RTwP versus Turn Based Combat

[Captain Shrek]

Hi.

 

I understand that RTwP has been confirmed for this game. But it might still be instructive to consider what are the weaknesses and strengths of each type of combat style.

 

 

I am posting as essay here on these comparing these two based on arguments built from scratch. This was first posted on RPG codex some time back on a similar issue. Feel free to comment.

 

Since we are talking about video games, please understand I will not associate the following discussion to games in general although a lot of these arguments wills till hold there.

 

RTwP and Turn based are time-keeping devices in games. To understand the motivation of putting them in a game requires a set of tools that include a vocabulary and some concepts.

 

First definitions:

 

Let's define the following:

 

Ideas:

 

Tactics as positioning units and queuing actions for an event.

Turn: Defined in those games where actions of units happen independently of each other and in a sequence determined statically or through an initiative roll.

Round: When a game is NOT turn based then every unit takes a certain amount of time to finish its action. If all actions available to the unit are made to take the same time and simultaneous actions are allowed for multiple players, we call such an action a Round.

Deep: Providing a large array of tactical options.

 

When the actions are neither turn based or round based we will call then animation-time (AT) based actions.

 

 

Genres:

Adventure genre: Concerned with exploration, puzzle solving and interaction. (

Strategy: Resource management and tactics (e.g. HoM&M, JA)

Action: Twitch based gameplay (do not involve tactics as defined above but rather instantaneous decisions e.g. Gothic games)

 

 

Now to concepts.

 

Good tactical games:

 

The word tactical is quite broad. It can be used for any genre you can think of starting from action to strategy, but not so much in adventure. But to be qualitatively considerate it applies best to strategy genre. RPGs can be a mix between strategy, Adventure and action and then some other elements (typically tiered/leveling mechanics). Depending upon how much part of each had entered the RP game, the level of tactics required changes considerably. Games that focus on tactical combat require certain amount of 'consideration time' before action is taken. Thus, it makes sense to choose a time-keeping device for a game with respect to the number of tactical decisions available and the depth of such decisions. i.e. If the characters in the game under the player control can take a large number of possible actions and the same holds for the enemy then it makes sense to choose a time-keeping system that allows larger consideration times.

 

Computers by default are always faster than the player. If in a continuous time keeping system with deterministic mechanics, such as Round based or AT based, the computer is given free reign, the player will NEVER win. Thus difficulty for these games is always artificial, in the sense that evenly matched characters in the game will always be biased towards computer victory. In evenly matched turn based games, where the results of actions are purely deterministic, the game will always have a fixed outcome (if there is no starting move bias) of draw if the player is an expert. Otherwise the computer will always win. Only in a game which has mechanics with random component to it, can a player have a chance to win.

 

Games are (almost always) created to be winnable. Thus they always must have some level of artificial difficulty/ease. In order to retain element of challenge in tactical games, they are made to be restrictive in terms of strategies that can succeed. The typical aim of the game is to force the player to create/explore/discover winning strategies. Intuitively speaking, a game that allows a large variety of strategies and a significantly large variety of winning strategies is to be considered good because it provides more quality content overall. I will refer to two of these quantitative ideas often in this discussion:

 

1) Total number of allowed strategies (TS)

2) Ratio of winnable strategies / losing strategies (RS)

 

I am hoping that it is obvious that the quality of games can be evaluated with these two numbers. The first is obvious. If the second number is in the range of (1/9 , 1/4) it will be better. Of course some might prefer even lower rate of success, but then TS must go up to compensate for lower values of RS. Please understand, this is a highly simplified descriptor of the real system, since the actual number of losing strategies in typical strategy games are infinite if the player is an idiot. Thus a certain level of smartness is assumed. Also, we are talking aboutRPG games that do not usually involve a large number of units in action (number of units < 10 ). If the number of units exceed 10-20 then the game is a pure strategy game and much more complex to discuss without further simplifications.

