Taking turn base action out of RPGs...

[J.E. Sawyer]

Thing is if you focus too much on the story and not enough of the rules governing the story and setting then it stops being a RPG and becomes just another adventure game hybrid.

What rules are valid for consideration of the CRPG label in your mind?

[Commissar]

Thing is if you focus too much on the story and not enough of the rules governing the story and setting then it stops being a RPG and becomes just another adventure game hybrid.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

What rules are valid for consideration of the CRPG label in your mind?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Can't most tabletop rules systems be pretty faithfully transferred to the computer roleplaying game?

[ShadowPaladin V1.0]

Can't most tabletop rules systems be pretty faithfully transferred to the computer roleplaying game?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I've always thought it quite odd that you should want to translate PnP rules to a computer. PnP rules are the way they are because of the limitations of people sitting around a table. A computer dosnt have those, yet we still feel the need to inflict the same limitations on it.

[Commissar]

Can't most tabletop rules systems be pretty faithfully transferred to the computer roleplaying game?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I've always thought it quite odd that you should want to translate PnP rules to a computer. PnP rules are the way they are because of the limitations of people sitting around a table. A computer dosnt have those, yet we still feel the need to inflict the same limitations on it.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Well, I'd imagine that's mostly due to the popularity of the actual game systems rather than developer laziness. People like Dungeons and Dragons; make a CRPG Dungeons and Dragons, and people can play it whenever they can't get a group together, or however it is people tabletop game.

 

Fallout's SPECIAL system was wholly original, was it not?

[ShadowPaladin V1.0]

Well, I'd imagine that's mostly due to the popularity of the actual game systems rather than developer laziness.  People like Dungeons and Dragons; make a CRPG Dungeons and Dragons, and people can play it whenever they can't get a group together, or however it is people tabletop game.

 

Fallout's SPECIAL system was wholly original, was it not?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Oh i'm not blaming the developers. If anything it's the gamers who are at fault here.

 

Short answer yes.

[J.E. Sawyer]

Fallout's SPECIAL system was wholly original, was it not?

Wholly original? I guess that depends on how you define that. It was based on GURPS.

[LadyCrimson]

I like both styles...it really depends on the game more than anything else, IMO. Some types of games, the way they're made, real-time wouldn't work very well. Or at least, the options during combat (and, I'd assume, in level/combat design) would be decreased quite a bit because you don't have that pause-time to decide what to use. Some people find the lack of options annoying, some don't.

 

My experience with real-time (no pausing) combat in action/action-RPG's is that ultimately, I'd end up using just three or six or eight out of a hundred 'attacks' because it was too much hassle to keep switching all the time, every time I left an area of one monster/situation for another. Either that, or the game gave you 20 slots of 8 choices each and you'd go batty trying to configure a hotkey combo for every situation...and then remember which one had what combo on it and what key to push to get to that slot. Not all gamers have the reflexes or memories of The One.

 

Anyway, I like both...just depends. Because Kotor didn't have a real-time feel to it in the first place, with all the dialogue/cut-scene interruptions, many of them out of my control, the turnbased combat just felt like an extension of that same concept/playstyle. Same thing with BG etc.

 

Morrowind did have a nice real-time combat system...so did Nox, for that matter...too bad neither game had much longevity/replay, to me.

 

P.S. I remember some areas/levels in Might & Magic RPG series that would have been nigh impossible real-time.

Edited December 8, 2005 by LadyCrimson

[Child of Flame]

You can have real-time combat, so long as it doesn't require actual skill on the part of the player (I'm thinking VtM:B here).  I don't play shooters or action/arcade games, and can imagine struggling if that kind of combat were introduced into RPGs.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Say whatever you like about the bugs in Bloodlines, but it had the best mesh of RPG Stats and FPS combat I've seen since Deus Ex. It's not the game's fault if you don't have the reflexes to play it, don't blame it for not catering to your needs.

 

 

RPG's should have a compelling story that allows a player to have a meaningful relationship with their surroundings. 

 

The action of an RPG should have what ever action the developer can do best and make the most enjoyable for the gamer.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

I liek you. Let's be friends.

