Resource management in combat

As some of you might know, the Classic WoW Closed Beta is in progress and I've been watching quite a few videos and streams on it. One of the biggest differences between Classic WoW compared to Modern WoW is in resource management. In Classic you can run out of mana, energy or rage very very quickly which forces you to think very carefully about which abilities you use and on what target. A mistake here can easily get you killed. On the flipside, in Modern WoW you have to work very hard to run out of mana, and rage and energy generation means you can spam your abilities as much as you want.

Seeing this has got me thinking about the flow of combat in Ashes. From what we have seen so far, all classes will have both a mana bar and focus bar. The mana bar is for your regular abilities and the focus bar is for your ultimate ability. That's all well and good but we don't know how these resources work. How much mana will we be given? How fast will it regenerate (if at all)? How much mana will our abilities cost? How quickly can we fill our focus meter to use our ultimate ability?

These are all key questions that have a huge impact on the flow of the combat system. My question to you though is, what do you prefer? A system that lets you spam your abilities as much as you like, or a system where you have more limited resources and have to think carefully about each ability you use?

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Comments

nnightstalker

I wouldn't mind seeing it going both ways. Maybe certain classes or combinations down the line give you different ways that you can spec to make your character more you. For example, maybe you choose a direction that gives you large amounts of regeneration to your resources so you don't have to manage as hard but as a trade-off, your abilities deal less damage than the baseline ability. Whereas you could choose to make your abilities cost more resources making resource management even harder but in turn, your abilities do more damage than the baseline. Maybe even some classes don't necessarily use resources like you still need the stamina to use your rogue style abilities but you have a high regeneration in order to place more importance on the combo style of abilities. I think that would all be pretty cool

Wandering Mist

@leonerdo I like the idea of putting mana gaining mechanics into the classes. It reminds me of how Arcane mages worked in WoW Legion. They had very powerful spells that used a lot of mana, combined with lots of ways of gaining back the mana they used. The result was you would alternate between a strong burn phase and a recovery phase. The skill came in knowing when to activate your burn phase for maximum efficiency.

I also like mechanics that can steal mana. This was my favourite way to play Mesmers in guildwars. You could effectively shut an opponent down by draining their mana so they couldn't cast anything.

[Deleted User]

I keep on wondering why people are so black and white sometimes.

I personally prefer resources to be limited, it just makes that panic so much more real,

"ah sht sht I want to heal you, but I've can't because you keep on drawing meaningless aggro and I need to keep the tankies alive"

However, there should also be a bog standard 'free' skill that fits the description of the archetypes.

So every archer can keep on flinging unlimited basic arrows, but you want to use that awesome arrow?
Well, sorry, you should have made sure that the hUUUuuGGGe bag they gave you archers just for ammo was reasonably stocked.

Not black and white, one way or the other, both are valid, but resource management gets you better results.

Wandering Mist

genna wrote: »

I keep on wondering why people are so black and white sometimes.

I personally prefer resources to be limited, it just makes that panic so much more real,

"ah sht sht I want to heal you, but I've can't because you keep on drawing meaningless aggro and I need to keep the tankies alive"

However, there should also be a bog standard 'free' skill that fits the description of the archetypes.

So every archer can keep on flinging unlimited basic arrows, but you want to use that awesome arrow?
Well, sorry, you should have made sure that the hUUUuuGGGe bag they gave you archers just for ammo was reasonably stocked.

Not black and white, one way or the other, both are valid, but resource management gets you better results.

I understand what you are saying, although in the case of the healer having to prioritise healing the tank, that can be achieved without restricting their mana. After all, if you can only heal one person at a time and the tank is taking a lot of damage, you can't afford to heal anyone else regardless of how much mana you have.

Anyway, back to the point of "free" skills that require no resources to cast. I....need to think about it more before I form an opinion. I'll get back to it.

Azathoth

I like the concept of a free skill specific to each archetype. When you first select your secondary aspect you could gain whatever the skill would be at base, and then have the option of leveling that skill or not. Being a free skill the effect should, imo, be very specific and not as effective as other skills you could focus on. However, if you wanted to be the most Bard-like Bard possible, you would want to keep your archetype specific skill on par with your others.

I have not given much thought to skill types, but I can see an archetype specific free skill as being a fun utility.

