Essential and Critical changes to Combat System

[Dudel]

Slowing things just makes matters tedious and suggesting new things is BEYOND pointless.

The only "quick fix" that will slow down the "problems" is to increase tiredness and/or it's effect on things. Right now it's almost pointless to even bother with/look at/etc unless trying to kill a bazillion people.

This gives people time to do things like...

...break locks.

...get heal food.

...send away those weaker.

...etc.


This also prevents or at least slows down....

...only 2 people killing more then 2 or 3 people.

...less then 5 locking a whole town up.

...gives resting and working while tired a point to paying attention to.


I'm sure there are others.

ONLY down side is moving a crap load of resources... and I honestly don't care. XD

[returner]

Thanks for trying, Dudel. I'm just trying to prove to you that your disagreement with EVERY good suggestion here is not helping.
To recap, I'm quoting the essential parts of each post between you and me, just to make you realise what you're saying as I don't think you notice.

(bear in mind, the process IS the problem, obviously, but I thought I'd make that clear)

You say:

Again, that just slows down the process... not stop the problem.

I say: (and it's taken out of context, but I mean to ask for a solution that solves it and doesn't slow it)

What is your cure-all solution to the situation?

So you say:

Slowing things just makes matters tedious and suggesting new things is BEYOND pointless.

And then you say:

The only "quick fix" that will slow down the "problems" is to increase tiredness and/or it's effect on things.

Do you now see that even your idea only slows the problem?

Of course it only slows the problem!!!! The only way to stop killings of towns is to remove players who do it, OR remove the function to allow it!! That's it! Anything else will SLOW it down! Think before you speak.

[Cogliostro]

There's something interesting to Piscator's idea where X and Y both have to consent to a "hit" before the actual hit occurs. As usual, I would suggest adding a chance of severe/deadly damage to that equation, so that a "duel" like that would not be something that drags for days, nor something anyone would take lightly.

This way "surprise gank" and being killed before you even login would be history.

You enter a duel (battle) with someone, and either one or both of you is killed or badly wounded, based on the character's stats and skills. But now how to generalize this thing to work for battles with more than two people involved?

[returner]

LONG STORY SHORT: SIMPLE VERSION FOR THE SIMPLE CANTR USER:

MAKE NEW COMBAT SYSTEM

USE TURN-BASED FIGHTING

SOLVE PROBLEM

Long story:
Now, the idea behind constructing a new combat system should ensure that EVERYONE has a go at fighting in the town, before it is wiped out.

Have you ever played an RTS? If so, read on..
You'll often have troops guarding your buildings or cities or towns. If attacked, you're able to use the full force (or value) of those troops on the invaders. However, if Cantr was like an RTS, it's most likely that you won't get to use the power of each troop as most will be asleep.

There needs to be some kind of auto-response to an attack.

If I was stabbed in my sleep, I can guarantee you I would wake up.

Perhaps an email could be sent to the player every time his character is attacked?

Perhaps an sms system like reveri.es? (probably a bit excessive)

[Dudel]

Do you know how the game mechanics even work, returner?

You slow down the ACTION of the problem, mine slows down it's consistency. How about you THINK before speaking.

Your suggestions simply take the same solution and make it take longer... mine HONESTLY works at the problem that is presented, slowing the amount of times this can happen. Nothing can stop them, agreed, and the problem you think is happening is done by "veteran RPers" anyway. Those that KNOW THE GAME MECHANICS and who have been playing long enough to work around them.

Cogliostro, adding the chance to auto death is, again, NEVER A GOOD IDEA! EVER! Making Piscator's idea work on a single 1v1 level is a good start, agreed, despite the fact that it lest those around have a chance to respond to the duel before it actually takes place. (Dragging off the offender, etc)



And adding a new system just isn't going to happen. It takes programmers/volunteers that Cantr doesn't have to spare.

[Cogliostro]

All caps shouting, "NEVER EVER", blah-blah. In the context of a 1vs1 duel, the instant death possibility has, think about it, nothing you could object to.

[Dudel]

All caps shouting, "NEVER EVER", blah-blah. In the context of a 1vs1 duel, the instant death possibility has, think about it, nothing you could object to.

Near fatal would be accepted by a majority, I believe, provided it didn't mean some other random jack off couldn't "finish the job" in some manner.

[Drael]

Hmm tiredness isnt bad, it balances combat more, and reduces instances of weird occurances, but it doesnt effect the essential tactics, that is hide, move on tick, strike, drag etc, it just makes them more difficult to use for small numbers against big, or slower. Ei, it wont stop the tactic, it will just make the results less devestating - which is good.

The responding turn based idea isnt too bad. Ill think on that..

I still like autodefence project, which would include an inability to be dragged as well as retaliation. This could be the standard project for any town guard type. One could also perhaps autodefend a certain person, like a leader, or a freind?

Or auto-retaliate could be automatic.

Ill have to think on that too.

These two ideas are a similar sort of group, that addresses the problem of being sleeping and off guard a bit.

