Originally posted by GTwander

Originally posted by Distopia

Originally posted by Istavaan

it's not a new combat system it's an elder scrolls combat system, something they have been refining for years. They are going with standard mmo combat because they want to appeal to the masses and make lots of money.

As far as online tech goes, yes it is in a sense. I mean if you're wanting combat exactly like it is in TES. Even then in order to have a AAA version of say darkfalls combat there's a lot of ground to cover, and they didn't choose to traverse it. For whatever reason that makes it hard, or unapproachable by most dev teams. ANd like I said earlier I don't think it's matter of going with what's easy ( for the sake of ease) as much as it is going with what's easy in order to focus on the whole of the game rather than one feature. Maybe I'm wrong, I can live with that, but who knows really?

Are people really going to overlook that this is the exact same MMO gameplay we've been used to for the last 12 years, just because it has the TES name slapped on it?

There have been enough claims by analysts to state that the genre is in the state it's in BECAUSE of recycling the same shit over and over again. TESO may sell a million copies, but so did WAR and AoC. I really do think this is just a cash-grab, at the expense of stupid or oblivious people.

How do I know the answer to that question? First we'd have to know the number of people "sick" of this type of combat, and know the number of those who just equate it to the genre and enjoy it, like any FPS fan enjoys that combat style.

@The rest what does that have to do with what I said?

Originally posted by caremuchless

 I'll make this short.

 

 I love the elder scroll series, but they are single player RPG's.

 Do you really think it's possible to copy that type of combat into ESO and end up with something better than what is currently in Darkfall?

 

 Personally, I believe that if the devs were copying Elder scrolls combat into a futuristic fullbody sim, it could work. 

 But that tech isnt widely available in the market yet and what we have to work with (keyboard and mouse) cant do the combat justice without making it look like CounterStrike knife fighting (which is what I think DFO combat looks like)

 

So while Iam not defending the choices the devs made,

 I find it hard to believe what most of you want in combat is possible.

 

 

I think there is a difference between, not being able to exactly do it like the Elder Scrolls single player game and completely changing it.

When I played Tabula Rasa, you turned your character with your mouse, you moved forward with you w key and back with the A key, the left mouse button was your main attack, your right mouse button was your off attack.

When you hit the Q key you changed out your weapon so you could change weapons in battle, when you hit E it would change your ability.

By not having action bar combat you actually looked at your screen instead of your bars. I really enjoyed that semi first person shooter UI. I have always wished that another game would take one of the best things from Tabula Rasa and here was a perfect opportunity. 

Instead they seem to be going with the oppostite kind off UI going with a Tab Targeting action bar combat system. I hope we are all wrong about that.

I hope that it will be clarified and we are all just jumping the gun, because I don't understand why you would take a game that people were saying that, as a single player game, was a better "MMO" than most real MMO's; and then when you get a chance to make it as an MMO, you make it as a clone of all those MMO's people are complaining about in the first place.

The Elder scrolls have some very distinct and enjoyable features which includes the UI. They can't exactly translate that to an MMO but, I hope they try to keep those features the best they can and not just make a clone of games that many of us are getting a little tired of.

I really doesn't matter.  If it's possible, no one will try it because supposedly it's too hard.  Why is it too hard?  Perhaps no one knows.  If it is not possible, then maybe it's not technically possible at a AAA level.  Maybe it's not possible at a AAA level because it's an inferior system to TPS, tab-targetting with hotkeys.  Maybe not.

 

What we know is that AAA developers do not use FPS action combat.  Maybe it's just money, maybe it isn't.  It really doesn't matter. 

 

Personally, I'd rather have what I know is proven to work than what I know is proven to not work at a AAA level of quality.  I don't want combat half-arsed when the game is going to be designed around combat. 

