Whatever your feelings about Rogan are, this is a great episode--BUT aside from that...
While I'm taking what they're saying way out of context for their topic (though they do reference Tetris), I really think that, starting at this point in the podcast--https://youtu.be/_fbCcWyYthQ?t=189 --listening for about a minute or two, the principle they are discussing perfectly describes what CoH got right about combat. It was a flow I could play for hours without getting bored or stressed.
TSW and CO combat bored me. FPS combat slowly fatigued me. CoH... I could play and play and have a ball till I realized I had been playing for TOO long.
Man I miss it.
—
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
I'm sorry how does COH combat bore any less than CO combat or TSW combat? Logically it should bore far more. if theres any reason CO combat would bore its poor design of enemies with the only difficulty coming from knockspam/stunlock, not the system itself.
DCUO had good combat. if a Superhero game could combine DCUO or ESO combat with COH like superhero theme and other features it would be a match made in heaven.
I couldn't agree more, Empyrean. The old game managed to hit that sweet 'flow' channel all the time for me in a way the other games you mention never did. CO had way too much spamming of a single attack instead of the rhythm moving across a selection of powers like a dance. As you've said before, the old game managed to make combat feel tactical and action at the same time without going too far in either direction.
I dearly hope CoT combat will get us that feeling back. I haven't experienced it in any other game before or since.
Spurn all ye kindle.
I'd be willing to compromise and take COH like combat only with major improvements like far more mobility, stuff not rooting you when you used it, and no more than 25 buttons total for skills at max level.
As long as that limit on number of buttons is a player option and not imposed by the game. I loved having multiple configurable trays for regular powers, temp powers, emotes, etc. Also, I really, really dislike games that allow you to earn more powers than you can put into your active slots.
Spurn all ye kindle.
Ever played a game where having 30+ skills and having to use ALL of them to play optimally was a thing? it's not good design and not a very fun aspect of any game, literally the worst thing about FFXIV. you easily run out of good keybinds. limiting it to 25 or less skills used at once would be smart.
It doesnt mean you wouldn't have more than 25 skills, it means you'd have to choose which to use for each situation like ESO you choose 12 out of almost every skill in the game.
While I loved Two Gun Mojo and Dual Pistol's AOE attack (forgot the name) in CO, in other builds with two attacks like that, I was often bored in CO. Only loving the animations of those attacks made it fun, along with Void Shift to teleport in and just get in melee range for the awesomeness of it all :)
Though, I did love how it opened up defense powers for concept reasons, I didn't like it as much with other less than stellar animations. Or boring ones at least.
I saw this on reddit a while ago - at least one person's opinion on why CO combat was not as good as CoH (and I happen to agree with them):
COH combat was terrible though, not a high standard to go by. CO's might not be a lot better but why ask for a system like COH combat when theres many better ways to do it?
Also more skills does not mean more fun. At least to a point. Sure 4 skills may be boring but 15-25 is a good number. anything above that used in one build is excessive.
That reddit post does a good job of explaining my main issue with CO's combat design.
I also agree with Zee that a modern game would have to do more than just copy CoH though, since handled very much like an oldschool mmo. I totally agree with Zee that less player buttons (and more player decision making) would be great.
I would love to see players get to make decisions in combat and outmaneuver and outplay the baddies instead of hitting 1,2,3,4 in every fight. Something like superhero themed vermintide with less bugs and more abilities would be fantastic, though I know CoT isn't going to be that game.
For me, combat in City of Heroes wasn't about "the moment" at all (even when deep into Scrapperlock), but rather it was about [i]a cascade of anticipation for the NEXT moment[/i] that would happen after what was happening NOW. It was all about managing the "flow" of combat in a way that felt both effortless and also relatively repeatable (hence attack chains) in ways that felt seamless. The result was a sense that there was Never A Dull Moment™.
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[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
Wow, that's a great quote! I completely agree too!
That... is a perfect description--better than I could have come up with--of exactly what I loved and miss about CoH combat.
It was a combination of planning and strategy that you implemented through real-time tactical thinking rather than just a never ending sequence of "in the moment" reactions--though there was some of that too.
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
I could alpha strike just fine in CO. Don't know what you're talking about. I agree about crowd control being worthless in CO though. COH did a lot of things right after all, but the general feel of combat was not one of them.
While I'm not especially enjoying CO, that quote is... kinda wrong. I usually enter combat and immediately execute a powerful strike; it's not difficult, it just requires you to manage your equilibrium-enhancing stats. That (and at least for melee characters) combined with the energy generating taunt abilities meant that I usually spent most of ever combat spamming my mid-level energy-costing attacks, and frequently executing my AoEs and power strikes. Combine that with the close-to-melee ranged strikes and combat could flow well and quickly. Of course, with my melee focus dude (as opposed to my tank) he was such a glass cannon that every mook cluster felt like I was seconds from defeat. The lack of reliable self-healing was a real problem, and my tank was massively more effective than my scrapper-analogue.
Mind you, I mostly played solo, but honestly that's an important factor of any MMO for me; if I can't consistently have fun solo, I'm not likely to last long with the game. I'm not saying CO's combat was *good* by any means, only that it's not at all hard to lead with alpha strikes and keep consistently using them throughout a fight.
~ DariusWolfe
Errant, TNT, Vibrant and Fluxion on Liberty
Empyrean, I agree completely. CoX combat was visceral and engaging for me, from the plethora of options not restricted by arbitrary "you can only have so many active powers, superhero" to the tab targeting which allowed my character to perform superhuman acts, to the tactical DPS/DPE/DPA and resistance/defense and CC and terrain/targeting decisions, to the enemy designs. Sure, many improvements could be made, however no other game has ever come close to what CoX achieved.
I also never felt I HAD to have all of the powers in use, however I loved the option to have them available if things went differently then planned (which very rarely happened). I understand that this can be overwhelming to some, however since it was never required, I strongly disagree with anyone who advocates for an artificial limit to the numbers of powers we could have available for activation. Limits on energy, "build-up", recharge time, sure, but not straight up "you can't have more than # powers available to use".
