Perhaps this is far too early to bring up - but I haven't seen this discussed anywhere yet. (Yes, I understand this is an oversimplification of the topic and that gear and positioning should also be taken into account - but for the sake of the argument let's put these aside)
Global Cooldowns... WoW is something that in my opinion has standardized this mechanic and put most (perhaps all) abilities on a 1 second global cooldown. If a tank and spank fight lasts 254 seconds (in a perfect world where you weren't barred by resources) you should have cast 254 damaging abilities. This was the separation of the professional players versus the casuals - How many GCDs were they able to squeeze into the fight.
Now while Pantheon is designed to be slower paced, it is still technically a next generation MMORPG; I'm curious as to everyone's opinion on the subject.
Should there be a global cooldown? Should different abilities give a unique global cooldown? For example: Casting "Complete Heal" also comes with a 6 second global cooldown where no other abilities can be cast, while "Greater Heal" might only give a 3 second global cooldown.
Or will Pantheon go the "modern" route and simply have the 1 second global cooldown with abilities on their own individual timers?
- Furor
I really dislike global cooldowns. They make combat feel really clunky. I prefer each ability have its own cooldown, with a global recovery period, a la EQ2. Every time I played Rift, WoW, or worse still FFXIV, it always felt like I was casting through molasses. Maybe it's just an aesthetic thing though.
Furor said:SNIP
If a tank and spank fight lasts 254 seconds (in a perfect world where you weren't barred by resources) you should have cast 254 damaging abilities. This was the separation of the professional players versus the casuals - How many GCDs were they able to squeeze into the fight.
SNIP
This is exactly what I DO NOT want to see with Pantheon. I dont want to play UI whack-a-mole, I want to play Pantheon.
Your worth should not be measured by how well you play the UI by pushing buttons in a specific (or non-specific) order without missing a beat. Instead, player success should be measured by the decisions they make in the moment. Modern MMO's measure you as a failure if you're not blasting away at 100% full power 100% of the time. IMO, this is not what this game should be about.
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Snipped from my thread in the Wizard forum, but this philosophy applies to all:
Great power brings great responsibility. I feel our heavy nukers in Pantheon should be developed and balanced around this idea. In EQ, we had the freedom to spam cast huge nukes and lay down some serious burst damage like no other class. Yet at the same time, we had to exercise restraint, time our casts, spread out our damage so we didnt pull aggro, piss off the tank, run the cleric OOM, and ultimately get kicked from the group. There were also times when threat was firmly established and we could truly unload all of our awesome power. Mastering this responsibility is what separated the men from the boys, the good from the bad.
However, this gameplay mechanic has been lost to time in recent MMO's. The "skill" component has become who can play a perfect game of UI whack-a-mole for a sustained X minutes. How did we go so wrong? I dont want to play UI whack-a-mole. I want to play Pantheon. At what point did game developers feel we were no longer capable of handling such responsibility?
I'm ok with tools like concussion for agro management, but please dont dumb it down. I want the option, nay, the requirement that I use my brain to figure this out. I want it to be part of mastering your class. No UI elements to determine threat. Its something you learn by doing. This is where the challenge is at, and subsequently the fun. As an example, the game Myst doesnt give you big bold UI arrows showing you the answer to the puzzle. That would take the fun out of it. Figuring it out on your own is part of the journey and the path to becoming truly skilled with your class.
And on this note, I think this should apply to more than just the wizard. The ability to over-damage and subsequently over-agro should be a very harsh reality for many other classes, as should be the punishment for doing so. Opposed to modern day MMO's which makes tank threat so high that pulling agro is nearly impossible, and as a dps, your UI whack-a-mole skills determine your worth. And if the tank loses agro? Bad on him for being terrible at UI whack-a-mole, or not setting up his whack-a-mole buttons in the right order.
I firmly believe that balancing around the concept of responsible playing should be a cornerstone of Pantheon, and would add a level of skill and discipline that has been absent from modern MMO's.
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Global cooldowns as a yes or no answer doesnt really work until you analyze the rest of the equation. How will threat work? Will tank threat be so insanely high to the point where dps classes are expected to button-mash as fast as possible, or will we need to think about our actions? Do I need to exercise restraint while waiting for the tank to build some aggro? Once tank aggro is firmly established, am I free to unload dps at 100%, or should I ease into it? My thoughts on GCD would depend heavily upon everything else involving combat.
What we see in modern MMO's with button rotations, actions per second, and mindless UI whack-a-mole playing is not what I want to see with Pantheon. Period ever.
