Removed the big post for a lack of response.  If you read it once, and still want to know about it, feel free to send me a forum message.  Thank you for those who did give me feedback!

Very detailed, and workable enough that a programmer could easily take this if you provided the math that you wanted as well and make it.   Likewise other teams would know where to start.

Have you thought about change your defense a little bit.   Making it slower between uses.  Basically you force the player completely alter their defence meta game so that rather than being responsive they need to be predictive or if they want to be responsive they can't be for every attack that comes their way.  This means that there will be more kiting/movement, and using attack moves as your defense.

I'd also find some other way to limit feint attacks since surprises really suck.   Sure they're cool in movies when the hero uses one, but they're not when the hero(player) doesn't.

Also check out Mabinogi from Nexcon.   It's an old little almost-F2P game that is close to your idea and achieves a lot of the balances that you're achieveing.   The same core goals you could say even with different implementations.

Well, the idea behind having defenses so active (for being technically passive) is to give players that ability to react.  There would HAVE to be some form of Cooldown, simply to avoid macros to spam all three, and for latency, but I do want players to have the ability to out-play their opponent, which means to me there has to be a counter to everything, accessable to everyone at any time.  And to keep defense from being so powerful, the feints and special attacks are in place to make it possible, but not easy, depending on who you play.  The other side is that, in my head at least, beating an attack with another isn't something that happens constantly...or even every fight, save in the most skilled of players. 

To be honest though, anything involving timing is really going to come out in actual testing, which would be quite a ways a way.  The basic concepts are here, but tweaking is and will always be necessary.

As for feints as a combat mechanic...the goal is to have one player out-think another.  If you get hit with a feint, the hope is you feel temporarily outsmarted, or outskilled.  But the feint style attacks shouldn't be fight enders...I intend to generally have them low damage, but some is better than none.  Also, when you HIT with a feint, it's incredibly satisfying...speaking from fighting game experience.

I'm trying to take the approach that no, you can't balance classes, but you can balance abilities against each other.  As long as each style has a counter to certain types of moves, the styles should maintian quite a bit of PVP balance.  They will also be easier to maintain, as altering one move in one style effects only those with that style, and possibly only those with certain mixes of styles.  I'm not saying it's easy, but from a design-maintainance standpoint, it's more approachable without upsetting your customer base. 

This seems to be a very long, wellthought out idea. Im no computer programmer or anything but it seems like you could probably put this in affect now. I dont know if this is the concept your going for, but at least to me it seems your trying to make combat to where its more advanced and the player has to have his head on a swivle. I like that. it kinda seems confusing at first but thats probably just me. Without any info on the lore or classes i think combat concept  is a pretty good idea. Im a little shaky on the stealth concept but in the end i think you hit home. I for one though would like to see the lore and game classe/races you will come up with rather than the in-game play. But both are equally important. And like u said those can be made up because its a fantasy MMO.

But are you going to make it to where there are simple attacks they have that maybe they could just click on and use?

Im talking like if you pick a certain class that that class has a certain techqniue that they can use..

Hey, I appriciate the positive feedback, but I would ask you to go back and read it in some detail, because all your questions would be pretty much answered.

-No Classes, no Races, just humans
-Character Customization through feats, skills and styles (and appearance and items)
 

In terms of normal attacks, they'd just be the 1, 2, and 3 keys above a WASD setup.  Style attacks would be a quick couple of key presses, most likely something like: 4 to access your Soldier style, and then keys 1-6 to use a style move (and shift+1-6, and ctrl+1-6, etc).  The idea is that it won't be hard to USE your moves at all, not even for mages.  But to implement them and get them to hit with maximum effectiveness takes tactics and skill.

Dad gum man i TOTALLY missed that part on no races.. my bad. Guess my stupid side showed alittle.. Okay. well that answers my question about the combat. I guess i didnt understand that it would be like a wasd setup. Should"ve read little closer. I like it so far. Think it makes the player pay more attention to the game and i like that. I play to many games where i just get bored to easy. What would be awesome is if you could maybe add to your combat concept the option to comibe both simple physical attacks like a slash and thrust together or maybe a magical and phyiscal attack together. If you could do that i think it could make for a plenthra of fun and unique attacks. and if you said something like that already forgive me. Its for some reason hard for me to understand most of this computer stuff.

no class=HUGE mistake.It means everyone is just a player with no real meaning.A game has to have a THEME a story otherwise it is just a bunch of players fiddling with numbers and the luck factor in combat aka. paper/rock/scissors.A class treee gives each player a distinct role in the game ..hence the word ROLE in RPG.

