Has there been any mention to bring in reactive attacks & counter system ala Vanguard? System has so much potential.
Also - does anyone know the current development plans are for the Con system? More EQ style? or will we see something like vanguards dot system...colour of the dots indicates the mob's level relative to your own on the target.
Thanks!
In terms of con color, EQ and Vanguard's systems were pretty similar. The quantity of dots represented the difficulty of a mob (independent of level). The color of the dots was simply the UI location that displayed the con color.
Rukn said:Has there been any mention to bring in reactive attacks & counter system ala Vanguard? System has so much potential.
Also - does anyone know the current development plans are for the Con system? More EQ style? or will we see something like vanguards dot system...colour of the dots indicates the mob's level relative to your own on the target.
Thanks!
The current con system as of the latest stream is identical to Everquest. If you take a look throughout the VR Shaman stream, you can see instances where Montreseur considers several different mobs (I would post a screen shot but I actually don't have one pertaining specifically to this). Whether or not that is going to stay or they will bundle it up and display it differently (like the Vanguard "dot" system) remains to be seen.
As far as combat, Joppa mentioned in the stream that they are playing with some ideas such as certain classes opening up opportunities for others. Again, whether that will manifest into something like the "chain" system we saw in Vanguard, time will tell. Joppa also said he hoped that they would be able to show some more combat features in future streams.
Liav said:I don't recall a "chain" system in Vanguard. Do you mean weaknesses?
That was part of the system, yes. But not all of it. The following is from the Wiki:
Chained and Responsive Attacks
A unique and challenging aspect of combat in Vanguard is that certain attacks and abilities can only be used to full effect in very specific circumstances. Others are specifically designed to counter and interrupt an enemy’s spells or attack chains.
You don’t have to guess or memorize which attacks apply in which situation, however. The game provides up to four buttons at the lower center of your screen that show you exactly when a special attack can be used as part of a chain (most attacks that are part of a chain can be used by themselves as well, but some can only be used in a chain). The button will light up when the interface detects a good time to start a chain. When you begin a chain, the button will change to the next step in the chain, guiding you through Chained Attacks, Counters, Rescue Actions and Sympathetic Actions.
Of course, foes with the proper abilities can disrupt your chains and spells just like you can disrupt theirs. Chained Attacks. Chained Attacks are programmed sequences of specific attacks that, when performed sequentially in the correct order, can have a devastating cumulative effect. When you initiate the first attack in a chained sequence, the Chained Attack button changes to the next attack in the sequence. There is a red bar next to the attack icon in the window … you must get the attack off before the bar goes down in order to keep the chain going. You can trigger the next attack in a chain by clicking on the attack either in the Chained Attack window or on the Quick Bar. Counters. There are two kinds of attack that are controlled by the Counters window. Counter attacks are attacks which can only be performed after you successfully block, dodge or parry an enemy attack. Counterspells apply only to magical combat, and can neutralize an enemy spell or even turn it back against its caster.
Rescue Actions. Rescues are abilities that hit the attacker of your defensive target. If your defensive target were being attacked by a giant spider and you executed a rescue, the rescue would hit the spider. You wouldn’t have to have the spider targeted to make this work, and performing the rescue does not change your offensive target. Rescues generally force the NPC to target your for a time, so they are perfect for saving the life of a weaker ally without having to swap targets.
Sympathetic Actions. Sympathetic effects can be created when characters use special abilities in combination with each other. The effects of these combinations are generally quite powerful.
Oh nevermind. That's not what I think of when I think of chained attacks. I was thinking of chained attacks between players.
On a Bard, for instance, you had something like this:
Hewing the Mountain (or Erosive Hew) -> Cleave the Mountain -> Shatter the Mountain
There were chained attacks for every class basically, but yeah, not what I was thinking you meant. There was also a parry reactionary ability for Bards iirc where if you parried you have a special ability you can use. Tanks had a lot of those iirc with rescue type effects.
Nikademis said:As far as combat, Joppa mentioned in the stream that they are playing with some ideas such as certain classes opening up opportunities for others. Again, whether that will manifest into something like the "chain" system we saw in Vanguard, time will tell. Joppa also said he hoped that they would be able to show some more combat features in future streams.
Exactly, it's just too early to know the exact combat mechanics. I'm sure they're giving it a lot of thought though.
Liav said:Oh nevermind. That's not what I think of when I think of chained attacks. I was thinking of chained attacks between players.
On a Bard, for instance, you had something like this:
Hewing the Mountain (or Erosive Hew) -> Cleave the Mountain -> Shatter the Mountain
There were chained attacks for every class basically, but yeah, not what I was thinking you meant.
That's correct. Disciple had something similar that would result in a short duration buff or a heal. But the "chain" portion of the system that I was actually speaking of was the set of extra abilities that would become active when certain criteria were met (often a critical hit, if memory serves). These skills were quite literally displayed with the image of a chain (though I suppose in practice this is actually more reactionary).
Nikademis said:That's correct. Disciple had something similar that would result in a short duration buff or a heal. But the "chain" portion of the system that I was actually speaking of was the set of extra abilities that would become active when certain criteria were met (often a critical hit, if memory serves). These skills were quite literally displayed with the image of a chain (though I suppose in practice this is actually more reactionary).
Right, the Hewing the Mountain chain I mentioned was triggered by critical hits. A critical hit would allow you to use Hewing the Mounta, which would then chain into the other two abilities. These abilities were actually greyed out and unusable at all unless the prerequisite was met. Disciples had 2-3 of these chains, Bards had two (one was a DoT chain, the other was more direct damage), etc. Every class had at least one or two chains that used crits as a prerequisite, if I'm not mistaken.
And yeah, you're right. They were both considered "chains" but also intuitively "reactionary", so the way Vanguard differentiated them that way was kind of eh, misleading maybe.
A better way would have just been to label them all "Reactionary Abilities" and simply have different prerequisites. That's how it worked in effect, but the different terms made them all seem categorically distinct.
Liav said:Nikademis said:That's correct. Disciple had something similar that would result in a short duration buff or a heal. But the "chain" portion of the system that I was actually speaking of was the set of extra abilities that would become active when certain criteria were met (often a critical hit, if memory serves). These skills were quite literally displayed with the image of a chain (though I suppose in practice this is actually more reactionary).
And yeah, you're right. They were both considered "chains" but also intuitively "reactionary", so the way Vanguard differentiated them that way was kind of eh, misleading maybe.
A better way would have just been to label them all "Reactionary Abilities" and simply have different prerequisites. That's how it worked in effect, but the different terms made them all seem categorically distinct.
Yea, exactly. Really it was a matter of semantics.
Thanks for the info guys. I always loved the idea of being able to counter an incoming spell. either disable it / bounced it back / or turn it into something beneifical for the group. I can even see this being a specialized class for support etc..curious what the team will come up with.
There is a continuum between twitch combat where only the agile and constantly alert can survive and autoattacks where you can target a mob then go afk and return to loot.
I hope combat here is kept interesting, and reactives can help. I also hope there is room for those that don't like or simply ...what is the term these days ... suck at action combat.
An obvious way to accomodate many people is to have the level of quick reaction time needed vary by class. Thus a ninja type of character might do best constantly moving and trying for side attacks and rear attacks and having combinations that were best done in a certain order from differing positions. A plate armor using warrior-type would quite logically not be as fast and active and might be less positional though she certainly could and perhaps should have reactives after things like block or parry. A tank's JOB is to get attacked so the tank classes will have the most blocks and parries to begin with.