RPGs with the best combat systems

[Chris Tian]

For other games, I... still really like Baldur's Gate (2, mostly) for older style top-down combat. I find that kind of frequent pausing top-down view combat *way* more tactically intensive than more recent games it influenced. If Dragon Age was even 1/10th as complex and engaging as BG, I would have liked it - but it was just a poor man's mockery of a once-great combat system, and the frequent pausing felt very out of place in Kotor/Mass Effect (the latter in particular), and the smaller party size/reduced party options threw complexity/neat team builds out the window. IMO a party of 6 is that sweet spot - enough for meatshield, melee damage, support caster, damage caster, thief, etc.

The AD&D mechanics are pretty arcane and definitely feel dated (I hope you love reading pages-long spell descriptions!) but even despite that, BG2's combat remains one of the most complex, engaging and rewarding turn-based RPGs have to offer.

It's probably a matter of opinion, but i have to ask: Where do you see the big difference between Dragon Age: Origins and Baldurs Gate/any of the old AD&D combat?
For me DA:O felt like the modern recreation of the AD&D based combat systems. You have your Warriors who can take a hit and dish out pretty good, Spellcasters who can deal damage or use utility spells and Rogues who deal damage with critical hits and the like and lockpick/disarm traps for you.
The only big differneces were that BG had this hybrid classes like Bards, who combined some rogue stuff with some spells and the Clerics, who have no equivalent in DA:O.
DA:O did instead the whole threat mangament better, with the abilities that let a Warrior force the mobs to face him instead of the squishies.

 

[A Weakgeek]

For other games, I... still really like Baldur's Gate (2, mostly) for older style top-down combat. I find that kind of frequent pausing top-down view combat *way* more tactically intensive than more recent games it influenced. If Dragon Age was even 1/10th as complex and engaging as BG, I would have liked it - but it was just a poor man's mockery of a once-great combat system, and the frequent pausing felt very out of place in Kotor/Mass Effect (the latter in particular), and the smaller party size/reduced party options threw complexity/neat team builds out the window. IMO a party of 6 is that sweet spot - enough for meatshield, melee damage, support caster, damage caster, thief, etc.

The AD&D mechanics are pretty arcane and definitely feel dated (I hope you love reading pages-long spell descriptions!) but even despite that, BG2's combat remains one of the most complex, engaging and rewarding turn-based RPGs have to offer.

It's probably a matter of opinion, but i have to ask: Where do you see the big difference between Dragon Age: Origins and Baldurs Gate/any of the old AD&D combat?
For me DA:O felt like the modern recreation of the AD&D based combat systems. You have your Warriors who can take a hit and dish out pretty good, Spellcasters who can deal damage or use utility spells and Rogues who deal damage with critical hits and the like and lockpick/disarm traps for you.
The only big differneces were that BG had this hybrid classes like Bards, who combined some rogue stuff with some spells and the Clerics, who have no equivalent in DA:O.
DA:O did instead the whole threat mangament better, with the abilities that let a Warrior force the mobs to face him instead of the squishies.

Spells per day.

One of the things I love about D&D is that magic is actually powerful, because theres a cap how many times you can cast it per day. Unlike DA where you throw ice and fire like they were darts or something.

 

[Chris Tian]

Spells per day.

One of the things I love about D&D is that magic is actually powerful, because theres a cap how many times you can cast it per day. Unlike DA where you throw ice and fire like they were darts or something.

I dont really get your statment "I love that magic is actually powerfull". Is it less powerfull if you can cast it more often?
I'm probably understanding that wrong, because if you found magic in DA:O to be not powerfull you definitely skilled your casters wrong.

That spells are limited by casts per day instead of a manapool makes the combat so much deeper for you?
For me that just meant I had to rest every few encounters.

 

[88chaz88]

No Mount & Blade? I'm disappointed.

I like the support for Dark Souls though, and I'd rate it as a better RPG in general, but the combat alone in Mount & Blade is by far the best imo.

