I'm going to challenge pretty much everyone's concept of what Pantheon's combat should be in this post - fair warning. I hope that all of you are reasonable enough to approach this topic with an open mind.
One of the things that really bothers me about most MMORPGs is that it is very easy for players to find ways to trivialize content. Whether it's out-gearing things, or out-leveling them, or even just clever use of abilities, it seems that the vast majority of content loses its challenge rather quickly in these games. Even the games we like to hold up as examples of how things were done "right" suffered from this problem. It might happen more slowly, but power creep and trivialization have been a problem in every MMO I've ever played, including EverQuest.
I think that a large part of this has been due to the simplistic, numerical mechanics that govern most fights in these games. Every single person who's ever played an MMO for more than a week or two is familiar with the concept of threat as a numeric value, and the idea of taunts and the like to manipulate that threat. Likewise, we all understand concepts like DPS and mitigation. The fact is, we're used to an MMO paradigm where the job of tanks is to keep the mob focused on them, the job of healers is to keep everyone topped up on health, and the job of everyone else is to do as much damage as possible without stealing threat. Sure, there are different ways that classes can do these things, and the idea of control is certainly an added element, but fundamentally every game follows the same basic formula when it comes to what players do in combat.
So here's the question in the title. What if, instead of combat being all about managing damage taken and damage dealt, it was about skillful countering of enemy abilities?
For example - what if mobs did not have threat at all, and instead warriors and the like "tanked" by purposely intercepting specific attacks? Instead of smashing the taunt button and spamming whatever abilities gave the most aggro, the key to being a good tank would be watching for when the monster was about to do something and interposing yourself in some way when they did. A shield bash to interrupt it, or physically pushing your party member out of the way and taking the hit for them.
What if control wasn't about parking a mob out of the way temporarily, but was actually about controlling its actions? Countering its ability to heal, or forcing that spell it was casting to target another mob (or a nearby tree or rock) instead of a player?
What if classes weren't defined by the type and amount of damage they do but by their ability to exploit specific conditions during combat? A rogue using dirty tricks to blind and confuse their opponents, a ranger striking when there was an opening for maximum damage, a monk turning the mob's own attacks against it, or a wizard analyzing the situation and using just the right spell at the right time to exploit a weakness?
To some extent Pantheon will already do this - but at least as it's currently envisioned, exploiting weaknesses and reacting to NPC abilities seems like it will be a secondary focus in combat, not the primary focus. The primary focus seems like it will be hp, mana, damage, and stats - all things that are prone to power creep and that lead to trivialization.
Thus my question: What if Pantheon were to flip that around and make those things secondary considerations? What if the stats were helpful, but being good at combat really meant being skilled about when and how you used the abilities available to you? Assuming that it worked, would it be fun? Would it really be challenging? Why or why not?
To be clear - this isn't a black and white situation. On a range of purely numbers-driven combat to purely reactive ability use, there's a lot of room in between. So before anyone dismisses this post out of hand, I'd like to challenge you to think about what *could* work. How far *could* it go before it was uncomfortable?
I"m looking forward to seeing everyone's opinions.
Mostly because the closer you get to RTT + HRT + GCD, the more frustrating it is for everyone not in the same state as the servers are hosted in.
There's nothing logically wrong with the approach, it's just fraught with implementation problems because of the speed of electrons through copper and the speed of light through fibre.
If you want to discuss the value in the implementation, set a baseline for reaction times/durations/windows. (2 seconds, 3 seconds, 4 seconds, 8 seconds, 10 seconds, whatever)
If you can get consensus on that? I could see value in pursuing a theorycrafting exercise.
vjek said:Mostly because the closer you get to RTT + HRT + GCD, the more frustrating it is for everyone not in the same state as the servers are hosted in.
There's nothing logically wrong with the approach, it's just fraught with implementation problems because of the speed of light through copper and fibre.
If you want to discuss the value in the implementation, set a baseline for reaction times/durations/windows. (2 seconds, 3 seconds, 4 seconds, 8 seconds, 10 seconds, whatever)
If you can get consensus on that? I could see value in pursuing a theorycrafting exercise.
