721 réponses à ce sujet

[In Exile]

Lotion Soronnar wrote...

All warfare is absolutely ***.
Bullet, arrow or sowrd - you still die.

Exactly! Unless it's DA:O, where four darkspawn can hit you with swords for hours and you never die.

All modern advances did is make killing from range easier. You're no less dead in your example then you would be taking on 3 people with guns.

Yup... but range > melee, because not getting hit > getting hit... unless it's an RPG where "getting hit" is literally the sole purpose of some classes. 

[Lotion Soronarr]

In Exile wrote...
As DA:O illustrates, all darkspawn had ornate plate armour, and the protagonists rarely had matching gear until midgame. 

But you make a good point. Knight wins... 9/10 times. So out of the 1000 encounters we have, it was unrealistic for the Warden should have died 100 times over. 

Darkspawn equipment is canonicly garbage. Ghouls don't make good smiths.

Also, the Warden is PC with a power of save and load, so it's irrelevant.

[Wulfram]

hhh89 wrote...

@Wulfram: so you're fine with having ridicolous, powerful abilities, as long as they don't have a visual effect?

I never said anything like that.

I dislike many things about DA:O combat.  But DA2's impossible, flashy animations added another thing.  And this thread is about the aesthetics, not mechanics.

[In Exile]

Wulfram wrote...
I dislike many things about DA:O combat.  But DA2's impossible, flashy animations added another thing.  And this thread is about the aesthetics, not mechanics.

Yes, and I'm saying DA:O was even worse. The "realistic" looking combat was even more ridiculous because of how it pretended to look like what people did and how it was nothing like that, it jarred with how utterly indestructible the protagnists were as engines of death and massacre, and it was inconsistent in how abilities would on the one hand be grounded and on the other hand be fantastical.

And that doesn't get into the absurdity of the mage not even more OP than the warrior with a power curve supposedly being realistic. 

Lotion Soronnar wrote...
Darkspawn equipment is canonicly garbage. Ghouls don't make good smiths.

Visually it's more ornate than anything that the PC can wear.

Also, the Warden is PC with a power of save and load, so it's irrelevant. 

So now "save and load" makes entirely unrealistic scenarios possible because.... what? How? I love this shifting line business. 

Modifié par In Exile, 20 septembre 2013 - 03:54 .

[Lotion Soronarr]

In Exile wrote...
Yup... but range > melee, because not getting hit > getting hit... unless it's an RPG where "getting hit" is literally the sole purpose of some classes.

that only holds true if:
1) armor protection is insufficient
2) you opponent uses good range weapons


So 1vs3, regardless of weapon - you still die. You don't magicly stop getting hit if you have a gun. The other guys ALSO have a gun.
And you can't block or parry with a gun (unlike with a sword). So...your chances of survival haven't really gone up.

[The Elder King]

Wulfram wrote...

hhh89 wrote...

@Wulfram: so you're fine with having ridicolous, powerful abilities, as long as they don't have a visual effect?

I never said anything like that.

I dislike many things about DA:O combat.  But DA2's impossible, flashy animations added another thing.  And this thread is about the aesthetics, not mechanics.

I wasn't implying you said that. I was trying to understand your point on the matter. 
I didn't like much DA2's speed and animations. I'm glad that they toned down the speed.

Modifié par hhh89, 20 septembre 2013 - 03:58 .

[Lotion Soronarr]

In Exile wrote...

Lotion Soronnar wrote...
Darkspawn equipment is canonicly garbage. Ghouls don't make good smiths.

Visually it's more ornate than anything that the PC can wear.

Which is irrelevant to the point that it's garbage.
I can make an impressive lookign armor out of paper mache too.

Also, the Warden is PC with a power of save and load, so it's irrelevant. 

So now "save and load" makes entirely unrealistic scenarios possible because.... what? How? I love this shifting line business. 

Ever heard of a phrase "acceptable breaks from reality"?
It's those things that you accept because you MUST.
To finish the game you must be victorious - ergo, encounters MUST be winnable.
PLAYER WINS is something you must accept, otherwise there is no game.

Now, do I want to wade trough a million enemies? No. I honestly prefer smaller scaled fights. I'd also prefer less fights and less padding. That would also make it more realistic.
But I doubt I will get that.

