Combat is now mostly a dull chore

[Multihog]

 

 

 

I find the combat to be a marked improvement. Now the combat in PoE1, THAT was dull and a chore.

Could you elaborate? I can perhaps see the "chore" part, as combat required more of the player's attention in the original. But, since most fights in Deadfire do not reward or punish the player for paying attention and actually using tactics, I'm failing to see how most combats are actually interesting in Deadfire?

 

With abilities and health regen between fights, individual encounters can be more dangerous. Because of this system, I try to punch above my weight far more often, seeking out red skull fights and seeing if I can pull them off. It also means I don't have ot conserve abilities as a resource, so I can comfortably steamroll trash mobs quickly. All the fights in PoE1 felt like they just dragged on. Resource management isn't fun. Playing with abilities and spells to solve an encounter is.

 

 

I see it 180^o differently.  Having to manage your health resources was a challenge and that's what made it more fun.  Seeing how long you could push into a dungeon before you were forced to fall back and rest.  What you describe as "fun" is completely mindlessness.  About the only resource you have to worry about is the 3 injuries before death.  Big whup. 

 

As for going for those "red skull" fights, you could do that too, in PoE1.  It's called reloading, for crying out loud! 

 

It was a challenge, but any joy that could've possibly come out of that challenge was marred by the fact that running out of camping supplies meant you'd have to suffer through numerous lengthy loading screens (despite having the game on SSD.) Fortunately, PoE2 loads much faster, so it wouldn't an issue this time around. 

[Crucis]

 

My problem comes in a lack of tuning for your level and a complete lack of end game encounters.  With the current system on Vet and POTD in fights of my level I should HAVE to do more then let my pre-determined AI abilities play out (which has casters just autoing) at maximum game speed since I will simply obliterate the enemies with no thought. 

 

I agree with what you said here. After completing the game, I was surprised that there wasn't an adra dragon or Llengrath type battle to really make things interesting.

 

On Vet, the only encounters I had trouble with were against fampyrs and that's cause they used MY party members against me :D

 

Oh well, time for a PotD playthrough to see how that goes.

 

 

I never really liked the Adrea Dragon fight.  It always seemed too cheesy.   I preferred the dragon in Hylea's temple because it was a fight that you could win "honestly" without resorting to cheesy tactics.  At least that's how it felt to me.

 

As for fampyrs, yeah, any time in a fight where one side starts charming the other's combatants, it's going to be tough ... for one side or the other.  It's one of the reasons why I like having a paladin around with the Aegis of Loyalty ability to uncharm party members.  Of course, one has to keep the pally from being charmed.  And it also helps to keep the pally alive too.  A KO'd pally helps no one.

[tela2k]

Those are all legit points, but as a rest-spammer coming from BG2, I never even thought about this. 

 

Yeah BG2 is a completely different system from PoE1 and PoE2. Resting isn't really limited in any way (except for possibly having to murder some hobgoblins.) BG is mostly just about knowing the priest and mage spell books in and out, so you know which spells you'll want to memorize for the coming fights. Which is something I love about the old IE games. So many choices, so many ways to do things. Or well, ermh, when in doubt chain contingency abi-dalzims, abi-dalzims, abi-dalzims. Or protection from X scroll. So much cheese too.

[Crucis]

 

 

 

 

I find the combat to be a marked improvement. Now the combat in PoE1, THAT was dull and a chore.

Could you elaborate? I can perhaps see the "chore" part, as combat required more of the player's attention in the original. But, since most fights in Deadfire do not reward or punish the player for paying attention and actually using tactics, I'm failing to see how most combats are actually interesting in Deadfire?

 

With abilities and health regen between fights, individual encounters can be more dangerous. Because of this system, I try to punch above my weight far more often, seeking out red skull fights and seeing if I can pull them off. It also means I don't have ot conserve abilities as a resource, so I can comfortably steamroll trash mobs quickly. All the fights in PoE1 felt like they just dragged on. Resource management isn't fun. Playing with abilities and spells to solve an encounter is.

 

 

I see it 180^o differently.  Having to manage your health resources was a challenge and that's what made it more fun.  Seeing how long you could push into a dungeon before you were forced to fall back and rest.  What you describe as "fun" is completely mindlessness.  About the only resource you have to worry about is the 3 injuries before death.  Big whup. 

