After watching the recent Cohh stream and dev stream which were both excellent, especially the amount of gameplay the dev stream was able to show off, I think there's two key things that could help the look during combat and the look of characters in the world.
1. Winding Down & Resting During Combat
Many of us have fond memories of casters sitting to med during combat in EQ, but here I feel that while in combat anyone that is 'sitting' for winding down or resting should instead go into a kneeling or praying animation.
This would help show the difference between anyone resting or trying to rest while in combat, compared to someone resting out of combat. It also feels more natural, rather than players sitting down cross-legged like kindergarten children while next to an orc that's pummelling their tank.
2. Floating text for + Gaining an effect / - Losing an effect.
I think the text colours should change when gaining / losing a positive effect, and similarly when a negative effect is inflicted on you or it wears off. (Ultimately this should all be customisable in future UI settings for the user to specify themselves also).
For example (mostly copying Counterfleche's colour scheme idea here as I think it's simple and effective).
I hope we can extensively customise the floating text; for example keeping the floating text for the ability effects and healing while hiding the numbers for damage. As I think it could easily get too busy seeing too many numbers.
3. Character's feet placement on terrain, especially uneven terrain.
I'll preface this by saying I don't know the technical complexity of this and there could be far too many hurdles that make it unattainable for our smaller team.
But, if it's possible I feel this makes a difference to how you feel connected to your character in the world and seeing everyone else's character also, it's not perfect but it helps to remove some of the uncanny valley feelings.
Guild Wars 2 does a pretty good job of this.
Ezrael said:This would help show the difference between anyone resting or trying to rest while in combat, compared to someone resting out of combat. It also feels more natural, rather than players sitting down cross-legged like kindergarten children while next to an orc that's pummelling their tank.
I like the idea of having a different visual for resting while in combat and resting otherwise when nothing is happening around you.
May I sugesst something else: could resting generate some aggro if that is not already planed? I noticed during the goblin cave streaming that when one of the team mates was very low life, one of the goblins turned away from the tank to finish the job. It seems reasonnable to think that a NPC would try to kill off a mow life foe before it might be healed, so am I wrong to think that being low life already generates aggro?
One could think that a NPC would also try to whack those that sit nearby, especially if medding means that you loose basic AC bonus coming from stats like Str or AGI.
Kneeling in combat rest vs. sitting outside combat to rest seems like a nice idea. But I also worry that the teenagers will somehow utilize the kneeling animation for unsavory behavior. I know they will anyways, a teenage boy could find a tire iron a bit alluring* but we should strive to avoid any ambiguity where we can.
*Possibly speaking from experience
Ezrael said:1. Winding Down & Resting During Combat
I agree. Athletes usually don't sit to rest for brief rests (unless a chair is handy). The effort needed to sit and stand again 15 seconds later negates the benefit of resting. More common is hands on knees, leaning over. This is especially true if someone is in combat, since you need to be ready at any moment and you do not want to let everyone know how exhausted (and thus vulnerable) you are. As someone with sword combat (fencing) experience, if my opponent appears exhausted, I will "run" them (push and pull them up and down the strip).
The rest animation should be type specific. Melee types could have hands on knees, clerics making holy symbols, etc. Watch videos of exhausted athletes for ideas.
Also, there should be a Disposition that targets weak / resting characters.
2. Floating text for + Gaining an effect / - Losing an effect.
I agree these should be differentiated. But using too many colors is not intuitive, so I suggest having a color style guide instead.
3. Character's feet placement on terrain, especially uneven terrain.
This would be nice, though lots of good ground cover lessens the obviousness of clipping.
