Improvements to Turn based combat

[Hiver]

This will be my last post here.

We covered everything needed. The devs have read this and understood it correctly.


This thread was NOT about making Wasteland2 another JA or Fallout Tactics.

Those and Temple of Elemental Evil games were talked about as examples of past high points of turn based combat systems THAT ARE MEANT TO SERVE AS INSPIRATION and live examples for specific mechanics.

Wasteland 2 should have good, diverse and enjoyable turn based combat as ONE OF THE BASIC PILARS OF GAMEPLAY.
Not the only one.

Other features that directly influence this are encounter design which MUST BE diverse in all aspects.

And mechanics that would allow clearing mobs of low level enemies in quicker ways.
- Enemies surrendering where the player has an option of "forcing them to leave their gear for looting and then run away" or similar.
- or low level enemies running away or avoiding the high level player while eventual exp made from killing them would be very low or non existent to avoid grinding.
- non lethal solutions would help greatly to reduce focus on combat and killing as solution to everything.

Many of the mechanics these inspirational games have in combat would increase enjoyment in combat, tactically or in usability.
All were mentioned in this thread several times.
Go and check them out.


Thanx to everyone who kept on point and didnt stray away from the theme.

[Jaws4096]

Great post, and some great ideas.

My main suggestion would be to make sure that combat is fast-paced, despite being turn-based. I say this as someone who thinks that combat in all three Diablo games is utter crap, and who wishes that the Elder Scrolls games had a turn-based, grid-based combat option. So let me describe what I mean by "fast-paced".

One great thing about Wasteland was that the combat could become very complex, despite a very simple interface. I think Jagged Alliance 2 is a great game, and up to a point, I enjoyed tweaking every little thing about each of my characters, every single turn. But honestly, it gets a little tedious. Compare that to Wasteland's "hold down 'a' and watch the fireworks" combat, which only became a tactical challenge when it needed to be, in order to beat a really tough enemy. In a game with a robust story and character development, I would prefer this sort of fast, clean combat interface.

That doesn't mean that combat can't be really robust. For example, if you take away facing (i.e. the way a character is looking) and character stance (i.e. crouching vs standing) from the combat engine, you can still have a robust cover system, "aimed shots", and many other features, but you would remove a huge amount of time and tediousness from each turn. That's what I'd like to see in Wasteland 2.

The most important thing is to make it extremely obvious to players what factors are affecting combat, and help them understand how to change those factors to their advantage. For example, how much of my 22% chance to hit is about the range of the target, vs my abilities, or the inherent accuracy of my gun? What affect does this heavy desk I'm hiding behind have on the enemy's chance to hit?

Below is an excerpt from a very long previous post by me, which a couple of readers recommended I break up into separate posts. The suggestions below assume a complex, turn-based tactical combat system. I don't know that such a system is the best way to go for Wasteland 2, but I've provided some (hopefully new) ideas and a few links to other, relevant combat posts on this site.

Combat: Line of Sight

During combat, it’s essential to know what characters can see (i.e. what they can shoot). An easy way to facilitate this is to have a “line of sight” hotkey that, when pressed, shows what the active character can see by highlighting anything in his line of sight. This feature might be enhanced by color-coding the highlighted area to reflect the chance a character would have to hit a target with his current weapon, at different ranges. So the area in a character’s line of sight adjacent to him might be shaded green to reflect that he has a high chance to hit, orange as you move farther away, and red where he has little chance of hitting a target.

Just as importantly, players need to know what areas of the map will be visible to their characters after they’ve moved. The line of sight feature described above could have an alternate function by which the player would hold another hotkey, and simply move his mouse around the map to discover what his characters would be able to see from various positions. This feature would also accommodate checking the hypothetical line of site from a given position while standing, crouched, or prone, assuming those stances are part of the combat engine.

Combat: Action Points

One problem with the early Fallout games is that one character can be twice as lethal as another, by virtue of having just one more action point. Since weapons take a fixed number of points to fire, and action points do not carry over into subsequent rounds, one action point can become incredibly valuable. This is a major game balancing problem, and resulted in players investing an undue amount of ability points into AP-boosting traits. That ain’t right.

One way to fix the problem is to move away from an action point system. Another solution would be to allow action points to carry over, not just into the enemy’s round (see Reaction Moves below) but also into the player’s next round. Obviously you’d want to set limits on this concept.

Combat: Reaction Moves

In turn-based combat, allowing the player to take actions during an opponent's round is critically important. One reason for this is that reaction moves allow for a leap-frog style of advance. That is, one character spends all of his action points moving towards the enemy, while another character hangs back and waits for an opponent to reveal himself during the enemy’s turn. The next round, the roles are reversed. This is how troops move in real life, and there’s a reason for it. It’s hard to pull off without allowing for actions during your opponent’s turn.