 

As for going for those "red skull" fights, you could do that too, in PoE1.  It's called reloading, for crying out loud! 

 

It was a challenge, but any joy that could've possibly come out of that challenge was marred by the fact that running out of camping supplies meant you'd have to suffer through numerous lengthy loading screens (despite having the game on SSD.) Fortunately, PoE2 loads much faster, so it wouldn't an issue this time around. 

 

 

I was thinking more about HP and Endurance, rather than camping supplies. 

 

Frankly, I don't think that limited "camping supplies" was that great an idea.  As long as you had a good supply of food and drink, anything else would be a luxury that shouldn't have been strictly necessary to rest.  What would these "other things" be?  A bed roll?  You really only "need" one per person, and I'd assume that that's just party of any adventurer's kit.  Fire wood?  Well, maybe if you really need a fire in a dungeon, perhaps.  But outside in the great outdoors, you shouldn't have to be concerned with packing firewood.  Keep your supply of firewood for dungeons and just go scavenge some in the woods around you (if there are any, etc.).    It seems a bit silly that there should have been such a constraining limit on camping supplies, when you think about how much anyone could carry with them, plus how one can get along with out a lot of things if pressed.

 

It's also kind of silly when you think of all the stuff you're allowed to carry in your "stash" to then be limited in "camping supplies" so severely.

 

On the flip side, I found that having a limited ability to rest prevented rest spamming so that you could fight a battle and blow your entire memory of spells on a single battle, then go rest up before moving on to the next battle.  To me, limited camping supplies encouraged a greater reliance on physical combat as well as spell casting classes whose abilities weren't rest-limited.  Of course, this wouldn't prevent some people from just walking all the way back to an inn to rest and rest-spam that way.  But I would never do it.  To me, it was more ethical to roleplay my spellcasters and try to work within the resting limitations.  It made it important to conserve spells for when I really needed to use them, and rely on my physical combatants to carry most battles, as well as relying on their endurance to get me as far as I could go on a single "tank" of endurance "gas".

[laviathons]

I also like the battle in Deadfire more. I'm playing on Classic and found the normal battles pretty easy so I understand. I think the problem is that they indicate the quest difficulty using the skulls so you have control and avoid running into the hard quest or battles. Back in Poe 1, there was chance of running into really tough battles because you were a little under leveled and there was no indicator. In Deadfire when i breezing through and want a greater challenge, I give the red skull quest areas a try and holy crap, was it hard. it was challenging and felt satisfying to complete. One of the bosses i had to fight, I had to blow everything, almost all my cooldowns, per rest items and still wipe a couple times. After a while i did it with two casualties. So if your finding it too easy I suggest trying the red skulls quest for a challenge, that is what they are there for. Another tip is to play with less characters.

 

I did not like the combat in poe 1, relied too much on efficiency. and can only rest 4 times. just makes you run all the way back to town to use the tavern and buy more resting supples. I found that to be more of a chore.

[Teacher]

I never really liked the Adrea Dragon fight.  It always seemed too cheesy.   I preferred the dragon in Hylea's temple because it was a fight that you could win "honestly" without resorting to cheesy tactics.  At least that's how it felt to me.

 

As for fampyrs, yeah, any time in a fight where one side starts charming the other's combatants, it's going to be tough ... for one side or the other.  It's one of the reasons why I like having a paladin around with the Aegis of Loyalty ability to uncharm party members.  Of course, one has to keep the pally from being charmed.  And it also helps to keep the pally alive too.  A KO'd pally helps no one.

 

 

It doesn't have to be the exact fight, I just wanted to say that it would have been good to have a somewhat lengthy challenge region, like the endless paths, where combat is more optimized towards higher level/geared parties. Like a place where you can go "alright, I'm as good as I can be... Time to take on the mother of all dungeons".

 

It's natural for the main quest path to be optimized for parties that aren't fully geared/leveled since not everyone does all the sidequests etc. But having some of the harder type zones makes it appealing for people who do everything :D

[Lokithecat]

Looking at the differences in PoE 1 and 2 for comparison, it's like we've taken PoE 1, and added a free, automatic rest between every fight.  In order for any encounter to have any sort of impact, it needs to wound one of your characters, otherwise you are ready for the next fight.  From a balancing perspective, that does mean they are trying to hit a very small window, difficult enough to have a reasonable chance to wound one of your characters, not so hard that you're running a Total Party Kill.  Even if you end up getting a wound per character, per fight, Resting (as stands) is fairly meaningless to repair the damage.