As usual, really good point vjek. That question might be worthy of its own thread :)
What *is* an appropriate reaction time? Personally, I think it's probably in the neighborhood of 3-6 seconds. But that's just my gut response. I'd love to see what others think.
Sure, that's a good place to start. You could make adjustments based on the magnitude of the effect, or the power of the counter effect. In a simple implementation, countering 3 second windows might offer more powerful counter-consequences, versus countering a 6 second window.
You could also scale the power based on the quickness of the response, if you wanted to. Something like an amplifier to the counter-consequence if you responded quickly, tapering over time to the baseline after a few seconds.
There's also duty cycle to consider, both for effects on mobs and effects on players. An example is stun. Very powerful, and frustrating if you're stunned, as a player, for more than a 10-30% duty cycle, typically. (3/10 seconds is a long time to be helpless)
Yet, duty cycle or scaling repeat-immunity for negative/control/status/counter effects on mobs might need to have different duty cycles versus those same things on Players.
Additionally, having NPC's perform these moves/counters against players would be an obvious escalation point for challenge.
What you're describing isn't bad, and sounds good on paper, but is considerably hard to implement.
Realistically, these concepts implemented correctly will usher in the next era of MMOs that transcends the fundamentally basic style of MMO gameplay we experience today. I am not confident that we will see it pulled off any time soon, however.
For Pantheon, I don't think these concepts will ever be executed on in a meaningful way to differentiate it from traditional MMO combat. We might see a unique twist here or there, but that's about it.
Edit: JFC I'm tired and can't type.
I think that's what they intended to do with GW2, somehow, making combat "dynamic" to the point nothing was about stats, specs or such, but about counter/dodge and such. To the point the only thing that mattered in the end was damage to shorten the encounter, and we know how it ended.
I'm not really a fan of a design where gear has little to no impact, it narrows the possibillities of game design and strategy due to beeing accessible at any gear level, and usually ends up making a fight a sole pattern you learn until you master it and it's no longer an issue.
Excellent, interesting post, Neph, as always, and I think there's definitely room for games like that (and it's been attempted to some degree and with some success) but as for Pantheon doing it, I have to say, I wouldn't want it.
For me, a large part of my desire for Pantheon is the 'type' of game it will be and the combat is a pretty fundamental aspect.
The things you site as problems and issues are much more classic 'features'.
Out-leveling/gearing content:
One thing I loved about Everquest was the ability to get into trouble. You could take on anything, no matter how tough, if you could get to it. You could die horribly quickly if you were over-confident.
The other side of that is if you took on something too tough and got beat you could have a few goes and decide to come back 'later', ie. when more powerful.
Is that really a 'problem' to be fixed? Should people who just can't work out the 'trick' to beat a particular encounter be doomed to never beat it, even if they put in the effort elsewhere to progress their character to a level where the encounter isn't so hard, though for different reasons?
For me it adds to the 'realistic' feel of the world and to the long term interest. That encounter is always *that* powerful/difficult. If you try at a different level, with a different number of friends, with different gear, with a combination of all those and with different tactics to compensate, then you might win or lose in a different way.
If mechanics where changed to scale with the level/gear of the attacker, then that encounter is forever 'the same'. It's makes your gear and level less relevent (or almost irrelevent) and, in a game where progression is front-and-center, that's an odd thing to do and an odd feel to have.
Counters:
There was (is) already this kind of thing in EQ and, from what we are seeing/hearing, it will be even more emphasised in Pantheon.
To enhance it further to a degree where it is more important than the raw numbers will again, change the nature of combat fundamentally. It will be a different game, akin perhaps to Dark Souls or Monster Hunter, where each encounter has a 'trick' and a 'sequence' with dynamism, but cues that enable you to cope with that. Difficult, but still learnable.
Is that 'better' or just 'different' though? I'm not saying 'bad', but I am saying it's 'different'. There's already been lots of unhappy feedback to the comcept of States recently revealed, with accusations it will turn the game into a see-this-do-that Street Fighter button sequence game... Whilst I'm pretty sure it won't, it think great care is needed with the idea unless they want to change combat into something that is not longer recognisable as an 'old-school' MMORPG.
