Partying Options

[Timmmy]

A lot of these game consist of a simple tank,a few summoners and ranged folk and of course a mage.Of course when they party they all try to do so with fellows of the same level.I would really like to see Project Wish with use a different system,even if allowed this method to also allow a more enjoyable and possible realistic one,something like what follows:

Parties act as more so squadrons than just a bunch of people sharing xp and loot.In these squads troops could come together and work with other squads to allow much larger player interactions.For example Bobs been with hsi guild a long time and has been promoted to colonel of a guild squad.His rank reflects what he brings to the squad,such as morale and leaderships bonuses.

Now Bobs always been in the cavalry and so decides to set up a lancer squad of 15 lancers.Of course a medic couldnt possibly keep all their supplies and use them while operating at high speeds and charging,thus wouldnt be part of the squad.The same effect would be had by a mage trying to maintain their concentration while galloping around.

Thus Bob would have a squad very very powerful in attack being able to strike deep and fast.At the same time however they would have no healing abilities and would be at the mercy of flying monsters.Thus other squads would act in support for example mounted archers covering the lancers.The medical squad would keep their distance running in when someone was in real need(stretcher bearers idea) but otherwise keeping their distance and maintaining some sort of field hospital.Mages would travel in covenants combining their powers to realise unspeakable powers upon their enemies.

These squads however would only really be seen in large PvP conflicts or special mob spawns.The traditional parties would still roam together although larger guilds could possibly keep such a squad based army for raiding their enemies.

In the heat of battle medics can only use first aid,healing wounds slightly.To be fully healed a player would have to retire from battle to be propery treated.On the other hand magical healers could cure terrible wounds in battle but these are a quick fix method,being more so powerful but short lasting,that is the wound would reappear unless treated by a medic/surgeon character.

Fallen allies in battle can be picked up either by characters(onto their back),mounted characters(to ride behind them) or by stretchers(no speed loss).Just some thoughts,think the healing idea mightn't be all that popular...

[joshpurple]

Ah.. Partying! Right . You mean as in grouping, formations (strategic combat), benefits of military sized units, like WWII (example):

Corps 2 or more Divisions 25,000 to 50,000 General or Lt. Gen.
Division 3 or more Brigades or Regiments 10,000 to 15,000 Lt. Gen or Maj. Gen.
Brigade 3 or more Battalions 1500 to 3500 Maj. Gen, Brigadier or Col.
Regiment[2] 2 or more Battalions 1000 to 2000 Col.
Battalion 4 or more Companies 400 to 1000 Lt. Col.
Company 2 or more Platoons 100 to 250 Captain or Maj
Platoon (Troop) 2 or more Squads 16 to 50 1st Lt.
Squad 2 or more Sections 8 to 24 Sgt.

-Horde like zerging group of goblins, some bonuses would be nice .

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I thought you might have meant Part-AY! Which, would be fun too! For the goblins, I think a goblin drum jam would be GREAT! Show up, eat some goblin mushrooms -or drink Goblin Wine, etc., have that 'trigger' a filter to be put on your camera view so that the contrast values are +300, or some funky effect, then you get the goblin drums for audio, then -as a pixie, you try to fly and dance, lol! .

>Ahem!< Right, good ideas Timmy. I can see where grouping/partying ideas like you have mentioned would be good.

[Radiostorm]

Coming from World of Warcraft, a game that is completely dominated by group play, I'd like to establish something.

Ever since the days of Everquest, partying has worked on the same mechanics. There are several key roles that must be filled or else the group will not work.

1] The tank. Basically, the tank serves as a barrier between the monster and his vulnerable allies. Not typically a large damage dealer, the tank relies on threat generating skills to keep a monster's attention and heavy armour in order to survive the onslaught. Warriors almost exclusively fill this role.

2] The healer. Renews the tank's health reserves, allowing him to perpetually defend the group. Invaluable, because tanks generally have no reliable way of replenishing their own health. Priests, and to a lesser extent paladins and druids, are healers.