I totally understand that latency issues make porting the Elder Scrolls' game mechanics into an online environment very difficult (or, as the developers argue, impossible even), but this only leaves me with another question: if its not feasible to make an MMO using the very mechanics that make an Elder Scrolls game an Elder Scrolls game, then why make it at all? It's been said, but what we're left with is a completely traditional MMO wrapped in Elder Scrolls lore, and while it might prove to be a perfectly decent MMO, this approach really doesn't cut it for me.

i don't think it is 12 years of a crappy system

i think it's more of crappy games coming with that system

if u make a good polished game that is ACTUALLY immersive (good community, pve,pvp,) and not just one feature that ppl can talk about..then a traditional combat system works fine

as far as having to look at ur keyboard..i don't think after a couple hours at max lvl in any mmo have i really had to look at my keyboard..i would think most if not all would have the hot keys memorized by then and be looking at ur screen lol

if my sentences make no sense or grammical errors sorry..playing poker atm and multitasking

Im not on the hate TESO bandwagon, but it is totally possible.


Planetside (1 and 2), Tera, and other games prove it. Heck look at MO (as crappy as that game is) has a similar system.

The real time aiming and actionsystem cries for for not approved helper software.
Or you get a console like implementation with the helper software already in the game integrated.
And for a mmo with thousands of players (or 200 pvping in ESO) i doubt it will work well.
To many people around the world have high latency connections, package losses etc.
The tab target system is inherently more robust and works with cheaper hardware.

Imho real time action combat works only for single player games and smaller moba alike games.

It's easily possible if there weren't instanced raids where 20-25 people are wailing on the same boss.  If it was an open sandbox oriented game then the original combat would easily be viable.  The chose from the get-go to make this a traditional themepark with some added pvp elements and with that decision they tossed out the idea of core TES combat.  You can't have a current themepark setting with TES combat.

---

Originally posted by Thorqemada
The real time aiming and actionsystem cries for for not approved helper software.
Or you get a console like implementation with the helper software already in the game integrated.
And for a mmo with thousands of players (or 200 pvping in ESO) i doubt it will work well.
To many people around the world have high latency connections, package losses etc.
The tab target system is inherently more robust and works with cheaper hardware.

Imho real time action combat works only for single player games and smaller moba alike games.

---

Clearly there has been large, fps games which have incorporated the technology and are profiting.

Originally posted by DAS1337

I really doesn't matter.  If it's possible, no one will try it because supposedly it's too hard.  Why is it too hard?  Perhaps no one knows.  If it is not possible, then maybe it's not technically possible at a AAA level.  Maybe it's not possible at a AAA level because it's an inferior system to TPS, tab-targetting with hotkeys.  Maybe not.

 

What we know is that AAA developers do not use FPS action combat.  Maybe it's just money, maybe it isn't.  It really doesn't matter. 

 

Personally, I'd rather have what I know is proven to work than what I know is proven to not work at a AAA level of quality.  I don't want combat half-arsed when the game is going to be designed around combat. 

 I find it interesting, because "what works" doesn't seem to be working as well as people seem to think it is.

If the "traditional" mmo control scheme, was the one that really worked, why is that every single MMO that releases using it, never does any better then EQ did at it's peak, and most everyone of them actually do worse.  If it was the sure thing, and best way to go, there wouldn't be a single MMO sitting on the top of the hill, with a multimillion subscriber gap between it and the next contender. 

Besides that, AAA developers do use "fps action combat".  The big complaints about DCUO weren't it's combat, although the animation cancelling was a problem but that's on the developers not addressing; not the system itself as a whole. 

I understand that there are people that don't like FPS or action games.  However, I have a feeling that you people haven't caught on yet that you're a minority.  The most popular video games all use action or fps combat; not "traditional mmo combat", and people who play MMO's don't only play MMO's.

None of you can say that it's not viable financially.  It's never been done at a AAA level.  But it takes more then just doing the combat mechanics diffierent; as SOE learned with DCUO.  There is not a single MMO out there that has been produced with the financial backing of a large, experienced studio and used action or fps combat as well as non linear sandbox gameplay.  The only examples anyone really has to look at are games made by small, inexperienced, and often underfunded studios. 

It doesn't matter what you prefer; it in no way shows evidence that the alternative isn't vialbe.  More people are used to action combat then they are the typical mmo combat.  There's a much broader base out there that developers could be appealing to if they would stop developing games like lawyers and start doing it like gamers. 

