Before I start, I would request that everybody who intends to come in with a comment along the lines of "We should entirely remove combat from being the focus of games" just not bother. I find combat in games quite enjoyable. My thought, however, is that perhaps if some of this were taken into account it would make combat a much more risky affair, with much graver concequences. That being said, the point of this post is that I think combat would be a lot more enjoyable, and possibly have an additional wow factor, if it were made somehow much more realistic. These thoughts were really spurred by another posting in the General and Game Programming Discussion board. These are some thoughts drawn from my personal experience with armed and unarmed combat. I have never seen the differences among weapons and advantages of individual weapons modeled anywhere near accurately. For instance, consider two people in a battle starting at distance, one armed with a yari (a spear, generally about a dozen feet in length) and the other with a long dagger. At first it might seem like the person with the spear has the obvious advantage, being at distance and all, but what if I tell you that a dagger used properly can be a very effective weapon against a spear? This battle could generally go three possible ways, all things being equal, depending on the relative skills of the combatants: Skilled dagger, unskilled spear--the person with the dagger will EASILY be able to quickly and efficiently close distance, at which point the person with the spear will no longer stand a snowball''s chance in hell. Unskilled dagger, skilled spear--the person with the spear will know how to keep proper distance and will eventually catch the more agile dagger wielder. Roughly equal skill--the fight will turn into a complex distance game, the person with the dagger constantly closing, and the person with the spear constantly opening--possibly a VERY long fight. Place the person with the dagger agains someone wielding, say, a staff, and the situation changes drastically. My point being that every weapon has its peculiar strengths, weaknesses, and techniques against every other possible weapon. Sometimes one weapon will be obviously inferior (as is a bastard sword to a katana), but most of the time any weapon can be equally deadly. It is not about the "power" of your weapon, but how you use it that will 99 times out of 100 determine who wins the fight. Another often overlooked aspect of combat is distance. Ask any experienced swordsman and they will tell you that maintaing proper distance is THE most crucial aspect to fighting successfully. Opening distance, closing distance, maintaining distance--these are all very central concepts to armed combat. Being able to do these things skillfully is as difficult as it is important. I said I was going to talk about unarmed combat, so I''m going to make this simple. Against an armed opponent it''s simply not done by itself. It''s just another thing on the list of ways to get real dead real fast. In conjunction with weapons, though, it can be an immensely useful skill. Your sword isn''t always going to be the most handy thing to hit an opening that you see with. A well placed kick, if it doesn''t cripple your opponent outright, will generally induce a gaping wide opening in their defense for a swift cut. Finally, in combat no enemy is ever harmless. Ever. That little 3'' goblin with a knife can kill you just as dead than that 20'' gigas with a giant magical longsword +5. Trying to swing through foes--any foes--with reckless abandon will get you killed. I repeat, it WILL get you killed. So, if anybody managed to make it all the way through this post, I''d like to hear any thoughts as to how practically this could be applied to a game. And for that matter, what it would add to or remove from the game if it were.

I would just throw the spear at the dagger boy from a distance of about 40-50 yards.

Poof. Dead dagger boy.

Admittedly, combat shouldn''t be the only option in an RPG. It is, however, the one that the broadest range of people seem to find the most enjoyable.

The question that remains for me before I''d start putting any specific rules down is whether the system should by VERY realistic, or just FAIRLY realistic. The difference, as I see it, would basically come down to whether most characters could take a good hit from a weapon and keep on fighting, much less living.

As for the spear example, well, if you''ve ever tried to throw a 12'' spear, you''ll know it''s not very easy That weapon is not for throwing. Not to mention that if you saw it coming it''d be pretty easy to dodge at all but a very specific range.

I would have thought that the most important aspect of combat was timing myself. Are you talking about a combat system that will be using body location hits, hit points or what?

I always look for realism to add elements to combat systems that i work on but its usually just for adding fun. I never use realism as a template either.

Whether or not some gets killed by a stike in combat would (i believe) come down to 2 main factors: luck and skill. It also comes down to the weapon used. A 3 inch knife would have to be used in the right places to land an instant kill whereas a spear would be relying more on strength to create an instant kill (depending on how sharp it is) in my opinion.

This is the thing, if you want realism then you have to take into account everything about every different weapon. Remeber that there isn''t so many different weapons becuase they are all used the same way.

I love Game Design and it loves me back.

Our Goal is "Fun"!

First off, I've got to say that in real fighting similar weapons are not used the same way. The difference between handling a sabre and a rapier can be rather astounding. A katana and a longsword (aside from the fact that a katana is generally two-handed and a longsword one) are vastly different. The only similar weapons are those of a class in which the idea is not so much skill, as persistence (basically all very large swords as I see it--I'm no fan of the broadsword).

Timing is a critical factor in fighting, but in my opinion, as well as those I've trained with, not as much so as distance.

I'll give you that a 3 inch knife would be difficult to kill someone with (need to go for the medulla, temple, throat, or some other weak spot), but you're a lucky man if you get hit by any weapon with a significant size and live to tell about it. Discounting arm or leg hits, which are still immensely crippling (not just from loss of use of that appendage, but from pain, shock, and loss of blood). Not to mention that it's real hard to remain focused on the combat right after being cut open. They are not quite as deadly as bladed weapons, but still a good shot with a club or staff can easily kill a person.

Aah, forgot to mention... I can't see how a realistic fighting system could possibly be based off of hit points, so yes, I would imagine it would be location based. As a matter of fact, I could see to critical factors in determining damage--location and severity.

Edited by - Shinkage on August 17, 2000 9:13:21 PM

A lot of it comes down to training too. You could give me a chainsaw and there would be people out there who would still kill me with one arm tied behind their back. But at course this sort of training is an entire life.

This makes me think of a game called International Karate where if you hit someone they went down. Then that was round one. But what your talking about is a hit someone and they die. So what would the players options be in combat? Wouldn''t every fight be the same?

I love Game Design and it loves me back.

Our Goal is "Fun"!

I guess I wasn''t specific about this, but most of what I said only applies to armed combat. And this is a game--they don''t HAVE to die, the game should just acknowledge that a single hit can be extremely crippling.

A chainsaw... now there''s a though... give me a rapier (which I should mention is probably the most effective weapon I have ever used) any day