Posted by SphereMaker on August 06, 1999 at 15:04:05:
In Reply to: CF Woes -- Very long. posted by The Angel Gabriel on August 05, 1999 at 12:36:00:
Example: two groups of 6 engage in combat, all have autoassist on (for the sake of the example). Tank_A attacks Defender_B. Suddenly all six members of group A are attacking Defender_B. Defender_B's friends then assist and all of them are fighting Tank_A. Realistically speaking, how is it that six people are fighting Tank_A at once (all doing special moves, throwing, tripping, bashing, etc) and simultaneously there are six people beating the hell out of Defender_B as well? Example2: A hero warrior walks into a goblin stronghold. A hundred screaming goblins come rushing out to battle him, and (amazingly) the hero (after some work) kills every last one of them. No matter how strong he is, shouldn't the warrior just be overwhelmed by a horde of that size? Dragged down to the ground and crushed? I keep thinking that group combat based on the size of he opponents is the way to go. Let's say you can have four human-sized oppenents vs a giant. Let's say you could have four gnome-sized opponents vs a human. That changes the dynamic of (large) group fighting dramatically; limiting the number of hand-to-hand opponents any player could have would mean groups would have to strategize about how they would divide up their opponents. The problem of assigning remaining group members arises then, however. And if you're with a group, shouldn't the number of people that can surround and beat on you be smaller because you've got companions covering your back (for example)? Otherwise, there's little advantage to being in a group (other than your group members can handle the other opponents queuing up behind your current one). Obviously area-affecting players (invokers, Masters with scourge, anti-paladins with fire/iceball, bards, etc) would become valuable in a different way, as they could still deal out some damage even in queue. I don't know if there's an elegant and player-usable solution to making group vs. group combat more realistic, but I suspect that would have a major impact on this issue. As it is now, being Tank_A or Defender_B really sucks if the opposing group is large, especially with the introduction of many lag-producing skills. It may be a hideous can of worms, though. If groups had to choose formations, queuing orders, actual leaders, etc. would it make a complicated game too complex to be worthwhile...
What if group vs. group combat were redesigned to distribute targets amongst groups differently? Something that's troubled me on and off for some time is the fact that group vs. group combat isn't done particularly realistically.