Saber system suggestions

[JRHockney*]

Nope, still under the weather. I've been told that I might be this way until the end of the week.

 

As for attack-on-attack impacts, there's no DP cost as is. However, it does mean that the players have to successfully touch their sabers together.

 

Aww man. Poor Razor. You don't have the bird flu or something do you?! That would really suck. Anyway, good luck with getting well. I hope it has at least lightened up a bit.

 

As far as my idea is concern, I actually meant when you get hit first while swinging and parry your opponent. I noticed that I've been able to do this with the Tabbots and they seemed to get completely parried. I don't know, maybe its fine the way it is. I'll keep thinking about some logical possibilities.

[razorace]

It's just the flu.

 

Well, that's probably occuring since there are slight mishap possibilities even in attack-on-attack impacts. I'd rather not add a directional block to that sort of situation since it would make pure blocking seem pretty pointless or that least that's what I'd be concerned about.

[JRHockney*]

It's just the flu.

 

Well, that's probably occuring since there are slight mishap possibilities even in attack-on-attack impacts. I'd rather not add a directional block to that sort of situation since it would make pure blocking seem pretty pointless or that least that's what I'd be concerned about.

 

I'm glad its nothing too serious. Anyway...

 

I see your concern, however the way I had envisioned this is that autoblocking would still happen regardless of whether or not you were pushing the proper parry direction. Getting hit first in an attack on attack situation would still drain your DP if you weren't pressing the proper parry direction, but pressing the proper parry direction in this situation would cause you no DP loss. The trade off is that: if you were attacking when you got hit first adn you press the proper parry direction, your opponent won't get parried. You have to not be attacking in order to actually parry an opponent.

 

Although I'm still not sure if this is a good idea. While it might add some strategy and technique to full on attacking, it might also change the combat a little too much in favor of swinging, so I'm not sure myself. It might be an interesting experiement though. Anyways, it's something to think about. I'm sure there would be issues with it that I haven't thought of yet.

[razorace]

So, basically, you're just suggesting that a player shouldn't be able to parry if they're forced into a block while attacking, right?

[JRHockney*]

So, basically, you're just suggesting that a player shouldn't be able to parry if they're forced into a block while attacking, right?

 

Basically yes, but if they do press the right parry direction at such a time, they will lose no DP. This just prevents them from stunning their opponent with a parry in such a situation. It turns what would normally be a parry into a swingblock that costs no DP.

 

Like I said before, I'm still not sure if this is a good idea or not.

[JRHockney*]

Just a couple things:

 

1. I was wondering if it would be possible to have the TABbots still gain a little FP while running because they always seem to run out of steam just when our duals are getting good. Although I'm not sure if this problem will get fixed by something you already have planned for the next release.

 

2. I had an idea about having it so that you gain 50 FP and to bars of DP when ever you kill somebody. This might help make fighting two people a little easier and prevent anyone from getting slaughtered by someone else right after they just barely defeat someone else. Good idea?

 

3. Any word on the next realise of Enhanced and what it will have thats new? including bug fixes and other stuff? And hows your health btw?

[Lathain Valtiel]

I should be clear that I am not trying to turn this system into promod bya any means. I've read about it, but it basically died before I ever started playing JK at all.

 

It's a shame actually, as you missed some of the greatest straight up FFAs in Jedi Outcast or Academy. For almost every single night of its lifetime, ArtifeX's server was packed by both Jedi and gun-using badasses. That and firing rockets in close quarters was actually DANGEROUS to whoever fired it... especially if said rocket was Level 4. It also had balanced jetpacks that put those in Academy to SHAME.

 

The saber fights were beyond excellent, and for once Lightside wasn't a horrific handicap in 1v1 duel since Heal was buffed a bit and Drain was slightly less badass.

[razorace]

1. I was wondering if it would be possible to have the TABbots still gain a little FP while running because they always seem to run out of steam just when our duals are getting good.

I'm not sure about this one. The 1st priority with the bots is that they don't have an unfair advantage over the human players. We'll just have to live with it until I can improve the bots some more.