Formerly wyldhunt of CoH; Guardianite since I2.
Whether you feel you had to have it is not relevant. the fact is in any system which has a certain number of skills all usable at once, you're going to need to be using all of them to be most effective, unless some are literally useless. and that means too many keybinds. 25 is more than enough skills to have avaliable at once.
I'm hoping we don't have too many skills on the bar either, I completely agree. CoT won't be an action mmo so I think we can handle more than ESO for example, but FFXIV would be severely pushing it when those devs have even made it clear they want to cut back on skills and fear skill bloat. Even if we have 50 active skills to choose from, they don't have to all be usable at once. They can help determine a playstyle even if we could use as few as ten at a time. I don't like useless skills, or skills that get replaced and forgotten over time by versions that essentially do the same thing. So I don't think a powerset or class is necessarily fleshed out more by having more skills.
One system I liked was in the original Aion (I haven't played in years to know what it's like now) where skills combo'd into another without taking up anymore hot bar slots. If you had a skill set to the one key, it's more powerful iterations that built off that were automatically set to one.
It's OK to have skills that are situational and don't get used all the time. You don't need to use them all in any given fight.
Totally on board with not having the screen be a giant mess though of abilities, absolutely. CO actually did a bit right in that they made some standard powers keybinds that everyone could use, like blocking. It didn't need a power tray slot because everyone had it and it was supposedly something you'd use enough to warrant a keybind for it regardless of build. I'm not saying the way they handled blocking was perfect, but it is an example of minimizing clutter on the interface.
Having abilities with different activation modes is another, and something we already know CoT will have (ie holding shift or something to get an ability to behave differently).
I'd like to think that this [i]cascading flow of successive moments[/i] is what gave Scrapperlock its unique (and enduring) appeal. Because at that point you were, in effect ... [i]surfing on he waves of possibility[/i] ... and catching each new wave even before the last one completed, leading to a chaining of decision making which, even if routine and regularized, kept you engaged and focused on two things simultaneously ... what was happening NOW and what you were commanding to happen NEXT. Scrapperlock turned that experience into a gaming adrenaline rush, in which you had to put your trust in your build and your skill to pull off the seemingly impossible (as a matter of routine, let's be honest with ourselves) ... and that FELT HEROIC, even when it was standard operating procedure.
[b]Boot to the head![/b]
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[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
I personally loved the general feel of CoH combat. I liked my four stacked trays of powers. I had different sequences with different patterns for different situations.
I had my single hard target sequence, my swimming in minions PBAOE sequence, my ranged/TBAOE "grab aggro first" sequence, and others. All different sequences of different powers for different situations.
And being effective was never a problem solo or on a team, trial or taskforce. And I always cranked 'em to 11--at least whenever it was up to me.
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
I really liked CoH combat, and part of that was the lack of any 'real' global cool down, while at the same time having a slower paced combat, Your 'global cool down' was the length of the animation to the attack you used. Combat at least 'flowed' visually because CoH's animations were always full with damage happening at the appropriate moments. Take WoW today, people want damage when the button is pressed and was a short global cooldown, which makes a lot of melee characters look like they're having a seizure while they attack. CoH had 'titan weapons', they were slow, the animations had weight. in WoW a fury warrior weilds 2 two-handed weapons with the same speed as a dagger. There's no weight, and the animations are incredibly short to ensure another attack can be used near immediately.
This is part of why I've been moving towards FFXIV more than WoW, I enjoy the slower pace of combat itself. FFXIV has hectic fight mechanics in it's dungeons and raids, which I enjoy more than in WoW because I get to look at the boss and what's happening instead of what's flashing on my bar.
CoH's endurance system was also more fluid. A mana bar depletes and then you're normally toast. CO's bar needed to fill up every fight. In CoH, you had your normal attack patterns to try and stay endurance even, if you pushed yourself with bigger attacks you'd run low and have to conserve for a bit. You had options that weren't just reliant on whether or not you use burst cooldowns.
I like combat in ESO and DCU, but they both had an issue they share with CO. Not everyone will agree with me on this, it may not even be a popular sentiment. But DCU, CO and ESO are TIRING.They're a bit more active with dodging, blocking, DCU's attack combos and it can be pretty entertaining. But it's draining on the mind, it wears me out after a while. If I have a shit day at work, I'm exhausted and just need to relax, those games don't work for me. CoH could have some really intense fights in group content, but solo I could street sweep or run paper/radio missions and just enjoy myself. I could turn off elite bosses, lower the difficulty and do what my brain could handle. I could play CoH for an entire day and adjust to how I felt. ESO/DC after a bit, I'm tired of just spam clicking basic attack.
I think this is starting to turn in a ramble so I'll stop. But I really liked CoH's combat, it'd take it back in a second, animation locks and roots included.
I dunno its a lot more draining on the mind for me to keep track of 30 skills even with a 2 second GCD when 5 mechanics are going off at once on screen. LESS abilities means MORE ability to focus on actual mechanics and therefore more mechanics can be added.
This.
And this.
The fact that no other game out there has combat like that of the old game, and the fact that MWM said during the Kickstarter that combat in CoT would feel similar (which still leaves room for some innovation) is the main reason I'm here in the first place.
Spurn all ye kindle.
Honestly I think CoH veterans themselves are ruining their own future by demanding a clone of CoH or even close to it. if COH launched today it would have failed.
Consider that there are a total of 23 possible power slots, up to four travel powers (with their own branches for additional related powers), reserve activations, and temp powers, the possibility exists for having several trays set up.
Like others have pointed out, not all those powers need to be utilized in every situation. Heck, look at the old game’s dual wield set with its combos. 9 possible powers, 3 possible combos for unique abilities, and one of the highest dps combos for that AT onky required 4 powers from the primary.
[hr]I don't use a nerf bat, I have a magic crowbar!
- Combat Mechanic -
[color=#ff0000]Tech Team. [/color]
The highest DPS (that was just insane to get) didn't even use the high dps combo, which in itself was hard to just nonstop chain that combo.
