Combat should be closer to Fallout than WL/Bard's Tale

[BatCountry]

Did nobody notice that Wasteland let you split your party during combat and that objects could give cover?

That's the only way my first party (back in '89) survived to get away from the first time I accidentally wandered into the Guardian Citadel.

It had a lot more depth than the Bard's Tale-like combat report/menu screen showed.

[MDF_MadDogFargo]

Did nobody notice that Wasteland let you split your party during combat and that objects could give cover?

That's the only way my first party (back in '89) survived to get away from the first time I accidentally wandered into the Guardian Citadel.

It had a lot more depth than the Bard's Tale-like combat report/menu screen showed.

Yes! Wasteland gave you enough combat options to make it interestng, but not too many steps involved in fighting.

I think the crux of the Wasteland system is simultaneous turns. You don't just step your pieces one at a time through Wasteland battles. You give them orders and then everybody acts at the same time. It's very different from Fallout. It happens quicker but you don't have fewer things to do.

The turn-based simultaneous moves are enabled by the command interface. You don't need to mouse your way through a graphical combat interface. You can have all the characters acting simultaneously because the picture isn't set up one move at a time. There are many moves in a single turn, with initiative determined by speed.

I think we are short-selling Wasteland if we arbitrarily choose Fallout's more graphical interface because it's "more modern." Wasteland combat has a lot going for it, and it's more advanced in its own way, than more "modern" tactical combat.

IMO, you can strike a balance. Easy battles can take less time to solve than harder battles. Your characters can learn real strategies and tactics and use them as commands that act as macros through multiple turns. Your party can plan out combats if they have the advantage of surprise; that sort of thing.

[undecaf]

I envisioned that it might turn out something like this:

I really like that picture, I really do - it, kinda, almost correctly depicts how I have envisioned the system in Wasteland 2. I do not know, if it is your personal horrorstory, or a wish, but it really digs into what I think of being the best alternative (comparison) of Fallout and Wasteland combat systems. Think about a bit more outzoomed view, where you gave your characters indivual attack/evasion commands (more delicate than the ones in Wasteland), and then see how it worked out with AP's (by each character at the time) - with possibly a choice to see the whole turn in one seamless act (just a choice about visual flavor - but just as a choice). Wouldn't that be the kind of compromise, the people - some of 'em - ask for?

[rurouni]

While I appreciate discussions such as 'Combat should be like this or that', combat in WL2 should have the same balance like in WL1, where it does not overpower the storyline yet at certain times (E.g. Fighting the Octotron or Scorpotron) becomes the compelling focus. Other times the mystery of sleeper base takes the forefront etc...

Some newer games of late (while still fun) don't have that sort of fine balance and that is essentially what differentiates a good and great game.

Hence, whatever combat engine is chosen at the end of the day, it should always be finely balanced within the overall game and not become an overpowering feature of it.

[Sharkey]

I don't see why no one has brought up classic RPG systems seen in classic games from Square like Chrono Trigger, the older Final Fantasies, and Mario RPG. Seriously, those were fantastic party turn based games that I grew up on, and are a lot closer to Wasteland 1 than Fallout.

There's been all this talk on importance of tactical gameplay ala Fallout Tactics and Jagged Aliance, but those games are closer to an RTS than an RPG. Granted we'll probably not get the classic RPG combat of the games I grew up on, though I would love to see something like that as those games have fallen to the wayside, but I really do hope Brian and company stay truer to the original Wasteland's combat than what we've seen in the Fallout games.

I like Fallout 1&2's combat as it works for those games being focused on the single player, but I really don't want to see Wasteland 2 turn into Fallout Tactics as it just wouldn't be that old school RPG gameplay that Brian has been talking about bringing back.

[kipper]

I disagree with the OP, I think Wasteland did a great job with combat, it made complex combat situations flow smoothly and quickly. I much prefer it to the Fallout style of combat.

In Wasteland, sometimes the battles were easy and you just stood there and blasted/smashed away until they were dead. But for the tough battles this wasn't enough, you had to use tactics like splitting the party, using cover for sneaking up (or running behind), and hit-and-run tactics. Just because it's a simple interface doesn't mean that combat is simplistic, its abstract nature hides a great deal of complexity!

