Height Advantage?

ArchivedUser

I did a quick search and didn't notice anything on the subject. But, what do you all think? Would this be a good idea? Specifically, for increasing the range of ranged skills.

I was thinking that this would make a lot of sense in sieges and town defense and to give some weight to what would be an obvious advantage in any real world scenario. Even if it only applied in certain areas, like guard towers for instance.

You could have the bonus set as a curve as well, so the bonus increases as your elevation increases. But it drops off if you get "too high". This kind of comes back to another discussion about town defense that I had posted a while ago on collision.

https://forums.ashesofcreation.com/discussion/726/player-weapon-collision/p1

Just thinking of ways to give the defenders a bit more of an edge. Thoughts?

ArchivedUser

An arrow is an arrow, no matter where you get shot from. If you're on a tower you already have an advantage, you have a tower.

ArchivedUser

Shooting up is not the same as shooting down though. I'm suggesting that height offer more range. So, for instance: A defending archer at height can start hitting an attacking archer before the attacker gets into range. I'm not suggesting a damage bonus, just a range increase from height.

ArchivedUser

That's a bad idea, melee classes would instantly be at a massive disadvantage. Some ideas sound cool but just can't be implemented fairly.

ArchivedUser

Well sure, if you are 10 cm higher, you can have 10 cm longer shooting range, fine with me. :P

ArchivedUser

Elder said:

That's a bad idea, melee classes would instantly be at a massive disadvantage. Some ideas sound cool but just can't be implemented fairly.

Defenders are supposed to have an advantage and this would make fighting on walls useful. It would encourage attackers to use siege engines to either destroy walls and/or push up onto them. I feel like this supports the siege fantasy/experience.

ArchivedUser

Siege Towers too. The melee could hide in or behind them and then scale the wall safely. It doesn't make sense that the ranged characters on the ground would be able to hit the one's on the wall/tower as easily. And, if they aren't scheduled sieges the defenders would always be at a disadvantage in numbers. So, keep that in mind.

ArchivedUser

Well they plan on making races give a small boost to certain stats which would be good for certain classes if your trying to min/max, so having height give a small boost doesn't sound so bad. they can try to implement it in a similar way as Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen where height can be an advantage and a disadvantage which can also make players feel more unique to their characters and players can become a little unique with the whole 64 archetypes as well.

ArchivedUser

If they are going to implement such a system, I'd say the higher you aim from the more range you get, but you also get less accurate.
not only do you get more realistic, you also don't put melee classes at a disadvantage
also, there is dodging iirc.

ArchivedUser

McStackerson said:

Elder said:

That's a bad idea, melee classes would instantly be at a massive disadvantage. Some ideas sound cool but just can't be implemented fairly.

Defenders are supposed to have an advantage and this would make fighting on walls useful. It would encourage attackers to use siege engines to either destroy walls and/or push up onto them. I feel like this supports the siege fantasy/experience.

There are other ways of making walls and towers useful. There are preparation times before sieges so we may very well be able to have ballistas and other weapons mounted along walls.

Defenders aren't supposed to have a great advantage, the time, effort and resources to attempt a siege is equal to the amount it took to construct the city. 

Remember this game has tab targeting, being able to lock on to enemies automatically at that great of a distance is too much of an advantage for defenders to have. 

Even outside of sieging it would be broken. Imagine you're fighting  someone, even another ranged class, all you would have to do is run up a hill while firing at him and he couldn't touch you. The decider of who wins a fight shouldn't be who's higher up a hill.

ArchivedUser

I would actually love something akin to DnD. A sword for Halflings is like a dagger for others. But that would probably create balance issues.

But something like that would most definitely be awesome.

ArchivedUser

Elder said:

Even outside of sieging it would be broken. Imagine you're fighting  someone, even another ranged class, all you would have to do is run up a hill while firing at him and he couldn't touch you. The decider of who wins a fight shouldn't be who's higher up a hill.

