a problem with auto attacks

i've been re watching the streams of the basic weapon animations, i tend to like the direction its going towards, i know there is alot to improve on however one concern i have is the weapon attacks are so fast just auto attacking that it seems to be a dps loss to even bother using your abilities, especially how the abilities seem to work at the moment many of the abilities are not instantaneous, i think this could be fixed by slowing down auto attacks or speeding up skills/spells

a good example is

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FglW5YhugRY 1:03 - 1:08 in this video he looses a ton of dps just to use one ability, also i know this could be different with gear scaling etc but just throwing it out there

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Chicago

edit - also this is a 100% personal opinion, but i think that the damage output for a level 15 is super high, hitting 700s per hit with a cleave ability auto attack seems insane, obviously this all can be balanced with mob hp etc but i think that less is more at lower levels, it adds alot of immersion and feels way better when you get a weapon upgrade, when you hit your first 100 dmg on a mob feels really good, where as how it is atm it seems like at max level people are going to be cleaving 10k dps + either way it is a personal opinion

Ludullu

None of the numbers are balanced, so dmg values are irrelevant. And the same goes for basic attacks vs abilities. We have no clue how strong any of those abilities will be at the end, so you might not be losing out on dps when you use them. We've also have seen any real proc abilities on weapons, which might add more interactions between abilities and basic attacks, so you'll feel like you HAVE to use abilities if you want to keep your dps up.

Chicago

NiKr wrote: »

None of the numbers are balanced, so dmg values are irrelevant. And the same goes for basic attacks vs abilities. We have no clue how strong any of those abilities will be at the end, so you might not be losing out on dps when you use them. We've also have seen any real proc abilities on weapons, which might add more interactions between abilities and basic attacks, so you'll feel like you HAVE to use abilities if you want to keep your dps up.

true true, hopefully we see some infomation about this soon

, i feel like they could even put auto attack on a timer like a gcd or something but we shall see

Ludullu

Chicago wrote: »

true true, hopefully we see some infomation about this soon , i feel like they could even put auto attack on a timer like a gcd or something but we shall see

Every day I pray for no god damn gcd

SirChancelot

NiKr wrote: »

Chicago wrote: »

true true, hopefully we see some infomation about this soon , i feel like they could even put auto attack on a timer like a gcd or something but we shall see

Every day I pray for no god damn gcd

There has to be some kind of GCD between active spells, but as long as it doesn't have any impact on the action combat system I'd be okay with it.

Ludullu

SirChancelot wrote: »

There has to be some kind of GCD between active spells, but as long as it doesn't have any impact on the action combat system I'd be okay with it.

Animation-locked combat works perfectly for both tab and action. Serves the same purpose as gcd, except w/o your wholeass skillbar constantly CDing when you use a single ability.

Arya_Yeshe

Idk, alpha-1 is the past now.

Hopefully, the system will be like this: the last activated skill will keep looping if it's a skill that has auto-attack

KingDDD

Animation locked combat essentially adds a cast bar to every ability. Any melee abilities with longer animations will be unusable in pvp unless the effect happens as soon as the animation is initiated.

Ludullu

KingDDD wrote: »

Animation locked combat essentially adds a cast bar to every ability. Any melee abilities with longer animations will be unusable in pvp unless the effect happens as soon as the animation is initiated.

Why though? If all abilities shoot out at the end of the animation (to help with the ping and to give the ability to cancel out or interrupt the cast), the melee ability wouldn't be any different. It would then just come down to the effect of the ability and your timing with it, and probably resource cost as well. You'd burst with your quick ones, but then use the bigger ones after a CC of some kind. Or you start off with the CC, then do your slow animations and then finish off with your fasts ones. All kinds of approaches for all kinds of encounters.

Add to that the variety that could come with different CD/animation (de)buffs and you have yourself a really deep combat system, rather than "I hit this, everything is on cd so I have time to reposition and hit this, rinse repeat".

KingDDD

NiKr wrote: »

KingDDD wrote: »

Animation locked combat essentially adds a cast bar to every ability. Any melee abilities with longer animations will be unusable in pvp unless the effect happens as soon as the animation is initiated.

