Edit: Oh I took up the top post slot without a new compilation, but that's fine since last page was data gather and philosophy, and it's probably better not to repeat that. So if you're looking at this and want the "Latest Compilation" just go back to page 4. Also, this post is a response to @maouw's on the previous page.
There are actually two ways around 'group skill-spam deletion' that I expect Ashes to flirt with, though, whether others like them or not is definitely going to be a big point of feedback contention.
(You may need some of my 'concept of what the likely augments are based on class names' from the 'Tanking' thread, somewhere around the middle of page 4, but probably not).
Based on what I expect from Augments, I'm highly suspicious that Ashes is going to have fewer direct damage abilities, but still have a lot of abilities overall. Also that the 'skill points method' of choosing those abilities will result in any given player not having too many damage ones. The Global CoolDown would be how 1v1 or even 2v1 would not result in the player dying instantly even if they have no mana (assuming Strafing Q/LMB).
Utility skills can be tuned to do much less damage, this doesn't prevent 'Javelin Tank pulling you into a 4v1 and you getting deleted', but there's some counterplay if you have to keep spending points in a skill to keep the damage 'relevant'. E.g. Ranger's 'Bow Combo' might do 40+STR/10 damage at level 1, but that won't keep up or become some 'relevant' number without skill points pumped in to make it something like 60+STR/5 at a higher level.
I'm expecting a lot of DoT, damage mitigation, and utility stuff, particularly damage mitigation buffs, to end up padding out the skill lists. The reasons for this belief have more to do with my expectation of how open world 'Raid Boss PvP' will be designed, but it's all speculation, so it would get its own thread, if my group decides that they care enough for me to try to suggest it.
Part of the reason the Compilation includes parts 1 and 2 is actually that I expect the number of abilities to be lower, and that people won't be happy without the Strafing Q/LMB for mobility. I also expect that they'll be really upset by 'seeing an enemy Javelin Tank hunting party coming for them' and not having a Brace to get a chance to negate the Javelin at the right timing.
I'll know when we see the Combat Revamp, there's a lot of little things in there about 'how mana costs scale if at all' and 'overall growth of the mana pool', but the 'standard' for games like this is pretty predictable if balance, even 3v3 balance, is their goal. It almost always converges (or the game sucks and dies).
I also have other expectations about group synergy in Sieges (similar to the concept of the Summoner party calling the WarBeast) that might make 'let's focus down their healer and delete 'em' sufficiently harder to actually do, that GvG would not consistently devolve into skill-spam death (Imagine if Tank's Shockwave or some separate skill temporarily created an impassable area of jagged earth on the ground in front of them, for example, as a solution to 'not wanting to buff the HP on everyone')
Sorry, my native language is Erlang.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
edited June 2021
Hmmmn. That has me very curious to know how the Passive Skills tree and racial augments might counter/resist the pull of Javelin.
As far as physical control goes, I would like ashes to have smooth/fluid movement and animations, and that's all I care about. The rest is more philosophical.
I have 2 hopes for Ashes of creation combat:
The first is that I'm hoping for combat which can be fun in multiple forms of pvp. I split pvp fights into 3 categories: 1v1, small skirmish, and big battles. I want all 3 of these to feel deep and engaging, in instanced combat, and in the open world!
The second is that I hope the combat in ashes of creation will have a high skill ceiling, which facilitates potential for comebacks, and underdog victories in pvp engagements. I have to emphasize the word skill ceiling, because I do not want the game to rely on comeback mechanics, ultimate moves, or other cheap easy ways of artificially constructing a close fight. I want one guy to be able to beat 5 guys, because that guy is John Wick! I want 25 guys to be able to beat 100 guys, because that's 25 John Wicks!
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
The devs are not balancing for 1v1 at all. Combat is balanced as rock/paper/scissors for 8-person groups.
Also, the focus of PvP combat is objective-based combat. So, it's mostly going to be about which group can win their objectives, rather than who has the most kills.
Even so, there are many players that will have 1v1 out in the open world, and it might be nice for those players to get as close to balance as possible.
If a person can attack another for their gathered items with minimal risk because their advantage is considerable in a 1v1 scenario, especially since main Archetype can't be changed, it will probably be less engaging than if the balance is close enough for the 'bad matchup' to prepare really specifically for their 'dominant opponent' and maybe surprise them.
If Clerics lose to Fighters as a generality, and one is known as a Cleric, gathering alone puts all the risk on you and very little on your attacker. The answer would be 'don't gather alone', but I feel like we should make the effort.
Though, I am interested in that, what is your planned personal solution to 'being hunted by your bad matchup while doing things'? I don't know if you're the sort of person who will ever travel out of a safe area alone.
Sorry, my native language is Erlang.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
edited June 2021
Corruption.
And, if I'm really worried about it - group.
Well, either way, @Tubes' expressed desire was just that it feel engaging, not specifically 'be balanced', which is even easier, and 'relatively balanced' is pretty easy, so we're back to a discussion of how to achieve a skill ceiling.
I can 'guarantee' a skill ceiling of 17 decisions per minute with the current Compilation, with synergies from all obvious functional augments raising the awareness level (without relying on UI) to 24 decisions per minute on any classes other than Rogue or Bard assuming that Bards don't have really long animations for their buffs.
(If you care how I get to those numbers, it's a fighting game experience kind of thing, you have to be able to simulate matches in your head the way a chess player does, so we know this sort of data beforehand)
I think that going past 30 decisions per minute leads to decision fatigue very fast, but if players would want to have to make more than 30, there are ways to tweak the Compilation to get to it, even without knowing how many abilities they intend to add.
True! I hadn't considered GCDs.
Interesting that GCD's bring in an element of Turn-based gameplay. Which means you can create a whole meta revolving around fast cast/standard/slow cast, and adapt a ton of turn-based strategies into the game. That's a bit overwhelming to think about right now. But if you want that 200ms to respond to someone's actions, GCD is going to get in the way.
Also depends if weapon skills are going to be the "between active spells" stuff - coz that determines the pace of combat regardless of GCD.
I'm very keen for Utility skills, and would love to see greater emphasis on them, and how they interact with passives and the weapon tree. Speaking of, judging by the name "weapon skills" I dunno if we'll see many utility skills there? Keen to find out what comes out of the oven.
1v1/2v2 balance explicitly wasn't Jeff's goal, so I don't care about it too much either. I'm mostly in favour of higher reliance on utility abilities to open/close opportunities to strike the enemy where it hurts for a more interesting TTK.
Just on mana - I'm curious if they intend late game mages to be mana potion addicts, or if they'll be an everlasting fountain of mana and everyone else chugs mana potions. Actually, this might work better as a speccing option.
But now you've got my brain all stirred up and I just had a realization that needs outlet:
One more thing worth noting about LoL's design:
Riot tries to fit a champion's whole kit onto QWER + passive, so in later designs you find that 1 champion ability has multiple effects - which makes it multipurpose and this is accidentally deep combat by nature.
Example:
Katarina's W drops a marker where she is standing and gives her a momentary boost in movespeed.
There are three main ways a Katarina player uses W:
For the boosted movespeed, either for fleeing or to gap close
So she can dash back to her marker after diving the enemy (marker lasts 6 seconds)
Drop the marker near her enemy so she can explode it for damage
Best case scenario for Kat: Enemy is chasing, so she drops a W to "flee" (use 1) leaving a marker behind. The ignorant enemy keeps the chase up and walks too close to the marker --> boom, she dashes back to her marker (use 2) to re-engage the enemy and explodes it in their face (use 3). In this case she took all three options with one use of the skill.
The correct way to play around a katarina is to force her to make a trade-off choosing only 1 (or less) of those options:
Attempt an engage on Katarina, if she drops a W to flee, you stay out of melee range of her marker but within a threatening distance of it should she choose to dash back to it - forcing her to stay away from her marker.
If she drops a W to engage you, you immediately disengage until the marker is gone - she's forced to choose between continuing the dive without her marker or to wait for her W to come off cooldown again.
Just do your best to stay away from her markers so she never gets the chance to explode them. (she can only drop them where she's standing and also throw them behind you, so lateral movement pisses off Katarina players)
If you separated these three options into distinct abilities, then opportunity for outplay becomes reduced: She can now drop a marker, and engage you, saving her movespeed boost as a backup exit strategy in case her marker expires - so you gain less from disengaging. She can save her "explode" ability for only when she's in melee range of you - which means she'll likely never waste the ability. So your outplay options reduce to the default: kill her before she kills you.
Point is, if you design a skill with multiple purposes:
- it creates options for different circumstances, leads to greater creativity with skills
- provides counterplay opportunities by way of allowing opponents to create situations where the user must sacrifice one purpose in favor of another.