Loved Dual Blades. What my main used. Relied almost entirely on the +DMG Combo, with a non slotted PBAOE attack purely for the love of the animation :p
CoH Veterans are both who are creating the game, and backed it through kickstarter, precisely to replace the CoH that was lost. Not 100%, but the goal was to feel familiar to CoH vets, combat included.
I'm not saying not to make improvements, I like their compromise to being rooted during attacks, which is a stacking snare IF you keep attacking on the move.
But if the combat suddenly matched CO, DCU or ESO, there would be many here who would cry foul as it's not what the kickstarter advertised.
How else would you make a spiritual successor if it doesn't catch the feel of the old game in as many areas as possible? We are not talking about a clone here but rather using CoH as the basis and "rebuilding" its flaws. MWM has already said that "inherent" rooting on skill activation will be the exception (I'm thinking top-tier nukes) rather than the rule so it will already be much more mobile than CoH.
Personally I don't think the combat in CoH was bad in any way, it gave enough time to think ahead without the need spam keys and still giving the feel of being in frantic battle.
What I think you are forgetting is that depending on build many powers may be (regular) toggles or even passives which mean they are not meant to be actively used in combat, reducing the number of key-binds you "need" to use. Second we have long-ish buffs that are mostly cast between battles which won't really need "easy access" key-binds (if any at all).
It seems to me that your major concerns are effectively already addressed. Beyond "too many skills" you don't seem to give any actual points on why you think CoH's combat was bad.
I loved combat in CoX. I didn't think "too many skills" was an issue.
As others have mentioned, rightly so, that not every power was meant to use in every fight and they still weren't useless. There was no pressure to force them all into every fight. The situational abilities were some of the best and I loved that we had an "oh s#!&" button for most scenarios.
I had my bars all set up with most of my common primary abilities on the first bar, most secondary on the next bar and miscellaneous situational abilities and buffs from those sets after that.
I had them when I wanted them and wasn't forced into only 10 abilities like in ESO. ESO was built more on action rather than diversity which took a lot of the feel of Elder Scrolls out of it for me. That kind of set up also forces pretty strict standards on what's considered a "right" or "wrong" build that is commonly seen in MMOs. FFXIV is an amazing game, but I think it has too many essential abilities with to many combos forcing your rotation rather than making combat feel like it flows naturally.
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings: Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
I still want Trays that have 12 slots in them (1 to =) (F1 to F12) rather than merely 10 slots (1 to 0) (F1 to F10).
That way I can set up 48 entire keybind slots as 1 to = and F1 to F12 with (and without) a Shift key modifier.
By adding Control as an additional keybind modifier, I can increase that out to 72 keybind slots.
This "reserve" of extra trays wound up being quite necessary useful for builds that involve "shifting" like Kheldians would do, in which you basically want to be addressing different trays with your keybinds depending on which "mode" your character is working in.
Note that such "mode switching" features could easily be exploited in City of Titans as having different "setups" depending on whether you're trying to build up, or burn down, your Momentum. Just a thought ...
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[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
I'm not against the general idea of CoT starting with CoH's combat system and "improving" on it in various ways. But it's also hard to prove your assertion that a 100% identical clone of CoH would be certain to fail in 2018. How can you possibly assume/prove that claim?
As the other folks have pointed out the entire point of making CoT was to create a "spiritual successor" to CoH. By simple definition that means it ought to be "relatively close" to the look and feel of the original game. Of course this begs the question just how "relatively close" should CoT be to CoH. It's a fine line without an easy answer.
But while the exact details of "how close should CoT be to CoH" is hard to quantify I think it's very easy to speculate what would happen if the folks of MWM chose to radically veer off from CoH and remake the core combat system of their game be more exactly like CO, ESO or some other completely different game. If you made CoT be an effective clone of say [insert any [b]other game[/b] here] then what's the point of having a CoT in the first place? MWM might as well drop the whole pretense of CoT being a "spiritual successor" to CoH and just admit that it would be a totally new/unique game.
Basically CoT couldn't be CoT if it didn't retain fundamental aspects of CoH. I think in this case that would have to extend to the basic formulation of the combat system. If you prefer another game's combat system more than CoH's then you always have the option to play that other game instead.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
Actually. As a CoH veteran who backed the KS, I hope they not only improve on CoH, but I was hoping they'd be wise enough to look at games such as Blade & Soul, Tera and WS for combat.
Feel familiar? I want it to be better. The familiar aspect I want, is a superhero setting MMO.
Not every power needs to have to be used in every situation for there to be a button bloat issue. FFXIV abilities dont have to be used in every situation yet they acknowledge they have a bloat problem which must be addressed. more than 25 buttons to bind is a cancer.
Please don’t equate and conflate button binding with a systematic disease which can grow and spread to affect multiple organs in the body and cause death.
It is at the very least a hyperbolic statement and doesn’t belong in any conversation with regards to game design.
I don’t mean to sound harsh but having a step-mother who lost her battle with cancer after 5 years of terrible pain, multiple surgeries, radiation therapy and multiple chemo treatments, and having a good friend who is now in the beginning stages of his battle with the disease; I take exception to use of the word in the absolute wrong context.
It is fine to voice displeasure over a design aspect. We need criticism and critical thinking as much as we need praise. When it comes to the number of buttons to actually place in trays or to key bind, just looking at power slots, there are 23. Some builds with permanent powers won’t have to bind those powers, but that is more of an exception. There may be builds where someone has 23 powers at their disposal.
Temp Powes aren’t a requirement unless specific to a mission, in which case those appear in their own unique utility tray. Reserves have their own activation but it is possible people may want to burn their own keys for Reaerve activation which can be another 5.
Then there is the Commander archetype with its unique pet commands of which there will be several just for basic play. However, having played the MM archetype from the old game, I had made special combat scripts into macros which I bound to my keyboards macro keys. I had 6 commands for each of the 3 mob ranks, and another 6 for the entire group commands. Then more just for fun with emotes and /petsay commands.
Really, this is something where your mileage may vary.
Someone can end up having a build where they use only 4 of their primary powers, 4-5 secondary., and those could be “set and forget” like toggles, nonuse for Tertiary, and never care about Reserves or Temp Powers. Or, you could have a Commander...