To be honest this sounds like no more than a FPS,because it relates more so to PVP.

Heh no, I didn't say anything like that.

But the way the system is in place, any move that is both two types of attacks would be absolutely broken overpowered.  The best you're going to get is a defense penetrating move, in which it messes with which defense would work.  As for different kinds of damage types, I already plan to have those implemented.  An axe will have Puncturing and Slicing, for example, and I'm sure there will be varities of magic that  do say, both bludgeon and fire damage (a meteor of some sort).

When it comes to magic though, it's best to keep in mind that the difference in damage type won't be as large a factor as how the damage is applied.

Wizardry: There have been an IMMENSE number of MMOs without classes.  The styles and feats (both of which will be out in a while...feats need more work, and I need more example styles) are a source of definition and progression for players.  If you want some archaic way of looking at it, think of styles as classes you can level up in, and you can have a total of three (although it doesn't work exactly that way, it may sate your desire for a game telling you what to do).  I would also mention that your comment is really not all that constructive...save for the part where some people just like a short list of classes I guess.  Not to mention I can almost guarantee you didn't read the entire thing.

Okay, and I understand that some people will want a story.  That will be there, I don't have it set out yet.  And the reason for this as I explained was to put the effort in time to where it was needed most.  I'd rather have a game where the story adapts to the gameplay, NOT where the gameplay adapts to the story. 

Cool, im going to reread this and see if there is anything else i missed. When you come up with ideas over storylines thats what i want to see. That stuff is right up my ally. I might not be good with computers but i like to research past languages and create scenerios that would be freakin awesome. keep on posting about this if you want. I would like to see how you progress. Best of luck to ya.

btw. this is food for thought. If you get a team together that would like to work on this. Go to hero engine.com and look at the packages they have for you to be able to create your world. It's pretty sick man. Graphics and the options you have look great.

Noticed your x,y,z axis was wrong. It always goes counter clockwise (right hand rule).

The X,Y,Z is actually just the way it needs to be, as it corresponds to how the different attacks work.  A thrust moves along the Z, the slash along the X, and the chop along the Y.  Z beats Y beats X beats Z.  Just how it goes.  The right hand rule doesn't hold me down! Hah!

Man, a lot of people were commenting in my other thread, so I was hoping to get somewhat close to that level of response...hoping to get more feedback too.  Anyone?  Is it just too long to read? heh

Also, I would be very disinterested in using packaged art, as my actual educated background is as a tech artist, and most packaged art I've found is very....inefficient.  For example, I'm a huge fan of shell-technique modelling for grass and fur, because it's poly count is so easily manageable, but it takes technical effort on the part of the texture artist.  Also, I'm not a big fan of the camera focal sprite trees that Oblivion and AoC are known for...I just see it as kind of lazy.

I like your thinking!

I spend my weekends discussing similar to that with a friend, sounds very good!

But I cant agree with your only Humans thing.

Aww, I want to see his idea. :(

Do you have any other information more on the game that you could release? I think i recall u saying something about no races but are you going to offer classes in the game? I liked some of the combat features you have, but what else do you got? I know you might not have lore figured out  but that would be cool to look at.

No races or classes.

The reason behind this thought is multi-layered.

Races are neat, and definately have their place in many-a-story, but from a game design standpoint, having yet another factor to balance around is more of a chore, especially with my intent to have an extreme level of character customization.  By only having one race (humans) it allows me to have the focus be on that customization, rather than which race has what stats and little tricks.  Also, modelling and animating humans is far easier for 3d artists and animators.  The benefit for animators is even greater: there only needs to be one skeleton model to animate for all players.  It also means all players have access to all things like clothing, emotes, skills and styles, etc.

That isn't to say other races won't exist, they simply won't be playable.  For the amount of animations and features the players will have, having other races and making them distinct just ends up being a waste of resources.

As for classes, the system relies on people learning 3 styles of combat.  Each of these styles is kind of like a class, only on a more limited scope.  You could learn the Sword and Board soldier style, but unless you decide to focus on heavy armor, you could be a wizard that uses a shield and sword and cloth armor.  There's really no outright way to define a character in terms of classes.  It's just what options they pick.