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Turn-based combat in MMORPGs ?

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Comments

  • Loke666Loke666 Member EpicPosts: 21,441
    ikcin said:
    Every MMO uses turn based combat. Faster or slower, but it is turn based. Point a MMO where you actually can hit with your opponent simultaneously.
    Not really. Trinity games does have a semi turnbased mechanic in the background but action combat games don't have that. 

    And you can actually hit eachother at the same time in some turned based games, the ones where everyone give their orders first and then the round happens. With the same initiative there you hit eachother the same time. You could already do that in an old Mechwarrior game on the Commodore Amiga.

    That turned based gameplay is actually rather more fun then when you have to wait in line for everyone. :)
  • VrikaVrika Member LegendaryPosts: 7,973
    ikcin said:
    Every MMO uses turn based combat. Faster or slower, but it is turn based. Point a MMO where you actually can hit with your opponent simultaneously.
    Turn-based game means that the simulation stops while waiting for your decision on what to do that turn.

    As opposed to real-time games where the simulation is running all the time.


    They've got nothing to do with whether it's possible to hit simultaneously with your opponent or not.
     
  • SephirosoSephiroso Member RarePosts: 2,020
    These exist already. Wakfu/Dofus. There's some Atlantica something mmorpg that you could ride around in ships and had an entire party with multiple npcs and had turnbased combat.

    There's even a FFTactics mmo.

    image
    Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!

  • Flyte27Flyte27 Member RarePosts: 4,574
    There are a lot of games that use the term real-time turn-based.  Most MMOs are still using background number crunching to decide hits than actual avoidance of contact.  You can press a certain button at the right time to avoid, connect, and interrupt, but it's not based actual avoidance.  In this sense, it mimics a lot of the classic roll calculations that determine whether or not you are hit, dodge, etc.  It is just made to seem like it doesn't.  In real action combat, it's not just timing, but also exact positioning and precise movement.  None of this really happens even in modern MMOs as the server can't handle the number crunching it would take from so many different players at once.
  • Mihalich216Mihalich216 Member CommonPosts: 1
    Guys there is a great mmo with turn base battles, it calls Fonline
    https://fonline2.com/en/download-fonline-2/
    https://wiki.fonline2.com/Main_Page
    Check this out! Its ewesome!!!!
  • AkulasAkulas Member RarePosts: 3,028
    Wakfu was pretty good.

    Can't believe no one heard of The Realm Online. (from that great era before MMORPGs were called MMORPGs) Start a fight, turned into a combat cloud in the outside word. Anyone in the area could join the next round if they clicked on it.

    This isn't a signature, you just think it is.

  • Gobstopper3DGobstopper3D Member RarePosts: 970
    Hariken said:
    Would you guys call Wizard 101 turned based? I really enjoyed it in that game with the whole deck system.
    It is turn-based.  I play it with my youngest daughter.  We have been playing it since day one.  When it first launched it was certainly aimed at the pre-teen crowd, but I don't think that applies today.  With the complexity of some bosses, the deep cash shop and the ranked pvp, I would say it's aimed at everyone, but kids at least the later stages of the game.

    I'm not an IT Specialist, Game Developer, or Clairvoyant in real life, but like others on here, I play one on the internet.

  • JeffSpicoliJeffSpicoli Member EpicPosts: 2,849
    Check out Heroes of Dire 
    • Aloha Mr Hand ! 

  • AlBQuirkyAlBQuirky Member EpicPosts: 7,432
    Loke666 said:
    DMKano said:

    I am talking about how turn based MMOs have very low traction today, since the current trend is action combat which is the polar opposite of turn based.

    The reason why turn based is not common in mmorpgs is because its a huge turn off for the masses
    Well, that is just partly true. Games like Age of wonders 3 did really well. The problem is more that turned based combat works poorly in an open world. It sucks when you see locked combat all over the world you can't join and that just stand in place for a long time.

    That and the fact that AoW 3 have way better combat mechanics then Atlantica and similar games.