Wandering Mist

@genna and @azathoth I've thought quite a bit about offering a free skill from a healing perspective (my chosen party role), and in my opinion it just doesn't make sense in terms of gameplay. Let's say they gave you a very weak heal that costs no mana, to use when you run out of mana. Depending on how much healing a fight requires, that skill will either be worthless or too OP. If the amount of healing required is less than the healing output of the no-cost heal, then players would just use the no-cost heal all the time. Why waste mana when you don't have to?

On the other hand, if the amount of healing required is more than the healing output of the no-cost heal, the no-cost heal becomes worthless. From a healing standpoint a no-cost healing spell makes no sense. As for dps and tanking roles, why have a no-cost attack when not just use basic auto attacks that follow the same principle? Back in Vanilla and TBC WoW, if a caster ran out of mana they would switch to their wand and use that instead.

I do like the idea of having reagents as a separate resource though. Different ammo types, or certain items needed to cast powerful spells. One of the things I love about Runescape is how they handle magic. Magic spells in Runescape are powered by Runes that come in all different varieties. Every spell consumes some Runes to activate, with more powerful spells needing runes that are harder to get compared to the less powerful spells. This meant you had to pick your spells carefully based on what you were fighting and what runes you had access to. Not only this but you had elemental staffs that substituted for a particular rune. For example, an Air staff would allow you to use Air-type spells without using up any Air runes.

I haven't seen another game that uses a system like it, which is a shame because it has such a lot of potential.

Damokles

@wanderingmist
They could implement the no-cost healing spell if they made the cast time too high to use in normal circumstances.
No one would use a overly long spell with low healing when they could use a normal healing spell ;D

Azathoth

But it doesn't have to be healing, and we know that clerics will have some form of Anti-corruption ability too. I think you have good points, I just don't think the healers free-skill would have to be a heal. I would prefer a utility to be honest.

Noaani

I don't see how a game with this many classes could possibly do combat without limiting resources.

I'm fairly sure we'll find that there are a number of classes that are somewhat focused on restoring group member resources in combat, as well as some focused on depleting enemy resources (likely useful in PvP).

To me, the key is in giving players enough tools to counter resource depletion. Resource management can in itself be fun during combat, but only with tools with which to manage it. Without these tools, resource management becomes resource rationing, and that is never fun.

Wandering Mist

@noaani None of the class abilities we've been told about so far have resource-restoring properties. In fact, we know practically nothing about resource management apart from the fact that all classes will have a focus meter that is tied into the weapon attacks, and when the focus meter is at 80% you can use your class' ultimate ability.

Damokles

Edit: Sry missread! XD

Noaani

wanderingmist wrote: »

@noaani None of the class abilities we've been told about so far have resource-restoring properties. In fact, we know practically nothing about resource management apart from the fact that all classes will have a focus meter that is tied into the weapon attacks, and when the focus meter is at 80% you can use your class' ultimate ability.

Absolutely true.

However, I for one am going to assume that - at the very least - a number of classes will be able to restore mana to others in their group.

At it's very basic, this is resource restoring.

I wouldn't be surprised if we end up with classes that have abilities to increase focus generation of others, but I would be shocked if we don't have a class or two that can restore mana.

Alexander4048

100% need to be able to run out of mana, i want some element of strategy and tactics.
This goes for all classes and speccs.
If you run out of mana as Cleric in PVP, that should mean imminent death vs a DPS.

Make Mana Matter

Having infinite resources makes the concept of energy/rage/mana completely cosmetic, as has been the case in Retail WoW for many years during and after WOTLK.

Songcaller

I would say the DPS would run out of mana before the priest and as the priest will DPS and heal in the same skills, the DPS will be dead before the Cleric runs out of mana.

Of course, focused teams will have to work together to halt the Cleric.

We've seen Gift of the Magi, Whip and Mana Well in the lists to restore mana.

unknown

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ShroudedFox

@Wandering mist Last livestream was showing a mage ability vfx that was called gift of the magi and transferred mana from the mage to another person, so whilst not confirmed id say it's likely.

Edit missed the earlier comment that mentioned this

Im kinda undecided on resource management and replenishment time out of combat, especially in a pvx game where being oom is essentially a death sentence if someone wants to kill you when you've just taken out a bunch of mobs so have no mana, therefore using powerful skills with high mana costs is dangerous for farming purposes. this is of course solo which I understand this game is not balanced around

I feel there should be a way to restore mana in combat but at the cost of damage, I like the basic attack restoring mana idea(maybe as a spec for staffs and wands).
or maybe something like passives you can assign to having a larger pool or faster regeneration of resources (to specialise for either long term or short term fights).

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