Mass Combat

[Eloran]

In order to help slow down combat in the battlefield, I think it'd make sense if a few changes were made:

1) Agree on a cap in regards to the amount of characters that can gang up against an opponent. No more spam from ten characters filling up the screen of the person on the receiving end. I think we can all agree that having ten pcs gang up on one pc is a bit much - how can that many people encircle and hit their target without hitting one another? A limit should be reached, so what are your thoughts?

2) Unit vs Unit combat: This could have been changed already, but in the event that it isn't, allow only units to engage other units. No more <order followers kill x>, only to have three units of hg warriors instantly kill a character.

These are two things I think could help mass combat. What are your ideas? Should mass combat be coded separately from normal combat? What about creating a room that pcs enter on a virtual battlefield where once you're in the clash, you're in a giant clusterfuck of flying weapons and limbs?

[shadeoux]

In order to help slow down combat in the battlefield, I think it'd make sense if a few changes were made:

1) Agree on a cap in regards to the amount of characters that can gang up against an opponent. No more spam from ten characters filling up the screen of the person on the receiving end. I think we can all agree that having ten pcs gang up on one pc is a bit much - how can that many people encircle and hit their target without hitting one another? A limit should be reached, so what are your thoughts?

2) Unit vs Unit combat: This could have been changed already, but in the event that it isn't, allow only units to engage other units. No more <order followers kill x>, only to have three units of hg warriors instantly kill a character.

These are two things I think could help mass combat. What are your ideas? Should mass combat be coded separately from normal combat? What about creating a room that pcs enter on a virtual battlefield where once you're in the clash, you're in a giant clusterfuck of flying weapons and limbs?

Well depending on sizes of the attackers, HG's can stand back and -still- hurt you, even with daggers, but honestly limiting the number attacking a person, unless you -really- pissed in someones wheates shouldn't be 10 vs 1 that I can really ever think of.

As far as Unit VS Unit combat,

2) Unit vs Unit combat: This could have been changed already, but in the event that it isn't, allow only units to engage other units. No more <order followers kill x>, only to have three units of hg warriors instantly kill a character.

I've personally had the -SAME- PC Rezzed twice for this, if I remember correctly, it has been 8-10 years ago, but I was unlucky, and a 60+ day warrior able to kill almost anything, getting WTFpwnd sux.

Maybe, if you can temporarily remove keywords from your desc or add in Temp Keywords to others in the distance maybe

Aka:

l n
[near]
nothing.

[far]
nothing.

[Very Far]
Bret Farve is here ready to toss you a football.

<prompt>
addtkword bret n retire

You add Retire as a temporary keyword to Bret to the north.

l n

[Near]
Nothing.

[Far}
Nothing.

[Very Far]
(retire) bret farve is here ready to throw you a football.


just a suggestion to preemptively fix that second issue.

[Armaddict]

I think a limit on the number of attackers is a good idea, but not a 'hard cap', just a 'soft cap'.  Hehe, WoW players might get what I'm thinking of just based off of that.

After say...4...space is getting more cramped up around that guy.  Additional attacks should still get their action, but with penalties to attack speed (waiting for an opening) and with a slight disadvantage to those first however many's defenses temporarily after each of those attacks (less mobility until that space is opened up again).  Perhaps, finally, this could even be expanded into a real use for polearms in game, since right now no one seems to recognize the benefit of them as has been discussed and argued over in previous threads.  XD

[brytta.leofa]

1) Agree on a cap in regards to the amount of characters that can gang up against an opponent. No more spam from ten characters filling up the screen of the person on the receiving end. I think we can all agree that having ten pcs gang up on one pc is a bit much - how can that many people encircle and hit their target without hitting one another? A limit should be reached, so what are your thoughts?

This is great, and would make crimecode and NPC assists feel more reasonable.  Though Armaddict's "soft limit" sounds more realistic, a hard limit of four would add a tiny bit of strategery to how leaders deploy their people.

If this were implemented, aggressive NPCs would need to be intelligent about who they choose to attack, rather than trying fruitlessly to stack on an already-surrounded victim.  Maybe they already are.

2) Unit vs Unit combat: This could have been changed already, but in the event that it isn't, allow only units to engage other units. No more <order followers kill x>, only to have three units of hg warriors instantly kill a character.

I believe that units, since the Copper War, can't be ordered to attack a non-unit mobile.  I suspect that a unit can still be made to guard someone...  If this is so, it might be worthwhile to make units' ldesc change when they are guarding:
   A unit of lightly-armored half-giant drummers is here, guarding the tall figure in a blue hooded templar's robe.


