I think it is unrealistic for mobs to run away when injured. Why? Because they are injured.

Imagine walking through the forest and running into a goblin. You start fighting, when he is low on health, he drops to his kness and holds his hands up? Maybe at that point you can choose to have mercy on him and let him go? Or what if he is really injured badly and decides to run away only to fall and start crawling?

One of the cool things about Fallout 3 was that you could get injuries in specific parts of your body. You would limp if you legs were hurt, and the screen would get blurry in and out if your head was hurt.

It is 2009, and I am shocked we don't have a more realistic way of dealing with combat injuries. Instead, when low on heatlh, mobs run away at full speed?

 Lol, I bet you would chop that goblins head off anyway for the xp.

Some good deaths of mob I have seen in Requiem BloodyMare, well deaths of everyone and anyone who dies really including me, which sometimes were just hillerous.

Serious at level 25 or something theres a dungeon with an uber boss, well theres a few but I was 25 when I done this, he hits pretty hard, once I got hit so hard I bounced of the floor, hit the roof of the dungeon all the while in some kind of spasm mode, LOL

The only time I could not stop laughing when I died in a mmo.

That's pretty funny.

Well with my idea, you would still game XP from the fight. If it is skill based you would not need to make the kill.

If it is like WoW, heck, spare his life for that necklace number 3 out of 10 you are trying to collect..

If realistic injuries applied to players then no way.  It would be a little annoying to be crippled then have to drag yourself to safety and especially if there is player verses player.  Players being the malicious spiteful things they are would go out of their way to cripple and taunt others, I mean they kill and annoy people without any bonus but the ability to add injury to insult would encourage griefers even more.

Originally posted by donjn

I think it is unrealistic for mobs to run away when injured. Why? Because they are injured.

The part that always bothers me the most is that all characters operate at 100% effectiveness until they are dead.  So silly, and it really trivializes combat.

The current combat model assumes that weapon blows or magical attacks are doing real damage to the opponent.  Blood and gore aplenty, including turning enemies into pincushions with arrows, or slashing them into quivering piles of meat with a cleaver.  "It's all so violent"

If you want something more realistic, then most attacks should be blocked, parried or avoided (subject to whatever skill system is in place, whether character and/or player).  When a blow lands on an armored opponent, that blow may well produce some kind of performance-impairing damage without actually breaking flesh or bone.  A blow landing on an unarmored opponent is going to do serious damage.  "Serious damage" is the sort that puts an opponent on the ground.

Landing an attack on a goblin's armored hip may not do serious damage, but it may make him move less nimbly.  That will give you greater advantage in the fight.  If you're fighting him solo, then you'll do better against him.  If you're fighting several goblins, that one goblin may take that minor injury as a opportunity to withdraw.  The same could be said for striking the weapon from the goblin's hand, stunning his sword arm, etc.  Combat becomes a case of trying to avoid that performance-impairing damage.

Then we come to the poster's observation about experience points and going for the kill.  In a game where kills equate to experience points, sure, players will kill the goblin.  How about a game where experience points are subtracted when you kill a surrendering opponent?  It's all about how the game is structured, and most gamers have very ingrained notions about how MMOs must be structured.  Yet MMOs need not be structured as they are today.  They sure didn't start out the way they're structured today.

I presented the idea of slow motion combat recently.  That would permit more involved melee so that each sword swing, duck, dodge or parry would be played out.  It would make combat a bit like a lethal dance, or a game of high-speed chess.  It could also be applied to hand-to-hand combat.  The idea of having attacks impair the performance of a character dovetails with all this nicely; if your mobility is impaired, then your opponent will try to leverage that impairment in his slow motion attacks.

If magic is left to its current form, it would be a disaster; point at a character, say "damage" and it is instantly damaged.  Unless magic can be parried, blocked or avoided like a physical attack, magic would need to be changed to be something else entirely.  My preference is to make magic something that has nothing to do with combat.  Physical weapons are for combat.  Stop making fighters obsolete.  Let them do their thing.  Magic becomes a way of playing with ambient conditions in the game.  Magic lets a smith's fire be hotter (or go out), the door that the goblins are trying to break through be stronger (or collapse), the ground that the goblins are charging across slipperier (or the ice more stable), the bow that the archer is firing be more powerful (or weaker), etc.

Archers are a bit of a mess themselves because of the problem of making defense interesting.  After all, the defense against archery is to hunker down and hide, whether behind a shield, a tree or a stone wall.  MMOs are about entertaining everyone, not just the attacker.  Archery would probably have to include lots of player skill in a challenging situation to ensure that only a real enthusiast would try to be an archer.  That, or as with magic, ways to parry, block or avoid arrows would have to be introduced.  But that's not particularly realistic.