In other wors, I accept save&load (even tough I think some games should have ONLY Ironman mode) because it exists outside of the narrative, outside of the world and because it's there for player conveinience. It has an actual reason to be there other than "it looks kewl"

[Allan Schumacher]

Yet due to the frontloading of the damage and the animation
having to be resolved in full, it actually took more time for party
members to acknowledge your orders in DA2 than it did in DA:O, where
they automatically and immediately interrupted the task they were
working on to acknowledge your commands (which is how I measure
responsiveness: by time to acknowledgement).

That's fine, but it's actually not relevant to why I brought the point up.  In your eyes we failed to deliver on that (fair enough), but saying that the inclusion of the rock effect is evidence of us wanting "push a button something awesome happens" is more just a reflection for how that particular line missed its mark.

Though people harping on it IS a great way for me to disengage.

Since I want it to be more realistic, I'll say I want it to be more realistic

That's just it though.  I am not convinced that you just want it to be more realistic.  You want it to be a way that you like it more.  Or rather, I think you want it to not look stupid.


However, we've now just added bleeding and fatal wounds, as well as infections.  If the Inquisitor gets hit, there's a high risk of death and complications later on (Yes, I recognize I have gone in the far extreme).


If you don't like something, and you ask for more salt when the lack of salt isn't actually the problem, then it means we'll not address it in the way that you would like.

If we change the sword swinging animation to something more realistic, it won't make you happy.


Further, if there was an actual in game explanation for the effect and why it exists, would it make you happier?  If realism is genuinely the issue, then my assumption is no.  But if you're willing to accept other unrealistic aspects, then I get confused.  Why is *this* violation of realism unacceptable?  My assumption is because you think it looks stupid.

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 20 septembre 2013 - 04:11 .

[Vilegrim]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Yet due to the frontloading of the damage and the animation
having to be resolved in full, it actually took more time for party
members to acknowledge your orders in DA2 than it did in DA:O, where
they automatically and immediately interrupted the task they were
working on to acknowledge your commands (which is how I measure
responsiveness: by time to acknowledgement).

That's fine, but it's actually not relevant to why I brought the point up.  In your eyes we failed to deliver on that (fair enough), but saying that the inclusion of the rock effect is evidence of us wanting "push a button something awesome happens" is more just a reflection for how that particular line

Since I want it to be more realistic, I'll say I want it to be more realistic

That's just it though.  I am not convinced that you just want it to be more realistic.  You want it to be a way that you like it more.  Or rather, I think you want it to not look stupid.


However, we've now just added bleeding and fatal wounds, as well as
infections.  If the Inquisitor gets hit, there's a good chance that
you'll die.

You want it to be some idea of what you think is realistic, and in your mind your brain has filled in the blanks that it being "realistic" is desirable, so that's what's missing.



If you don't like something, and you ask for more salt when the lack of salt isn't actually the problem, then it means we'll not address it in the way that you would like.

If we change the sword swinging animation to something more realistic, it won't make you happy.


Further, if there was an actual in game explanation for the effect and why it exists, would it make you happier?  If realism is genuinely the issue, then my assumption is no.  But if you're willing to accept other unrealistic aspects, then I get confused.  Why is *this* violation of realism unacceptable?  My assumption is because you think it looks stupid.

L5R style combat? We have a winner!

[Plaintiff]

Vilegrim wrote...

Bleachrude wrote...

Then I'm out if the warriors are simply restricted to simply plodding around while the mages actually get to do ANYTHING...

Go on YouTube and search for fight scenes from game of thrones or iron clad...then tell me that is plodding.  If I wanted to play a mage I would roll a mage..I didn't please don't turn me into one.

Lol, the fight scenes from Game of Thrones aren't realisitic. No sword fight in any movie or show is realisitic. Hitting your sword against another person's sword is a quick way to ruin two swords.

Modifié par Plaintiff, 20 septembre 2013 - 04:11 .

[Vilegrim]

Plaintiff wrote...

Vilegrim wrote...

Bleachrude wrote...

Then I'm out if the warriors are simply restricted to simply plodding around while the mages actually get to do ANYTHING...

