KaM Remake gameplay balance

[Bence791]

@Pepa, you know nothing about the Remake... Matt is right, he wrote the public opinion shortly about your post. Sorry, but this is the truth. I guess you have never played KaM Remake, but you would be welcome as anyone else, just play and experience things around here. Then you would have a way different mind of your "balanced fighting system", or "knights-slayer militia" etc. We could play tomorrow, are you in for some games?

[Siegfried]

@pepa

Your idea has a few side effects that caught my eye.

For example a pikeman could kill a scout with only one strike from behind or diagonal behind. In the current state, he would need at least 4 strikes.

The limit that only 1 lifepoint can be taken at a time has the effect, that lifepoints become more important. So a 4 lp unit needs to be hit at least 4 times to be killed - during which he will launch 4 attacks as well. So the 4 lp gives him also additional attack power.

As said above, your system allows for critical hits. This means the pikeman can get out of the fight with the scount without even being damaged. The chance for that is already at 31% if he attacks from the back.

In the remake he'd need at least 4 strikes, so it's much more likely that he takes away some damage too.

Did you already think about implementing the long-range into this system? Because crossbowmen are even stronger against all units than pikemen are to horses. So the critical hit-problem might become devastating if you give the crossbow a firepower 120. Imagine a crossbow killing a unit with only one shot. The crossbowmen does not even need to attack from behind, the side is enough.

[pepa999]

Hi, thank you for comment.

You are absolutely right and i realize it. First of all, the main reason for creating this idea of new fighting system,
was to create system in which you can make balance changes very easily and very effectively. And in real game, it will
look like with the old system. By my previous text, i wanted to familiarize with the main idea of this system. So, the base
things about this system i wrote. So, list of Units is not completed, it was only for example how it would look like, and of course
i want change rest units by the same way, so also with bowmans and crossbowmans.

And now, back to the problem, that you outlined.
You are absolutely right, that with that stats "transformed" from the original kam fighting system, there will be incredible fast
battles. I must say, that i didnt realize it a much when i was writting that text, but later. But i also realize, that it is not
error of my system, but only error of specific number i assigned to a units, but i had to start somewhere and concluded, that
"transforming" original number will be a good start, and when problem will appear, i will solve it very easy, because for this reason
i made this system. So, there is a big problem, that i must solve. And i have very easy solve. i will multiply Life Point of all
Units by some number, say 3(or any else, that i will find by testing), and mutual balance between units remains unchanged, and the
big problem will disappear by this easy change.

The limit that only 1 lifepoint can be taken at a time has the effect, that lifepoints become more important. So a 4 lp unit needs to be hit at least 4
times to be killed - during which he will launch 4 attacks as well. So the 4 lp gives him also additional attack power.

I know, we must be very careful, when make changes in old system, because much things are intertwined with each other, and it needs much mathematics and lot of testing.
and just for that reason i decide to try to make easy and effective system in making balance changes.

Did you already think about implementing the long-range into this system? Because crossbowmen are even stronger against all units than pikemen are to horses.
So the critical hit-problem might become devastating if you give the crossbow a firepower 120. Imagine a crossbow killing a unit with only one shot. The crossbowmen
does not even need to attack from behind, the side is enough.

Yes, crossbowman will be extremely devastating when i "transform" their stats from old system to new, but i will decrease their damage and that problem will disappear.
It is point of my system, simple changes.

[pepa999]

@Pepa, you know nothing about the Remake... Matt is right, he wrote the public opinion shortly about your post. Sorry, but this is the truth. I guess you have never played KaM Remake, but you would be welcome as anyone else, just play and experience things around here. Then you would have a way different mind of your "balanced fighting system", or "knights-slayer militia" etc. We could play tomorrow, are you in for some games?

You didnt understood anything what i said, ok, we can at least play a game together.

[Bo_]

@pepa

Your idea has a few side effects that caught my eye.

For example a pikeman could kill a scout with only one strike from behind or diagonal behind. In the current state, he would need at least 4 strikes.

The limit that only 1 lifepoint can be taken at a time has the effect, that lifepoints become more important. So a 4 lp unit needs to be hit at least 4 times to be killed - during which he will launch 4 attacks as well. So the 4 lp gives him also additional attack power.

As said above, your system allows for critical hits. This means the pikeman can get out of the fight with the scount without even being damaged. The chance for that is already at 31% if he attacks from the back.

In the remake he'd need at least 4 strikes, so it's much more likely that he takes away some damage too.

Did you already think about implementing the long-range into this system? Because crossbowmen are even stronger against all units than pikemen are to horses. So the critical hit-problem might become devastating if you give the crossbow a firepower 120. Imagine a crossbow killing a unit with only one shot. The crossbowmen does not even need to attack from behind, the side is enough.

Hey did you notice that you can already kill an archer with 1 hit, knowing it has 3 lp? Same with xbow.

[The Dark Lord]

So? Do you suggest making archers and crossbowmen less vulnerable for direct attacks? Siegfried is right here.

[Siegfried]

Hey did you notice that you can already kill an archer with 1 hit, knowing it has 3 lp? Same with xbow.

Archers and xbowmen have 1 lp.

[Bo_]

Realy? That's good, thanks for telling me.
I tought they had also 3.

And Lord, not at all. I just didn't get the 1 kill.

