In-Character Fighting

[Krent]

First off - I'm not the sole engineer of this system. I cite Siv Neo Vist for a reason. Second of all, in ALL of the experimentation we did (and we did alot of it over the span of a year), we came to the conclusion that in order to find a balanced system that's attractive to newcomers, you need to make it as simple as possible. Not to say that your ideas of encompassing weapon / armor / class are bad, it's just that you need to watch yourself in however many rolls / numbers you need to make.

For example, my criticism would be that right now you're concentrating too much on arithmetic. Remember that the more time people spend crunching numbers together, the less time they'll spend putting together a well-thought out logical emote for their combat action. You have a total of -four- rolls being made in a single round of combat (If I'm counting this correctly). All of which have 3 different modifiers applied for each fighter (Strength, accuracy, and armor), along with a complete rule set for multiple weapons.

At the rate you're going, you're gonna have to write an entire encyclopedia on this system. Listing the various modifiers based on race, class, and biological composition, along with what sort of armor effects what and what type of weapon operates how. Then we get into the "Skill level" argument, which I'm sorry to say but a lot of people are going to try to abuse that as much as they can.

I know you don't want a system that benefits a specific type of fighter over another, but people will try to find a way to buff up their character as much as they can with stats if you let them make the argument that their character is a "Born and bred fighter". I completely agree on the point that some characters should do better in a fight than other character - I under power Krent in combat because he's just a stupid little teenager who's only had 3 years of Military Scouting under his belt - but this server has seen more than enough characters who buff themselves up to be "true fighters", and the results have been very ugly rounds of highly intellectual god-moding. The last thing you want to give god-moders is a justification for their moding, and a stat system that will back them up with it.

Also; don't try to concentrate too much on the little details. People have already begun to pick apart your "Knife doesn't do anything to plate mail" statement, even though I'm sure you didn't mean it in the way people have argued. The more details you have, the more things people can pick apart and debate, which turns a perfectly good RP session into an OOC bracket argument over what's "realistic" and what's "Utter bullshit".

My suggestion; Concentrate on reducing the number of rolls and modifiers in the system. Make very broad, loose definitions that have enough flexibility for other people to modify how they see fit. An example would be the oldschool system we have now; the basic system is very flawed, but it's simple enough for players to modify it how they see fit. Again, I point to the example that Kaiza talked about. You want to make your system like this to cater to specific situations and character styles. Above all else, though, you want to make it as minimalistic as you can so you don't have to worry about making imbalances.

Heck, look how many problems WoW has had in keeping "balance" between all the classes. You don't want that transferring over to your system. And again, you don't want to force people to sit at their computers with a calculator at their desk. The energy put into number crunching, the more energy that can be put into the RP post.

Anyway, that's just something to think about.

[GaldorXII]

You know, after some good thinking I actually agree to some degree with the original Idea ( with the said tweaks was made) and I also have looked into taking that idea and merging it with others.

For example:

Vileskin the Undead Mage

vs

Bronzebeard the Dwarf Warrior

Right off the bat you have certain bonuses and penalties that the owner of each character should be able to remember at the drop of a dime, and be able to clearly, without problem, say to the other player, Look, I get +4 HP because I wear plate armor, and I'm harder to hurt, but because I'm slower moving, my attack roll gets a -5.

As for the Mage... I'm undead and my bones are showin, -1 HP, or something.
But I'm wearing cloth armor, so i get +1hp ( so he'd end up with a 0 HP B/P ( Bonus/Penalty)


And for spells..... ho ho ho that'd be fun.

As we all know, Mages are nothing without their fireworks, so they'd have their own rolls for them.

1-10 for fizzle chance
1-3 (or a higher secondary number for a a spell's damage roll, depending on the spell)
and a 1-100 for hit chance.



My point is that if we start using a Penalty, or point system, it's going to get complicated, BUT it will ensure that everything is fair, or logical.

But I'm sure the GMs wouldn't want to sit down for several days writings things down and hitting them into the Wiki, showing us the Penalties and Bonuses of almost every aspect of RP fighting.

So in a new light, I honestly think that the individual person, or persons, that are looking to get into the RP fight should take a minute and discuss their approach... Should we go it Emote, B/P, or Random Rolls.

And If The GMs do see it fit do make a B/P system then I'm sure they'd enjoy the fruits of their labor, seeing Rp fights being done fairly due to character builds, RP factors and actual ingame factors that would CLEARLY give advantages and disadvantages.




Wow, I'm going ahead an stopping because I'm going to keep ranting if I don't

[FrozenFire]

I like the idea, However, maybe the fizzle chance should be lumped in with the hit chance. Also, I'm glad you took into account the flat out obvious stuff. Big weapons, heavy armor = Less evasive, less accurate, less magically powerful(?)
Lightweight, small weapons = Less powerful, less resistant. I personally hate big math problems and number crunching. I want players who decide to go this route to pay attention to obvious things and make good judgement calls, and be able to incorporate the bonus/penalty where it actually can change something. That' why I like small numbers for rolling.


I didn't want any stat system written in the wiki, it's the player's responsibility to notice the penalties and bonuses that are associated with certain character archetypes. Any more ideas for magic? (Healing? hint*)

[GaldorXII]

I didn't want any stat system written in the wiki

I know hehe I was just saying. Not suggesting it, but if it DID come into play than I guess that's where it would go. *shrugs*

[Strahl]

Hey guys, pretty new, was reading this thread, and it got me thinking. Dice-role is a but-pain for sure (Nearly lost a D&D fight against minions once because of bad roles), and god-moders are practicaly everywere (Some don't even realy realize they are doing it), pluss actualy computer generated duels just ain't the stuff...so, I was thinking a lot.