Well, I think it's really an either/or. You need Global Cooldowns without Resource Management. I want Pantheon to have Resource Management and finite resources (Mana/Endurance, etc.). When there is "downtime" you don't need global cooldowns because people won't be playing whack a mole and constantly button mashing or they will blow through their mana/endurance every encounter.
I do think there will be skills and abilities on a timer such as Lay on Hands, so they would not be overpowering though.
itvar said:I really dislike global cooldowns. They make combat feel really clunky. I prefer each ability have its own cooldown, with a global recovery period, a la EQ2. Every time I played Rift, WoW, or worse still FFXIV, it always felt like I was casting through molasses. Maybe it's just an aesthetic thing though.
Could you explain the difference between a global recovery period and a global cooldown? I don't remember it from my short time in EQ2.
My general feeling is GCD feels right with melees, since they need abilities without cast time. Casters could do without if spells all have cast time. I'd hate to see people macro their 8 abilities and unload them in one cast.
Assuming there is a GCD, please leave interrupt abilities off it. When WoW switched them (back in BC i think) it felt horrible.
I too dislike global cooldowns where one action, when completed, stops me from doing ay other action for some period of time. If you design spells and abilities with varied 'cast' times and their own cooldown times then it is the players who can decide how best to apply their abilities. Just give us the tools and we'll figure out the rest.
I hate Global Cool Downs and prefer for each spell to be on its own cool down cycle. In my opinion I feel EQ had it right and Pantheon should follow that model. As an Enchanter back in early EQ I would often have to root/mez a mob, but sometimes root or mez would break early, and I would literally chain cast root and immediately mez the mob. If I had to wait for a global cool down it would really reduce the efficiency of my casting and possibly get me and my group killed.
I think each spell having their own cool down cycle is more in line with Pantheon's ideas. More decisions are going to be left up to the players to decide for themselves. As far as I'm concerned, that should also include what and when we cast and how we use our mana. It will show if you are a better player and allows for adaptability as the situation goes to s*** changes.
Vanguard had GCD and it was literally the one thing about the game that I hated, in terms of design.
Please no GCD. Ever.
Even EQ2's combat system is preferrable to GCD and could potentially work as long as ability count is kept low, and every ability has a defined meaning as opposed to the 20+ useless abilities that exist in that game now.
I still think we need to define Global Cool Down for this discussion. Reading the replies it's clear I don't have the same definition as all of you (maybe I'm alone...).
To quote Rint specificaly, EQ spells shared a GCD (according to my definition). i.e, it would take a 1 second or 2 before you could cast a spell again no matter which spell was cast. On top of that you added to spell specific cool down if applicable.
Mekada said:I still think we need to define Global Cool Down for this discussion. Reading the replies it's clear I don't have the same definition as all of you (maybe I'm alone...).
To quote Rint specificaly, EQ spells shared a GCD (according to my definition). i.e, it would take a 1 second or 2 before you could cast a spell again no matter which spell was cast. On top of that you added to spell specific cool down if applicable.
By this definition and without considering any other factors (i.e. my prevoius post above), I would prefer a hybrid system, similar to what we saw in EQ. GCD timer started from the beginning of your cast, not when the spell went off. Spells with a 1.5 second cast time or greater could effectively be chain cast without any preceived GCD, but it still served as a buffer for instant cast spells.
Spell casters should not be hindered or artificially slowed down by a GCD as it should be up to the player to play responsibly -- again, in reference to my previous post.
Global Cooldown generally refers to most or all abilities sharing a "cooldown", generally a brief one of about 500ms-1500ms between casts. This is where the meme of mashing "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" came from, because you could effectively compile a dozen abilities into one macro and mash it like crazy. This is because games that have GCD generally have some instant-cast abilities that don't trigger GCD. The Bard shouts (Eaon's Boasting Bellow, for instance) didn't trigger it.
This is as opposed to a game like EQ where abilities all shared separate cooldowns, with the exception of spells. Even then, they weren't spammable necessarily and still required a bit of foresight to use properly. This is also opposed to a game like EQ2 where you have a few dozen abilities to use at any given time, but they all have separate cooldowns and require you to apply situational priority to what gets used.
Literally any system is better than GCD, honestly. No offense to the Vanguard developers, but it really was the worst feature of the game.
Mekada said:Could you explain the difference between a global recovery period and a global cooldown? I don't remember it from my short time in EQ2.
EQ2's equivalent is recovery time, which basically is just a short delay between abilities, I think it was a base value of .5 seconds, but gear and AAs could effectively cut that in half. It is sort of like a GCD, but fast enough that it didn't feel clunky. Every ability would have its own cooldown, so for the most part, you couldn't just spam the same ability over and over, unlike in FFXIV, which to me just seemed way spammy (although admitedly I didn't get to that high a level in that).
