I think the key here is to have a locked view on the opponent. In a FPS it is too easy to turn/strafe and too hard to find someone around you. So the aim should be locked on the opponent. Maybe with the possibility to make a quick look at the surrounding area but that would always come back to the opponent.

One thing that I don't like about more complexed fighting systems is that you have to think about what controls you need to use. In real life if someone overhead swings at you you will instinctively move to block or dodge it, you don't really think about it./quote]
What if you had an auto block feature that would, in the absence of any other player command, attempt to block an attack. That as a player you wouldn't have to think about blocking an attack. However, if you tried to make an attack (or were in the cooldown from a previous attack), then your character would not be able to block.

For delivering attacks, I think you should look at some tactical systems that you could use for the fight. They don't have to be absolutely realistic, but ones that offer good gameplay choices in the battle.

Think of Scissor/Paper/Rock.

For example: Say the player has 3 basic moves: Thrust, Swing and Parry. The Thrust attack is easily defended by the Parry move, but the Swing is able to (mostly) get through it. A Parry is the fastest, but does no direct damage, however after a successful parry your opponent is slowed for their next action. The Thrust is the fastest move that does damage, and the Swing is the slowest (all damage is the same regardless of thrust or swing)

So if an enemy decides to thrust at you, then you can easily parry them, however, if they Swing at you, you might be able to reduce the damage a bit with a parry, or you could just start your own Thrust at them.

This creates an interesting choice, if you swing, then you can be beaten by them if they thrust, but if they thrust you can beat them by a parry and if they parry you can beat them by a swing.

But these would be basic moves. To make it interesting, you should include the ability to "Fake" an attack. That is start an animation of one action, but end up doing another (Feinting). This could be achieved by allowing the player to change their action during the warmup time of their action. So as the character is pulling back for the swing, the player could then input the command needed to initiate a parry as the player would be expecting their opponent to use the appropriate counter for their action (as the counter to a swing is a thrust and the counter to the thrust is the parry).

This Feinting would still require the player to go through the motions of the warmup of the action (and whatever time you have spent in the warmup of the leading action), so it is not without cost (spend too much time feinting and your opponent will just let their attacks follow through while you are playing around).

From this you could expand the different styles of attacks or include combos.

If you are wanting a more complex system, then you could use different combat styles as "weapons" in the FPS selection. So you might have your sword equipped, but then you choose "Defensive" style that uses moves that are more focused on defending from attacks (it might give bonuses to blocks and parries, be faster at the defensive moves or have more combos centred around avoiding attacks, slowing down the attacks of your opponents or even an auto defence), or use an "Offensive" style that focuses more on the actual damage attacks (it might give bonuses to damage, be faster at the attack moves or have more combos centred around doing damage). You could have as many "styles" of combat as you like (and call them what you wish).

Another thing for a melee combat system is to have more differences between weapon types. Not just speed, amount of damage, etc, but to have real mechanics differences between them. Make it so that different weapons are useful indifferent situations.

As an example: Pikes are good weapons if your opponent is close, but not within sword reach. If they are too close, then the pike is almost useless, also to get the best out of a pike you have to set it to receive an attacker, which means that you can't move fast (and turning corners would be harder/slower/etc)

A Sword is good up close, but you can't really close in with someone if they are using a pike. But get within the reach of a sword and then they are defenceless.

A Bow is good if the enemy is at a long distance away, you can shoot them without them being able to engage you in melee. However, if they are able to get in close, then the bow can not effectively be used (time to load and aim the bow - you might be able to shoot early, but your shot would be fairly wild and inaccurate).

So if an enemy is trying to close with you, then the pike would be good, as you can sit in place and let them impale themselves on your weapon. However, if you have a bow, then you can sit back and make pin cushions of the player using the pike. But if you are suing a sword then you could attack the archer with ease as they would have to stop (or move backwards slowly) to hit you, but you could close in and start slicing and dicing them. This gives a Scissors/Paper/Rock relationship between the weapons.

Quote:Original post by Edtharan
What if you had an auto block feature that would, in the absence of any other player command, attempt to block an attack. That as a player you wouldn't have to think about blocking an attack. However, if you tried to make an attack (or were in the cooldown from a previous attack), then your character would not be able to block.

It's reasonable, although I think having to watch for an attack is an interesting mechanic in itself.

Quote:For example: Say the player has 3 basic moves: Thrust, Swing and Parry. The Thrust attack is easily defended by the Parry move, but the Swing is able to (mostly) get through it. A Parry is the fastest, but does no direct damage, however after a successful parry your opponent is slowed for their next action. The Thrust is the fastest move that does damage, and the Swing is the slowest (all damage is the same regardless of thrust or swing)

So if an enemy decides to thrust at you, then you can easily parry them, however, if they Swing at you, you might be able to reduce the damage a bit with a parry, or you could just start your own Thrust at them.

This creates an interesting choice, if you swing, then you can be beaten by them if they thrust, but if they thrust you can beat them by a parry and if they parry you can beat them by a swing.