Why though? If all abilities shoot out at the end of the animation (to help with the ping and to give the ability to cancel out or interrupt the cast), the melee ability wouldn't be any different. It would then just come down to the effect of the ability and your timing with it, and probably resource cost as well. You'd burst with your quick ones, but then use the bigger ones after a CC of some kind. Or you start off with the CC, then do your slow animations and then finish off with your fasts ones. All kinds of approaches for all kinds of encounters.

Add to that the variety that could come with different CD/animation (de)buffs and you have yourself a really deep combat system, rather than "I hit this, everything is on cd so I have time to reposition and hit this, rinse repeat".

Ping will make those longer abilities unusable. When the server checks for the target being in range the person getting hit has more time to move even a hair out of the range check. This will make ping even more important for melee players as they have to physically be near the target.

A GCD allows for the server check to happen instantly because you are still locked out of any action for whatever the GCD time may be.

My guess is it's the reason cast times on abilities for online games have significantly decreased over the past two decades. Excluding Korea, people are just to far from data centers.

Ludullu

KingDDD wrote: »

Ping will make those longer abilities unusable. When the server checks for the target being in range the person getting hit has more time to move even a hair out of the range check. This will make ping even more important for melee players as they have to physically be near the target.

Wouldn't this be the same as any magic ability with the same animation? Isn't the whole point of action combat to be able to dodge shit by a hair's width? And melee abilities would probably have some type of cone effect to them, so it won't be the same as a magic projectile that has to hit precisely on the hitbox. Melee abilities will also have movement part to them, so you'll just have to predict which way your enemy might dodge, which will increase action combat's difficulty and skillcap, as action players seem to want.

And backwards dodge could cost a bit more stamina (or mana, or whichever resource) than a sidestep, so that people trying to avoid all attacks by just dashing back would run out of stamina faster. This would also counterbalance mages a bit, because most projectiles would probably get sidestepped rather than backstepped, so melees will have a bit of an easier time fighting mages.

KingDDD wrote: »

A GCD allows for the server check to happen instantly because you are still locked out of any action for whatever the GCD time may be.

My guess is it's the reason cast times on abilities for online games have significantly decreased over the past two decades. Excluding Korea, people are just to far from data centers.

In what online games though? I'd assume stuff like MOBAs and fighting games rely the most on ping and neither of those have gcd afaik. With fighting games having their own approach to countering ping in the form of predictive inputs (or however they're called, the rollback(?) netcode thingy).

KingDDD

NiKr wrote: »

KingDDD wrote: »

Ping will make those longer abilities unusable. When the server checks for the target being in range the person getting hit has more time to move even a hair out of the range check. This will make ping even more important for melee players as they have to physically be near the target.

Wouldn't this be the same as any magic ability with the same animation? Isn't the whole point of action combat to be able to dodge shit by a hair's width? And melee abilities would probably have some type of cone effect to them, so it won't be the same as a magic projectile that has to hit precisely on the hitbox. Melee abilities will also have movement part to them, so you'll just have to predict which way your enemy might dodge, which will increase action combat's difficulty and skillcap, as action players seem to want.

And backwards dodge could cost a bit more stamina (or mana, or whichever resource) than a sidestep, so that people trying to avoid all attacks by just dashing back would run out of stamina faster. This would also counterbalance mages a bit, because most projectiles would probably get sidestepped rather than backstepped, so melees will have a bit of an easier time fighting mages.

KingDDD wrote: »

A GCD allows for the server check to happen instantly because you are still locked out of any action for whatever the GCD time may be.

My guess is it's the reason cast times on abilities for online games have significantly decreased over the past two decades. Excluding Korea, people are just to far from data centers.

In what online games though? I'd assume stuff like MOBAs and fighting games rely the most on ping and neither of those have gcd afaik. With fighting games having their own approach to countering ping in the form of predictive inputs (or however they're called, the rollback(?) netcode thingy).

The difference is your magic is a range ability and by default you will be at range in a neutral state. The hitboxes for the actionmode will have to be forgiving for range players otherwise it'll be something no one uses. The scenario you mention of sidestepping mage abilities as you approach is completely nullified if the mage uses tab target. I was under the impression they removed melee abilities moving you by default when they switched to split body animations.

Intentionally dodging is good . Using a resource to dodge is good. But a high dodge chance being tied to holding strafe is a recipe for a melee range balance gap.