 

We are discussing only games that provide some arbitrary level of challenge. Games that are un-challenging by this arbitrary standard are casual games. Unfortunately I am unable to enforce a condition of challenging onto you since there are people around who find combat of DA: O challenging. But it is always possible to create an artificial and relative scale by referring to one example. In this case we will make the combat of Witcher 2 as the example since it can offer ridiculously large amount of posterior pain from all circles for the common enjoyment of all.

 

Also, it is important to consider at all points that games need not be realistic. i.e. it is not a priority of the design to make games realistic. The priority is rather that they are made to be fun for the intended group i.e. you don't make strategy games for action oriented players. After this has been achieved realism can be the topping but never the base.

 

Alright. With this framework in mind we can now analyse how gameplay is affected by time-keeping.

 

 

Actual Discussion:

 

It should be clear by now that games do not always need to be strategic in nature. There are those who rather prefer playing purely twitch based games (genre of action). There are others who prefer more slow paced games (genre of strategy). Real time keeping can exist for either genre while turn based time keeping can only exist for strategy games.

 

First let's discuss the TB system since it is the easiest to wind up:

 

For a well designed game TB system automatically implies deep mechanics. Without the depth the game would become bland. This is a two way necessity (TB <-> Deep Mechanics) since if the developer wants to provide deep mechanics to the player, he should also allow the player the time to consider them. Thus a game with deeper mechanics ideally should be TB so thatTS are actually realized within the game.

 

It now makes sense to state that games with large number of party members require a closer attention when each member has a large array of options. Since a battle is dynamic with the enemy also strategizing it is important to adopt to the situation. Now with larger and larger number of teammates it is progressive harder to maintain control of all actions. A game that has so many options but does not require you to use them is of course badly designed since its RS is too high for non-casual games.

 

So just to be clear, if the party is made up of two guys with two options each (attack or defend) then there is little reason to make the game turn based.

 

Real-time games:

 

There is a large video games audience that plays games just to vent off steam. There is also another audience that plays games to vent of steam and feel like a little tactical challenge and a listening to a good story every once in a while. Real Time RPGs are typically oriented for the latter.

 

Please do not misunderstand: these games DO require strategizing. But not strategizing the way tactical has been defined in this post. Thus an action game which necessitates preparation before a battle (potions, choice of weapons etc) is smart but not tactical in the same way as a game with party members with distribution of differing skills. The distinction is purely artificial to facilitate a clean division.

 

I will claim that such games are best played with few party members (1- 4) and have less combat options per action. Sound heretical, but to me, it is a good design decision with the time-keeping system in mind. A game that offers 10 options per action and is real time driven without pause would make no sense to have all these options, because to win you'd either require to cripple the AI severely or have a hand-eye coordination + genius of batman. This is so because the Computer has instantaneous, absolute and precise control of its units, while a human being can meaningfully control one unit at a given point of time. Thus what he can do, the AI can do better. Crippling the AI risks the game becoming casual (although some level of crippling is always necessary).

 

A Real time system with Pause introduces some level of fine control over the actions of the units. It now allows to issue orders, all the while synchronizing them periodically thus preparing for long term combat. AT based games that do not use a standard time-keeping devices, lose synchronicity faster since the units end their actions at different times thus forcing tighter control over action. That is why I presume a Round based system becomes necessary.

 

It is interesting to note the apparent inspiration of the idea of a round from the idea of a turn. Round is a one sided time-keeping device that allows greater synchronicity or at least a temporal scale for the player to control his units. Even if individual units are not synchronized, rounds act like mini alarms giving the player a breathing space. The problem with them is of course again the AI and the number of options.

 

Those who play NWN2 see this often. The Units if left with even slight freedom start acting up with their 'in-duh-viduality' by casting nuking spells or AOE spells on their own party, running heedlessly into enemy Area of Free Attack zone or buffing themselves up un-necessarily. It is of course sometimes necessary for Units to act on their own. But since the correct balance between automation and tactics is hard to achieve (or you'd have skynet) these things typically do not work out as expected. The solution to that in IWD was that AI was overall too dumb and relied on strong but small 'organised' (scattered but balanced) mobs instead. But again this is a sub-optimal solution.