2. I had an idea about having it so that you gain 50 FP and to bars of DP when ever you kill somebody.

I'd really prefer not to award players in such a way since that would be very unrealistic. However, maybe it would be wise if we just reduced the total amount of DP a player has since it seems to me that DP deaths are pretty rare at the moment.

3. Any word on the next realise of Enhanced and what it will have thats new? including bug fixes and other stuff? And hows your health btw?

I'm feeling better but I do have to get caught up on my school work. Hopefully I'll be able to release something so. I just finished a Basic release today so that should indicate good progress.

[JRHockney*]

The saber fights were beyond excellent, and for once Lightside wasn't a horrific handicap in 1v1 duel since Heal was buffed a bit and Drain was slightly less badass.

 

Yeah, I've heard alot about how good it was. I really wish I was around to ry it out at it's prime.

 

 

I'd really prefer not to award players in such a way since that would be very unrealistic. However, maybe it would be wise if we just reduced the total amount of DP a player has since it seems to me that DP deaths are pretty rare at the moment.

 

Probably a good idea.

 

Along those lines I do still think that the saberstyles should do slightly different DP damages, maybe like in my old idea about the styles. I also think that something needs to be done with the special moves such as either making them all cause stuns or making some of them instant kill moves that cost a TON of FP and leave the attacker vulnerable. Anything to make them have a use in this system. It might be good to make them cause stuns for the next release because It would probably be easy to do (I think) and it could be a temporary edition to the system if you don't like it. It might add some wholeness and some eye candy to the system too. Because they cost FP, they probably wouldn't be overused either.

 

I'm feeling better but I do have to get caught up on my school work. Hopefully I'll be able to release something so. I just finished a Basic release today so that should indicate good progress.

 

Good to hear youre feeling better. Good job on making a new basic (even though I still refuse to play it because of the base saber combat! LOL ) I hope you don't have too much school work to catch up on.

[The Antilles]

for some reason my quote is not working so "Along those lines I do still think that the saberstyles should do slightly different DP damages, maybe like in my old idea about the styles. I also think that something needs to be done with the special moves such as either making them all cause stuns or making some of them instant kill moves that cost a TON of FP and leave the attacker vulnerable. Anything to make them have a use in this system. It might be good to make them cause stuns for the next release because It would probably be easy to do (I think) and it could be a temporary edition to the system if you don't like it. It might add some wholeness and some eye candy to the system too. Because they cost FP, they probably wouldn't be overused either"

 

I fully Agree with this idea. Also thanks for the basic update, And I'm glad your over the flu. So get your school work done slaker!!!!!

[razorace]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll work on my school work.

[JRHockney*]

I fully Agree with this idea. Also thanks for the basic update, And I'm glad your over the flu. So get your school work done slaker!!!!!

 

I'm glad you like this idea. Although I did just notice that special moves only use 4 FP. This might need to be increased a bit (maybe 8-10 FP) to make them less used or spammed. It might also be cool to have the special moves (including the rollstab) kill the opponent when they get Long stunned at below 50 DP but only if they hit perfectly or something.

 

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll work on my school work

 

Yeah, me too! I look forward to trying out Enhanced 0.0.6...... when class is over!

[JRHockney*]

Great improvements on this version of enhanced. I especially like the new stances and the new walking. Also great work on the saberthrow and not penalizing blocking with FP pauses.

 

There is still one thing that desperately needs fixing though more than anything. That is: Something has to be done about blue style!! I fought Plo-koon again (the freak Tabbot that uses Blue) and he still tore me to streads until I started swing spamming him with blue aswell. I decided to watch my DP meter as I fought him strictly defensively and even when I moved perfectly into his swing, I still lost nearly 1 and 1/2 full bars of DP at least 2/3 of the time and only parried him about 1/6 of the time! Any bot I swing spammed with blue no matter what style I were using (except blue) I tore to shreads very quickly as well.

 

I'm not sure why this happening but the blue style strikes do seem to spend longer inside the opponents defenses longer then any other style. If you would like to get together an test this out again, let me know here or on the scheduling thread.

