Saber system suggestions

[Vruki Salet]

Anakin, admittedly a sith by then but still jedi-trained, blocked a shot from behind very easily in Ep. III. Also in Ep. II many if not all of the surviving jedi at the Geonosis arena must have been able block bolts from behind since they were surrounded and greatly outnumbered.

 

I think saberists should kick gunners a**es. Since it can't be way too unbalanced I guess make saberists vulnerable to being shot simultaneously by several gunners. That way gunners can bring them down with teamwork.

[MisterM]

Yes, i agree, too.

Its nearly impossible to kill a jedi with the e11 or the standard repeater fire even when there are 3 gunners firing (what i have seen on the server)

[JRHockney*]

Extra damage for crouch? Yowza that's a pity for the poor guy who gets hit when he happens to be crouching for a perfectly legit reason, like swinging low. If there absolutely has to be a disincentive to crouch then make it something more spread out, that only hurts much if you overdo crouching. How about lowering DP a little for each .5 second spent crouched? After all, crouching and being crouched could be considered akward physical acts/conditions which could inhibit your ability to dodge stuff. Crouch-walking should lower dp even more. It's like duck walking and have you ever tried to do that? It's very clumsy and tiring. (FPS characters can all do it like Chuck Berry though lol.)

 

A half-second wait for the extra damage? Hmm. Maybe. But one of the biggest reasons for having the crouch penalty is to keep slowbouncers from just automatically pressing crouch without looking at what their opponent is doing. If we were to do it like this, we would have to not have the .5 sec wait in slow bounce.

 

Btw, I'm still a bit concerned that running is not penalized enough against people who are good at it even with the double damage it does to hit them. I suggest the following to make it balanced:

1. All parries on runners cause slowbounces

2. attack parries on runners cause big mishaps (since its really hard to attack parry them anyways).

[Vruki Salet]

Not extra damage from a hit, an automatic small decrease in dp for every .5 seconds ( or whatever time period seems best). Make it .25 or something. I almost put that, I don't care.

 

Runners are penalized enough I think. Double damage is a big deal.

 

I understand that standing and duelling is encouraged because it looks good and helps avoid some of the lame style of sabering that grew up around baseJKA, and that you want to discourage crouch spamming because it's a block against something (is it kicks still?) but I think you need to keep a limit on penalties you impose on legitimate moves. Beware of too much social engineering by making harsh penalties just to force people to fight in a style you think coolest.

[JRHockney*]

Runners are penalized enough I think. Double damage is a big deal.

 

I don't know. Try fighting RP whos a master of hit and retreat and tell me the same thing. Unless their good, they dont do much damage, but either way they are really hard to catch and kill compared to a walker Many times they end up running circles around you avoiding your saber and scoring back hits. My idea makes it a bit easier to stop them.

[Vruki Salet]

Good for him then if that's his style. The existing penalty is still enough to keep the majority of people from adopting a running style, unlike baseJKA where it's the norm. You don't need to make more penalties.

[JRHockney*]

Good for him then if that's his style. The existing penalty is still enough to keep the majority of people from adopting a running style, unlike baseJKA where it's the norm. You don't need to make more penalties.

 

Well, we'll have to see what happens as the Enhanced community starts getting bigger. RP would still be hard to kill even with these added penalties given that these penalties were similar to this in previous versions, and runners were still successful often times (even noobs).

 

Btw, Razor, I've heard that the back vulnerability to forcepower has been changed to only when the mishap meter is high. It is ESSENTIAL that it is for when they are low on DP as well, otherwise that gives DP people a one way ticket to escapesville since all they have to do is turn around and run away. Force powers are presently the only good way stopping a low DP runner.

[Sushi_CW]

Runners are penalized enough I think. Double damage is a big deal.

 

I understand that standing and duelling is encouraged because it looks good and helps avoid some of the lame style of sabering that grew up around baseJKA, and that you want to discourage crouch spamming because it's a block against something (is it kicks still?) but I think you need to keep a limit on penalties you impose on legitimate moves. Beware of too much social engineering by making harsh penalties just to force people to fight in a style you think coolest.

 

I agree 100%. Couldn't have said it better myself.

 

Incidentally, this is the same reasoning that leads me to dislike some of the new features, such as "encouraging" people to use attack fakes along with normal swings by making the mishap bar penalize normal attacks and reward fakes. I basically like the mishap bar as a feature for causing mishaps... but I feel that a lot of the rules for what make it go up and down fall into the "social engineering" trap a bit too much.

