwing away the fundamentals of the old diku combat code and replacing it with something new -- keeping it as is will inherently make these great changes negative rather than positive.

Or maybe not.  Just think about it.  Or maybe you already are.  I don't know.

[Intrepid]

Speaking as someone playing a warrior currently, I gave it a go last night
against a beastie and found that I did lose a noticable amount of stamina
for one or two combat moves.  Granted, this may just be that my skill was
lower than I previously believed too.

I do think that Disarm is insanely powerful.  Everyone knows that an
unarmed opponent is vulnerable to an armed one.

Oh, and RM: Magickers do get a cooldown.  We call it mana loss.

All in all, I like the change so far.  I'll have to take a closer look at it
later.

[elvenchipmunk]

I do not want to see a loss in stamina without something else put in as well. If nothing else will be changed, then I would prefer the cooldown.

One idea I think I'd like to see if bash/kick/disarm make you lose stamina would be moving in the wilderness in some places taking off less stamina. Now I'm not sure exactly what the grey forest, or the windswept plains, or the desert are like, but I know that when I walk in the forest in rl, or a field or whatever, I don't get tired very fast at all, and I think this could be reflected a little better in game.

So ya, if you keep the stamina penalty, I'd like to see something to balance it out a little more.

If you put in the cooldown, I think it would solve most of the spamming problems and wouldn't necessitate (sp?) any other changes.

In conclusion, the cooldown is preferable IMO.

[mansa]

I think that we should be able to regenerate stamina while standing, and regenerate at one point of movement at a time.  That would be a cool addition.

[Twilight]

The last time I played a moderately buff warrior was awhile go.  Since then, two of the skills in question have been insanely buffed.

Kick used to do 1 or 2 points of damage.  Three if you were a half giant.  Every time, it simply didn't get higher.  Spiked bracers did more damage in a fight than spamming kick.

Disarm was absolutely useless against anyone who was not wearing gloves.  You might get off one if you were insanely strong and lucky (probably less than 1 out of 100 times).

And...warriors still kicked ass.  The only two pk I was involved with, it took less than three RL seconds to kill the other person.  Once you are good, you aren't just good in combat, you are insane.  These skills were buffed, now they are a little unbuffed just a little in comparison.  I don't see the big deal.

[Falconer]

I think this is a great addition, primarily because it closes the gap between those warriors who choose to consistently emote during fights and those that use combat skills over and over again for an advantage.  That said, I'd vastly prefer to see warriors use disarm, kick, and bash throughout the fight, rather then spamming them at the beginning of the fight until they're out of stamina - I'm not sure the current system addresses this.  

Also, in my newbieness, I'm not sure if there's an algorithm within the combat code that lowers combat proficiency if a character's stamina is low, but I think that such would be a boon to this system.  By keeping track of their stamina before entering a fight, a great deal of RP opportunities emerge: warriors can attempt to outlast, rather than overpower, an opponent.  Assassins can find a unique opportunity for attacking an exhausted warrior.  Hunters and caravan guards will find it neccessary to set up camp within the desert to rest.  It adds to realism, and it adds to playability.  Granted, warriors are taking a hit in the coded power department, but are gaining an interesting piece of code that will force them to think critically, interact with other PCs, and develop a particular style of fighting that works for them.  All of that is a great thing.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

I think that we should be able to regenerate stamina while standing, and regenerate at one point of movement at a time.  That would be a cool addition.

[jhunter]

I think that we should be able to regenerate stamina while standing, and regenerate at one point of movement at a time.  That would be a cool addition.

[Yokunama]

They depend point blank upon those three skills.

They have more skills than those three skills.

Unarmed combat, expert battle maneuvers such as disarming, the ability to hurl missiles, and the eventual expert use of bows and arrows are all part of a warrior's skills. Some master warriors can even bandage the wounded.

Also, the skill is being missused, when it comes to life or death situations and skill training. Their combat ability is great enough to take down many PCs and NPCs, if done correctly.

No other guild can match a warrior's combat prowess

I hope this jogs your memory, because warriors do not rely on three skills to bring them to victories. If it did, I'm sure the documents would state otherwise.

[jmordetsky]

Well...I wasn't going to post. But...Wtf..why not.

Email I sent:

I'm not a big fan of the Stam drain on warrior skills. Not that I mind them, they don't really effect my play much. But, I don't feel they are realistic penalty. Nor is it an effective penalty. I'm playing a warrior right now, and it's pretty easy, even with the stam drain in place to train disarm and bash which are imho what gives warriors their truly awe inspiring fighting skills. Disarm in and of itself is incredibly powerful.

I also think "something" was needed to curb the "bash;stand;disarm;kick;repeat" syndrome and the people who are complaining about warriors being nerfed are a little out of line. It's like a few points of stamina, per skill, get over it.

