Active combat/real physics in an MMO.

[Drizzitdude]

Is it just me or does it seem like there is a sever lack of MMOs that actually use a combat system that wasn't completely ripped off from wow? I mean honestly, World of Warcraft is a great game, I love it. The dungeon finder, the huge open world, distinctive class diveristy, auction house,the holy trinity, all of these are elements that WoW brought into the norm for MMO's yet I honestly think that it is not the big all powerful skygod everyone seems to think of it as.

Yet with all the good that I witness in a game like wow there is still one thing that truly bothers me. The combat system/physics engine. Lets be honest in WoW (and so called 'wow clones') all we really do is watch our character autoattack while we use skills every now in then. It doesn't seem very active and to be honest I don't think any of us have ever had the feeling of there being weight behind our blows with slashes or spells. It just seems to phase through the enemy as if they were insubstantial, the only real indicator of damage being done is the number you see flying up and the enemies health being reduced.

When I first played 'Fable' and 'Fable: The Lost Chapters' all those years ago one giant fact hit me, the game had an EXCELLENT combat system. It existed in a realm above other rpgs for the simple fact your ACTIVELY controlled your characters actions. Every slash, spell, block or roll everything had weight to it. When you hit an enemy they reacted now wouldn't this be great in an mmo? Where instead of the game just rolling off of hidden dice rolls it, would exist in that realm where if I slash my sword, anything caught in that slash will be hurt by it? A realm where if I see a boss swinging a meat cleaver in my direction I could attempt to roll out of the way or block it to nullify a percent of the damage and if I acted like I do in wow and simply stood there and took it (I tank) there would be consequences?

I mean really how much fun is it for a DPS in wow? As a Tank I know the extent of my fun mostly revolves in throwing down consecration and watching all the enemies attack the most armored target for no apparent reason while the dps wails on them, which is, well not fun at all. I mean there is very little work done on my part what about you guys? All you have to do is just use your rotation without having any fear of something bad happening to you provided I do my job, doesn't sound very exciting. And what about the healer? You get to stand still and stare at MY health bar, wooo, fun.

It just seems to me that a game with a more active combat with be a great addition to MMOS everywhere so why hasn't anyone REALLY tried it yet? Why hasn't there been, essentially a fable (one and TLC not any of that 2-3 rubbish) like mmo? Are devolopers just too scard to attempt something new?

The only games I have ever seen with a combat system even somewhat like I described are as follows

1: Vindictus: has a pretty damn good combat mechanic, but it would appear because of this fact there is a sever lack in everything else with the game being extreamly linear and short as well as having only one city. Also most characters had the ability to kill enemies in ear one hit and an enemy managing to hit the player dit little to no damage. This did not only give defensive skills (what little there was) no purpose but also made the tank class pretty redundant as well.

2: Tera: So far this game is looking decent. It seems to have something similar to what I have described though I have not sen as much gameplay that would allow me to formulate a good opinion on it though the gameinformer article seems impressed. Also it seems to suffer from the same curse as all Korean made game in the sense that enemeis just take way to many hits. Why it may feel lie your blwos have weight to them when our greatsword sends an enenmy flying back it DOESN'T feel this way when they have so much health it didn't seem to affect them. Then again the footage I saw may have had the player facing higher level enemies so I will have to wait to find out more about the game.

3: Aion: the only reason I put this in heare is because the chain skills make the combat more interesting but honestly it IS just a wow clone, if your looking for something different don't get try this.

4: Age of Conan: Pretty damn good active combat system requires players to actually use a series of keys in order to use attacks, blocks, and skills. Can't believe I forgot this one. Thanks to Ghostwise

5: Darkfall: Lost of statistics and numbers and an exceedinly unnessary amount of buff/preperation needed before doing a raid or whatever. Combats pretty active it can be described simply as an online version of oblivion with a medium-steep learning curve

/EDIT/NOTE: guys lets keep the conversation restricted to mostly MMORPG's. We are all aware there are a few good MMOFPS/3rd person shooter out there and it is becoming more common so lets stick with the RPG/ feeling weight with your hit issue. Keep in mind that if you reccomend a game that has such an engine we are refering to systems where you swings are NOT measured by some invisable dice roll that determines if you hit or not

 

[ResonanceSD]

Guild Wars. Surely you should have at least heard of it.