GCDs just feel like a lazy solution to me.
Frankly, I think having a system where you need to play really well to manage your resources provides it's own form of "global cool down" or "global recovery period."
That is, if you are always concerned with being able to maximize your resources, you will be striving to cast (or not cast) abilities in line with that. With tight resource management over "maximize my GCD's" you have more compelling questions as you play. Do I fire an ability now becasue I can, or do I wait because that other ability will be a better cast when I have the resources to do it - OR - do I spam heals because I can (GCD model without much resource considerations), or do I have to really watch my mana and let some people stay damaged for a bit so that I know I can react to an actual emergency?
Give me resources that I actively have to work at and think about while I play... make GCD's irrelevant and outdated as a combat consideration.
On the other hand, I'd like to avoid the situation where Wizards cast 1 spell per mob then sit and med for the next 5 minutes.
Resource consideration is good and it gives more meaning to support roles, but I'd rather not see it go overboard as well like vanilla EQ, where resource management required massive amounts of downtime. Downtime is good, but EQ could get a little excessive.
Absolutely No Gobal Cooldowns! I want Seperate cooldowns that are balanced according to power/utility vs time. For instance a really powerful ability might have a 30 min or longer cooldown. But if we use a very short cool down it might be appropriate for a CC or weaker attacks. In any case each ability should be on its own cooldown not shared. Now Im also not against some system that makes you pay attention to resouces or building up stamina to use either. Hell we could even mix em up a bit like XI did: Weaponskills had TP (stamina), Abilities had cooldowns, and Magic did have cooldowns but it was coupled with resource management (exception ninja used consumables which got quite expensive, and bard was just cooldowns).
Whatever the case, I mostly just dont want to see global cooldown as that leads to ROTATIONS!. I want situations not rotations.
Amsai said:Whatever the case, I mostly just dont want to see global cooldown as that leads to ROTATIONS!. I want situations not rotations.
Well, it's kind of difficult to avoid rotations. At best, you'll just have a different rotation for a different situation, but it'll still be a rotation.
One way you could mix things up is to have special procs or something that will reset one random skill prematurely (before its cooldown expires naturally) which will require you to constantly change the abilities you prioritize.
Regardless, there will always be a best possible ability to use at a specific time that will become increasingly evident with player experience and lead to the vague outline of what could be considered a rotation.
Liav said:On the other hand, I'd like to avoid the situation where Wizards cast 1 spell per mob then sit and med for the next 5 minutes.
Resource consideration is good and it gives more meaning to support roles, but I'd rather not see it go overboard as well like vanilla EQ, where resource management required massive amounts of downtime. Downtime is good, but EQ could get a little excessive.
Yeah, I agree. Resource management shouldn't mean "sit down and don't play your character much longer than you stand up and play your character"
It should mean that your resources more or less (generally) allow you to do SOMETHING (unless you play very badly and just blow all your resources) - but that within the ability to do SOMETHING are compelling choices.
More akin to this running through your mind: "Hmm, I can cast this magic damage ability now, but so and so just hit the mob with a spell that reduces its defenses against cold damage. If I wait a few seconds, I can use that cold ability instead and do more damage."
I'd be willing to bet most people would like those types of decisions - and be OK with waiting those few seconds here, few seconds there to perform better. I could be wrong...
Liav said:Amsai said:Whatever the case, I mostly just dont want to see global cooldown as that leads to ROTATIONS!. I want situations not rotations.
Well, it's kind of difficult to avoid rotations. At best, you'll just have a different rotation for a different situation, but it'll still be a rotation.
One way you could mix things up is to have special procs or something that will reset one random skill prematurely (before its cooldown expires naturally) which will require you to constantly change the abilities you prioritize.
Regardless, there will always be a best possible ability to use at a specific time that will become increasingly evident with player experience and lead to the vague outline of what could be considered a rotation.
Ability interdependence (or ability impact) between classes can break rotations - but can also lead to it's own set of issues.
For example - EQII's heroic system thingy (for the life of me I can't remember what it's called). If you were with a group that really knew how to use that, and you were firing abilities that lead to lesser benefit from it - they'd get mighty ticked at you... but using it right meant breaking a rotation in favor of hitting the right ability at the right time (outside of whatever rotation you might have been trying to accomplish)
Depends on how the debuffing information is presented, probably. It's a fine line between the combat making you feel like you're in the moment, and making you feel like you're playing a game of chess.
I've always liked much faster-paced combat personally, especially things that reward rapidly adapting to a situation than being able to plan several seconds in advance. I don't really know where the equilibrium is. I've never been 100% satisfied with the combat of any one game.
