Whats going on with PvP? Is the main focus only to work on PvE?

[Xsyon]

I responded to a similar post in the the Suggestions section but I'll make a few comments here as well.

1) The issue with the creatures running away is something that was inadvertently changed. I'm not sure how or when it actually happened and I did look into the old code but couldn't figure it out. The upcoming creature patches fixes these issues and makes it much each to adjust and balance when creatures fight or run away. We'll be testing these things this week.

2) The updates I've been working on this year should be good for PvP players, at least players that enjoy combat.

3) Ranged combat, shield or additional combat improvements will come but require the creature / combat update that I am currently wrapping up.

4) The Peace Server was launched because there was always a high demand for it. I should have launched it on day one and it saved me from having to shut down the game. It wasn't launched due to advice from the Guides, although it did reduce the number of conflicts that I've had to personally deal with.

Actually one of the final signs that convinced me to launch the Peace Server was a poll done on a game website where 80% or so of the respondents said they would return to or start playing Xsyon if we had a PvE only server. There were more respondents to that poll than were playing Xsyon at the time.

5) The Free to Play system we had for a while was a counterproductive failure. Going Free to Play on Steam may be something else entirely as Xsyon would appear in different lists and categories, but I've already learned the hard way that major changes like this often come with unpredictable and unwanted results. It's not worth a risk right now when there are more reliable steps I can take such as finishing updates and removing Early Access.

I do appreciate the feedback and hope that answers your concerns.

Thanks!

[Static]

I paid full price $32 canadian or something for this game recently for my wifes account, before you put the sale up on steam cuz I wanted it attached to her steam account so she wouldnt loose it.

Having f2p, steam only, locked to steam accounts, would prevent abuse since we wouldn't be able to log in without making a whole new steam account, than xsyon account and a new email for it all so I think that would heavily detour abuse.

The point I'm making here is that I've paid my dues and I'm not trying to get f2p accounts for myself to use since we have paid accounts... I'm purely looking at this from a population stand point and how it would benefit the server and feedback by giving more people to test features and suggest changes or features to be added to make combat more fun, more interactive so it feels more fluid, more real, more fun, instead of the generic "broken" that imo really doesn't highlight "what" the problem truely is.

We've gone over the problems lightly but the whole concept of combat is not here.... even real life boxing follows the basic rules of combat;
1)avoid damage
2)deal damage
3)inbetween combat get stronger

This has been true for every combat game since the start, doom, tomb raider, mortal combat, all first person shooters and even evolved into modern titles like dauntless (that is honestly the best example of showing alot of the below combat effects) skyrim ect the list goes on. I get your not a tripple AAA studio but most of the "frame work" is already there, xsyon's combat is already more complex than skyrim with the directional twitch style combat, it just needs to be refined and you could honestly have amazing combat.... Thats why folks play for the first time see the directional combat but than with nothing done beyond that to work with that style of combat its seen as "broken" vaguely since nobody can "put their finger" on what "exactly" makes it broken.

You could take this into more complex concepts like;
a) counter attacks - waiting for the enemy to swing, make them miss, than capitalize on hitting them in the opening. This could be some kind of overswing, a way AAA studios do this is by having the starting slow swing/rear up animation, than a fast attack animation with a slow recovery back to stationary giving the clear visual cue to the player 1) hes attacking and 2) this is the opening to hit him after
b) hit recovery - if you hit someone with a heavy full power hit, it should have some kind of effect (fast hits dont apply) this could be a hit recovery, this could be causing them to lose their charged up hit, could even be a stamina hit
c) parry - avoid damage while opening up the ability to deal damage, this could be a stun, this could be a hit recovery action, this could be stamina hit
d) block - avoid damage, take stamina damage, more complex could be parry blocks or shield bashes that smack the weapon hand out of the way opening up the ability to deal damage
e) lunge attack - stamina used to do a forward leaping/lunge attack. This could be under dodge skill and would be great for polearms and getting in quickly to capitalize on a opening to deal damage

These are just the basic concepts off the top of my head that are planned around when your building combat in order to make combat that feels good, real and interactive. A fair amount of my friends work in building games so I've picked up a fair amount over the years, I've even helped them come up with ideas that have made it into some of their games as solutions to issues they brought up.