 

There are indirect ways to take care of these issues:

 

The first is to exploit the idea of the Round as a time-keeping device. Since Rounds are required to create synchronous and provide 'consideration time', by making everyone's rounds last longer it is possible to make the game more controllable. This automatically reduces the game play speed, which again has to be balanced with gameplay so that it is not overtly slow. Interestingly DA:O to DA2 transition is the travesty of this idea where slow round speeds were replaced with bad AI and restricted spamming to compensate for the lack of tactical combat to achieve faster game mechanics.

 

Another way of dealing with the problem is small parties. With a single player character or two player character parties, it becomes easier to get a handle on the situation and micromanage effectively. Three is where probably the line is crossed although this may be a little preferential.

 

 

Conclusion:

 

Thus it makes sense to have both kinds of time keeping devices for games as long as they are being developed for the right audience. Video games are a relatively nascent form of expression and will require a lot of guidance and experience that can only come from developing and playing bad games. It is the ability to identify the exact ingredients and the context of the elements that create poor games that will save gaming as a whole from Bioware and co.

Edited October 4, 2012 by Captain Shrek

[Valorian]

I'll just say that there should definitely be attacks of opportunity when someone moves around the battlefield or uses a potion for example.

Otherwise, I think that real time combat can be very tactical as well. I enjoy both.

[Grimlorn]

I don't really think there are any weaknesses with turn based combat. Real time with pause has that whole move in real time, fight in turn based thing. So if you get hurt you can move out of range of a mob in real time, while the rest of your party takes it's turns fighting and killing the mob and mobs usually have no way of closing the distance. I think in IWD you can actually do an action for your turn, then immediately after it's done you can move for a few seconds while your turn ends. I think that's a bit weak too.

[Althernai]

It's rather late here so I will not reply to this in detail today, but one thing to keep in mind is that Project Eternity will not use "rounds". They were an artifact of translating D&D to RTwP and a system designed from the ground up to be RTwP does not require them.

[Captain Shrek]

It's rather late here so I will not reply to this in detail today, but one thing to keep in mind is that Project Eternity will not use "rounds". They were an artifact of translating D&D to RTwP and a system designed from the ground up to be RTwP does not require them.

 

How do you know there are no rounds? Did the devs actually say this at some point of time?

[Lady Evenstar]

The only thing I've seen about rounds is http://www.rpgcodex....cle.php?id=8483

 

I also disagree that there are no negatives to turn-based. Having to wait for everyone in range to take their turn can be really tedious in large fights. It's also very artificial to be able to base your actions on the results of the actions of those whose turns preceded yours.

Edited October 4, 2012 by Lady Evenstar

[Grimlorn]

It's also very artificial to be able to base your actions on the results of the actions of those whose turns preceded yours.

How?

[Lady Evenstar]

In your experience folks fight in turns, waiting patiently for whoever is next? Really? Turns are a tidy abstraction, i.e. artificial.

[Caerdon]

Dear OP,

 

That is a very biased look into the whole turn-based/real-time question. You've just defined tactics so that TB systems appear 'deeper' and more tactical. I'm not saying one is better than the other, but your essay is far from objective. Let's have a look at some of the things you've written:

 

Tactics as positioning units and queuing actions for an event.

 

For starters, that's an incredibly limited definition for tactics. I am not going to use that definition.

 

Round: When a game is NOT turn based then every unit takes a certain amount of time to finish its action. If all actions available to the unit are made to take the same time and simultaneous actions are allowed for multiple players, we call such an action a Round.

 

A completely useless concept. It might be relevant when talking about IE games, but here we're discussing things in general, right?

 

Games that focus on tactical combat require certain amount of 'consideration time' before action is taken. Thus, it makes sense to choose a time-keeping device for a game with respect to the number of tactical decisions available and the depth of such decisions. i.e. If the characters in the game under the player control can take a large number of possible actions and the same holds for the enemy then it makes sense to choose a time-keeping system that allows larger consideration times.

