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Best examples of Action Combat? Starting to Feel Like Tab > Action
Tyranthraxus
Member
Yours truly is trying a lot of different MMO's lately, and it's starting to feel pointless to have an Action-style combat system in a real MMORPG.
Now, I've tried Lost Ark - which is probably the end-all of Action-style combat systems. I didn't stick with it (80 hours, according to the tracker) because Lost Ark feels like a single-player game. It's almost akin to a 2D-scroller, except you can move in all of the compass directions. The most useful insight it provided is that Action-style combat really isn't very useful against a single opponent, since the game is capable of not registering that you're trying to hit the enemy; it's true usefulness seems to be in fighting against groups of enemies. However, most MMO's will let you tab-target either yourself or a single enemy, and then fire off an AoE ability, in fighting groups.
Since enemies in MMO's tend to gather directly around you or bunch up together in small, cloistered groups that you can just AoE, is it really necessary to HAVE Action-style combat in an MMO? Isn't it more of a hack-and-slash game feature?
Just started trying Guild Wars 2 - which in previous forums-threads, some people identify as Action-combat, while others identify it as Tab-targeting. I've come to define GW2 as Action-combat, since you don't have to have an enemy targeted to use your combat abilities, and your weapon swings freely - damaging any enemies in your way. I've already tried Lineage 2, since AoC is supposed to take a lot of inspiration from it's systems, and just find it too static/old now to really get into, as a new player.
Are there some really good examples of Action-based systems anyone can recommend? I'm not enjoying the feel/gameplay of GW2, atm.
Now, I've tried Lost Ark - which is probably the end-all of Action-style combat systems. I didn't stick with it (80 hours, according to the tracker) because Lost Ark feels like a single-player game. It's almost akin to a 2D-scroller, except you can move in all of the compass directions. The most useful insight it provided is that Action-style combat really isn't very useful against a single opponent, since the game is capable of not registering that you're trying to hit the enemy; it's true usefulness seems to be in fighting against groups of enemies. However, most MMO's will let you tab-target either yourself or a single enemy, and then fire off an AoE ability, in fighting groups.
Since enemies in MMO's tend to gather directly around you or bunch up together in small, cloistered groups that you can just AoE, is it really necessary to HAVE Action-style combat in an MMO? Isn't it more of a hack-and-slash game feature?
Just started trying Guild Wars 2 - which in previous forums-threads, some people identify as Action-combat, while others identify it as Tab-targeting. I've come to define GW2 as Action-combat, since you don't have to have an enemy targeted to use your combat abilities, and your weapon swings freely - damaging any enemies in your way. I've already tried Lineage 2, since AoC is supposed to take a lot of inspiration from it's systems, and just find it too static/old now to really get into, as a new player.
Are there some really good examples of Action-based systems anyone can recommend? I'm not enjoying the feel/gameplay of GW2, atm.
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Still plugging Neverwinter as always.
In terms of 'games that are not necessarily otherwise great proper MMOs', Blade and Soul is among the best as far as I know, and Onigiri is a specific type of thing that works decently due to being very spacing dependent, but isn't necessarily 'not tab targeted' either.
All these games are relatively lower mobility games, which I feel is somewhat required for the RPG part of MMORPG to happen. Even in voice chat, you can't really roleplay (not necessarily heavy RP, just sometimes 'basically any') if you can't rely on spacing or make predictions about situations.
The 'problem' with Tab Targeting in my opinion is that it often takes the 'spacing' aspect out of the game too, which feels to me to be a meaningful downgrade to the experience. Building in any type of 'tab targeting works but your spacing determines your damage or effectiveness' essentially makes the 'tab target' mode useless for difficult content, and refusing to build that in leads to the 'action target' mode useless for medium content.
Overall, Neverwinter does it best, even if you don't like the abilities in the game, you can sort of imagine what the game would feel like with more satisfying abilities, so maybe try that if you haven't.
Tera online: Although the game shuts down in a week, it is considered of most as probably the best action combat there is. The first time i played it i was blown away by it´s combat, i have never had so much fun pressing a button. Due it´s action nature, the spell quantity was limited and most open world PvE became stale quickly.
This video makes up for a good basis on difference of tab-targeting and iterations of action combat and on what made tera "truly action". Worth a watch.
