5 ms·

> As a result, the game offers no easy satisfaction of hacking and slashing through weaker opponents. Besides the questionable morality of kill=experience=prog

by myfonj 4mo ago

> As a result, the game offers no easy satisfaction of hacking and slashing through weaker opponents. Besides the questionable morality of kill=experience=progress in typical hack'n'slash or roguelike, what started to irritate me in there as I grew older as well, was the stupid mechanics where crowds of enemies described as intelligent humanoids (i.e. not animals or robots) facing clearly overpowered high-level PC (famous, even) never surrendered, almost never tried to flee, attacked one-by-one, and shoved no sign of tactical thinking or self-preservation instinct. Despite being armed and (by description) organised, PC could enter a narrow corridor, defeat dozen of them without taking any damage, yet there will be a waiting line eager for demise by a single hit -- even actively advancing towards it. No attempt to regroup, to take advantage of the number superiority, wait in open space, ambush from all directions, or anything like that. Same applies to most FPS: there is a Doomguy running around at unprecedented pace, slaughtering everything that moves, but we will all keep our scattered positions. (This led me to a thought, whether it would be possible to rearrange enemies in canonical Doom map so that all would attack at once at some appropriate spot and whether it would guarantee their victory or not.)

yomismoaqui 4mo ago
The solution for your problem is playing a Souls game
- scotty79 4mo ago
  How would roleplaying a victim help his problem of not being feared sufficiently by little computer people?
rootlocus 4mo ago
While I agree it's incredibly jarring in some games, I'm always thinking back at a presentation by David Rosen on procedural animation: "First, do no harm to the gameplay". He's talking about animations in particular, but I feel that should be a core pillar for any game designer. Many things are unnatural in games: you don't instantly recover from a beating by eating one apple in real life, but we're ok with it in games because it makes the gameplay fun. https://youtu.be/LNidsMesxSE?si=fGFCTCHm77OJiYu3&t=260 https://youtu.be/LNidsMesxSE?si=fGFCTCHm77OJiYu3&t=260
- fc417fc802 4mo ago
  > you don't instantly recover from a beating by eating one apple in real life, Contrast with Dwarf Fortress where you'll end up as a crutch user because it's more ¡FUN! that way.
pprotas 4mo ago
Game developers (mostly... hopefully?) try to optimize for the "fun" aspect of a game, not the "realism of the flight/flight instinct" aspect
- myfonj 4mo ago
  Sure, but I don't think they must be mutually exclusive; on the contrary: in the late stages when your character is a tank, swarms of minions that posed a challenge in early stages become just a nuisance, mostly. You are walking legend slaying dragons for breakfast, everybody and their dog knows about your invincibility … but instead of giving you some respect, they try to bite your heels on the first sight. I guess the "fun aspect" of seeing them flee and not restraining your movement at all could be slightly more satisfying than taking them down in a single hit one-by-one for the thousand time.
  - card_zero 4mo ago
    Similarly, a mindless swarm doesn't present much opportunity for tactics, compared to a group with individual self-preservation instincts, and a manipulatable group morale level, or individual fear level mechanisms. On the other hand it's true that realism is not the goal. Reality is no fun, that's why we're playing a game. But it's a sort of distorted echo of reality, I suppose. I see somebody in another comment complaining that enemies who get frightened rob the player of the fun of battles. So it depends what it's all about.
  - Jensson 4mo ago
    > I guess the "fun aspect" of seeing them flee and not restraining your movement at all could be slightly more satisfying than taking them down in a single hit one-by-one for the thousand time. Chasing enemies is much more annoying than them coming to you, so that would be a punishment to the player. Players don't like when you punish them in that way, they want to kill the monsters they don't want an upgrade that makes you more powerful make it harder to kill monsters since now they start running.
    - myfonj 4mo ago
SubiculumCode 4mo ago
This is, IMO something that has infected modern mainstream TTRPG: Monsters hardly run away, even if a fireball just killed half of you. One thing B/X AD&D got right were the heavy use of Moral Checks, e.g. Check their morale on first death in enemy party, when half have died, etc. In fact, fighting is deadly and scary. And these morale checks differentiated undead as that enemy that knows no fear and had no morale checks, unless forced upon them by a Cleric's Turn Undead.