[Lanatir]

Well, ok, i say the complete opposite to what OP posted. To me it should be FAR away from the Combat in Fallout. Its complicated, you dont see your opponents, it takes too long and it favors combat from a distance. I would rather see that the WL combat (that actually DID have a strategic map when you pressed space) gets taken to the next level and improved. But DONT destroy the flow of combat by making it tedious and long and boring.

[WastelandFan72]

Bye, bye...

[DeN_DarK]

Combat should be closer to Fallout than WL/Bard's Tale - true for me. I'm play both and really Fallout fight model far more interesting. Maybe it must be close to Jagged Alliance for party combat... don't know.

[ffordesoon]

I don't see why no one has brought up classic RPG systems seen in classic games from Square like Chrono Trigger, the older Final Fantasies, and Mario RPG. Seriously, those were fantastic party turn based games that I grew up on, and are a lot closer to Wasteland 1 than Fallout.

There's been all this talk on importance of tactical gameplay ala Fallout Tactics and Jagged Aliance, but those games are closer to an RTS than an RPG. Granted we'll probably not get the classic RPG combat of the games I grew up on, though I would love to see something like that as those games have fallen to the wayside, but I really do hope Brian and company stay truer to the original Wasteland's combat than what we've seen in the Fallout games.

I like Fallout 1&2's combat as it works for those games being focused on the single player, but I really don't want to see Wasteland 2 turn into Fallout Tactics as it just wouldn't be that old school RPG gameplay that Brian has been talking about bringing back.

I agree. I realize nobody wants to bring up JRPG combat for fear of this thread turning into another "gay romance/social" freakout that has to be locked, but the fact is that those games are by far the more direct antecedents of the original Wasteland's combat, and thus, they're worth looking to for inspiration. I think it would be a mistake to rely on solely Western precedents in crafting Wasteland 2's combat system, because most of those just aren't very good, frankly. If there's one area where JRPGs beat WRPGs fairly consistently, it's in crafting interesting combat systems. Fallout Tactics is a game I haven't played, but from what I know about it, it sounds like a good primary inspiration. However, games like the Shin Megami Tensei series and Etrian Odyssey I-III are also worth studying.

[Stainless]

I'm in favor of all moves playing out at once at the end of the turn.

Keep it simple stupid: KISS principle.

When I run a paper and pencil rpg, I have the player characters with the lowest intiative declare and roll first, the players with the highest initiative declare and roll last. When all rolls have been made I the storyteller describe what happens starting with the highest initiative players action first. The reason I make the highest initiative player declare moves and roll last is to give tactical advantage to his high initiative, he gets to know what the lower initiative players are attempting.

On a computer game Winning initiative would allow for you to scroll over NPCs and an "action bubble" would appear over him. The AB would tell you his declared move for the turn; "preparing to shoot," "pulling pin on grenade," "ready to spill your entrails," "shitting his pants," "running towards(location)," "reloading," "applying pressure to the stump where his favorite arm used to be." or any other snarky but relavent information. Those NPCs who have higher initiative will only have their AB revealed when you are declaring moves for your PC with higher initiative.

So your PC with the lowest initiative goes first and only gets to see the AB of NPCs with lower initiative. Your next PC with the second lowest initiative gets to see more ABs and thus the battle unfolds giving the character with the highest initiative last deceleration of action and the best picture of the battle field. Now when you hit the end turn button you see the mayham unfold through success, failures, and botches.

Making this closer to pencil and paper is my preference over emulating other turn based games.

[MDF_MadDogFargo]

While I appreciate discussions such as 'Combat should be like this or that', combat in WL2 should have the same balance like in WL1, where it does not overpower the storyline yet at certain times (E.g. Fighting the Octotron or Scorpotron) becomes the compelling focus. Other times the mystery of sleeper base takes the forefront etc...

Some newer games of late (while still fun) don't have that sort of fine balance and that is essentially what differentiates a good and great game.

Hence, whatever combat engine is chosen at the end of the day, it should always be finely balanced within the overall game and not become an overpowering feature of it.

What you've said here is very true and it also reflects the sentiment behind Sid Meier's self-imposed "Covert Action Rule."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covert_Ac ... ction_Rule

Sid Meier: "Don't try to do too many games in one package. [...] When two units get together in Civilization and have a battle, why don't we drop out to a war game and spend ten minutes or so in duking out this battle? Well, the Covert Action Rule. Focus on what the game is."