 

[Moriarty]

The problem with active combat in an mmo would be lag.

The auto attack with special abilites makes the game playable and enjoyable even with a full second of lag between your input and the games reaction, as the global cooldown on spells/abilites blocks your next action for 1,5sec anyway.

Could you imagine actually aiming at an enemy with a second delay?

In your fable example, your client would have to display something when you attack, so he would propably guess wether your strike hit a monster and make that monster recoil from damage. But if the server disagrees about whether you actually hit something, your client will update the monsters position later, resulting in a monster that teleports a few feet closer to you and may actually be already hitting you.

 

[Zipa]

You realize that WoW did not invent that combat system right, MMOs that came out before it use the same combat system, like say everquest and Star Wars Galaxies. Both of which were out before WoW.

WoW did not invent the MMO despite what you might think.

and yeah combat works the way it does in most games (especially the older ones that came up with the system) is because of things like technical limitations , EQ is what 12 - 14 years old now with dev time. The tech available all those years ago was very limited compared to now. They did what they could.

Plus lag is another factor, single player RPGs don't have to worry about it so their combat systems can be more outlandish.

 

[Tesral]

Hosting millions of players who are auto attacking is hard work, hosting millions of players who are actively fighting with rolls, blocks, slashes, spells ect in real time is hugely difficult. Most MMO players play for gear, stats and social aspects, not for interesting combat, so there isn't any need to waste bandwidth and memory making a better combat system.

Personally I don't like auto-attacking and love the Guild Wars 2 take on the MMO, but for most MMOs the time and money that would be sunk into a part of the game the average player cares less about is simply not profitable.

I apologise for any factual mistakes or assumptions since I don't play many MMOs, but that's what it looks like to me.

 

[Drizzitdude]

Guild Wars. Surely you should have at least heard of it.

I played it before wow and used to be in love with it. It also suffered from the auto attack feature and the fact youwere not actively attacking your enemies. Guild wars also suffered from rather bad tanking/holy trinity mechanics. Guild wears 2 is looking FANTASTIC (totally rolling a guardian) though from the footage I have seen. I haven't seen much group combat videos so I am wondering if it will have holy trinity based combat. Where everyone just watches the tank do work or if it will be more active.

The problem with active combat in an mmo would be lag.

The auto attack with special abilites makes the game playable and enjoyable even with a full second of lag between your input and the games reaction, as the global cooldown on spells/abilites blocks your next action for 1,5sec anyway.

Could you imagine actually aiming at an enemy with a second delay?

That isn't a problm with people with a decent rig/connection which is the majority of POC gamers. Are we supposed to stop making games better because someone is still using a computer from 06? Should the entire industry just halt?

You what your aiming statement make me think of though? A game where a ranged class had to aim. Where being a hunter/archer you could hit weak points/head for increased damage and such. Or as a caster place a well simed fireball at the foots of a group of enemies in order to knock them aside.

 

[Drizzitdude]

You realize that WoW did not invent that combat system right, MMOs that came out before it use the same combat system, like say everquest and Star Wars Galaxies. Both of which were out before WoW.

WoW did not invent the MMO despite what you might think.

and yeah combat works the way it does in most games (especially the older ones that came up with the system) is because of things like technical limitations , EQ is what 12 - 14 years old now with dev time. The tech available all those years ago was very limited compared to now. They did what they could.

Plus lag is another factor, single player RPGs don't have to worry about it so their combat systems can be more outlandish.

Don'y you just love it when instead of focusing on the topic people instead nitpick at the fine details on your statement? Sure it is true that wow did not invent this system but it is the biggest MMO out there and basically sets the standard. So I apoligize for not taking the time to google 'who invented the autoattack combat system'

You forgot Age of Conan. The combat in that game is pretty great. I like Vindictus. The combat is very frenetic but it's also a little redundant. Fantastic game though and it has higher quality and content than most 60 dollar retail games.

