Re: CF: combat proposal (long)

[Florian Beck <>]

Hello!

First of all: CF really is great! And the weapon code modifications
sound even better. So please, don't missunderstand any of my
comments/suggestions. It's not for me even to think about coding
things like that myself...


Brian Thomas wrote:
> 	I. Weapon attack modes
...

> 	cut		low		1-Attacks cause bleeding to occur
> 					and Mult all damage that penetrates
> 					armour by 1 1/3.

A cutting attack shoud less likely penetrate armour.

...

> 	Cut     -- Nothing beyond initial damage check.

I'd suggest a high chance for blade weapons to be damaged when trying to cut 
armour.

...

> 	Disarm  -- NO initial damage check.
When I'm trying "disarm" and don't succeed - probably my AC should be lowered?
[Idea: I'm doing something very non-defensive.]
AND: Chance should depend on opponents  weapon/attack style. It should 
work less likely against someone bashing with heavy weapons than fencing with
a rapier. 

...

> 	If a weapon/armour item accumulates a negative ac/wc "bonus" greater 
> 	than  its magic bonus, it is destroyed. This means that an ordinary
> 	small shield (ac 1) is destroyed after accumulating 2 damaging hits 
> 	(ac first goes to "0", on next hit it then becomes negative) and a 
> 	+1 small shield can take 3 hits. A piece of armour is also destroyed 
> 	if its armour value drops below 0. 

I know it would be difficult but I would prefer a new veriable. It would 
indicate if it is damaged or not (100%=perfect condition,0%=can't even be
fixed anymore). For the time being wc/ac/damage could be multiplied with
the "quality" (a 50% damage+10 weapon would do +5 damage). Spice could be 
added: low quality weapons are less likely to succeed with special attacks.

> 	  b. how to 'invoke' special attacks
> 
>        Under some attack modes several effects are listed. For a first
>        pass at coding this, each effect listed is checked for in every
>        attack. Later, we may think of an easy, intuitive way to allow the
>        wielder to select the special attack effect.
>  
>        The player invokes a special attack by readying the melee weapons
>        skill, and making a 'ranged' attack. Monsters may make special 
>        attacks  based on their intelligence, attack movement, and whether 
>        they have the skill_melee_weapons in their inventory.

Idea: Let the player set one or two parameters:
two: Aggressive - Defensive, Melee - Technical OR:
one: Aggressive - Technical.

Depending on these paramteres, the wielded weapon and the stats,
the special attack os chosen: 
- an aggressive style is chosen:
  if the character has high STR and say a warhammer - fine: lots of
  bash attacks;
  if he has low STR or e.g a rapier/dagger - bad: lots of misses
- same with technical style: high INT/DEX and rapier/nunchacu/taifu -
  many impaling and disarming attacks, else - failures...

  
> 	  c. immunities.
> 
> 	Of course, some monsters will be immune to some or all of these
> 	attack modes, and may be unaffected by bleeding and fatigue. 
> 	For players, some magical items may make the user immune to some
> 	attack modes and reduce or (in rare and REALLY powerful items) 
> 	eliminate the effects of fatigue and/or bleeding.  

Seems all monster archetypes have to be changed. (Fine, there are other
things which could be done.) First I though "impale" should not work against
ghosts. But then: what attack can hurt ghosts at all?

> 
> 	Some player character types may not be affected by bleeding (cf. 
> 	fireborn and wraith).

Hmm, either bleeding is only a small nuicance or these type would 
gain a HUGE advantage. (Neven liked those anyway: they can't be seen
as professions.)

> 	II. Fatigue and Bleeding. 
> 	  a. fatigue
> 	
> 	This is essentially a measure of how much physical exertion 
> 	a given creature can accomplish. As the amount of fatigue 
> 	rises, the creature begins to lose vigor (Str) and can accomplish
> 	less. In game terms, we assign a maximum number of "fatigue points" 
> 	(fp) that may be accumulated by each creature based on their Str + 
> 	(physique) experience level (in players) or just assign it to a 
> 	monster (just like hit points). 
> 
> 	The amount of Str lost depends on the percentage of fatigue 
> 	points relative to the maximum number of fp. For very high
> 	levels of fatigue, our healing rate is effected adversely. 
> 
...
> 	Note, as you lose strength, you will auto-matically be slowed
> 	down (from the speed calculation in fix_player) thus simulating
> 	a characters "tiredness".  
> 
> 	Fatigue is regained at a rate equal to about 2x that of hit
> 	points. In players this rate is based on their Str and Con
> 	(in monsters the Str value is used).
> 
> 	Most probably, it would be nice to have a stat bar in the lower
> 	window for monitoring the current fatigue level.

I would suggest a close connection between hp and fatigue. The "hp" are 
something silimiar anyway: If a character with 2 of 150 hp's left
really would be damaged physically (i.e compltly mutiliated) I couldn't
see how he could be healed again. I always pictured low hp characters 
as: exhausted and many scratches.