That said, it's a bit silly that I can fight for hours and hours locked in deadly combat and never lose a point of stamina, but if I try to knock your weapon from your hand I get tired. I see the need for a penalty, I just don't think this is right one.


I was thinking about the change, I wanted to propose something a bit different: Rather then stam drain, I was considering that these skills if they miss should really make you lose an attack that round, or lower your chances for success on your attavks or possibly open you up for an attack.

I also think increasing the dangers associated with failure would curb the "bash;stand; bash;stand; bash;stand; disarm" syndrome.

The reason the "danger of failure" effect appeals to me, is that I found myself typing "disarm;disarm;disarm" at a set interval last fight my new char had. I was trying to train it to a usuable level.

I was unworried about failure because the NPC wasn't going to grab my weapon if I had a critical failure and dropped it, I knew I would be able to snatch it up first.

But, anther time I was attacked in a room full of npcs in an area, and I was VERY cautious with disarm, because I knew if I failed badly that one of these room NPCs would snatch up my shiny new sword because they were coded to do so. I feel things of this nature are a much more effective deterent against against spam skilling.

Another thought are ramifications of success. Which I cover below.


Essentially I break it down like this:


1) Failure or Success for Disarm

a.       Lowers your ability to attack the next round (IE lower offense for N rounds) because you were focusing on the disarm

b.      Opens you up for attacks (lower defense for N rounds) because you were focusing on the disarm

2) Successful Disarm may also wear away at your weapon


2)       Failure for Bash

a.       Again if you are trying to bash, you should be less able to attack, because you were tying to knock into the person not hit them with your weapon or defend yourself, so you should suffer a off/deff penalty.

b.      Also, for "danger of failure" effect, maybe the penalty for fighting on the ground should be higher? I've always felt that when I bash someone successfully, or they failed to bash me, and I have them on the ground at my mercy that the bonus wasn't' high enough. Upping the on the ground bonus would be a good balancer I think because It would be more effective, but much *more* dangerous to fail as well and as a result would curb attempts.

c.       In addition, missing the bash and hitting the ground should also do a moderate amount of damage to the attacker, maybe like 1-3 points. If you are charging at someone full speed and miss, it doesn't tickle.



3)       Success for Bash

a.       Rather then a stamina drain, this should be a mild HP drain, perhaps one forth of the damage done to the victim is done to the attacker, because the impact. I mean, I did just run into you. I've seen warriors with high bash just bash NPCs to death. Not hit the NPC once with their weapon, but rather just bash, stand, bash stand until the fight was over.  This would curb that because some of the damage would be dealt back to you. Not much, but some.

4)       Kick

a.       The same off/def penalty for Disarm should apply here to reflect that you are concentrating less on your general attack, and more on your kick.


All of that said and done, barring these as more realistic penalties, I don't have a major problem with the stam drain.

Truly, I think combat in general should drain stamina at a set managable rate.

[Maybe42or54]

Atleast Endurance is as important as the rest of the stats now, I suppose.

[Tamarin]

Really good post, jmordetsky.  I like those ideas.  They make perfect sense.

[Synthesis]

Stamina loss or effectiveness delays don't make sense in some cases, particularly for half-giants vs. small opponents.

It takes virtually no effort for something as large as a half-giant to knock a human clean across a room, so the stamina loss doesn't make sense (the weight of a human body with gear is trivial compared to a half-giant's strength).

It also takes very little skill on the part of the half-giant, and is consequently very difficult for an attacker to avoid.  This thing has arms as long as your halberd and even its glancing blows carry enough force to break bones.  Getting knocked over repeatedly should almost happen without any intentional effort put into it by the half-giant...it's like trying to dance with an elephant:  eventually you're going to get trampled.

And with disarming...I think half-giants should get a size modifier to this skill, regardless of their guild.  Any serious attempt at parrying a blow from a beast this huge is going to result in either your grip or your weapon breaking.  A half-giant actively trying to knock your weapon out of your grasp should have a very good chance of being able to do it...because with that much strength behind the blow, it takes absoloutely no technique to succeed...you only need to connect. Furthermore, the idea of disarming a half-giant is a little absurd.  I guess you could make the case that it's an attack against the half-giant's hand, causing him to drop the weapon, but that's a skilled shot, and I would say it would have a very low chance of succeeding.

These changes significantly affect the dynamic of half-giant combat, and I think it's to the detriment.  Half-giants should be able to wade into combat and wreak havoc with little or no skill or training.  Currently this is not the case.  It takes real-life months of near-constant combat training for a half-giant warrior to even begin to approach the ability to dominate a combat in a way that all half-giants, warrior or not, should be able to, based solely on the virtues of their size and strength.  And since half-giants attack so -ridiculously- slowly, these secondary combat commands are absoloutely essential for them to effectively dominate combat.