Go on YouTube and search for fight scenes from game of thrones or iron clad...then tell me that is plodding.  If I wanted to play a mage I would roll a mage..I didn't please don't turn me into one.

Lol, the fight scenes from Game of Thrones aren't realisitic. No sword fight in any movie or show is realisitic. Hitting your sword against another person's sword is a quick way to ruin two swords.

Whether parrying was a thing bfore the rapier is still debated their are examples of blades that have been whether that was intentional or a desperation move is open for debate.  Mushasi certainly did in his duels, but how exactly he did and if it made him unique again open for debate if you really care I will find for and against sources when I am off this ship.

[Ziggeh]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Further, if there was an actual in game explanation for the effect and why it exists, would it make you happier?  If realism is genuinely the issue, then my assumption is no.  But if you're willing to accept other unrealistic aspects, then I get confused.  Why is *this* violation of realism unacceptable?  My assumption is because you think it looks stupid.

Realism isn't the same as Realistic. There are numerous unrealistic elements that I accept, and would argue are commonly accepted as part of what it's probably best to start calling something like "unstylised" combat. Health bars and inventories and recovery are all things we're so familiar with they're part of a baseline for the genre and don't represent a fresh challenge to expectations.

I wouldn't use the word unacceptable, because I recognise that stylisation is a preference, but I would argue there is a difference between this and say, health potions in terms of what I'm going to call "believability" at the risk of further linguistic discombobulation.

[In Exile]

Ziggeh wrote...
Realism isn't the same as Realistic. There are numerous unrealistic elements that I accept, and would argue are commonly accepted as part of what it's probably best to start calling something like "unstylised" combat. Health bars and inventories and recovery are all things we're so familiar with they're part of a baseline for the genre and don't represent a fresh challenge to expectations.

I wouldn't use the word unacceptable, because I recognise that stylisation is a preference, but I would argue there is a difference between this and say, health potions in terms of what I'm going to call "believability" at the risk of further linguistic discombobulation.

Yes, and I would argue that the difference is that it's much easier to accept health potions and other RPG mechanics nonsense when the rest of the game doesn't pretend to be simulating reality (poorly). 

[Sylvius the Mad]

Bleachrude wrote...

How many people that actually have complaints about the "unrealistic" nature of the fighting in DA2 actuallly played a warrior or even better yet, an all non-mage party in DA:O.

In DA2, this was a valid choice and I thought it was fun to play and to look at...A party with warrior Hawke, Fenris, Isabella and Varric was fun for me to control and play.

A party consisting of Sten, warrior Warden, Oghren and Zevran? Not so much.

I think the difference here is that DA2's combat and encounter design made melee combat mandatory - there was no way to avoid melee reliably.  As such, playing melee characters became entertaining in every encounter.

Because DAO didn't force melee on you, sometimes encounters passed without your melee characters having been useful at all.

Does an all-ranged party work in DA2?  It works really well (and is fun) in DAO.

[In Exile]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Does an all-ranged party work in DA2?  It works really well (and is fun) in DAO.

Yes. Merril, Hawke (mage), Varric and Anders is a favourite combo of mine. So long as you're mobile, you can control the battlefield very easily with force mage spells, and then use chokepoint to create what amount to AOE kill zones. All of this speaking, of course, about a nightmare playthrough (which is the only difficulty I play at). 

In fact, I find that a force mage renders a tank irrelevant in all battles except for some very mechanically absurd boss battles where the game's rules stop working, and having a melee fighter at all with a force mage is counter productive.

I found that DA2 heavily discouraged melee on nightmare. Or rather, at most more than one melee character. 

Modifié par In Exile, 20 septembre 2013 - 05:33 .

[Wulfram]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

That's just it though.  I am not convinced that you just want it to be more realistic.  You want it to be a way that you like it more.  Or rather, I think you want it to not look stupid.

I do want it to not look stupid.  The reason it looks stupid to me currently is because it doesn't look realistic.  Or if that word is giving people trouble, because the Warrior is doing something that cannot be explained by human capabilities, or even preternatural human abilities, but requires magic.

However, we've now just added bleeding and fatal wounds, as well as infections.  If the Inquisitor gets hit, there's a high risk of death and complications later on (Yes, I recognize I have gone in the far extreme).