    I do think you could make an awesome turned based CORPG with the right mechanics. Think Guildwars with AoW3s combat mechanics, I would certainly enjoy something like that (huge AoW and HoM&M fan). I don't think I am the only one.

    An open world massive game on the other hand doesn't really work as well, there are some fans but just not enough of them.
    Wizard101 does open world turn based combat well, I think. But you play ONLY wizards with spell decks and when entering combat, a "combat circle appears" and anyone else (4 total) can join in throughout the fight. Here's a quick (short 2 minutes with no sound) video of a wizard joining a combat in progress in Wizard101.

    Pirate101 uses turn based combat, but I did not like that at all. It just didn't go smoothly for me in an ability (not spell deck) based combat system. I gave Atlantica a feeble try and its combat didn't grab me, either.

    I just don't know how turn based combat could work in an open world setting, other than like Wizard101 where the battle area claims a portion of the map and can effect others. I've been running along and been "nabbed" by being too close to someone else triggering a combat and done the same others.

    - Al

    Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.
    - FARGIN_WAR


  • LytecLytec Member UncommonPosts: 26
    Atlantica online is turn-based I played it when it first came out, I enjoyed it but now I think it might be p2w
  • SephirosoSephiroso Member RarePosts: 2,020
    Lytec said:
    Atlantica online is turn-based I played it when it first came out, I enjoyed it but now I think it might be p2w
    It always was.

    image
    Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!

  • sunandshadowsunandshadow Member RarePosts: 1,985
    AlBQuirky said:
    I just don't know how turn based combat could work in an open world setting, other than like Wizard101 where the battle area claims a portion of the map and can effect others. I've been running along and been "nabbed" by being too close to someone else triggering a combat and done the same others.
    You should try the free trial of Dofus for a few hours.  Combat can't "nab" passers-by, but the person starting a battle can configure whether randos can hop in or not.
    AlBQuirky
    I want to help design and develop a PvE-focused, solo-friendly, sandpark MMO which combines crafting, monster hunting, and story.  So PM me if you are starting one.
  • AlBQuirkyAlBQuirky Member EpicPosts: 7,432
    AlBQuirky said:
    I just don't know how turn based combat could work in an open world setting, other than like Wizard101 where the battle area claims a portion of the map and can effect others. I've been running along and been "nabbed" by being too close to someone else triggering a combat and done the same others.
    You should try the free trial of Dofus for a few hours.  Combat can't "nab" passers-by, but the person starting a battle can configure whether randos can hop in or not.
    I'll look into Dofus. I want to see how this works :)

    - Al

    Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.
    - FARGIN_WAR


  • KnightFalzKnightFalz Member EpicPosts: 4,522
    AlBQuirky said:
    AlBQuirky said:
    I just don't know how turn based combat could work in an open world setting, other than like Wizard101 where the battle area claims a portion of the map and can effect others. I've been running along and been "nabbed" by being too close to someone else triggering a combat and done the same others.
    You should try the free trial of Dofus for a few hours.  Combat can't "nab" passers-by, but the person starting a battle can configure whether randos can hop in or not.
    I'll look into Dofus. I want to see how this works :)
    It is pretty straightforward at the beginning, but as characters advance the cooperative tactics available and needed to overcome content becomes quite complex, with the turn-based nature of the game enabling a greater level of sophistication due to the inherent structure it provides.
  • blamo2000blamo2000 Member RarePosts: 1,130
    I've played all the MMOs listed with TB combat.  I haven't Seen Shadowrun - Boston Lockdown mentioned.  I haven't played it in a while but when I did it had a decent community for people looking for groups.  I would say Dofus, Wakfu, and Shadowrun had similarly good combat, while Shadowrun easily beat both in character development and itemization, as well as also having implants/bioware.  Shadowrun is hub based and had a good storyline and mission.  When I last played it had no cash shop or p2w elements. 
  • TheocritusTheocritus Member LegendaryPosts: 9,976
    It's been a few years since I played Dofus or Wakfu, but I had issues playing both of them.....I remember getting frustrated trying to navigate the maps in both games and often had trouble even finding anything to fight...Have they improved that?
  • MadFrenchieMadFrenchie Member LegendaryPosts: 8,505
    edited August 2018
    Daikuru said:
    Vrika said:
    I'm struggling to imagine how turn-based combat would work in an MMO. Even in final fantasy games, the first thing I do when I start a new game is turn off the waiting mechanic so that it's no longer turn-based. 