A Dark Souls style counters concept would not be a quick-twitch thing, but will still move firmly away from 'old school' style combat.
As I said, Pantheon already will have this aspect, but it will be an interesting, tactical 'influence' on combat, not the core of it. I think I prefer it that way.
TL;DR: Great post, Neph, but, to me, what you suggest would not be 'fixing' combat, but would just be 'changing' it into something else. Something that would move away from what an old-school MMORPG is, to me, anyway.
Love everything about this topic and we have some of the best theory crafters and analyzers on these boards already in this thread (looks for 187).
First power creep and trivialization of content is one of the primary reasons I was pushing for diminishing returns per level. The idea being that one can never trivialize content more than half their own level and characters bellow max level can still engage endgame content at maybe 50% magnitude. That is all in the maths and how things stack up when you consider all the different avenues of power growth over time. Stat growth by level could be linear, equipment growth would be nearly flat as it acts more as a qualifier and not a multiplier and skill progression is logarithmic. Or it could be stats basically don’t change after character creation, items basically have tiers but are otherwise qualifiers, and skills are 90% of character growth. Lots of ways to do it and the worst is the WoW gear merry-go-round of exponential growth.
Tab target game play, tactical game play, action RPG, reaction RPG, combat simulations. Each really have their own style of player-mob interactions.
-Tab target is the least complicated both network wise and player interaction wise. Both fire and forget or known rotations are common themes.
- Tactical game play has elements of tab target but where interactions, synergies and states play a large role in the magnitude of abilities but over all slower speeds.
- Action RPG is much more about positioning and twitch, basically the evolution of arcade games from the 80s.
- ReAction RPG has a basis of Action RPG but with Tactical game play added on rather than a Tab-target base.
- Combat simulators are just neat. (no bias there, nope) Virtual reality is opening up the first real opportunities for in home combat simulators were your movements mater, Basically vector based combat mechanics in real time and all spacial and physics limitations are enforced.
As Vjek pointed latency will really screw up many of these systems other than Tab target and to a certain extent Tactical as long as the states last long enough. Anything even remotely close to FPS reaction speeds is going to vulnerable to bad network connections so communications would need to be very robust. I am partially wondering if there is a way to cloud/torrent game processes across all users in such a way the load on the servers is limited. It may even require some form of paired computation where both the client and the server run the combat at the same time with the server being the master but the client filling in latency gaps. (honestly that’s beyond my technical knowledge)
I believe we could push the tactical game play closer to reactionary tab target without making the game twitch but it will require layering many different systems between mob states, environmental states, player states, disposition modifiers, second or third tier state that show up only with certain combinations of states are present together and abilities that are very dynamic based on present states. One of the first steps though will be to eliminate auto attack as the basis point for combat and move to a turn based selected attack system. That way every turn represents a choice and there for a possible reaction to changing states. Combat slows WAY down when you switch to turn based combat but it opens up move and counter move opportunities, especially if charge up abilities that take multiple turns are added in.
Overall though I think its too late for Pantheon. Maybe VRs second MMO could move to a different combat system but Pantheon needs to get out the door asap, rewriting the combat engine is not going to mesh too well with that.
Trasak said: ... I am partially wondering if there is a way to cloud/torrent game processes across all users in such a way the load on the servers is limited. It may even require some form of paired computation where both the client and the server run the combat at the same time with the server being the master but the client filling in latency gaps. ...
Another item to consider in a 'counters' mechanic is... what if two people counter it at roughly (or exactly) the same time? Should some NPC moves require multiple PC counters? Should some PC moves count twice, or have bonuses attached to multiple counters? If, for example, you place a state like a bleed on a humanoid NPC, and they counter it with rage, and a tank can counter rage with knockdown, what if multiple classes apply the knockdown? Should it stack in power or extend in duration, or both? Or do you not permit it, ever? Things like that are important to consider up front, as it either limits or expands your design options.
Well written, very interesting, entirely logical, and to my mind two glaring problems. Insurmountable ones.
