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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
That is different than the Ashes concept of focus being required to pull off advanced combos.
But, even then, the counter is more about trying to disrupt the Ranger while they charge the ability than it is about blocking their attack.
The QTE is really all about Focus.
So what we are saying is if you dont use weapon combos you are going to be slow and less powerful.
Thus the weapon combo system is compulsory rather than situationally optional.
If you dont use it you will essentially be outgunned.
I dont feel like discussing about definitions of various words which wouldnt help to come up with a better combat system anyway...
These games dont have a combat qte, but they require alot of focus and fast decisions (especialy Tera is very punishing for mistakes). Bdo has a qte fishing mechanic thats similar to the combo qte, but the mechanic is awful even if only used during fishing.
In wow i make use of the los abuse mechanic alot with standard skills.. im sure it would work for the qte combo aswell with some extra practice.
I didnt play the game yet, what button do you push to trigger the sweet spot during combo? 1? space? It doesnt really matter, i could make my mouse push the whole alphabet and all numbers with one click if i'd want to..
When i've been talking about the counter attack, i was refering to a previous idea. A certain skill i called 'counter attack'. You somehow confused combo and counter attack in my text and wrote a huge paragraph about my ideas for the counter attack wouldnt make sense if applied to the combo attack :x
With pvp micro i mean a mechanic that makes players compete in small scale (without necessarily huge impact on the outcome of the fight if you loose just one of these competitions) during tiny time frames (less than 1 second).
Atm most of your skills have a very delayed impact and the qte takes the focus away from your opponent even more.
Btw whats up with the forums? everytime i refresh the page comments keep appearing and disappearing, even older ones.
Everyone has the option to play the entire game as a carebear, non-combatant Artisan.
And, if you make that choice, you will be outgunned.
The weapon combo is "situationally optional".
You get to choose when you try to hit the sweet spot to start the weapon combo and when you don't. Nothing in the game forces you to move through the weapon combos against your will.
You have the free will to not use your weapon ability.
You have the free will to use your weapon ability while ignoring the QTE.
You have the free will to cancel the combo chain before it reaches the final ability in the chain.
You have the free will to attempt to finish the combo chain.
All of those decisions depend upon the situation.
Compulsory would be if the game always forced us to complete the weapon combo chain before we could activate any other skill.
You can say anything you want - that doesn't make it true.
You said that if you do not hit your timing bar...the cool down is increased.
You said higher stage skills come with greater power, which requires playing the combo game to do more damage and access higher stage (damage) skills.
All of these things will increase your TTK.
Combat is a TTK contest.
Whoever has the worst TTK dies first.
So....not going through the combo stages cripples damage and cooldowns and TTK making the combo skill compulsory and means you must permanently play the combo game and suffer the RNG bar.....if you want to or not
Trying to change that into a ....well if you arent going to hit people you aint gonna cause damage is a strawman and avoiding the purpose of the comment.
1: It's not a cooldown - there is a small delay/rest period between weapon attacks.
2: If you successfully hit the bar, you get one bonus weapon attack immediately following the first weapon attack.
3: If you miss the timing bar, you don't get a bonus weapon attack.
Abilities later in the chain will most likely have more damage - or will provide added attack consequences. It's not going to be just repeating the same basic weapon attack, as demoed at PAX. (Unless, you're using a basic weapon with only one attack ability rather than an advanced weapon with multiple attack abilities.)
TTK = Time to Kill? (I think you really mean DPS, but, whatever...)
TTK will not be solely reliant upon your weapon combos.
TTK will be dependent upon how a player mixes their weapon attacks with their non-weapon attacks and how they strategically use the battlefield.
If TTK = Time to Kill, I don't agree that combat is a TTK contest.
Quickest TTK really has very little to do with who wins at combat.
You can try to build your character like that if you wish, sure.
An avoidance character with lots of healing and stamina will increase TTK and likely will not lose that challenge.
In combat, attempting to only maximize weapon combos is mostly likely a poor strategy - depends, I suppose, on the abilities you have (weapon and non-weapon) and how they're augmented.
Every combatant -in every fight- will be choosing when to use weapon attacks and when to use non-weapon attacks. Based on the situation of each combat beat.
When choosing to use weapon attacks, players will decide whether they just want the basic attack or whether they want to use a subsequent ability in the combo chain multiple times before using the final ability in the chain or whether they want to continue to the end of the chain. They will be deciding when they want to cancel portions of the chain and switch to a non-weapon attack. And, they will be deciding whether it's best to ignore the QTE and cancel the chain by moving to avoid an incoming attack or by traveling to a more strategic point on the battlefield.
When and how to use the weapon combos all depends on the specific situation.
There will be situations when players -especially casual players who don't care about maximizing TTK and DPS- will decide, "You know what, I don't need to use my combos to kill this mob/opponent. I'm just gonna use my non-weapon attacks and my basic weapon attack."