3] Crowd control. In situations where multiple opponents are encountered, crowd control in neccesary so the tank and healer only have to worry about one target at a time. Enchanters and mesmers are solid examples of crowd control.

4] DPS. This role has been marginalized in recent games, but it is still important. Depleting a monster's health more quickly essentially increases the overall efficiency of the tank and the healer. Wizards, archers and thieves generally fill this role.

The reason these roles are essential is because of the virtually unanimous use of health points in MMORGs. All these games adopt a system where damage inflicted depletes a numerical total, and when this total bottoms out the player passes on. In order to avoid this fate the player must do one of three things.

1] Redirect the damage to another target, such as a tank or a defensive ability.

2] Replenish their health points, by means of a healer or their own healing abilities.

3] Avoid the damage, either by killing the target swiftly (DPS) or incapacitating the target (crowd control).

The party mechanics of modern MMORPGs are not an arbitrary design choice, but an inevitable consequence of a health point based system. The "tank + healer + DPS + CC" combination is simply the most efficient way of dealing with the limitation of health points. The only way a party system could radically depart from this formula is if it were to find an alternative to health points.

[Pandra]

It would be nice to find a way to break from the traditional 'must have' group line of thought. I'm not sure the milateristic approach is going to appeal to alot of players though. Keep in mind the majority of the market is made up of casual gamers, people who generally only have an hour or so after work to play. Seeing an end to health points and mana points would be nice also, but how would you balance out combat then? Are there any current alternatives? How would you establish how hurt you are, how hurt the mob is? How would you keep track of how many spells have been cast and how many can still be cast until the mage has exhausted himself?

Something else nice to see would be adaptive fatigue bars. A young adventurer without alot of experience under his belt should get tired from all the sword swinging alot faster than a vetran. Running should tire you out faster than swimming. Seriously, I can run 15 minutes and be ready to die, but give me half an hour doing laps in a pool and I've got some energy still. How much you vs. what your not doing should also affect fatigue. If you spend most of a week sitting around an inn you should be slightly more out of shape than if you'd been following a regular adventuring pattern of walking, exploring, maybe some combat, tending to mounts and so on.

[Timmmy]

Partaying comes later Joshpurple!

The main reason partying operates as it does as you mention Radiostorm is because of the style of the game.For example,in the majority of cases were the 'typical party' exists it forms as such because of the style of combat of the game,for example:

1:XP gain,what you cant handle by yourself a bunch of you might be able to deal with together thus giving access to better level goods/higher XP level.

2:Too many players to mobs,thus to stop from kill steals forming of groups.This is a major problem with zone spawning games.

3:Usefullness alone eg a cleric wont be very useful by themself and thus want to join a group for security and XP.Warrior wants cleric so they can fight more often without having to stop to heal and mage/ranged wants a tank.

Note that I am not saying this is a bad systm,in fact starting out it can be very fun to play and to get to know your team mates.However it can later on be very monotonous with same tank takes the hits,ranged attacks pound away at foe and cleric stares at stat bars.

Thus some situation that would allow far more freedom with partying:

*Instead of traditional spawn areas have pakcs of animals that traverse the lands.
-Primary packs
(herbivores)wander the lands in search of food and safety.Give them basic checks.

-Secondary packs
(carnivores)search for the herbivores with basic checks.

These would add much to the immersion in the game with a living environment.Also hunters could form hunting the primary for food,leather for tanning etc)always weary of the predators they know might nt be that far away.Predators could also attack farms with livestock.

Thus quests in the game are not simply one NPC who has in his life asked thousands of players to murder tens of thousands of wolves but instead simple farming NPCs who if they have their farm raided by wolves will make a quest to have them killed etc(event questing discussed before in far more detail).

Of course to stop packs from being wiped out they would over time respawn members over time('mating').

-Tertiary Packs
The intelligent mobs on the map.These are the goblin gangs that form their own little towns(somebody mentioned in an earlier thread)and raid PCs.They are also the ones who might break into the kings castle and rob his crown thus promoting quests of that type.