Problem one - its simply too big a change for this game. We have had enough and more than enough delays - no fiddling with basic concepts please just moving as rapidly as feasible towards launch.
Problem two - it would turn Pantheon into an action combat game where *player* reflexes, vision and the like would predominate over planning, character building, choice of skills, gear, and the like. If I were 16 years old I would love the idea - I could dominate all the old people. I am not. And I do not.
dorotea said:If I were 16 years old
You're not fooling anyone dorotea. We all know you're an ancient silver dragon simply pretending. Age is immaterial to you ;)
In seriousness - I'd like to understand why you (and others) believe that there is not a possible middle-ground solution? You're not the first person to say "oh that's action combat" like (insert game here). Why do our minds go to the two extremes? Is it simply that we've only seen ham-handed attempts from games to implement this sort of thing and thus we think that every implementation is doomed to be a bunch of ground-effect telegraphs that we need to dodge?
Nephele said:dorotea said:If I were 16 years old
You're not fooling anyone dorotea. We all know you're an ancient silver dragon simply pretending. Age is immaterial to you ;)
In seriousness - I'd like to understand why you (and others) believe that there is not a possible middle-ground solution? You're not the first person to say "oh that's action combat" like (insert game here). Why do our minds go to the two extremes? Is it simply that we've only seen ham-handed attempts from games to implement this sort of thing and thus we think that every implementation is doomed to be a bunch of ground-effect telegraphs that we need to dodge?
I think I do appreciate you aren't suggesting "action combat" entirely, but it is simply further in that direction than I want for an MMORPG.
As for only seeing bad examples before, I'm not so sure. I think we've seen fine examples and some were even successful and popular, but *shrug* not with me.
I think Pantheon is already going as far in that direction (with timed shield blocks and with Status-response stuff) as I'm comfortable with.
It's like saying, "why don't we add some more chopped olives to this bolognese?" I don't like olives, but I've discovered, actually, just a small amount, finely chopped, seems good. People who like olives love that, but, for me, any more and it's too much and it spoils it.
ESO has already explored the middle ground, and it's pretty bad. Even with better mechanics it would still be bad.
Action combat is the future. When a studio finally pulls off what EQ:N sought to achieve on paper, we will experience a revolution in MMO gameplay.
Tab targeting and cheap tricks to give the illusion of physicality are already sorely dated. FFXIV, imo, is the absolute epitome of what the illusion of physicality can offer in terms of combat design. While the game itself is not ideal, we have reached the limits of what this system can offer.
If VR had tens of millions of dollars and a development staff of a hundred plus, maybe...just maybe..they could do something like what you are wanting Nephele. But VR has neither of those..not even close. And as mentioned above, any desire for stuff like this to appear in this game has long since passed. Maybe the next game though.
Some of the ideas you present are interesting and could even be fun if a game were built with them in mind from the very beginning. Fights being a long change of counters with little to no damage happening until that critical mistake happens and bam...one side wins with a single stroke.
I have to admit, I read this yesterday and as I was crocheting my latest stuffie; I was trying to think of why I have the opinion on it that I do. To me, the concept sounds like it would just turn the game into a quick-time event haven. I can't truly explain why yet that I feel like that, but when I read this (and even rereading this today) the first thing that came to mind was just that, QTE. I get what you are saying in that, that's how most RP games like Pathfinder and D&D are played, but that comes from the people using the tools they have on hand while still being within the rules of the game. Not only that, it all depends on the DM too if you ware allowed to do some things and how strict or lenient they want to be on the rules. on top of all that, everyone plays these games very differently so while one person might use a clever way to manipulate one outcome, another might simply just go in for the kill and get a different outcome. I have to admit, this type of thing is extremely hard to implement within the confines of MMOs and possibly coding; but don't quote me on the coding part, I have never done it, but it seems like it would be overwhelming.