 

With the difficulties in balancing the difficulty levels not yet worked out, and the vast difference in player skill (Not implying that some players are unskilled, but the difference between a 'causal' player, and someone that min maxes and has a highly efficient / tweaked party) I have problems seeing how they are ever going to hit that sweet spot, with the current system. 

 

Perhaps higher difficulty levels need different mechanics to some degree; on Veteran you don't regain your abilities per encounter, on PoTD you don't regain abilities and have a PoE1 HP system of health, and on these modes you get some limited number of Rests.  Even something like this, or having the food / inn buffs wearing off quicker, would only 'slow down' someone by forcing them to leave the area and return, unless the dungeon / fights respawn when you leave, which really doesn't have the PoE feel.

[tdphys]

I very much agree with the OP....

 

My Solution (For at least Path Of the Damned):

 

Every attack has a chance of doing injury that rises with miss->graze->hit->crit. (this is the tunable part, of course)

 

No limit on injuries (no death dependent injury),  but resting with decent food only gets rid of 1 injury / rest .   Sleeping in a tavern clears injuries.

 

Being knocked down in combat with 3+ injuries is instant death.

 

 

This will make

 

#1  the pre encounters leading up to a final one relevant, and even easy ones will

be meaningful in order to avoid graze injuries for no reason.

 

#2  make the infinite healing a little less powerfull, as long combats will increase chances of incurring injuries.

However, healing will be circumstantially more important, when somebodies about to die, for example... 

 

#3  make the game more like dwarf fortress,  which is nirvana.

 

On POD  I'd say 2% graze chance 4% hit chance  8% crit chance.

Veterans half those values.

 

Normal, forget it...  that's story mode in this game ( unless you try  and punch too high, of course)

Edited May 18, 2018 by tdphys

[Multihog]

^ Random injuries from getting hit? Not a fan of that. How exactly do you avoid getting hit in this game? It'll be just pure RNG. Not good. It's not some Dark Souls, where you can dodge hits with good mechanical skill. It's a game of the dice. 

Edited May 18, 2018 by Multihog

[tdphys]

The whole combat is based on RNG....  that's what the whole deflection/accuracy mechanic is. 

Edited May 18, 2018 by tdphys

[Multihog]

The whole games is based on RNG....  that's what the whole deflection/accuracy mechanic is.  

Sure, but getting random injuries just from getting hit doubles it. It's like taking random, undodgeable homing bullets in an FPS game that cripple your aim just to make the game harder. There are ways to introduce consequence and difficulty. This isn't it. This is simple random inconvenience and annoyance that's outside of the player's influence other than by upgrading armor—and even then you're at the mercy of RNG.

Edited May 18, 2018 by Multihog

[whiskiz]

And I don't think a difficulty spike is going to address this.

 

I think the decision to move spells and abilities to be entirely per encounter has doomed this aspect of the game. Added to this is the removal of long-term health, the focus purely on wounds and removal of limited camping supplies.

 

These changes together have led to two big problems.

 

The first is that bite-sized encounters no longer matter. They are just wasting the player's time. Any fight that does not threaten to knock one of my characters out is meaningless. Because these fights no longer drain meaningful resources from the player, they no longer have any long term effect. And for players who take any effort to study the game's systems, the overwhelming majority of encounters in the game are going to fall into this category.

 

Think back to PoE1 with the temple below the first village, Gilded Vale. It was one of the first difficult areas many players would encounter, and yet no single fight in that temple is a maximum effort "boss fight". This kind of dungeon crawl cannot exist in Deadfire.

 

Upping the difficulty isn't going to change this, it's actually only going to make even more of a chore. All it means is that I go from using almost none of my abilities in these kinds of fights to having to use more and more of them. So long as my characters aren't getting knocked out, I don't have to worry about optimizing my performance in the majority of fights.

 

The second problem is that, even when the game throws a tough fight at you, requiring you to burn per rest items, empowers and suffer wounds, the cost of resting afterwards is so minimal that it's a no-brainer. Food is cheap. Camping is unlimited and risk free. The only kind of "agony" a player might feel in whether to rest or not rest is perhaps if they will burn nice inn bonuses or previous food bonuses.