 

Now, this here is purely your opinion. It's true that tactical combat requires some 'consideration time', but that doesn't mean that more consideration time is better. You have consideration time even in RT with no pause systems. You just have to be quick. And you know what? Making fast decisions is part of tactics - and if you don't agree with that, at least you should agree that you can have strategies for quick decision-making. For example, "a quick decision is better than the right decision" is a strategy.

 

Computers by default are always faster than the player. If in a continuous time keeping system with deterministic mechanics, such as Round based or AT based, the computer is given free reign, the player will NEVER win. Thus difficulty for these games is always artificial, in the sense that evenly matched characters in the game will always be biased towards computer victory. In evenly matched turn based games, where the results of actions are purely deterministic, the game will always have a fixed outcome (if there is no starting move bias) of draw if the player is an expert. Otherwise the computer will always win. Only in a game which has mechanics with random component to it, can a player have a chance to win.

 

You have some really weird ideas on how AIs work. Very sophisticated AIs can't even win 100% of the time in Chess, where the number of possible actions at any given time is very limited. Creating an AI that can challenge a human player in the kind of RPGs that we're talking about is exceedingly difficult. There's absolutely no need to purposefully make the AI any dumber than it is.

 

For a well designed game TB system automatically implies deep mechanics.

 

Nicely put. I'd like to add that for a well designed game RT system also automatically implies deep mechanics. Also, for a badly designed game neither TB nor RT system imply deep mechanics.

 

This is a two way necessity (TB <-> Deep Mechanics) since if the developer wants to provide deep mechanics to the player, he should also allow the player the time to consider them. Thus a game with deeper mechanics ideally should be TB so thatTS are actually realized within the game.

 

This again.

 

You know, we have this concept know as planning. It's very useful in tactical games - especially in those that don't allow you to spend as much time as you like (or need) pondering your every single move. Planning can be done on many levels: for example, you can plan your movements and actions, you can plan how you will react to different situations you will face on the battlefield and you can plan how you will act when things get too heated and they won't go as planned. It's a completely valid argument to say that this makes RT systems more tactical - precisely because you don't have as much time to think, so preparing and planning is more important.

 

It now makes sense to state that games with large number of party members require a closer attention when each member has a large array of options. Since a battle is dynamic with the enemy also strategizing it is important to adopt to the situation. Now with larger and larger number of teammates it is progressive harder to maintain control of all actions. A game that has so many options but does not require you to use them is of course badly designed since its RS is too high for non-casual games.

 

One significant tactical consideration is choosing how and where to direct your attention. This consideration only exists in RT systems.

 

Real-time games:

 

There is a large video games audience that plays games just to vent off steam. There is also another audience that plays games to vent of steam and feel like a little tactical challenge and a listening to a good story every once in a while. Real Time RPGs are typically oriented for the latter.

 

A great start. You conjured up the impression that RT games are not to be taken seriously, they are just for venting off steam. They don't represent a tactical challenge - they just feel like it.

 

You have an agenda, and it's not very well hidden.

 

Please do not misunderstand: these games DO require strategizing. But not strategizing the way tactical has been defined in this post.

 

Yes, it's all about the definition. You're defining RT games as non-tactical.

 

A game that offers 10 options per action and is real time driven without pause would make no sense to have all these options, because to win you'd either require to cripple the AI severely or have a hand-eye coordination + genius of batman. This is so because the Computer has instantaneous, absolute and precise control of its units, while a human being can meaningfully control one unit at a given point of time. Thus what he can do, the AI can do better. Crippling the AI risks the game becoming casual (although some level of crippling is always necessary).

 

Again, your ideas of how AIs work is fascinating. Let me tell you: it's much easier to create a challenging AI for turn-based games, because the AI needs time to think.

 

A Real time system with Pause introduces some level of fine control over the actions of the units. It now allows to issue orders, all the while synchronizing them periodically thus preparing for long term combat. AT based games that do not use a standard time-keeping devices, lose synchronicity faster since the units end their actions at different times thus forcing tighter control over action. That is why I presume a Round based system becomes necessary.