Having mana, health and all that secondary, leads me to feeling that it'll be QTE and that you would have people at a disadvantage that might have sight issues, hearing issues if you are using sound ques for things, or even reflex issues. I know Pantheon is targeting a niche audience, but even people within that niche audience are getting older and possibly disabled and can't truly play games like that. To me, this sounds like you're just trading one way to trivialize the content for another way to trivialize it; and that you will essentially be being told what to do and when. I honestly would rather have the choice of what I want to cast and when, instead of being told when to cast it and what to wait for. It's an interesting idea, and one I could see when RPing with friends in like D&D, but not something like an MMO, in my opinion anyways. Again, I can't clearly explain why I feel this way, but that's just the feeling I get.
@Nephele did you play Tera when it was new (before the combat was made easier)? It still had threat but I feel like that's the closest example of what you're describing that I've ever played. It was fun too.
Pantheon won't ever go that route IMO, I'm pretty sure they've said no action combat, and I realize that's not exactly what you're describing. But, it does sound like they're on a decent track of reaction based triggers beyond just interrupt casting and don't stand in the bad, so that's good to see.
I like the idea as it would certainly make NPC's in combat feel more human. After all, if some guy in a bunch of armor is taunting me but I can go strike down a healer or caster before the "tank" gets to me (or perhaps I can perry/stun/whatever and slip away from him), I would certainly opt to do that.
In case stats would be pushed to the background, what happens to the perceived value of gear or crafting?
Like many stated, up to this point in mmo development, it might be best to aim for middle ground and no further. Where VR already has several "responsive" abilities going for them. Let's see how they play out and if positive you can add in some more along the way. The majority of the combat still residing in the domain of hp and dps.
Responsive combat can be challenging if it doesn't become a routine. With current cycling spells and abilities combat, many players got a habit of rotating preferred spells, no matter what mobs they encounter. Unless the mob has a very defined script which demands to player to act differently.
For responsive combat to continue to be fun and challenging you'll need that variation factor. Will every Orc Guard have the same spells to counter? Do all mobs have a big array of action options?
Becoming skilled and experiencing this process is a very addictive thing. I believe, that it would be very enticing if a game could produce this and it's effect on the player should not be underestimated. Example: you get skilled as a ranger in reacting to guards' special actions. A higher level guard or a group of guards presents you the next bigger challenge and the player knows how to tackle 1, but how will he manage a stronger one or more of them?
You can combine classes to counter some spells or effects, that would bring me into the timewindow topic, which is already discussed earlier so I won't go into that. But it's not impossible.
Because, we're mixing and not going black and white on this, not every mob will have this "responsive combat" occurring. Although they might have that option within them, some randomization factor might influence it's occurance during combat. This unexpected factor, might be interesting to keep players on their toes and maintain that desired "fun" factor. This doesn't have to stear towards twitch action. It just means, if two groups encounter the same Orc Guard at a different time, one might need to use a responsive tactic, whereas the other group does not. Purely because it didn't come up.
When a groupmember or the group as a whole fails to counter ability X of the mob with their own abilities, the effect should always be VERY impactful. This, for me, should always be on more then 1 player. This so that, next time you encounter this, you know that you don't want to miss it again. It's impact should be and remain important. Some options here for when players failed to respond correctly ; the mob just runs away, goes into enrage mode, any other increased difficulty, calls in reinforcements, does not render loot or a decreased xp, becomes weaker. This isn't very different than raidscripts to be fair. Like I said, this won't be experienced with every fight.
The mix between abilities and skills a good approach thusfar. When the mechanic is properly tested and response is positive, one could advance to add in more...with expansions for example. Where classes gain more 'responsive' abilities and mobs get more scripted actions.
daameon said:@Nephele did you play Tera when it was new (before the combat was made easier)? It still had threat but I feel like that's the closest example of what you're describing that I've ever played. It was fun too.
Alas, I did not! I didn't get to try Tera until a few years after it launched. I wasn't impressed when I did but that was probably after it had been made easier.
In other games I have played there have sometimes been specific boss or raid encounters that "broke the rules", and those were often a lot of fun because they forced us as players to suddenly adapt to an entirely new paradigm. Whether it was not having a threat table (the monster just does what it wants), or having to counter specific abilities in various ways, the effect was to push players out of the "tank and spank" comfort zone and force them to re-evaluate what they were doing in combat.