    My main concerns for an MMO:
    • Movement stops being a factor in combat (though, presumably you could still have positioning)
    • Timeouts - would need to have some sort of limit so that people wouldn't take 10 minutes to decide on their move. 
    • Scale - these are massively multiplayer games we're talking about. Turn based just seems like a bad way to handle large amounts of players as you could end up waiting large amounts of time between turns. 
    • Who goes first - the first turn generally has a good advantage, making turn-based a poor fit for an MMO with PvP. 
    • Deep combat - turn based combat tends to only work well when you have a really deep combat system. If players have tons of choices and those choices are meaningful and strategic, then turn-based can be really engaging and tense. The general MMO playerbase seems to be incapable of handling deep combat systems. 

    In general I'm a fan of slower, more strategic combat and I have a deep dislike for the shallow spamfest action combat pervading the genre, but I just can't see how turn-based would work well. That said, I'm happy to be proven wrong as I've never played an MMO with turn-based combat. I do enjoy it in some single player games, like the XCOM series. 
    Most turn-based MMOs have the world proceeding in real-time, but switch to turn-based for those in combat. That keeps the scale at a manageable level.

    For some turn-based MMOs movement is much more important than real-time MMOs, because turn based allows a much more gameplay with line of sight, reach of abilities, and using positioning to block both movement and attacks than real-time combat.

    Basically all turn-based MMOs have timeouts. Usual timeout is 30 seconds for a turn, though there are others.

    If PvP is important, who goes first can be determined by initiative stat. Alternatively, the game can use same resource for both moving and attacking so that the one who closes distance can only do weaker attack on his first turn and neither gets real advantage. Alternatively, the game can have people competing with movement speed, spell reach, line of sight and tactics so that that the better player gets first attack.
    Yeh, so I wouldn't be interested if the scale was kept manageable. My personal feeling is that if you are building an MMO, then you should build massively multiplayer features. If you have to limit combat to a small amount of players then, in my opinion, you're missing the point of the genre and my interest drops dramatically. 

    I would want it so that if I was out in the world with my group of 10 friends, we could engage in a world boss and then have more and more people join if they felt like it. I would want the system to be able to handle large scale battles and for players to be able to come and go as they please. 

    So, in that respect, I wouldn't want it turn based like XCOM, but could accept something like final fantasy 7 or 9 where it is kinda turn based, but really it's just a long GCD which makes it feel turn based. Perhaps that could be a built in dynamic - below 10 players, have it turn based, but above 10 players it switches to just long GCDs or something. 
    Lets be honest here, how many enemies or other players do you encounter in a battle in MMOs at  the same time? I dont talk about RvR or something, im talking about open world, Im not playing an MMO right now, but i guess its rather rare to encounter groups of 10+ players but if so, i think its quite possible to invent a turn-based system. that can easily handle 10vs10. 

    So if you have an open world, with an instanced turn-based combat system, where other players can join if you allow it, i would rather play such a game than the games out there, which instance everything else anyways.

    Im playing Atlas Reactor, its a 4vs4 turn-based pvp game and it does a good job on it. 
    Speaking from WoW, world bosses and such all provide an opportunity for players to band together ad hoc with anywhere from 2 to 20+ players.  That wouldn't be compatible with a turn-based system.  In general, the more entities in a turn-based combat scenario, the longer the delay between each player's turns.  That introduces an inverse correlation that makes turn-based largely incompatible with MMORPG.

    image
  • blamo2000blamo2000 Member RarePosts: 1,130
    edited August 2018

    Speaking from WoW, world bosses and such all provide an opportunity for players to band together ad hoc with anywhere from 2 to 20+ players.  That wouldn't be compatible with a turn-based system.  In general, the more entities in a turn-based combat scenario, the longer the delay between each player's turns.  That introduces an inverse correlation that makes turn-based largely incompatible with MMORPG.
    I won't argue it makes a very small aspect of some mmorpgs - world bosses needing huge groups of players to take them down - incompatible with TV mmorpgs.  But certainly not the vast majority of what mmorpgs have to offer.

