Attack decreased debuff with every attack

[Solaris]

I usually do not post in this type of thread, but my playtimes reduced significantly of late, so I thought it worth a shot to chime in. I really enjoyed BGTSCC and I played here for several years. I can say I have made a lot of friends here and I thank everyone who played with me for that. I have no desire to be disrespectful towards the skill, creativity and dedication of our great developers, but admittedly this massive, MMO-like change is getting in the way of my fun.

Didn't the community vote against this feature in your poll, Rasael ? I see the votes are 11 to 10 here. And now that people can make a more educated decision, I bet the difference would become much larger.

Why are things that have been downvoted in the past getting in? Was there another poll behind closed doors that I am not aware of? I am sorry to say that the way things are now, I rate my chances of ever logging back in altogether as realistically rather slim. If this has to be an MMO, well...there are better ones around.

Didn't the community vote against this feature in your poll, Rasael ? I see the votes are 11 to 10 here. And now that people can make a more educated decision, I bet the difference would become much larger.

No response to this? In the IRC there is a growing number of people at odds with the update too.

Unfortunately, it's not only in the IRC.

Didn't the community vote against this feature in your poll, Rasael ? I see the votes are 11 to 10 here. And now that people can make a more educated decision, I bet the difference would become much larger.

That poll... was a bad idea.

For half of those features you'd need a new engine.
People that are unaware of that would get starry eyed and excited, and vote "yes", because they would imagine some awesome perfectly working mechanic in their head.

The last jegs version is nigh-unusable and glitches out on almost all abilities. I tested that dervish build I mentioned earlier, and it misfires all of its abilities, cleave and greater cleave doesn't work on point blank range ("attack blocked"). Judging by situation on the forums, whatever happens on the server is somewhat similar.

So it would be the best to only implement features that fit well into nwn2 framework/limitations. Cover system is not one of those, even when used for ranged component.

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Or, I don't know, you guys could try funding development of replacement engine for nwn2.Something like that can be done these days, since there are free engines on the market.

Thank you for sharing these insights, Neginfinity. I am far from being a programmer, and that helps shed some light on the difficulties at hand. When I tried JEGS and several things were not working, I assumed it was simply due to them being in a "work in progress" stage.

[Rasael]

Why are things that have been downvoted in the past getting in? Was there another poll behind closed doors that I am not aware of? I am sorry to say that the way things are now, I rate my chances of ever logging back in altogether as realistically rather slim. If this has to be an MMO, well...there are better ones around.

It was already elaborated elsewhere in the forum that the ranged downvote caused the elevation component to be removed.

The other features we wanted to let the community experiment with, so we could make an informed decision about whether to keep them or not. As I wrote elsewhere: the melee obstruction mechanic is going to be disabled on the very short term. That also affected melee ranged attacks with bows.

The ranged component is subject to changes. It consists of two mechanics: a cover system (behind trees, placeables), and an extended range system (you can shoot farther but at the extra range you suffer a penalty)

[Thorsson]

The extended range idea isn't bad, if it works as intended. There's always been an AB bug on ranged attacks anyway though, which might affect things.

The cover system has an inherent problem in that you cannot see if there is cover a lot of the time, due to the settings that allow you to see your character through all the foliage, etc.

Are these penalties also being applied to NPCs?

[NegInfinity]

The ranged component is subject to changes. It consists of two mechanics: a cover system (behind trees, placeables), and an extended range system (you can shoot farther but at the extra range you suffer a penalty)

I can tell you right away that any kind of cover system in nverwinter 2 is a bad idea due to poorly implemented collision queries. In this game something like a dragon is implemented as a huge CIRCLE on a 2D map, also see the kind of trouble people get when they have a large clikcable monster - something like treant (especially if it is enlarged) makes it impossible to click anything near it with mouse (including ground), and jegs demonstrates well what happens when you try to make cover happen despite the limitations. You can also hear people whispering on the 4th floor because of this. You don't want to implement any kind of "cover" with this kind of mess, and either way you'd need some visual feedback (for example, hit chance or AB penalty visible under mouse cursor) on GUI level so people can see their chances. Randomly changing AB value is wrong way to do it, and GUI-level fix is probably not gonna be possible.

On other hand you COULD use more obstacles on the map that block line of sight. That would make corner-sneaks more viable (there were two maps total where you could use that - kobold ruins and gnoll caves). However, any kind of cover where "oh, he's sitting in a bush, so he is harder to hit"... that's a bad idea that should be scrapped, because collision detection framework is not robust enough.