X-COM handled this particularly well. Any character that had reserved enough action points to fire their weapon could do so during the enemy’s turn, with the reaction chance increasing with the number of action points reserved. Reaction was a separate character skill, as well – a very important one.

Combat: Behind the Curtain

I think players appreciate being able to see how their decisions are being interpreted by the game’s various ghosts in the machine. When I see that I have a 55% chance to hit that bandit crouching behind a crate on the other side of the warehouse, I want to know what goes into that calculation. How much of it is about my weapon? My ability? The range? His cover? His armor and agility? Make it an option to display all of this in detail, with an ability to drill down to even more detail, for players that are interested in doing so.

Combat: Mop Up

One great feature would be a “mop up” button that fully automates all characters, basically having them attack the nearest enemy. It may make sense to disable turn-based mode while this is happening, to further speed things up. If a player is severely damaged, or a new enemy appears, the game would pause and mop-up mode would be suspended. Also, players could check a “melee only” box during mop up operations that would force all characters to conserve ammo by putting away ranged weapons and drawing their best melee weapon.

Combat: Damage and Healing

When a character is hit during combat, he should suffer penalties other than just a hit point reduction. For example, he could have fewer action points during his next round, and depending on the type and severity of the damage taken, perhaps have temporary penalties applied to certain skills. If he is hit during his own turn by an enemy interrupt move, these penalties would apply immediately.

Along similar lines, minor penalties could be applied to characters who are being shot at, even if they aren’t hit. The idea would be to model the way suppressive fire works in the real world. This concept has been discussed on the forum at viewtopic.php?f=7&t=2234 and viewtopic.php?f=7&t=1958.

As far as healing, there should be limits on how many points can be recovered during a given time period. Spamming stimpacks is not only unrealistic, but somewhat game-breaking. Allowing characters to overdose on healing items is one way to limit this. This is discussed in some detail at forum post viewtopic.php?f=7&t=697 and viewtopic.php?f=8&t=91.

I also believe that a really robust location-specific damage model (e.g. get shot in leg, walk slower) is worthwhile. There is a relevant forum post at viewtopic.php?f=7&t=1337.

Combat: General Forum Posts

The posts below have some good general discussions regarding how the combat system should work:
viewtopic.php?f=7&t=1066
viewtopic.php?f=7&t=315

[Drool]

Great post, and some great ideas.

I hope this is the thread where this conversation continues as opposed to the other thread where you posted this.

One way to fix the problem is to move away from an action point system. Another solution would be to allow action points to carry over, not just into the enemy’s round (see Reaction Moves below) but also into the player’s next round. Obviously you’d want to set limits on this concept.

Personally, I'd advocate for either complete removal of action points (Wasteland) or abstracting them out so much that they're effectively removed (Temple of Elemental Evil). I never much cared for the action point mechanic. I have no problem with artificial constructs for mechanics in games, but AP always felt too artificial to me.

In turn-based combat, allowing the player to take actions during an opponent's round is critically important.

This is part of why I'm more in favor of phase-based combat like Wasteland and the Bard's Tale games had. Aside from the fact that everything moves much more quickly (I shudder to imagine a Fallout combat against 70 Temple Guardians), it kind of eliminates the need for figuring out a reaction mechanic.

Of course, Wasteland had a rudimentary auto-react mechanic (if the guy you were shooting died, you didn't shoot his corpse, you held fire or moved to the next foe), but it didn't allow for anything more complex, like changing a movement or anything like that. I suppose that blocks off tactical options, but I don't much mind that, especially if it keeps combat fast. Any combat that lasts more than a minute or two had better be some epic Grand Melee against a small army (70 Temple Guardians) or against a suitably badass boss-like foe (Scorpitron).

In theory, the Adytum fight against the Regulators was great: it was a huge battle against many foes with ordinary civilians rising up against their oppressors. In practice, it sucked. Dozens of combatants meant that you spent the vast majority of the combat sitting on your hands, waiting for your turn, and unable to even see the action, let alone get to it. With phase-based simultaneous-resolution combat, it would take half the time and you would be involved for all of it.

X-COM handled this particularly well. Any character that had reserved enough action points to fire their weapon could do so during the enemy’s turn

That being said, snap reaction shots could be a good mechanic to add. However, I would prefer it to be your action for the round, as opposed to a matter of how many mystical action points you had left. Instead of attacking in a round, you order your Ranger to do overwatch or some suitably military-sounding order.