Your Right I will add this to list age of conan is prety active gameplay involving using a combo of keys in order to attack and use skills.

 

[geK0]

The problem with active combat in an mmo would be lag.

The auto attack with special abilites makes the game playable and enjoyable even with a full second of lag between your input and the games reaction, as the global cooldown on spells/abilites blocks your next action for 1,5sec anyway.

Could you imagine actually aiming at an enemy with a second delay?

In your fable example, your client would have to display something when you attack, so he would propably guess wether your strike hit a monster and make that monster recoil from damage. But if the server disagrees about whether you actually hit something, your client will update the monsters position later, resulting in a monster that teleports a few feet closer to you and may actually be already hitting you.

Maybe 10-20 years from now well see servers powerful enough to host such games. Wouldn't that be epic?

OT:
yea the auto attack thing always bugged me, keeping a constant rotation always seemed tedious and the fact that neither enemies nor players reacted to any damage bugged the shit out of me; there's nothing like being taken down by a flurry of random damage and having no clue where that damage came from. "What! I was standing in fire?! I couldn't tell for all the flashy spells and AOES flying around."

 

[Drizzitdude]

The problem with active combat in an mmo would be lag.

The auto attack with special abilites makes the game playable and enjoyable even with a full second of lag between your input and the games reaction, as the global cooldown on spells/abilites blocks your next action for 1,5sec anyway.

Could you imagine actually aiming at an enemy with a second delay?

In your fable example, your client would have to display something when you attack, so he would propably guess wether your strike hit a monster and make that monster recoil from damage. But if the server disagrees about whether you actually hit something, your client will update the monsters position later, resulting in a monster that teleports a few feet closer to you and may actually be already hitting you.

Maybe 10-20 years from now well see servers powerful enough to host such games. Wouldn't that be epic?

It just seems if people can play games such as vindictus with 5 players going completely hectic and age of conana with them en mass surely we can find a way to host good player vs player and instance mechanics while giving the player the ability actively have more control over their actions right? (maybe making instanced battlegrounds for mass pvp to go with the Pve instances, thiough I have to admit when it coems to open world travel and quests + leveling and such I am at a loss. Unless we made extreamly EPIC quests that took place in the instances) Anyway I will continue to think this one through.

 

[Zipa]

You realize that WoW did not invent that combat system right, MMOs that came out before it use the same combat system, like say everquest and Star Wars Galaxies. Both of which were out before WoW.

WoW did not invent the MMO despite what you might think.

and yeah combat works the way it does in most games (especially the older ones that came up with the system) is because of things like technical limitations , EQ is what 12 - 14 years old now with dev time. The tech available all those years ago was very limited compared to now. They did what they could.

Plus lag is another factor, single player RPGs don't have to worry about it so their combat systems can be more outlandish.

Don'y you just love it when instead of focusing on the topic people instead nitpick at the fine details on your statement? Sure it is true that wow did not invent this system but it is the biggest MMO out there and basically sets the standard. So I apoligize for not taking the time to google 'who invented the autoattack combat system'

I also answered your thread, regardless I will expand on it for you.

Older games that initially came up with the system use it because that is all that would work, hell some of the games (like EQ and SWG and there are others to) were designed before broadband was widely available.

So throw in too much fancy combat mechanics and any kind of grouping would just lag the hell out. Since then a lot of games have used similar systems because it works very well, and if its not broke then why fix it?

WoW itself falls under the same category, it was released in 2004 so its about 10 years old itself now (it was announced by blizzard in 01 as being made), and while newer and better tech exist today its very very hard to re-write the entire engine of a game, its easier to make a new game.

MMOs that start the dev cycle now should be very interesting and should be able to do more yes, but most MMOs just launching now or not so long ago were working with older tech, even TOR which has been official for about 5-6 years now.