    WoW, the run away most popular mmorpg, had one low level world boss introduced in vanilla, one or two in outland, phased them out during WotlK, and then I don't know because I stopped playing after that.  

    But, they could have world bosses in a TB mmorpg.  The parties are usually scaled down in these games, with a party generally being smaller than in RT mmos.  Just cap world bosses to the first eight or so players entering the combat area.   
    Post edited by blamo2000 on
  • KnightFalzKnightFalz Member EpicPosts: 4,522
    Daikuru said:
    Vrika said:
    I'm struggling to imagine how turn-based combat would work in an MMO. Even in final fantasy games, the first thing I do when I start a new game is turn off the waiting mechanic so that it's no longer turn-based. 


    My main concerns for an MMO:
    • Movement stops being a factor in combat (though, presumably you could still have positioning)
    • Timeouts - would need to have some sort of limit so that people wouldn't take 10 minutes to decide on their move. 
    • Scale - these are massively multiplayer games we're talking about. Turn based just seems like a bad way to handle large amounts of players as you could end up waiting large amounts of time between turns. 
    • Who goes first - the first turn generally has a good advantage, making turn-based a poor fit for an MMO with PvP. 
    • Deep combat - turn based combat tends to only work well when you have a really deep combat system. If players have tons of choices and those choices are meaningful and strategic, then turn-based can be really engaging and tense. The general MMO playerbase seems to be incapable of handling deep combat systems. 

    In general I'm a fan of slower, more strategic combat and I have a deep dislike for the shallow spamfest action combat pervading the genre, but I just can't see how turn-based would work well. That said, I'm happy to be proven wrong as I've never played an MMO with turn-based combat. I do enjoy it in some single player games, like the XCOM series. 
    Most turn-based MMOs have the world proceeding in real-time, but switch to turn-based for those in combat. That keeps the scale at a manageable level.

    For some turn-based MMOs movement is much more important than real-time MMOs, because turn based allows a much more gameplay with line of sight, reach of abilities, and using positioning to block both movement and attacks than real-time combat.

    Basically all turn-based MMOs have timeouts. Usual timeout is 30 seconds for a turn, though there are others.

    If PvP is important, who goes first can be determined by initiative stat. Alternatively, the game can use same resource for both moving and attacking so that the one who closes distance can only do weaker attack on his first turn and neither gets real advantage. Alternatively, the game can have people competing with movement speed, spell reach, line of sight and tactics so that that the better player gets first attack.
    Yeh, so I wouldn't be interested if the scale was kept manageable. My personal feeling is that if you are building an MMO, then you should build massively multiplayer features. If you have to limit combat to a small amount of players then, in my opinion, you're missing the point of the genre and my interest drops dramatically. 

    I would want it so that if I was out in the world with my group of 10 friends, we could engage in a world boss and then have more and more people join if they felt like it. I would want the system to be able to handle large scale battles and for players to be able to come and go as they please. 

    So, in that respect, I wouldn't want it turn based like XCOM, but could accept something like final fantasy 7 or 9 where it is kinda turn based, but really it's just a long GCD which makes it feel turn based. Perhaps that could be a built in dynamic - below 10 players, have it turn based, but above 10 players it switches to just long GCDs or something. 
    Lets be honest here, how many enemies or other players do you encounter in a battle in MMOs at  the same time? I dont talk about RvR or something, im talking about open world, Im not playing an MMO right now, but i guess its rather rare to encounter groups of 10+ players but if so, i think its quite possible to invent a turn-based system. that can easily handle 10vs10. 