When I see that I have a 55% chance to hit that bandit crouching behind a crate on the other side of the warehouse, I want to know what goes into that calculation.

I do not. I like things being hidden behind fudge factors when it comes to combat, and would hate to see a complete breakdown of every calculation that goes into every hit. To me, that's debug mode. Great if I'm debugging, but pretty horrible (and cheaty) if I'm just playing. Since the game will have a mod kit, I'd rather this be the kind of thing that's unlocked with a mod, as opposed to a togglable option.

One great feature would be a “mop up” button that fully automates all characters, basically having them attack the nearest enemy.

Hopefully combat will be streamlined and fast enough that this really isn't necessary. If it isn't, then I'd like this option.

When a character is hit during combat, he should suffer penalties other than just a hit point reduction. For example, he could have fewer action points during his next round, and depending on the type and severity of the damage taken, perhaps have temporary penalties applied to certain skills.

No thank you. If you're going to have hit points, you shouldn't be penalized as long as you have hit points. That's what they're there for.

Along similar lines, minor penalties could be applied to characters who are being shot at, even if they aren’t hit. The idea would be to model the way suppressive fire works in the real world.

Personally, the risk of being shot is penalty enough for me. This is the sort of realism I'll gladly sacrifice on the altar of fun.

As far as healing, there should be limits on how many points can be recovered during a given time period. Spamming stimpacks is not only unrealistic, but somewhat game-breaking.

As I'm in the "no healing items camp," I pretty much agree.

I also believe that a really robust location-specific damage model (e.g. get shot in leg, walk slower) is worthwhile.

I'm torn on hit locations. I won't advocate for them, but won't advocate against them either.

[Woolfe]

In theory, the Adytum fight against the Regulators was great: it was a huge battle against many foes with ordinary civilians rising up against their oppressors. In practice, it sucked. Dozens of combatants meant that you spent the vast majority of the combat sitting on your hands, waiting for your turn, and unable to even see the action, let alone get to it. With phase-based simultaneous-resolution combat, it would take half the time and you would be involved for all of it.

That sounds like bad design tho. If you can't see the action, then you shouldn't be waiting for it to happen. The calculations etc should be done, but no graphics etc need be drawn. With today's power this should be a relatively trivial element.

X-COM handled this particularly well. Any character that had reserved enough action points to fire their weapon could do so during the enemy’s turn

That being said, snap reaction shots could be a good mechanic to add. However, I would prefer it to be your action for the round, as opposed to a matter of how many mystical action points you had left. Instead of attacking in a round, you order your Ranger to do overwatch or some suitably military-sounding order.

I like the xcom manner. Any move left gets used automatically for opportunistic fire.(providing you allow the opp fire)

When I see that I have a 55% chance to hit that bandit crouching behind a crate on the other side of the warehouse, I want to know what goes into that calculation.

I do not. I like things being hidden behind fudge factors when it comes to combat, and would hate to see a complete breakdown of every calculation that goes into every hit. To me, that's debug mode. Great if I'm debugging, but pretty horrible (and cheaty) if I'm just playing. Since the game will have a mod kit, I'd rather this be the kind of thing that's unlocked with a mod, as opposed to a togglable option.

I'm more for not seeing all the calculations as well. I don't care if its an option or a mod tho.

One great feature would be a “mop up” button that fully automates all characters, basically having them attack the nearest enemy.

Hopefully combat will be streamlined and fast enough that this really isn't necessary. If it isn't, then I'd like this option.

Agreed

When a character is hit during combat, he should suffer penalties other than just a hit point reduction. For example, he could have fewer action points during his next round, and depending on the type and severity of the damage taken, perhaps have temporary penalties applied to certain skills.

No thank you. If you're going to have hit points, you shouldn't be penalized as long as you have hit points. That's what they're there for.

Plenty of other conversations on this, probably best to take it elsewhere.

Along similar lines, minor penalties could be applied to characters who are being shot at, even if they aren’t hit. The idea would be to model the way suppressive fire works in the real world.

Personally, the risk of being shot is penalty enough for me. This is the sort of realism I'll gladly sacrifice on the altar of fun.

I am for suppressive fire, but it is hard to model in a turn based game. Tho I think it could be done.

I also believe that a really robust location-specific damage model (e.g. get shot in leg, walk slower) is worthwhile.

I'm torn on hit locations. I won't advocate for them, but won't advocate against them either.

Agreed. I like the idea, but can't see how to work the implementation well enough to be happy with it.

[Drool]

That sounds like bad design tho. If you can't see the action, then you shouldn't be waiting for it to happen. The calculations etc should be done, but no graphics etc need be drawn. With today's power this should be a relatively trivial element.