I'm not convinced there's anything interesting here. With 3 moves, each of which having a certain success rate against the others, there's probably an optimal strategy that is trivial to deduce.

Quote:But these would be basic moves. To make it interesting, you should include the ability to "Fake" an attack. [...] This Feinting would still require the player to go through the motions of the warmup of the action (and whatever time you have spent in the warmup of the leading action), so it is not without cost (spend too much time feinting and your opponent will just let their attacks follow through while you are playing around).

Assuming you've found the optimal strategy previously, feinting just becomes a game of reaction speed. That can still be fun, but it's not terribly interesting. It might be equally fun if you took away the Rock/Paper/Scissors aspect and became a sword-bearing version of the Snap card game.

Unfortunately 90% of combat systems can be distilled down to this sort of thing quite easily. Some games add more and more statistics and attacks - different stances, or weapon types, as you say - so that calculating the optimal strategy is very complicated, though not impossible.

Quote:I'm not convinced there's anything interesting here. With 3 moves, each of which having a certain success rate against the others, there's probably an optimal strategy that is trivial to deduce.

It was meant to be a Scissors/Paper/Stone relationship (but I didn't spend a lot of time completely balancing it :D).

Swing beats a parry as the swing will still do damage and the next action will not be slowed (a parry is unsuccessful if you don't parry anything)

Thrust beast a Swing as you can do more damage (faster attack)

and Parry beats a Thrust as it prevents any damage and then slows their next action.

Quote:Assuming you've found the optimal strategy previously, feinting just becomes a game of reaction speed. That can still be fun, but it's not terribly interesting. It might be equally fun if you took away the Rock/Paper/Scissors aspect and became a sword-bearing version of the Snap card game.

Reflexes should be an important aspect of a melee combat. It should not be an overwhelming factor, but the player with the better reflexes should have an advantage.

You are talking about an FPS game and they are generally "twitch" games. Even with non melee combat in FPS games, twitch is still an important (not usually overwhelming) factor in the outcome of a battle. Choice of weapon, Environment, Planing should all come into play (eg: in UT2004 a Rocket launcher is not as good as a flack gun in close quarters fighting, but in medium range in open ground the RL can be more effective than the Flack).

This is the main reason I don't like random "to hit" rolls in games (whether they are FPS, RPG, etc) as these random rolls (if you look at their origins in Pen and Paper RPGs) were to substitute for environmental and other factors not usable by the player (but would be for the character if they were real).

In an FPS, the player has access to these factors and so any combat mechanic should allow them players to take advantage/be disadvantaged by them.

One of these factors is Time. As FPS games are twitch, it would not be beyond the player's expectations, but would instead be part of those expectations.

I also talked about "Faking" attacks that would allow a player with slower reflexes to take advantage of players that react too quickly. If the player start off with a Thrust move, then when their opponent initiates a Parry move to counter it, the first player switches to a Swing and before the Parrying player can readjust their action, the Swing can hit. If, however, the second player decides to not go with the Parry and expects the first player is going to fake them, they might instead go with the Thrust and the first player then has an opportunity to attempt to change their action (but this could depend on how long they left it before changing or initiating their actions).

I would anticipate that during combat there might actually be periods where players repeatedly change their actions (maybe even several seconds worth of it) without following through with any of them as they try to out manoeuvre their opponent.

Someone with fast reflexes might be able to get off one or two counters, but a smart player knowing that they react quickly can take advantage of that fact and out manoeuvre them.

Have a read of this article from Gamasutra to see where I am coming from: http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20070123/chelaru_02.shtml

Quote:I'm not convinced there's anything interesting here. With 3 moves, each of which having a certain success rate against the others, there's probably an optimal strategy that is trivial to deduce.

It was meant to be a Scissors/Paper/Stone relationship (but I didn't spend a lot of time completely balancing it :D).

Swing beats a parry as the swing will still do damage and the next action will not be slowed (a parry is unsuccessful if you don't parry anything)

Thrust beast a Swing as you can do more damage (faster attack)

and Parry beats a Thrust as it prevents any damage and then slows their next action.

Quote:Assuming you've found the optimal strategy previously, feinting just becomes a game of reaction speed. That can still be fun, but it's not terribly interesting. It might be equally fun if you took away the Rock/Paper/Scissors aspect and became a sword-bearing version of the Snap card game.

Reflexes should be an important aspect of a melee combat. It should not be an overwhelming factor, but the player with the better reflexes should have an advantage.

You are talking about an FPS game and they are generally "twitch" games. Even with non melee combat in FPS games, twitch is still an important (not usually overwhelming) factor in the outcome of a battle. Choice of weapon, Environment, Planing should all come into play (eg: in UT2004 a Rocket launcher is not as good as a flack gun in close quarters fighting, but in medium range in open ground the RL can be more effective than the Flack).