Mobas have different phases or quarters where a GCD isnt as needed. Part of the strategy in mobas is the differentials in power spikes and exploiting them to gain advantage. Mmos just don't have that same thing as every single pvp contest is always in the phase, assuming everyone is at level cap.

Chicago

KingDDD wrote: »

NiKr wrote: »

KingDDD wrote: »

Animation locked combat essentially adds a cast bar to every ability. Any melee abilities with longer animations will be unusable in pvp unless the effect happens as soon as the animation is initiated.

Why though? If all abilities shoot out at the end of the animation (to help with the ping and to give the ability to cancel out or interrupt the cast), the melee ability wouldn't be any different. It would then just come down to the effect of the ability and your timing with it, and probably resource cost as well. You'd burst with your quick ones, but then use the bigger ones after a CC of some kind. Or you start off with the CC, then do your slow animations and then finish off with your fasts ones. All kinds of approaches for all kinds of encounters.

Add to that the variety that could come with different CD/animation (de)buffs and you have yourself a really deep combat system, rather than "I hit this, everything is on cd so I have time to reposition and hit this, rinse repeat".

Ping will make those longer abilities unusable. When the server checks for the target being in range the person getting hit has more time to move even a hair out of the range check. This will make ping even more important for melee players as they have to physically be near the target.

A GCD allows for the server check to happen instantly because you are still locked out of any action for whatever the GCD time may be.

My guess is it's the reason cast times on abilities for online games have significantly decreased over the past two decades. Excluding Korea, people are just to far from data centers.

Not to mention it q

KingDDD wrote: »

NiKr wrote: »

KingDDD wrote: »

Ping will make those longer abilities unusable. When the server checks for the target being in range the person getting hit has more time to move even a hair out of the range check. This will make ping even more important for melee players as they have to physically be near the target.

Wouldn't this be the same as any magic ability with the same animation? Isn't the whole point of action combat to be able to dodge shit by a hair's width? And melee abilities would probably have some type of cone effect to them, so it won't be the same as a magic projectile that has to hit precisely on the hitbox. Melee abilities will also have movement part to them, so you'll just have to predict which way your enemy might dodge, which will increase action combat's difficulty and skillcap, as action players seem to want.

And backwards dodge could cost a bit more stamina (or mana, or whichever resource) than a sidestep, so that people trying to avoid all attacks by just dashing back would run out of stamina faster. This would also counterbalance mages a bit, because most projectiles would probably get sidestepped rather than backstepped, so melees will have a bit of an easier time fighting mages.

KingDDD wrote: »

A GCD allows for the server check to happen instantly because you are still locked out of any action for whatever the GCD time may be.

My guess is it's the reason cast times on abilities for online games have significantly decreased over the past two decades. Excluding Korea, people are just to far from data centers.

In what online games though? I'd assume stuff like MOBAs and fighting games rely the most on ping and neither of those have gcd afaik. With fighting games having their own approach to countering ping in the form of predictive inputs (or however they're called, the rollback(?) netcode thingy).

The difference is your magic is a range ability and by default you will be at range in a neutral state. The hitboxes for the actionmode will have to be forgiving for range players otherwise it'll be something no one uses. The scenario you mention of sidestepping mage abilities as you approach is completely nullified if the mage uses tab target. I was under the impression they removed melee abilities moving you by default when they switched to split body animations.

Intentionally dodging is good . Using a resource to dodge is good. But a high dodge chance being tied to holding strafe is a recipe for a melee range balance gap.

Mobas have different phases or quarters where a GCD isnt as needed. Part of the strategy in mobas is the differentials in power spikes and exploiting them to gain advantage. Mmos just don't have that same thing as every single pvp contest is always in the phase, assuming everyone is at level cap.

Yep an invisible cast timer for melee abilities renders most melee next to useless against any range class, also not to mention you can literally run and spam wand attack from 30 yards it will be almost impossible to connect, melee abilities need to be instant

Ludullu

KingDDD wrote: »

The difference is your magic is a range ability and by default you will be at range in a neutral state. The hitboxes for the actionmode will have to be forgiving for range players otherwise it'll be something no one uses. The scenario you mention of sidestepping mage abilities as you approach is completely nullified if the mage uses tab target.

If tab abilities can't be dodged through stats and action movement boosting those stats - Intrepid would've probably failed with their hybrid combat, because they game would just effectively be tab. And I think they discussed dodges and all that stuff either on the tank stream or somewhere around that.