Every new MMO that releases is going to continue to suffer the same fate, even the ones that give you a new way to kill stuff becauase every other part of the game is still going to be the same exact game we've been playing for near a decade.

Know what game is going to dethrone WoW?  It'll be a sandbox MMO with action combat, and I bet you it'll be made by blizzard.  Aferall, they already said that Titan won't be like WoW, and it's an all new IP.  I would seriously not be shocked if blizzard announced the game, and it was the "MMO ES fans have always wanted". 

Silly fact for you.  Skyrim didn't outsell MW3.

Originally posted by Istavaan

Originally posted by caremuchless

Originally posted by Istavaan

if mortal online and darkfall can do it why can't TESO?

The answer is, zenimax want to make the most amount of money possible with minimal amount of effort. thats software development 101 right there.

You must of not read the post. I think darkfall combat is shit. 

i don't care what you think is shit thats your opinion my point was, if darkfall can make half assed fps combat what do you think zenimax could do with all the resources they have at their disposal..darkfall was made by an indie company on a shoe string budget.

Fair enough. Point taken.

Yeah I gotta say it's an entirely possible option.

 

And here is my breakdown.

 

First and foremost Planetside.

 

They used hitscanning to circumvent physics, which on faster machines and internat now is a reasonably viable option as long as you don't make certain things too obvious, Like hitscan on a siege weapon is a terrible idea. It's better to do an aoe effect on a destination and just hit whatever is there when the animation completes(tracking time, not the object, though that can cuase clipping error if things travel between, but still, more eficient than more realistic options).

 

A secondary example here being Chronicles of Spellborn. I didn't like the game but I thought the basic physical controls were there and functional.

 

Point with this though is that technology that enabled 300 players to shoot at one another back in 2003 is a perfectly acceptable basis to build something on.

 

Or you could go with tech they have developed for Planetside 2 (the modern alternative) which enables better physics and supposedly larger amounts of people.

 

Or take a more tentative route and develop a game with brand new technology like PicoServers, which was demonstrated for the first time by having 1,000 people shoot at one another in a small FPS made for demonstration.

 

Point with all this is, there is indeed a way to pull it off. There has been a few ways to do so for a good ten years or so now, they just didn't want to do it that way.

 

EDIT: Like others have said too, there's varying quality in examples from Fallen Earth, Tera, Darkfall, Mortal Online, Entropia Universe, Face of Mankind, Neocron, APB, etc. Games that play with a semblance also exist(or have existed) like DDO and Tabula Rasa.

Originally posted by Deivos

Yeah I gotta say it's an entirely possible option.

 

And here is my breakdown.

 

First and foremost Planetside.

 

They used hitscanning to circumvent physics, which on faster machines and internat now is a reasonably viable option as long as you don't make certain things too obvious, Like hitscan on a siege weapon is a terrible idea. It's better to do an aoe effect on a destination and just hit whatever is there when the animation completes(tracking time, not the object, though that can cuase clipping error if things travel between, but still, more eficient than more realistic options).

 

A secondary example here being Chronicles of Spellborn. I didn't like the game but I thought the basic physical controls were there and functional.

 

Point with this though is that technology that enabled 300 players to shoot at one another back in 2003 is a perfectly acceptable basis to build something on.

 

Or you could go with tech they have developed for Planetside 2 (the modern alternative) which enables better physics and supposedly larger amounts of people.

 

Or take a more tentative route and develop a game with brand new technology like PicoServers, which was demonstrated for the first time by having 1,000 people shoot at one another in a small FPS made for demonstration.

 

Point with all this is, there is indeed a way to pull it off. There has been a few ways to do so for a good ten years or so now, they just didn't want to do it that way.

 

EDIT: Like others have said too, there's varying quality in examples from Fallen Earth, Tera, Darkfall, Mortal Online, Entropia Universe, Face of Mankind, Neocron, APB, etc. Games that play with a semblance also exist(or have existed) like DDO and Tabula Rasa.

 

PS2 uses guns, which fire at a rate that isn't detectable by naked eye. So there is no need to balance Ranged combat to the Melee Cmbat.