The whole issue of dragging seems quite central too. Perhaps there could be a random chance that each person is undraggable for a tick or two. That way only some could be dragged, from a whole town.

I think as far as stealth attacks from buildings and the like, one really has to have something that deals with sleeping, either turn based, or autoretaliation so that numbers matter over stealth.

[SekoETC]

One problem with Cantr is that everything either happens on the tick or instantly. There's no in-between. But if there was a delay of a few seconds that couldn't be avoided, that would give online people more time to react. In RaceWarKingdoms they introduced a progress bar that needs to fill before you're allowed to make the next click. If you click on something before the bar has filled, you have to do a captcha to prove you're not using a macro to play the game. If it took a few seconds between hits and entering buildings, defenders would have a better chance of dragging. And the bar could fill more slowly when you're tired. Also going through locked doors should cause delay. Running through an open through could have a 10 to 15 second delay but opening locks should take a few seconds more than that.

Also it would be good if people in vehicles in town couldn't attack people outside the vehicle unless the target hit you first. (Then you could assume they came closer.) That would force attackers to dismount and you couldn't have someone squatting in a boat or a van, safe from dragging while they're able to hit everyone.

[catpurr]

A few seconds or even minutes doesn't help the problem at all. Should Cantr really be one of the games where you have to be more or less online constantly in case you're attacked? I doubt it anyone but the core Hack&Slash peope would like that.

When it arent a few hours make it instant it doesn't matter at all then.

[SekoETC]

It would make a difference when stopping some newspawn or pirate who's running in and out of all the buildings in town, or someone who's hitting everybody in town.

Although better yet, actions like that shouldn't even be possible. When characters get 100% tired, they should fall unconscious until tiredness decreases. But tiredness from hitting should be lowered as already suggested earlier.

A system that potentially forces someone to stand still for hours or even days before a hit is registered couldn't be any good.

[Dudel]

Drael, you can't out-right stop a Cantr tactic without removing the mechanics that allow said tactic and that requires an overhaul which Cantr doesn't have the man power to do.

[Kaizerwolf]

I disagree with this entire idea. My reasons;

- The skills system. The weaker people would be reduced to 15 or less damage if they're lucky.
- Shields. If you've got the best shield in the game, the damage you take is severely decreased.
- Healing Food. If someone is going to kill a leader of a town, chances are they've got a stock pile of healing foods in a locked room that only a select few have the key to.

The current system isn't really "unfair" because it's a Role Playing game. You don't see any other RPG games making attack decreases because it's "unfair." (this is a somewhat bad analogy) But take WOW for example. If two or three people gang up on one, they can easily kill him; same as Cantr. There are ALWAYS going to be role players who make a marauder type character, same as any other RPG game. If you restrict the game so that there is no real marauder class, you're taking away a huge aspect of RPGs.

And even for dragging, there are ways to stop yourself from being dragged. Veteran players might know this while newbies might not, but that's how you learn.

[Piscator]

First off, yelling "they can't do it anyway" in every post doesn't exactly helps the discussion, Dudel. We don't have to limit ourselves before reality does.

Piscator, while I like your idea I don't. The delay is annoying and results in that other people could drag off the "attacker" before anything was done.... and it also means "the defender" can point out "the attacker" to allow others to attack. This is just.... ugly.

That's exactly why I said that such an idea needs to be developed before it is evaluated.

I agree that having to wait a day might prove annoying, but as I said, it's the same as waiting for a lock to be broken. Theoretically lock breaking could be instantaneous too (with a one lock per day rule in place), but it isn't to give others the opportunity to react. I don't see why fighting should be different.

Dragging is of course something that needs to be considered. Generally speaking it should be no different than any other combat move, that is, you shouldn't be able to be dragged before you had a chance to react to the attempt.
Coming up with an easy solution is of course complicated by the fact that dragging can involve more than two persons. It would be much easier if the success of dragging was chance based, depending on the relative strengths and conditions of the dragger and draggee, or if an unsuccessful attempt would leave both with increased tiredness so that a second dragger could finish the job.
Or a person could just become undraggable until the combat move they initiated is completed.

About your last point, what's wrong with pointing out the attacker? You would know who attacked whom in any case and the general rules would of course apply to the victims friends, too. They wouldn't strike until the original attacker chose to acknowledge them.

A announces an attack on B.
C, D and E announce an attack on A.
B strikes back (runs away, starts to drag, etc). -> A smacks B in the face.
A tries to run off (announces another attack on B, whatever). -> C, D and E beat the living crap out of A.

[SekoETC]

What if B is a sleeper and doesn't log in, would the attack be carried out after a day or waiting? Or what if the players of the defenders know each other outside the game and for example C logs in and notices B is under attack, then IM's B's player "hey, your character is under attack but don't do anything now before D and E's players have had time to come online". The game would protect B until he makes a move, and stalling would give C, D and E time to alert each other outside the game and ensure that A won't get away. It would be a CRB but there would be no way of telling that OOC coordination happened, it could just be that B was busy in real life and logged in late for that reason.