Upcoming Combat System Changes, the Details

[Halaster]

Maybe I'm just unlucky. But this "half giants attack faster then an elf two handed" seems outright false.

We should clarify:
"half giants with high 2h skill can possibly attack can faster than an elf".

The point we're making is that 2h gives a speed bonus when no other style does.  And it's so over the top that it totally negates the poor agility of a HG.  We're not so much focusing on making it worse for HG's as we were using that as an extreme example of the imbalance of the 2h system.

[Halaster]

Staff, would you be able to take a look at learning rates / fail conditions while you're doing this work?

No.  That's called scope creep and we're not going to look at that in this project.  I think it's something we should look at in general, but it would be after this.

[FantasyWriter]

This change, overall, looks pretty cool. 

The only thing I really have to say about it is a big thank you to staff for the transparency coming with the change.
Even after 15 years, I barely understand the combat code beyond always trying to fail at each of my skills every game day.

[Dresan]

Oh. Nice.

The change to strength and agility damage calculation is an interesting change. Its a nice viablility bonus to elves but the real winners are muls and humans since their balanced stats raised both the min-max damage respectively. I like this aspect of the change. 

This may potentially make overall skill more important than just stats as the +dam bonuses weapon/offense skill (may or may not) give become more noticable as the character improves, since it won't be overshadowed by the ridiculous amounts of flat damage that comes from high strength characters currently. 

As for combat speed, I still think that past the first round, combat in this game is just way too fast for its own good. This is most evident when you are travelling in a small group and there is often no chance to jump into the fight bfeore its over. There needs to be a big difference between winning a fight effectively and being able to effectively kill in a fight.

The max combat speeds we see today shouldn't be attainable without a combination(not just one) of factors at really optimal levels; these would include weaponskill, weapon weight, agility, spice, magick and possibly race.

With those thoughts in mind: e-twoing should still be king of winning fights, but not great at killing. This means it would have good defense/parry and offense bonuses. Strength based damage is good and agility based damage should be moderately good as well.  But it should be much slower to compensate. Dual wielding should have offense bonuses comparable or slight better than etwoing but its defense/parry bonus should be small or non existant compared to etwoing. Alternatively, shield use should have defense and parry bonuses compariable or slightly better than etwoing and very minor offense bonuses in comparion to etwoing, non-existant on off hand.  Both dual wielding and shield use should both have more normalized attack speeds compared to etwoing.

Again past the initial attack round, if combat is slowed, insta flee should be looked at and given an appropriate pre and post skill use delay which would be reduced by skill but not completely. Additionally high watch+flee skill should allow you to determine where the person will most likely run to, before they do so, allowing them to chase more effectively or plan a tactical bash better. This makes the game less about player reaction/typing  time and more choice and skills. But I digress to avoid scope creep.

In short, I really hope that even the lightest of shivs will slow a characters atttack speed once weapon weight is added. Finally if Armor pen becomes a thing based on agility, then I would recommend the chance of being reeled/reel locked should increase based on strength/damage as a percentage of total health inflicted per strike.

[Bogre]

Pretty cool proposed changes @ staff!

[lostinspace]

From my playtime with heavy combat classes, they seem to receive a boost to their strength. I know this because in the past it's been explained that 'AI' stats are impossible to roll and have to be modified.

Will those boosts be split up between strength/agility now that both are a viable approach to combat?

[Brytta Léofa]

Will those boosts be split up between strength/agility

ak) Quick Raider
al) Stronk Raider
am) Good Raider

I mean I'm half serious.

[Dresan]

One more thoughts:
-shield shouldn't be focused on strength but a modest combination of both strength and agility equally. Allowing any combination of stats to have success with it, whether it be a giant with a great shield, or a halfelf with rapier and buckler it should be very viable to both.


Lastly, I wanted to mention that I believe the fact that you needed to fight things that were around your level to learn has really impacted the game in some positive but also some negative ways. Particularly if you are like me who prefers to be indie but like to play elves or character that don't travel to remote unknown locations then finding adaquete training sometimes feels impossible.

With agility becoming more useful, I would like to propose wisdon be changed to also significantly increase the range of lower level fights your character can still learn from in combat. This in combination with faster learning will make this a very enticing stat for indies or civilization bound characters with no one to train with.