Basically, if the idea of "cover" was inspired by this:
http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Cover

Then the only "safe" kind of cover you can implement in this kind of engine is a "wall" without any reflex saves or bonuses from it. Full concealment/wall, like what is already present in NWN2 engine. If you want people to hide behind stuff, make obstacles that properly block line of sight. On most maps environmental objects (that includes trees) do not block line of sight at least that's the way it was year ago.

Really, though, I hope that one day someone will gather enough money and fund development of the replacement engine, based on Unity3D or something.
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Extended range should be fine, though, as long as original range works as usual without changes.

Unrelated:

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I also hope that the "new" warlock invocations won't be implemented in the way they existed last time I saw them, cause there's at least one warlock left in my roster that I might want to play again one day. New invocations are nice, but full revamp of the GUI and attempting to bypass builtin spell system will just cause trouble, and will make it harder(or impossible) to put anything onto hotbar.

[ShortRedandLoud]

Last night I had a weird instance of my ranged AB being massively increased for every other attack on a zombie in the BG graveyard. I think it was a bonus of around twelve ab? I don't know exactly what I did to get it, though.

[Passiflora]

If this has to be an MMO, well...there are better ones around.

Might I know what is MMO in this update? As far as I know it seems to be more like P&P, taking it further away from MMOs. (Which is what got me interested again into looking into it).

Unless I missed something in the update.

Cover, range penalty, elevations and such, that's P&P stuff.

So.. what exactly is MMO there?

[Solaris]

So.. what exactly is MMO there?

The massive amount of changes, and the attempts at "rebalancing" classes and creating a fairer mechanical environment. D&D has nothing to do with fairness, whereas MMOs are all about it (or perceived fairness by the community).

[metaquad4]

So, if I understand this correctly, melees have an attack decreased between each attack, and ranged characters (in theory) have their AB decreased based on range. Not good in its current form at all, it seems.

Since the melee nerf was retracted according to Rasael, I won't touch on that too much. But, I will note that this "feature" that was added already happens, in the form of a -5 penalty between attacks.

For ranged!
An AB penalty for attacking farther than the original range limit? Based on this wording, I will operate under the assumption that ranged attacks are unlimited, but if you attack further than what nwn2 would previously allow then you take a penalty.

If this is to be the case, a UI should be created to show if you are "in range" for what AB your character sheet shows, or if you are "out of range" for what AB your character sheet shows (the UI should display this when you target an entity). Additionally, OOBI should eliminate this ranged penalty entirely, and spot should extend the range before this penalty kicks in.

[Rasael]

So.. what exactly is MMO there?

The massive amount of changes, and the attempts at "rebalancing" classes and creating a fairer mechanical environment. D&D has nothing to do with fairness, whereas MMOs are all about it (or perceived fairness by the community).

We don't balance for fairness. Fairness is essentially an arbitrary concept in a game like this.

What we balance for is accurately described here,
http://bgtscc.wikia.com/wiki/Design_Philosophy

For ranged!
An AB penalty for attacking farther than the original range limit? Based on this wording, I will operate under the assumption that ranged attacks are unlimited, but if you attack further than what nwn2 would previously allow then you take a penalty.

If this is to be the case, a UI should be created to show if you are "in range" for what AB your character sheet shows, or if you are "out of range" for what AB your character sheet shows (the UI should display this when you target an entity). Additionally, OOBI should eliminate this ranged penalty entirely, and spot should extend the range before this penalty kicks in.

In the newest patch feedback is given on the ranged circumstances that are in play. It will let us fine-tune it and gives the community insight into how it works.

The feedback can be turned on or off via the character options dialogue. It is on by default, to introduce it to new folks.

Passiflora is right about cover, range, and elevations: They are PnP elements. It has nothing to do with MMO's. If anything NWN2 was built to be a niche sort of multiplayer RPG, taking the things that easily work for multiplayer games from PnP, and leaving the rest ('easily' meaning in terms of time and work-effort, for Obsidian).

[thebeasttt]

Why are things that have been downvoted in the past getting in? Was there another poll behind closed doors that I am not aware of? I am sorry to say that the way things are now, I rate my chances of ever logging back in altogether as realistically rather slim. If this has to be an MMO, well...there are better ones around.

It was already elaborated elsewhere in the forum that the ranged downvote caused the elevation component to be removed.