[hr]I don't use a nerf bat, I have a magic crowbar!
- Combat Mechanic -
[color=#ff0000]Tech Team. [/color]
I honestly think your definition of "CoT just needs to be a superhero setting MMO" is probably several orders of magnitude too far away from the acceptable limits of what a "spiritual successor" of CoH should be.
To use the animal kingdom as an analogy if we were to say CoH was a "[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hominidae]Great Ape[/url]" I'd want CoT to at least be another "Great Ape" in closeness. Specifically maybe CoH could go from the game version of a Chimpanzee to a Gorilla and be fine. On the other hand I think as long as CoT was still a generic "Mammal" that'd be good enough for you. I simply think that leaves the possibilities for what CoT could end up being far too wide in scope.
As I said before if you really want CoT to be that close to being a completely different game you could always go and play that completely different game [b]instead[/b] of CoT.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
And this is why we went with traditional tab targeting for those who enjoy that, and our optimal hybrid active aim (with soft and hard locking)) system. Under the hood it is still a tab target style of combat, but with a more active way for the player to engage in combat.
[hr]I don't use a nerf bat, I have a magic crowbar!
- Combat Mechanic -
[color=#ff0000]Tech Team. [/color]
I didn't mean to bring up old trauma by anyone who was affected by a family member with a terrible disease. I meant it as a figure of speech only. Apologies if it offended anyone.
The point I'm trying to make about button bloat is thus, In any game with a certain number of skills avaliable to be used at once, all of them are going to be required to perform at your best. and that means binding all of them. I understand some people dont strive to be the best they can be at a game, and are happy with stopping at a certain level of efficency, but this is not true for many players. many players will feel disenfranchised if being the best you can be means more skills need to be bound than can effectively be keybound to easily reached key combos.
FFXIV has a serious case of this problem. I don't have a problem with having a ton of skills but unless the amount able to be used at once is limited, there will be issues with keybinding it all which won't be making many players happy.
This issue of "button clutter" just reminded me of a feature in CoH that I hope we'll have in CoT.
In CoH, regardless of how many trays you had visible by default, if you pressed shift (or the button you chose) it would expand to 4 trays and then collapse again when you released.
I usually only had two trays visible, and put temp powers (and on some toons, toggles) on the 3rd and 4th row so that they were out of the way until I needed/wanted them.
"I don't think you understand the gravity of your situation."
That doesn't solve the issue of button clutter at all unless you manually click buttons. Which is highly inneficient for gameplay compared to keybinding things.
Well, it solved it for [i]me[/i].
Sure I used keybinds and muscle memory for all of my regular abilities, but things I used rarely (like temp powers) or set and forget (like toggles), popping up the tray and clicking didn't waste much time at all.
I agree that to rely strictly on memory for dozens of abilities would be difficult, but that alone doesn't sound like a good reason to limit the number of possible abilities.
"I don't think you understand the gravity of your situation."
Well, whaddya know! I thought I was relatively well-versed in the mechanics of the old game, but I never knew there was such a key-bindable command.
The problem here is that 'better' is entirely subjective. While I can understand that you may prefer the combat model from those games, in my book (and I suspect that of others) those models are much worse. No one's right or wrong on this, because it's entirely a preference thing, but I agree with the idea that combat is such a core element that it's a requirement for CoT to be considered a spiritual successor. I think MWM's approach of a core model that's similar to that of the old game but with optional features layered on top is the best compromise to try to reach as many players as possible.
MWM may have already dealt with this, but please allow us to determine the size and location of this temp tray. When the old game added such a temp tray near the end of its life, its location was not configurable. The way I liked to set up my trays, this meant the temp tray obscured my insps.
Spurn all ye kindle.
There's not currently another super hero MMO inwhich to go "I hope they're better than the last super hero MMO that I loved to play"
However, if I'm wrong, please, point me to this other MMO inwhich to hope.
By your logic, the players here who want the CoH clone should really be looking at and supporting Heroes & Villains, as that is the obvious CoH clone.
Let's look at CoT. You want spiritual successor? I don't find anything I've seen of the aesthetic style of CoT to remind me of CoH at all. So, where's my aesthetic spiritual successor?
Animations? For the attack animations I have seen so far, none have looked to be as good as CoHs. So, spiritual successor to you means going backwards in terms of animations being cool?
Graphics. Okay. There's a step forward for CoT to be called successor.
The ability layout seems to be heavily CoH inspired, but done just differently enough to not be a total copy. So, there we go, successor.
So please your talk and many others is less successor and more "I want clone, but with updated graphics and I'm willing to accept it not looking like CoH at all!"
Same. It worked just fine for me too, and that was including gameplay up to things like Hamidon and Incarnate Trials. That's why I kept my commonly used stuff on the first two bars, then the less common on the upper bars. It wasn't the end of the world to have to actually click the powers in those slots occasionally. But I guess not everyone was as comfortable with that. It's not like the game actually demanded min/maxing for any content. Just had be adequately modded and know how to play your toon.
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings: Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
I believe all my most important abilities I had on keys 1-5 and alt 1-5 and everything else was basically abilities I hardly ever used. Like WP's tier 9 defense power.
Imho the best would be to start with a full energy/mana/stamina bar (like City of Heroes) but use action-basic-attacks to refill the bar (like Champions Online). This way you still use your basic attacks, but you don't start from zero therefore you will use your skills at the best time.
Why the basic attacks? Here the possibilities:
> Autoattack (double click on the mob and your char attacks with you just watching) is bad nowadays, boring and not in synergy with an "actiony" style of combat. The only good thing is that it was easy (good for all kind of peoples, maybe too easy for most) and relaxing.
> But basic attacks retain the 2 good things (easy and relaxing), while also gaining the "actiony" side by forcing the player to at least barely AIM (very little, and melee won't need to aim at all, but needs to position more) and HOLD a button (mouse button preferably, for basic attacks).
Holding a button is important to make you feel you're the char, while auto-attacking makes you feel like a spectator.