 

Btw, I did just have an interesting Idea for saber style diversity. This idea comes from when I use to fight in Tae Know Do tournaments years ago and shorter opponents use to get really close to me to make me unable to kick them. The idea is this:

 

Basically, all styles have "sweet spot" ranges to them. Too close will do no damage and too far will do less damage. The styles would differ something like this:

 

Tavion and blue would have a very small sweet spot in the middle of their saber and do very little damage further up.

 

Yellow would have a medium size sweet spot in the middle and do marginal damage further up.

 

Desann have a large sweet spot in the middle and do marginal damage further up.

 

Red Would do full damage from the middle of the saber to the tip.

 

I think this idea would help players not to get too close to eachother and allow for some strategy in positioning.

[razorace]

Unfortunately, I'm not sure we can impliment the range idea accurately enough to make it fair/fun for the players.

 

As for blue, I'll double-check blue's animation speed compared to the other styles.

[JRHockney*]

Unfortunately, I'm not sure we can impliment the range idea accurately enough to make it fair/fun for the players.

 

Hmmm, that's a good point. Because players are always moving it might end up being more frustrating than anything if the "sweet spot" is to small or too particular. Maybe if we combined a similar but larger and less particular version of this idea with the a style varying DP damage idea maybe like one of the ones I written before, it might balance itself out without being frustrating. I still especially like the idea of no damage being done at too close of a range and making the faster styles require more acquiracy somehow.

 

As far as blue style is concerned, if worse comes to worse and you can't figure out a way to balance it through the animations to where it is more parryable, I think Vruki's old idea about penalizing several swings in a row with a ton of FP might help resolve this issue a bit.

[razorace]

Well, I looked into it a bit and it looks like the actual attack animations are a bit faster than the yellow style. I slowed just the attack animation speed by 20% and that appears to have helped the problem.

[JRHockney*]

Well, I looked into it a bit and it looks like the actual attack animations are a bit faster than the yellow style. I slowed just the attack animation speed by 20% and that appears to have helped the problem.

 

Great! I don't suppose you could make a patch or something like that for 0.0.6 could you? It might be nice to destroy that problem while this version is still new so people aren't wondering why they keep killing everything with blue. Although I haven't seen too many problems when using tavions style, it might be a good idea to check that one too.

[razorace]

mmm, it would be too much of a hassle to do. It will just be in the next version.

[JRHockney*]

I've been brainstorming several very large ideas for the sabersystem that I think would make it reach its greatest potential as a truly superior sabersystem to anything available.

 

One of the biggest strengths of the base sabersystem was its sheer variety of ways to go about attacking and this is what is currently lacking in this system. Eventhough the back and forth action awsome in this system, it still has its limits because you learn to know what to expect. If we can come up with more variety and unique characteristics to all the styles. I have come up with a possible plan of how to do this.

 

First off, before reading about the change to the individual styles, a few things need to be changed in order to make these ideas balanced:

 

1. Parrying for most styles costs a little DP, like it did in 0.0.4. Perfect blocking (that costs no FP or DP) by DP costing parrying styles can be done by faking into the opponents on coming saber as it can right now.

 

2.The special moves cause regular stuns and have the following characteristics: Roll stab and Blue uppercut do 25% DP damage and cost 10 FP, Yellow overheadslash does 50% DP and costs 20 FP, Red leap slash does 100% DP damage causing death in most cases and costs 30-40 FP (lets face it, only noobs will be hit by this for the most part). However, special attacks will only do half their normal damage if they hit someone who is in a 50+ DP stun.

 

3. Each additional chained slash will cost 10 FP after 2 slashes for tavion and blue and 3 for yellow and red (I'll esplain desann's change in the next section)

 

4. Hits to the back 180 degrees of an opponent will cause 50% DP damage.

 

 

Ok, Now for the individual characteristics of the styles:

 

Tavion: The fastest style which will do the weakest DP damage by default, but will do Yellows amount of damage if the opponent is targeted when hit. Roll stab will do 50% Dp damage with this style as well. These changes are to make this the perfect fencer's style and get the old promod fans a style of their own (they will love you for it!!! LOL).

 

Blue: Does more DP damage than not targeting with tavion but less damage than yellow. This style, however, will have its FP jumping drain reduced by 75% or more, thus making it like yoda's style. Back hitting is the key to this style, which will be hard to do against bots sadly.