 

It's a shame because I greatly appreciate the other aspects of the game such as expanded factions, better companion interaction, better thieving options and on and on. But combat, which is a core focus of the game, feels like a repetitive grind for all but the absolutely hardest of fights.

 

Per encounter was the best thing they ever did, it's just terrible balancing on release. They said they will be working on it post release, especially PotD.

 

Now that you get to actually use all the awesomeness and fun of your characters every fight, instead of having to auto attack or use low lvl spells 80% of combat and then faceroll boss encounters with everything else (amazing gameplay..) but it just needs to be balanced properly - so we actually need to use everything every fight, just to get by.

 

The per rest in PoE 1 was a meaningless, tedious gimmick since you could go rest any time, almost anywhere. It added absolutely nothing and restricted the use of most of each character most of the time, again for no good reason since we could just tediously go and rest at any time.

 

I will never understand the few of you desperately clinging to the per rest system, with the above problems. Obsidian really dropped the ball on balance in this one and someway somehow you guys twist this into it being because of per encounter stuff. Per encounter would (will) be absolutely fine - when it's balanced properly. I can't wait to get to use all of my characters all of the fights, but im more looking forward to needing to, just to get by on PotD.

 

As i said in another post - let's take this mechanic out and put it in a game with similar combat - say Diablo. Imagine in Diablo 3 if you could only use each skill 3 or 4 times, then you had to run back to town. How is that a good mechanic? How is that fun? If you maybe said (because it's about all you can say) that it's a different genre, then what makes a bad mechanic like that fit in this genre all of a sudden? Just because it's what people do in this type of game? Just because the games this is based off did it? *rolls eyes*

 

I personally believe anyone preferring per rest is purely going off nostalgia, and definitely has no idea about good, fun game design. Developers of a gaming company saw the logic and changed it for a good reason.

 

I still can't wait to get this when they balance the game and PotD properly, just because of the per encounter system.

Edited May 18, 2018 by whiskiz

[Koth]

^ Random injuries from getting hit? Not a fan of that. How exactly do you avoid getting hit in this game? It'll be just pure RNG. Not good. It's not some Dark Souls, where you can dodge hits with good mechanical skill. It's a game of the dice. 

Yes, not a fan of "random" injuries... but I like the rest of his idea... Imagine the same as the current system (injuries from knock-outs, traps & scripted events), with his idea of only clearing one injury per rest - Rests in taverns, and on your ship (for while you're out exploring) clears all injuries. I like it...

[Multihog]

 

^ Random injuries from getting hit? Not a fan of that. How exactly do you avoid getting hit in this game? It'll be just pure RNG. Not good. It's not some Dark Souls, where you can dodge hits with good mechanical skill. It's a game of the dice. 

Yes, not a fan of "random" injuries... but I like the rest of his idea... Imagine the same as the current system (injuries from knock-outs, traps & scripted events), with his idea of only clearing one injury per rest - Rests in taverns, and on your ship (for while you're out exploring) clears all injuries. I like it...

 

Yeah, I can get behind that. I'm all for resting in taverns granting greater benefits (more than just the stat bonuses.) Gives them more purpose.

Edited May 18, 2018 by Multihog

[tdphys]

 

The whole games is based on RNG....  that's what the whole deflection/accuracy mechanic is.  

Sure, but getting random injuries just from getting hit doubles it. It's like taking random, undodgeable homing bullets in an FPS game that cripple your aim just to make the game harder. There are ways to introduce consequence and difficulty. This isn't it. This is simple random inconvenience and annoyance that's outside of the player's influence other than by upgrading armor—and even then you're at the mercy of RNG.

 

 

The consequence and difficulty comes from mitigating the chance of injury.  It makes in combat buffing important,  it makes in combat healing more important.   You might need to make the injuries a little less... injurious,  but  I think in this sense it increases consequence of actions ( where healing and per encounter actions have reduced them).

 

However,  I get what your saying that if it's low probability and somehow the computer rolls 3 graze injuries in a row, that would leave someone fuming. 

 

Dota 2 has an interesting mechanic where each hit modifies RNG chance, so you're guaranteed a "random chance" in a certain numbere of hits, something similar could be done. IE , 5 crits increase injury chance.