Having those above player changes would mean the world for pvp, but for pve verse creatures you would also than need to change the creatures to be more interactive than a 1990's mmo where they just walk up to you and spam the same single attack repeatedly (this could be why it feels broken or rather out dated and non interactive)

So instead of having a creature that just repeatedly spams a single attack while you spam your single attack till one of you dies like a bad game from 1990s, you would also need to change creatures to have more interactive combat. So they feel alive with weakness instead of a mindless zealot till they die, that should be every game designers goal, or at least thats what I'm told.

Somethings you gotta keep in mind to have a good interactive creature:
1.1) Multiple attacks - if all they are doing is spamming the same single attack with the same timing than players can easily exploit this like your walking back combat you want to avoid. By making the attacks different, with different responses required to each attack, you remove the ability for players to use the same trick verse every attack since it won't work for every attack. Some basic attack types to choose from that would work are:
a) power lunge attack - rear up slowly to show its going to leap forward and lunge forward, this needs to be locked in the direction that the lunge attack starts at so that the player can side step or side dodge in order to avoid the lunge. There also needs to be some kind of slow overswing/recovery to default that opens up the ability for the player to hit them at least once while they are locked in that direction.
b) quick attack - this could be what the default attack is "currently" on servers and not what was tested on last test. What I mean by this is that you can "see" the start of the swing happen with enough time to parry and if you make them miss, the overswing/recovery to default speed is long enough to hit them, this is what the goal should be; I'm not suggesting leaving old bugged code or "putting it back", I'm just saying it needs to be recoded to work like this. Lunge attack would prevent the ability for someone to walk back in a line.
c) swipe attack - like lunge attack it would give a "different' rearing/wind up animation than do a sweeping attack around the front half of the creature so if someone side steps or side dodges to avoid a lunge attack, they would still get hit with the sweeping wide swing attack
1.2) With these 3x attacks you would have different attacks and different responses to each, lunge you would need to side step or side dodge, swipe you would have to roll backwards or dodge backwards or walk back instead of to the side, quick attack you would need to parry or block or avoid.
2)creatures need to be alive, feel pain, when you hit them there needs to be a reaction (you already have a hit recovery action in game)
3)creatures need counter play, this means you need the ability hit put them into hit recovery, or wound them, or stun them with a heavy blow, all the above player suggestions need to effect these animals.
4) counter attack, if a creature lunges at you and you smack them with a heavy attack before they hit you in the lunge animation, than you should heavily damage them and stun them, possibly forcing them to lay down unable to combat till the stun animation is over.

My "best advise" is to download dauntless; its free and will show you how I think end game combat should be in this game. Ignore the flashy graphics, ignore the big fancy attacks; focus on the concept; the concept of the monster attacking and leaving openings after... and beyond that, if a creature "charges" you like the wolf guy is the best example, if you time a power attack at him charging you and you smack him first, than he gets smacked to the ground and has to recover back to his feet. Do you run? Do you try to hit him charging at you? Do you fail and get smoked by the charge? this is interesting combat.

Adding wounding, broken bones or bleeding mechanics would also be good, you could have bats/maces do more limb braking damage and have things like knives do bleeding damage and axes do half wounding half bleeding... LOTS of options here.

I get thats alot to process but thats more or less the combat bible and the base concepts you should be asking yourself when thinking about the direction of combat; how can I make this more interactive. I made it easy on ya I think with this post, I know your not a combat programmer but at least you know the direction and concepts you should be thinking about.

[MrDDT]

Let me start off by saying there is a lot of good info here and ideas. Many I've already said long before.