 

Yellow: Moderate DP damage given. No FP penalties for preforming fakes and no DP penalties for parrying. Obiwan like Balance is the key to this style

 

Desann: Does the same damage as yellow, but is endlessly chainable in swings without the large FP costs of the other styles. Swings still cost 1 FP though. Agression is the key to both offense and defense in this style

 

Red: Highest DP damage and no penalties for parrying. The slowest but most powerful Anakin/Sidious like style.

 

I'm still not sure about Staff and Dual yet other than staff being the best defensive wise and duel the best offensive wise.

 

Well there it is, my most complex but hopefully balanced and benefitial idea set yet. If anything, I hope it will give you an idea of what direction to take this system next.

 

Question: Did you ever find out if turning swings can be eliminated or not. I ask this because I'm pretty sure my old more powerful but more risky turn swing idea will only work with our current system if a button is pressed to activate them, otherwise people will be doing them by accident too often.

[razorace]

I looked into the transitions stuff and there simply aren't the animations nessicary to pull out the spin moves without seriously hampering the moves that a player can make.

 

Thank you for making an attempt at quantifying the differences between the styles. Hopefully this will finally get the ball rolling. However, I do have some issues with some of your suggestions.

 

1. I don't think a swing chaining limit is nessicary since players can already reverse the tables pretty easily by simply parrying one of the attacks. Adding in a increasing FP drain would only drive newbies away from the game.

 

2. The FP jump reduction for Blue is an interesting idea, but not a realistic one. I don't want to grant magical abilities based on whatever style the player is using. Style differences really need to just be saber combat related and hopefully something that make logical sense.

 

For example, I think any move in any stance where the player is holding the saber with one hand should have a very large disarm penalty since two handed grips are much better than one handed ones. Ideally this penalty would be carefully tuned to the individual animations but I might just have it be based on style for starters.

 

3. I'm still musing about the special moves. Your suggestions are good ones, but I'm really worried that the special moves would be totally spammable. The best that I can come up with so far is that a blocked special would automatically result in a stun. Maybe specials should just cause different mishaps in the defender based on their FP/DP status. For example,

 

Blue Lunge:

A blue lunge is seen in the movies to be a disarming move. It should cost double DP to saber block and cost 3 FP to the attacker. If the defender is hit while stunned, it costs double the normal Body Dodge cost. If the player doesn't have the DP or if they're fatigued, the player automatically loses their saber hand and dies.

 

4. All the saber damage is lethal. As such, we can't really tweak saber damage levels since they are all lethal to start with.

 

Anyway, I'm running out of musing steam and I have some homework so I'll call it quits for now. Thanks for the stimulating debate.

[JRHockney*]

1. Hmm, I'm not sure I entirely agree that it would drive newbies away from the game penalizing combo swings over 2 or 3 moves is actually very generous compared to movie battles2 where the it can cost around 10% BP or more to swing twice in a row. This suggestion was more meant to help keep the faster styles from spamming than anything. Maybe those limits or something similar could be just for them.

 

2. Agree that maybe the one handed styles should have a disarm penalty, but I don't think the Jumping idea is entirely unrealistic. Sure, its not real life like, but it is movie like. Yoda and episode 1 Obiwan used it, so why not have a style that promotes a little more jumping. How about as a compromise, Back flips and side flips are not penalized. It would also be neat if the lowest jump (which still goes over peoples heads) went into a flip with this style.

 

3. more to be added later, I have to go

[razorace]

Looks like we both had a little time at the same time.

 

1. I just don't agree with that. FP costs are high enough without adding combo penalties. Besides, the back/forth action should prevent the possibility in the first place.

 

2. I'm not against having special moves associated with each style, but I don't agree that certain styles should get physical bonuses/penalties to things over than saber combat. For example, the fact that players can't roll out of a fall without having the saber out has been something that I've heard complains about.

 

3. As for the DFA move, I'm thinking that it should probably cause DP damage and knockdown unless the defender parries. In addition, I think that the attacker should have to be running forward to be able to launch into a DFA. What do you think?