KingDDD wrote: »

I was under the impression they removed melee abilities moving you by default when they switched to split body animations.

Yes, they're separated, but you can move and use your abilities. Just look at the melee showcase, they were moving forward and hitting or moving sideward and hitting. And if we can move while doing the cast, then you can gain on your opponent during the cast itself. And judging by the current design, we seem to be able to do that.

KingDDD wrote: »

Intentionally dodging is good . Using a resource to dodge is good. But a high dodge chance being tied to holding strafe is a recipe for a melee range balance gap.

Yeah, it'll obviously have to be a dodge mechanic rather than just stepping to the side. I should've been clearer about that.

KingDDD wrote: »

Mobas have different phases or quarters where a GCD isnt as needed. Part of the strategy in mobas is the differentials in power spikes and exploiting them to gain advantage. Mmos just don't have that same thing as every single pvp contest is always in the phase, assuming everyone is at level cap.

I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean here. Just as everyone on the map in a moba can be top lvl with best items in super late game, everyone in an mmo can be at the top of their progress as well. And the other way around, just as mmos have different buffs that boost your dps output shortly - the same is true for mobas. And both games rely on tight movement, timings, rotations of abilities and item uses - all of which rely on ping. And I'd even argue that mobas are way faster than most mmos, but they don't have gcd.

Is it about server locations? Character density? Netcode? Something else?

Ludullu

Chicago wrote: »

Yep an invisible cast timer for melee abilities renders most melee next to useless against any range class, also not to mention you can literally run and spam wand attack from 30 yards it will be almost impossible to connect, melee abilities need to be instant

Not having the cast wouldn't really solve this issue though. Different cast times on abilities would prevent permadodging from enemies. I'm not asking to make all melee abilities 3s+ cast.

But to me executing an attack in one place, then seeing my opponent move 10m but the attack still hitting is way worse than adjusting my attacks to their movement. The whole skillbar CDing is just the shitty cherry on top for me.

KingDDD

NiKr wrote: »

KingDDD wrote: »

The difference is your magic is a range ability and by default you will be at range in a neutral state. The hitboxes for the actionmode will have to be forgiving for range players otherwise it'll be something no one uses. The scenario you mention of sidestepping mage abilities as you approach is completely nullified if the mage uses tab target.

If tab abilities can't be dodged through stats and action movement boosting those stats - Intrepid would've probably failed with their hybrid combat, because they game would just effectively be tab. And I think they discussed dodges and all that stuff either on the tank stream or somewhere around that.

KingDDD wrote: »

I was under the impression they removed melee abilities moving you by default when they switched to split body animations.

Yes, they're separated, but you can move and use your abilities. Just look at the melee showcase, they were moving forward and hitting or moving sideward and hitting. And if we can move while doing the cast, then you can gain on your opponent during the cast itself. And judging by the current design, we seem to be able to do that.

KingDDD wrote: »

Intentionally dodging is good . Using a resource to dodge is good. But a high dodge chance being tied to holding strafe is a recipe for a melee range balance gap.

Yeah, it'll obviously have to be a dodge mechanic rather than just stepping to the side. I should've been clearer about that.

KingDDD wrote: »

Mobas have different phases or quarters where a GCD isnt as needed. Part of the strategy in mobas is the differentials in power spikes and exploiting them to gain advantage. Mmos just don't have that same thing as every single pvp contest is always in the phase, assuming everyone is at level cap.

I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean here. Just as everyone on the map in a moba can be top lvl with best items in super late game, everyone in an mmo can be at the top of their progress as well. And the other way around, just as mmos have different buffs that boost your dps output shortly - the same is true for mobas. And both games rely on tight movement, timings, rotations of abilities and item uses - all of which rely on ping. And I'd even argue that mobas are way faster than most mmos, but they don't have gcd.

Is it about server locations? Character density? Netcode? Something else?

The tab abilities dodging wouldn't be a choice in that case it would just happen based on dice rolls. This is really advantageous for range as range can force melee to burn the dodges on approach without the melee players consent. The default will be to use low animation skills to burn dodges.