 

It is interesting to note the apparent inspiration of the idea of a round from the idea of a turn. Round is a one sided time-keeping device that allows greater synchronicity or at least a temporal scale for the player to control his units. Even if individual units are not synchronized, rounds act like mini alarms giving the player a breathing space. The problem with them is of course again the AI and the number of options.

 

Those who play NWN2 see this often. The Units if left with even slight freedom start acting up with their 'in-duh-viduality' by casting nuking spells or AOE spells on their own party, running heedlessly into enemy Area of Free Attack zone or buffing themselves up un-necessarily. It is of course sometimes necessary for Units to act on their own. But since the correct balance between automation and tactics is hard to achieve (or you'd have skynet) these things typically do not work out as expected. The solution to that in IWD was that AI was overall too dumb and relied on strong but small 'organised' (scattered but balanced) mobs instead. But again this is a sub-optimal solution.

 

There are indirect ways to take care of these issues:

 

The first is to exploit the idea of the Round as a time-keeping device. Since Rounds are required to create synchronous and provide 'consideration time', by making everyone's rounds last longer it is possible to make the game more controllable. This automatically reduces the game play speed, which again has to be balanced with gameplay so that it is not overtly slow. Interestingly DA:O to DA2 transition is the travesty of this idea where slow round speeds were replaced with bad AI and restricted spamming to compensate for the lack of tactical combat to achieve faster game mechanics.

 

Another way of dealing with the problem is small parties. With a single player character or two player character parties, it becomes easier to get a handle on the situation and micromanage effectively. Three is where probably the line is crossed although this may be a little preferential.

 

This is complete nonsense. This 'round' is a leftover from D&D that exists in IE games. It has absolutely nothing to do with RT games in general.

 

Conclusion:

 

Thus it makes sense to have both kinds of time keeping devices for games as long as they are being developed for the right audience. Video games are a relatively nascent form of expression and will require a lot of guidance and experience that can only come from developing and playing bad games. It is the ability to identify the exact ingredients and the context of the elements that create poor games that will save gaming as a whole from Bioware and co.

 

Conclusion: an unobjective and disingenious look at two different game mechanics tells us nothing about their relative strengths and weaknesses.

[metiman]

I can immediately see that the Shrek character represents the forces of good and the Caerdon character represents the forces of evil that are now destroying everything that was good about some of the older cRPGs. I hope you are happy with DA2, Caerdon. Because that's what you are begging for with posts like yours. Just remember that as you attempt to push games as far as you can stand into the anti-intellectual, popamole paradigm there are others with even less patience for standing around thinking and they will always prevail. Always. Less intellectually oriented games, all other things being equal, will always be cheaper and easier to make and will always be crowd pleasers. That's all a publisher ever needs to know. Once you venture down that road at all there is no escape from your destination, which is a game with breathtaking graphics which even a monkey could play.

 

Yes, it's all about the definition. You're defining RT games as non-tactical.

 

While I do appreciate that you are some kind of super-genius with an IQ of 210 who can think as fast as a computer, what about the rest of the 99.9999999999999999999% with average intellects who cannot think as fast as a 5 Ghz quad core CPU? I guess they should start their own kickstarter? The idea of real time combat without built in pause mechanics being tactical is ridiculous. If you love popamole combat and can't get enough of clicking pixels to death with your mouse, at least be honest enough to admit it. Or go play against an excellent chess player, but limit your turns to no more than 1 second and allow them to take as much time as they need to make a move. Come back and report the results Mr. I-am-as-fast-a-thinker-as-a-computer. There can be no debate about whether turn-based is a more strategic style of gameplay. It is that pretty much by definition. You can argue all you want about whether it is a fun style of gameplay, but it is clearly more strategic unless you are just fighting without thinking.

 

Oh yeah. And if the developers ever have any question about how the combat in this game should work, just look to the fantasy cRPG with the greatest combat system ever: ToEE. Look no further than Tim Cain. In that sense it's really not that complicated. Once you have replicated that, then we can talk about improvements.