You could take this into more complex concepts like;
a) counter attacks - waiting for the enemy to swing, make them miss, than capitalize on hitting them in the opening. This could be some kind of overswing, a way AAA studios do this is by having the starting slow swing/rear up animation, than a fast attack animation with a slow recovery back to stationary giving the clear visual cue to the player 1) hes attacking and 2) this is the opening to hit him after

We had this already in charged attacks with parry. No one uses it. The reason why is because it's highly ping focused and in like a lot of games, you are better off getting a hit in for sure than trying to parry for a chance to get it right.
This works well in games like Mount and Blade. Where you can control the ping a lot better, they are more focused on combat.

b) hit recovery - if you hit someone with a heavy full power hit, it should have some kind of effect (fast hits dont apply) this could be a hit recovery, this could be causing them to lose their charged up hit, could even be a stamina hit

I like this idea. However, I think removing the charged attacks are going to be happening, so what this could be is simply a delay/stun (very very short) in when they can attack again.

c) parry - avoid damage while opening up the ability to deal damage, this could be a stun, this could be a hit recovery action, this could be stamina hit

Great job on getting him to see this, I've said this a while back. Really good to see it put into place.

d) block - avoid damage, take stamina damage, more complex could be parry blocks or shield bashes that smack the weapon hand out of the way opening up the ability to deal damage

I would love to see some shields put into game. I'm not sure he can do it without an artist but yes to this. Please yes. Really going to be needed when archery comes out soon too.

e) lunge attack - stamina used to do a forward leaping/lunge attack. This could be under dodge skill and would be great for polearms and getting in quickly to capitalize on a opening to deal damage

Would love to see this for all attacks, but could really make group combat with a back line having more ranged but slower attacks with a polearm/archery. Lunges would really add skill to all types of combat here.

1.1) Multiple attacks - if all they are doing is spamming the same single attack with the same timing than players can easily exploit this like your walking back combat you want to avoid. By making the attacks different, with different responses required to each attack, you remove the ability for players to use the same trick verse every attack since it won't work for every attack. Some basic attack types to choose from that would work are:
a) power lunge attack - rear up slowly to show its going to leap forward and lunge forward, this needs to be locked in the direction that the lunge attack starts at so that the player can side step or side dodge in order to avoid the lunge. There also needs to be some kind of slow overswing/recovery to default that opens up the ability for the player to hit them at least once while they are locked in that direction.
b) quick attack - this could be what the default attack is "currently" on servers and not what was tested on last test. What I mean by this is that you can "see" the start of the swing happen with enough time to parry and if you make them miss, the overswing/recovery to default speed is long enough to hit them, this is what the goal should be; I'm not suggesting leaving old bugged code or "putting it back", I'm just saying it needs to be recoded to work like this. Lunge attack would prevent the ability for someone to walk back in a line.
c) swipe attack - like lunge attack it would give a "different' rearing/wind up animation than do a sweeping attack around the front half of the creature so if someone side steps or side dodges to avoid a lunge attack, they would still get hit with the sweeping wide swing attack
1.2) With these 3x attacks you would have different attacks and different responses to each, lunge you would need to side step or side dodge, swipe you would have to roll backwards or dodge backwards or walk back instead of to the side, quick attack you would need to parry or block or avoid.
2)creatures need to be alive, feel pain, when you hit them there needs to be a reaction (you already have a hit recovery action in game)
3)creatures need counter play, this means you need the ability hit put them into hit recovery, or wound them, or stun them with a heavy blow, all the above player suggestions need to effect these animals.
4) counter attack, if a creature lunges at you and you smack them with a heavy attack before they hit you in the lunge animation, than you should heavily damage them and stun them, possibly forcing them to lay down unable to combat till the stun animation is over.

Loving all of this. You can even add more to the list.

Adding wounding, broken bones or bleeding mechanics would also be good, you could have bats/maces do more limb braking damage and have things like knives do bleeding damage and axes do half wounding half bleeding... LOTS of options here.

I love these ideas, but before you can put too much of it in, you also need a way to fix them. How you going to fix bleeding or a broken bone? We need that stuff put in before you make it in.