BDO: Contrary to tera the combat does not become stale even when grinding mobs for hours, as the combo system allows for many combinations of your spells. This is the strength and also the core of the game, you basically grind spots all day to progress. I have never really gotten into the combat, something felt off for me, but the skill ceiling is really high in that game.
Kritika Online: A hub based mmo that has a few really fun classes. The combat is a bit adhd though, you constantly press your 3-6 second cds from a selection of like 6 abilities. It feels like a mix of fighting and hack n slash.
Invictus: Another action / hackn slash type of combat, with reaction and dodging at it´s core.
Blade and Soul: Feels like "Fighting game THE MMO". Blocking, dodging, reaction and utility very key here.
PS02 is another one, though i have never played it.
Other 3D action combat games:
Smite: Because it´s a moba they made it really sanitized and clean, but also limited in terms of how movement and ability feels.
Kurtzpel: Fun classes with good ideas. But the permanent animation locking is frustrating.
This is something I agree with, and have been saying for a while.
A tab target combat system is not all that great for PvP. Action combat is where it's at there. It makes what you do as a player more interesting, but also makes the player you are fighting more interesting.
However, when it comes to PvE, tab target is where it's at.
With tab target, there absolutely is less to the combat system from a players perspective. However, this leaves developers free to make up that difference on the encounter side of things.
If you work on the assumption that developers can develop content in either tab or action combat that will overwhelm players (they can), you then have to assume that they can develop content to give players as much or as little to do as they want, and that action or tab have no bearing on how intense it is to fight a PvE encounter.
Based on this, action combat gives developers less wiggle room on the encounter side of things than tab combat does meaning there is less room for variation in PvE content.
The other downside to this is that tab target is often boring on trash mobs, where as with action combat you still have that action combat system.
It is essentially only at the top end of PvE where action combat shortfalls become glaringly obvious, though they can be spotted in other aspects of you look.
The only time there are issues around imbalance between an input system and an output system is when both are designed in isolation.
Tab target is utter shit in collision and Los systems. Action Combat is utter Shite for a tank. Nothing urks me more in a duel than 1 million 'target not acquired' 'target not visible' 'target out of range' text spam.
The only issue around pve is the threat tables because I will have to have single tab target taunts for the tanks to ensure the toughest raid bosses are not all pulled into one Chaos combat circle except by utter noobs who spam aoe taunt and dps buttons.
Hybrid will always be superior because it merges all concepts and does not suffer narrow mind syndrome.
I'd prefer not to lean on complete bias towards an ordered and strategically PvE setting.
Hardcore PvE, from a niche NA playerbase perspective is mainly focused around timely rotating skills and countering an enemies threats via a skill in a timely manner with a skill or a very simple movement of the character.
Tab target prioritizes a players role and capability, in an extremely simple manner and this old and rustic design almost completely eliminates interesting and reactive player combat and input. FF14 and WoW raids play out, pretty much like a poor puzzle game, you'll keep re-doing a boss and make corrections until you've solved it (and then once it's solved, look on youtube for the guide and follow the script...).
The entertainment value to this (besides the reason you fight, for the loot) for the most part, is quite comical as it's competitive, the name of the game is don't be the one to screw up, including offering a bit of social or leader roleplaying. It's funny because in it's competitive nature, the people who generally love this type of thing and herald "This is why we play MMO's" hate any talk, potential concepts or involvement in PvP although I can definetly sympthasize, as PvP isn't something directly rewarding, especially when tab target limits gameplay success to stats and timed rotations.
I'm sorry, but if you believe in tab target for the future production of something that is meant to be the next big attraction, provide solid entertainment and inspire people to play, you've failed to realize the potential and growth of gaming.
I will agree with you that action combat is neutured by a lack of passion and ideas of development on a mass scale, ie when many people are vs's a boss, crowd control doesn't work, so the whole impact and mechanics that players were used to and trained at have been sullied and all skill rests on quickly sending out attacking skills and evasion mechanics. In terms of bosses or encounters being way more difficult to develop though toward action combat I completely disagree, I don't think at all there is enough evidence to support that and I don't particularly want to give a further view on it.
Main point, for a real mmorppg (not a console/story one...), after 2010, to appeal to a wide scale audience that has numerous genre competitions it must go more action orientated.
If you didn't see the potential from BDO's combat system, I don't know what to tell you, the games systems and progression in its entirety was an uninpsiring mess but its foundations for player input and viewing reaction were next level, the quality of combat almost made you not care about the fact it was a failed mmo and if it had actual team/role synergy and a enjoyable/expanded war & objective system (without bs p2w) it could of been something decent!
