HRPT: Units and PCs

[Dre]

You know another problem i see and its sort of related...Magickers in mass battle. Right now you have mundanes on one side and mudanes+magickers on the other.

Lets say you have huge units of NPC and vNPC rushing each other and about 7 mundanes one one side and 5 mundanes on the other with 3 magickers.

Now if it were just mundane vs mundane some might die others would run. However what usually happens is you have the invisible magickers targeting the pcs with macroed spells of doom and they drop them like rocks.

Now i don't blame the magickers, even though i miss my 2 year old uber PC, just because whenever one is spotted the leaders always try to drop the magickers as fast as they can aswell.
However i still would like to see something done about those uber spells of doom happening to hit single PC when there are hundreds of soldiers by their side. They should really be less likely to hit and a magicker rely on area effect spells, again nerfed a bit so all the PCs dont die all at once and maybe have a chance to run or hide.
Basically the chance spells(mostly individual one) work against individuals should drop depending how many VNPC , NPC and PCs are in the room.

That said people on both sides are playing to win, Icly for sure and and to some extent oocly too, however its within respectable and appropriate limits (they don't attempt to wipe out the other side ALL at once).
To those that say stop playing to win...lighten up, its a game...its so so SO much more fun when you have an invested interest in your PC, don't want him or her to die, and when your oocly rooting for your 'side' to win.

I think the HRPT has been a great success (I am sure the game will improve for it aswell but still) , i've seen great roleplaying with all the emotions, gameplay and stratagy, and just sheer "holy shit i can't believe we pulled that off or lived through that"...You imms have really outdone yourselves this time.

[ThirdEye]

Just a quick idea. If it already isn't in, how about when units of soldiers are getting closer to you that you get some sort of warning message.

> The sound of armor clacking together and obsidian and bone being drawn reaches your ears from some distance away. (obviously not a good one but you get the idea)

It could possibly stop 2 units of soldiers seeming to appear out of nowhere to kill you.

[Ava]

However what usually happens is you have the invisible magickers targeting the pcs with macroed spells of doom and they drop them like rocks.

I'd like to see magickers KOing units before non-leader PCs, unless they suspect that the PCs might be able to see them. But there may be sides to that story that I don't understand...I know next to nothing about wiggling.

[Armaddict]

Just a note...aside from those with the 'order' command, units can't be ordered to kill things.  Those who must use 'ask' on their units do not have 'kill' as an option.  Therefore...it comes up to someone in the clan to attack something first...and then all those units will autoassist.

That being said...I know it sucks, but it is also somewhat realistic.  Even if a bunch of units can't logically attack one guy...that guy being attacked by a leader with a bunch of soldiers behind him -will- be mopped up quickly.  How is this prevented?  I tried for awhile with a PC to explain it to people, but people just didn't pick up.  Let's just say that in early battles on earth, yes...it was swarms of people rushing forward to meet, with some being cut down and overwhelmed instantly before it slowly disperses into more spread out fights.  That's how these fights go, currently.

There -is- a way to defend against it.  There -are- ways to get formations going, IC'ly, without any changes to code.  There are certain skills -made- for keeping this onslaught from overwhelming every unit/pc/npc one at a time.  When I tried to talk about it in an IC manner, though, it was frustrating because even though I thought I was getting to close to just straight up explaining the ooc mechanics, people wouldn't pick it up and thought I was just talking out of my ass.

I, personally, do not feel that there are many changes that need to be made for code to fix it.  I think it's the players who need to apply some logic and tactical thinking to their armies/followers to find a way to defend against it.  It -is- there.  It's just not emphasized by anyone as important...and then, in those mass battles, the error of such shows but it's still blamed on current code.

Just my opinion.

[spawnloser]

A point was made about magickers attacking random individuals.  I do not count the leaders as random individuals...simply hard to reach.  Other PCs are not random individuals, but do stand out a bit, I would suggest.

For magick as for archery, many spells are 'ranged' attacks in one way or another.  Krathi don't have to run up and touch someone to light them on fire, and the same would hold true for other magickers and many of their magicks.  You want to target 'leaders' with magick and archery?  Go right ahead.  I'm all for it.

Targetting 'leaders' with units is just sad for the story...making baby Tek cry and all that.

[Halaster]

Morgenes and I have been talking a lot about this the past few days, and we've come up with an idea we really like.  However, it's fairly complex and will not likely be done before this HRPT ends.

But, a "quick fix" is also being worked on - I think Morgenes started it today.

The quick-fix is something like this:
order units attack - makes all the 'unit' type npcs engage in combat with enemy units in the same room
order soldiers X - makes all the non-unit type npc's commanded by that person do X

The old traditional order followers will still be in place, so someone could still order units kill bob.  But the above two options will help them until the long-term fix is in place - which I'm not going to detail yet.

As someone else said, there has been more than one instance of someome making all their troops attack one person.  Their errors have been addressed and handled, so don't worry (tho if it happens again, please do email in or use the request tool).  I will say, though, that they don't have a lot of other options so far.