 

4. As for the yellow overhead jump, I keep thinking that it's primarily a evasive move to get on the other side of the defender. It's primary function is that it's a jump move that doesn't make the player lose block/Dodge protection. We might be able to get away with a small DP smash on the defender as well, but I think this move is mainly about manovering around.

 

5. Anyway, I really hope Tokeke gets his server back up soon. I'd really like to try the lastest release against other human players. I saw another Enhanced server up last night but it had a password on it.

 

6. Number lists are fun!

[JRHockney*]

I'm back with some time. Go, go, gadget number lists!!!

 

1. Ok, if you are set on not penalizing too many multiple combo swings, than thats fin; however, if it turns out that after what ever adjustments you make, noobs can still swing spam the faster styles and win, you might want to reconsider.

 

2. The point of making jumping cost less with blue is mainly to help promote a different fighting style with that blue in general, but as a unique characteristic, I suppose having the blue uppercut would be enough. If it is still going to be faster than yellow, it should do a little less DP damage though. For all the styles, I would like to see backflip and cartwheel penalized less FP wise (10 FP is way too much) though, and maybe the lowest jump go into a fli if possible. They are too dangerous to use too often anyway.

 

3. I don't think they would be spammable if they cost too much FP to use or maybe allow the attacker to get stunned if he misses and hit on the landing. FP can become a rarety in combat and spamming the special moves would not be realistic for anyone who knows how to fight with this system.

Your ideas are for yellow overhead slash and DFA are pretty good too. Yellow overhead slash should do at least a little DP damage because its one of the coolest moves in the game.

 

As for you blue lunge idea, I think that might make it alittle overpowered to only use 3 FP and cause so much damage. I personally think should cost no less than 10 FP or maybe 15, disarm and do alot of DP damage if the person isn't stunned, do a little less DP damage if the person is stunned at 50+ DP, and do a ton of damage or kill like you suggested if the person is in a 50- DP stun.

 

4. Yellow overhead slash should do at least a little DP damage because its one of the coolest moves in the game. The Evasion is a good idea too.

 

5. I think rolling stab should cost a least 10 FP, do significant DP damage, and maybe knock the opponent over.

 

6. What do you think about my Promod like suggestions for tavions style? I think it's a good idea and I still think that rolling stab with tavion style should do more DP damage than regular. Remember the theatrics mod and how each swing of its tavions style stopped in the middle and did a stab move? That might also be cool to see done even thought the animations arent perfect.

 

7. Desanns style needs something original I think, maybe an up close grapple move that causes some DP damage and knocks them over. You could use the last hit of the malee grap punch kata animation and have the saber still turned on in the punchers hand.

 

4. All the saber damage is lethal. As such, we can't really tweak saber damage levels since they are all lethal to start with.

 

Whenever I say the word "damage," it usually means I forgot to say DP in front of it! lol . Anyways, I still think the saber styles need to vary in the DP damages their swings (But not by much!!!) And hopefully if you use my suggestion for tavion's style, it will be the only mutant style of the bunch with to damage possibilities.

 

Btw, is it possible to speed up the malee grap kata just a bit? I would be cool if doing a kata grap between saber swings was a little more possible for pure maleers. I'm sure that MB people like Shawn Za'an would love you for it. I like to do it once in a while as well.

 

If Tokakeke gets his server up tonight, I'll put a time to meet down on the scheduling thread if you want to test stuff.

 

Also, Have you tried putting the new Enhanced on pcgamemds today yet? There are a few new entires.

[razorace]

2. I'll consider reducing the backflip/cartwheel/jump FP costs.

 

6. I don't remember the theatrics mod, sorry.

 

7. Actually, there's a different, unused fancy DFA animation that isn't used. I might just add that DFA as the Desann style's special move.

 

8. I don't know about speeding up the grapple move as it could very well unbalance things. There's not exactly much disadvantage to the grapple other than gap in saber block.

[razorace]

9. Oh yeah, I'm considering redoing the mishap internals to simpify them. I'm considering removing the more subtle mishaps like ones that occur in attack-on-attack impacts and just making mishaps only happen when the players do something specific. It would make things easier to modify and understand. Yes, we would loss all the subtle random events but my experience has been that random mishaps like that just cause confusion.