I think augments are in a great position to do this well. Could get ugly to balance though hahaha.
I wish I were deep and tragic
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
edited June 2021
I think I also would love each Primary Archetype to have at least a hand full of Utility Abilities.
Weapons can also have enchantments, I think, in addition to the Weapon Abilities.
And then there's that Passive Abilities skill tree...curious to see what's in there!!
For now, don't worry about balance. I say this both out of 'my arrogance' and 'my faith'. Saying things like 'not balancing for 1v1' is 'insurance' most of the time. Devs still try, but when they realize that perfect balance can't be reached, they settle for 'balance soft-cap'.
Technically it's harder to balance for 3v3 without partially balancing for 1v1 precisely because it means whoever has the gap-closer or the faster engage wins by rapidly making it a 3v2, and 'making the cost of that high' still doesn't change the fact that it is so. That's saying 'we will make abilities where three people have to use up a whole person worth of resources on their side'.
I don't think we're likely to see that since it usually makes TTK extremely low.
As we see it now, the current abilities are designed with a lot of flux like what you mentioned, in mind. The Weapon Skills I'm familiar with are again, FFXI, so they're mostly damage, but about a third of them also have meaningful utility in the form of debuffs, often at the cost of damage dealt. We know that Jeff either played that game or was familiar (from some quotes about how mobs detect and so on), though I wouldn't necessarily make any inferences from that. Still, it would be a little odd to not have them, I see a lot of signs of it, in quotes.
So back to abilities, let's take the 'Jagged Earth' I mentioned, and assume it's an upgrade of Shockwave, and blocks all those pesky 'ray-casted' abilities like Prismatic Beam, Chain Lightning, Weapon throw, and Javelin, for whatever duration.
It can be used as a knockback+knockdown, but the ground is impassable to the user too, let's say, so you need a ranged attacker or a flanker to capitalize easily, otherwise you're just buying yourself time to use buffs.
It can be used without even hitting the opponent, just to prevent them from moving to an objective for a while, or to block a group of mages from beaming you or your group into ashes, but you don't get the damage.
It can be used to isolate one member of a group from others by blocking off the others a little, if the enemy Rogue slipped behind defenders and was assuming they would be saved by the main group, now they can't get immediate help and they can't easily run straight toward their comrades either.
On the 'potential augments' side, a Tank/Cleric wants to hit with this ability every time (assuming it has an On-Hit heal to the user) and hit the maximum number of people. A Tank/Mage (assuming Meteoric Impact to make the Jagged Earth area/cone even bigger) might moreso use it to block things, and a Tank/Tank might not bother to augment this skill for PvP at all and focus on a PvE style augment, while just using their other skills to deal with the above situation as suits them.
The counterplays and decisions made would get pretty hectic, yes, but probably not overwhelming.
I am hoping for a bit of actual slower combat, and focused on more of a planned and tactical setup over something that looks as it´s shown in 25 X speed.
I don´t play For Honor, but this combat system speaks much more to me than the typical " explosions of colors numbers and weird poses in mid air " does.
DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
Oh! I really like the melee in For Honor much more than Paragon, but...
For Honor looks like it's closer to a medieval sim rather than a high fantasy RPG.
So... there kinda needs to be some explosions of color.
Pretty sure the magic number is 3 (2 if you're minimalist) to stop the brain feeling overwhelmed by choice.
I like that ability example. Sounds awesome and really useful, but I'd also want to give opponents another option to respond to it - so if Jagged Earth creates impassable terrain (I'm just gonna run with "wall"), that wall can still be destroyed by abilities/basic attacks if the opponents want to force their way through, and anyone with a teleport/super jump ability can hop over the terrain if they so dare.
This also creates an opportunity to design skills that synergize with and/or counter this ability, and put them on other classes to emphasise team-work/interactivity.
Synergy examples:
Abilities that can slam the opponents into a wall
Create a ramp/step (becomes a one-way wall)
An ability that makes terrain invisible <--- I imagine this would be a nightmare to implement coz you open vision to out of bounds/subsurface layers on 3D objects.
Counter examples:
(like before) create a ramp/step (just be careful you're not going over into a trap)
Phasing/Levitating/wall climbing abilities
Terrain destruction/morphing/dispelling abilities (as long as these abilities take some time/preparation so it doesn't completely nullify the wall's existence)
I see what you mean about resource management. It affects long-term strategies more than short term in-the-moment stuff. Have to say though, I do enjoy it when games reward you with ability resources for pulling off combos.
@Grihm - that would be a difficult 'sell' for two reasons. Firstly, For Honor is basically a fighting game, with hitstop, frame data, everything. And has maybe too much of what we fighting gamers call 'footsies'. Very slight adjustments to range to make your opponents miss so you can punish them while they are animation locked in the recovery, or overcommit with a longer range attack that you then move into range and block at the last minute and counterattack because it has 'frame disadvantage' when blocked.
I can add 'more footsies' to the compilation, but I've avoided it since this started from 'people who wanted Action style combat to be faster' and 'people who don't want it to be like a fighting game' so there would be a schism there, and one would need a lot more people of that opinion to share it, in this thread, before I'd consider it accurate to do so. But you are +1 to it.
@Dygz - Any specific reasons? The actual request when the video was first linked, was to please complain about Paragon (or at least the Feng Mao video) as much as possible.
@maouw - Got it. I'm used to 3 decision options since that's where most games, fighting games or otherwise, tend to converge in their moment-to-moment combat. I expect fighters to get a big leaping bypass and an AoE slam-knockback, and for Blink to bypass this ability if it were added. Personally I also automatically think of the wall as destructible but this is a lot harder to code without massive testing in terms of interactions in an MMO of this size. That said, my other ideas would still require it (the 'Special Ability for 8-Tank Party in Siege would be, you guessed it - Rumble Wall - where they all use Jagged Earth at once to put up an entire wall, and that one be destructible for sure)
I'm familiar with the destructible version from Paladins (a Tank Champion 'Inara' has this sort of thing) but in Paladins you normally only have to worry about max 3-4 of this wall being in play.
Anyways here's the current idea in simulant form, since the Compilation doesn't really show the dynamic between my thinking and the original posters' goals.
1. A player sees an opponent coming and is wary of them, watching them carefully, possibly with weapon drawn, just in the open world. In the current implementation in the game their options are all ability based, and dodge, and rely on the player having abilities to do something here (Clerics don't currently get anything, for example). Strafing Q/LMB adds an on-reaction option to most attacks with longer animations, and Brace adds an option against shorter animation CC. The moment you see the opponent's name color change, you are reacting with one of these two, regardless of your class.
2. We assume the player chose Brace or was too slow on the Strafe Hit, takes damage, and the enemy is right next to them, assuming a Fighter's Leap. Now, Dodge is still available, another Strafe is available (but chaseable by the Fighter's W+Q/LMB, I've used this example before probably earlier in the thread, so spoilers).The Fighter has to turn to get this done, though, and after a short recovery, you could Strafe again (you'd probably still get clipped by their attack). Since weapon being drawn is required for this, Mages would be unable to recover mana, but they also have a better Strafe due to the wand option. The Fighter decides if to go for another Gap Closer with CC because their target is a 'Strafe Spammer', times the attack, and gets the CC, or assumes they're being baited into using such an attack and wasting mana on someone who is about to Brace.
3. The Fighter retains advantage due to never being in range to get hit by the Strafes (in my mind they take about 3/4 of a second to fully animate, but move your 'hurtbox' out of the way of most linear attacks by 1/4 of a second in, but this is all 'frame data' level specificity which only matters in precise terms if you can't imagine it, I don't know if you play them and need any context. Anyway, the target is lower on health no matter what, and if they keep 'spamming' Strafe and the Fighter keeps managing Chase Q/LMB, they keep taking more damage over all. Every second or so of the Fighter doing this successfully, the target loses 7% health and has to start thinking about what to do about this. Are they stalling for a nearby ally? Trying to get to a terrain position?
4. Eventually the target sets up a situation or range where they get to have a sure shot at some ability they want to use. Shockwave? Castigation? some Frost bind thing? If they pull this off because the Fighter has overcommitted to expecting that they will keep strafing, things shifted and the Fighter now has to care. This is the reason that all forms of Q were possibly to take small amounts of stamina, so that a player would eventually tire out of just Strafe and Chase, be unable to Brace (or dodge?) for a moment, and be at the mercy of their opponent's toolset. There's a pressure to come up with something that will help you regain Stamina, using an ability, before that happens, but in a GvG, maybe the weighting of that decision is different.