[Multihog]

 

 

The whole games is based on RNG....  that's what the whole deflection/accuracy mechanic is.  

Sure, but getting random injuries just from getting hit doubles it. It's like taking random, undodgeable homing bullets in an FPS game that cripple your aim just to make the game harder. There are ways to introduce consequence and difficulty. This isn't it. This is simple random inconvenience and annoyance that's outside of the player's influence other than by upgrading armor—and even then you're at the mercy of RNG.

 

 

The consequence and difficulty comes from mitigating the chance of injury.  It makes in combat buffing important,  it makes in combat healing more important.   You might need to make the injuries a little less... injurious,  but  I think in this sense it increases consequence of actions ( where healing and per encounter actions have reduced them).

 

However,  I get what your saying that if it's low probability and somehow the computer rolls 3 graze injuries in a row, that would leave someone fuming. 

 

Dota 2 has an interesting mechanic where each hit modifies RNG chance, so you're guaranteed a "random chance" in a certain numbere of hits, something similar could be done. IE , 5 crits increase injury chance.

 

I still see that as a bad thing because it would pigeonhole the player into always beginning combat with the same sequence of buffs. It would undermine more aggressive openings and other playstyles by necessitating defensive buffing or running the risk of suffering random injuries. I simply fail to see how that would be a good addition in any way, especially with the game not allowing pre-buffing or long-term buffing. 

Edited May 18, 2018 by Multihog

[Koth]

Better yet... make the removal of injuries require medical supplies... And more than just 1... maybe like 5 per injury... one injury each.. 25 medical supplies...

 

 

^ Random injuries from getting hit? Not a fan of that. How exactly do you avoid getting hit in this game? It'll be just pure RNG. Not good. It's not some Dark Souls, where you can dodge hits with good mechanical skill. It's a game of the dice. 

Yes, not a fan of "random" injuries... but I like the rest of his idea... Imagine the same as the current system (injuries from knock-outs, traps & scripted events), with his idea of only clearing one injury per rest - Rests in taverns, and on your ship (for while you're out exploring) clears all injuries. I like it...

 

Yeah, I can get behind that. I'm all for resting in taverns granting greater benefits (more than just the stat bonuses.) Gives them more purpose.

 

[cokane]

 

Per encounter was the best thing they ever did, it's just terrible balancing on release. They said they will be working on it post release, especially PotD.

 

Now that you get to actually use all the awesomeness and fun of your characters every fight, instead of having to auto attack or use low lvl spells 80% of combat and then faceroll boss encounters with everything else (amazing gameplay..) but it just needs to be balanced properly - so we actually need to use everything every fight, just to get by.

 

 

I'm going to have to disagree with this characterization of how dungeon crawls went down in much of the original game. A number of dungeons did not have typical trash mobs leading up to one final boss fight. As I said in the OP, the temple of Eothas is one example. Another pair of dungeons like this are the catacombs below Copperlane and the Ciant Lis (sp?) ruins. Neither dungeon has a traditional "final boss". Moreover, even dungeons/sequences that did have a true final fight such as Raedric's hold also had several fight where you most definitely had to engage at a higher level even if not total max effort, such as the animancer in his dungeon, some of the guards on the rooftop areas, should you chose to engage in those fights.

 

And again, I think you should trust me on this. The "fun" of seeing "all the awesomeness of your characters" in *every single* fight is not going to be a sustainable kind of fun, at least imo.

[tdphys]

 

 

 

The whole games is based on RNG....  that's what the whole deflection/accuracy mechanic is.  

Sure, but getting random injuries just from getting hit doubles it. It's like taking random, undodgeable homing bullets in an FPS game that cripple your aim just to make the game harder. There are ways to introduce consequence and difficulty. This isn't it. This is simple random inconvenience and annoyance that's outside of the player's influence other than by upgrading armor—and even then you're at the mercy of RNG.

 

 

The consequence and difficulty comes from mitigating the chance of injury.  It makes in combat buffing important,  it makes in combat healing more important.   You might need to make the injuries a little less... injurious,  but  I think in this sense it increases consequence of actions ( where healing and per encounter actions have reduced them).

 

However,  I get what your saying that if it's low probability and somehow the computer rolls 3 graze injuries in a row, that would leave someone fuming. 

 

Dota 2 has an interesting mechanic where each hit modifies RNG chance, so you're guaranteed a "random chance" in a certain numbere of hits, something similar could be done. IE , 5 crits increase injury chance.