There've been a ton of ideas on mass combat in the past (which doesn't mean we should stop talking about it), but I think a lot of them suffer from excessive complication.

[Salt Merchant]

I've liked the idea of a survey command that quickly sums up what's going on.

If you just look at the room, it can be incredibly spammy when the screen is already scrolling madly.

Instead, a command could give output like:

> survey amos yopp jian kasix jimbo
the tall muscular man is fighting three opponents
the short rotund man is fighting two opponents
the bearded man is fighting noone
the dark-eyed templar is fighting one opponent
no jimbo!
>

This means when a unit or group forms up, the leader (and others) could alias the command to quickly produce its list for the relevant people.

Maybe it would be a skill (warrior and/or templar?) rather than just a command all could use. On the other hand, you could argue it's just the evidence of one's own eyes.

[mangler]

I like the sound of some kind of cap in terms of number of people fighting one PC, however there are a few circumstances in which I can see 10 players fighting another NPC, such as a group of hunters taking a mekillot/bahamet, whereby there would be plenty of room for the crew to arrange themselves around said creature, so would it be possible to have varying caps depending on what is being fought? So perhaps 4 for a humanoid or small creature, 6 or 7 for larger ones and then 10 for the largest creatures about?

[Reiloth]

I've liked the idea of a survey command that quickly sums up what's going on.

If you just look at the room, it can be incredibly spammy when the screen is already scrolling madly.

Instead, a command could give output like:

> survey amos yopp jian kasix jimbo
the tall muscular man is fighting three opponents
the short rotund man is fighting two opponents
the bearded man is fighting noone
the dark-eyed templar is fighting one opponent
no jimbo!
>

This means when a unit or group forms up, the leader (and others) could alias the command to quickly produce its list for the relevant people.

Maybe it would be a skill (warrior and/or templar?) rather than just a command all could use. On the other hand, you could argue it's just the evidence of one's own eyes.

Fuck yeah.

[Sephiroto]

My only qualm about a survey command would be taking it all in during combat spam.

This wouldn't be a problem if ArmageddonMUD used more than one window like some of those fancy MUs.

[Salt Merchant]

My only qualm about a survey command would be taking it all in during combat spam.

This wouldn't be a problem if ArmageddonMUD used more than one window like some of those fancy MUs.

It might be difficult, yes. But certainly it would be less difficult than figuring out what is happening using "look" during a big fight.

[Dan]

Turning 'brief combat' on is your best friend during mass combat.

It can still be pretty spammy, and I think a soft limit on number of oppoents wouldn't help for spam at all. That would just make it less likely that someone will be instaganked at the start of a big fight.

I think there should be another option that allows you to turn off all combat messages, even hits, on unspecified people. This way you can have a fog of war in big fights, where you can choose to only see the combat spam of the people you want to see it from.

Example:

Brief combat

Brief combat turned on.

view amos amosa malark malarky

You will now view Amos, Amosa, Malark in combat.

l room

You see a unit fighting a unit. (No combat spam from them other than initiation of combat, and when one dies, or disengages)
You see so and so fighting Amos. (Only the hits scored on each other are seen)
Amosa standing here. (You will see arrows shot from or hitting this person)
Malarky is standing here. (Not viewed, so you will not notice arrows hitting or shot by this guy unless they target you)

[Agent_137]

My only qualm about a survey command would be taking it all in during combat spam.

This wouldn't be a problem if ArmageddonMUD used more than one window like some of those fancy MUs.

or fancy clients. It should be pretty easy to gag the survey output into another window in MUSHclient.

In fact . . . if these jokers Amos, Amosa, and Malark don't have hoods on, I could probably just shunt all their combat spam into a special window. I'll have to put something like that on my 'to figure out' list.

p.s.
I'm still in favor of ANY ginka-level improvements to mass combat. Because honestly, right now, I avoid it on an OOC level. I already lost a good character to it once. And I've taken appropriate highlighting steps to prevent the same again, but it still sucks. It's still more OOCly dangerous than ICly dangerous. Dare I bring up the Byn Lieutenant Deno incident? The only soldier lost in the attack on the gith camp 4 or 5 years ago? How did the highest ranking byn PC in years DIE when not even a runner died? He was magicked and NO ONE NOTICED BECAUSE OF THE SPAM. And he couldn't scream for help because ... he was magicked. THAT SHOULD NOT HAPPEN.

p.s.s. I was not Deno, but I loved him.