5. The Fighter could see them doing this, decide to spend a Mana Potion and try to perfectly use their other Gap Closer, or buff up and then use a big one, since if the target strafing, even in Action Mode, Fighter still can see where the target is likely to end up. In Tab Target mode, even easier, because they don't care about any 'Action Mode enabled CCs', only about getting closer. So they use more abilities, knowing that because the target's intent is to stretch out the battle, they should prioritize stamina. The target could notice and react to this and try to heal, but the Fighter has the advantage. On offense, they have more time to think, to make the call, and they're not reacting to anything. The Target, if they just 'spam Strafe', can't 'stop to use their potion' (assuming this is a thing) until their next one ends, putting them in perfect position for the Fighter's Somersault Strike or whatever.
It goes on and on. I figured this sort of thing would be the maximum most people would accept in an MMO without the big schism between the Action Combat supporters and the Timing Combat supporters (people who want Tab Target but don't want Timing to be the difficulty, I am not convinced want difficulty, or if they do, it's a dangerous type that leads to decision fatigue). It also doesn't innately lead to 'fighting game' play as most of us understand it (that could devolve fast into Spear users always winning in 'footsies' and people already are pulling toward spears in PvP).
So far, the Compilation has no specific complaints, but as always, please correct me. Even the beginnings of a consensus on a system probably would help the Devs immensely at this stage. Nothing worse than 'having to come up with your own design spec' with no idea of the client's goals.
Even if the current direction of their revamp doesn't match this at all, they will at least be able to know what complaints they may get.
The map they are on was their new map, designed for 'verticality' and 'opportunity', which ended up being code for 'one person always has advantage and the best course of action for the other is to run' which leads to a lot of that chase and half-finished battles.
It lost a lot of the effectiveness of the first map, where that was much harder to do, you couldn't be sure if your opponent had a buff that would make the fight more even, and more battles were about positioning in the much wider lanes. Without changing basically any characters, just the map tweak and 'the way buffs work and where they spawned', the game did, successfully shift toward a more MOBA feeling.
Whether or not that was good depends on if you started Paragon because you like MOBAs and wanted to play the same thing in 3D, or if you got into it because a 3D MOBA feels different enough to enjoy playing it. Ashes is sure to face this problem no matter which direction it takes, which is also why I hope they can commit to one relatively early. Nothing worse than having the rug pulled out from under you and a game you love getting revamped, but at least in this case, those of us who see things changed away from what we want, can just unsub.
I liked it more when Health and Regen were better and timing/positioning were how you built up advantage, and damage classes still did well because your healing couldn't outpace their damage once their cooldowns were back up.
The Compilation isn't actually based on that though, since this isn't built for me.
There's no point in even giving timestamps for the battles in that match since they don't really feel anything like 'battles' (see Spoiler text) in the context we're discussing. If you feel like giving an opinion on that, it might help potential Rangers add to the current discussion, though.
Sorry, my native language is Erlang.
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DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
Dygz - Any specific reasons? The actual request when the video was first linked, was to please complain about Paragon (or at least the Feng Mao video) as much as possible.
Ha. Hmmmn. Well...I haven't shared a critique of Paragon yet because I;m still trying to process what I saw.
A part of me was repulsed by the combat and a part of me was very intrigued by the combat.
It almost feels like something I'd like to explore as the game that it is and at the same time it's horrible game play for an MMORPG - which shouldn't be surprising because it's not an MMORPG.
So... Neverwinter Online is a good example of the action combat that I like in an MMORPG.
It has free aim abilities, dodge/roll/parry/block and the tempo is faster than tab-target combat and slower than FPS combat. There's also something about the maneuverability of the characters that I prefer in NWO that I prefer over FPS maneuverability.
Prior to the latest dev stream, I had never thought about "Floaty" v "Motion Lock" and I'm still not quite sure what that means.
When I think about in terms of Alpha One Preview combat - I don't like pushing past my opponent as it falls to its death. I assume the motion lock is sticking to/locking onto the opponent during melee combat.
But, as I watch Paragon afew vids of Paragon team combat, I realize the overall maneuverability -strafing and backpedaling- feels way too floaty for what I'd want in an RPG. Especially compared to what I see in NWO.
I think APOC may have had that same kind of floatiness but I didn't notice it as much 1v1, especially since I never try to use that kind of maneuverability.
I'm not sure I've described that well, but - I prefer the maneuverability showcased in the NWO video above over the maneuverability in Paragon.
The first thing that irked me in the Paragon melee video is that it seems like the character only has two animations for his attacks. There seem to be several interesting cards that act as abilities but the character still does the same two animations. I would want to have a different animation for each ability.
What I like about For Honor that's way better than Paragon, is that it appears that there is a separate animation for each type of attack. The thing I don't like about For Honor is that it appears to be a no magic Fighter - which looks fantastic for what it is, but - I would want to be playing a high magic RPG... and I'd probably prefer anime caliber sfx for the magical abilities.
The movement in For Honor also isn't "FPS floaty" so maybe it's that the movement in NWO and For Honor feels more grounded?
In Paragon melee, the two attacks seem maybe a bit to slow, but worse, NPCs seem to be killed in 4 strikes - which is way too fast for an multiplayer RPG, where the team should be reacting and adjusting to the abilities being used by the other characters.
It's difficult to tell for sure because there doesn't seem to be group combat in For Honor, but it seems like there's plenty of time for attack telegraphs and the mobs stay alive long enough that in Ashes, the Tank has time to notice that the Ranger has rooted an opponent, so he chooses Onslaught to charge to that opponent rather than using Javelin to pull the opponent. The Rogue then has time to flank behind the opponent to get a Crit with Backstab. And the Cleric has time to set up a heal or deal some damage or both, as needed.
Also, I like the use of dodge/roll/parry/block in For Honor and NWO. Paragon seems to use an FPS floaty strafe to dodge, as far as I can tell.
I don't know that any of that adds much to the intended discussion, but that's my first pass at a critique of Paragon.
I've played Neverwinter, I have enough experience with it, on multiple classes, and with friends, to adjust and discuss it.
You probably don't need to check much more on Paragon. It really is what you see, for that character in particular. It's completely unsuitable for an MMORPG which is sort of why I chose it. I needed a video where everyone could say 'this is wrong, I want this to be different'.
As for Neverwinter otherwise, it brings up something that I may need to clarify with posters quite often, please feel free to join me in seeking this same clarification, so the Devs can get more direct feedback. Either way...
As a Rogue in NWO, I have action abilities, but I have something akin to Tab Target, in that, my reticle is 'sticky'. The same thing happens in BDO and one or two other games. Once I have 'hitscanned' my reticle over a target in action mode, I no longer always have to line up the shot for throwing daggers, for example.
I don't think most people would complain about this other than in large scale PvP, but there might be some who dislike it. You can see what I'm talking about at the 6:20 mark of that video if you check it in slow motion, assuming you're not aware already. The player slowly moves the reticle toward the next enemy, but the thrown daggers still hit the first.
There's also the aforementioned 'really wide swing arc for melee'.
A game's pacing is very seldom decided by how the targeting works, it's decided by how the reticle works vs how evasion works. Ashes already has some 'your target is not in your attack cone/line of sight' limitations on even tab targeted abilities, so I'd quite frankly say that we can outright ignore tab target vs action combat given the skills we know of, hence the Compilation's state.
The other thing you will see in Neverwinter Combat is that 'need to be able to move a certain distance sideways suddenly'. The flaw I've often met is that since you do not attack during this, there's a bunch of balance issues, hence 'Strafing Q'.
Otherwise though, it's what we've already discussed, so I hope I can consider it fair to say that you support the current Compilation, and hopefully I can consider it 'successful' in terms of the usefulness of showing the Paragon Video.
NWO combat is pretty damn enjoyable. The problem with NWO, is the lack of balance, lack of impactful skills... and hell, animations are often trash. The only real reason I still play it sometimes is because I love the Dragonborn design
I'm not 100% certain what ppl mean by floaty combat either since (or maybe its just me) I heard different versions of floaty combat in here.
As for this .... split body? vs locked in animation (I'm hoping I'm keeping up, there's a lot of shit to read lol) I have no idea which is better frankly.
I played both WoW and NWO, and Tera and I have never given it a closer look. However, I do like a stamina system for blocking, attacking etc. However if that is to be a case, melee > ranged > casters would have to be the order for harder to kill to easier to kill in order. I always found it stupid how casters are equally hard to kill like melee in many games despite being ranged casters. Melee should be harder to kill but not do humongous damage, while casters should be easier to kill but do humongous damage... thats at least my philosophy to an extent. Willing to listen to opinions on this one.
Another problem is some classes having far more utilities, defensives etc. This will cause the same shitfest as in wow. Devs need to plan this part out very carefully.
