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[Idea] Combat QOL
Magavyn
Member
During the recent 8/28 Twitch stream Steve reviewed combat briefly and I had an idea. I'm sure you all are inundated with ideas but haven't heard this mentioned.
For TAB abilities it's straight forward. Tab or click your target, use ability, job done. But for the action abilities instead of pressing Z to bring up a recticle, aiming the ability, then pressing the ability it may make more sense to hold down the ability, aim, then release the ability button to cast. For example:
Let's say you have a fireball combat ability (non tab target ability) set to Q. You could press and hold down Q and that would activate the aiming reticle, then move the mouse normally to aim the reticle at the target, then simply release Q to cast the fireball.
Has this been mentioned? If so I'm sorry. I've been activate for only a few months but this is a much simpler idea than tab targeting, pressing Z to activate reticle, then press ability, then press Z to reengage or disengage the reticle to go back to normal movement.
Anyone else have any other combat ideas mentioned or not mentioned? Very curious to start testing.
For TAB abilities it's straight forward. Tab or click your target, use ability, job done. But for the action abilities instead of pressing Z to bring up a recticle, aiming the ability, then pressing the ability it may make more sense to hold down the ability, aim, then release the ability button to cast. For example:
Let's say you have a fireball combat ability (non tab target ability) set to Q. You could press and hold down Q and that would activate the aiming reticle, then move the mouse normally to aim the reticle at the target, then simply release Q to cast the fireball.
Has this been mentioned? If so I'm sorry. I've been activate for only a few months but this is a much simpler idea than tab targeting, pressing Z to activate reticle, then press ability, then press Z to reengage or disengage the reticle to go back to normal movement.
Anyone else have any other combat ideas mentioned or not mentioned? Very curious to start testing.
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I think that tapping the key sould be a quick fire, and holding it should let you aim with z being the default global aim mode button.
Keep the toggle as an option but have this for players skilled enough to make use of quickly swapping back and forth.
This is my proposal for a character controller that is suitable for action combat while still maintaining the comfort and responsiveness of a generic third person controller. The key mechanic is that holding down the right mouse button allows action abilities to be aimed like a third person shooter, with the character locked to facing the direction the camera is pointing. The most important point is that when not aiming, the player should be able to run in any direction without backpedaling. Backpedaling and strafing should be avoided at all costs in normal movement mode because of how stiff it makes regular character controllers feel, and should only happen when aiming with a reticle.
Action Combat Mode (3rd person shooter controller)
Free Movement Mode (generic 3rd person controller)
A notable feature of this setup is that camera control is split between left click drag and right click drag, such that the player has the freedom to orbit the camera either with or without repositioning the character's facing direction.
Mouse Camera Control
Yes well, hopefully we'll be able to rebind the controls.
Definitely agree with this. Easy fix would be just allowing full reassignment of your keys and ability to change it between hold and toggle.
Holding right click is by far the easiest way to quickly switch between two different camera modes.
Also it was unclear whether you could still tab target while in that mode. I think regardless of what camera mode you are in, you should still be able to use any of your abilities and should still be able to tab target.
There are a couple ways this could be handled. I think the most ideal way is to use what's known as mouse-over targeting. When you're not aiming at anything in reticle mode, it defaults to your last tab target, but if you are hovering over something, it temporarily overrides your current tab target to that. It's particularly nice for a hybrid system, because it frees up the mouse-left click button to be used for default weapon attacks while in reticle mode. That's what I call true quality of life. The other option is to have it work like normal targeting, where you need to left click on things to acquire a new tab target in reticle mode. In this case, weapon attacks would have to remain on the keyboard input of Q.
It sounds like the same thing but the layout is very different. Certain information would be shown assuming you are in action mode all the time as opposed to mouse mode. They'd have to put a basic reticle in game, but that's really not a big deal. Can literally just be a dot. xD
Example of what information might be revealed in action mode with a menu mode toggle is resources. So that you don't have to open the menu assuming there is only a couple overall resources to count. Things equivalent to gold, not every item in your bag that is a material. It's really not too different in general but the entire game being made with action mode being the default is really what matters. This is actually how WoW used to be on release. They changed it but I liked that way better.
You can then make a button so that when you turn the camera you look instead of turn. Probably just make that the right click function and bind the menu button to tilde or something.
The reticle can be how you select targets in action mode. That's why you would need one if this were the norm.
U.S. East
This is essentially the exact system Guild Wars 2 uses for it's non-action-cam/tab-target-mode combat.
Edit: Actually not essentially, it IS the same system for when you don't have a target selected
This is something I've been bringing up constantly on threads in this forum and haven't really gotten an answer. I'm sure everyone's seen one of my long ass comments talking about it by now lol. I even created a post right after today's livestream asking specifically about this that nobody has responded to yet.
The idea should be to design a character controller in such a way that players don't need to hold down right click 98% of the time in the first place. Specifically, they should not need to be in 3rd person controller aiming mode to aim non-projectile abilities. Think about melee classes in particular. Most of their attacks are simply 360 degree grounded directional attacks and do not require vertical aiming. Any ability that is not a projectile will already function based upon character facing direction. Using WASD to aim non-projectile attacks is much more comfortable than using a reticle. As such, reticle aiming mode should be reserved for attacks that have a vertical aiming component and actually require it. If you activate an archer bow attack without being in reticle mode, it should just aim straight ahead of your character's facing direction.