I was thinking that they could flag the wall and tower floors/surfaces to give the bonus and not have it apply to the open world hills, etc. When the attackers storm the walls they would have an advantage over any defenders on the ground. Siege towers have been implemented as such trash in other games, this could make them much more necessary. Strictly suggesting range bonus, not a damage bonus. In case I wasn't clear before.

ArchivedUser

I think it's a cool Idea that adds realism and another addition of skill into the game for PVP. People fight for higher ground for advantage. It wouldn't be unfair cause either side could go for higher ground.

This would take a lot of work but adding some real world physics into the game for modifiers could add a whole aspect of skill and strategy into the game.

@Elder Sorry bud but I think Defenders should have advantage it adds realism .  Taking down a large node could lead to strategic political maneuvers. Requiring people to make alliances and surmount a huge overwhelming siege to take down the top dog. This should not be something that is easy to do and take some coordination.  Typically defenders always have the advantage.

Starving out a city and cutting off trade routes in would be an interesting concept.

Also TAB targeting would work for both sides.

Melee would have things such as chains to pull people and charge to people who are using range so height advantage should work for anyone who has the skill to utilize the advantages that physics would allow such as higher grounds. 

So a melee could be at the top of a hill creating a disadvantage for ranged shooting up at him. He could use chains ability to pull a range character up to him. So the advantage would work both ways for melee or range.

So with physics a ranged attack would have advantage of distance lets say. But if he loses that distance his ranged attack could lose some damage at close range.

ArchivedUser

Elder said:

There are other ways of making walls and towers useful. There are preparation times before sieges so we may very well be able to have ballistas and other weapons mounted along walls.

Defenders aren't supposed to have a great advantage, the time, effort and resources to attempt a siege is equal to the amount it took to construct the city. 

Remember this game has tab targeting, being able to lock on to enemies automatically at that great of a distance is too much of an advantage for defenders to have. 

Even outside of sieging it would be broken. Imagine you're fighting  someone, even another ranged class, all you would have to do is run up a hill while firing at him and he couldn't touch you. The decider of who wins a fight shouldn't be who's higher up a hill.

Why take a step closer to homogenizing the classes and delegate a role that range classes could fill to siege engines? Yes, there should be a role for defensive siege engines but we don't need them to be able to do everything. For the most part, range classes would have the same mobility restrictions as the siege engines as they would be forced to stay on the walls to get the range advantage. 

They are stuck on walls so staying out of there range is easy. All this allows defenders to do is start shooting earlier then the attackers. In direct conflict between 2 big groups, it would give the defenders an advantage because they could start to do damage earlier. Hopefully, because of this advantage, attackers would be forced to implore tactics besides zerg the gates.

In a world pvp scenario, you would handle this the same way we deal with range now, LOS. Just hide behind a tree or rock. If they are abusing this advantage then they are farther away so it would be hard for them to do anything about you hiding. As i said before, the terrain is (most likely) not mobile so they can't pursue you with the range advantage. While you are LOSing can probably eat up and/or get on a mount to either charge them or run away. 

What about mounts? do they give an unfair advantage to melee classes because they make you faster?

ArchivedUser

It would give ambushes a nice bonus as well. If we are indeed supposed to ambush caravans, picking a nice chokepoint with some high ground would have obvious benefits.

ArchivedUser

so if I ask Dave to give me a piggyback ride does that mean I will do more damage?

ArchivedUser

nagash said:

so if I ask Dave to give me a piggyback ride does that mean I will do more damage?

Only if you're not wearing pants.

ArchivedUser

@nagash

What about high heels? Or what if, I have the high ground Ani? 

ArchivedUser

Ariatras said:

@nagash

What about high heels? Or what if, I have the high ground Ani? 

you underestimate my army ^^

ArchivedUser

nagash said:

Ariatras said:

@nagash

What about high heels? Or what if, I have the high ground Ani? 

you underestimate my army ^^

And you mine

ArchivedUser

then lets put it to the test 

ArchivedUser

Challange accepted.