UE4 - Dynamic Combat System

Potato Basket

Stumbled upon these videos and wanted to hear your opinions

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQWfWiSsaCA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAjxbJ7-RKg

Exciting to see there's a real potential to make action combat work well with UE4.

Really liked the roll and bow animations, looks fluid and overall pretty dynamic combat.

Hope it ends up being nothing compared to what Intrepid is aiming for. 🤞

What do you think?

Atama

Well we kind of already saw what action combat will look like in APOC...

Potato Basket

@atama True but imo it didn't feel so good and dynamic enough.
granted it's an early iteration but from what I've experienced the general direction kind of disappointed a little.

Atama

Yeah there’s certainly potential. I hope it’s better by release, which is why I qualified my response by saying we only “kind of” saw what it was like.

Also I feel compelled to mention (in case anyone reading this thread is unaware) that AoC plans to have a hybrid combat system. Some action-based like a FPS game, some tab-targeting. Not fully going either way.

Wandering Mist

Making a combat system look good is easy. Making a combat system feel good to use is much harder. There are many variables that effect how the combat feels that the looks very rarely play a part.

The souls games are an example of this. Dark souls 1, 2, 3 and bloodborne all were made using the same physics engine (havok) and yet all of them feel slightly different in terms of the combat. Speak to anyone who has played all 4 games and they will probably tell you which 1 has their favourite combat system.

Take a look at dodge rolling as one variable you can change in an action combat system. Dodge rolls in games usually contain invincibility frames (I-frames for short) where you can't take damage during the roll. Altering the number of I-frames you put into a dodge roll changes the feel of the combat. Fewer I-frames mean you have to be much more precise on when you roll in order to make use of them compared to more I-frames.

Not only this but you have to decide when you get the I-frames during a roll. Do the I-frames occur at the beginning of the roll animation, in the middle of the animation or at the end of it? Putting the I-frames at the beginning of the animation makes the combat more reaction-based, whereas putting them at the end would require more planning by the player.

This is just 1 small element of the combat system and yet it can completely change how the combat feels. The reason why I haven't yet commented on the Ashes combat system yet is because we have no idea what they will do to affect the "behind the scenes" variables.

Damokles

The combat effects look really cool, but we already know that IS will design some kind of hybrid between action and tab-target ;D

Rem_

I hope Ashes will have a good mix of the both, and you can choose to not just have a 50 50 split between them but like a 70 30 % split or more. Either way I just hope they improve the combat from the feedback from apoc!

burnthefern

I just really hope they get their net code down solid. Nothing ruins a good action combat system more than desync and latency. Regardless of what % hybridization is allowed, if my skills looked like they landed on my screen, they'd better connect. And if I dodged on my screen, I'd better dodge.

Pinkberry

I actually hope they used some of that footage when they used the wind skill as inspiration cause that mini tornado skill looked nice.

An actual wind element skill with wind animations instead of everything being lighting is a small thought that came to mind when i saw the video above displaying skill fx.

Magic Man

@ninfosho Thanks for sharing this. It shows a fraction of what that they can achieve using UE4. I hope they don't let all of this potential to go to waste by focusing more on tab skills and creating a generic MMO combat. Hybrid combat will be interesting to see but it's at least 6 months away.

seaber

kayra wrote: »

@ninfosho Thanks for sharing this. It shows a fraction of what that they can achieve using UE4. I hope they don't let all of this potential to go to waste by focusing more on tab skills and creating a generic MMO combat. Hybrid combat will be interesting to see but it's at least 6 months away.

WoW, BDO, AA and GW2 all have hybrid combat according to Steven's definitions.

Also sort out your signiture.

Wandering Mist

seaber wrote: »

kayra wrote: »

@ninfosho Thanks for sharing this. It shows a fraction of what that they can achieve using UE4. I hope they don't let all of this potential to go to waste by focusing more on tab skills and creating a generic MMO combat. Hybrid combat will be interesting to see but it's at least 6 months away.

WoW, BDO, AA and GW2 all have hybrid combat according to Steven's definitions.

Also sort out your signiture.

Any game with a mixture of targeted and manually aimed abilities is technically a hybrid system, which covers most mmorpgs these days. The only mmorpg I can think of which doesn't have any manually aimed abilities is Runescape.

So, saying Ashes will have hybrid combat doesn't really mean anything until we know how much of the combat will require manual aiming.

Magic Man

^

Magic Man

@seaber Steven's definition is regarding choice of either action or tab based abilities. We've tested the action combat in APOC. Now it will be combined with traditional tab target system - this will be the true hybrid combat and the real combat of the MMORPG.

seaber

kayra wrote: »

@seaber Steven's definition is regarding choice of either action or tab based abilities. We've tested the action combat in APOC. Now it will be combined with traditional tab target system - this will be the true hybrid combat and the real combat of the MMORPG.

?????

Also, go here and sort out your signature ffs

Magic Man

@seaber you have some real issues girl 😅Gonna leave it there tho 👍