[zlarm]

I can immediately see that the Shrek character represents the forces of good and the Caerdon character represents the forces of evil that are now destroying everything that was good about some of the older cRPGs. I hope you are happy with DA2, Caerdon. Because that's what you are begging for with posts like yours. Just remember that as you attempt to push games as far as you can stand into the anti-intellectual, popamole paradigm there are others with even less patience for standing around thinking and they will always prevail. Always. Less intellectually oriented games, all other things being equal, will always be cheaper and easier to make and will always be crowd pleasers. That's all a publisher ever needs to know. Once you venture down that road at all there is no escape from your destination, which is a game with breathtaking graphics which even a monkey could play.

 

While I do appreciate that you are some kind of super-genius with an IQ of 210 who can think as fast as a computer, what about the rest of the 99.9999999999999999999% with average intellects who cannot think as fast as a 5 Ghz quad core CPU? I guess they should start their own kickstarter? The idea of real time combat without built in pause mechanics being tactical is ridiculous. If you love popamole combat and can't get enough of clicking pixels to death with your mouse, at least be honest enough to admit it. Or go play against an excellent chess player, but limit your turns to no more than 1 second and allow them to take as much time as they need to make a move. Come back and report the results Mr. I-am-as-fast-a-thinker-as-a-computer. There can be no debate about whether turn-based is a more strategic style of gameplay. It is that pretty much by definition. You can argue all you want about whether it is a fun style of gameplay, but it is clearly more strategic unless you are just fighting without thinking.

 

Oh yeah. And if the developers ever have any question about how the combat in this game should work, just look to the fantasy cRPG with the greatest combat system ever: ToEE. Look no further than Tim Cain. In that sense it's really not that complicated. Once you have replicated that, then we can talk about improvements.

 

 

Wow just wow.... I'm speechless. I don't know even know where to start. Are BG, IWD, PS:T (you know most of the games that are inspiring PE) no longer old school RPGs? I guess they're only for us intellectually challenged because clearly there can't be any depth to a game that isn't TB. Its not like theres a WHOLE GENRE of strategy games that are real time (oh wait there is). And it's not like in real life situations you'd have to make decisions in real time (oh wait you would). Oh well realism is for the intellectually challenged. Caedron you are clearly everything that is wrong with the games industry. You should go play DA2 or chess (which you'll obviously lose at cause I'm implying you're dumb).

[ogrezilla]

If you have two chess players and only one is on a timer, the same strategies and tactics will be effective. One just lets you choose more carefully. The time you are given to choose has absolutely no effect on how strategic or tactical a game is. A lot of real time games are probably more forgiving for your choices, but that's the game design not the real time.

Edited October 5, 2012 by ogrezilla

[Caerdon]

(EDIT: Just to make it clear, this is addressed to metiman)

 

Whoah! I was expecting strong reactions, but nothing that dramatic. Forces of evil, huh?

 

So, let me get this straight: because I defend RTwP when it's represented unfairly in a biased essay, I'm now an enemy of intellectual games everywhere? Riiight.

 

I assume you're an intelligent guy (you play intellectually oriented games, after all), so maybe we could actually discuss some specific things that I wrote that bug you? Well, you did quote me once, so I'm going to address that one:

 

I wrote: "Yes, it's all about the definition. You're defining RT games as non-tactical."

You wrote: "The idea of real time combat without built in pause mechanics being tactical is ridiculous."

 

Firstly: I'm not advocating RT systems without pause. The OP was about RTwP. I simply used RT to refer to that, because that was the topic. Sorry for the confusion. Secondly: Your claim is undeniably false. Why? Because real combat is both real-time and without pause - and it's most definitely tactical.

 

Also, you wrote: "There can be no debate about whether turn-based is a more strategic style of gameplay. It is that pretty much by definition." Yes, there can be, and that was largely the reason for my original post (and the definition of "turn-based" has nothing to do with how strategic the game is). I'm not saying that RTwP is more strategic than TB (or vice-versa). I'm saying there are completely valid arguments for both sides - i.e. the issue is very much debatable.