 

I still see that as a bad thing because it would pigeonhole the player into always beginning combat with the same sequence of buffs. It would undermine more aggressive openings and other playstyles by necessitating defensive buffing or running the risk of suffering random injuries. I simply fail to see how that would be a good addition in any way, especially with the game not allowing pre-buffing or long-term buffing. 

 

 

The same mechanics still exist currently,  either buffing is meaningful or its not,  whether or not that means more crits for you or less grazes for the enemy (currently)  or more injuries (suggested).    I think its the magnitude of the injury that puts you off,  and that can be mitigated by making injuries not autokill and maybe nerfing them a bit.   The most important thing is somehow adding more elements to the current combat that are meaningful for the next one.  

 

I'm also a big fan of making combat results thematically meangingful, rather than having an auto health bar go up and down,  injuries are far more interesting.   It links the combat to the story  to have your character push through a broken rib and a bruised eye to finish of a deep dungeon, rather than auto healing each time.

 

How about every time a character suffers 3 crits,  ( with 3 hits being 1 crit and 3 grazes being 1 hit )  =  one injury?

Edited May 18, 2018 by tdphys

[tdphys]

I killed

 

 

 

Per encounter was the best thing they ever did, it's just terrible balancing on release. They said they will be working on it post release, especially PotD.

 

Now that you get to actually use all the awesomeness and fun of your characters every fight, instead of having to auto attack or use low lvl spells 80% of combat and then faceroll boss encounters with everything else (amazing gameplay..) but it just needs to be balanced properly - so we actually need to use everything every fight, just to get by.

 

 

I'm going to have to disagree with this characterization of how dungeon crawls went down in much of the original game. A number of dungeons did not have typical trash mobs leading up to one final boss fight. As I said in the OP, the temple of Eothas is one example. Another pair of dungeons like this are the catacombs below Copperlane and the Ciant Lis (sp?) ruins. Neither dungeon has a traditional "final boss". Moreover, even dungeons/sequences that did have a true final fight such as Raedric's hold also had several fight where you most definitely had to engage at a higher level even if not total max effort, such as the animancer in his dungeon, some of the guards on the rooftop areas, should you chose to engage in those fights.

 

And again, I think you should trust me on this. The "fun" of seeing "all the awesomeness of your characters" in *every single* fight is not going to be a sustainable kind of fun, at least imo.

 

 

My most memorable moment in POE1 was finishing off the ogres in stalwart for white march at level 5 or 6,  and having Eder die on me in the process.   Took quite a few saves, but since resting wasn't allowed, it was much more satisfying, and added meaning to the companion death.   I was really scraping the bottom of the barrel by the end, but each ogre encounter definitely took a measured approach to conserve spells/abilities, with not much left for the end fight.

Edited May 18, 2018 by tdphys

[Alienka]

I'm also a big fan of making combat results thematically meangingful, rather than having an auto health bar go up and down,  injuries are far more interesting.   It links the combat to the story  to have your character push through a broken rib and a bruised eye to finish of a deep dungeon, rather than auto healing each time.

 

How about every time a character suffers 3 crits,  ( with 3 hits being 1 crit and 3 grazes being 1 hit )  =  one injury?

Maybe, having low health at the end of combat could result in an injury? Fatigue would be thematic.

[Tigranes]

Yup, absolutely. When you do "awesome stuff" every battle it stops being awesome, it becomes pointless and boring. No matter how good a fireball looks I'm not going to be entranced by it 800 times.

 

What you really remember, what really has you on the edge of your seat, is when only your wizard is left standing in BG1 and out of arrows, you're firing off every consumable you ever found in your inventory at the hulking enemy hoping your stoneskin won't run out. It's when the dungeon has bled your health and spells dry, and you're trying to figure out how to take on that last group of shadows with only two scrolls of Fan the Flames - instead of fighting every single fight with the same abilities over and over again. It's when you think you've just about taken out this tough enemy, and then they roll a crit on your guy and smash him to pieces, pulling off a heroic victory for the wrong side.

 

That's what you remember about great games years down the line, and inspire you to fire it up again and try all sorts of different characters; in the case of POE1, at least you have the starting bear to look forward to, or trying out Eothas' Temple with just two party members, or the big dragon fights.