Besides that, I would have 100% more accurate readings on combat if there was dual wield for me to test 😂. If you play in your best, then you have the best information you can gather and properly predict if you will like the combat. So kinda feels bad if we won't have various class players since feedback is usually far better if you know and like your class, cuz then you can at least say "based on this playstyle I think [this] or [this] combat style is better.
Unfortunately most games with 'good combat' devolve into 'balance issues' because of an essayworth of tiny things.
I spend a massive amount of time studying these tiny things, hence all the stuff you have to read (sorry!).
I would be surprised if it were not that order in terms of difficulty to bring HP down to 0 once you start to hit them. Mages just have so much upfront damage, that you need to be able to burst them down or keep them from casting more. That's the experience so far from Alpha tests, even before any revamp.
Floaty combat seems to generally refer to 'I can move from side to side in unrealistic ways while swinging my weapon at full strength, and not reacting in any way to my opponent's attacks'. Slow animations don't help. If you have low 'recovery time' on your slashes, for example, it makes it worse.
I find the more useful terms are "High Impact" and "Low Impact", because you can combine those with "High Recovery" and "Low Recovery" to get feedback.
NWO is generally Low Impact Low Recovery, which is fast, but the low recovery is what helps to cause the imbalances and feeling of skills being like that.
Tera is sort of in the middle, by class, but is normally "High Impact Low Recovery" which is generally built for games with big enemies who have huge sweeping attacks and characters have lots of iFrames. Basically meant to give some skill illusion, and feel really good.
Ashes right now is High Impact High Recovery but this doesn't work as well with its limited movement. Split Body generally changes a game to Low Impact Low Recovery because if it changes it to Low Impact High Recovery everyone almost universally hates it and wonders what the Devs were smoking.
Do you have any specific input regarding the page 4 Compilation?
As a Rogue in NWO, I have action abilities, but I have something akin to Tab Target, in that, my reticle is 'sticky'. The same thing happens in BDO and one or two other games. Once I have 'hitscanned' my reticle over a target in action mode, I no longer always have to line up the shot for throwing daggers, for example.
I don't think most people would complain about this other than in large scale PvP, but there might be some who dislike it. You can see what I'm talking about at the 6:20 mark of that video if you check it in slow motion, assuming you're not aware already. The player slowly moves the reticle toward the next enemy, but the thrown daggers still hit the first.
Right. I got burnt out on themepark MMORPGS right after playing through NWO Beta and first module Launch, so, it's been a while. I pretty much stopped playing, immediately started following EQNext and I'm waiting for an MMORPG that allows us to construct our own cities to defend from destruction.
I remember NWO's aim assist and some players complaining about it, but...
I think you probably have to have something like that - especially for a class that is supposed to have excellent Dexterity.
In an RPG, character attributes and abilities should always trump player twitch skills. There will be many players who, for a variety of reasons, have poor aim or poor twitch skills. But, in an RPG, the player should be able to pump enough points into DEX that their DEX character rarely missed its target.
Same with Stealth. Gamers who are fans of player twitch skills often complain that Stealth should just be the player hiding the character in shadows or ducking behind objects and there should not be any kind of invisibility effect for Stealth, but an RPG is all about building your characters to be better at things than the player might. Same thing for Spot. We should be able to put enough points into a skill like Spot that the character can Spot things that a player might miss.
There was a discussion about that regarding the sparklies that highlight harvesting resources. Sparklies or no sparklies? Could start out with no sparklies, but we should still be able to put points into something like Spot that would allow some player characters to see those sparklies.
So, there probably has to be something like aim assist - especially if Z axis is going to be included in combat targeting.
There's also the aforementioned 'really wide swing arc for melee'.
I never notice the really wide swing arc for melee, but that could be another example of trying to ensure that the player characters are better at melee than the player might be via twitch skills.
Yes, it's free aim compared to tab-target, but still some assisted aim.
A game's pacing is very seldom decided by how the targeting works, it's decided by how the reticle works vs how evasion works. Ashes already has some 'your target is not in your attack cone/line of sight' limitations on even tab targeted abilities, so I'd quite frankly say that we can outright ignore tab target vs action combat given the skills we know of, hence the Compilation's state.
I disagree. Steven even mentions that in Ashes, the tempo of action combat is faster than the tempo of tab-target. One of the things that makes action combat faster is that need to be able to flit away from the telegraph in an instant. It's where dodge/roll/parry/block and it's why I like ground telegraphs.
Lots of people abhor ground telegraphs, but I feel they are necessary, and I love them, because that reflects our peripheral vision. As a Cleric in NWO, I might be facing away from the boss fight while I focus on killing adds in order to build back my depleted mana. But, if I see the ground telegraph in my periphery that's coming from the boss behind me, I reflexively dodge or roll away from the ground telegraph in an instant. i don't know what kind of danger that was but I know I have to scoot away.
If everything is essentially tab-target, it doesn't really matter whether I scoot away because I'm going to get hit by the attack anyway. If it's strictly tab-target, a lot of times I'm not going to be worried aboutquickly scooting away from an attack, rather I'm going to rely on my gear and attributes to calculate what my Evasion is. Basically the AI will calculate my Parry rather than me trying to time an active Parry.
And, while I think it's important that my character should be able to Block better than my twitch skills, I still love using active Block with my shields in Valheim. (I also love sneaking in Valheim, even without invis/Stealth)
After playing NWO, I found melee swings in both EQ2 and WoW to be tediously slow. I like a lot of stuff I see in Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen, but every time I watch combat it always looks painfully slow and it's an instant turn-off.
Shadowlands combat felt comfortable, rather than tediously slow. I think maybe still not as fun as NWO combat, but it's probably been 8 years since I played NWO, so... I dunno how I would perceive that if I were playing NWO in addition to WoW.
The other thing you will see in Neverwinter Combat is that 'need to be able to move a certain distance sideways suddenly'. The flaw I've often met is that since you do not attack during this, there's a bunch of balance issues, hence 'Strafing Q'.
Right. I think I like that?
I'm not sure what Strafing Q is... I recall some players loving to attack while running in circles.
Otherwise though, it's what we've already discussed, so I hope I can consider it fair to say that you support the current Compilation, and hopefully I can consider it 'successful' in terms of the usefulness of showing the Paragon Video.
I'm not sure I understand the Compilation well enough to support it, but no flaws have leapt out at me, which is probably a good sign because I typically can't refrain from pointing out the flaws I see.
(I think "floaty" probably means something different in my use of "floaty v grounded" than it does for "floaty v motion lock". Floaty is the word that now comes to mind after reading that discussion title and watching the movement in Paragon, but there might be a better term for that type of movement.)
What did people think about the combat updates this last test?
I managed to unlock 58 Skill Points and max out all of my Mage Skills at level 2 (Even though I only had 6 skill points). Once I reported the issue the servers went down but I managed to use each skill before the server went down. The skills are pretty cool.
What did people think about the combat updates this last test?
I managed to unlock 58 Skill Points and max out all of my Mage Skills at level 2 (Even though I only had 6 skill points). Once I reported the issue the servers went down but I managed to use each skill before the server went down. The skills are pretty cool.
Not the changes I am talking about. They nerfed the damage on tanks, made targeting allies a little cleaner.
That is not dead which can eternal lie. And with strange aeons even death may die.
Not the changes I am talking about. They nerfed the damage on tanks, made targeting allies a little cleaner.
They corrected the damage on tanks, the tanks were doing more damage than the tooltips. They just corrected the damage to reflect the tool tips. I didn't group with anyone so can't speak for allied targeting, but, the targeting was fine tuned and I never flagged despite two melees running in front of my missiles.
-Light/Heavy and maybe medium attacks something like BDO or eso. Maybe take out the weaving. Being able to hold Q or left click took out weaving but I'd like different kinds of basic attacks.
-Some general balance tweaks to average character health and magicka recovery.
-More sustain/survivability for tanks.
-Active blocking or more ways of actively being able to mitigate damage.
-Skills that remove CC or an Active way to break cc.
-Dodge and blink that grants I-frames.
-Greater variety of the length of skill cooldowns for skills.
-Stamina or energy system.
-Melee attacks no longer pushing players forward and forcing a momentum.
That is not dead which can eternal lie. And with strange aeons even death may die.
@Cold 0ne FTB - not much of the changes are actually in yet. In my last attempt I was able to understand what they meant by rotational speed though, if you hold Q, you can adjust your character's facing between swings. It doesn't feel meaningful to me yet.
@Dygz - I would actually argue that Ashes is already almost entirely Action Combat (main exception being Fireball), which is why it works. Example, if I use Castigate but my opponent is either too far away or too much out of a frontal cone (I feel like I saw this message and I don't unlock attack skills other than Castigate in tests), the ability doesn't fire.