> Skills-only (several mmorpgs put the "basic attack" like some sort of low-damage initial skills that you throw away at a certain level... so wasted), becomes a random-fest of pressing all skills to do the most damage, even a skill that tactically should have been used another time, or even not used at all for that kind of enemy. I find this bad, non-relaxing and still boring (randomly pressing all buttons doesn't relax nor gives you fun).
Therefore imho including basic attacks, while giving them a purpose ("mana/energy/stamina regen") is the best way to go for an action combat that want to retain an easy and relaxed attitude. An example of this may be Dragon Age Inquisition, basic attacks that regen the skills bar, skills that are not spammed but used with a specific purpose (some may not be used at all in some fights and abused in other).
Not really sure how you jumped to these hyperbolic conclusions. I simply stated that my definition of spiritual successor is "something close" to CoH. Making CoT's combat system work like other currently existing games is not what I'd call "close" to CoH.
At least I did correctly point out in an earlier post that nailing down how "relatively close" CoT should be to CoH was never going to be an easy task for anyone to define let alone MWM.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
CoH combat was not its strong point so why copy it for a successor entirely? Keep the good change the bad, get better game.
Again I'll ask anyone to point out where I said CoT's combat system should be 100% identical to CoH's.
My point is that to "improve" it it doesn't need to be 100% identical to [b]any other game's combat system[/b] either.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
I never had issues with keybinding in COH. I only used three trays and each one was easy to tab to and then the same 10 keys were used for each tray which only left direction keys, inventory and perhaps one or two other keys. These coupled with auto repeat feature for travel made everything very easily accessible. The powers were all easily accessible tray one (default) main attacks/combos, tray two secondary attacks/defensive and tray three had the left overs, travel, tertiaries that weren’t vital to battle but were valuable nonetheless.
Hell the first couple months I played I was using the mouse to activate each power, didn’t even try changing the key bindings until I really got entrenched in the game then it was no-brainer...
Rarely ever had that third tray full, about six or seven slots for most characters. I did like passive abilities. Keybinding just wasn’t a problem at all to me.
From what I remember reading, several of these features (trays, auto-repeat and such) are intended to be available which works for me!
"A sad spectacle. If they be inhabited, what a scope for misery and folly. If they be not inhabited, what a waste of space." ~ Thomas Carlyle
I didn't say it had to be, but I did say I'd definitely like to see SOMETHING LIKE or something more similar to other games combat systems I did like. A copy wouldn't be a good idea either.
Please stop continually making statements that are your opinion as undeniable fact where it's patently not true. You've said repeatedly that it wasn't its strong point yet many of us have stated that we enjoyed that aspect of the game. Please do not speak for myself or anyone else by caveating it as from your perspective.
Thank you.
As Cobalt Azurean directly stated your "opinion" on the matter is duly noted. I would simply guess that most of the people who "generally liked" CoH as a game overall also "generally liked" its core combat system. *shrugs*
Everything in life can always be "improved" and I would certainly never claim that CoH was a "perfect game" in any regard. But let's not throw the baby out with the bath water shall we?
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
I remember a few threads discussing the UI, but has there been confirmation on UI customization/modification? I honestly can't recall at this point.
Actually, the combat system was probably the thing I liked *most* about the old game, and something I miss every time I try any other MMO.
I'm pretty sure MWM has said we'll be able to customise the UI, but I can't recall where or when. I certainly hope we will be able to (including the temp tray)!
Spurn all ye kindle.
Right-o. Thanks!
Well, I for one hope that there will be the option to play CoT with exactly the same type of combat style as CoH, whether or not that might require choosing appropriate option settings. My hand-eye coordination was never very good, and having tried most of the other suggested games, I very definitely did not enjoy the more mobile combat there.
As far as number of distinct powers goes, why is more bad, as long as there is a place in the GUI to put every power? I do hate it when a game gives you more powers than available slots for them.
For example, my main was Illusion/Storm/Psionic Mastery. The power usage broke down something like this:
On all the time:
Steamy Mist
Phantasm
Mind Over Body
Hover
Use as soon as available:
Blind
Deceive
Spectral Wounds
Phantom Army
Freezing Rain
Indomitable Will
Psionic Tornado
Blackwand
Situational:
Lightning Storm
Hurricane
Tornado
Snow Storm
O2 Boost
Spectral Terror
Snow Storm
Sands of Mu
Apprentice Charm
Recall Friend
Teleport
Fly
Now, that's a lot of powers, but as you can see the crucial ones didn't even fill one bar; and I used keybinds for the travel powers.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
I just want to point out that, while probably I won't personally be using it much, the soft lock when combined with the smoothed out combat movement should make combat feel faster for those who like a more active style.
One of the things I always loved about CoH combat was all the movement. Much more fun movement than the monotonous jog along, strafe and dodge style of most current MMO's.
Many MMO's feel like a molassas swamp after CoH.
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
The jump was easy. You said my idea was several steps removed from spiritual successor.
My idea of how CoT should be, I feel is still in line with being a spiritual successor to CoH.
Good character creator? Yes! That's one of the things that kept me at CoH. When WoW came out, I couldn't get into it with all my friends, because everyone in WoW is the same (a little less now).
Super heroes? Yes! Because that's what I want over fantasy or other some such (though an awesome VtM MMO or Cyberpunk MMO would be nice).
No need for the holy trinity. Yes!
I mean, let's look at some things. In CoH, I was able to enhance my character with IO sets so I could solo some of the harder content. Yes, this took the right choice in power set and maybe AT picks, but it was possible to do. This made CoH fun for me. On this very forums, there are those who whine about that being possible.
To me, being able to do that, is being a CoH spiritual successor.
So, if the one of the few things I would change is aesthetic (which again CoT doesn't match up with CoH at all already) and how combat is done, I'd still consider it very much a spiritual successor. :p
The defunct Scarlet Blade felt very CoH in terms of combat.
Truthfully, I don't find WoW or TOR off from CoH style combat either. Unless by off people are talking the channel abilities one may find in WoW/TOR, but right down to it, they don't feel that much different to me, in terms of combat.