 

If I wanted to just fireball everything 800 times and go 'awesome!', I could play on easy mode, I could console myself resources, I could play more action-based games. None of that would be a crime against nature, that's fine if that's what somebody wants to do. But in a small niche of CRPGs that are supposed to be a little more about tactical challenges, I'd like the game design to still focus on that.

Edited May 18, 2018 by Tigranes

[Multihog]

 

 

 

 

The whole games is based on RNG....  that's what the whole deflection/accuracy mechanic is.  

Sure, but getting random injuries just from getting hit doubles it. It's like taking random, undodgeable homing bullets in an FPS game that cripple your aim just to make the game harder. There are ways to introduce consequence and difficulty. This isn't it. This is simple random inconvenience and annoyance that's outside of the player's influence other than by upgrading armor—and even then you're at the mercy of RNG.

 

 

The consequence and difficulty comes from mitigating the chance of injury.  It makes in combat buffing important,  it makes in combat healing more important.   You might need to make the injuries a little less... injurious,  but  I think in this sense it increases consequence of actions ( where healing and per encounter actions have reduced them).

 

However,  I get what your saying that if it's low probability and somehow the computer rolls 3 graze injuries in a row, that would leave someone fuming. 

 

Dota 2 has an interesting mechanic where each hit modifies RNG chance, so you're guaranteed a "random chance" in a certain numbere of hits, something similar could be done. IE , 5 crits increase injury chance.

 

I still see that as a bad thing because it would pigeonhole the player into always beginning combat with the same sequence of buffs. It would undermine more aggressive openings and other playstyles by necessitating defensive buffing or running the risk of suffering random injuries. I simply fail to see how that would be a good addition in any way, especially with the game not allowing pre-buffing or long-term buffing. 

 

 

The same mechanics still exist currently,  either buffing is meaningful or its not,  whether or not that means more crits for you or less grazes for the enemy (currently)  or more injuries (suggested).    I think its the magnitude of the injury that puts you off,  and that can be mitigated by making injuries not autokill and maybe nerfing them a bit.   The most important thing is somehow adding more elements to the current combat that are meaningful for the next one.  

 

I'm also a big fan of making combat results thematically meangingful, rather than having an auto health bar go up and down,  injuries are far more interesting.   It links the combat to the story  to have your character push through a broken rib and a bruised eye to finish of a deep dungeon, rather than auto healing each time.

 

How about every time a character suffers 3 crits,  ( with 3 hits being 1 crit and 3 grazes being 1 hit )  =  one injury?

 

Yes, I prefer the current state. 

 

It's not the magnitude; it's the whole idea of receiving random injuries from normal blows in a game where fights are spent mostly standing still and trading blows. You're doing nothing more than introducing yet another RNG-element which the player can only minimally influence by casting defensive buffs and upgrading armor. It adds nothing more than a redundant inconvenience of an RNG-lottery into the game. It adds no tactical depth whatsoever. There's no "fun" here nor does it incorporate any interesting gameplay. All it adds is a potential annoyance that occurs every now and then, that the player then has to deal with or be hindered by. 

 

The only counterplay to that is casting defensive buffs and equipping armor, both of which you will probably do anyway. So all your suggestion essentially adds is a chance to receive random injuries for the sake or what? Artificial difficulty? Artificially increased use for medical supplies in order to remove the injuries? I see no gameplay added whatsoever unless you count opening the resting menu and removing the random injuries gameplay. 

 

Adding elements is one thing, but adding for the sake of adding is not conducive to good combat.

 

As for your second point, yes, I can see how that makes sense from a realism standpoint; I mean, you should get injured in combat. But I'm afraid it doesn't contribute enough in terms of interesting gameplay to warrant this change.

 

(IMO. I'm not trying to assert absolute truth here. These are all just ideas after all)

Edited May 18, 2018 by Multihog

[Fenr]

I think the combat could be really fun if most of the encounters could easily kill you. Now it's not the case even on PotD. Also while I really liked the health and endurance system from the first game, it would not work on this. Resting is too cheap and there are no big dungeons where the attrition would settle in. I think the best thing they could do regarding single encounters is reduce the healing each character can take to 3-5 times their max health, or something along those lines.

[Zagadka]

Might be better if combat were more regular, which could offset hte whole per-encounter and no-camping-limit...