 

[A Weakgeek]

Spells per day.

One of the things I love about D&D is that magic is actually powerful, because theres a cap how many times you can cast it per day. Unlike DA where you throw ice and fire like they were darts or something.

I dont really get your statment "I love that magic is actually powerfull". Is it less powerfull if you can cast it more often?
I'm probably understanding that wrong, because if you found magic in DA:O to be not powerfull you definitely skilled your casters wrong.

That spells are limited by casts per day instead of a manapool makes the combat so much deeper for you?
For me that just meant I had to rest every few encounters.

Spells per day makes it so that spells can be more powerfull without being OP. For example, your mage in baldurs gate can have Sleep first level, which absolutely wrecks any encounter in the start. Thats because its literally the only thing a LVL1 wizard has. Compare that with an average videogame starter mage. You have some spammy recolor of magic missile that you boringly toss around.

On the topic of DA:O magic: Yeah it was powerful, but for all the wrong reasons, and probably not intentional. Magic is OP in DA:O because of huge AOEs with stacking status effects, and yet even the power of those spells was dependant on their spammability (Essentially you can stack all the last level elemental spells, and once the enemies finally crawl out of the ridiculous Freeze>Fall prone>Catch on fire>Freeze again... etc. you can already cast it again.

Something is wrong with the game if 3 mages is the optimal way to play...

 

[Ushiromiya Battler]

Also, I am still to see anything close to Jade Empire battle system. That shit was rad.

Hah, yeah that combat system was the shit, sadly the story was pretty boring, but totally worth playing just for the combat system.

OT:
Valkyria Chronicles have, in my opinion, the best combat system of all rpg's. Got everything you need for a fun experience and I kinda chuckled when I noticed Combat Points where shortened to CP

 

[The Madman]

No Mount & Blade? I'm disappointed.

I'd completely overlooked it since generally speaking I don't really think of Mount & Blade as an rpg, although in retrospect that's exactly what it is.

That said Mount & Blade has by far the best 3rd person combat in an rpg. Might not be the most flashy or pretty, but it's by far the most fun and satisfying combat system out there for melee and mounted combat.

 

[dimmkexa]

I really enjoyed Eternal Sonata amd Grandia 2.

 

[A Weakgeek]

No Mount & Blade? I'm disappointed.

I'd completely overlooked it since generally speaking I don't really think of Mount & Blade as an rpg, although in retrospect that's exactly what it is.

That said Mount & Blade has by far the best 3rd person combat in an rpg. Might not be the most flashy or pretty, but it's by far the most fun and satisfying combat system out there for melee and mounted combat.

I'm going to say M&B too.

Chivalry beats it in Melee, but since it doesnt have mounted combat I can't in good faith call Chivalry better.

 

[The_Echo]

I too might sing a verse of praises for the Dark Souls combat.

But I'll apparently be the first to say the same for the combat in Kingdom Hearts. Not vastly complicated, no, but sincerely fun and each installment does something different with it (some more than others[footnote]I'm still terrible at Chain of Memories.[/footnote]).

The most major of which, the shift from Command Menu to Command Deck, completely changed the landscape of the franchise's combat. You were given a much wider variety of attacks to use at your leisure, and appropriate cooldowns to give an element of strategic timing (or shit-yourself frantic running waiting for Curaga to come back).

More than anything, though, it's just fun as hell, and I've grinded (ground?) up to LV99 on multiple occasions without it feeling like much of a slog.

 

[88chaz88]

I'd completely overlooked it since generally speaking I don't really think of Mount & Blade as an rpg, although in retrospect that's exactly what it is.

That said Mount & Blade has by far the best 3rd person combat in an rpg. Might not be the most flashy or pretty, but it's by far the most fun and satisfying combat system out there for melee and mounted combat.

I'm going to say M&B too.

Chivalry beats it in Melee, but since it doesnt have mounted combat I can't in good faith call Chivalry better.