-Quartenary Packs
These are the rare creatures,dragons,kraken(sp)giants etc that can only be found in desolate areas in the map.The areas are designed so that possible to find and kill a few to actually get all the way through to kill the 'spawn' animal would be impossible,at least for a long time.

The pack idea works that each pack has a maximum number.As long as two members survive it will slowly mate its way back to full strength if left alone.If pack exterminated will be respawned somewere suitable on map as two breeding animals.The point of wiping out packs is both that it will complete any quests that desire so but also that the last animal will drop special item such as snow wolf dropping fine pelt.

Another idea to allow better partying systems is to remove the grinding system.Instead use something like Dungeon Siege were by you skill up in what you actually do as opposed to levelling up and then getting points to put into skills you may never have used.Thus players wont simply move from one mob to another in the typical party looking for suitable risk vs reward.

On a side note it also means Jim the barbarian whos being smashing skulls with his massive mallet will level up in that while Tom the swordsman would level up obviously in sword as thats what hes being using.They would also slightly affect attributes,that is Jim the barbarian would have gained strength also from lifting his brunt of a weapon while Toms dexterity would have risen from use of the sword parrying etc.Some other thoughts but this post is too long already!

[Minthos]

some of it has been covered in this http://forums.projectwish.com/index.php?showtopic=2723 thread, but due to migration/database trouble, that thread along with many of the other old ones is kinda messed up..

As for hit points and mana.. Yes, there is an alternative. I wrote about it in an earlier post, but it seems to have disappeared.

The basic idea is that when you make an attack against someone, there are three possible results:

No damage
Light wound
Severe wound

Severe wounds are SEVERE. One of these is enough to dramatically reduce your fighting ability, or even kill you. Examples: Deep gashes, broken arms, cleaved skulls. To make things more life-like, it would be fun to add realistic concequences for missing/disabled limbs, and of course the animations to go with it.

Light wounds are any wound that's not severe enough to significantly affect your ability to fight. Scratches, bruises, flesh wounds and the likes. No amount of light wounds will kill you, but as you get many of them you'll tire faster and recover slower, and eventually be too tired to fight and probably end up getting severely wounded.

Light wounds can occur when you're not completely in control of a situation, i.e. pretty much any combat situation. Severe wounds can occur when you're not in control of a situation, i.e. when you're fighting someone who's bigger and badder than yourself or when you're fighting multiple opponents..


Another thing that might make combat more interesting would be attacks of opportunity. Any dnd player should know what they are.

[Radiostorm]

Timmmy, that all seems rather peripheral to the topic. Having a variety of different encounters won't change what the most effective party setup will be. A tank will always be better off with a healer tagging along to replenish his health. Likewise, a healer will always be better off with a tank in front of them. We can add all the fancy quests and abstract monster behaviour we want to try to circumvent this kind of partying, but players will always lean towards the most effective solution rather than the most creative. It's all about crunching numbers - even casual players will quickly realize the optimal strategy.

In fact, generally speaking, it is next to impossible to design particularly difficult combat encounters for a group of players lacking a healer in a health point based system. In the end, the creature they are fighting has to deal substantially less damage than they do or else they will suffer an inevitable demise. A period of down time has to be offered after every single fight to allow for recovery as well. It's just sloppy.

[Pandra]

some of it has been covered in this http://forums.projectwish.com/index.php?showtopic=2723 thread, but due to migration/database trouble, that thread along with many of the other old ones is kinda messed up..

As for hit points and mana.. Yes, there is an alternative. I wrote about it in an earlier post, but it seems to have disappeared.

The basic idea is that when you make an attack against someone, there are three possible results:

No damage
Light wound
Severe wound

Severe wounds are SEVERE. One of these is enough to dramatically reduce your fighting ability, or even kill you. Examples: Deep gashes, broken arms, cracked skulls. To make things more life-like, it would be fun to add realistic concequences for missing/disabled limbs, and of course the animations to go with it.