(Strafing Q refers to a spinning sideways attack+evade using D+Q or A+Q, as opposed to 'walking sideways slowly while swinging')
I will have to poke more at the various 'Action Combat only!' feedback people, but if they will accept 'tab target but abilities miss or don't fire if you are out of their cone', 'sticky reticles', ground telegraphs on things like a Fighter's potential leaping closer, and Strafing Q (fixed distance type), I think there's no current arguments at all.
Except Animation Cancels and moves with lots of iFrames, but I believe those have already been disqualified by Word Of Steven.
If the community can agree that 'sticky reticle' could replace most Tab Targeted linear skills, as of now, there might, in fact, be a way to move further away from Tab Target other than for healing and 'buffs you want to cast on allies around you while swinging at target in front'.
One option would be to have your Tab Target be 'the target that your sticky reticle snaps to', and hitting tab while over a target would cause that one to be targeted (for when you're trying to pick one person out of a group but only get your reticle over them for a moment).
Fair enough. What do you want to see done to the dodge roll mechanic?
Dodge, sprint and active block to be on an independent stamina bar with independent stamina regeneration rate. I believe there will be a higher skill cap and better risk/reward than simply casted abilities.
Fair enough. What do you want to see done to the dodge roll mechanic?
Dodge, sprint and active block to be on an independent stamina bar with independent stamina regeneration rate. I believe there will be a higher skill cap and better risk/reward than simply casted abilities.
So dodge would have to physically avoid the attack? So you could still get hit mid dodge roll? Is that what you are asking for? I could get behind this too. Honestly have a second bar to actively perform combat activities like sprint, block and dodge would be good. KInda like ESO. Being able to break CC would also be really nice.
That is not dead which can eternal lie. And with strange aeons even death may die.
Iframes won't work in an MMO. A game like dark souls manages it because the game is build differently. Instead, dodges and evasion should either give high dmg mitigation or something of sort.
As for whoever mentioned Tera. Tera has a shit combat. Feels like the attacks make no impact and combat feels like a snooze fest. NWO has its problems, but somehow, the combat feels impactful as melee. Barbarian legit feels like smashing and cleaving someone to bits at a rapid pace. Tera? I feel like my attacks are just dummy placeholders. I want to feel like a badass, or a big dick dps not some wimp flails around with 2 swords like an idiot.
Tbh, I have yet to see a game where dual wield animations are badass and not animesque with too much body motion.
Dragon Age Origins does dual wield animations and fatalities very well, but the auto attacks sadly suck.
Probably my most favourite animation is for Riposte skill ngl. Swat away with your left and then stab with your right over your left arm. Example here at 0.19 mark: https://youtu.be/V8mwg7G0t2c
These skills feel impactful and there is no stupid shit like anime moves. Sure, some attacks are not what you would see in martial arts, but they aren't unrealistic where you instantly know they are bull. Now if only we get regular attacks as impactful as well, I will be pretty happy. And hopefully daggers and 1h weapons won't share animations. Will be too easy to spot out
Comments
There are actually two ways around 'group skill-spam deletion' that I expect Ashes to flirt with, though, whether others like them or not is definitely going to be a big point of feedback contention.
(You may need some of my 'concept of what the likely augments are based on class names' from the 'Tanking' thread, somewhere around the middle of page 4, but probably not).
Based on what I expect from Augments, I'm highly suspicious that Ashes is going to have fewer direct damage abilities, but still have a lot of abilities overall. Also that the 'skill points method' of choosing those abilities will result in any given player not having too many damage ones. The Global CoolDown would be how 1v1 or even 2v1 would not result in the player dying instantly even if they have no mana (assuming Strafing Q/LMB).
Utility skills can be tuned to do much less damage, this doesn't prevent 'Javelin Tank pulling you into a 4v1 and you getting deleted', but there's some counterplay if you have to keep spending points in a skill to keep the damage 'relevant'. E.g. Ranger's 'Bow Combo' might do 40+STR/10 damage at level 1, but that won't keep up or become some 'relevant' number without skill points pumped in to make it something like 60+STR/5 at a higher level.
I'm expecting a lot of DoT, damage mitigation, and utility stuff, particularly damage mitigation buffs, to end up padding out the skill lists. The reasons for this belief have more to do with my expectation of how open world 'Raid Boss PvP' will be designed, but it's all speculation, so it would get its own thread, if my group decides that they care enough for me to try to suggest it.
Part of the reason the Compilation includes parts 1 and 2 is actually that I expect the number of abilities to be lower, and that people won't be happy without the Strafing Q/LMB for mobility. I also expect that they'll be really upset by 'seeing an enemy Javelin Tank hunting party coming for them' and not having a Brace to get a chance to negate the Javelin at the right timing.
I'll know when we see the Combat Revamp, there's a lot of little things in there about 'how mana costs scale if at all' and 'overall growth of the mana pool', but the 'standard' for games like this is pretty predictable if balance, even 3v3 balance, is their goal. It almost always converges (or the game sucks and dies).
I also have other expectations about group synergy in Sieges (similar to the concept of the Summoner party calling the WarBeast) that might make 'let's focus down their healer and delete 'em' sufficiently harder to actually do, that GvG would not consistently devolve into skill-spam death (Imagine if Tank's Shockwave or some separate skill temporarily created an impassable area of jagged earth on the ground in front of them, for example, as a solution to 'not wanting to buff the HP on everyone')
I have 2 hopes for Ashes of creation combat:
The first is that I'm hoping for combat which can be fun in multiple forms of pvp. I split pvp fights into 3 categories: 1v1, small skirmish, and big battles. I want all 3 of these to feel deep and engaging, in instanced combat, and in the open world!
The second is that I hope the combat in ashes of creation will have a high skill ceiling, which facilitates potential for comebacks, and underdog victories in pvp engagements. I have to emphasize the word skill ceiling, because I do not want the game to rely on comeback mechanics, ultimate moves, or other cheap easy ways of artificially constructing a close fight. I want one guy to be able to beat 5 guys, because that guy is John Wick! I want 25 guys to be able to beat 100 guys, because that's 25 John Wicks!
Also, the focus of PvP combat is objective-based combat. So, it's mostly going to be about which group can win their objectives, rather than who has the most kills.
If a person can attack another for their gathered items with minimal risk because their advantage is considerable in a 1v1 scenario, especially since main Archetype can't be changed, it will probably be less engaging than if the balance is close enough for the 'bad matchup' to prepare really specifically for their 'dominant opponent' and maybe surprise them.
If Clerics lose to Fighters as a generality, and one is known as a Cleric, gathering alone puts all the risk on you and very little on your attacker. The answer would be 'don't gather alone', but I feel like we should make the effort.
Though, I am interested in that, what is your planned personal solution to 'being hunted by your bad matchup while doing things'? I don't know if you're the sort of person who will ever travel out of a safe area alone.
And, if I'm really worried about it - group.
I mostly solo.
I can 'guarantee' a skill ceiling of 17 decisions per minute with the current Compilation, with synergies from all obvious functional augments raising the awareness level (without relying on UI) to 24 decisions per minute on any classes other than Rogue or Bard assuming that Bards don't have really long animations for their buffs.
(If you care how I get to those numbers, it's a fighting game experience kind of thing, you have to be able to simulate matches in your head the way a chess player does, so we know this sort of data beforehand)
I think that going past 30 decisions per minute leads to decision fatigue very fast, but if players would want to have to make more than 30, there are ways to tweak the Compilation to get to it, even without knowing how many abilities they intend to add.
Interesting that GCD's bring in an element of Turn-based gameplay. Which means you can create a whole meta revolving around fast cast/standard/slow cast, and adapt a ton of turn-based strategies into the game. That's a bit overwhelming to think about right now. But if you want that 200ms to respond to someone's actions, GCD is going to get in the way.
Also depends if weapon skills are going to be the "between active spells" stuff - coz that determines the pace of combat regardless of GCD.
I'm very keen for Utility skills, and would love to see greater emphasis on them, and how they interact with passives and the weapon tree. Speaking of, judging by the name "weapon skills" I dunno if we'll see many utility skills there? Keen to find out what comes out of the oven.
1v1/2v2 balance explicitly wasn't Jeff's goal, so I don't care about it too much either. I'm mostly in favour of higher reliance on utility abilities to open/close opportunities to strike the enemy where it hurts for a more interesting TTK.
Just on mana - I'm curious if they intend late game mages to be mana potion addicts, or if they'll be an everlasting fountain of mana and everyone else chugs mana potions. Actually, this might work better as a speccing option.