    So if you have an open world, with an instanced turn-based combat system, where other players can join if you allow it, i would rather play such a game than the games out there, which instance everything else anyways.

    Im playing Atlas Reactor, its a 4vs4 turn-based pvp game and it does a good job on it. 
    Speaking from WoW, world bosses and such all provide an opportunity for players to band together ad hoc with anywhere from 2 to 20+ players.  That wouldn't be compatible with a turn-based system.  In general, the more entities in a turn-based combat scenario, the longer the delay between each player's turns.  That introduces an inverse correlation that makes turn-based largely incompatible with MMORPG.
    That size of that encounter wouldn't work well as a turn-based scenario to be sure. On the flip-side, the kind of encounters Dofus and the like have wouldn't work outside of  the structure turn-based play provides. So, either style works, so long as the encounters are designed to make the most of whichever is used.

    The turn delays were used to discuss tactics and overall strategy, which could easily be done without voice as one's hands were often free. If everything was nailed down and such talk was no longer needed, it shifted to social chatter, especially when playing with guildmates.

    Despite the smaller party size, I had more interaction with other players in Dofus than any other MMORPG I played, so I think turn-based is quite suited to the them.
  • VrikaVrika Member LegendaryPosts: 7,973
    Daikuru said:
    Vrika said:
    I'm struggling to imagine how turn-based combat would work in an MMO. Even in final fantasy games, the first thing I do when I start a new game is turn off the waiting mechanic so that it's no longer turn-based. 


    My main concerns for an MMO:
    • Movement stops being a factor in combat (though, presumably you could still have positioning)
    • Timeouts - would need to have some sort of limit so that people wouldn't take 10 minutes to decide on their move. 
    • Scale - these are massively multiplayer games we're talking about. Turn based just seems like a bad way to handle large amounts of players as you could end up waiting large amounts of time between turns. 
    • Who goes first - the first turn generally has a good advantage, making turn-based a poor fit for an MMO with PvP. 
    • Deep combat - turn based combat tends to only work well when you have a really deep combat system. If players have tons of choices and those choices are meaningful and strategic, then turn-based can be really engaging and tense. The general MMO playerbase seems to be incapable of handling deep combat systems. 

    In general I'm a fan of slower, more strategic combat and I have a deep dislike for the shallow spamfest action combat pervading the genre, but I just can't see how turn-based would work well. That said, I'm happy to be proven wrong as I've never played an MMO with turn-based combat. I do enjoy it in some single player games, like the XCOM series. 
    Most turn-based MMOs have the world proceeding in real-time, but switch to turn-based for those in combat. That keeps the scale at a manageable level.

    For some turn-based MMOs movement is much more important than real-time MMOs, because turn based allows a much more gameplay with line of sight, reach of abilities, and using positioning to block both movement and attacks than real-time combat.

    Basically all turn-based MMOs have timeouts. Usual timeout is 30 seconds for a turn, though there are others.

    If PvP is important, who goes first can be determined by initiative stat. Alternatively, the game can use same resource for both moving and attacking so that the one who closes distance can only do weaker attack on his first turn and neither gets real advantage. Alternatively, the game can have people competing with movement speed, spell reach, line of sight and tactics so that that the better player gets first attack.
    Yeh, so I wouldn't be interested if the scale was kept manageable. My personal feeling is that if you are building an MMO, then you should build massively multiplayer features. If you have to limit combat to a small amount of players then, in my opinion, you're missing the point of the genre and my interest drops dramatically. 

    I would want it so that if I was out in the world with my group of 10 friends, we could engage in a world boss and then have more and more people join if they felt like it. I would want the system to be able to handle large scale battles and for players to be able to come and go as they please. 