Imagine a fight where instead of blasting away with their biggest damage spells, the party's wizard, druid, or shaman had to use specific elemental attacks to tear down the enemy's damage shield and create an opening? That's a simplistic example, but it's the sort of counter that I think games could use more of (and it's an example of something other than a tank stopping a big attack with a well-timed block).
I also see potential in stats facilitating skills. In the sense that it helps a player's 'reaction window'. Similar to cutting along a thick, thin, obscured or interrupted line on paper. Or a fashion of connecting the dots and creating a pattern. This last one should already be very familiar to most gamers. Underlining once again, it's not a black or white solution and it's applicable when mob X displays behaviour Y (which is not all the time, possibly not even predictable).
When you go about skills, be that character or player skills, there should be an understanding that you learn through failure. This relates to the suggestion of keeping a chance of failure in this mechanic. So even when you pressed your skills correctly there is still that Chance that it gets resisted (or countered otherwise). This % to fail, is something that must be omnipresent in the responsive skill combat design.
Personally, when a skill is 100% succesful it's no longer a skill it's a fact and it leans more towards an ability or factual spell/combat art. Where you know, when I press this X happens. And the skill design you're describing Nephele, sounds not so absolute. Because stats are just that, reliable data to build upon, your skills however are living evolving things within your character and player.
A question here could be, where do design that chance to fail in the skillmechanic of the characters themselves. Could you for example max out in that skill? Or is working backwards where the detriments decrease as you skill up?
Nephele if I may, I would like to add the follow question. What if there is no auto attack? So if you're not actually pushing buttons, you'll remain in combat but not hitting anything. The mob however will of course continue to hit you.
So here, you design it so that players actually need to click and choose which abilities to use, if they don't they would just not do any damage to the mob at all. (not counting dots or sorts)
The stats and gear can still be functional, but if you want something damaged there is no "I'll engage with my sword and go afk for a sec."
This isn't twitch combat or waiting for opportune moments to strike a combo. (still not excluding elements of those being integrated ofc)
Nephele said:Every single person who's ever played an MMO for more than a week or two is familiar with the concept of threat as a numeric value, and the idea of taunts and the like to manipulate that threat. Likewise, we all understand concepts like DPS and mitigation.
You are being far too generous in your belief that everyone truly understands threat, DPS and mitigation. It's because a lot of people don't "truly" understand that at it's core it is just math, and although there can be multiple ways to get to the same result, ultimately the end result is inevitable. You can see evidence of this in some of the form's debates.
With that said, I love the idea of having players be more responsive, but as some have mentioned, this would rely heavily on player's connection speeds, quality of PC as well as skill and experience. It would also require them to scrap pretty much all of the "progress" they've made so far and start over.
This is just my opinion, but it sounds to me like you would actually enjoy a PvP server if you get bored with how PvE encounters work. What you describe is basically the reason players PvP: Being both reactive to attacks while trying to anticipate your opponent's next move hoping for a slip up to counter only to find out that it was a feint and now you have a split second to change your tactic or be defeated.
((ancient silver dragon))
Thank you - far better than an ancient red dragon.
Apart from all else I see a *compelling* need to move as quickly as possible towards release. Not at the expense of compromising basic principles. Not at the expense of having a buggy release. Not at the expense of having only half a game. But, yes, at the expense of frills, bells and whistles, changes in mechanics that may be improvements but aren't essential. Let us get the show on the road and some money coming in from subscriptions before the whole project goes bye-bye.
I agree that some things could be changed that would not make the game more "action combat". Things like interrupts, blocks, evades etc. are already ubiquitous and some of what you urge is no different. There, the key issues to me are what cues tell the player that the action is needed and how fast must the player respond. If I need 20-20 vision to see the enemy's left eyebrow twitch as the signal to interrupt that isn't going to work for many of us. If I have a second and a half to find my quickbar icon and click it that isn't going to work for many of us. It isn't just a matter of age and reflexes and disabilities it is a matter of server lag and computer ability and internet connection and monitor quality and .....