Perhaps we should be happy that the Devs of CoT are generally [b]not[/b] going to be listening to either one of us for their major game design decisions. ;)
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
The fact that a FEW on the forums of a game that is mostly only known to some dedicated CoH fans, I'd say the fact that a few have the opinion that CoH's combat was something they enjoyed (and make no mistake, I loved CoH's combat too, even when I do think CoT's should be updated) doesn't mean the comment that CoH's combat was not it's strong point, was not in fact, true.
Having talked to Zee myself, and remembering many who thought the same thing about CoH, one of the things they're basing it off of, is low level and not idea how to properly slot powers or what powers to pick (like before when everyone was usually pretty off the mark if they didn't take fitness pool).
YAY! I'm a hero and I'm using BRAWL ALL THE TIME! Is basically what Zee, from out conversations, really seems to be saying.
Though, I think Zee and many other players should've known, like other MMOs, get some levels and game knowledge under your belt.
But then, I knew people who complained about energy use on their character, and wouldn't listen to how to fix their issues at all with comments like "But I don't want to slot like that." :p
I'll disagree with that too :p
But as long as we agree, that the CoT Devs will need to nerf Regen every issue to truly be a spiritual successor. :)
Nothing says they couldn't set it to a reasonable starting point from the very beginning of CoT and then institute like a 0.0001% nerf each Issue just to keep the tradition alive. ;)
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
I would argue that one of the huge strengths of the old game was the fact that you could use Brawl all the time if you wanted, that there was no 'correct' way to slot powers, and that you didn't need to use Fitness if you didn't want to. The range of freedom was to me one of its selling points.
However, I'm completely with you if a player was complaining about something that resulted directly from their choices. It's one thing to decide to max slot Brawl and use that as one's only attack; it's a whole other kettle of fish if one chose to do that and then whinged about it.
Spurn all ye kindle.
True, but then I wouldn't want to hear about the whining about lack of damage, because you concept was to use brawl a lot. :p Or, wanted to skip Fitness, so sacrificed ACC and DMG mods for END RED mods.
I agree with the initial statement and many following statements that made CoH combat the most enjoyable of any MMO I've played to date. It was something that didn't start to grate on me after a couple hours. Other aspects such the same cave looking mission, sure, but not combat. The only game that seemed to get close yet have limited spells was Neverwinter. Having played GW2, CO, dabbled a bit in Tera, Rift and currently playing ESO, I still prefer the CoH model. Yes, a little boring in the beginning levels but later levels were just so much more fun, had more variety and gave me different options to gameplay than just running around going pew pew pew instead of pew pew BAM or just run up and go BAM or be sneaky or hold you in front of me while I laughed and whittled down health. A lot of that I could do on ONE character, no bar swaps or character swaps. I don't want to lose that variety whether I use one attack 90% or that one power only twice in one week. It kept me entertained no matter the so-called flaws. You want to root me during Energy Transfer and hit me with -HP when I used it...well, it was worth it in damage output, sound and animation.
Up to 23 powers sounds + tab targeting + a little more mobility while fighting sounds like it will satisfy just fine for me.
[b][color=red]Reward tactics as well as damage dealing.[/color][/b]
How is COH movement superior to ESO or DCUO movement if every attack would root you?? Doesn't make sense at all.
Ever heard of the term "running around like a chicken with its head cut off"? That's how I feel in games with limited spells. Not very heroic. Also, I really don't see anyone here arguing for "ROOT EVERYTHING". Another thing, is we are talking combat where you reduce everything to movement=fun, end of story. We say I like the animations, you say no movement no fun. I loved the sound, you say no movement, it sucks. I loved the mechanics, you say it doesn't have movement, not worth considering. That is too myopic view that you are unable to enjoy anything unless a speedster is infusing every action with speed force.
[b][color=red]Reward tactics as well as damage dealing.[/color][/b]
To my knowledge, that isn't happening in CoT. However, I'm pretty sure, some of the love for CoH combat is about other aspects of the combat and not just that.
Sounds like you really should've played TERA more as it did that, except the combat was more action. Like, "instead of a dice roll on if you dodged the aoe attack" you just got out of the way of the AOE attack :p
Though, I think some classes still had some defense aspects to add to that just getting out of the way aspect.
The rooting allowed for really cool and powerful-looking animations. Some of the attack animations in CO look absolutely ridiculous as you run around - but then I was never really fond of the aesthetics of that game.
That's how I play in ESO. Some circles, cones, etc you move out of and some you have to go stand in. Even without the AoEs, foes had a tell of charging attack. You could run back or dodge behind them and they miss. I'm not saying its completely horrible but to me something is missing in those games.
[b][color=red]Reward tactics as well as damage dealing.[/color][/b]
Heroes are a bit more mobile than "I have to stop moving whenever I attack"... the more movement the better unless your concept is literally to stand there and never move which is not that common in hero concepts although it does happen occasionally.
I'm sure MWM can figure out a way to make those "I NEVER WANT TO MOVE" people happy while still making everyone else happy.
Wow.
Edit: ALL heroes are not mobile in comic books. ;)
[b][color=red]Reward tactics as well as damage dealing.[/color][/b]
Gonna have to agree. I don't recall Cyclops being considered the most mobile of heroes :p
It has nothing to do with “heroes are mobile” and about game design balance.
Many games do not offer the wide variety of movment powers like the old game or like we will. When, with the right travel power, people could joust very difficult encounters making them trivial.
Or people could messs with cone attacks zipping them at the right movment into hitting more targets than what the attack is even coded to hit.
When things like this become abused, and people commonly accept these behaviors, and others don’t abuse these mechanics, the non-abusers can end up being derided for not “playing right”. It lends to more socially toxic encounters.
Sometimes it has to do with making animations look or feel right.
We will. It have rioting for all attacks. Cones will need to root, certain high level powers will need to root (thenlook and feel too floaty for powerful hits while in motion). All attacks will eventually slow you down the more you fight.
What we are not going to do is have twitch-based combat with manual dodging or blocking mechanics. There will be some of “avoid this area” but there will be indicators provided to notify players move and these will be exceptions. We won’t have rapid button presses to activate or trigger an effect.