[Krom]

@pepa999: I'm sorry you get such a harsh response from some guys. I like your idea, but as Siegfried wrote - there are some issues with it. On the other hand there's some very important improvement - we can guarantee minimum damage from each hit (e.g. 10hp) and thus even luckiest Knight is guaranteed to be killed after 400/10 = 40hits.

[pepa999]

No problem ... Good idea, we can make fights less random by changing damage from 0% - 200% to any other numbers we will find by testing as the best. For Example 25% - 175% or 50% - 150%.
And another big problem is away.

[Siegfried]

The problem with critical hits persists as long as you increase the maximum possible damage and don't limit maximum damage.

Even if you lower the maximum possible damage to 175% and think of an attack from behind, the damage still can be 875%. So almost 9 times the power of a single attack in the current state where it is limited to 100% (1 lifepoint is 100 in your case).

There are two possibilities to reduce that:
1. decrease the direction multiplicator, maybe to something like 1 (front), 1,5 (diagonal) 2 (side) 2,5 (diagonal behind) 3 (behind)
But that would mean a) that you get away from the battle mechanics that make KaM so unique towards a system like AoE where damage is don proportionally and b) that could only lower the problem, not abolish the critical hit; in this example, the maximum firepower would still be 525%

2. decrease the firepower of all units (equivalent to an increase in lifepoints). So maybe the 55 of the swordsman would translate into a 30 in your system, which would mean a range from 0-60. So the maximum amount would be 300 divided by the defense point. So to kill a knight you would need at least 4 hits from the back. When attacking from the front you need in average 14 hits compared to 22 hits atm. So the attacking power is still quite hight.
But if you lower it even more, it is a step towards a proportional damage system, just like all other strategy games have, because it decreases the influence of random on the single fight.

I know that's it may sound unfair when I pledge for a random fighting system like the current one. But all of you know from your experience, that the result of a big fight it's not as random as it might look like on paper. That's a practical consequence of the law or large numbers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_large_numbers)
Sorry if that sounds boring as hell, but the working of the kam fighting system is a living consequence of that. The single fight between two units is quite random, so a single barbarian can defeat a pikemen and two scouts. But as soon as you increase the number, you'll see that it becomes so improbable that it almost never appears.

So I'm in favour of the current, random-driven fight mode.

[Bo_]

I'm sorry, I tought oppinions from players with experience would mean more than what 2 people say who haven't played kam for 3 years or only do mathematics.
So I see no point in keeping discussing, I'll do like jeronimo, I'll just wait, do as they say, if it ruins the game then players will just leave, and if it works why not?
But what I don't get, I remember Dark Lord proposing to multiplie all the values with 10, so fights would be less random, but then you said 'it didn't fit kam'.
So why is it ok now?

[Lewin]

@pepa999: I'm sorry you get such a harsh response from some guys. I like your idea, but as Siegfried wrote - there are some issues with it. On the other hand there's some very important improvement - we can guarantee minimum damage from each hit (e.g. 10hp) and thus even luckiest Knight is guaranteed to be killed after 400/10 = 40hits.

If we did it like that it would become more like Age of Empires and other strategies games, where each hit does a fixed amount of damage and so fights become very predictable. I like the way the KaM system works with low HP and each attack does 0 or 1 damage. It makes KaM feel the way it should, a system where attacks do fixed damage just wouldn't be KaM in my mind.

[Krom]

Yes, but the fact that 2 Scouts can fight up to 15 minutes and longer (given good random streak) does not makes it very nice. It's nice to see your militia kills barbarian in campaign mission, but it's very disappointing seeing it happen vice versa. I agree with Sid Meyer GDC 2010 speech - player wants to see "good" randoms that look fair, not the mathematically correct "randoms". It's especially important in MP where players compete with their skills, not with a rolling dice. Random is needed, but it would be better if it were a little more fair. Similar to arrows hitting targets out of range due to random jitter, random allows that, but we fixed it in favor of players experience. I don't rush to implement suggested changes "as is" as they are clearly flawed, but I would like that everyone gave them a deeper look and analysis and maybe pushed research further.

[Lewin]

Yes, but the fact that 2 Scouts can fight up to 15 minutes and longer (given good random streak) does not makes it very nice. It's nice to see your militia kills barbarian in campaign mission, but it's very disappointing seeing it happen vice versa. I agree with Sid Meyer GDC 2010 speech - player wants to see "good" randoms that look fair, not the mathematically correct "randoms". It's especially important in MP where players compete with their skills, not with a rolling dice. Random is needed, but it would be better if it were a little more fair. Similar to arrows hitting targets out of range due to random jitter, random allows that, but we fixed it in favor of players experience. I don't rush to implement suggested changes "as is" as they are clearly flawed, but I would like that everyone gave them a deeper look and analysis and maybe pushed research further.

I agree, the idea is worth pursuing to see if the flaws can be better resolved. Maybe it can be designed so that the KaM feeling is maintained. Maybe there could be a maximum/minimum amount of damage inflicted with each strike, so kind of like the current system but instead of only doing 0 or 1 damage, they can do somewhere between 0 and 1, e.g. 0.36. But you can't do 4 damage and kill a unit in one blow, 1 is the maximum so it still takes the normal number of strikes to kill a unit.