Edited October 5, 2012 by Caerdon

[Caerdon]

Caedron you are clearly everything that is wrong with the games industry. You should go play DA2 or chess (which you'll obviously lose at cause I'm implying you're dumb).

 

Yeah, I'm starting to get that. Come on guys, what do you expect? I'm the Black Sheep of the Obsidian Order, after all.

[cyberarmy]

Pause game every 10 seconds in battles and dont give any orders at real time, there you have turn based battles.

[Bloody Hypocrite]

I an comfortable with rtw/p but I must say TOEE made a very convincing arguement in my mind for jut how amazing tb can be. It kicks a lot of ass.

[TrashMan]

I don't really think there are any weaknesses with turn based combat. Real time with pause has that whole move in real time, fight in turn based thing. So if you get hurt you can move out of range of a mob in real time, while the rest of your party takes it's turns fighting and killing the mob and mobs usually have no way of closing the distance. I think in IWD you can actually do an action for your turn, then immediately after it's done you can move for a few seconds while your turn ends. I think that's a bit weak too.

 

 

High exploitabiltiy and some very slogicly silliy situations are not a weakness?

[Volourn]

RT w/pause vs RT vs TB disucssions are meaningless on the PE forums since they alreadyd ecided on theirs. This is like going onto a Wasteland 2 forum to and starting the same silly debate.

 

 

"I an comfortable with rtw/p but I must say POR2 made a very convincing arguement in my mind for jut how awful tb can be. It is ass. "

 

Fixed.

 

More seriously, TOEE had a great combat system buts its combat sucked ballz barring a handful of actual fun and challenging encounters.

[Vampero]

It's rather late here so I will not reply to this in detail today, but one thing to keep in mind is that Project Eternity will not use "rounds". They were an artifact of translating D&D to RTwP and a system designed from the ground up to be RTwP does not require them.

 

I'm so glad to hear that I don't like rounds.

Edited October 5, 2012 by Vampero

[Captain Shrek]

RT w/pause vs RT vs TB disucssions are meaningless on the PE forums since they alreadyd ecided on theirs. This is like going onto a Wasteland 2 forum to and starting the same silly debate.

 

 

 

Hi volly, my dearest pretty princess.

 

Read the very first line of that post.

 

@caerdon

 

I can't see where all this unnecessary opposition is coming from but I will try to address it at least where I can hope to.

 

For starters, that's an incredibly limited definition for tactics. I am not going to use that definition.

As I see it I am using the military definition of strategy and tactics: Strategy as grand scale decisionmaking and tactics as small scale resource limited decision making. Feel free to tell me what is a better definition.

 

A completely useless concept. It might be relevant when talking about IE games, but here we're discussing things in general, right?

 

There is this thing called reading comprehension that allows you to link between different parts of a textual study to see how they interact with each other. I believe that I have included very clearly a reason why there may be rounds in a game that is real time. Check it out!

 

Now, this here is purely your opinion. It's true that tactical combat requires some 'consideration time', but that doesn't mean that more consideration time is better. You have consideration time even in RT with no pause systems. You just have to be quick. And you know what? Making fast decisions is part of tactics - and if you don't agree with that, at least you should agree that you can have strategies for quick decision-making. For example, "a quick decision is better than the right decision" is a strategy.

 

Your enthusiasm to bash me seems to get better of you. At no point one length of consideration time has been considered better than others. I am clearly allowing that different people are attuned to different kind of games and thus games should be tailored to suit their audience.

 

You have some really weird ideas on how AIs work. Very sophisticated AIs can't even win 100% of the time in Chess, where the number of possible actions at any given time is very limited. Creating an AI that can challenge a human player in the kind of RPGs that we're talking about is exceedingly difficult. There's absolutely no need to purposefully make the AI any dumber than it is.