Light wounds are any wound that's not severe enough to significantly affect your ability to fight. Scratches, bruises, flesh wounds and the likes. No amount of light wounds will kill you, but as you get many of them you'll tire faster and recover slower, and eventually be too tired to fight and probably end up getting severely wounded.

Light wounds can occur when you're not completely in control of a situation, i.e. pretty much any combat situation. Severe wounds can occur when you're not in control of a situation, i.e. when you're fighting someone who's bigger and badder than yourself or when you're fighting multiple opponents..
Another thing that might make combat more interesting would be attacks of opportunity. Any dnd player should know what they are.

Oh yes, attacks of opportunity and back stabbing <3

So, you could accumulate alot of minor wounds that wouldn't take you of the fight but would slow you down and make you more susceptable to a severe wound. What if you were going one on one with someone of equal skill though? Would neither of you be likely to score a hit then?

That leaves the question though. how would you handle mana and spell casting? Obviously the bigger spells should take alot out of the caster, but being able to cast big spells should also mean that the caster has access for a mana reserve avalible that can be used for several smaller spells.

[Minthos]

Oh yes, attacks of opportunity and back stabbing <3

So, you could accumulate alot of minor wounds that wouldn't take you of the fight but would slow you down and make you more susceptable to a severe wound. What if you were going one on one with someone of equal skill though? Would neither of you be likely to score a hit then?

It would probably be a matter of endurance or luck, unless other factors come into play - magic, special moves, external factors like distractions or additional combatants.

That leaves the question though. how would you handle mana and spell casting? Obviously the bigger spells should take alot out of the caster, but being able to cast big spells should also mean that the caster has access for a mana reserve avalible that can be used for several smaller spells.

I think "mana" should just be plain stamina, just like in Wish. Call me lazy, but it makes sense to me to have something similar to mana, and it makes sense to link it to something more real than intelligence/level/class and how many potions you have in your backpack.

edit: I realize many of you new people don't have the same background from Wish, so let me bring you somewhat up to speed on combat, stamina and spellcasting. Characters have a stamina bar, that also is their mana bar. Sprinting, fighting and spellcasting reduces stamina, and it regerates automatically. Early on, both warriors and mages spent all their stamina in a single fight. As you grew more powerful, the maximum stamina increased and there were abilities that decreased the stamina cost of basic attacks, so you were able to fight longer and cast more spells. Different weapon types had different stamina costs (I can't say it was balanced, but there were noticeable differences). As an example, one of my characters chose to fight unarmed(doing less damage and not getting any special moves), to conserve stamina and thus be able to heal himself more often.

It may be worth mentioning that spells required reagents to cast, as well as draining stamina.

[Radiostorm]

I generally like the idea of stamina. It's basically mana that regenerates far more swiftly and takes into account more variables.

I think a slick way of dealing with health is a method generally employed by fighting games: percentile health. A player starts at 0%, and whenever damage is taken the percentage rises. The higher the percentage, the more injured the player is. Abilities become more taxing to use, stamina returns more slowly, reaction speed is reduced, and blows produce more recoil, knocking the player around more. The progression would be exponential; a player wouldn't see much of a difference between 0-50%, but would see a more substantial impact in performance between 60-70%. Once the player reaches the 90-100% mark they become vulnerable to abilities that incapacitate them, knock them out, or otherwise remove them from battle.

Health would regenerate back to 0% at a brisk pace, much like stamina. However, the regeneration rate slows down the higher a player's percentage is, preventing players who have just been badly defeated from immediately returning to combat. Again, this would be an exponential progression. Taking a breather from combat, bandaging wounds, or sitting or lying down would all increase recovery time though.

[Pandra]

I like the stamina approach. I've always thought spell casting should take something physical from the caster and tire them out. Intellegence should determine how difficult, complex, powerful and how fast you can cast. But that magic reserve used to acctually shape the spell should be something more tangible.