 

As far as crouch... why not go with something intuitive? It makes sense to me that it would cost more DP to get hit while crouching, since it is not a natural position for swordplay. You ever tried to parry or block a swing while crouching? You could do it, but it would be harder. I think the double DP damage for crouched targets is perfect, and I think that double DP damage for runners is likewise ideal.

 

Summary: choosing features to "encourage" specific styles of play and "discourage" others is a dangerous road, and IMO best avoided as much as possible. Choosing features that follow intuitive notions about saber combat and swordplay is good.

[JRHockney*]

While I agree that too much social engineering is bad, Im still worried that running will be too preferred for the reasons Ive started above. There are far too many people who dont want to give up their base style of combat out of just not wanting to learn something new. The penalties I've suggested are more to try and give only the best runners equal ground with the walkers and a slight advantage to walkers against people who arent as good. In this combat, a running style should be rare but still possible. There is not running combat in the movies.

 

Incidentally, this is the same reasoning that leads me to dislike some of the new features, such as "encouraging" people to use attack fakes along with normal swings by making the mishap bar penalize normal attacks and reward fakes. .

 

You might have a point there. Do you have a better idea on how to lower the mishap bar in a move oriented fashion?

 

As far as crouch... why not go with something intuitive? It makes sense to me that it would cost more DP to get hit while crouching, since it is not a natural position for swordplay. You ever tried to parry or block a swing while crouching? You could do it, but it would be harder. I think the double DP damage for crouched targets is perfect, and I think that double DP damage for runners is likewise ideal.

 

Yeah, Jack basicaly proved that crouch swinging is very spammable yesterday at the code server from what I hear.

[JRHockney*]

wait a minute, how about just a slower DP regen while running like in MB2? It makes perfect logical sense. Have any of you ever tried trying to get back endurance by running?! LOL

[JackBaldy]

MB2 stops BP gain completely while running. And I think this mod is leaning towards movie realism and in the movies, there was minimal running. Just short bursts of running, and I've been analyzing much videos of saber fighting from the movies. A running all the time style should be a no-no lol

[Sushi_CW]

Winning against runners should probably occur more often due to FP drain than anything... they get tired! It's already the case that running stops FP regen, and I think that fixes most if not all of the problem. Perhaps running backwards should incur a slight FP drain?

 

I'm not sure if parries cost any DP at the moment... if not, perhaps they should cost something when you're running.

 

As far as my ideas on the mishap bar: here's what I would do in my ideal world.

 

1. The mishap bar would go up if you hit someone and are parried. The amount that it goes up depends on the hit: parried attack fakes or attack parries would cause the attacker's mishap to go up further (attack parries would make it go up about 50%, enough to cause a slowbounce most of the time).

 

2. If you hit someone with any attack and are not parried, your mishap bar does not go up at all.

 

3. The mishap bar is continually going down at a fairly slow rate: maybe 6-10 seconds for the bar to go from full to 0. Maybe it could decrease at a slower rate while running too: harder to regain your balance on the run.

 

4. Attack parries would not automatically cause slowbounces: at least not directly. They would just cause a huge spike in the attacker's mishap meter...probably causing a slowbounce. The benefit of this is that attackers already fairly high on mishap could be forced into a "higher" mishap with an attack parry. (I give up on trying to get rid of attack parries. Everyone else likes 'em. )

 

There wouldn't be any special moves to decrease your mishap bar (besides meditating). If you are defending, it wouldn't go up, since you are either parrying or blocking. If you are attacking, it would go up at a rate proportional to how often you get parried (and how quickly comboed your attacks are: keeping your mishap bar down would be harder the faster your attacks fly as long as at least some of them are parried).

 

I personally think this is a more intuitive system: Basically, you cause mishaps as the defender by defending against them well (including attack parries). You avoid mishaps as the attacker by not getting parried and/or pacing your attacks to give yourself a little time to regain balance. The main role of attack fakes is to actually fool your opponent.

[razorace]

We already tried having a constant regen for the balance bar on the code server. I wasn't happy with the results but that could have just been the particular implimentation. The problems areas were...

 

- When should mishaps be "rolled" in this kind of system? Only on parries, or any kind of saber impact?

- The regen rate probably needs to be set independantly of DP or FP since it requires a different level of skill to use.

- Does the defender ever get off balance? If not, what's the point of attack fakes?

[Sushi_CW]

- When should mishaps be "rolled" in this kind of system? Only on parries, or any kind of saber impact?

 

Why not roll whenever the mishap bar is increased, whatever the reason?

 

- The regen rate probably needs to be set independantly of DP or FP since it requires a different level of skill to use.

 

Sounds good to me.

 

- Does the defender ever get off balance? If not, what's the point of attack fakes?