[Halaster]

New combat system initial preliminary coding is done.  There's tweaking to be done, settings to adjust, knobs to play with it.  I have reached out to 12 players who are going to help playtest it once it's done.  Probably in about one to two weeks I'll have a testport available to them and then will unleash them on it.  How long testing will last, I'm not sure.  However long it takes, really.  I -expect- it to probably take 2-4 weeks, but we'll see.

[creeper386]

Maybe I'm just unlucky. But this "half giants attack faster then an elf two handed" seems outright false.

We should clarify:
"half giants with high 2h skill can possibly attack can faster than an elf".

The point we're making is that 2h gives a speed bonus when no other style does.  And it's so over the top that it totally negates the poor agility of a HG.  We're not so much focusing on making it worse for HG's as we were using that as an extreme example of the imbalance of the 2h system.

Newest reply made me come back and really want to respond to this. Two handed with a half giant, with not bad agility, averages like four attacks a minute. Way way slower then anything I've ever seen in any other style.

If that gets slower, that's probably a problem.

[Pariah]

Maybe I'm just unlucky. But this "half giants attack faster then an elf two handed" seems outright false.

We should clarify:
"half giants with high 2h skill can possibly attack can faster than an elf".

The point we're making is that 2h gives a speed bonus when no other style does.  And it's so over the top that it totally negates the poor agility of a HG.  We're not so much focusing on making it worse for HG's as we were using that as an extreme example of the imbalance of the 2h system.

Newest reply made me come back and really want to respond to this. Two handed with a half giant, with not bad agility, averages like four attacks a minute. Way way slower then anything I've ever seen in any other style.

If that gets slower, that's probably a problem.

All due respect, I'd listen to the guy who actually can see the code versus a player who just plays with it.

[Brytta Léofa]

Newest reply made me come back and really want to respond to this. Two handed with a half giant, with not bad agility, averages like four attacks a minute. Way way slower then anything I've ever seen in any other style.

Is that with advanced/master two-handed?

All due respect, I'd listen to the guy who actually can see the code versus a player who just plays with it.

Sometimes staff don't play enough to know though, especially all the corner cases.

[Brokkr]

Maybe I'm just unlucky. But this "half giants attack faster then an elf two handed" seems outright false.

We should clarify:
"half giants with high 2h skill can possibly attack can faster than an elf".

The point we're making is that 2h gives a speed bonus when no other style does.  And it's so over the top that it totally negates the poor agility of a HG.  We're not so much focusing on making it worse for HG's as we were using that as an extreme example of the imbalance of the 2h system.

Newest reply made me come back and really want to respond to this. Two handed with a half giant, with not bad agility, averages like four attacks a minute. Way way slower then anything I've ever seen in any other style.

If that gets slower, that's probably a problem.

Bolded part is sort of impossible.  Unless you are comparing different characters.  There is all the calculations for how long to next attack and then at the very end, for two handed only, there is a reduction based on skill.

[creeper386]

I'm saying there is no way a half giant etwoing, when the attacks come averaging about 15 seconds a piece, which I've checked are pretty consistant dual wielding two, come way slower then any other character with other skills.

Etwoing half giants aren't faster then other races.

[Riev]

I'm saying there is no way a half giant etwoing, when the attacks come averaging about 15 seconds a piece, which I've checked are pretty consistant dual wielding two, come way slower then any other character with other skills.

Etwoing half giants aren't faster then other races.

I'm super mad about the half-giant thing.
Moze had shit agility and I counted it... 45seconds between some swings.
Now you want to tell me I MIGHT only do 5 damage on that swing?


But... at Master levels of two handed... I'm telling you it would not matter. Its like I'm swinging as fast as anyone else with two handed.

[creeper386]

Maybe I'm just unlucky. But this "half giants attack faster then an elf two handed" seems outright false.

We should clarify:
"half giants with high 2h skill can possibly attack can faster than an elf".

The point we're making is that 2h gives a speed bonus when no other style does.  And it's so over the top that it totally negates the poor agility of a HG.  We're not so much focusing on making it worse for HG's as we were using that as an extreme example of the imbalance of the 2h system.

Newest reply made me come back and really want to respond to this. Two handed with a half giant, with not bad agility, averages like four attacks a minute. Way way slower then anything I've ever seen in any other style.

If that gets slower, that's probably a problem.

All due respect, I'd listen to the guy who actually can see the code versus a player who just plays with it.

All due respect but it's not uncommon to look at code and go, "this is how it works." And then find out later that there was some other impact, unintended behavior, or it was interpreted incorrectly.