The other issue right now is while servers are a lot better than in the past they still have limitations, PvP areas and such especially open world PvP areas would just crash the hell up with too much going on and well PvP would be restricted to small scale instanced arena PvP and that is not much fun.
Again I will use SWG as a example, when they ramped up the combat speed with the NGE the PvP areas would start to lag out massively and crash because the old servers could not cope with the massive increase of speed and all the new flashy animations the devs shoved on top of the game. Too many people would kill the sub server and boot everyone out of the game.

TlDR version: tech is getting better but its not good enough yet.

 

[thiosk]

Who cares about combat in MMOs? The purpose of MMOs is to get totally geared out in sexy ass armor, stand around in main town centers while the noobs jump around in circles going OMG U LOOK SOO COOL And then you open trade with them and put up 5000 gp, but neglect accept the transfer. Thats when you go out for drinks with your friends.

THATS what an MMO is all about.

 

[oplinger]

Yet with all the good that I witness in a game like wow there is still one thing that truly bothers me. The combat system/physics engine.

Just want to point out WoW has no physics engine. All the "physics" are pre-generated animations. Absolutely no physics calculations are involved >.>

Also a major flaw with active combat, is actually making it active. Think about fable, you only get 2 abilities, to make it simpler for the user. The abilities also have timers and cast times. In that time you can be doing something else, but the effect is has is just like a passive battle system. You click and you wait until you can click again.

The real key to active battle would be taking out percentage based combat statistics, like dodge or hit. and make them real time (however you'd need collision detection for everything, which means more calculations..) Also more animations for being hit, and you'd need more scripting to make the AI work with the new mechanics, like say...running around, dodging. It's much more work.


You'd also have to have really really really good netcode. Many games don't.

 

[geK0]

It just seems if people can play games such as vindictus with 5 players going completely hectic and age of conana with them en mass surely we can find a way to host good player vs player and instance mechanics while giving the player the ability actively have more control over their actions right? (maybe making instanced battlegrounds for mass pvp to go with the Pve instances, thiough I have to admit when it coems to open world travel and quests + leveling and such I am at a loss. Unless we made extreamly EPIC quests that took place in the instances) Anyway I will continue to think this one through.

I was thinking more along the lines of an ElderScroll-esque MMO...... those games lagg badly enough in single player

 

[Maze1125]

Why doesn't any MMO use a different combat system?
Because that question is a red herring and they, in fact, do.

There are many many MMOs that use a non-standard system.
City of Heroes has a similar class system to your standard MMO, but you activate every attack yourself, and they feel powerful, not just like any auto-attack system.
Planetside was an MMO who's combat system was a FPS, which is pretty much as far from your WoW style as you can get, and it was popular for it's time.

So, why don't MMOs use different combat systems? They do, you just don't pay attention to them.

 

[Drizzitdude]

Yet with all the good that I witness in a game like wow there is still one thing that truly bothers me. The combat system/physics engine.

Just want to point out WoW has no physics engine. All the "physics" are pre-generated animations. Absolutely no physics calculations are involved >.>

Also a major flaw with active combat, is actually making it active. Think about fable, you only get 2 abilities, to make it simpler for the user. The abilities also have timers and cast times. In that time you can be doing something else, but the effect is has is just like a passive battle system. You click and you wait until you can click again.

The real key to active battle would be taking out percentage based combat statistics, like dodge or hit. and make them real time (however you'd need collision detection for everything, which means more calculations..) Also more animations for being hit, and you'd need more scripting to make the AI work with the new mechanics, like say...running around, dodging. It's much more work.


You'd also have to have really really really good netcode. Many games don't.

I am nort sure if you read the post or skimmed it or what. The entire point of my comment about wows physics engine was regarding the point it had none.

Also please elaborate how in fable you had '2 abilites'

1: Melee attack
2: flourish
3: dodge/block
4: The rather large list of spells I am not going to go into
5: Ranged attack/zoom

also myu entire post was about adding the REAL hit boxes and collision detection over the old percentages, where u restating this simply to add the note that it would be harder? (I am soprry if I am coming off as rude after i reread my statement it kind of sounded like an attack but really I just want to know where u are coming from here)

when I go into gaming I am going to go into the industry with this in mind.