If you don't like something, and you ask for more salt when the lack of salt isn't actually the problem, then it means we'll not address it in the way that you would like.

Well I think the lack of salt is the problem.  And they're my taste buds, so I think i'm in the best position to judge.

If we change the sword swinging animation to something more realistic, it won't make you happy.

It'd be a step in the right direction.

Further, if there was an actual in game explanation for the effect and why it exists, would it make you happier?

Depends on the explanation.  It might address my current complaint, but most likely add other ones -  I don't want the Warrior to turn into a magic user.

If realism is genuinely the issue, then my assumption is no.

I don't understand that assumption.  If your point is that magic is unrealistic, then OK.  But we're talking about warriors here.  And Mages should still ideally obey the rules of magic set up in the universe the game takes place.

But if you're willing to accept other unrealistic aspects, then I get confused.  Why is *this* violation of realism unacceptable?  My assumption is because you think it looks stupid.

How acceptable a "violation of realism" is to me depends on

1.  How unrealistic it is.  Lesser degrees are less problematic, this isn't a case of "might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb".  Jumping a bit too far is one thing, leaping tall buildings with a single bound is another.
2.  Does it provide a strong gameplay benefit.  Hitpoints are obvjously problematic, but they're pretty much necessary.
3.  Is it really cool?  Yes, this is in there.  But it can't be appealed to too often, or it stops working.

But the lack of realism remains a bad thing, it's just that there might be other good factors that are more important.  And accepting the presence of some doesn't make me any more inclined to accept more, rather the opposite.  And if people insist that giving an inch means I must accept a mile, that just makes me regret giving the inch.

Modifié par Wulfram, 20 septembre 2013 - 05:34 .

[eye basher]

Plaintiff wrote...

Vilegrim wrote...

Bleachrude wrote...

Then I'm out if the warriors are simply restricted to simply plodding around while the mages actually get to do ANYTHING...

Go on YouTube and search for fight scenes from game of thrones or iron clad...then tell me that is plodding.  If I wanted to play a mage I would roll a mage..I didn't please don't turn me into one.

Lol, the fight scenes from Game of Thrones aren't realisitic. No sword fight in any movie or show is realisitic. Hitting your sword against another person's sword is a quick way to ruin two swords.

Actually with something like the long sword you can block with the flat of the blade.

[Ziggeh]

In Exile wrote...
Yes, and I would argue that the difference is that it's much easier to accept health potions and other RPG mechanics nonsense when the rest of the game doesn't pretend to be simulating reality (poorly).

From a fresh perspective, certainly, but I think there are a set of things so common to the genre that most (and I hesitate to speak for groups larger than myself) wouldn't even consider them in these terms. They're just a part of the underlying structure, and we're practiced at not looking at them.

It's the same reason 3D cinema doesn't suddenly greatly alter the nature of the experience - we were all really well practiced at ignoring the fact that it was flat.

So I'm not certain that simulating reality is really the desired effect, but a sort of "realist fantasy combat" that we've bought into over the years.

But I can definitely see why individual bugbears would disrupt and expose that, leaving you in a sort of "accept all or nothing position". That said, would you not say that even within your case that there are limits? That if, say, your choices were between "hitting them with sharpened metal" and "turning into a giant hedgehog called Norman, reversing time and killing their grandparents so they did't exist to fight you" you'd find the system a little difficult to buy into? At which point it's all about limitations of the stylisation and individual levels and such.

Modifié par Ziggeh, 20 septembre 2013 - 05:52 .

[Ziggeh]

Filament wrote...

Realism is not the best word to describe it, but there's not really a better one either.

Just to clarify, "realism" is distinct from "realistic". Realism is adopting a sense of reality rather than actually being or presenting it.

The classic example is shakey-cam. A lot of space sci-fi uses shakey cam for spaceship exteriors (see Battlestar, Firefly, District 9 etc) because a) it helps hide cgi and it adopts a sense of reality imbued by an assumed handheld camera.

We associate that camerawork with news and documentaries, with the portrayal of reality. It became part of our visual langauge.