But now you've got my brain all stirred up and I just had a realization that needs outlet:
One more thing worth noting about LoL's design:
Riot tries to fit a champion's whole kit onto QWER + passive, so in later designs you find that 1 champion ability has multiple effects - which makes it multipurpose and this is accidentally deep combat by nature.
Example:
There are three main ways a Katarina player uses W:
Best case scenario for Kat: Enemy is chasing, so she drops a W to "flee" (use 1) leaving a marker behind. The ignorant enemy keeps the chase up and walks too close to the marker --> boom, she dashes back to her marker (use 2) to re-engage the enemy and explodes it in their face (use 3). In this case she took all three options with one use of the skill.
The correct way to play around a katarina is to force her to make a trade-off choosing only 1 (or less) of those options:
- Attempt an engage on Katarina, if she drops a W to flee, you stay out of melee range of her marker but within a threatening distance of it should she choose to dash back to it - forcing her to stay away from her marker.
- If she drops a W to engage you, you immediately disengage until the marker is gone - she's forced to choose between continuing the dive without her marker or to wait for her W to come off cooldown again.
- Just do your best to stay away from her markers so she never gets the chance to explode them. (she can only drop them where she's standing and also throw them behind you, so lateral movement pisses off Katarina players)
If you separated these three options into distinct abilities, then opportunity for outplay becomes reduced: She can now drop a marker, and engage you, saving her movespeed boost as a backup exit strategy in case her marker expires - so you gain less from disengaging. She can save her "explode" ability for only when she's in melee range of you - which means she'll likely never waste the ability. So your outplay options reduce to the default: kill her before she kills you.Point is, if you design a skill with multiple purposes:
- it creates options for different circumstances, leads to greater creativity with skills
- provides counterplay opportunities by way of allowing opponents to create situations where the user must sacrifice one purpose in favor of another.
I think augments are in a great position to do this well. Could get ugly to balance though hahaha.
Weapons can also have enchantments, I think, in addition to the Weapon Abilities.
And then there's that Passive Abilities skill tree...curious to see what's in there!!
Technically it's harder to balance for 3v3 without partially balancing for 1v1 precisely because it means whoever has the gap-closer or the faster engage wins by rapidly making it a 3v2, and 'making the cost of that high' still doesn't change the fact that it is so. That's saying 'we will make abilities where three people have to use up a whole person worth of resources on their side'.
I don't think we're likely to see that since it usually makes TTK extremely low.
As we see it now, the current abilities are designed with a lot of flux like what you mentioned, in mind. The Weapon Skills I'm familiar with are again, FFXI, so they're mostly damage, but about a third of them also have meaningful utility in the form of debuffs, often at the cost of damage dealt. We know that Jeff either played that game or was familiar (from some quotes about how mobs detect and so on), though I wouldn't necessarily make any inferences from that. Still, it would be a little odd to not have them, I see a lot of signs of it, in quotes.
So back to abilities, let's take the 'Jagged Earth' I mentioned, and assume it's an upgrade of Shockwave, and blocks all those pesky 'ray-casted' abilities like Prismatic Beam, Chain Lightning, Weapon throw, and Javelin, for whatever duration.
It can be used as a knockback+knockdown, but the ground is impassable to the user too, let's say, so you need a ranged attacker or a flanker to capitalize easily, otherwise you're just buying yourself time to use buffs.
It can be used without even hitting the opponent, just to prevent them from moving to an objective for a while, or to block a group of mages from beaming you or your group into ashes, but you don't get the damage.
It can be used to isolate one member of a group from others by blocking off the others a little, if the enemy Rogue slipped behind defenders and was assuming they would be saved by the main group, now they can't get immediate help and they can't easily run straight toward their comrades either.
On the 'potential augments' side, a Tank/Cleric wants to hit with this ability every time (assuming it has an On-Hit heal to the user) and hit the maximum number of people. A Tank/Mage (assuming Meteoric Impact to make the Jagged Earth area/cone even bigger) might moreso use it to block things, and a Tank/Tank might not bother to augment this skill for PvP at all and focus on a PvE style augment, while just using their other skills to deal with the above situation as suits them.
The counterplays and decisions made would get pretty hectic, yes, but probably not overwhelming.
I am hoping for a bit of actual slower combat, and focused on more of a planned and tactical setup over something that looks as it´s shown in 25 X speed.
I don´t play For Honor, but this combat system speaks much more to me than the typical " explosions of colors numbers and weird poses in mid air " does.
For Honor looks like it's closer to a medieval sim rather than a high fantasy RPG.
So... there kinda needs to be some explosions of color.
I like that ability example. Sounds awesome and really useful, but I'd also want to give opponents another option to respond to it - so if Jagged Earth creates impassable terrain (I'm just gonna run with "wall"), that wall can still be destroyed by abilities/basic attacks if the opponents want to force their way through, and anyone with a teleport/super jump ability can hop over the terrain if they so dare.
This also creates an opportunity to design skills that synergize with and/or counter this ability, and put them on other classes to emphasise team-work/interactivity.
Synergy examples:
Counter examples:
I see what you mean about resource management. It affects long-term strategies more than short term in-the-moment stuff. Have to say though, I do enjoy it when games reward you with ability resources for pulling off combos.
I can add 'more footsies' to the compilation, but I've avoided it since this started from 'people who wanted Action style combat to be faster' and 'people who don't want it to be like a fighting game' so there would be a schism there, and one would need a lot more people of that opinion to share it, in this thread, before I'd consider it accurate to do so. But you are +1 to it.
@Dygz - Any specific reasons? The actual request when the video was first linked, was to please complain about Paragon (or at least the Feng Mao video) as much as possible.
@maouw - Got it. I'm used to 3 decision options since that's where most games, fighting games or otherwise, tend to converge in their moment-to-moment combat. I expect fighters to get a big leaping bypass and an AoE slam-knockback, and for Blink to bypass this ability if it were added. Personally I also automatically think of the wall as destructible but this is a lot harder to code without massive testing in terms of interactions in an MMO of this size. That said, my other ideas would still require it (the 'Special Ability for 8-Tank Party in Siege would be, you guessed it - Rumble Wall - where they all use Jagged Earth at once to put up an entire wall, and that one be destructible for sure)
I'm familiar with the destructible version from Paladins (a Tank Champion 'Inara' has this sort of thing) but in Paladins you normally only have to worry about max 3-4 of this wall being in play.
Anyways here's the current idea in simulant form, since the Compilation doesn't really show the dynamic between my thinking and the original posters' goals.
2. We assume the player chose Brace or was too slow on the Strafe Hit, takes damage, and the enemy is right next to them, assuming a Fighter's Leap. Now, Dodge is still available, another Strafe is available (but chaseable by the Fighter's W+Q/LMB, I've used this example before probably earlier in the thread, so spoilers).The Fighter has to turn to get this done, though, and after a short recovery, you could Strafe again (you'd probably still get clipped by their attack). Since weapon being drawn is required for this, Mages would be unable to recover mana, but they also have a better Strafe due to the wand option. The Fighter decides if to go for another Gap Closer with CC because their target is a 'Strafe Spammer', times the attack, and gets the CC, or assumes they're being baited into using such an attack and wasting mana on someone who is about to Brace.
3. The Fighter retains advantage due to never being in range to get hit by the Strafes (in my mind they take about 3/4 of a second to fully animate, but move your 'hurtbox' out of the way of most linear attacks by 1/4 of a second in, but this is all 'frame data' level specificity which only matters in precise terms if you can't imagine it, I don't know if you play them and need any context. Anyway, the target is lower on health no matter what, and if they keep 'spamming' Strafe and the Fighter keeps managing Chase Q/LMB, they keep taking more damage over all. Every second or so of the Fighter doing this successfully, the target loses 7% health and has to start thinking about what to do about this. Are they stalling for a nearby ally? Trying to get to a terrain position?
4. Eventually the target sets up a situation or range where they get to have a sure shot at some ability they want to use. Shockwave? Castigation? some Frost bind thing? If they pull this off because the Fighter has overcommitted to expecting that they will keep strafing, things shifted and the Fighter now has to care. This is the reason that all forms of Q were possibly to take small amounts of stamina, so that a player would eventually tire out of just Strafe and Chase, be unable to Brace (or dodge?) for a moment, and be at the mercy of their opponent's toolset. There's a pressure to come up with something that will help you regain Stamina, using an ability, before that happens, but in a GvG, maybe the weighting of that decision is different.