Because realistic injuries really hurt.

If you want realism, one hit and you're dead or at least incapacitated is more realistic than having an HP bar.   No healing in combat and take weeks or months to recover from serious wounds is realistic, too.

Originally posted by CactusmanX

If realistic injuries applied to players then no way.  It would be a little annoying to be crippled then have to drag yourself to safety and especially if there is player verses player.  Players being the malicious spiteful things they are would go out of their way to cripple and taunt others, I mean they kill and annoy people without any bonus but the ability to add injury to insult would encourage griefers even more.

Not at all.  If you are crippled, just hit the ol' "pass out" button and you're back at your spawn point.  That's the most obvious solution to realistic injuries.  In normal play, if you have a healer, he can patch you up, but if a griefer is on you, you pass out.

One aspect of great value to realistic injuries is having characters operating under suboptimal conditions.  Instead of always having the same 100% character, sometimes you'll have to complete an engagement with an arm injury that slows your sword swings or a head injury that just slows everything.  Judgment calls will have to be made.  You'll bite off less than you normally would.  You'll rely on stealth and planning a bit more than simply charging headlong into another fight.

You'll bring a healer next time.

Because realism for the most part just isn't a fun concept, which is why we're playing videogames=)   You have to know where to blur the lines while keeping a game fun.  We are still taling about games here, not virtual worlds=)

Originally posted by donjn

I think it is unrealistic for mobs to run away when injured. Why? Because they are injured.

Imagine walking through the forest and running into a goblin. You start fighting, when he is low on health, he drops to his kness and holds his hands up? Maybe at that point you can choose to have mercy on him and let him go? Or what if he is really injured badly and decides to run away only to fall and start crawling?

One of the cool things about Fallout 3 was that you could get injuries in specific parts of your body. You would limp if you legs were hurt, and the screen would get blurry in and out if your head was hurt.

It is 2009, and I am shocked we don't have a more realistic way of dealing with combat injuries. Instead, when low on heatlh, mobs run away at full speed?

its 2009 and MMO devs are still lazy as fuck.

if i want realism id rather go play a real fps game

Originally posted by Quizzical

Because realistic injuries really hurt.

If you want realism, one hit and you're dead or at least incapacitated is more realistic than having an HP bar.   No healing in combat and take weeks or months to recover from serious wounds is realistic, too.

Healing is magical, however the being beaten by a mace should not let you run away. Nothing magical about that.

Originally posted by Josher

Because realism for the most part just isn't a fun concept, which is why we're playing videogames=)   You have to know where to blur the lines while keeping a game fun.  We are still taling about games here, not virtual worlds=)

Realism can be fun.

Skill based games are more realistic. I find them fun. "Leveling Up" and choosing skills is not realistic. Gaining skill points over time by practicing a skill is.

And it is still fun..

Originally posted by Josher

You have to know where to blur the lines while keeping a game fun.

Yep.  And the line got blurred long before combat could ever be considered to be fun.

I've highlighted my own views on this topic in a number of previous posts, 'how to stop theory crafting' was the latest. It seems obvious to me that more realistic game play will provide a wider range of options not limit a players options. Sure it will be annoying if your character gains a limp from a fight or can only use one arm, but being dead is fairly annoying yet we've accepted that this will occur. Its just a new idea (not that new to many) and so for a while some folk will say 'I dont like it, its different', and then after a while when most are use to the idea they'll be defending it against the next 'new idea'.

I agree with JB47394, weapon damage is very telling, combat should be all about avoiding such impacts, failure to avoid should not be removing some 'HPs' but giving you some injury, ranging from a simple stunned limb (effect dependant upon the limb) to the removal of said limb with a colourful shower or gore for all present. In order to retain some 'health-bar' system for those who need one, you can employ a HP system to reduce the nature of the injuries until this health is all but depleted, hence you'll tend to get stuns, disarms and broken bones before you start to lose limbs (or head).

Of course 'stronger' characters (monsterous creatures etc) will have some reductions to any given injury while more capable weapons and users may be able to increase the nature of any injuries, hence dragons will tend not lose their head to a dagger wielding halfling, but the halfing will be squished in return. By retaining 'health' you can retain a choice about just how injured you're willing to risk becomming, doing a runner when the health gets low, although I'd still propose that limited injuries can occur regardless of health- that'll teach you for parrying hammer blows with an empty hand.

I can see ranged characters having an upper hand in these kinds of situations, and balancing this kind of combat would be my primary concern.

In theory, all it would take is an arrow or two to the legs and your character would be toast if realistic injury applied. Yes, you could have armor, but then where do you draw the line when it comes to where realism applies or not, since not all armor deflects arrows. Plate might, but a plate-wearing character shouldn't be able to move as nimble as someone in leather or lighter.