    So, in that respect, I wouldn't want it turn based like XCOM, but could accept something like final fantasy 7 or 9 where it is kinda turn based, but really it's just a long GCD which makes it feel turn based. Perhaps that could be a built in dynamic - below 10 players, have it turn based, but above 10 players it switches to just long GCDs or something. 
    Lets be honest here, how many enemies or other players do you encounter in a battle in MMOs at  the same time? I dont talk about RvR or something, im talking about open world, Im not playing an MMO right now, but i guess its rather rare to encounter groups of 10+ players but if so, i think its quite possible to invent a turn-based system. that can easily handle 10vs10. 

    So if you have an open world, with an instanced turn-based combat system, where other players can join if you allow it, i would rather play such a game than the games out there, which instance everything else anyways.

    Im playing Atlas Reactor, its a 4vs4 turn-based pvp game and it does a good job on it. 
    Speaking from WoW, world bosses and such all provide an opportunity for players to band together ad hoc with anywhere from 2 to 20+ players.  That wouldn't be compatible with a turn-based system.  In general, the more entities in a turn-based combat scenario, the longer the delay between each player's turns.  That introduces an inverse correlation that makes turn-based largely incompatible with MMORPG.
    Any number of players can be compatible with turn-bases gameplay if you make a system where everyone makes their decisions in planning phase, then the game calculates results in action phase. It's more of a question of whether large scale battles provide fun gameplay or creates an unnecessary mess.
     
  • Vermillion_RaventhalVermillion_Raventhal Member EpicPosts: 4,198
    I would play a turn based MMORPG if it was Divinity Sin type.  And a 30 second timer please with scripting for AFK players.
    Cryomatrix
  • MMOman101MMOman101 Member UncommonPosts: 1,787
    I really enjoy atlas reactor, but I would be very hesitant to classify it as an MMO. 

    “It's unwise to pay too much, but it's worse to pay too little. When you pay too much, you lose a little money - that's all. When you pay too little, you sometimes lose everything, because the thing you bought was incapable of doing the thing it was bought to do. The common law of business balance prohibits paying a little and getting a lot - it can't be done. If you deal with the lowest bidder, it is well to add something for the risk you run, and if you do that you will have enough to pay for something better.”

    --John Ruskin







  • MadFrenchieMadFrenchie Member LegendaryPosts: 8,505
    Vrika said:
    Daikuru said:
    Vrika said:
    I'm struggling to imagine how turn-based combat would work in an MMO. Even in final fantasy games, the first thing I do when I start a new game is turn off the waiting mechanic so that it's no longer turn-based. 


    My main concerns for an MMO:
    • Movement stops being a factor in combat (though, presumably you could still have positioning)
    • Timeouts - would need to have some sort of limit so that people wouldn't take 10 minutes to decide on their move. 
    • Scale - these are massively multiplayer games we're talking about. Turn based just seems like a bad way to handle large amounts of players as you could end up waiting large amounts of time between turns. 
    • Who goes first - the first turn generally has a good advantage, making turn-based a poor fit for an MMO with PvP. 
    • Deep combat - turn based combat tends to only work well when you have a really deep combat system. If players have tons of choices and those choices are meaningful and strategic, then turn-based can be really engaging and tense. The general MMO playerbase seems to be incapable of handling deep combat systems. 

    In general I'm a fan of slower, more strategic combat and I have a deep dislike for the shallow spamfest action combat pervading the genre, but I just can't see how turn-based would work well. That said, I'm happy to be proven wrong as I've never played an MMO with turn-based combat. I do enjoy it in some single player games, like the XCOM series. 
    Most turn-based MMOs have the world proceeding in real-time, but switch to turn-based for those in combat. That keeps the scale at a manageable level.

    For some turn-based MMOs movement is much more important than real-time MMOs, because turn based allows a much more gameplay with line of sight, reach of abilities, and using positioning to block both movement and attacks than real-time combat.

    Basically all turn-based MMOs have timeouts. Usual timeout is 30 seconds for a turn, though there are others.