This is the main reason I don't like random "to hit" rolls in games (whether they are FPS, RPG, etc) as these random rolls (if you look at their origins in Pen and Paper RPGs) were to substitute for environmental and other factors not usable by the player (but would be for the character if they were real).

In an FPS, the player has access to these factors and so any combat mechanic should allow them players to take advantage/be disadvantaged by them.

One of these factors is Time. As FPS games are twitch, it would not be beyond the player's expectations, but would instead be part of those expectations.

I also talked about "Faking" attacks that would allow a player with slower reflexes to take advantage of players that react too quickly. If the player start off with a Thrust move, then when their opponent initiates a Parry move to counter it, the first player switches to a Swing and before the Parrying player can readjust their action, the Swing can hit. If, however, the second player decides to not go with the Parry and expects the first player is going to fake them, they might instead go with the Thrust and the first player then has an opportunity to attempt to change their action (but this could depend on how long they left it before changing or initiating their actions).

I would anticipate that during combat there might actually be periods where players repeatedly change their actions (maybe even several seconds worth of it) without following through with any of them as they try to out manoeuvre their opponent.

Someone with fast reflexes might be able to get off one or two counters, but a smart player knowing that they react quickly can take advantage of that fact and out manoeuvre them.

Have a read of this article from Gamasutra to see where I am coming from: http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20070123/chelaru_02.shtml

This idea is perhaps better for console games than PC games, but it could work for both. Let me know what you think about it.

Step 1 - Player finds need to enter into CQC*:
The player will find himself in a position where fighting in CQC* would be better than shooting. This could be perhaps because the player is out of ammo, or the player has encountered an enemy to close for his weapon of choice (EG sniper rifle or rocket launcher), or perhaps the player has just snuck up behind a camping enemy. To enter into CQC, the player must acknowledge for himself that there is a need to fisticuff. Yes, this all occurs in the player's brain, but this is a part of the gameplay mechanic nonetheless.

Step 2 - Player enters into CQC:
This step simply involves pressing a button that is predetermined to enter the player into CQC mode. This button could perhaps have another primary role such as "use object", and would only cause the player to go into CQC if there is an enemy close enough. Another possibility is to have the button dedicated to CQC so the player can make the decision to holster his weapon ahead of time so he can slink around like Sam Fisher, ready to snap some necks. This simple button press can easily become reflex for your average FPS player, and once pressed, it will cause the player to focus on his chosen opponent(s) (Modern day CQC is supposed to be 1 on 1, but you can always team up with someone and have them "make like a table" while you shove the enemy), blurring the background and causing background noise to shut out. (If facing your opponent, you'd hear your heartbeat as you ready to attack, and simultaneously you'd hear their strained breathing as they recovered from an attack. Meanwhile, gunfire in the other room would seem ever so distant)

Step 3 - Player selects mode of combat:

At this stage, the player simply decides whether he wants to:
A. Melee Attacks such as punches and kicks (includes defending, too)
B. Attempt a quick/stealthy kill
C. Disarm/disable the enemy(perhaps the opponent still has his gun out?)
D. Knife attacks
E. Etc.

Again, relitively simple once you get the hang of it. But after this it starts getting tricky. Fortunately, rather than having to memorize all of this, the game will display buttons corresponding to each action.

Step 4 - Player selects target

I dont mean the player selects an enemy, I mean the player selects where on his opponent he wants to attack, such as the head and neck, the torso, the arms, or the lower body. The buttons or keys will be shown to correspond with each part of the body (the "X" button will appear over the head, the "Up Arrow" will show up over the torso, etc.

Step 5 - Player selects and executes an attack

The game will display the types of attacks the player can use on this target. Once the player makes his choice, the attack will be carried out.

At any time, should the player decide that his current mode of attack is no longer the best choice (for instance, the player was planning on choking the enemy from behind, but the enemy turned around), the player can always press back to turn around quickly.

Yes, this may seem way too complicated at first, but who is instantly able to knock someone cold on their first try? After a while of getting used to it, you're favorite attacks will become second nature to you, and you'll be able to zoom through the steps in perhaps less than half a second. And if theres something you want to try new, the game will always tell you what attacks are available to you.

Just to picture how this would play out, imagine watching someone play an FPS. They're probably flicking their thumbs on the controler (or rolling the mouse across the pad), maybe pressing a few buttons here or there, then you see their eyes widen. The player quickly mashes a sequence of buttons, and a moment later, a bloody grunt echoes from the speakers. The player stands up from his seat and yells "yes! I slugged you in the face!"

And if you're a player who doesnt like the whole "button-mashing-mortal-kombat style of fighting, you always still have your good old rifle to kick butt with. (But if your opponent happens to twist the gun out of your hands in a disarmament attack, youd better be ready to try and meet him on his level, or suffer the consequences.

*CQC (Close Quarters Combat) is the official military term for any combat that occurs within arms length of the enemy. CQC involves melee attacks, knife attacks, disarmament maneuvers and the like. This is not to be confused with CQB (Close Quarters Battle) which simply refers to any combat situation where combatants are fighting in close quarters.