In a fantasy theme game which has you shooting different kind of magic attacks out as well as Melee combat, this could throw balance out the window, with certain magic attacks hitting faster than others from range, or Melee attacks that are gimp from ranged alone. Also let's not forget that usually in Tab Target MMO, the spells are way more unique and interesting that simple damage types from aim combat games.

The technology is likely there, just look at some of the newer games... it is mostly a matter of money and talent, neither of which grow on trees (unfortunately).

thats if they decide to use elder scrolls like combat.. they might just make an mmo with an elder scrolls background/lore etc..

 

*shurgs*

Originally posted by NaughtyP

The technology is likely there, just look at some of the newer games... it is mostly a matter of money and talent, neither of which grow on trees (unfortunately).

No, but you can bet your ass that TESO will have "talent trees".

*buh dum tish*

The TES series have been played by millions of players all over the world and loved by the same and to go and make an mmo would be great news for most but the news of them not making the game for what the TES series is loved for is wrong and i hope they see the error of their ways and fix this issue and hopefully satisfy there fanbase instead of ignoring them for they are the reason why TES is what it is and have supported them through their journey to the top of the single player RPG heap and to ignore the fans will destroy them 100% gaurantee.

Alright so Jedi Outcast was released around 2000 and Jedi Academy was released a few years later. I'm guessing you never played these, i did, online, for about 9 years straight. Has the best real time combat sword fighting in any game ever, every move is controlled (more so when you get really good) and calculated. It's all about finding a weakness, and countering your opponents moves. Jedi Outcast did this perfectly online around the year 2000. You are telling me that 12 years later, it is IMPOSSIBLE to implement meaningful swordplay into an MMO? You are joking right?

It's not at all impossible. It's the fact that game developers are getting LAZY and GREEDY. They want to make an MMO because, if succesful, it's one of the biggest money makers in the world. And making MMO's is hard work, especially if you are trying to be innovative... So what do they do? They take the easy road, trying to make a quick buck, and just copying everybody else.

I think that pretty much sums it up.

 

After readinf some more replies I wanted to add that this game had guns with many varying projectile speeds as well. It all worked very well.

Originally posted by caremuchless

 I'll make this short.

 

 I love the elder scroll series, but they are single player RPG's.

 Do you really think it's possible to copy that type of combat into ESO and end up with something better than what is currently in Darkfall?

 

 Personally, I believe that if the devs were copying Elder scrolls combat into a futuristic fullbody sim, it could work. 

 But that tech isnt widely available in the market yet and what we have to work with (keyboard and mouse) cant do the combat justice without making it look like CounterStrike knife fighting (which is what I think DFO combat looks like)

 

So while Iam not defending the choices the devs made,

 I find it hard to believe what most of you want in combat is possible.

 

 

If you enjoy that style of combat in the single player then why wouldnt you enjoy it in multiplayer? I'm not saying TES games combat is perfect, its far from it. But to go as far as to say classes with turn based combat? No.

No, the combat is very possible in an MMo. The problem comes to other areas in the game that people enjoy that just wouldn't work in an MMo. The games are based off a world which you effect and can explore. What you do has effects upon the world. In an MMo, this would be near impossible, mostly since after the first person lands his mark, no one else can do the same. Taking claim of a home would only work for one player in particular locations. Story events would be practically non existant since there are so many players at different points that no real effect can befall the world. Essencially your choice and their effects would be greatly hindered which is a big factor in why the games are so well liked. 

 

In order to mimic those features from a single player MMO, its going to alienate a lot of players and leave many unhappy. Housing would likely be limited in numbers forcing many to go without. Having the same house able to be bought by a bunch of players will lose immersion as players will see others sitting right outside the door, feeling more so that the house doesn't actually belong to them. the actual size of the world would have to be huge in order to really even get players to get the sensation of exploration, cause face it, seeing a bunch of people in the same areas would make it feel that much less adveturous when going into the cave someone else just entered into. It would pretty much be... well... SWTOR. 

 

The combat is not at all what is holding it back. While some elements can be a bit hard to handle (large crowded places with tons of effects going off) its still possible for it to happen. The issue comes when those details of immersion, getting your own places, joining guilds, all of those things meant to shaep your character and the world just do very little to effect the character, nevermind the world.