5. The Fighter could see them doing this, decide to spend a Mana Potion and try to perfectly use their other Gap Closer, or buff up and then use a big one, since if the target strafing, even in Action Mode, Fighter still can see where the target is likely to end up. In Tab Target mode, even easier, because they don't care about any 'Action Mode enabled CCs', only about getting closer. So they use more abilities, knowing that because the target's intent is to stretch out the battle, they should prioritize stamina. The target could notice and react to this and try to heal, but the Fighter has the advantage. On offense, they have more time to think, to make the call, and they're not reacting to anything. The Target, if they just 'spam Strafe', can't 'stop to use their potion' (assuming this is a thing) until their next one ends, putting them in perfect position for the Fighter's Somersault Strike or whatever.
It goes on and on. I figured this sort of thing would be the maximum most people would accept in an MMO without the big schism between the Action Combat supporters and the Timing Combat supporters (people who want Tab Target but don't want Timing to be the difficulty, I am not convinced want difficulty, or if they do, it's a dangerous type that leads to decision fatigue). It also doesn't innately lead to 'fighting game' play as most of us understand it (that could devolve fast into Spear users always winning in 'footsies' and people already are pulling toward spears in PvP).
So far, the Compilation has no specific complaints, but as always, please correct me. Even the beginnings of a consensus on a system probably would help the Devs immensely at this stage. Nothing worse than 'having to come up with your own design spec' with no idea of the client's goals.
Even if the current direction of their revamp doesn't match this at all, they will at least be able to know what complaints they may get.
I'd discuss more Paragon related stuff, specifically what happens when you're not playing melee, but...
It lost a lot of the effectiveness of the first map, where that was much harder to do, you couldn't be sure if your opponent had a buff that would make the fight more even, and more battles were about positioning in the much wider lanes. Without changing basically any characters, just the map tweak and 'the way buffs work and where they spawned', the game did, successfully shift toward a more MOBA feeling.
Whether or not that was good depends on if you started Paragon because you like MOBAs and wanted to play the same thing in 3D, or if you got into it because a 3D MOBA feels different enough to enjoy playing it. Ashes is sure to face this problem no matter which direction it takes, which is also why I hope they can commit to one relatively early. Nothing worse than having the rug pulled out from under you and a game you love getting revamped, but at least in this case, those of us who see things changed away from what we want, can just unsub.
I liked it more when Health and Regen were better and timing/positioning were how you built up advantage, and damage classes still did well because your healing couldn't outpace their damage once their cooldowns were back up.
The Compilation isn't actually based on that though, since this isn't built for me.
There's no point in even giving timestamps for the battles in that match since they don't really feel anything like 'battles' (see Spoiler text) in the context we're discussing. If you feel like giving an opinion on that, it might help potential Rangers add to the current discussion, though.
Ha. Hmmmn. Well...I haven't shared a critique of Paragon yet because I;m still trying to process what I saw.
A part of me was repulsed by the combat and a part of me was very intrigued by the combat.
It almost feels like something I'd like to explore as the game that it is and at the same time it's horrible game play for an MMORPG - which shouldn't be surprising because it's not an MMORPG.
So... Neverwinter Online is a good example of the action combat that I like in an MMORPG.
It has free aim abilities, dodge/roll/parry/block and the tempo is faster than tab-target combat and slower than FPS combat. There's also something about the maneuverability of the characters that I prefer in NWO that I prefer over FPS maneuverability.
Prior to the latest dev stream, I had never thought about "Floaty" v "Motion Lock" and I'm still not quite sure what that means.
When I think about in terms of Alpha One Preview combat - I don't like pushing past my opponent as it falls to its death. I assume the motion lock is sticking to/locking onto the opponent during melee combat.
But, as I watch Paragon afew vids of Paragon team combat, I realize the overall maneuverability -strafing and backpedaling- feels way too floaty for what I'd want in an RPG. Especially compared to what I see in NWO.
I think APOC may have had that same kind of floatiness but I didn't notice it as much 1v1, especially since I never try to use that kind of maneuverability.
I'm not sure I've described that well, but - I prefer the maneuverability showcased in the NWO video above over the maneuverability in Paragon.
The first thing that irked me in the Paragon melee video is that it seems like the character only has two animations for his attacks. There seem to be several interesting cards that act as abilities but the character still does the same two animations. I would want to have a different animation for each ability.
What I like about For Honor that's way better than Paragon, is that it appears that there is a separate animation for each type of attack. The thing I don't like about For Honor is that it appears to be a no magic Fighter - which looks fantastic for what it is, but - I would want to be playing a high magic RPG... and I'd probably prefer anime caliber sfx for the magical abilities.
The movement in For Honor also isn't "FPS floaty" so maybe it's that the movement in NWO and For Honor feels more grounded?
In Paragon melee, the two attacks seem maybe a bit to slow, but worse, NPCs seem to be killed in 4 strikes - which is way too fast for an multiplayer RPG, where the team should be reacting and adjusting to the abilities being used by the other characters.
It's difficult to tell for sure because there doesn't seem to be group combat in For Honor, but it seems like there's plenty of time for attack telegraphs and the mobs stay alive long enough that in Ashes, the Tank has time to notice that the Ranger has rooted an opponent, so he chooses Onslaught to charge to that opponent rather than using Javelin to pull the opponent. The Rogue then has time to flank behind the opponent to get a Crit with Backstab. And the Cleric has time to set up a heal or deal some damage or both, as needed.
Also, I like the use of dodge/roll/parry/block in For Honor and NWO. Paragon seems to use an FPS floaty strafe to dodge, as far as I can tell.
I don't know that any of that adds much to the intended discussion, but that's my first pass at a critique of Paragon.
I've played Neverwinter, I have enough experience with it, on multiple classes, and with friends, to adjust and discuss it.
You probably don't need to check much more on Paragon. It really is what you see, for that character in particular. It's completely unsuitable for an MMORPG which is sort of why I chose it. I needed a video where everyone could say 'this is wrong, I want this to be different'.
As for Neverwinter otherwise, it brings up something that I may need to clarify with posters quite often, please feel free to join me in seeking this same clarification, so the Devs can get more direct feedback. Either way...
As a Rogue in NWO, I have action abilities, but I have something akin to Tab Target, in that, my reticle is 'sticky'. The same thing happens in BDO and one or two other games. Once I have 'hitscanned' my reticle over a target in action mode, I no longer always have to line up the shot for throwing daggers, for example.
I don't think most people would complain about this other than in large scale PvP, but there might be some who dislike it. You can see what I'm talking about at the 6:20 mark of that video if you check it in slow motion, assuming you're not aware already. The player slowly moves the reticle toward the next enemy, but the thrown daggers still hit the first.
There's also the aforementioned 'really wide swing arc for melee'.
A game's pacing is very seldom decided by how the targeting works, it's decided by how the reticle works vs how evasion works. Ashes already has some 'your target is not in your attack cone/line of sight' limitations on even tab targeted abilities, so I'd quite frankly say that we can outright ignore tab target vs action combat given the skills we know of, hence the Compilation's state.
The other thing you will see in Neverwinter Combat is that 'need to be able to move a certain distance sideways suddenly'. The flaw I've often met is that since you do not attack during this, there's a bunch of balance issues, hence 'Strafing Q'.
Otherwise though, it's what we've already discussed, so I hope I can consider it fair to say that you support the current Compilation, and hopefully I can consider it 'successful' in terms of the usefulness of showing the Paragon Video.
As always, please correct me.
I'm not 100% certain what ppl mean by floaty combat either since (or maybe its just me) I heard different versions of floaty combat in here.
As for this .... split body? vs locked in animation (I'm hoping I'm keeping up, there's a lot of shit to read lol) I have no idea which is better frankly.
I played both WoW and NWO, and Tera and I have never given it a closer look. However, I do like a stamina system for blocking, attacking etc. However if that is to be a case, melee > ranged > casters would have to be the order for harder to kill to easier to kill in order. I always found it stupid how casters are equally hard to kill like melee in many games despite being ranged casters. Melee should be harder to kill but not do humongous damage, while casters should be easier to kill but do humongous damage... thats at least my philosophy to an extent. Willing to listen to opinions on this one.
Another problem is some classes having far more utilities, defensives etc. This will cause the same shitfest as in wow. Devs need to plan this part out very carefully.
Besides that, I would have 100% more accurate readings on combat if there was dual wield for me to test 😂. If you play in your best, then you have the best information you can gather and properly predict if you will like the combat. So kinda feels bad if we won't have various class players since feedback is usually far better if you know and like your class, cuz then you can at least say "based on this playstyle I think [this] or [this] combat style is better.
I spend a massive amount of time studying these tiny things, hence all the stuff you have to read (sorry!).
I would be surprised if it were not that order in terms of difficulty to bring HP down to 0 once you start to hit them. Mages just have so much upfront damage, that you need to be able to burst them down or keep them from casting more. That's the experience so far from Alpha tests, even before any revamp.