It's possible there will be players who decide to try to maximize their TTK and DPS by always attempting to only use weapon combos no matter the situation, but such players would be exceedingly rare - not even a statistical blip.
Use of the weapon combo is inherently situational and optional.
It is only compulsory for those who suffer from OCD to the extent that they would feel compelled to only use their weapon combo in order to maximize TTK and DPs.
At PAX, we had 8 abilities on the ability bar.
Key 8 was a non-combat utility skill.
Key 7 activated the Ultimate ability.
Key 1 activated the weapon ability. Also used to attempt to hit the QTE sweet spot.
Keys 2-6 activated non-weapon abilities.
We had a basic weapon with only one weapon ability.
In the Ashes game design:
- Weapon abilities will be accessed by Key 1.
- Advanced weapons will have multiple abilities all accessed via using Key 1 to successfully hit the QTE sweet spot.
- Missing the sweet spot does not affect the cooldowns on abilities.
- Hitting the sweet spot triggers a bonus weapon attack immediately after the initial weapon attack - most likely the next ability in the combo chain.
- Hitting the sweet spot also builds Focus. Once Focus is maxed, it's possible to trigger your Ultimate. *
- Changing your weapon will not affect your non-weapon abilities.
- Changing your weapon will change the abilities available via Key 1.
- The abilities available on your weapon will be determined by primary class, by race and by crafter (among other conditions - probably character/class level as well).
* At PAX, the interface for advanced weapons was not ready.I suspect that while we used Key 7 to activate the Ultimate, the actual design calls for the Ultimate to be triggered via Key 1 as the final ability in the combo chain when Focus is maxed.
I think in the live game, the Ultimate will not have a cool down and it will take longer to build Focus. Such that the Ultimate will trigger whenever Focus is maxed and we reach the end of the combo chain - rather than using Key 7 to activate the Ultimate.
But we need to have the devs confirm my suspicion.
Well I guess there will be those who wont use the weapon combo, will never charge their ultimates and will die 1st as a consequence, because they are too busy doing anything other than causing damage to the opponent as they lose more and more health.
Especially from a PvP perspective.
And yes TTK means time to kill, which is pretty much all that matters at the end of the day.
It doesnt matter how well balanced the classes are.
Combo skills and Ultimates are bonus damage that exist outside that system.
They are game changers and they arent there to be useless or their existence would be pointless.
No reasonably competitive player, will ignore the bonus damage opportunities offered by the combo and ultimate system.
Nothing you have said changes anything that I have said. But regardless, your thorough explanation of the system to date is very warmly appreciated. So I thank you for that.
TTK, really doesn't matter at the end of the day. That is objectively true.
What matters at the end of the day is winning/surviving the combat competition - not how long it takes to win/survive.
Combo skills and Ultimates are bonus damage.
Augments to non-combo skills are bonus damage.
Non-combo skills, buffs and heals provide other means of mitigating and meting out damage.
Ashes has a wide variety of combat game-changers besides just weapon combos.
All based on the moment-to-moment situation.
When players choose to ignore the bonus damage of weapon combos will be a moment-to-moment situational decision. 99.99% of the time.
0.1% of the time someone will choose to use weapon combos 100% of the time regardless of the moment-to-moment situation.
It is unreasonable to try to use your weapon combos 100% of the time regardless of the situation.
My opinion didn't change. To be clear, I had a lot of fun playing and i'm just trying to give feedback. I like the idea of the bar, the focus meter, and how it encourages you to not spam but i didn't like staring at the bar. It didn't feel good having to quickly look between my target and the bar. It seemed punishing to miss because of the second or two delay you had before you could use your next ability.
Just copy BDO combat pls its easy. just do some motion capture and put some hit boxes in. gg. BDO copied most of there game fro mother games so what would it matter. The current combat is trash and if they follow thought it will still be trash or like most other MMOs. All of the skill are slow and boring it it so slow why do you need tageting in the first place it so weak. Are they players so unskilled thy cant aim at somthing. So you dumb down combat so todderlers can play it GG.
Most of the comunity thats not on these fourms were hoping for a BDO alternative and you come up with this. You may have better business practices and more content but thats what mosty games have over BDO. Im probably going to end up playing CU hopfully since there combat isnt going to be dumbed down even if plebeian tab targeting is the main way of targeting in that game. Since CF looks like trash too.
I dont know any one that was impressed with the PAX gameplay. Every one was sad that we have to play BDO for the forseable future. RIP AoC.Im gonna go cut myself.
sorry if Im mean but this play looks like a circle jerk and Im pissed that Im proplaby going to play a korea game for the next 2-3 years because western Devs think tab targeting is acceptable 2017 and want to dumb down combat to sliding bars and action button quick time sequences like its a damn cut scene.