    If PvP is important, who goes first can be determined by initiative stat. Alternatively, the game can use same resource for both moving and attacking so that the one who closes distance can only do weaker attack on his first turn and neither gets real advantage. Alternatively, the game can have people competing with movement speed, spell reach, line of sight and tactics so that that the better player gets first attack.
    Yeh, so I wouldn't be interested if the scale was kept manageable. My personal feeling is that if you are building an MMO, then you should build massively multiplayer features. If you have to limit combat to a small amount of players then, in my opinion, you're missing the point of the genre and my interest drops dramatically. 

    I would want it so that if I was out in the world with my group of 10 friends, we could engage in a world boss and then have more and more people join if they felt like it. I would want the system to be able to handle large scale battles and for players to be able to come and go as they please. 

    So, in that respect, I wouldn't want it turn based like XCOM, but could accept something like final fantasy 7 or 9 where it is kinda turn based, but really it's just a long GCD which makes it feel turn based. Perhaps that could be a built in dynamic - below 10 players, have it turn based, but above 10 players it switches to just long GCDs or something. 
    Lets be honest here, how many enemies or other players do you encounter in a battle in MMOs at  the same time? I dont talk about RvR or something, im talking about open world, Im not playing an MMO right now, but i guess its rather rare to encounter groups of 10+ players but if so, i think its quite possible to invent a turn-based system. that can easily handle 10vs10. 

    So if you have an open world, with an instanced turn-based combat system, where other players can join if you allow it, i would rather play such a game than the games out there, which instance everything else anyways.

    Im playing Atlas Reactor, its a 4vs4 turn-based pvp game and it does a good job on it. 
    Speaking from WoW, world bosses and such all provide an opportunity for players to band together ad hoc with anywhere from 2 to 20+ players.  That wouldn't be compatible with a turn-based system.  In general, the more entities in a turn-based combat scenario, the longer the delay between each player's turns.  That introduces an inverse correlation that makes turn-based largely incompatible with MMORPG.
    Any number of players can be compatible with turn-bases gameplay if you make a system where everyone makes their decisions in planning phase, then the game calculates results in action phase. It's more of a question of whether large scale battles provide fun gameplay or creates an unnecessary mess.
    That would be a pretty unfulfilling way to do group content with PUGs.  In real-time combat, I can see prompts for things such as ESO and GW2s interactable (that a word?) powers because you aren't locked into picking your next skill at the same time as the other player.  You don't need the player to tell you they're using it before they do so, because you can react in real-time once you see it has been activated by another player.  No such luck in turn-based.

    image
  • VrikaVrika Member LegendaryPosts: 7,973
    edited August 2018
    MadFrenchie said:

    That would be a pretty unfulfilling way to do group content with PUGs.  In real-time combat, I can see prompts for things such as ESO and GW2s interactable (that a word?) powers because you aren't locked into picking your next skill at the same time as the other player.  You don't need the player to tell you they're using it before they do so, because you can react in real-time once you see it has been activated by another player.  No such luck in turn-based.
    In turn-based combat the game may display all choices your teammates have already made for next turn, so that you can adjust your own choices based on that display of their choices.

    I remember when I used to play Wizard 101, we used that to create some really powerful coordinated attacks where rest of the group casts buffs for damage dealers huge attack. The enemies couldn't react because the buffs + attack were all done in a single turn.
    MadFrenchieAlBQuirky
     
  • KnightFalzKnightFalz Member EpicPosts: 4,522
    Vrika said:
    Daikuru said:
    Vrika said:
    I'm struggling to imagine how turn-based combat would work in an MMO. Even in final fantasy games, the first thing I do when I start a new game is turn off the waiting mechanic so that it's no longer turn-based. 


    My main concerns for an MMO:
    • Movement stops being a factor in combat (though, presumably you could still have positioning)
    • Timeouts - would need to have some sort of limit so that people wouldn't take 10 minutes to decide on their move. 
    • Scale - these are massively multiplayer games we're talking about. Turn based just seems like a bad way to handle large amounts of players as you could end up waiting large amounts of time between turns. 
    • Who goes first - the first turn generally has a good advantage, making turn-based a poor fit for an MMO with PvP. 
    • Deep combat - turn based combat tends to only work well when you have a really deep combat system. If players have tons of choices and those choices are meaningful and strategic, then turn-based can be really engaging and tense. The general MMO playerbase seems to be incapable of handling deep combat systems. 

