Breaking away from traditional MMO combat

[pretto]

Fighting in space is going to be something new to those coming from a fantasy MMO, but ground combat raises many questions about how it will be different from the MMOs of the past. Doing a little research on the forums seems to indicate some share the same sentiment as I have about ground combat. I want to see action and I want to feel like I'm playing Star Trek.

Not every fight was the same in Star Trek, so as you go about adventuring you should not feel like you're fighting the same battle over and over. Having the ability to duck-and-cover will at least spice things up because of varying terrain/locations. But I want a little something more as well.

I'd love to do something drastically different than other MMOs. It's something we've seen in many episodes even from the first season of Star Trek. I'd love it if I could damage an enemy with objects around him. For example, if an enemy is hiding between a rock and a cliff wall, it would be cool if you could flush him out or hurt him by shooting the wall and making some rocks fall on him. Being able to target and shoot at terrain or buildings presents a huge technical challenge but it would provide tons of variety in combat and would definitely have gamers talking about the cool ground combat system.

Like the idea? Other suggestions?

[Flatfingers]

I'd love to do something drastically different than other MMOs. It's something we've seen in many episodes even from the first season of Star Trek. I'd love it if I could damage an enemy with objects around him. For example, if an enemy is hiding between a rock and a cliff wall, it would be cool if you could flush him out or hurt him by shooting the wall and making some rocks fall on him. Being able to target and shoot at terrain or buildings presents a huge technical challenge but it would provide tons of variety in combat and would definitely have gamers talking about the cool ground combat system.

I'm with you on this, pretto, although I would say that space combat for this particular game would also benefit from having a richly interactive environment.

Star Trek was full of all kinds of amazing particles and energies and things-with-active-properties. Being able to apply our own effects (through tricorders or ship systems) to those environmental features would allow players to solve problems in many creative ways... and that, to me, seems not only a hallmark of Star Trek, but an opportunity for fun and distinctive gameplay.

We've actually touched on some of these concepts in previous threads. You might find Tactics, Havok, and Star Trek Online (http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=13796) interesting reading.

--Flatfingers

[pretto]

Very interesting. And you have hinted at the system I am trying to get at here that is dynamic and interactive. The problem with these systems is they work great when playing offline, but when you have to tell every computer connected to the game that you've just blown up or disrupted some part of the galaxy it becomes a nightmare of it's own.

It would be interesting to see studies done with perpetual virtual worlds contained completely in one system (cloud most likely) that allows clients to connect and receive one or more views of the world but with little or no terrain/model data transfer. I guess you would call it a single world, multiple viewer model as compared to the multiple world, multiple viewer MMOs use now, where each player has his own copy of the game world on his system.

For now we would have to settle for temporary dynamics within a permanent system where you can temporarily change the galaxy/world for the few people in range to see it. Then change it back once they are gone or the effect has worn off.

[HittingSmoke]

The shooting at rocks idea would be hard to work in well and still make combat playable since we have targeting. I don't want to cycle through a bunch of spots on the wall to get to my enemies.

I was asked in IRC about some ground combat details earlier and how it compares to WoW so I'll just post the same thing here. This is a quick rundown of how I made use of different skills on the ground in a tactical fashion.

Me and my BOs were engaging a group of Klingons. They were inside a room and we were in the hallway firing in. The melee enemy ran up to us so I stunned him with a hand Phaser before he could get far then knocked him down with my melee attack. I immediately ran up to the group, used my tactical career ability "leg sweep" to knock down the entire group then ran back to my BO's and unleashed the spread ability with my phaser rifle and killed them as they were getting up.

It's very much like an improved and less complicated version of pro-CU SWG combat where you had a move for every situation, and using them properly is essential.

[jsolo15]

The shooting at rocks idea would be hard to work in well and still make combat playable since we have targeting. I don't want to cycle through a bunch of spots on the wall to get to my enemies.

I was asked in IRC about some ground combat details earlier and how it compares to WoW so I'll just post the same thing here. This is a quick rundown of how I made use of different skills on the ground in a tactical fashion.

Me and my BOs were engaging a group of Klingons. They were inside a room and we were in the hallway firing in. The melee enemy ran up to us so I stunned him with a hand Phaser before he could get far then knocked him down with my melee attack. I immediately ran up to the group, used my tactical career ability "leg sweep" to knock down the entire group then ran back to my BO's and unleashed the spread ability with my phaser rifle and killed them as they were getting up.

It's very much like an improved and less complicated version of pro-CU SWG combat where you had a move for every situation, and using them properly is essential.

In my opinion Pre CU SWG combat was the best I ever played in any MMO to date. :cool:

[fractaleye]

Me and my BOs were engaging a group of Klingons. They were inside a room and we were in the hallway firing in. The melee enemy ran up to us so I stunned him with a hand Phaser before he could get far then knocked him down with my melee attack. I immediately ran up to the group, used my tactical career ability "leg sweep" to knock down the entire group then ran back to my BO's and unleashed the spread ability with my phaser rifle and killed them as they were getting up.

Awesome. I like it. Not too big on the "leg sweep" taking down an entire group, but meh, I can live with it. :)