You won't gain on the other person by default. The chased target is choosing the direction you're going. Unless your pill is hardcoded stuck to the chased target, they will gain on you if there is any differential in ping or any environmental object. Combine this with burnt movement abilities on approach and you will have a range dominated game even moreso than the inherit advantage range has.

Everyone in a moba can theoretically get the same items and levels, but that never happens in a real game at least in dota. I'm talking about the scaling for certain characters. PA is next to useless for the first 20 mins, but after that time can be a powerhouse due to ability and stat scaling. Conversely undying is a level 1 no item monster. But after 20 mins is a glorified creep. The point is that no pa expects to be a god 2 mins into the game. Your animations, abilities, etc are all balanced around specific timing points in the game, and how well your team did or didn't do getting to those points.

In an mmo these timing points don't exist as mmo pvp doesn't work like a sports match. There aren't carries, or timing windows as everyone is at their "endgame" when the fight starts. And while there are some statistical and ability choice differences between players it's no where near as dramatic as a moba.

Azherae

NiKr wrote: »

I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean here. Just as everyone on the map in a moba can be top lvl with best items in super late game, everyone in an mmo can be at the top of their progress as well. And the other way around, just as mmos have different buffs that boost your dps output shortly - the same is true for mobas. And both games rely on tight movement, timings, rotations of abilities and item uses - all of which rely on ping. And I'd even argue that mobas are way faster than most mmos, but they don't have gcd.

Is it about server locations? Character density? Netcode? Something else?

It's a long explanation about how exactly those things stack and roll back with the ping.

The other stuff you said is still right, and it is unlikely that many modern games will be moving forward with any form of GCD, as there are multiple implementations of both netcode and animation structures that allow this to work fine.

KingDDD is also right, but I'm not really sure I understand the point/relevance of the facts they provided either.

I saw no indications that Ashes would need a GCD because Ashes combat is slower in terms of engage options than most, so far. Maybe it will be a blitz later, but I don't think so, it seemed fine to me. What might happen though, is that people who aren't used to it get frustrated because they thought they reacted to something faster than they actually did, a common thing in the genres you are referring to.

If the goal is to give players long windows for reacting to things and good movement, the ping will matter a lot more.

Noaani

NiKr wrote: »

SirChancelot wrote: »

There has to be some kind of GCD between active spells, but as long as it doesn't have any impact on the action combat system I'd be okay with it.

Animation-locked combat works perfectly for both tab and action. Serves the same purpose as gcd, except w/o your wholeass skillbar constantly CDing when you use a single ability.

I prefer a GCD to an animation lock.

In effect, they perform the same function. However, a GCD can be manipulated via mechanics (a passive to lower GCD by x% as an example).

While you technically could do this with an animation lock, you quickly run the risk of making your animation look quite silly.

Ludullu

KingDDD wrote: »

The tab abilities dodging wouldn't be a choice in that case it would just happen based on dice rolls. This is really advantageous for range as range can force melee to burn the dodges on approach without the melee players consent. The default will be to use low animation skills to burn dodges.

You won't gain on the other person by default. The chased target is choosing the direction you're going. Unless your pill is hardcoded stuck to the chased target, they will gain on you if there is any differential in ping or any environmental object. Combine this with burnt movement abilities on approach and you will have a range dominated game even moreso than the inherit advantage range has.

Could those issues be addressed through gapclosers (though abilities and not innate movement mechanics)? If the melee is the initiator of the fight, they have the advantage of starting up close and having both movement and gapclosers on top of that. If the range is the initiator, they have the range advantage and the "they used their gapcalosers to just get to me" advantage.

After the initiation, it's just about dodging and overall movement of characters, which would stay true no matter the combat design. The only thing that would change is the general gameplay strategy, due to how the abilities work.

Ludullu

Noaani wrote: »

I prefer a GCD to an animation lock.

In effect, they perform the same function. However, a GCD can be manipulated via mechanics (a passive to lower GCD by x% as an example).

While you technically could do this with an animation lock, you quickly run the risk of making your animation look quite silly.

I'd assume there's a limit on how much you can decrease your gcd, otherwise it would start bleeding abilities into other abilities. Couldn't animation design account for the same passives? Just put limits on how far you can take it and account for those limits during development and you won't have the silly animation.

L2's magic attacks looked even cooler at super high cast speeds. Hell, some people even sacrificed some dmg buffs in favor of cast speeds, just to have a cool-looking attack

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