Our targeting system is tab targeting. We will have an optional cross hair targeting that soft locks until you activate a power then it hard locks, essentially a tab target system but you can “aim” as an option. It is the closest we will get to more “moder” (read twitch) based combat.
[hr]I don't use a nerf bat, I have a magic crowbar!
- Combat Mechanic -
[color=#ff0000]Tech Team. [/color]
This was one of the things I played close attention too, If I remember right, this is how it worked as of a few months ago.
You CAN attack while moving, but it will snare you a little. This snare will start to stack if you keep attacking on the move. This snare will start to go away if you attack without moving, or move without attacking for a few seconds. It can build up to -100% which is effectively rooting. You get some movement in combat, but won't be able to just 100% kite, throwing out ranged attacks while sprinting, forever. You can think of it as your hero/villain starts to loose balance, and needs a moment.
As others have said, one of the positives to the rooting was animations. It's hard to animate a 2 second axe kick attack that works on the move without just sliding on the standing foot. Some of us are willing to pay that price, some aren't. Some people don't want to have to move 100% of the time during combat. Some people don't like having to worry about block or dodge buttons. CoH was never a game that relied on twitch reflexes to do well. Half your performance was in character planning, the rest was the act of using your powers appropriately. Not maintaining perfect complex rotations with dot timers and cooldown management, just using the right powers at the right time.
I get some people don't want that, hate it even, I get it. But for every person saying it's not hard/fast/complex/twitch/skill based enough, there's someone playing on a WoW Classic private server. People excited to pay Blizzard to play on an official Classic server, or a Runescape classic server or any game that's offers a 'vanilla experience'.
CoT IS improving things. We're getting the ground AoEs to move out of, we're getting movement in combat, we're getting a lot of GOOD things. We can have those things without being ESO or Wildstar. It's subjective and there's no clear line, but the point of the game is City of Heroes 2.0, not Wildstar with a Super Hero theme.
*EDIT: Looks like Tannim beat me to it! And by the timestamps I spent far too long on this. @_@
Personally I like tabbed targeting. I have limited success with twitch style gaming and frankly I didn’t play COH for nearly a decade because it challenged my keyboard hand reflexes... I like the combat system COH used. I’m not saying it was the best, most realistic, or modern system.
I do like the changes that have been described so far, proof will be in the pudding. I’m not saying a superhero MMO couldn’t or wouldn’t do well with twitch style combat but it wouldn’t be a spiritual successor to COH and it wouldn’t likely be for me, or as I’m reading it several others here.
Thank you DEVs for reassuring us that this feature (tabbed targeting) will remain in COT!
"A sad spectacle. If they be inhabited, what a scope for misery and folly. If they be not inhabited, what a waste of space." ~ Thomas Carlyle
I liked CoH combat and I enjoy action games too (but for a mmorpg I prefer a more relaxed style). I completely agree with Tannim on all parts in regard of CoT.
In particular I second the matter about animations being very important and some must feel heroic (and it would never be so if we're forced to run non-stop to be stronger). Charged "superstrong" punches for example in CoH were amazing, and your feet were well planted into the ground to launch the opponent in orbit.
Let's remember that we're all here because we loved CoH, and in CoH like in many mmorpgs you pass the majority of the time fighting enemies. Therefore it's a good guess to think that the majority of the peoples awaiting for a sequel should like CoH combat if they want something that resembles what they loved. An upgrade, not a complete change.
The aiming-target for example is a very good addition for whom desires to use it instead of the "tab" button (and I will be among them).
I should mention, like ThunderCAP, I don't hate FPS or twitchy games. I play them with my son and enjoy them. I just don't want it (or all the problems that come with it in an MMO setting) in a Superhero themed MMORPG.
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
It seems like there are a lot of people that are of the mistaken impression that anything that isn't everquest combat requires the reflexes of a mongoose on speed. There are plenty of games that involve active participation from the player that aren't high speed FPS games.
Take SMITE as an example. The basic combat feels very much like a superhero game (fitting for a game about combat between ancient gods and demigods) and just about every ability in the game including basic attacks are skillshots. That means you don't lock on to enemies, you have to time and aim. If this sounds terrifying, try it. It really feels good. I honestly think it feels more like CoH combat than anything that has come along since despite having no tab targeting.
Even CoH had plenty of abilities that worked this way if you think about it. Anything that was a template or PBAoE worked essentially exactly like this. You could place it poorly or mistime it and it was up to the player to make use of the ability, and it allowed for some pretty slick tricks.
I feel like this conversation was already done before and the devs stepped in and gave pretty definitive answers though, that CoT would essentially have CoH combat but also have an auto lock system so players could lock onto a target by aiming at it and firing their skill (if it was a skill that required a set target).
In CoH combat, my pattern for my attack chain was 2, 3, 2, 4, with 1 and 5 as situational, 6 for Heal, and 7-0 etc. as toggles. Having more attacks/critical powers and especially having some arcane pattern for extra effects, was always difficult. Especially if the whole extra pattern was expected to be run on a single target.
I played Tankers, which meant that one of my critical skills was in swapping targets around, to control aggro-generation. Worse, when, in order to have access to all of those 'extra effects', one needed to have and use 'all' of the powers in a set. I recall crying aloud on the CoH forums for Help, when I tried to work out how to get my Fire/DB Tanker to work.
[URL=http://s105.photobucket.com/user/fireheart5150/media/FieryAura-DualBlades.jpg.html][IMG]http://i105.photobucket.com/albums/m207/fireheart5150/FieryAura-DualBlades.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
There just didn't seem to be enough buttons on the keyboard (and no way were my fingers agile enough) to use all of the powers I 'needed'.
So, let me chime in on the 'simple attack chains' argument.
Be Well!
Fireheart
And I finally ended up with a Fourth bar for the 'Optional out-of-combat Powers', which I would activate via mouse-click.
My standard tray arrangement for all of my alts was 6 trays of 10 slots ... for a total of 60 accessible keybind combos.
1 through 0
F1 through F10
Shift + 1 through 0
Shift + F1 through F10
Control + 1 through 0
Control + F1 through F10
I could have extended that out to 8 trays of 10 if I'd really been so inclined ...