[Brokkr]

I'm saying there is no way a half giant etwoing, when the attacks come averaging about 15 seconds a piece, which I've checked are pretty consistant dual wielding two, come way slower then any other character with other skills.

Etwoing half giants aren't faster then other races.

I'm super mad about the half-giant thing.
Moze had shit agility and I counted it... 45seconds between some swings.
Now you want to tell me I MIGHT only do 5 damage on that swing?


But... at Master levels of two handed... I'm telling you it would not matter. Its like I'm swinging as fast as anyone else with two handed.

It is mostly about averages, as that is what you use to determine something like DPS.

Yes, very long waits are possible currently, given the right conditions.  But on average the waits are shorter and the floor is lower, and hit more often.

The comparison would be like a Half-giant 2-handed vs an average agility (not AI, lol) elf dual wielding, and how fast they attack on average.  Not the HG vs the elf both 2handing...as the elf will get the same benefit the HG does and attack on average faster.

It is fairly complex and unlikely that most folks know what goes into the current attack speed calculations, thus Halaster setting up a test port.

[BadSkeelz]

How much attention is being given to how /mobs/ will fight? If it turns out a tarantula can get six hits in while we wait for our second two-handed one, that can be an expensive lesson to learn.

[Brokkr]

I mean, your two handed delay would be the same as your weapon + shield delay.  So I am not sure of the point of the question.  The change would be to make two handed weapons take as long as a weapon + shield, which against a tarantula would be the same as dual wielding as well.

[Riev]

I think he means:

Do NPCs/Beasts use stance skills like dual wield or two handed then they make an attack, and thusly will be affected by these changes? Because Mob stats are WAY different from PC stats and that could be... a think to look out ofr.

[Halaster]

I think he means:

Do NPCs/Beasts use stance skills like dual wield or two handed then they make an attack, and thusly will be affected by these changes? Because Mob stats are WAY different from PC stats and that could be... a think to look out ofr.

Not if they don't use weapons, no.  They do use strength and agility, though, so they'll be affected the same by those.

[BadSkeelz]

I think he means:

Do NPCs/Beasts use stance skills like dual wield or two handed then they make an attack, and thusly will be affected by these changes? Because Mob stats are WAY different from PC stats and that could be... a think to look out ofr.

Yeah. As far as I can tell this change is mostly directed towards PVP balance (and fighting gith) as that's where weapon vs weapon combat happens. But mostly deadly combat in Armageddon isn't happening between players. I'm just concerned that any changes towards PC combat will have negative, possibly unforeseen effects on PVE combat.

[Halaster]

I think he means:

Do NPCs/Beasts use stance skills like dual wield or two handed then they make an attack, and thusly will be affected by these changes? Because Mob stats are WAY different from PC stats and that could be... a think to look out ofr.

Yeah. As far as I can tell this change is mostly directed towards PVP balance (and fighting gith) as that's where weapon vs weapon combat happens. But mostly deadly combat in Armageddon isn't happening between players. I'm just concerned that any changes towards PC combat will have negative, possibly unforeseen effects on PVE combat.

That's why we've reached out to 11 players who are gonna help playtest on a test server.

[Krath]

I'm saying there is no way a half giant etwoing, when the attacks come averaging about 15 seconds a piece, which I've checked are pretty consistant dual wielding two, come way slower then any other character with other skills.

Etwoing half giants aren't faster then other races.

I'm super mad about the half-giant thing.
Moze had shit agility and I counted it... 45seconds between some swings.
Now you want to tell me I MIGHT only do 5 damage on that swing?


But... at Master levels of two handed... I'm telling you it would not matter. Its like I'm swinging as fast as anyone else with two handed.

My main concern with the changes are bolded. A half-giant/Mul doing 5 damage per hit, I disagree with. We live in a world where everyone wants to be on equal footing, however, this is a fantasy game...Fantasy. Armageddon is a harsh world, if you get hit by a Giant or Mul, or anything with significantly higher strength than you, you should not be grazed for 5 hps.

If the issue is around ETWO being OP, Nerf ETWO. How this got into a damage nerfing for HGs Muls etc, i do not know. Strength is just that Strength. If the complaint is Strength is too OP, either NERF strength or Update Agility.

[Halaster]

Update:

Testing is still ongoing.  Some of the playtesters and I are running lots of tests, tweaking, testing, tweaking.  I think we're getting close...