You might say, but Civ is a strategy game, not a tactical RPG. But I think we can strike a balance between the two. IMO, WL combats are sort of like Civ combats in that the moves (attack and defend) happen simultaneously, like they do in WL. You could give Civ combats a command interface like Wasteland to order some troops to do this and some troops to do that and then you would have something closer to Wasteland than Fallout et al provides.

I wouldn't mind some kind of combat that has the look of Fallout/Baldur's Gate/etc. but where you order all your characters before each turn and then everyone acts (according to their initiative) simultaneously. Even better, if you can change the POV around too.

[ffordesoon]

Anyone who says Sid fucking Meier's advice is irrelevant because he makes strategy games and not RPGs, assuming such people do exist, is an idiot. Because he's Sid fucking Meier, and he knows from game design.

[Clawdius]

The phased combat system seems like the best way to go, not least of all because Wasteland used simultaneous turn execution. Dmazz, have you ever played Wasteland? While you had your core group of 4 trained desert rangers, the other NPCs you could recruit were able to refuse commands, act in what they saw as their own best interest, to the point that they might not always give items from their inventory to a character with low charisma (representing that they don't like that character) or might burn through ammo on full auto instead of firing the single shot you ordered them to (representing their own fear or trigger happy nature). So, if they stick with a style similar to Wasteland I think you might actually appreciate the results. Asking for a Fallout/Fallout 2 style of combat where you control one character and the rest are left to the AI is unrealistic, and not at all what Wasteland 2 is likely to be about. They may as well have made a new series called Irradiated Hellscape or some such.

However, we should all put some stock in the quality of game design that has come from these people before, the last time I really looked forward to a party based RPG with the same anticipation I had for a Black Isle title, well... Black Isle was still around, and it was a Black Isle title. There have been few developers that had the same depth of thought put into their designs, and knowing that so many people who were behind the original Wasteland, and a number of people from Black Isle who weren't originally involved with the W2 project gives me hope that this product will meet and even exceed many expectations.

The combat system really ought to be a phase based combat system, similar to Wasteland and perhaps updated slightly. I agree with the previous mention of Frozen Synapse, it is an amazing example of how little there needs to be to make a game with well done phase based combat entertaining. There is no character building, no RPG-esque character development, and no equipment assignment. However FS is still an outstanding game, in large part thanks to a unique phase based combat system that is well thought out and designed.

If Wasteland 2 utilizes a similar system, they'll be saving that same give orders and watch the ensuing battle of the turn feeling from Wasteland, while satisfying a number of the requests from both sides of the fence that I've seen in this thread. If the spirit of the game is something akin to Wasteland, it will provide both the strategic manipulation of combat, and the unique AI personalities of acquired team members that made Wasteland so great. To me it seems this is the obvious choice, as it has aspects that cater to both sides of this argument, while maintaining that which made the original game so enjoyable.

[Sharkey]

I'm in favor of all moves playing out at once at the end of the turn.

Keep it simple stupid: KISS principle.

When I run a paper and pencil rpg, I have the player characters with the lowest intiative declare and roll first, the players with the highest initiative declare and roll last. When all rolls have been made I the storyteller describe what happens starting with the highest initiative players action first. The reason I make the highest initiative player declare moves and roll last is to give tactical advantage to his high initiative, he gets to know what the lower initiative players are attempting.

On a computer game Winning initiative would allow for you to scroll over NPCs and an "action bubble" would appear over him. The AB would tell you his declared move for the turn; "preparing to shoot," "pulling pin on grenade," "ready to spill your entrails," "shitting his pants," "running towards(location)," "reloading," "applying pressure to the stump where his favorite arm used to be." or any other snarky but relavent information. Those NPCs who have higher initiative will only have their AB revealed when you are declaring moves for your PC with higher initiative.

So your PC with the lowest initiative goes first and only gets to see the AB of NPCs with lower initiative. Your next PC with the second lowest initiative gets to see more ABs and thus the battle unfolds giving the character with the highest initiative last deceleration of action and the best picture of the battle field. Now when you hit the end turn button you see the mayham unfold through success, failures, and botches.

Making this closer to pencil and paper is my preference over emulating other turn based games.

I never played the original Wasteland, but from what I've seen and read that actually sounds like how the original worked: you input the actions of your characters, then have them play out all at once along with the AI combatants.

Honestly, this is what I'm really hoping to see as it keeps things very exciting and it's more akin to classic RPG style.