It was probably a limitation of Fallout's engine. It just went from possible combatant to possible combatant, down the line. It didn't calculate anything ahead of time (because it was true turn base), so at each person it had to decide what to do, and then execute it, including all animations and such. But it had to do everyone, because there were there, even if you couldn't see them because they were LoS-blocked or outside the draw distance. And even if it didn't do the animations for "invisible" combatants, it still needed to calculate their action and place them on the grid, especially if their movement made them visible, or they were attacking someone who was. Also, when you moved to where you could see, there had to be people, corpses, whatevers as the result. It was massively irritating, especially if you kicked off the war in Zimmerman's office, where there were 2-3 people to kill and everyone else was up the road.

In my preferred method, those people you can't see would still be doing their thing, but it wouldn't matter, because it'd be happening at the same time as your actions, as opposed to taking your turn and then waiting for 20 or so others to take their turn, one at a time.

I like the xcom manner. Any move left gets used automatically for opportunistic fire.(providing you allow the opp fire)

It's been yonks since I played XCOM, but I vaguely recall this. Again, I'd prefer a method without action points, but that's a quibble.

I am for suppressive fire, but it is hard to model in a turn based game. Tho I think it could be done.

Probably, but it could easily be a mess, and the odds are really good that it'd either be A) WOMBAT or B) ridiculously over-powered.

I guess it would provide foes with some kind of penalty to hit with a chance for being shot, but there's the issue of ammo consumption, multipliers for more than one person doing so, what happens if both sides are trying to lay down suppressive fire, crossfire issues, cover issues, friendly fire issues, weapon caliber issues, and of course, just what kinds of penalties and odds for being hit there'll be.

Personally, I'd be satisfied with overwatch and leave suppressive fire out. Especially if it turns into "engage in suppressive fire and the enemy can't do anything". That wouldn't be especially fun.

[suz]

It was probably a limitation of Fallout's engine. It just went from possible combatant to possible combatant, down the line. It didn't calculate anything ahead of time (because it was true turn base), so at each person it had to decide what to do, and then execute it, including all animations and such.

IIRC fallout had no fog of war, and basically no AI except for A* to get in weapon range and start attacking. There were no delays for AI at all, the real problem was the slow animations and the fact every NPC had to move consequently... 2 NPCs multiply the player's idle time by ~2. A battle vs 100 would multiply by 100.

With many combatants (for example wiping out a New Reno gang ) the game turned into twiddling thumbs game.

Another vote for phase based. I want large battles and I also want engaging combat, not a coffee break every turn.

[Drool]

IIRC fallout had no fog of war

Well... sorta yes, sorta no. You couldn't see inside buildings, for instance, and the game would only show X tiles in any direction. So, if the game would only show 50x50 tiles, but someone was 60 tiles away, they could still act, but you couldn't actually scroll the screen over to see them.

[Woolfe]

In my preferred method, those people you can't see would still be doing their thing, but it wouldn't matter, because it'd be happening at the same time as your actions, as opposed to taking your turn and then waiting for 20 or so others to take their turn, one at a time.

I know devs of games after the Fallout period definately took opponent movement when in and out of view into account. I remember reading an interesting discussion ages ago around it. That was for and FPS as I recall and they required a lot more grunt than a Turn Based IMO. So hopefully this should be a non issue.

I like the xcom manner. Any move left gets used automatically for opportunistic fire.(providing you allow the opp fire)

It's been yonks since I played XCOM, but I vaguely recall this. Again, I'd prefer a method without action points, but that's a quibble.

I think AP work, even with a phase based model(Used in the 1 side acts then the other side acts concept) You still have X amount you can do in your turn etc. Indeed even if that X amount is the same for every character. I am still out to town on it, I like the granularity of AP, but the simplicity of "Move, Attack, Cower in fear, Run away screaming, do something tricky" model does appeal.

I am for suppressive fire, but it is hard to model in a turn based game. Tho I think it could be done.

Probably, but it could easily be a mess, and the odds are really good that it'd either be A) WOMBAT or B) ridiculously over-powered.

I guess it would provide foes with some kind of penalty to hit with a chance for being shot, but there's the issue of ammo consumption, multipliers for more than one person doing so, what happens if both sides are trying to lay down suppressive fire, crossfire issues, cover issues, friendly fire issues, weapon caliber issues, and of course, just what kinds of penalties and odds for being hit there'll be.

Personally, I'd be satisfied with overwatch and leave suppressive fire out. Especially if it turns into "engage in suppressive fire and the enemy can't do anything". That wouldn't be especially fun.

