Standard Controls for Attack Variants

OK ti took me long enough but I have made a decision on weapons damages at least .. now I just need to work out combos. I have decided to take an old table top wargamers generalization of weapons classifying weapon damage into 3 broad catagories. These are "Cut/Thrust", "Chop", and "Impact". each of these attack types will be characterized as follows:

• Cut/thrust - This is slicing and periceing damage that results in all strength applied as health damage. An example of this would be the slicing action of a knife blade or a thrusting attack using the weapons tip.
  
• Chop - This is a combination of cuting and spashing. Look at it as a weighted cutting attack like that from an axe. For me this will apply 20% of strength as a stamina attack. So a weapon (say a small hatchet) would be a 10/2 weapon.
  
• Impact - This is a lethal crushing attack like that you get from a mace or a club. Its a deadly attack but a good portion of the damage will be stamina. I will apply 50% of these attacks as a stamina attack. So lets say I use a small ball pean hammer on someone. It would be a 10/5 weapon.
  

Maybe all add a fourth type that is 100% stamina ... a "subdue" attack. Like that you get from using a lead powder "sap" on someone.

Now what does this mean? Well ... take yer standard Roman Gladius. Its is primarily a thrusting weapon (when used with a scutum) .. as used by the legions. But its weight also allows a very effective chop attack. So ... you would have 2 attack forms ... a thrust (which might give you a bit more range) and a chop attack. Note here for simplicities sake I am not varying the strength of the weapon based upon attack type.

Any Thoughts?

Tala .. will do .. Id like to come up with standard combos for attack variants so that users can expect similar behaviors from ML weapons. I prolly will start putting attack options in my next weapons release. The one I am on now just adds the ML support.

woolyfsh wrote:For instance .. A sword thrust that give greater range maybe a bit less damage and a narrower angle of attack.

This is easy to implement by modifying the "core range" of a weapon. For example for a standard sword you could use attacks like

Code:

damage|15|1.5|0

The first value specifies the amount of damage, the second is the core range and the third determines how much of the damage is used in order to lower stamina rather than health. What you can do now is implement an attack, e.g. triggered by certain keys, which has a greater core range, e.g.

Code:

damage|15|2.0|0

This automatically make the opening angle a little narrower (don't worry about that in the sensor event, you can use any angle, the meter calculates the rest). Maybe you also want affect stamina by such an attack, e.g.

Code:

damage|15|2.0|5

This will do 15-5=10 units of "health-damage" and 5 units of "stamina-damage".

woolyfsh, if you're experimenting with such attacks, I think it would be great if you let us know which attack combinations you give your weapons.

Have a nice day,
Tala

Well I think the charge feature is ok. Not particularly interested in it. What I am more interested in is adding cut thrust, jab kind of attacks. For instance .. A sword thrust that give greater range maybe a bit less damage and a narrower angle of attack.

I will try implementing the charge function on my next generation sword scripts when they are set in ML mode. I think it is a great idea to get beyond the click and run around figthing style and add some more interesting elements to figting.

/be well Patrik Ling

Woolyfsh, when I scripted the free ML sword (the Beefeater, coming with the meter), I thought a lot about a good way how to implement the various attacks. I came up with this approach:

Commonly, there are two ways how two script a sword. Version 1: you hit as soon as you click. Version 2: you must hold down the mouse button and the sword hits as soon as you press any of the movement keys. With the Beefeater I'm offering an alternative: first of all, there is the new concept of 'charging'. As soon as you hold down the mousebutton you lift the sword without hitting; on release of the mousebutton the sword strikes and it hits harder the longer you had held the mousebutton. Simple clicking will cause an attack 'damage|15' + timeout, which corresponds to the 'usual' attack of a GM-sword, for example. The idea here is that fighters new to ML can keep their fighting style until they learn how to use the new attack types.

In addition you can hold down the mousebutton (which initiates charging) and press any of the movement keys. Any key press stops charging and causes an attack. The advantage here is that one can put different attacks on different keys. E.g. you can put a full cut attack on the fwd key, a mixed cut/thrust attack on left/right and a thrust attack on the back key.

My intention was to offer an implementention which combines all possible attack modes and at the same time allows ppl to fight with the fighting style they know from other meters.

One thing I want to stress is the charging indication. This is a visual sign (an animation) which shows the opponent that you prepare an attack. I really this should become a standard.

I'm curious to hear you opinions

Many greetings,
Tala

First I have to say, I came across ML a few nights ago and 10 seconds into reading about it I was hooked. Ot Takes all the good stuff romg GM .. ads more and fixes alot of the issues I have with it. I am now preparing to convert everything I have to support ML.

Now .. to my question. I really like the alternate attack idea, setting up different speeds/damages and effects based upon the attack type. e.g.: for a sword cut vs. chop, vs thrust. Now this means programing alternates into the button/key press sequences to make it all work. Is there any established norm for these kinds of alternate attack forms? For users and developers alike it would be really nice if there was a standard sequence uses for say .. thrust so that there could be a little bit of commonality between weapon makers. This would make it easier on the users to learn and make the system more universal. Anything out there yet? Any thoughts?