You can always tell games are improving when it becomes simpler, smoother, more viseceral, more accessible for your customers without sacrificing qaulity and harder for you the devoloper. Improvement isn't about things being easy.

Why doesn't any MMO use a different combat system?
Because that question is a red herring and they, in fact, do.

There are many many MMOs that use a non-standard system.
City of Heroes has a similar class system to your standard MMO, but you activate every attack yourself, and they feel powerful, not just like any auto-attack system.
Planetside was an MMO who's combat system was a FPS, which is pretty much as far from your WoW style as you can get, and it was popular for it's time.

So, why don't MMOs use different combat systems? They do, you just don't pay attention to them.

Isn't planetside and its rip off mars wars both down? And I guess I should have specified more I was talking about mmorpgs more rather than mmos in general Under the MMOshooter category you also can't forget global agenda which is kinda, well its gameplay is pretty solid but its loot system is terrible. I will add a note in the OP stating we are referring mostly to MMORPG's sorry.

also I havent played City of Heroes/villains and no one I know plays it or talks about it so I don't have a solid opinion on it to work from.

 

[Detheroth]

That isn't a problm with people with a decent rig/connection which is the majority of POC gamers. Are we supposed to stop making games better because someone is still using a computer from 06? Should the entire industry just halt?

Actually Lag has nothing to do with the players computer, it is more to do with the players internet speed and the server's capabilities, having over a thousand people online on a single server (which you have to admit is TINY for an MMO) all doing the real time combat would put both massive strains on the server itself and on the players internet as the amount of data being sent and delivered is MUCH larger than the current systems used now.

I will admit that your idea is BRILLIANT and I too have wondered how epic it would be to have real time combat, with rolls etc and even how crazy a God of War style MMO would be, but the reality is; at this stage in the industry, with the quality of technology we have available to us, it would be improbable for a large scale MMO to be able to use this combat style effectively.

BUT upon saying that, the speed at which technology is advancing these days, I don't think it will be very long before we start to see some companies attempting this. We just have to play the waiting game.

 

[imnot]

The problem with active combat in an mmo would be lag.

The auto attack with special abilites makes the game playable and enjoyable even with a full second of lag between your input and the games reaction, as the global cooldown on spells/abilites blocks your next action for 1,5sec anyway.

Could you imagine actually aiming at an enemy with a second delay?

In your fable example, your client would have to display something when you attack, so he would propably guess wether your strike hit a monster and make that monster recoil from damage. But if the server disagrees about whether you actually hit something, your client will update the monsters position later, resulting in a monster that teleports a few feet closer to you and may actually be already hitting you.

Heh in oblivion everysingle button mouse movment has a 4 second delay minimum XD
I think I could handle it.

 

[Drizzitdude]

That isn't a problm with people with a decent rig/connection which is the majority of POC gamers. Are we supposed to stop making games better because someone is still using a computer from 06? Should the entire industry just halt?

Actually Lag has nothing to do with the players computer, it is more to do with the players internet speed and the server's capabilities, having over a thousand people online on a single server (which you have to admit is TINY for an MMO) all doing the real time combat would put both massive strains on the server itself and on the players internet as the amount of data being sent and delivered is MUCH larger than the current systems used now.

I will admit that your idea is BRILLIANT and I too have wondered how epic it would be to have real time combat, with rolls etc and even how crazy a God of War style MMO would be, but the reality is; at this stage in the industry, with the quality of technology we have available to us, it would be improbable for a large scale MMO to be able to use this combat style effectively.

BUT upon saying that, the speed at which technology is advancing these days, I don't think it will be very long before we start to see some companies attempting this. We just have to play the waiting game.

Damn you technology! Damn you and your slow ways!

 

[oplinger]

Yet with all the good that I witness in a game like wow there is still one thing that truly bothers me. The combat system/physics engine.