Idee: "fatigue" is used up before the "hit points". If fatigue is low most
attacks wouldn't atcually physically damage - they would use up stamina,
though. After stamina is used up, hits would immediatly decrease hip points,
as would arrows or backstabbing.

> 	  b. bleeding
> 
> 	Bleeding refers to the damaging effect of blood loss from open
> 	wounds. Not all weapons will cause bleeding nor will all creatures
> 	bleed (ex the undead!, also see above). 

Maces probably don't cause bleeding but other nasty effects eg. 
breaking bones...

> 	The rate of bleeding will vary from second to second depending on
> 	the damage the creature has received and its healing rate.

Should depend on a "healing" skill and the availability of bandages.

> 	You can bleed to death. Experience is awarded to the owner of 
> 	the "wound" that did the killing damage.

But that's a bit similiar to the wands (which don't award xp). Why 
reward the attacker just because the victim  has no bandages?

> 	III. Extended weapons.

...

Great!
Additional idea (actually something completly different): make a weapon 
subtype which I could refer to in maps. E.g (in a narrow passageway):
"you can't use a poleaxe here!".


> 	IV. Appendum - other related stuff ====
> 
> 	  a. Armour & Weapon repair
> 
> 	We can make an "anvil" in the shops that will repair armour to 
> 	its original (ie arch->clone.obj) properties. Magical equipment
> 	can only be repaired by the enchant armour scrolls (but we 
> 	should probably drop the weight increase effect for using these
> 	scrolls). We could drop the cost in these scrolls, or just 
> 	make magical properties restorable by the anvils. 
> 
> 	Weapons could have a repair anvil too, but here only the 
> 	original "magical" properties of the equipment are restored. 

Don't allow "magic repair". If the magic is lost, it's lost and can 
only be recreated.
(Besides: the making of magic weapons/armour should require a magic 
weapon/armour SKILL.)

> 	  b. Changes to skills, new skills first_aid and 2-handed melee
> 
> 	With the new attack modes, it makes sense to give some new 
> 	properties to older skills, ie:
> 
> 	Jumping skill	--	Give it ability to do knockback (really 
> 				ought to call this skill jumping/kicking). 
> 				Allow more damage versus inanimate objects
> 				(eg. doors). 
> 	Punching skill	--	Give it a stun effect as per bash.
> 	Karate skill	--	Allow it to parry thrown weapons/arrows.
> 	Clawing skill	--	Give it a cutting attack mode.
> 
> 	And lets add two new skills:
> 
> 	first aid 	--	Application can lower the bleeding level
> 				and do *minor* healing (ie 1-2 pts). May
> 				implement this as a skill-item "bandages"
> 				(this is a knowledge skill either way).

Good idea. Why not additionally add a "healer" skill which affects the long 
term healing rate?


> 	2-handed melee	--	User can wield 2 weapons (with restrictions
> 				based on Str). The primary weapon can be
> 				used to make special attacks, and the 
> 				secondary weapon is used to determine the 
> 				effect of being able to 'parry' special 
> 				attacks (ie takes the place of a shield; 
> 				in parrying a special attack the secondary
> 				weapon may be damaged too!).
> 				You get some small ac and damage benefits
> 				from the secondary weapon too. May get lower
> 				exp gain from using this skill (for the 
> 				sake of playbalance).
Hmmm, 
- even a low leven character should get more ac from a shield than a high
  level char from a secondary weapon
- make it difficult to learn: 
  1.secondary weapon get's a ?20%? penalty (left hand)
  2.starters need MORE time to attack with primary and secondary weapon
    than TWO times with a single handed attack.
    (Additional idea: a fighter should get higher WC when really SINGLE
     handed, ie no shield.)
  3.high level characters need LESS time to attack with both weapons
    than TWO times single handed.
    


FINALLY: how about:

1) skills for different weapon types. It would be great to have different
   weapon types (dagger, mace, sword, axe, staff, two-handed-weapon). 
   A fighter would start with several, others only with "dagger".
   A character who has sword skill still can use swords - but he would
   miss often and couldn't do any special attacks.
2) beside 2-handed melee, healing and melee - other skills that could
   affect fighting: 
   - fencing (higher chance for impale attacs, advantages against light 
     weapons)
   - backstabbing (against neutral/friendly monsters);
   - special "monster lore" (undead, trolls, dragons, feline ... whatever)
     could give advanteges against corresponding monsters.
   - "hiding" could give attack advantages (or does it already?)
3) difficult to implement, but I thing useful: SKILL LEVELS.
   - AFAIK skills are "hidden objects" in the player's inventory; so,
     if there is a variable left it could be used for the "skill level";
   - the "skill level" would raise with usage (0-100%),
   - for the time being, if the code doesn't make use of the skill level,
     no harm is done,
   - possible effects:
     a) low skill levels would cause dropped/damaged weapons, missed attacks,
        etc
     b) high skill levels would cause many special attacks, critical attacs,
        maybe even "fear"/"confusion"-type attacks.
    

-- 
Florian 
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