I'm glad I could remind people that Mount & Blade is an RPG. I admit it does seem easy to forget, perhaps because the focus is on the combat and the singleplayer isn't as refined.

Chivalry has arguably better combat but I can't really call it an RPG. There's practically no singleplayer and no real avatar creation or expression in multiplayer.

 

[Shoggoth2588]

My favorite RPG's battle system is the one used in Tales of Phantasia:


It's in Japanese but it should speak for itself. Mostly real-time battles with a level-up system on a 2D plane where you literally have to make contact to make your attacks count. This may not be the best but it's my favorite.

 

[Arqus_Zed]

Also gonna throw my vote out there for the Conditional ATB-system from FF X-2. The gameplay was the only damn reason I finished that game (twice).

As for other RPGs in that same genre, I'm gonna pick Resonance of Fate, Shadow Hearts and Legend of Legaia.
And it looks like I've been ninja'd on two out of three.

(Also, not gonna put SMT or any of the Persona titles here, because even though I love the games, it's not like the combat system did something new. Except for the Press Turn System, which does make things a bit more interesting, but that's it.)

 

[Eduku]

I love TW2 combat too, especially the combination of swordplay, bombs, traps, and magic, and how you can mix that up however you like.
But that is as far from realistic as its gets. I mean even aside the bombs, traps and magic, which is nowhere near realism as you will surely agree.

Well by 'realism' I meant things like the importance of positioning and not getting flanked and that kind of stuff. In hindsight realism probably wasn't the best word but I can't think of the right one. In truth, a 'realistic' fight between knights would probably be incredibly slow and boring. I guess the most 'realistic' combat system in the true sense of the word would be Mount and Blade.

For other games, I... still really like Baldur's Gate (2, mostly) for older style top-down combat. I find that kind of frequent pausing top-down view combat *way* more tactically intensive than more recent games it influenced. If Dragon Age was even 1/10th as complex and engaging as BG, I would have liked it - but it was just a poor man's mockery of a once-great combat system, and the frequent pausing felt very out of place in Kotor/Mass Effect (the latter in particular), and the smaller party size/reduced party options threw complexity/neat team builds out the window. IMO a party of 6 is that sweet spot - enough for meatshield, melee damage, support caster, damage caster, thief, etc.

The AD&D mechanics are pretty arcane and definitely feel dated (I hope you love reading pages-long spell descriptions!) but even despite that, BG2's combat remains one of the most complex, engaging and rewarding turn-based RPGs have to offer.

It's probably a matter of opinion, but i have to ask: Where do you see the big difference between Dragon Age: Origins and Baldurs Gate/any of the old AD&D combat?
For me DA:O felt like the modern recreation of the AD&D based combat systems. You have your Warriors who can take a hit and dish out pretty good, Spellcasters who can deal damage or use utility spells and Rogues who deal damage with critical hits and the like and lockpick/disarm traps for you.
The only big differneces were that BG had this hybrid classes like Bards, who combined some rogue stuff with some spells and the Clerics, who have no equivalent in DA:O.
DA:O did instead the whole threat mangament better, with the abilities that let a Warrior force the mobs to face him instead of the squishies.

For me, combat in games like Baldur's Gate was so much better than Dragon Age: Origins because of the variety in the class system as well as the fact that you traditionally had six members in your party instead of the limited four. AD&D wasn't just a case of 'warriors hit things, spellcasters blast things, rogues unlock things', there were tons of different classes, each with their own characteristics and nuances. For example, maybe the man on the front line was a heavily armored war cleric, supporting themselves with healing and destructive holy spells. Or maybe they were a kensai, a fighter subclass who gains bonuses for not wearing armor and relies on dodging and pure offense. There was also the ability to multi-class, so you could create countless combinations of classes for a hybrid character - perhaps as a level 8 druid you were to take some levels in fighter for some martial combat prowess, you could do that.

