FORMATIONS - Since Obsidian like them so much, why not make them deeper?

[Infinitron]

The formations in the IE games were purely about character placement. They had only a minor tactical effect on combat at best. Maybe since your fighter was at the front of the party, he'd get attacked by the monsters first. Or maybe they'd just run around him and go directly for the squishy mage. By midgame you generally stopped thinking about them entirely since combat quickly become too chaotic to stick to any sort of rigid formation.

 

I'd like to see formations made better. Let them have an actual effect on the combat rolls. Let the game recognize when my characters are bunched together, perhaps giving me the option to automatically place them in some kind of mini phalanx or shield wall formation. Let me effectively block off territory with a row of my fighters, and deflect arrows with their tower shields, defending my poor squishy mages.

Edited September 18, 2012 by Infinitron

[Oerwinde]

I generally used the star formation because it was the most aesthetically pleasing. I found they didn't have much of an affect on combat.

[Sordel]

It depends on how close you want to get to a Tactical RPG. The mechanics for the sort of game you're describing certainly exist, and I loved Tactics Ogre on the GBA, but it might make for a slower-paced game than people are really looking to play. Also it tends to demand a rigid playboard (e.g. with hexagons, or a chequerboard) and that might impact on immersion.

Edited September 18, 2012 by Sordel

[Posbi]

My issue with formations is that they really didn't have any impact on combat. Please, change this to give combat a more tactical feel instead of it being just the usual brawl. If you're in a dungeon corridor give the fighter equivalents the ability to make a shield wall blocking enemies from flanking you. If you've got a ranged damage dealer - mage, ranger, thief with a crossbow - have them stay back automatically. If an enemy gets close to them, have them switch to melee weapons automatically (if you've given them some to begin with). As is the formations serve no purpose.

[Troller]

As a fan of total war games, I love this idea, like in DAO as soon as your mage started blasting the enemies could just move freely and attack him, there should be at least a penalty of movement to attack someone that is behind a wall of his friends, and maybe you get to push the enemies back you know, or at least get bonus to your attack

[Infinitron]

It depends on how close you want to get to a Tactical RPG. The mechanics for the sort of game you're describing certainly exist, and I loved Tactics Ogre on the GBA, but it might make for a slower-paced game than people are really looking to play. Also it tends to demand a rigid playboard (e.g. with hexagons, or a chequerboard) and that might impact on immersion.

 

I believe these things can be implemented without a turn-based combat system and without a hex-based battlefield. Total War games do it, though admittedly you can't control each soldier individually there, which makes things simpler. I'm also reminded of certain fights in The Witcher 2.

Edited September 18, 2012 by Infinitron

[Paul D]

A big thing for me with formations is being able to set a designated flee point, possibly combined with a set of pre-defined actions. For example, if a mage ends up getting hit by a rogues arrows, rather than simply standing put where I place him, he flees to an alternative place and does a healing spell. This would allow me to focus on the melee side. I don't like formations when it is set, then it is as if the characters are set in concrete, and if there are enough companions, you can't get to them all in time during a hectic combat to move them to safer ground if you can.

[Lysen]

Formations were mostly useless in Infinity Engine games. Remember the usual thing, when you carefully placed all of your characters before a difficult battle, then the enemy starts conversation with you and after it ends, your party is suddenly in complete disarray and under heavy fire? I hope too that Obsidian will put more effort into party formations and try to make them really useful.

[floyd ryan]

Assuming (and hoping) that dialogue will be stat based as in Planescape i'd like to have the PC always start NPC interactions even if he is not the front character.

In IE games this was quite cumbersome, as the "stupid fighter" always started the talking if the whole group was selected. In other words: Don't make the front character the lead per default, please.

 

Aside, i like above ideas to give formations more tactical depth via stats.

[Juggie]

The first thing I thought when I read about the formations was: "What the hell, this was completely useless feature in the IE games.". There was no way to properly block enemy movement or to protect your weak party members. Formations are useless unless you have zones of control, attacks or opportunity, or something similar. This can be done even without tiles or turn based combat and supports tactical element of the game, so please if you're investing resources into making this feature make it right.

[Avantenor]

I was pleased by Joshs announcement, because I thought formations were a great addition to the infinity games and would have made NWN2 a even better game. I think it worked quite well in closed rooms, tunnels or caves. At least I had the feeling. In NWN2 there was always a chance your mage hurried away and died in a trap before the damage dealers or rogues could handle it, what I thought was quite annoying, especially in the Ork caves.

 

The infinity games had some minor issues with formations that could be dealt with first. But I think it could be interesting to exploit the possibilities of that feature further, 'though I wouldn't turn it into an alltimes must-have or a complicated science of it's own. Killing some goblins on the route shouldn't result in two hours of figuring out which formation fits best. But giving bonus points on fighting the dragon would be nice.

Edited September 18, 2012 by Avantenor

[digamma]

I think positions would be more useful if besides the shield wall and phalanx formations mentioned earlier, attacks of opportunity would be in. A feat that forces an enemy back on successful aoo (and tumble etc. checks) could expand on this. Furthermore a characters weapon could affect this; someone with a dagger will have a lesser 'threatened area' than someone with a dagger.

 

I think situations where a characters AI takes over to run towards cover and the like would be a poor design decision. It reduces of the interactivity of the combat, and the AI won't be able to execute the orders just in the way the player wants it to do, with wouldn't make the game more fun.

[Infinitron]

Another formation, more appropriate to medieval fantasy, is the schiltron or spear wall:

 

The testudo formation would probably be overdoing it:

Edited September 18, 2012 by Infinitron

[ShadowScythe]

It's an interesting concept, what I'd be concerned about is how you can do formations that complex with just a party of 6? It seems like something that'd work in a war game but I'm not so sure about a smaller and more focused party.

[Avantenor]

I think there is some theory about that. At least fantasy author James Barclay put an emphasis on that aspect when writing his Chronicles and Legends of the Raven.

[Crusty]

Completely agree with the premise of the OP. It'd also be nice if formations not only affected combat rolls, but had inherent strengths and weaknesses that make sense for the formation. Like how a shield wall reduces mobility, leaving them vulnerable to flanking and backstabbing Rogues. Or how magical AoEs would devastate a tightly grouped testudo. Seeing the AI utilise formations at times, and figuring out how to exploit said formations would also make for interesting encounters I think.

[Leferd]

Wedge formation + Charge!

[nikolokolus]

I guess it all comes down to the game engine's ability to do collision detection and programming formation specific combat bonuses and penalties. If we can actually block opponents with the heavies and keep mobs off of our soft, squidgy spell-casters then that would be fantastic. I dunno, might be tough to implement effectively.

[Zoma]

While in formation, give characters positioned in parts of the formation certain bonuses? Something similar to Last Remnant which has lots of formations and actually has impact on gameplay.

 

For example the wall formation could provide the units lined in the first row extra defensive bonuses while the units in the back row are granted with slightly better magical/range damage.

 

Or the pincer formation grants the front unit better defense at the expense of attack damage while the flanking units are given attack bonus.

 

This will only occur so long as the units are within their formation.

 

Just throwing out ideas here.

 

edit: Looks like similar ideas were already mentioned.

Edited September 24, 2012 by Zoma

[agewisdom]

Like ShadowScythe says, I don't think advanced formations would work too well unless we're talking about in places like dungeons with tight corridors. Reason being, with a party of six, how fancy can formations get?

 

A phalanx or tetsudo would hardly work with 6 adventurers.... Besides with wide open spaces, a phalanx of 3 or 4 persons, can easily be flanked from the sides or rear.