For example.  I'm a templar and I have 4 units and 3 soldiers with me.  I walk into the room with an enemy templar who has 3 units and 6 soldiers.  Is 1.unit mine, or is 5.unit mine?  Which soldier?  I can type:  keyword unit (if you don't know about the keyword command, look it up!) and that helps, but by the time I type order 3.unit kill 4.unit, order 6.unit kill 1.unit and so on.. bad things happen.

Sometimes in the heat of battle, a player panics and does something dumb like order followers kill bob.  I'm not saying it's OK, just helping you try to see the other side.

But like Tlaloc said, we're learning from this.  We knew the whole "unit" thing wasn't great, but it's become a bigger problem than we though.  I guess part of that is because this is drawn-out, whereas in the past the battles were short-term and over quick.

I do like LoD's suggestion of less NPC's and more virtual fighting.  One of the battles was actually done that way, and turned out rather well.  I had leaders from both sides basically wishing up saying "Ordering the troops to do X" and then I'd dish out the appropriate echo's, decide (on the spur of the moment) how it worked out, and so forth.  Overall, I think it turned out well.  Both sides were told to just take it easy and go slow, that we weren't in a hurry, and by doing that, this format turned out decently.  I'm sure we'll try it again before this HRPT is over.

So, look for the quick fix soon, it should help by giving the templars options which they didn't have before and will help cut back on the unit vs individual problem.

[jhunter]

Armaddict is correct. There are ways to defend against unit attacks against you.
I don't think anyone is intentionally ordering units to gank other pcs. It's as Halaster said, in the heat of battle, trying to deal with all the scroll, and get the correct keywords while responding in some sort of timely matter, these things cause people to make mistakes. Sometimes, those mistakes cost others their pcs, sometimes they cost the one making the mistake their own.

[Morrolan]

I don't think anyone is intentionally ordering units to gank other pcs.

Um.  Yes they are.

[jhunter]

I don't think anyone is intentionally ordering units to gank other pcs.

Um.  Yes they are.

You're a RL mindbender?

*shivers*

[Halaster]

I don't think anyone is intentionally ordering units to gank other pcs.

Um.  Yes they are.

You're a RL mindbender?

*shivers*

Of course he's not.  But he's right, it was done intentionally.  It has been addressed, so let's not drag this thread down with arguing about it, ok?

[jhunter]

Here's a question though...since from looking at the poll some of you believe that noone should ever order units to attack pcs. So are you telling me that if the enemy consists of only pcs on the battle field, you are to let them sit there and do nothing? Just let the others get away or attack them with only pcs? Even though they are severely outnumbered and should have almost -zero- chance to get away unscathed?

Having been in a few of these things, something that has come to mind several times.

How about maybe cutting units down to quads? That way, if they end up attacking single pcs then it isn't unrealistic? Make them weaker, use more of them to balance out numbers. *shrug*

I'm of the opinion that you should have units attack other units, until there are no opposing units, then you move on down to the single npcs or single pcs. It's not wholly realistic, but neither is standing there to fight when you've just watched most of your comrades die around you.

Some things I've said behind the keyboard while playing in these things in the past:


"FLEE FATASS, FLEE!!!"

"You are outnumbered 40 to 1!"

"RUN YOU FOOL!"

"Surrender!"

"DO SOMETHING!!!"

[marko]

As I noted in another thread, the most difficult aspect with units is that there is no way to reliably order individual units under your own command - let alone target the enemy's units.  That leads to people using mass commands and attacking the leader PC.  

What happens is that all the units try and attack and all the units under their command try and guard - therefore most units peel off for unit vs unit combat.

As per whether or not it is "realistic" to have entire units kill individuals - well, actually, it is.  If you are an enemy scout who wanders in on a formation of the enemy.  That entire enemy formation is going to charge, surround, and kill.  Yes, a single individual of the formation will be the one that kills - but the entire group goes in for the kill.  It's just not pleasant or fair to the PC in question - but, again, if someone encounters fifty of the enemy who are charging across the desert... really, what is going to happen?

Units are representations of many people acting together in formation.  These formations can, and will, charge down individuals.  The problem with arm's combat system is that your options as a leader were limited to order everyone to do something or to not do anything.  

It's not a great way to handle the situation, I don't really like it, and I think the recent update to be able to command units and command individual npcs will help the situation somewhat.

I believe the ability to order units will help out a lot in trying to maintain control.  It is simple and elegant - it won't solve all issues of warfare combat but it will definitely help.

It would be nice if each unit and soldier npc had a "team" keyword.  For example, a Kuraci would have kuraci as a keyword.  Allanaki would have Allanaki as a keyword.  Tuluki would have Tuluki as a keyword.  Etc.  That way you can always be certain to be targeting the enemy unit and not just "unit."

From what I've seen not all npcs and units have their team keyword.  This makes trying to target the enemy unreliable which leads commanders to target what they know they can target - PCs.