    In general I'm a fan of slower, more strategic combat and I have a deep dislike for the shallow spamfest action combat pervading the genre, but I just can't see how turn-based would work well. That said, I'm happy to be proven wrong as I've never played an MMO with turn-based combat. I do enjoy it in some single player games, like the XCOM series. 
    Most turn-based MMOs have the world proceeding in real-time, but switch to turn-based for those in combat. That keeps the scale at a manageable level.

    For some turn-based MMOs movement is much more important than real-time MMOs, because turn based allows a much more gameplay with line of sight, reach of abilities, and using positioning to block both movement and attacks than real-time combat.

    Basically all turn-based MMOs have timeouts. Usual timeout is 30 seconds for a turn, though there are others.

    If PvP is important, who goes first can be determined by initiative stat. Alternatively, the game can use same resource for both moving and attacking so that the one who closes distance can only do weaker attack on his first turn and neither gets real advantage. Alternatively, the game can have people competing with movement speed, spell reach, line of sight and tactics so that that the better player gets first attack.
    Yeh, so I wouldn't be interested if the scale was kept manageable. My personal feeling is that if you are building an MMO, then you should build massively multiplayer features. If you have to limit combat to a small amount of players then, in my opinion, you're missing the point of the genre and my interest drops dramatically. 

    I would want it so that if I was out in the world with my group of 10 friends, we could engage in a world boss and then have more and more people join if they felt like it. I would want the system to be able to handle large scale battles and for players to be able to come and go as they please. 

    So, in that respect, I wouldn't want it turn based like XCOM, but could accept something like final fantasy 7 or 9 where it is kinda turn based, but really it's just a long GCD which makes it feel turn based. Perhaps that could be a built in dynamic - below 10 players, have it turn based, but above 10 players it switches to just long GCDs or something. 
    Lets be honest here, how many enemies or other players do you encounter in a battle in MMOs at  the same time? I dont talk about RvR or something, im talking about open world, Im not playing an MMO right now, but i guess its rather rare to encounter groups of 10+ players but if so, i think its quite possible to invent a turn-based system. that can easily handle 10vs10. 

    So if you have an open world, with an instanced turn-based combat system, where other players can join if you allow it, i would rather play such a game than the games out there, which instance everything else anyways.

    Im playing Atlas Reactor, its a 4vs4 turn-based pvp game and it does a good job on it. 
    Speaking from WoW, world bosses and such all provide an opportunity for players to band together ad hoc with anywhere from 2 to 20+ players.  That wouldn't be compatible with a turn-based system.  In general, the more entities in a turn-based combat scenario, the longer the delay between each player's turns.  That introduces an inverse correlation that makes turn-based largely incompatible with MMORPG.
    Any number of players can be compatible with turn-bases gameplay if you make a system where everyone makes their decisions in planning phase, then the game calculates results in action phase. It's more of a question of whether large scale battles provide fun gameplay or creates an unnecessary mess.
    That would be a pretty unfulfilling way to do group content with PUGs.  In real-time combat, I can see prompts for things such as ESO and GW2s interactable (that a word?) powers because you aren't locked into picking your next skill at the same time as the other player.  You don't need the player to tell you they're using it before they do so, because you can react in real-time once you see it has been activated by another player.  No such luck in turn-based.
    Yeah, it would. Fortunately most turn-based MMORPGs don't use that method. They use the traditional consecutive style of play instead. This allows for coordinated interaction between players over the turns of several players to produce the conditions needed to secure victory.

    Some like Wizard 101 have concurrent action choice, but there is a display to indicate the intended actions of all players and usually enough time to change what you were going to do if need be. Wizard 101 doesn't feature character movement on the battlefield, so that element doesn't need to be considered when decision making.
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