Dark Age of Camelot is about the sweet spot for reactionary gameplay for me. Intelligent use of reactionary/positional abilities are what won fights in that game, although that's obviously a PvP example and the PvE combat in DAoC was admittedly horrible. At the same time, the speed wasn't quite MOBA-paced but it was definitely a relatively fast-paced game.
Vanguard had a neat take on the debuffing like you were talking about with their "weakness" system, where certain abilities will respond to other abilities for added effect. My only complaint here was that the system for determining which weaknesses were active wasn't really the most intuitive.
Wandidar said:Ability interdependence (or ability impact) between classes can break rotations - but can also lead to it's own set of issues.
For example - EQII's heroic system thingy (for the life of me I can't remember what it's called). If you were with a group that really knew how to use that, and you were firing abilities that lead to lesser benefit from it - they'd get mighty ticked at you... but using it right meant breaking a rotation in favor of hitting the right ability at the right time (outside of whatever rotation you might have been trying to accomplish)
Heroic Opportunities - EQ2 is the game I'm playing right now. :p Funny enough, they're completely worthless now.
That said, I agree. I liked the HO system and really wish they had fleshed it out a little more. If they refined that system and make the effects more powerful it could definitely work in a game like Pantheon to add some more engagement/intelligent use of abilities.
Liav said:Amsai said:Whatever the case, I mostly just dont want to see global cooldown as that leads to ROTATIONS!. I want situations not rotations.
Well, it's kind of difficult to avoid rotations. At best, you'll just have a different rotation for a different situation, but it'll still be a rotation.
One way you could mix things up is to have special procs or something that will reset one random skill prematurely (before its cooldown expires naturally) which will require you to constantly change the abilities you prioritize.
Regardless, there will always be a best possible ability to use at a specific time that will become increasingly evident with player experience and lead to the vague outline of what could be considered a rotation.
Dont take that too literal. I guess what I mean is I am sick of games that have one best rotation 2 if you are lucky. Now this mostly refers to dps. But I have played a couple of games where even the healing and tanking was very bland and had no variation to the rotation. That being said being a tank in FFXI there were so many many situations that called for different tactics. Yes it could be the same thing on repeat for a given scenario, but for the most part from encounter to encounter you found yourself doing different things. Of course how encounters are designed and the atmospheres could help with that as well. Ultimately I want to have to decide what to use based on the situation not have a set pattern that you must do like 99% of the time. Im sure the devs could work something out. Maybe something like you suggested above. Also with different cool downs its harder to set up as rotations, because sometimes it comes down to when an ability is available or needed.
Slightly related: It could come down to how they design a class. I like complex mechanics (melee or magic). But I understand some people might want a simpler and more straightforward class that comes down to a handful of abilities. Nothing wrong with that and maybe it should come down to that to keep good for all. Different strokes and what not.
Amsai said:Dont take that too literal. I guess what I mean is I am sick of games that have one best rotation 2 if you are lucky. Now this mostly refers to dps. But I have played a couple of games where even the healing and tanking was very bland and had no variation to the rotation. That being said being a tank in FFXI there were so many many situations that called for different tactics. Yes it could be the same thing on repeat for a given scenario, but for the most part from encounter to encounter you found yourself doing different things. Of course how encounters are designed and the atmospheres could help with that as well. Ultimately I want to have to decide what to use based on the situation not have a set pattern that you must do like 99% of the time. Im sure the devs could work something out. Maybe something like you suggested above.
Slightly related: It could come down to how they design a class. I like complex mechanics (melee or magic). But I understand some people might want a simpler and more straightforward class that comes down to a handful of abilities. Nothing wrong with that and maybe it should come down to that to keep good for all. Different strokes and what not.
Yeah, I think we're on the same page.
RIFT is a good example of a game that was horrible for this. Literally just mash 1112, 1112, 1112 ad nauseum until the target dies. Really awful gameplay.
I think both small and large numbers of abilities can work depending on implementation. Games with smaller quantities of abilities generally put emphasis on player positioning and movement, whereas games with large numbers of abilities put less emphasis on that and more emphasis on making sure you're using your abilities in a more dynamic way to maximize your effectiveness.
I would be more than fine if, as I learned this boss or that, I was able to discover that using X abilities in Y order was best (a rotation). What I don't want to see is, like Amsai said, a single rotation that is the best you can do in most situations.
As an example, at one point in WoW I played a rogue. I did research. Out on Elitist Jerks the thread said "do this in this order to do your best damage" - that same post existed for pretty much every class...
That ultimately makes for a very dry experience - it isn't about learning what set of abilities to use, it's using the set of abilities someone else figured out the best you are able to do so.