 

Weird ideas your sweet little heinie. Are you still in the 20th century? We have moved o baby.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human-computer_chess_matches

 

 

One significant tactical consideration is choosing how and where to direct your attention. This consideration only exists in RT systems.

 

uh oh. Hold action.

[Volourn]

"Hi volly, my dearest pretty princess.

 

Read the very first line of that post."

 

This thread belongs in General RPG Discussion not on a game forum dedicated to a game that has alreayd decided on its combat system. But, hey, let's go argue on WL2 forums about rt vs tb.

 

P.S. I like tb combat but it's silly to discuss it when it is meaningless here.

 

Bottom line is tb and rt w/p have strengths and weaknesses. *shrugs* I've enjoyed games with tb combat and hated games with tb combat. I enjoyed games with rt combat and hated games with rt combat. *double shrug*

[Captain Shrek]

"Hi volly, my dearest pretty princess.

 

Read the very first line of that post."

 

This thread belongs in General RPG Discussion not on a game forum dedicated to a game that has alreayd decided on its combat system. But, hey, let's go argue on WL2 forums about rt vs tb.

 

P.S. I like tb combat but it's silly to discuss it when it is meaningless here.

 

Bottom line is tb and rt w/p have strengths and weaknesses. *shrugs* I've enjoyed games with tb combat and hated games with tb combat. I enjoyed games with rt combat and hated games with rt combat. *double shrug*

Better yet, volly I assume your favorite combat type is from DA2, am I right or a mi Right?

[Volourn]

L0L But, no u r wong.

[Captain Shrek]

L0L But, no u r wong.

 

I admit defeat. Now let's be friends!

[metiman]

(EDIT: Just to make it clear, this is addressed to metiman)

 

Whoah! I was expecting strong reactions, but nothing that dramatic. Forces of evil, huh?

 

So, let me get this straight: because I defend RTwP when it's represented unfairly in a biased essay, I'm now an enemy of intellectual games everywhere? Riiight.

 

To be fair you didn't actually say RTwP or RTwaP. You said RT, which is very different. RT combat cannot be truly strategic. RTwaP can be because it isn't all that different from TB. In either case I can take a half hour to consider my next move if I want. While I think TB is inherently a superior system at least in terms of strategy (not always in terms of fun), I don't have a major problem with RTwaP unless it invariably ends up leading to things like cooldowns.

 

I assume you're an intelligent guy (you play intellectually oriented games, after all), so maybe we could actually discuss some specific things that I wrote that bug you? Well, you did quote me once, so I'm going to address that one:

 

I wrote: "Yes, it's all about the definition. You're defining RT games as non-tactical."

You wrote: "The idea of real time combat without built in pause mechanics being tactical is ridiculous."

 

Firstly: I'm not advocating RT systems without pause. The OP was about RTwP. I simply used RT to refer to that, because that was the topic. Sorry for the confusion. Secondly: Your claim is undeniably false. Why? Because real combat is both real-time and without pause - and it's most definitely tactical.

 

I don't think it is mostly. I think it's mostly chaos and people reacting to immediate threats and trying not to get killed. I don't think you really have much time for intellectual pondering in a real fight of any kind. I think it's usually more instinct or muscle memory than tactics. So true RT without pause is the most realistic kind of combat (as is a first person POV). It is not the most strategic however. In fact I think it is difficult to argue that it is strategic at all when you don't even have time to think.

 

Also, you wrote: "There can be no debate about whether turn-based is a more strategic style of gameplay. It is that pretty much by definition." Yes, there can be, and that was largely the reason for my original post (and the definition of "turn-based" has nothing to do with how strategic the game is). I'm not saying that RTwP is more strategic than TB (or vice-versa). I'm saying there are completely valid arguments for both sides - i.e. the issue is very much debatable.

 

Actually I still don't think there can be any debate about that. True RT is not really strategic at all. RTwaP is definitely strategic, but it lacks certain elements that make it somewhat less strategic. Which is I think why some of us at least slightly prefer ToEE combat to BG2 combat. There are a few more elements of strategy involved with TB than RTwP.