GW2 already did that. Im not saying they need to copy GW2 1 for 1 but definitely use it as a baseline as a successful hybrid system.
I think that pressing Z to activate the reticle is fine and what are you saying only can be an addition to that not to replace the Z activation.
There's more keybinds you can use than just q and e, you have whatever mouse buttons you have, z, x, c, v, f, r, 1-4, and all of those combined with shift.
When i play gw2 my keybinds let me move with ease and are as follows
1. Mouse 4 (1 is auto attack in gw2 similar to AoC's Q ability)
2. Mouse 5
3. F
4. Q
5. E
6. Shift+ scroll wheel click (heal ability slot)
7. Z
8. X
9. C
10. R
And then for the profession abilities
1. Shift + mouse 4
2. Shift + mouse 5
3. Shift + f
4. Shift + q
And my swap weapons is shift + tab
As you can see all of my keybinds are close to movement keys on my left hand and use my free fingers on my right hand.
It might take a little getting used to sure but if you use "different control scheme" as an excuse for not trying it then you're setting yourself up with a mindset that leads to you missing out on things
Now i set up my keys specifically for myself, but there's so many ways you can customize it for yourself, don't restrict yourself to the keybinds they set for you.
I do also use keybinds that are close to movement keys and I have 5 free button mouse either.
I only meant that if I'm moving with W/A/S/D probably I can't hold down another keys. Even Z/X/C/V that my free big finger can press, it will just feel uncomfortable. Only if I have to hold down, I'm totally fine having skills in these keys and pressing them normally.
Oh yea fair enough, you don't hold down abilities in gw2 so i can't say i have experience with that lol
That works for melee, but not ranged abilities.
Well, maybe for ranged abilities if you're on a flat plane, but when you're dealing with verticality and whatnot it's not viable because your arrows/projectiles will shoot in the right direction, but fly over heads or into stairs.
And if you made it so that the camera jumps to face character facing when you go into reticle mode that's going to be very jarring
Since you can still target players in action mode, the way I see it, you will be able to play 100% in that mode. No idea how it would work if you want to play tab target mode though.
But again, switching between them like that feels really clunky, even if you switch with another keybind.
Will have to see how the combat ends up, but if it is aiming your attacks, then I wouldn't want to constantly switch and have to readjust my aim all the time.
Ive also been saying exactly this for the past month on these forums and elsewhere
If you were too look at my comment history it's full of this argument xD
Unfortunately not enough people seem to understand it
Well yea, customizability is nearly always a plus. There's some backend issues that need to be made to allow that customization though
I don't think this is true at all. First person shooter games provide a good example here. Whenever players want to aim down the sights of their gun, they hold right click, constantly flipping back and forth in the middle of fast-paced action combat. There's a reason FPS games don't have you stuck looking down the sights of your gun the entire game. Players are able to do all their speedy movement and hip shots in the default controller state much more comfortably, then when they need to aim precisely they hold down right click and bang bang bang, easy. It's a completely seamless transition. There's no reason this system can't be applied to a third person person controller as well. The key is to have the camera take over the character's forward facing direction when holding right click, but leave it unlocked otherwise.
That's not an accurate comparison at all in any capacity.
FPS hipfire and ads both are functionally the same thing. Tab-target camera and reticle/third-person camera are entirely different from a visual and mechanical standpoint.
For you to bring up FPS hipfire and ads is absolutely ridiculous. Superfluous at best
Your example is the same a saying "Action camera is the same as Action camera zoomed in", which has nothing to say about tab-target.
Sure, but as I've said before, this only works if you're fighting on a flat plane for ranged abilities.
It's fine if this is an option. It's abhorrent if this is the only option.
But the whole point is that you can hold right click and aim projectiles with a reticle whenever you need to. You're responding as if I'm suggesting a character controller without that capability.
You're fighting an enemy with a stationary-camera and free-movement character. You run in to fight the enemy and it works fine of course, but then in the course of the battle the enemy ends up behind you and your character has to turn around to face him and with that, the camera. Now you have to turn the camera around 180 degrees, then precisely aim before you can then fire off any linear-projectile/hitscan abilities you want to use.
If you're fighting on a flat plane, you could just cast your ranged abilities while moving towards the enemy. However, if you're fighting on a slope, which based on the footage we've seen so far is pretty common, your abilities might just fire into the slope, or above their head. You could say, "Well make the abilities fire on the same vector as the slope", and yes that could work. But what if you're on the stairs, and they're on the floor at the top of the stairs a little ways from it and the projectile flies up the stairs and past them into the ceiling. In these scenarios you can't just not be constantly repositioning the camera, and if you're constantly moving the camera to compensate for these things, then you're really just using action/reticle cam in practice.
This is all fine as an option if this is the kind of controls you'd like even with this problem, but it absolutely won't be a popular choice for ranged players.
It's the reason I play my Force/Techer in PSO2 in action-cam instead of the camera-mode you're describing. Though at least in PSO2 there's a lock-on feature and your skillshot projectile/hitscan abilities auto-aim at the target. It's not confirmed if auto-aim projectiles/hitscan will be a thing in AoC yet though, which I've been trying to get confirmation on for a few weeks now.