Well, I wouldn't mind a game with more realistic combat system, most games today probably have the most unrealistic system possible.

But devs and producers are scared that they wont get enough subs for that kind of game and maybe they are right.

Still, I wish the devs at least took a few sword fighting lessons, it is obvius that few or none ever hold a real sword in their hands.

But totaly realistic system just isn't possible right now and will probably never be. There are just to many factors.

Originally posted by AgentsAreGo

I can see ranged characters having an upper hand in these kinds of situations, and balancing this kind of combat would be my primary concern.

In theory, all it would take is an arrow or two to the legs and your character would be toast if realistic injury applied. Yes, you could have armor, but then where do you draw the line when it comes to where realism applies or not, since not all armor deflects arrows. Plate might, but a plate-wearing character shouldn't be able to move as nimble as someone in leather or lighter.

Balancing archery is a challenge.  I see two techniques to apply to archery to ensure that it does not supplant melee combat:

1. Make archery attacks difficult.  Aiming a bow has no assists.  No targeting, no crosshairs.  Include wind and humidity as factors that affect the flight of arrows (think procedural content here).  Include encumbrances as a factor that affects the ability of the archer to aim.  A quiver holds 20 arrows.  Rapid firing requires sticking arrows in the ground (preparation time).  Pulling from a quiver is slower.  And so on.  There are lots of burdens that would make archery optimal only for firing at long ranges into large groups or firing one or two arrows into charging opponents.  Stupid opponents.  Monsters.  No Machine-Gun Legolas stuff.

2. Make archery defenses easy.  Move from cover to cover, or carry cover with you in the form of a shield.  Even improvised shields.  Zig-zag so that the archer doesn't have a stable shot.  Plate is effective at defeating arrows, while lesser armors are usually penetrated.  Shields are there for a reason.

Archery against monsters could be made far more practical than against players.  Monsters may not be interested in armor, shields and cover.  Most of them may just charge.  A group of archers would cut down charging monsters, but they will eventuallly have to retrieve their arrows or simply run out of the things.  Then those charging monsters are going to drive off  the lightly-armored archers unless they are very good with their melee weapons.

For all I know, that will be the 'best build' choice for most players; lightly armed and armored archers that plink monsters and finish off a few stragglers with the sword.  But I would hope that if the game doesn't place great reliance on efficiency in battle, then players would be more willing to experiment with different combat styles - just because it's fun to do so.  Donning heavy plate mail to see if punching a goblin in the face with an armored hand is more satisfying than picking them off at a distance might just provide enough new 'content' to keep players coming back for more.  "I'm gonna keep trying spinning slashes until I take a goblin's head clean off!"

Plate mails can be penetrated with longbows as history proves us. I saw it on some documentary that a a single arrow could strike through the plate armor, through the man and hit the horse eventually killing both.

Realistic or rather near-realistic combat would be a refreshing change. In a real war, you don't want to kill the enemy but wound him so that it takes two guys to drag him off the battlefield. In a sense, you get 3 with one bullet.

Rock, paper, scissors would demand that heavily armored enemies could be defeated and killed with grappling, choking and breaking limbs... like samurais' Jiu-Jitsu.

Originally posted by JB47394

Originally posted by CactusmanX

If realistic injuries applied to players then no way.  It would be a little annoying to be crippled then have to drag yourself to safety and especially if there is player verses player.  Players being the malicious spiteful things they are would go out of their way to cripple and taunt others, I mean they kill and annoy people without any bonus but the ability to add injury to insult would encourage griefers even more.

Not at all.  If you are crippled, just hit the ol' "pass out" button and you're back at your spawn point.  That's the most obvious solution to realistic injuries.  In normal play, if you have a healer, he can patch you up, but if a griefer is on you, you pass out.

One aspect of great value to realistic injuries is having characters operating under suboptimal conditions.  Instead of always having the same 100% character, sometimes you'll have to complete an engagement with an arm injury that slows your sword swings or a head injury that just slows everything.  Judgment calls will have to be made.  You'll bite off less than you normally would.  You'll rely on stealth and planning a bit more than simply charging headlong into another fight.

You'll bring a healer next time.

Yea I agree on what you say.  But also that I dont think a goblin would beg for mercy, they would rather just spit at you or disrespect all the way until they die.  Thats usual in the movies, so I guess the games are that way.  It would be a disadvantage.  Like other say even I will tend and want to taunt them, and if they beg for mercy or etc I probably wont agree..on some occasions

Realism...

Is it fun? and how does it allow a player to tell their story to other players? are the only things that MMORPGs should concern themselves with (Aside from technology limitations)

Why do you think it will be fun and how can you incorporate it into telling a PCs story?