Shift+Control + 1 through 0
Shift+Control + F1 through F10
I just want trays that are 12 slots "long" rather than just merely 10 slots. After that, it's all just a matter of setting up keybind patterns that I can replicate to every alt I'm ever going to play and then developing a common "power arrangement language" such that similar things get put into similar slots across all alts. However, in order for that to be possible, it is necessary to NOT try to cram everything into as few trays as possible. There needs to be some degree of freedom to leave parts of individual trays empty in order to sort powers into slots in a way that is most ergonomic for actual USE once you've got your keybinds all set up.
[center][img=44x100]https://i.imgur.com/sMUQ928.gif[/img]
[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
So since we're talking about toolbars and keybinds...
Like some others, I only actively used keys 1-6. Un-modified, Alt- and Ctrl- that gives me 18 keys to use in combat, which is more than enough for me, with un-mod- 1-6 getting the most play, and Ctrl-1-6 getting the second most. 7-8 were usually very situational long-recharge abilities, 9-10 were toggles or stuff I used out of combat; Usually my 2nd row was mostly toggles I turned on before a fight and wanted handy if they got deactivated, or if I [i]really[/i] needed a little better stamina regen I could deactivate them easily. I think I also stuck one row off to the side of my screen with a vertical alignment for travel powers or stuff I didn't need to keybind, but I wanted easily accessible. (CoH had this, right? ability to put un-attached bars elsewhere on the screen? It's been so long I may be getting things mixed up with other MMOs where I did the same thing, like WoW)
Aside from Alt/Ctrl/Shift and number keys, I rarely used any keybinds; One exception was a special keybind I set up that was like Ctrl-Leftclick, which would confirm teleport and activate teleport; It made long-distance teleportation SO much simpler. Just hold Ctrl- and left-click where I wanted to go.
What I really loved, and what I'm hoping to see in CoT, is the ability to make complex key-bind buttons; Create a button and assign it a logo that would do multiple things; So when I hit the button that was in my number 8 slot, either by using the 8 keybind or manually clicking it, it would send my character's motto ("Honour and Glory!") to Local chat, and activate Invulnerability. I even used a third-party tool that was amazing where it would rotate through different pre-defined combat taunts (and pre-defined lines of silence so it wasn't EVERY button click) when I would use my abilities.
Other examples included my flyers, where moving would toggle flight on and hover off, but stopping moving would toggle hover back on; So if I was moving I was "Fly"ing, if I was stationary, I was "Hover"ing. My bubbler, Fluxion, also had a /team message whenever he'd activate his personal deflection field so people would know he was out of the fight for a bit, and another would send a message whenever he used the stasis bubble on a $target, so people wouldn't waste their attacks on an invulnerable enemy.
Having the ability to set up complex keybinds and buttons is almost a must-have for CoT (Even Champions Online has it, but the documentation for it was difficult to find; I had the old CoH game guide, so I had it easy to hand) because of what it could do, both for tactical communication and roleplay. Having that ability I mentioned earlier to position, resize and color toolbars and other UI elements as I see fit is also a strong wish.
Edit: Oh! Having UI arrangements be consistent, or at least easily export/import ready so I don't have to re-configure everything whenever I make a new alt would be amazing.
Aside from all of that, I enjoyed the CoH combat system just fine, and I think anything that captured a similar feel and flow would do just fine in a modern era. I had my gripes (most of which have been forgotten or muddled by other games since then) but I'm sincerely liking what I'm hearing so far.
~ DariusWolfe
Errant, TNT, Vibrant and Fluxion on Liberty
Something else to consider regarding action bars is that if macros become available in this game, then people like me will fill many with emotes, "spell macros" of text+power, text channel change macros, and other RP-related stuff.
In short, the more action bars, the better!
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
I'm not opposed to having a lot of space for macros or having more action bars. I'm opposed to having more than a certain number of functional abilities usable at once on a single character becuase that becomes a pain to play.
The good news is, 23 powers does not mean 23 buttons. Some of these will be passives or toggles. In terms of City of Heroes, a Blaster who's primary was ranged attacks and secondary crowd control had a lot more buttons to his than a Tanker or Scrapper who's abilities were divided between attacks and defensives (many toggles and/or passive.)
Masterminds and Kheldians had hella buttons though. I don't want to say macros were required, but I would dare say became standard with any player who kept with the classes to the higher levels.
I'll adapt to whatever setup they give us.
Compulsively clicking the refresh button until the next update.
I sincerely doubt that, will you be fine with 6 bars full of active skills and 60 buttons to press?
That happened to me in a mmorpg some years ago (2 side bars and 4 central bars full of skills with no empty spaces). I played it till level 47/50 and now I can never go back there because I cannot really remember 50 buttons/skills nor does it make me feel fine with starting over... knowing that I will reach such situation around level 40 and it can only get worse till the new level cap...
I understand you probably said that trusting MWM, I do too (more so since I agree with all they said till now), but still voicing your experience and your limits can only help them. "Everything will be fine" doesn't.
My suggestion therefore (that I'm pretty sure they don't need and they're already close enough to my vision, also it's late for these suggestions but you never know):
We don't need a skill for each punch we throw, basic attacks with 3-5 random or consecutive animations is fine for base damage (and regen of stamina/mana imho) and the skills/powers must be something special you do with a specific purpose.
Having several skills that just do damage (with slight variations) is really the wrost of the wrost, and it's spread in mmorpgs like a pestilence.
I didn't mind leveling in CoH even with a 1000 buttons to press because each one added provided more enjoyment to my gameplay. I loved going from Flares to Fire Blast to Fireball to Rain of Fire to Firebreath to Blazing Bolt to Inferno and any secondary I used for soft control in between. It was fun to use the differences between the powers to manage the mob and my health/stamina. There are more than enough MMOs where you don't have those [CoH-like] options with GW2, ESO, NWO, BnS, etc, if players prefer that type of gameplay. /shrug
[b][color=red]Reward tactics as well as damage dealing.[/color][/b]
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