I cite the Vanguard launch as an example in a somewhat non-obvious way. There, one issue was that the bar for what quality computer was needed to play the game at high quality was simply set too high. Too bleeding edge. Pantheon learned that lesson and it will not be so again. But if even 1/4 of the computer/monitor/internet setups of potential players will make it much harder to see cues without 20-20 vision and to respond with the right response within a short time we will have the same type of issue. I *know* that you weren't and aren't advocating action combat but every step in that direction increases the need for players to have better set-ups. I strongly prefer more strategy and planning and general tactics in a game to more reaction-time manuevers even if you are open to making the reaction time a longer one. VR may be less open to that.
Moreover, we all know and don't necessarily love the endless grind for gear and skills and other character-based (not player reaction time based) things. But whether we love it or not a MMO needs grinds and time sinks and currency sinks. And our core audience wants an "old school" game and few things are more old school than needing gear and skills and levels and building the *character* up. The core of my concern in this area is what you said here:
((What if the stats were helpful, but being good at combat really meant being skilled about when and how you used the abilities available to you? Assuming that it worked, would it be fun? Would it really be challenging? Why or why not?))
You might be as horrified as I if Pantheon turned into a first-person shooter but downplaying gear and levels and character skills and emphasizing player coordination and skills seems to me as a step and not a trivial one in that direction.
Barin999 said:Nephele if I may, I would like to add the follow question. What if there is no auto attack? So if you're not actually pushing buttons, you'll remain in combat but not hitting anything. The mob however will of course continue to hit you.
So here, you design it so that players actually need to click and choose which abilities to use, if they don't they would just not do any damage to the mob at all. (not counting dots or sorts)
The stats and gear can still be functional, but if you want something damaged there is no "I'll engage with my sword and go afk for a sec."
This isn't twitch combat or waiting for opportune moments to strike a combo. (still not excluding elements of those being integrated ofc)
So, the challenge with not having autoattack at all is that now you need to provide an "attack" button to every player that represents their basic sword swing or what not. Once you've done that, there's a natural pull to want to provide permutations on that attack button - for example, as their skill gets high enough, maybe they get a "sweep" attack that can damage multiple opponents, or maybe they get a "combo" attack that follows up their first hit with a second. None of these is a bad thing in concept but where it starts to become an issue (at least, as i see it) is when it begins to push players into rotation-based play and/or button mashing. Hitting 1, 2, 3 every time they're off cooldown isn't really requiring thought from the player. It's also more vulnerable to latency than a default auto-attack would be.
dorotea said:
You might be as horrified as I if Pantheon turned into a first-person shooter but downplaying gear and levels and character skills and emphasizing player coordination and skills seems to me as a step and not a trivial one in that direction.
Fair enough :) And yeah I definitely would never want it to go that far. I do believe there's probably a happier medium than what we've seen in the past, however, especially if we want challenge to be consistent as the game ages and players learn.
That said - I also feel the need to say this (for everyone's benefit): The reason I post these sorts of "what if" threads isn't to say that Pantheon must be this way - it's to provoke critical thinking and healthy debate among the community. We have a lot of really smart and experienced gamers around here, and I think that when we really get into a topic and talk about why and how it would work or won't work, it helps VR with refining their own ideas. To be honest, I think that's one of the core reasons to even have development forums for a game - to leverage the passion and experience of supporters. The more we can bring up topics that help them with that (especially new topics that haven't been discussed to death over the past five years), the better.
((That said - I also feel the need to say this (for everyone's benefit): The reason I post these sorts of "what if" threads isn't to say that Pantheon must be this way - it's to provoke critical thinking and healthy debate among the community. ))
I appreciate these threads and make a special point to look at anything you post and respond in depth and with analysis where the topic seems to warrent it. I even usually agree with you. But not here. Yet as mentioned many times in these forums - not least by myself - disagreement with each other and even with VR is perhaps the most useful thing we can do if logic and analysis is present and insults and rudeness are not. VR learns little or nothing from two pages of "great idea". Or two pages of "that sucks" for that matter. Yet two pages of discussion of what parts of an idea work well and what parts do not and *why* are priceless. Among ourselves we have enormous experience in the genre.