Floaty combat seems to generally refer to 'I can move from side to side in unrealistic ways while swinging my weapon at full strength, and not reacting in any way to my opponent's attacks'. Slow animations don't help. If you have low 'recovery time' on your slashes, for example, it makes it worse.
I find the more useful terms are "High Impact" and "Low Impact", because you can combine those with "High Recovery" and "Low Recovery" to get feedback.
NWO is generally Low Impact Low Recovery, which is fast, but the low recovery is what helps to cause the imbalances and feeling of skills being like that.
Tera is sort of in the middle, by class, but is normally "High Impact Low Recovery" which is generally built for games with big enemies who have huge sweeping attacks and characters have lots of iFrames. Basically meant to give some skill illusion, and feel really good.
Ashes right now is High Impact High Recovery but this doesn't work as well with its limited movement. Split Body generally changes a game to Low Impact Low Recovery because if it changes it to Low Impact High Recovery everyone almost universally hates it and wonders what the Devs were smoking.
Do you have any specific input regarding the page 4 Compilation?
That is not dead which can eternal lie. And with strange aeons even death may die.
I remember NWO's aim assist and some players complaining about it, but...
I think you probably have to have something like that - especially for a class that is supposed to have excellent Dexterity.
In an RPG, character attributes and abilities should always trump player twitch skills. There will be many players who, for a variety of reasons, have poor aim or poor twitch skills. But, in an RPG, the player should be able to pump enough points into DEX that their DEX character rarely missed its target.
Same with Stealth. Gamers who are fans of player twitch skills often complain that Stealth should just be the player hiding the character in shadows or ducking behind objects and there should not be any kind of invisibility effect for Stealth, but an RPG is all about building your characters to be better at things than the player might. Same thing for Spot. We should be able to put enough points into a skill like Spot that the character can Spot things that a player might miss.
There was a discussion about that regarding the sparklies that highlight harvesting resources. Sparklies or no sparklies? Could start out with no sparklies, but we should still be able to put points into something like Spot that would allow some player characters to see those sparklies.
So, there probably has to be something like aim assist - especially if Z axis is going to be included in combat targeting.
I never notice the really wide swing arc for melee, but that could be another example of trying to ensure that the player characters are better at melee than the player might be via twitch skills.
Yes, it's free aim compared to tab-target, but still some assisted aim.
I disagree. Steven even mentions that in Ashes, the tempo of action combat is faster than the tempo of tab-target. One of the things that makes action combat faster is that need to be able to flit away from the telegraph in an instant. It's where dodge/roll/parry/block and it's why I like ground telegraphs.
Lots of people abhor ground telegraphs, but I feel they are necessary, and I love them, because that reflects our peripheral vision. As a Cleric in NWO, I might be facing away from the boss fight while I focus on killing adds in order to build back my depleted mana. But, if I see the ground telegraph in my periphery that's coming from the boss behind me, I reflexively dodge or roll away from the ground telegraph in an instant. i don't know what kind of danger that was but I know I have to scoot away.
If everything is essentially tab-target, it doesn't really matter whether I scoot away because I'm going to get hit by the attack anyway. If it's strictly tab-target, a lot of times I'm not going to be worried aboutquickly scooting away from an attack, rather I'm going to rely on my gear and attributes to calculate what my Evasion is. Basically the AI will calculate my Parry rather than me trying to time an active Parry.
And, while I think it's important that my character should be able to Block better than my twitch skills, I still love using active Block with my shields in Valheim. (I also love sneaking in Valheim, even without invis/Stealth)
After playing NWO, I found melee swings in both EQ2 and WoW to be tediously slow. I like a lot of stuff I see in Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen, but every time I watch combat it always looks painfully slow and it's an instant turn-off.
Shadowlands combat felt comfortable, rather than tediously slow. I think maybe still not as fun as NWO combat, but it's probably been 8 years since I played NWO, so... I dunno how I would perceive that if I were playing NWO in addition to WoW.
Right. I think I like that?
I'm not sure what Strafing Q is... I recall some players loving to attack while running in circles.
I'm not sure I understand the Compilation well enough to support it, but no flaws have leapt out at me, which is probably a good sign because I typically can't refrain from pointing out the flaws I see.
(I think "floaty" probably means something different in my use of "floaty v grounded" than it does for "floaty v motion lock". Floaty is the word that now comes to mind after reading that discussion title and watching the movement in Paragon, but there might be a better term for that type of movement.)
I managed to unlock 58 Skill Points and max out all of my Mage Skills at level 2 (Even though I only had 6 skill points). Once I reported the issue the servers went down but I managed to use each skill before the server went down. The skills are pretty cool.
Not the changes I am talking about. They nerfed the damage on tanks, made targeting allies a little cleaner.
That is not dead which can eternal lie. And with strange aeons even death may die.
They corrected the damage on tanks, the tanks were doing more damage than the tooltips. They just corrected the damage to reflect the tool tips. I didn't group with anyone so can't speak for allied targeting, but, the targeting was fine tuned and I never flagged despite two melees running in front of my missiles.
-Light/Heavy and maybe medium attacks something like BDO or eso. Maybe take out the weaving. Being able to hold Q or left click took out weaving but I'd like different kinds of basic attacks.
-Some general balance tweaks to average character health and magicka recovery.
-More sustain/survivability for tanks.
-Active blocking or more ways of actively being able to mitigate damage.
-Skills that remove CC or an Active way to break cc.
-Dodge and blink that grants I-frames.
-Greater variety of the length of skill cooldowns for skills.
-Stamina or energy system.
-Melee attacks no longer pushing players forward and forcing a momentum.
That is not dead which can eternal lie. And with strange aeons even death may die.
Fair enough. What do you want to see done to the dodge roll mechanic?
That is not dead which can eternal lie. And with strange aeons even death may die.
@Dygz - I would actually argue that Ashes is already almost entirely Action Combat (main exception being Fireball), which is why it works. Example, if I use Castigate but my opponent is either too far away or too much out of a frontal cone (I feel like I saw this message and I don't unlock attack skills other than Castigate in tests), the ability doesn't fire.
(Strafing Q refers to a spinning sideways attack+evade using D+Q or A+Q, as opposed to 'walking sideways slowly while swinging')
I will have to poke more at the various 'Action Combat only!' feedback people, but if they will accept 'tab target but abilities miss or don't fire if you are out of their cone', 'sticky reticles', ground telegraphs on things like a Fighter's potential leaping closer, and Strafing Q (fixed distance type), I think there's no current arguments at all.
Except Animation Cancels and moves with lots of iFrames, but I believe those have already been disqualified by Word Of Steven.
If the community can agree that 'sticky reticle' could replace most Tab Targeted linear skills, as of now, there might, in fact, be a way to move further away from Tab Target other than for healing and 'buffs you want to cast on allies around you while swinging at target in front'.
One option would be to have your Tab Target be 'the target that your sticky reticle snaps to', and hitting tab while over a target would cause that one to be targeted (for when you're trying to pick one person out of a group but only get your reticle over them for a moment).
Dodge, sprint and active block to be on an independent stamina bar with independent stamina regeneration rate. I believe there will be a higher skill cap and better risk/reward than simply casted abilities.
So dodge would have to physically avoid the attack? So you could still get hit mid dodge roll? Is that what you are asking for? I could get behind this too. Honestly have a second bar to actively perform combat activities like sprint, block and dodge would be good. KInda like ESO. Being able to break CC would also be really nice.
That is not dead which can eternal lie. And with strange aeons even death may die.
As for whoever mentioned Tera. Tera has a shit combat. Feels like the attacks make no impact and combat feels like a snooze fest. NWO has its problems, but somehow, the combat feels impactful as melee. Barbarian legit feels like smashing and cleaving someone to bits at a rapid pace. Tera? I feel like my attacks are just dummy placeholders. I want to feel like a badass, or a big dick dps not some wimp flails around with 2 swords like an idiot.
Tbh, I have yet to see a game where dual wield animations are badass and not animesque with too much body motion.
Dragon Age Origins does dual wield animations and fatalities very well, but the auto attacks sadly suck.
Probably my most favourite animation is for Riposte skill ngl. Swat away with your left and then stab with your right over your left arm. Example here at 0.19 mark:
Or more ability animations here (first 20s and then skip to 9:50 for more):
These skills feel impactful and there is no stupid shit like anime moves. Sure, some attacks are not what you would see in martial arts, but they aren't unrealistic where you instantly know they are bull. Now if only we get regular attacks as impactful as well, I will be pretty happy. And hopefully daggers and 1h weapons won't share animations. Will be too easy to spot out