 

 

 

Personally, I really don't like turn based combat all that much. The only turn based combat that's been half enjoyable to me, is the combat in the Fallouts, and that was mostly because of the option to shoot NPCs in the groin. Maybe that is because I never pause during combat, but probably not. It seems like that would just make it more boring, considering that's the thing I hated the most about the combat in the Fallouts (the drawn-out monotony). However, I still end up putting up with it in some games, because the ones with the best story and roleplaying elements are generally based around it.

 

I can dig real time, or first person combat just fine though, as I was a 'twitch' gamer long before I found RPGs, KotOR being my introduction aside from Shining Force, followed by devouring the back catalogue of BIS RPGs.

[kirottu]

Good combat. That's all I want. Llyranor, and I win.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

If I agree with you do I win too?

[Commissar]

Fallout's SPECIAL system was wholly original, was it not?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Wholly original? I guess that depends on how you define that. It was based on GURPS.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Is that code for, "We couldn't get permission to use GURPS"?

[Hell Kitty]

PnP rules are the way they are because of the limitations of people sitting around a table. A computer dosnt have those, yet we still feel the need to inflict the same limitations on it.

 

I've always assumed the belief that a player isn't allowed to use reflexes in an RPG is due to the fact that PnP players can't make use of the reflexes, and people have interpreted this to be some kind of RPG rule.

 

All games make use of player skills, the difference with RPGs is that they make use of player skills and character stats.

 

As for TB versus RT, I enjoy both. I love the combat in ToEE and Silent Storm, and wish there were more games like them, but that doesn't mean it should be one or the other.

[ShadowPaladin V1.0]

Following FOT which was easy to handle in real time TB Fallout was just clunky.

 

If the companions are given more AI responsibility then TB combat becomes even less nessercery and a case of simply adding more wait time.

 

I played the Hammer & Sickle demo pretty recently. Enjoyed it to a point. However it's doubtful I'd buy the full game. The prison level especially bored me to tears (kind of lucky there is a quick way) simply having to twiddle my thumbs while not only the enemy , but allies were AI controlled made the turns drag on to the point where I was just too aware of how much time was being wasted where I had no input what so ever in the game.

[SteveThaiBinh]

Say whatever you like about the bugs in Bloodlines, but it had the best mesh of RPG Stats and FPS combat I've seen since Deus Ex.  It's not the game's fault if you don't have the reflexes to play it, don't blame it for not catering to your needs. 

I wouldn't know about that, since I never play FPS games. My point was that I was able to enjoy VtM:B precisely because the combat didn't require skill or reflexes and so didn't present, except on occasion, a problem for me. Unless of course that's typical of FPS, in which case I might start buying some if they have good stories for me to enjoy.

[ShadowPaladin V1.0]

Bloodlines is probably more difficult than an FPS because of the way the cross hair wont keep still. Reminds me of playing those darts games. Once you get the hang of the movement though its not difficult to hit things at normal ranges.

 

ON the easiest levels pretty much anyone can play an FPS. I used to think I wasnt very good at them , but apparently I was wrong. I suppose it's just a matter of practice.

 

Can't recall ever playing one with a good story. Story seems to just be an excuse to shoot things.

[Janmanden]

If there is a reason for turns, then by all means make it turnbased, but if it's just a way to make a really short (and boring) game really really REALLY long (and boring), then *yawn*.

 

To me it's really a question about compensating for handiCaPS and having fun at the same time. I can't be in complete control of a partybased isometric game as long as I've got ten thumbs and have to use the mouse as well - in real time. All that micromanagement and pathfinding is just plain awful and LEEEERRROY JENKINS...

[Kaftan Barlast]

The main drawbacks of realtime combat

• Atleast half the combat rules of the PnP game goes out the window because it cant be translated to realtime
  
• The tactical aspect of the combat disapears almost completely and is replaced by twitch elements. NOT necessarily FPS combat but more like "attack, attack, press health potion shortcut, attack, press mana potion shortcut, press special attack button, press magical wand shortcut button"
  

The main villain in the death of turn-based combat is as usually, Diablo.