The other features we wanted to let the community experiment with, so we could make an informed decision about whether to keep them or not. As I wrote elsewhere: the melee obstruction mechanic is going to be disabled on the very short term. That also affected melee ranged attacks with bows.

The ranged component is subject to changes. It consists of two mechanics: a cover system (behind trees, placeables), and an extended range system (you can shoot farther but at the extra range you suffer a penalty)

It absolutely does affect you at all ranges, including melee. Here's some screenshots:

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I shot a goblin straight down the hall with no obstructions, some at medium range and some in melee. Notice the attacks are at AB +17, +5, +11, +8, +8. So what's the problem? Well my AB is 21/16. Proof below....

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The first attack was manyshot which is fine but every other shot was supposed to be full AB attacks. Instead I got -11, -10, -8, -8(improved rapid shot). Now it's possible the game interpreted me as being obstructed by that stalagmite next to me but you can see I clearly wasn't and that's exactly the problem with this system, it's quite often impossible to judge whether the game gives you a penalty or not. Here's some more:

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Shooting at unobstructed gnoll down the hall, no manyshot this time. As you can see by my hp's I was only 1 level lower and getting -10, -5. Even that melee shot was -4, also notice the atk debuff on my portrait for no reason? And yes I have point blank shot.

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Here's a longer fight where I had 19AB at the time, shooting at a minotaur in melee until it rolled four 20's in a row lol. Notice how many of those attacks are at my max 19 AB? Just 1. See how the penalties are completely random, you can see the melee swings of the minotaur and neither of us moved an inch.

Also keep in mind out of all these screenshots how many random bonuses above my AB did I get? Zero. I'll be shooting from an elevated position with no obstructions and still get a heavy penalty. It gets way worse in groups to the point where I don't even want to bother, getting obscene -20 penalties.

In D&D rules the MAX cover penalty is -10 and that's for 9/10 cover. So even if the NWN2 mesh was interpreting it correctly the penalties are well beyond ridiculous. You should be getting a -2 for 1/4 cover 90% of the time, not the crazy numbers i've shown. Heavy Crossbow has a 120ft range, it's not even possible in NWN2 to shoot more then 1 extra range increment, so lets be generous and give another -2 max range, at best.

I invite anyone that voted yes to make their case here and now because I just don't see it.

[omuvrajitor]

I hope the new ranged combat mechanic will be removed. There are 2 problems with it. First, it doesnt work correctly because i get decreased attack even if there is nothing between me and the target(melee range) and second it makes any ranged focus character unusable in any party environment. The penalty is so large that you cant hit anything through party members. How can i play ranged chars if there cant be anything between me and the target?

[ShortRedandLoud]

After a while more of playing with it, I've noticed a few things.

Your first attack isn't adjusted. You can thus move, waiting for the adjustment to fade, then fire unadjusted to bypass it. This is probably just a limitation of the system. (Since attacking is more or less immediate and the debuff isn't)

If your attack is massively penalized, due to such an occurrence as a bandit taking cover behind multiple toe-high bedrolls, the negative adjustment messes up and instead BUFFS your attack bonus. So you can position yourself on a hill, behind a stump, which is itself behind several bushes and a fence, and become a ranged god. I'm not sure how consistent this is, but large penalties becoming bonuses seems to be the pattern.

The adjustment is not applied to enemies. This is likely intentional, but feels lame.

All of this is before the March 19th patch went live. (Which I don't think changed anything.)

Some thoughts, in an attempt to be constructive:

The distance penalty is fine, and seems to show up relatively uncommonly.

That it triggers on every placeable is not fine. I would suggest, if keeping the obscuring mechanic, to only tag certain placeables as 'cover', such as low walls, and finding some way of communicating that the placeable is cover to the player. You could also have variable types of cover tags. Partial (-2, low debris, half-open fencing), Normal (-4, low walls, low boulders) and Improved (-8, arrow slits).

PCs shouldn't be obscured by cover if they're closer to the cover than the foe is.

NPCs shouldn't be unhindered by the mechanic if the player is, though I'm not sure how feasible applying the penalty to NPCs is.

EDIT:

The penalty showing up seems consistent to me, it's just that some things that aren't obviously placeables, (such as dirt on the floor), and some things that seems like placeables, but aren't, (some tileset features), confuse it a bit. Going melee range seems to be reliable in getting to no penalty.