Just want to point out WoW has no physics engine. All the "physics" are pre-generated animations. Absolutely no physics calculations are involved >.>

Also a major flaw with active combat, is actually making it active. Think about fable, you only get 2 abilities, to make it simpler for the user. The abilities also have timers and cast times. In that time you can be doing something else, but the effect is has is just like a passive battle system. You click and you wait until you can click again.

The real key to active battle would be taking out percentage based combat statistics, like dodge or hit. and make them real time (however you'd need collision detection for everything, which means more calculations..) Also more animations for being hit, and you'd need more scripting to make the AI work with the new mechanics, like say...running around, dodging. It's much more work.


You'd also have to have really really really good netcode. Many games don't.

I am nort sure if you read the post or skimmed it or what. The entire point of my comment about wows physics engine was regarding the point it had none.

Meaningless, I was saying you were wrong in stating the game had a physics engine at all. It does not.

Also please elaborate how in fable you had '2 abilites'

1: Melee attack
2: flourish
3: dodge/block
4: The rather large list of spells I am not going to go into
5: Ranged attack/zoom

Left mouse button. Right mouse button. Attack, flourish, or 2 spells. You only get 2, unless you're really quick at switching. In an MMO that'd be a huge turn off. (I dont' remember the Xbox controls.)

also myu entire post was about adding the REAL hit boxes and collision detection over the old percentages, where u restating this simply to add the note that it would be harder? (I am soprry if I am coming off as rude after i reread my statement it kind of sounded like an attack but really I just want to know where u are coming from here)

when I go into gaming I am going to go into the industry with this in mind.

You can always tell games are improving when it becomes simpler, smoother, more viseceral, more accessible for your customers without sacrificing qaulity and harder for you the devoloper. Improvement isn't about things being easy.

You want hit percentages AND hit boxes? ...Why? If you go with RPG stats, having a 90% hit chance would mean, statistically, for every 100 hits, you should hit them 90 times. That makes the hit box useless. Having the character swing with a button, and then using the hit box to calculate hit, makes the percentage useless.

also,

Yet with all the good that I witness in a game like wow there is still one thing that truly bothers me. The combat system/physics engine. Lets be honest in WoW (and so called 'wow clones') all we really do is watch our character autoattack while we use skills every now in then. It doesn't seem very active and to be honest I don't think any of us have ever had the feeling of there being weight behind our blows with slashes or spells. It just seems to phase through the enemy as if they were insubstantial, the only real indicator of damage being done is the number you see flying up and the enemies health being reduced.

When I first played 'Fable' and 'Fable: The Lost Chapters' all those years ago one giant fact hit me, the game had an EXCELLENT combat system. It existed in a realm above other rpgs for the simple fact your ACTIVELY controlled your characters actions. Every slash, spell, block or roll everything had weight to it. When you hit an enemy they reacted now wouldn't this be great in an mmo? Where instead of the game just rolling off of hidden dice rolls it, would exist in that realm where if I slash my sword, anything caught in that slash will be hurt by it? A realm where if I see a boss swinging a meat cleaver in my direction I could attempt to roll out of the way or block it to nullify a percent of the damage and if I acted like I do in wow and simply stood there and took it (I tank) there would be consequences?

The bolded points have nothing to do with an active battle system at all. You just want more animations by the sound of it, not an active battle system. Hit calculations are there in WoW, and on hit, they can have the game play an animation. That kinda sounds like all you want.

The italicized point is closer to an active battle system. However, you want to keep the percentages of things like dodge, so why move out of the way? He might miss anyway. Magically.

The only real way to see active combat is by removing the chance stats, that way you can rely on collision detection rather than numbers. You'd need a collision box for every character type, a good one too, not just a cube. More animations to give the player more feedback than damage numbers, and have the ability to press more buttons, rather than 2 or 3 without it being too clunky, as it's an active battle, you will need to be on your toes. (Or as I explained with fable, things have cast times and their own attack speeds, which makes the system just like WoW, only more transparent)

My points were to display that an active battle system is much more work than a passive one, and many MMOs are about content, not combat.

Another note would be to say WoW -is- an active battle system, as it is not turn based. I won't do that to you though