Armor & Damage Types
Rokiyo
A.K.A. .::FeX::. Revenge Join Date: 2002-10-10 Member: 1471Members, Constellation
A.K.A. .::FeX::. Revenge Join Date: 2002-10-10 Member: 1471Members, Constellation
<div class="IPBDescription">From the NS2 Twitter Feed</div><!--QuoteBegin-NS2 twitter feed+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(NS2 twitter feed)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Charlie is working on armor and damage types. Damage types are so versatile, but how to make them clear in FPS? Probably just avoid them.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Hrrmm... Some random thoughts:
It could be argued that machine gun bullets are universally better at penetrating hard targets than shotgun pellets. You could show that there is a difference by coloring bullet tracers their normal yellow, and pellet tracers a radioactive blue.
Organic targets could have green flesh, and bone white armor plating.
When hitting an armored organic target, the bullets would create normal blood splatters, while the pellets could create an effect that looks more like splintering wood flying off the armor. When hitting normal flesh, both bullets & pellets would create the same blood splatters.
It wouldn't take long for players to notice that blue bullet effects don't look like they are doing much to white boney armor.
As long at the particle effects are used to provide clear, consistent feedback (with consistent feedback taking priority over art direction), it can become a powerful tool for educating players on deeper game mechanics. Ie if the blueish colors always do x, and brownish colors always do y, the players will come to learn this.
Word of warning, this will have to apply to non-weapon effects to. If a neon-green explosion from a chemical grenade has one effect, but a neon-green gas cloud from a leaking air vent does something completely different, you'll end up confusing the players, and they'll learn to ignore particle colors.
Hrrmm... Some random thoughts:
It could be argued that machine gun bullets are universally better at penetrating hard targets than shotgun pellets. You could show that there is a difference by coloring bullet tracers their normal yellow, and pellet tracers a radioactive blue.
Organic targets could have green flesh, and bone white armor plating.
When hitting an armored organic target, the bullets would create normal blood splatters, while the pellets could create an effect that looks more like splintering wood flying off the armor. When hitting normal flesh, both bullets & pellets would create the same blood splatters.
It wouldn't take long for players to notice that blue bullet effects don't look like they are doing much to white boney armor.
As long at the particle effects are used to provide clear, consistent feedback (with consistent feedback taking priority over art direction), it can become a powerful tool for educating players on deeper game mechanics. Ie if the blueish colors always do x, and brownish colors always do y, the players will come to learn this.
Word of warning, this will have to apply to non-weapon effects to. If a neon-green explosion from a chemical grenade has one effect, but a neon-green gas cloud from a leaking air vent does something completely different, you'll end up confusing the players, and they'll learn to ignore particle colors.
Comments
Besides visual aid it might also help to give the hits different sounds like it's already done with aliens getting hit in umbra.
Cue lack of time/budget argument.
For example the Warcraft 3 damage/armor system works fairly well because it has clear guidelines (ranged fighters have medium armor, melee buddies are heavy armor, ranged does piercing damage, melee does normal dmg and ect) and the information is easily accessible. Particles, different kind of sounds and splatters can also help a lot.
Well I wouldn't put what I just wrote as is in the buy menu, that's an overview. It would be like what was suggested above by <b>Bacillus</b> with short info text under each gun.
IE:
Shotgun
-Does reduced damage to Dynamic Infestation, but normal damage to all structures and lifeforms
Flavor Text: BLAH BLAH
For example, I would be more in favor of your system if LMGs sat in the same category as other MGs:
# Light - knife, HG, SG
# Flame - FT, GL, welder
# Heavy - LMG, MG, HMG
EDIT: Also, I would be happier if instead of low & high lifeforms, we instead talked about armored and un-armored lifeforms & structures. I think distinctive types of armor plating is a great way to show players how a target will react to a damage type, and I think it falls in line with Bacillus' clear guidelines suggestion ("Knives don't work very well on big armored guys").
My point here is that if we look at damage types purely from a balance perspective, we risk making the damage system unintuitive. If we create a clear, simple system that includes easy to identify visuals, then we can work within that to achieve both goals of balance and intuition.
--Normal damage
* * used by most weapons
* * does 100% to all targets
--Piercing Damage
* * used by HMG only
* * does 50% damage vs structures
--Blast Damage
* * used by Onos tusk and Grenade launcher
* * does 200% vs structures
--Light Damage
* * used by Turret and OC
* * does 50% vs Heavy Armor and Onos
--Bile Bomb
* * Does 0% vs players, 100% vs structures
--Spores
* * Does 0% vs Structures and Heavy Armor, 100% vs Light Armor and Jetpacks
--Healspray
* * Does variable %healing to friendly players/structures, 17 to enemy players, 0 to enemy structures, 50% healing to self while using it on other targets
--Acidrocket
* * Does 200% vs marines armor totals, but not their health totals. 100% vs structures.
So thats eight different kinds of damage with no indications whatsoever until another player explains them to you. Most of them affect only a single weapon. Yeah, that could use some improvement. There's still some room for damage types in NS2, but we'd need to have some way to tell them apart, and eight is probably too many.
Edit: I keep remembering new damage types. Should Welder count as a new one? How about Devour? You could get as many as 10 that way.
Still, you can see most of them used correctly. I think it's more of an issue when some guns have a specific role that isn't clearly explained by the very common sense. For example not everyone realises how useful shotgun is for shooting the node or how ineffecitve hand grens are against RTs. On the other hand only very few newbies are seen bilebombing or healspraying rines on purpose.
Fair enough. I want the LMG to be effective against everything, which is why I don't nerf it against structures or lifeforms and don't want to pair it with the HMG and/or Minigun. I also tried to have as few dmg types as possible for the rines.
I glossed over the alien damage abilities and structures, but I suppose they could be:<ul>Light</li><li> Bite</li><li> Lerk Bite</li><li> Swipe</li><li> Spit
Flame(probably change name)</li><li> Gore
Heavy</li><li> Charge</li><li> Acid Rocket</li><li> Xenocide</li><li> Parasite</li><li> Leap
Specials</li><li> Heal Spray/Gas</li><li> Bile Bomb/Siege Cannon</li><li> OC/Turret(maybe fit in normal category or maybe their own)</li></ul>
KISS.