The dice roll system is crap, and everyone is different right? Well, it's not set in stone, and I'm just throwing it out there to be refined, but...when you /roll, you can do...1-10, 100-100, 190000-1009320, practicaly anything, so I realized...let's say your average recruite guard with not a lot of experience encounters an orc warchief bent on destruction, they hit it off.

The guard, since trained, has your average 1-100, but the warchief has a distinct advantage of experience (As one is chosen through dules for instance, so survival of the fitest), so the warchief has let's say, 1-130. It's still gona be a non-god-mode, but you get your advantage. so an all powerfull mage, with 1-200, could own your average child in a one on one fight because the kid has no strength, stamina, experience, or gear, so the kid has a measly 1-30. The kid just doesn't realy stand a chance, but he could potentialy get a good lucky random knife throw to the jugular.

You have the chances of fast paced combat, but you still have the advantages, it's also simple to use (Common sense mostly) but effective. There is a lot of room for critisism and improvment, but hey, it's an idea.

And someone can go ahead and ninja me for my spelling....

[Hawk]

Well, normally, if say for example I was a Gnome fighting a Tauren, I'd still have both of us doing 1-100 but I'd just have something like a -25 to all my rolls. so it's more fair.

E.g.

/roll 50 - Tauren

/roll 60 - Gnome (Ends up being 35, tauren wins!)

You get my drift. I hope.

[Vrahn]

Hmmm.... thats actually a really interesting idea, albeit it would take a little work to organize a chart for roll advantage/disadvantages. But it would help to represent certain characters better when they are fighting each other. After all.... with only 1-100 Arthas is fair game for toddler.

[Brutalskars]

You'd almost have to take some stuff from DnD to make that work right
examples -
Attack Bonus: Skill of weapon + Magic Bonus + Strength or Dex whichever is higher
Damage Done(Only if using HP): Weapon Damage value + Magic bonuses + Strength
Armor(Goes against Attack Bonus): Armor Value + magic Bonus + dodge bonus
HP(If used): Stamina based and Class Based
Spells: Spells ignore armor bonus but not magic and dex. Spell damage is reduced by different magic resistance. Spells do all sorts of things, buff other statistics, deal damage, etc.


Generally depending on what armor you wear and the weight of it, that affects you Dodge bonus total. A man in platemail with say a capable +2 dodge cannot use it because the armor hinders movement.

THis system would be hard to organize though and people would need to study it. But it can be made easy to use, but character HP and the like most be shown on thier Character Profile for no cheating occurs. People then could reference the site to check what they have start at and the like. The hard part is building out many types of abilities for this system. Spells and such.

[Vrahn]

While I think that would be interesting I also think not very many people would want to do a system that complicated. (Though it could be fun!) I'd suggest a simpler system for people who aren't familiar with D&D fighting. Probably just a +- chart for multiple circumstances.

[waffenbaum]

The idea of some well-trained guardsman losing to a tiny withered beggar who just happened to roll higher is still sort of funny though. All I've ever been thinking of is the same system as dice rolls, but with each class having a base value according to their proficiency as a fighter which they can add to the roll.

Fighters would have +10, while the other classes might have down to about +1. (Only melee and normal weapons, no magic taken into consideration) So, say a mage tries to stab a warrior, he rolls 20, and so does the warrior. The warriors innate training (+10) would allow him to win, while it takes very good luck for the mage to actually do something against an opponent who knows how to fight and protect himself. I don't know if that makes any sense. I'm sure something similar could then be used for magic too, taking the same system and turning it around. (I guess it would require people to say whether their attack is magic or melee, so people know that they are up against)

Oh well, too tired to make it coherent, sorry.

[Vrahn]

Yeah, I understand what you mean. There would probably be a few charts and people would just figure out their modifier when they create their character. Mind you, it could possibly change through RP, as your character progresses and such. Anyway, all that is up to GM consideration, and I don't know if they want to bother with it.

[Walrus]

I beleive, though useful at times, the dice-roll-system is un-needed. If the people involved behind the characters in the fight are realistic, mature and fair, there needs not be a single /roll. I understand that not all people agree with me on this, but I will never suggest a roll unless the outcome of an event is so obscure the situation demands a fair and even chance at the two or more outcomes desired by each player.

I know that some people just don't want their characters to die (which may often happen in fights), and I respect that. I will even give some wiggle room to people who really desire to keep playing their character. Though, a parallel, Characters want other Characters to die sometimes. All parties involved in a fight should understand this and act accordingly.

Realism, though, must also be taken into account. Like afore stated a your average Joe wont stand up to a well trained fighter. Even if that average Joe really doesn't want to lose. So, one should always realize that when being attacked by a character, who is stronger than you, you might be less inclined for survival.

On fairness, please no godmodding, I've done my fair share long ago and I don't ever want to do it, much less see it again. With that, also take into account the typing speed of others, taking turns is a great way to solve this problem.

Finally, when people fight, in most cases, someone loses. Respect others desire to win, and with luck they will respect yours. If you just really don't want to lose, try and talk your way out of it. For example Characters like my own Valyr are more than happy to strike up deals. Another tactic to avoid death is simply running. Running however is an iffy deal and can be seen as unfair due to someones lack of typing speed. When running take short bursts and allow for your opponent to reply.

Heh, turned into a rant that did... /end rant

[Nostra]

Personally I like Krent´s and Siv´s system, it´s easy. simple and can be modified to suit ones needs and different dis/advantages. If anyone want to make a more complicated system, go a head! Though don´t expect everyone to use it, people are free to handle situations as they want (as long as all parties agree) be it through rolls, pure emotes or PvP.