 

Good point... perhaps attack fakes, if landed unparried, could cause some mishap bar increase for the defender. Do they do that now? (I didn't know). That would give the attacker a way to induce mishaps on people already high on the bar.

[razorace]

Why not roll whenever the mishap bar is increased, whatever the reason?

So, does the trigger event have any control over that? Is it random or does the player have to do something special to trigger the actual mishap. I'm trying to avoid a situation where the player has to do something more specific than a parry to cause a mishap (like an attack parry) since attack parries are REALLY hard to do.

Do they do that now? (I didn't know).

Attack fakes currently cause imbalance in the defender.

[Vruki Salet]

I'd like to see Sushi's ideas here implemented.

[Sushi_CW]

So, does the trigger event have any control over that? Is it random or does the player have to do something special to trigger the actual mishap. I'm trying to avoid a situation where the player has to do something more specific than a parry to cause a mishap (like an attack parry) since attack parries are REALLY hard to do.

 

Well, I was thinking that parries, attack parries, and landed attack fakes could all be triggers, but I see that this would make it hard to get "higher" mishaps without the giant boost provided by attack parries. That's tricky. Maybe something like this would work for triggers:

 

1. Under 50% mishap bar, no mishap can be triggered. You're safe.

2. At 50% mishap bar and above, normal parries have a probability of triggering the mishap proportional to the mishap bar (after the extra mishap induced by the parry). So, if someone's mishap bar jumps to 75% when they are parried, there is a 75% chance the mishap would be triggered. If the bar is maxed out (or close enough) the chance of triggering the mishap on a normal parry would be 100%.

3. Attack parries (and maybe attack fakes too?) would always trigger the mishap bar.

 

This induces some element of randomness... but it's a predictable sort, a probabilistic kind of randomness that I personally would have no problem with.

[razorace]

Ok, we can give it a shot again.

 

Anyway, any ideas around fixing the crouch saber issues, I'm hearing no end about it. IE, saber combat being unbalanced if you simply crouch all the time.

[Vruki Salet]

So what's the crouch for? Why is it so good or unbalanced? I thought it was for blocking kicks but I must be behind the times.

[JRHockney*]

So what's the crouch for? Why is it so good or unbalanced? I thought it was for blocking kicks but I must be behind the times.

 

We're not entirely sure why it is so unbalanced, but crouching and swinging seems to mow people down everytime just about. Me and jack beta tested it for hours today and had the same result everytime. It allows for more or better comboing for some reason.

 

Anyway, any ideas around fixing the crouch saber issues, I'm hearing no end about it. IE, saber combat being unbalanced if you simply crouch all the time.

 

Well, we've already suggested making more damage on a croucher. I suppose maybe lessening the strength of a crouchers swing is another alternative. Or even swings in crouch make the mishap bar go up?

 

How ever we handle crouch, I must say that I still very strongly believe that we need to create another alternative penalty for holding kick block in slowbounce when some other move thats not kick is executed. Its far too easy to train yourself to press the kick block button (I just noticed today at the code server that holding alt attack still works btw.) whenever you see yourself go into slowbounce. I do not what the classic OJP "kick the slowbounce" move to become a move reserved only for noobs and bots (like the mblock is for MB2 players), but at the same time, it needs a block or the conversions will never be used. This is why I suggest either making a non-kick hit on a person pressing crouch in slowbounce do more damage, or create and alternate move that requires another button or not pressing anything.

 

Other important issues that should probably be fixed for the next build aside from this are the bunny hop which allows for an easy get away for a low DP opponent, a still spammable lunge which could benefit from higher FP cost or cooldown period, and a better testing of Blue style against the others. Kyle mentions an exploit in his new thread that involves bluestyle btw, so that might be a good place to start. While these problems may not seem like that big of a deal, it will be nice to get rid of them now so we dont get future complaints. Heck, just look at MB2. As soon as someone finds a bug or exploit, the entire community hassles the team for months on end until the problem is fixed in the next release. With the publicity and ratings that we've gotten already jk2files for the next build, its very possible that our community could get ALOT bigger in the next few months.

 

I also would like a more thorogh description of how the new saber lock works so I can put it in the new manual. It kind of confused me today.

 

Anyways, we are very close to having a fully releasable build here and the best one yet. All we have to do is squash a few remaining bugs, make a final decision about how we want the mishap meter to work and maybe do something with drain and this will be more than sufficient for the next build. After three months of planning and ergency, it will be nice to get this release over with so we can stop worrying about it and hassling razor about stuff for a while. Ok I'm rambling so I'm going to bed now.