Now, moving away from half-giants, the stamina and effectiveness delays are simply unfair to beginning warriors.  Other classes still have only the ordinary penalties (command delays, mainly) to their second-tier combat skills, while now warriors have the command delays -and- a stamina penalty -and/or- a success probability penalty.

To make it fair, I propose the following:

1. Throw - Successive attempts at throwing knives at someone should be penalized by lowering the chance of a successful strike.  If you can't -kick- someone as effectively, why should you be able to throw a knife at them with equal effectiveness, when now they are probably actively engaged in trying to avoid your knives?

2. Backstab - Successive attempts at backstabbing (e.g. backstab;disengage;backstab) should be penalized in a similar manner, in addition to the penalties already received for attempting to backstab a target already engaged in combat.  The same reasoning applies.

3. Sap - Same as backstab.

4. Subdue - Same reasoning holds.  Apply stamina loss and negative success probability modifier here.

5. Flee - Apply stamina loss to failed attempts, and make successive attempts less likely to succeed.  (Ha.  Yeah, right.)

But, to make a long story short, I think the whole idea stinks.  The reasoning presented is simply a fig leaf for the real idea behind the idea, which is to prevent spamming.  If we're going to universally apply the logic here, then -every- skill should drain your stamina, and -every- skill should have penalties against frequent successive uses, not just combat skills.  That obviously is a bad idea.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

If you scanned the other posts regarding this, other physical skills will be draining stamina.

Additionally, I'm not so sure it's an attempt to stop spammers as an attempt for realism. Remember, a spill-code for bowled food just went in as well.

[UnderSeven]

I think the thought behind this change is a good one and I applaud the staff for that.

My concern though is bringing Stanima into combat in any way shape or form worries be in regard to balance issues.

If we're spending ST in fights, and npcs are too, then players will now suddenly have to consider their st in a greater level in combat that before, where as npcs, being the block heads they are, won't.  They recover faster than we do too, standing and ready to fight, without having to rest.  In fact if I'm correct an npc recovers as fast if not a little faster standing ready, then a player does resting.  

End result that I see is while players have to plan and be tactical, npcs can continue to be the mindless attackers they are.  While my post is taking things a little far, one or two st isn't a big deal for skills that you should maybe use only a few times in combat.  I think I'm going to agree with mansa and Deadly7 here.  If you're going to take st for something done in combat, you should give it back too.  But that would render this change useless.  Maybe a cooldown would just be an ultimate better solution.  

Or maybe instead of a cool down, a skill penalty.  You kick once, cool.  You kick again within a certain amount of time and you receive a massive penalty for kicking while off balance.  

If you fail a kick currently and get a critical failure as I understand it can suck for you.  Making the cool down hurt your skill would mean spamming kick/disarm/bash (all of which have crit failures that suck for you) would result on you getting knocked on your behind frequently.  Make sure the code accounts for this and doesn't give skill gains based off of poor choices on when to use said skills and I think we may have a slightly better solution for the problem as I understand it to be.

[Yang]

It seems to be that bash is essential in stopping magickers from repeatedly casting nasty spells at you. How is limiting its use going to balance warriors further if they are fortunate enough to even be able to SEE their opponent?

[Yokunama]

It seems to be that bash is essential in stopping magickers from repeatedly casting nasty spells at you. How is limiting its use going to balance warriors further if they are fortunate enough to even be able to SEE their opponent?

The benefit of adding some additional strategy to combat is also a factor, though admittedly that has less to do with balance.

Play smarter.
Don't be afraid to flee, it is part of strategy.

[mansa]

I like it.  I like it all.  Yum!

[Yokunama]

And with disarming...I think half-giants should get a size modifier to this skill, regardless of their guild.  Any serious attempt at parrying a blow from a beast this huge is going to result in either your grip or your weapon breaking.  A half-giant actively trying to knock your weapon out of your grasp should have a very good chance of being able to do it...because with that much strength behind the blow, it takes absoloutely no technique to succeed...you only need to connect. Furthermore, the idea of disarming a half-giant is a little absurd.  I guess you could make the case that it's an attack against the half-giant's hand, causing him to drop the weapon, but that's a skilled shot, and I would say it would have a very low chance of succeeding.

However, possibly due to the magick which birthed half-giants, they are infamously stupid and have very low wisdoms. In addition, because of their great size, half-giants are typically slow to move and have low agilities.

Agility is an ability score that measures all types of physical coordination and swiftness. Hand-eye coordination, reaction time, balance, depth perception, and reflexes are all types of characteristics measured by agility.

With that said, I think Half giants' agility portray them as very clumsy creatures as well. It is fairly hard for them to knock your blade into another room, if you are darting every-wich-a-way from them.

Half-giants should be able to wade into combat and wreak havoc with little or no skill or training.