At the end of the day Steven has seen the potential in Archeage, I'm not too concerned because there was quite a fair chunk of mobility and targetting going on with that game but I really do hope the mmo can go to the next level already, I like a diverse array of people...
A top end raider should realise that tab and rng combo is a tame way to fight on rails. You can still use tab in Ashes, but, beware that tab will also flag you as combatant if wrong target chosen. Aoe will auto tab to pve toughest mob. Not that aoe should require a target at all. A nuke doesn't avoid the middle house of 3.
Tournaments are a test of all elements, mainly controllable but some uncontrollable and it's what can bring many countries/people together, otherwise you'd only have the best players who consistently play in the top flight winning.
Basically, if you don't like surprises, you can play mutliply games that focus on 1v1 with strict rules, strict balancing and where strengths and weaknesses are limited.
If you have the time, go try it out. I am not recommending the game as a whole really , but the combat is fine and you might enjoy that type of action combat.
There is 2 types of rng. I love input rng which you have referenced. I have referenced output rng. If you bought a gallon of fuel but you fuel gauge gave you a random number of miles available each time would you drive the car?
The other major design possibility is to aim for spell priority, rather than spell rotation.
This spell priority paradigm is achieved simply by adding change to things during combat. Not necessarily RNG, just change. This does also mean that your assertion that tab target necessitates that the combat system be old and rustic in design, and almost completely eliminates interesting and reactive player combat and input isnt inherently true to all tab target, only to tab target that follows the spell rotation paradigm.
The other build which fuelled itself was rather too rigid. You mentioned spell rotation, well, with the fuelled buffs the rotation could not be changed and was always the same.
Therefore, both approaches were reversed and turned into class buffs. The class buffs mean rotation has ended and choice had been frees. However, the build seems simple because the extra functions have been absorbed or given to bard.
I have requested a combat tracker now and before I could not expect all the mini buffs, hots, dots and bursts to be trackable without a ct. Anyway, the requests are in and implementation takes time.
It is strange to be disconnected from any actual information back right now.
I personaly like both Action combat and Tab target combat as long as not completely one or the other, therefore a good mix of both is the best in my opinion, thankfully Ashes is planning on going for hybrid.
As for questions
Q: is it really necessary to HAVE Action-style combat in an MMO?
A: Nowadays yes, but only to a certain extent as 100% Tab target becomes less viable even for MMORPGs as time goes by, and there is no need to go full on Action like BDO before the aim assist or Lost Ark.
Q: Isn't it more of a hack-and-slash game feature?
A: I would say originally, more of a fighting game feature, but certainly also a hack-and-slash feature even tho the majoriy of them still has some form of target.
Q: Are there some really good examples of Action-based systems anyone can recommend?
A: For MMORPGs in specific probably BDO, Blade and Soul and even tho very near it's scheduled death, Tera.
Aren't we all sinners?
I would agree that it is essential in a PvP MMO, but not all MMO's need to even have PvP, let alone focus on it.
Ashes has PvP, for sure. As such, Ashes kind of needs action combat (tab target PvP really is boring). However, I see no reason at all as to why either PvP or action combat are necessary for a new (non-Ashes) MMO.
I would go as far as to suggest that any future PvE focused MMORPG would essentially need to be tab target based.
Less viable in a sense that more and more people are learning and acquiring a liking for Action combat and starting to lean more towards it, which can be seem by the MMORPGs in recent years moving more towards the action combat side, not necessarely a mater of if it is better for PvP or not, its more about tab-target getting kinda outshined by the trend of part of the public.
It doesn't mean that Tab-target combat is worse than action combat or doesn't have value, much on the contrary i believe Tab-target combat fits MMORPGs the best, and a MMORPG that doesn't have TT at all isn't as good as one that has it, its a mater of implementation, many consider that FFXIV is currently the best MMORPG and its mostly TT, WoW is mostly TT, Lineage 2 was mostly TT and it had excelent pvp.
I believe the future of combat in MMORPGS will be blends of different amounts of TT and AC in different percentages.
Aren't we all sinners?
Do you think players are wanting action combat games and so developers are developing action combat games, or do you think developers are developing action combat games because the technology is there now to be able to pull it off, and since that is what developers are developing, players are picking up and trying?