[ShadowPaladin V1.0]

The main drawbacks of realtime combat

• Atleast half the combat rules of the PnP game goes out the window because it cant be translated to realtime
   
   
  
• The tactical aspect of the combat disapears almost completely and is replaced by twitch elements. NOT necessarily FPS combat but more like "attack, attack, press health potion shortcut, attack, press mana potion shortcut, press special attack button, press magical wand shortcut button"
  

The main villain in the death of turn-based combat is as usually, Diablo.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Rules made for PnP arnt always needed on a computer.

 

Congratulations what you just described are tactics. Just because you have to think about them and implement them at a quicker pace dosnt change that.

 

On Hell level Diablo is both strategy and tactics heavy. Probably more so than FO , which is basically target to your maximum advantage and then keep doing the same thing over and over if you can 95% hit the eyes, there is little reason to aim elswhere unless it's purely for "amusement".

 

Example of Fallout combat.

 

Shoot,shoot, use stim , target, shoot , reload, grenade.

 

See it's simple to strip things down when it suits your argument :D

Edited December 8, 2005 by ShadowPaladin V1.0

[Hell Kitty]

Rules made for PnP arnt always needed on a computer.

 

Computer RPGs should stick to using rule systems designed for computer RPGs, rather than trying to cash in on the popularity of PNP systems.

[Slowtrain]

Wholly original?  I guess that depends on how you define that.  It was based on GURPS.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Yes, well, the point remains, that it was wholly original after the deal with Steve Jackson fell through. SPECIAL remains the most inspired bit of rule system and character development ever developed for a CRPG. Extradorniarily simple yet capable of creating an almost endless variety of player charcters and a fairly immersive turn-based combat system to boot. I've never seen anything that has bettered or even equalled it. And while I wasn't totally adverse to relacing small guns/big guns/energy weapons with simply Ranged, I think it was something of an exercise in trying to make a better wheel. But whatever...

[Deraldin]

Example of Fallout combat.

 

Shoot,shoot, use stim , target, shoot , reload, grenade.

 

See it's simple to strip things down when it suits your argument :D

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Ahem, that's shoot, shoot, stim, scream at the moniter because the super mutant with the rocket launcher just scored a critical on dogmeat who is now a smear on the ground, reload game...

[Hurlshort]

There are definitely two types of "turn-based' games being talked about here. The types with turns like Fallout, Jagged Alliance, and ToEE are meant to allow extreme tactical care. In this type, everything is happening very quickly within the context of the game, but you are being given unlimited time to plan out your actions. I personally love this style.

 

The other turn-based combat is the type where the turns occur automatically. Most of these games allow you to pause and plan, such as BG, NWN, and KotOR. Some of these games don't, like WoW, Vampire, and (gasp!) Diablo. I don't like the combat of these games nearly as much. I can't plan things out as well. If I play these games, it's usually not for the combat, it's for the story.

 

I prefer either to real-time games, bcause I feel rushed in those. I don't want the game to be about how quick I am with the mouse. I want to take my time and strategize.

[Ellester]

I like both, so I can

[Judge Hades]

What rules are valid for consideration of the CRPG label in your mind?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Its not any specific set of rules but how the rules of the game interacts withthe gameplay itself. The Fallouts and ToEE felt like table top RPGing but on the computer. The KotORs, JE, NWN, Morrowind, and the such does not.

[J.E. Sawyer]

Its not any specific set of rules but how the rules of the game interacts withthe gameplay itself.  The Fallouts and ToEE felt like table top RPGing but on the computer.  The KotORs, JE, NWN, Morrowind, and the such does not.

Please explain the difference, because simultaneous real-time vs. sequential turn-based seems to be the obvious thing that separates the first two games from the last four.

[Arkan]

Its not any specific set of rules but how the rules of the game interacts withthe gameplay itself.  The Fallouts and ToEE felt like table top RPGing but on the computer.  The KotORs, JE, NWN, Morrowind, and the such does not.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Please explain the difference, because simultaneous real-time vs. sequential turn-based seems to be the obvious thing that separates the first two games from the last four.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

You forgot the top-down view. Visc is a stickler for that kind of thing.