Size and strength are not the main factors that determine the victor in battles. A lightning fast elf could make steak out of giants, if they are fast enough.

Also, they are very dangerous in combat as it is. It might take a while to get to the point where you can rip anyone to pieces, but there are half-giants out there that can do 100-200 pts of damage (an estimate), if the player puts a bit of strategy into play.

[John]

I just can't wait to see the posts where people claim that this is a stupid addition because they spammed disarm in sparring and so neither of the sparring pair could flee because they both had no more stun.

Combat SHOULD stop then IMO.

[mansa]

I like Synthesis's description of a Half-Giant in a fight, and agree with it.

[Bebop]

Is a HORRIBLE idea.

I think some of you that are all for this idea:  adding stamina decrease while you are battling, must not even play combat characters very often.

Most characters that I play are combat characters and outdoorsy.  It is already extremely difficult to get good at combat without twinking or joining the Byn or some such other clan where there are people to spar.  Adding this stamina decrease is not good, and it's not neccesary unless learning combat is going to be faster, and the entire battle system is going to be reworked to go faster.

Sometimes it has taken me fifteen minutes to kill one thing like a skeet, starting out.  Maybe strength is below average so the blow just keeps bouncing off the chitin.  But it's just something you have to endure when starting out and you are to weak to fight sometimes.  As well, people that use shield only get in one attack and they have a high defense, so sometimes the defense is high and the offense hasn't caught up so the battle takes a while.  No IRL it may be ten or so minutes but in game it is much longer.  The code in itself is not realistic in the aspect that it takes five minutes IRL to kill a yompar baking on a sunrock but that is the code.  That is why during sparring different things are emoted like drills and slow steady sparring movements, different people have different styles of combat emoting.  But the combat code in itself is not realistic, it only provides a way for us to codedly defeat someone in battle.  The emoting is left to the players.

Adding this stamina decrease would be taking a huge step (though an easier step) infront of the code.  I'm not even saying that the combat code even needs to be changed.  The point I'm trying to make is, you are considering putting in this stamina code to make it more realistic but the combat code is not realistic in itself.  All this is going to do is deter people from fighting at all and the real people it's going to effect are the indies and the hunters who can not escape from battle because they were fighting gurth that should have taken them less then ten minutes IG but because of the code and the poor strength causing the sword to bounce of it's shell due to code, it took them RL fifteen minutes, oh look someone lead a bahamet into the same square with the him *CHOMP*

Code Select Expand

The body of a potbellied gurth is here.

An armored bahamet has arrived from the west.

An armored bahamet viscously pinches you on the neck.

>flee

You flee heading north.

s

[NSWE] The Windswept Grasslands

>hitch kank

An armored bahamet has arrived from the north.

>mount kank

An armored bahamet viscously pinches you on the wrist.

A yellow kank throws you from it's back!

flee
flee
flee

You flee heading west.

An armored bahamet has arrived from the east.

w

You run west.

An armored bahamet has arrived from the east.

w

You are too exhausted!

That seems more available for twinking to me.  Meanwhile, the person that lead the bahamet into the square with the other person who is exhausted from fighting leads the bahamet away and takes up the stuff of the person who died.  Anytime you fight you will be at risk.

A group of Bynners fighting spiders and the IMMs decide they want gith to run in?  How are they going to do that when everyone is exhausted from battling.  Oh yeah and of course they'll have to take time out of the RPT to rest after fighting one or two things.

No, it's ridiculous.  It doesn't make anything more realistic.  It just makes it a pain.  People already have to worry about dehydration, and running out of stamina if they have to flee, and starvation, and the thing they are battling and the risk of any raider or large creature coming in after them.

Adding stamina isn't realistic, it will just screw up the code, the combat system itself is to unrealistically long.  I wish the stamina penalty would be taken out entirely, but adding that to some skills and then to combat, is different entirely.  And I really really, hope you guys are not going to add a stamina penalty to combat.  Because it would just suck for many OOC and IC reasons, and put players at a greater risk to do anything, especially for newbs.

EDIT - Not to mention a raider can just follow someone around, run in and attack, get them to flee, lose stamina, then when they are exhausted just kill them so they can't flee or shoot them from a safe distance.  This stamina loss would open it up even more for raiders to take advantage of people and in what I think is a twinkish way of doing it.

Leave well enough alone right?  That is one thing freaking me out, there's nothing wrong with the combat system right now, why change it?

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

I think some of you that are all for this idea:  adding stamina decrease while you are battling, must not even play combat characters very often.

I have been playing since 99. In that time, I have played two characters who were not fighters, wait, no, one.

My longest lived 52 days, my next longest 39, and my next longest 38.

I am for stamina decrease.

[Bebop]

I think SOME of you that are all for this idea:  adding stamina decrease while you are battling, must not even play combat characters very often.