My thoughts are definitely in the second group - due simply to the total absence of an actual long term successful full action combat MMORPG. Developers have nothing to point at in terms of successful games in this genre to say "this is why we need to make an action MMORPG". They have plenty of tab target games to point to in order to demonstrate potential for success - but no action MMO's. The only thing they can do, as far as I can see, is say that there hasn't been a super successful action MMORPG as yet because the ability to be able to actually make one is fairly recent - and so they are making one because they are now able to make one.
I mean, if you look at the three highest sustained population MMO's right now (WoW, ESO and FFXIV, afaik) all of them are essentially tab target. At absolute best, ESO could be considered tab target with an action accent.
If players were really after action combat, don't you think that action combat MMORPG's would be more popular than tab target MMORPG's by now?
If we're talking about a big multiplayer experience, it has to have some system that encourages Player versus Player interaction, unless you are settled with the fact that the mmorpg space will always be 2nd to other popular genres of the last 10 years or so.
I really can't understand how there is so much of this narrative of what mmo's SHOULD incorperate, why this kind of mentality I don't blame people for calling the genre dead.
This is far reaching as the majority of users are casuals or of a niche mentality.
The players who like PvP (not only want PvP, I find a distaste in the writing here as usual) aren't playing games like BDO anymore because it lacks in end game content and there is a huge gate saying p2w or get lucky.
This is way more complex than what is being questioned here...
I point out other genres and their action combat systems because most games present a focus type of game play, FPS, RPG etc, an MMO brings all of that together and that is why they are so difficult to make and develop. Adding action targeting presents innumerable obstacles, many of which require the best aspects of our current technology. To point at failed action target MMO's is like taking 5 coin flips and saying look it landed on tails 5 times, therefore all coin flips have a 100% chance of landing on tails.
Going to give Neverwinter a try, starting this weekend (I played the original for a couple of months, in the 90's!), as yours truly grew up on the old D&D computer games. Heheh - even my screen name here is the final demon you fight in the 1st-ever D&D computer Game from 1988, The Pool of Radiance.
BDO will make the list, too. I don't much care for Korean-style MMO's, but they both look to be P2W, at any rate. Had looked at it previously, and it's got some of the annoying Korean tropes I usually avoid (i.e. a spiky-haired guy with a smirk on his face with one hand on his hip, while the other is holding a sword taller than he is and that weighs infinitely more than him, over the shoulder - or a wizard whose robes are so thick and long that they cover his hands when he runs, and the only part of his face you can see are two glowing eyes, between the overly-high ridge of the robes and the super-low brim of the hat.) Some things I just hate seeing, around an MMO.
The combat videos from Tera look okay, but I'm also not a fan of seeing lolli's around MMO's. Heh - and there don't seem to be a lot of people who still seem to have a positive opinion of Tera. Most of the other recommendations made are games I'm entirely unfamiliar with - but am willing to check them out!
With that assumption out of the way, why does there need to be a system to encourage player versus player interaction? In my experience, people are more than able to find enough to fight and squabble over, without the need for things to be set up to encourage it.
Set up a game to encourage player cooperation, and let confrontation take it's own course.
To me the foundations of an online game are pretty basic, challenge players via other players and if devs engineer things within that, that are addictive and enjoyable then you'll have a product that people will keep on coming back to (most days, not every year or so "xxx expansion is coming out, I'll play again then!").
There's not a lot else to say because of such a differing opinion from both of us but so far I'm keeping faith that a node system with spring a lot of competition, instead of games like ff14 that are single player games shared/co-op within an online space.
@Tyranthraxus I don't know how much you've seen of BDO but I find that take ridiculous, I'll join anyone in slamming BDO for its lack of mmo fundamentals all day but in terms of graphics, cosmetics, art style/theme, music and solo gameplay, to knock it harshly imo is insulting to the obviously big passion behind it.
The only thing I can agree with is the basic wizard/witch basic dress, which is ...yes, it's not practical to the theme of the game really, I guess...but these characters are so super human anyway that it would be perhaps a little bit bogus to see them in very realistic clothing/fitting, perhaps.
These npc guards would one shot anything that did a combat move near it. These guards did not stop the pvp. Only moved the pvp.
What I learnt was that even the hardest players need downtime. It is not about pvp 24/7 it is about quality pvp and quality moments.