Btw, very interesting method in how you handle initiation in your games, giving the "better" players foresight like that, very unique!

[rurouni]

Thanks for bringing up the 'Covert Action Rule' MDF. Did not know that Side Meier faced this issue before.

I see many games straying from this principle these days and this would be a rule to keep in mind especially when taking in the inputs from passionate fans of WL. Ultimately I view our inputs as just inputs, for me the core team just needs to:

- Identify and preserve the core essence of WL1
- Keep the game elements balanced (Combat/Story)
- Create something that they would be proud of to call a successor to WL!

[MDF_MadDogFargo]

Thanks for bringing up the 'Covert Action Rule' MDF. Did not know that Side Meier faced this issue before.

I see many games straying from this principle these days and this would be a rule to keep in mind especially when taking in the inputs from passionate fans of WL. Ultimately I view our inputs as just inputs, for me the core team just needs to:

- Identify and preserve the core essence of WL1
- Keep the game elements balanced (Combat/Story)
- Create something that they would be proud of to call a successor to WL!

Since the combat of Wasteland and Fallout are so different, maybe we should point out those differences and make a poll about it, but not a dumb one like "which kind of combat do you prefer, Wasteland or Fallout," because that is vague and most people are more familiar with Fallout, so we can predict how that would go.

Is the combat of Wasteland "phase-based"? What would we call the combat of Fallout then? My personal distinction is sequential turn-based (Fallout) versus simultaneous turn-based (Wasteland). But maybe that also doesn't quite cover the difference? There are other associated elements to consider too, like the combat scroll. The combat/encounter scroll is an absolute necessity in Wasteland 2.

Over in this other forum there is posted a recent interview where BF makes the comment,

However, combat isn’t going to consist of scrolling text ...

Although what he probably means is that the combat will not consist solely of scrolling text, I hope he is not underestimating the power of the words in Wasteland. Words can tell you many things that pictures cannot. It can give you a mental picture of simultaneous actions, for example, that real pictures would have a hard time doing. IMO, you can show snapshots or excerpts of combat with the text, which would be more telling than the combat format in Fallout.

[Lanatir]

Thanks for bringing up the 'Covert Action Rule' MDF. Did not know that Side Meier faced this issue before.

I see many games straying from this principle these days and this would be a rule to keep in mind especially when taking in the inputs from passionate fans of WL. Ultimately I view our inputs as just inputs, for me the core team just needs to:

- Identify and preserve the core essence of WL1
- Keep the game elements balanced (Combat/Story)
- Create something that they would be proud of to call a successor to WL!

Since the combat of Wasteland and Fallout are so different, maybe we should point out those differences and make a poll about it, but not a dumb one like "which kind of combat do you prefer, Wasteland or Fallout," because that is vague and most people are more familiar with Fallout, so we can predict how that would go.

Is the combat of Wasteland "phase-based"? What would we call the combat of Fallout then? My personal distinction is sequential turn-based (Fallout) versus simultaneous turn-based (Wasteland). But maybe that also doesn't quite cover the difference? There are other associated elements to consider too, like the combat scroll. The combat/encounter scroll is an absolute necessity in Wasteland 2.

Over in this other forum there is posted a recent interview where BF makes the comment,

However, combat isn’t going to consist of scrolling text ...

Although what he probably means is that the combat will not consist solely of scrolling text, I hope he is not underestimating the power of the words in Wasteland. Words can tell you many things that pictures cannot. It can give you a mental picture of simultaneous actions, for example, that real pictures would have a hard time doing. IMO, you can show snapshots or excerpts of combat with the text, which would be more telling than the combat format in Fallout.

he also wrote :

We don’t want the tactics SO deep that you feel disconnected from the world by being in long battles all the time. The last thing we want is someone groaning every time combat pops up.”

and thats how it is for me in Ja2 and FOT. So it will be less tactical then those, im rather sure about that.

[Gizmo]

I envisioned that it might turn out something like this:

I really like that picture, I really do - it, kinda, almost correctly depicts how I have envisioned the system in Wasteland 2. I do not know, if it is your personal horrorstory, or a wish, but it really digs into what I think of being the best alternative (comparison) of Fallout and Wasteland combat systems.

It was a moderate, best case example (from when we had no details at all).

[astateofmind]

FO Tactics had a nice combat system. I hope they will take that as a reference and improve on it.