[JackBaldy]

I was thinking a little bit yesterday, about crouch, and here is an idea which I got which is a bit unorthodox. Well, first, crouch should be disabled if you have you're saber out. Here's the unorthodox part, what if when you have your saber out and hold crouch, crouch reverses you're attacks and parries. So an attack executed by {A+W} + attack would do (A+S) + attack if you are holding crouch. When parrying it would reverse directions too. So if you wanted to parry an uppercut ( {A+S} + attack) you'd be going A+S while holding crouch, instead of the usual W+S. This would allow for more freedom on both the attacker and defender's side. Tell me what you all think =D

[JRHockney*]

I was thinking a little bit yesterday, about crouch, and here is an idea which I got which is a bit unorthodox. Well, first, crouch should be disabled if you have you're saber out. Here's the unorthodox part, what if when you have your saber out and hold crouch, crouch reverses you're attacks and parries. So an attack executed by {A+W} + attack would do (A+S) + attack if you are holding crouch. When parrying it would reverse directions too. So if you wanted to parry an uppercut ( {A+S} + attack) you'd be going A+S while holding crouch, instead of the usual W+S. This would allow for more freedom on both the attacker and defender's side. Tell me what you all think =D

 

I must say this is the most unusual idea I've heard here probably ever. While it may seem almost unheard of to not be able to crouch AT ALL in saber combat, the trade off might be even more worth it. Walking forward with a uppercut swing and vice versa really allows for alot of freedom and variety in this combat.

 

Hmmm, maybe you we should make it so you are still allowed to crouch but any swing in it will force you to stand up unless you are in an enclosed space like a tunnel or something. This would allow for the best of both worlds I think.

[razorace]

That seems counter-intuitive to me. I don't really like it.

[Sushi_CW]

I definitely don't like the idea of simply removing crouch from saber combat.

 

Attacks from crouch should all hit low, so in theory all you should need to do to counter/parry crouch is move forward. Apparently, this doesn't work in practice, and the hits aren't properly registered as being "low." Why not? Is this a bug? If so, most of the problem could probably be solved by fixing it.

 

Razor, could you please explain one more time exactly how the correct parry direction is determined?

 

Also, a question about the new saberlock system: if both people are walking "in" to the saberlock, how do you decide who wins?

[JackBaldy]

Personally I like how the parry system is now, and introducing a vertical hit detection system for parry's would just cause more problems. Right now, certain strikes will always (and should always) parry specific strikes depending on aiming, now making it depend on whether it lands on your legs or your torso would just cause problems because hits are unpredictable and can easily be aimed anywhere you want them too.

 

Well here is my idea more explained. This mod is leaning towards movie realism, and crouching in movies was non-existant in saber fights. So why leave a feature in that is broken and not movie realistic? Crouching can't be considered a feature because the only reason someone would want to use it is to exploit it, simple as that. So as I was thinking of changing crouch, I came up with my idea. All uppercuts hit low, and the only 'legit' reason to crouch would be to do so, so why not make crouch reverse the effects of the forward and backward key for attacks and parry? This would allow more movement freedom for both the attacker and the defender. And here is how. Let's say a defender doesn't want to get closer to the attacker but wants to parry an uppercut. He could do so under this system but not by the current one.

 

Just look back at Episode 3: Revenge of The Sith. Obiwan vs Anakin at Mustafar, if you notice, Obiwan kept keeping his distance by going backwards but also parrying/blocking at the same time to stay alive. Now this under the current system wouldn't be possible because parry doesn't allow that much movement freedom under the current system. With lightning strikes being a problem at close distance, sometimes you just don't want to get in close, but sometimes you do, and this system would allow for both. I can come up with many examples, for an attackers example, what if you wanted to do an overhead diagonal strike without walking forward? You can't, atleast not in the current implementation simply because you'd have to stop and perform the slash with the forward key. Same as going forward, you'd have to stop for an uppercut slash. The whole point of this system is to allow movement freedom and to remove the unbalanced.

 

Now if it is to hard to code the removal of crouch, I say we heavily penalize crouch and make my reversal of the forward and backward keys for attack and slashes a different key. Crouch just isn't movie realistic and it shouldn't be a viable strategy just like running always shouldn't because both are not movie realistic. I really can't see a reason to crouch other than to exploit the saber fighting to be honest (aside from gunner fights). Especially if this new system would be implemented. Now keep in mind, I am not saying to completely remove crouch, I am saying to either make the crouch key reverse keys (as explained previously) and not crouch for someone with a saber out or to either make crouch heavily penalized in saber fights and have the new system implemented into another key to allow more movement freedom in both attacking and defending.