[In Exile]

Ziggeh wrote...
From a fresh perspective, certainly, but I think there are a set of things so common to the genre that most (and I hesitate to speak for groups larger than myself) wouldn't even consider them in these terms. They're just a part of the underlying structure, and we're practiced at not looking at them.

That ignores the fact that it's possible that you could have disliked the feature from the start, like I did, and simply have never accepted it as a necessary part of the genre. I'm not saying that for many it might not be true that they've come to be comfortable with this level un unrealism, for lack of a better word. I'm just saying that not everyone would be comfortable with it.

But I can definitely see why individual bugbears would disrupt and expose that, leaving you in a sort of "accept all or nothing position". That said, would you not say that even within your case that there are limits? That if, say, your choices were between "hitting them with sharpened metal" and "turning into a giant hedgehog called Norman, reversing time and killing their grandparents so they did't exist to fight you" you'd find the system a little difficult to buy into? At which point it's all about limitations of the stylisation and individual levels and such.

I'm not sure I follow. I will say that for me, the more believable video game animations are the ones that are decidedly unrealistic. The ones that pretend to be realistic are constantly broken and frustrating for me because of how unrealistic the game is. 

[Allan Schumacher]

Realism isn't the same as Realistic. There are numerous unrealistic elements that I accept, and would argue are commonly accepted as part of what it's probably best to start calling something like "unstylised" combat. Health bars and inventories and recovery are all things we're so familiar with they're part of a baseline for the genre and don't represent a fresh challenge to expectations.

I understand that realism isn't the same as realistic. But if we're making realistic a continuum, it's not exactly trivial to determine something lies on that continuum, especially as people have different levels of tolerance for different things.

I do want it to not look stupid.

And this is exceptionally useful feedback.

The reason it looks stupid to me currently is because it doesn't look realistic. Or if that word is giving people trouble, because the Warrior is doing something that cannot be explained by human capabilities, or even preternatural human abilities, but requires magic.

But now I'm confused, and will now be applying your terminology more generally. As such, I have now concluded "Hmmm, I think he wants warriors to be similar to AD&D fighters, and as such it may be best to just recognize that combat won't be why he likes this game, and he'll probably only enjoy it for other reasons." Is my deduction correct, or have I read too much into your statement? Because I consider a vast majority of the abilities used by both rogues and warriors in both DAO and DA2 to not be natural and to, in reality, require some level of "magical" abilities. Even the ones that, on an aesthetic level appear to be performed via a realistic animation.

But the lack of realism remains a bad thing

For you, is the ultimate ideal for martial combat to be a perfect replication of reality? (barring magic users of course). I understand you can say that there may be other good things that are more important, but I'm focusing the question purely on the specific aspect of combat.

[Ieolus]

Allan,
DA2 threw the baby out with the bathwater. No one who liked Origins and hated DA2 combat would object to tweaking the way it was done in the first game to address complaints.
Swords swing way too slow? Tweak.
Auto-attack is boring? Option for both.
Etc.

The problem is you seem to be using DA2's system as a baseline and trying to tweak that. That is inherently flawed IMO and misses the point.

Modifié par Ieolus, 20 septembre 2013 - 06:08 .

[Ziggeh]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

I understand that realism isn't the same as realistic. But if we're making realistic a continuum, it's not exactly trivial to determine something lies on that continuum, especially as people have different levels of tolerance for different things.

My point is that I don't believe realistic is what people are suggesting a preference for (even if they happen to be using the word), because such a request would, ironically, be unrealistic.

While on the other hand, I think if you were to poll people on whether specific instances fell in or outside of "realist fantasy combat", you'd find a fairly high degree of commonality.

[Allan Schumacher]

Would it only be "because I think it looks stupid" if a guy has a knife pierce his skull in a cinematic and doesn't die? Am I not allowed to say that seems unrealistic, perhaps because the same thing happens with arrows frequently in gameplay?

So if the murder knife didn't exist and people didn't instantly die in a cutscene, it'd be less of an issue?

What you're describing here is consistency, and that the inconsistency bothers you. We *could* have the cinematic have fatal wounds not happen (so your Warden can repeatedly stab the guy in the Korcari Wilds until he is at 0 hit points). It'd remove the inconsistency.

Or are you suggesting that the combat in Dragon Age games should instead mirror the actions that we see in the cinematics?