And then there is the fact that you could mix the party up if you wanted. You could run with a group of six martial combat classes, with fighters, paladins, barbarians or whatever. You maybe you'd like to go with a party of spellcasters - druids, clerics, wizards, sorcerers. The game gave you a lot more freedom and choice into how you could build characters and tailor them to your exact liking. Of course in my opinion, Dragon Age: Origins, despite being a very good game, is still a very shallow imitation of Baldur's Gate 2.

 

[s0p0g]

Jade Empire! (interwebbz y u no mention JE evar?!) and Gothic 2, of course

finally RPGs that let you fight yourself in a fun way ^^

 

[Chris Tian]

Spells per day makes it so that spells can be more powerfull without being OP. For example, your mage in baldurs gate can have Sleep first level, which absolutely wrecks any encounter in the start. Thats because its literally the only thing a LVL1 wizard has. Compare that with an average videogame starter mage. You have some spammy recolor of magic missile that you boringly toss around.

I am not sure what you mean by "average videogame starter mage" but the last mages I played could choose alot of different spells in the beginning.

On the topic of DA:O magic: Yeah it was powerful, but for all the wrong reasons, and probably not intentional.

I dont know, those statements sound odd. You really think they did not intend the magic to be powerfull? And what are wrong reasons?

Magic is OP in DA:O because of huge AOEs with stacking status effects, and yet even the power of those spells was dependant on their spammability (Essentially you can stack all the last level elemental spells, and once the enemies finally crawl out of the ridiculous Freeze>Fall prone>Catch on fire>Freeze again... etc. you can already cast it again.

If you had to spam your spells so much I still think you skilled your casters "wrong". In DA:O you could wreck a whole room of standard mobs by casting one or two high level spells, just like in Baldurs Gate.

Even if not, whats the big tactical difference or difference in depth between casting one mighty spell or having to cast three not so mighty ones?.
I remember the high level Casters in BG having alot of casts per day and since you could just rest between encounters they rarely run out of spells in combat. Its not that you had to hold back in fear of beeing cought with your pants down in a later battle.

Well, my point is that I am not sure I get your point. You said you loved D&D magic for being powerfull, that would mean in comparison DA:O magic is not powerfull, no?
Then you said DA:O magic is overpowerd because of the spammability, but wouldnt that only be an issue if the spells are very powerfull and can be cast to often?

In the end I dont really see the difference between being able to cast several less powerfull or one very powerfull spell.
Especially because in my experience the games don't have that difference at all, in both games your caster would pretty soon reach a level on which he could cast all his bread and butter spells as often as he needed to.

 

[Ishigami]

I fondly remember the combat system of Final Fantasy X. Since it was turn based there was no rush to get through the menus therefore it became more accessible and it was always clear how a move would affect the combat order which made it easy to plan in advance. All in all the system was simply transparent something many JRPGs lack (e.g. The Last Remnant).
If I remember right it became somewhat broken in the end game e.g. the Anima only served as meat shield and stuff like that but it never mattered to me since I never played it to that extend.

The combat of Tales of Vesperia was also highly addictive and enjoyable for me. Again it becomes very broken once you enter the ?game+? area. But I still enjoyed ranking up combos even though I was practically immortal.
The challenges were a nice touch and made me repeat a fight over and over again just to get it right.

Valkyria Chonicles was also very well done. There is nothing really remarkable here other than that the combat rules were pretty simple and crystal clear at any given time. I like it when you know what is going on and there is no ?wtf just happened?? moment.

The Legends of Dragoon is also a title I remember with nostalgia. Basically the combat was pretty much standard JRPG fare at the time in line with FFVIII and that sort of thing. It had this little QTE thing going on. An attack would have several stages and you had to press a button once several squares aligned on screen in order to progress to the next stage of the attack. It therefore felt a little bit more active then the usually rather passive combat systems at the time of most JRPGs.