Yeah pretty much what I was thinking. It would suck if you could use one guy to suppress a bunch of baddies so you can outflank them, and it worked perfectly EVERY time. Ideally something like that should work, but the opponents should be able to get out of it dependant on where they are etc. No cheap tactics.

[Drool]

I think AP work, even with a phase based model(Used in the 1 side acts then the other side acts concept) You still have X amount you can do in your turn etc. Indeed even if that X amount is the same for every character. I am still out to town on it, I like the granularity of AP, but the simplicity of "Move, Attack, Cower in fear, Run away screaming, do something tricky" model does appeal.

Yeah, I can't honestly say why TOEE's abstracted AP bother me less than Fallout's straight up AP. Nor why AP bug me but a Strength stat doesn't. Still, for whatever the reason, AP strike me as too artificial and metagamey to me. Maybe it's because they could be manipulated much more than your Dexterity could. Attributes are more of a sliding scale, while AP were a goal-post method. If your gun took 4 AP, having 7 was largely a waste and 8 instantly doubled your firepower. Hell, taking two perks in Fallout turned the Alien Blaster into Death Incarnate by lowering its cost to 2. Insanity.

I far prefer TOEE's method (but not their radial menus; evil) where you had a move allowance and an attack allowance. And you could sacrifice your attack for extra movement. Less bogged down in numbers. It still, essentially, uses AP, but they've been abstracted enough that they aren't there, staring you in the face.

[Woolfe]

Makes sense, and I do see what you mean re the AP element. I distinctly remember fiddling with a stat to adjust my base AP in FO.

It never bothered me that much, but I do agree with the Number of attacks being a game changer. Perhaps, the TOEE could be better. If you don't move you get to make another attack, but if you move AT ALL, then you lose that capability.

Still same issue, but gives away that little bit of move 1 fire twice type situation.

[misterman]

I love the combat system in the dragon age games. if something like that with the wasteland story line would be great! Hit pause and setup everything for the fight and go. I like more fluid game play these days vs single turn final fantasy style of play. wasteland story line with a dragon age or hell even fallout 3 type game play would be really nice to see.

[paultakeda]

I love the combat system in the dragon age games. if something like that with the wasteland story line would be great! Hit pause and setup everything for the fight and go. I like more fluid game play these days vs single turn final fantasy style of play. wasteland story line with a dragon age or hell even fallout 3 type game play would be really nice to see.

I liked Dragon Age, too, but that's an Action RPG (realtime with pause is still realtime) and therefore you're not gonna get it in WL2.

However, WL1's system was phase based. There was a decision phase, similar to an action RPG's pause mechanic, where you would assign actions for your party, then an action phase, where each combatant would act out that action sequentially based on initiative. If you had all of your party members attack one group and that entire group was killed before all your party members acted, the remaining party members did nothing for that turn.

WL2 will have a visual component to combat so movement will play a vital tactical role, but because of this visual component a decision phase may no longer be viable. The gameplay may end up being fully turn-based and therefore closer to Fallout, but I hope it plays more like SSI Gold Box, where movement points are just movement points and you only get to do one in-turn action.

[Gizmo]

The gameplay may end up being fully turn-based and therefore closer to Fallout, but I hope it plays more like SSI Gold Box, where movement points are just movement points and you only get to do one in-turn action.

I'd be fine with that. I would hope for some of the other features from those games too; like 'guard', and on the IBM versions you could spend all of your movement points, and yet so long as you hadn't made an attack, you could cancel and revert back to where you started the round; IIRC but you kept any damage taken during the move (when passing melee fighters / probably not by design).

[Cole]

A turn based time slider.

I want the option of having the enemy's turn to be very fast. (No animations just see where they end up and who they shot. If they do kill one of my characters I would like to see the death animation.)

I love doing the strategy in turn based games but I hate waiting for the enemy's actions to play out.

Kind of like the difference of Battle Chess (Watching the pieces take one another) and normal Chess.

[Gizmo]

A turn based time slider.

I want the option of having the enemy's turn to be very fast. (No animations just see where they end up and who they shot. If they do kill one of my characters I would like to see the death animation.)

I love doing the strategy in turn based games but I hate waiting for the enemy's actions to play out.

Kind of like the difference of Battle Chess (Watching the pieces take one another) and normal Chess.

Let's hope for a slider then.
In my case, I usually set such an option to Normal or slower. I want every animation to play out in full detail; also I usually find it impossible to determine what the opponents did during their turn aside from the obvious ~of where they ended up, and that some of the combatants ended the round poisoned or dead.

**I'm one of those that got ticked off when 'Pool of Radiance 2' got patched to have undead zombie sprinters instead of the shambling undead that it shipped with.

[kroska]

Great collection of ideas.