As for CRPGs I have to admit that I was not really into that stuff. AD&D and this stuff always seemed to restrictive or confusing. The first out of these to work for me was KotOR. I loved that game but tbh today I can not remember if the combat was actually any good... the characters, dialogues and twist were great but the combat? ? can't remember...
While I like playing e.g. Sykrim I don't really think much of the combat system in these sort of games. They are basically action games...

 

[Chris Tian]

Well by 'realism' I meant things like the importance of positioning and not getting flanked and that kind of stuff. In hindsight realism probably wasn't the best word but I can't think of the right one. In truth, a 'realistic' fight between knights would probably be incredibly slow and boring. I guess the most 'realistic' combat system in the true sense of the word would be Mount and Blade.

If by "Knight" you mean guy in full plate armor, that would be the most interesting "real fight" to watch, since they dont die from the first blow landed. Those guys really had to work for it, whailing at each other until ones armorjoints are messed up so bad that he couldn't move giving the other one the opportunity to crack that thing open and land a killing blow.
But i get your gist and liked those things about TW2 too.

For me, combat in games like Baldur's Gate was so much better than Dragon Age: Origins because of the variety in the class system as well as the fact that you traditionally had six members in your party instead of the limited four. AD&D wasn't just a case of 'warriors hit things, spellcasters blast things, rogues unlock things', there were tons of different classes, each with their own characteristics and nuances. For example, maybe the man on the front line was a heavily armored war cleric, supporting themselves with healing and destructive holy spells. Or maybe they were a kensai, a fighter subclass who gains bonuses for not wearing armor and relies on dodging and pure offense. There was also the ability to multi-class, so you could create countless combinations of classes for a hybrid character - perhaps as a level 8 druid you were to take some levels in fighter for some martial combat prowess, you could do that.

And then there is the fact that you could mix the party up if you wanted. You could run with a group of six martial combat classes, with fighters, paladins, barbarians or whatever. You maybe you'd like to go with a party of spellcasters - druids, clerics, wizards, sorcerers. The game gave you a lot more freedom and choice into how you could build characters and tailor them to your exact liking. Of course in my opinion, Dragon Age: Origins, despite being a very good game, is still a very shallow imitation of Baldur's Gate 2.

I often get the feeling that those "the old games were so much more complex" statements come from a place of nostalgia and simply the fact that we all were alot younger when we first played these games, of course they seemed very complex back then.

I mean you are right that Baldurs Gate had all these sub- and hybridclasses but most of them were just slight variations of the mainclass, and you can build your chars in several different ways in DA:O too. You can build a heavily armored healer guy aswell as a Fighter who uses little armor and concentrates on offense.

For the other point, well thats just my opinion, but i like it more that I have to specialise my characters to do one, maybe two jobs very well instead of branching out, i found that to be most effective in BG too.

On the lower difficultys you can run around with whoever you want in DA:O too. Only on Nightmare(and probably Hard, but i never played that) you have to use the more effective setup of tank, healer, and two damage dealer.
Thats again a thing I like better, than just having six autoattack machines run around.

 

[babinro]

Tales of Symphonia: This is the only Tales game I've played but the combat was very fun. It had the potential to be frustrating but gladly they didn't make monsters as cheap as they could have.

Dragon Age 2: I found DA:O combat to be great but DA2 improved upon it utilizing class synergies to deal extra damage which made the experience extremely rewarding. The attack animations really enhanced the experience as well.

Final Fantasy 12 / 13: I realize there is a ton of hate for all these games but I found the combat systems to be fantastic and flawed with each game.
- FF12 had you buy combat triggers forcing you to play through 80% of the game before you get the one you want. If you could have just set the commands from the start this would have been truly great.
- FF13 simply took far to long for the combat to become engaging due to a slow tutorial

 

[anonymity88]

Dark Souls, forever Dark Souls.

I also really liked Final Fantasy XII even though the gambit system is something that regularly gets ragged all over.