- SubiculumCode 4mo ago
  I'd fix my typos and spelling now that I have my coffee, but it will not let me.
- bee_rider 4mo ago
  I wonder, could Morale checks have been inherited from Chainmail? I could see them coming from a wargame…
  - SubiculumCode 4mo ago
    I believe it did, actually. Morale checks are pretty common in war games.
- lopsotronic 4mo ago
  I've retrofitted the Morale mechanic into DND5 and PFRPG1 as a Will Save. I generally run HERO System, though, for both Fantasy and for Star Wars. In HERO, minions of all sorts have to make EGO[1] rolls with cumulative minuses[0] for casualties AND for any BODY damage[2] taken. Fail the EGO roll and there is often is a "collapse cascade" effect as retreating/surrendering units are considered casualties, makes the steadfast units more likely to rout as well. Fighting hordes with one or two strong heroes, that's a good thing. You need to rout those mobs. Each additional engaged melee enemy makes it easier and easier to hit you, and before long the individually weak goblins are climbing all over you, taking off your armor (so they can shiv you to death), smear you with goblin fluids, among other indignities. Anyone with high EGO or strong Mental Defense- which is any Big Bad Guy, unless it is a "Big Bad Also Dumb Guy" like a troll or a rancor - will be harder to turn with a Morale roll. BBADGs can also be fun since you have a chance of stealing control from the bads, with a contested Skill roll (Animal Handling, Diplomacy, Tasty Snacks, etc). I always feel bad for the cave troll in FotR, so that's fun. This sort of thing works more or less the same in DND-based systems, just swap in Will save, and keep in mind the difference of standard deviation between 1d20 and 3d6. An impossible penalty with 3d6 is just another Tuesday with 1d20. [0] Like most things HERO, follow the rule of doubling. -1 for every halving of the original force. [1] i.e., Willpower [2] BODY is what kills you, disables your bits, makes you Bleed. PAIN is equal to BLEED is equal to the hit to Morale roll. Eh, my "stacking BLEED" is a houserule so, take that with $.02, it's not stock. HERO bleed rules are for pansies.
arc-in-space 4mo ago
The monsters running away when wounded is a basic element in the Monster Hunter games, which are still very unique in how they present the relationship between the player character and the world.
bob1029 4mo ago
It sounds like you might be interested in the idea of a PvP multiplayer game. I've never found myself concerned with the morality of camping/flanking/wiping an entire squad in BF6 without mercy because I know they urgently wish to do the exact same thing to me.
- Cthulhu_ 4mo ago
  But one where death is permanent / seriously bad; in Battlefield you just respawn so dying is not a major issue.
  - bob1029 4mo ago
    World of warcraft and battle royale variants exist. One life across a 90 minute game is pretty high stakes, relatively speaking. https://store.steampowered.com/app/3028330/Battlefield_REDSEC/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/3028330/Battlefield_REDSE...
  - butlike 4mo ago
    Check this one out: It's a F2P war game that ships with every new console. You only get one life in the game, so if you die, you can't play it anymore. It's not required to play, but heavily encouraged since it comes pre-installed.
arjie 4mo ago
There's a mod for Battletech (the video game) where people act realistically and it is catastrophically boring. The second you get sufficient advantage over an enemy they panic and promptly eject to save themselves at the cost of their company's mech. Yes, yes, it's what you would do, but it means I only fight 50% of the enemy.
- no-name-here 4mo ago
  Googling returned ‘PanicSystem’ https://www.nexusmods.com/battletech/mods/461 https://www.nexusmods.com/battletech/mods/461 which says it builds on 2 other mods - I don't know if you used this one or another it built on etc?
Modified3019 4mo ago
>CalebCity: “How fearless minions are in ANY video game” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OC375rujZhs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OC375rujZhs
bee_rider 4mo ago
IIRC the “Fallen” in Diablo 2 would sometimes run away. This is sort of funny because they actually did have a type of guy that could revive them. I think the Grunts in Halo would run too. Mostly it seems to be treated as a gimmick or joke in FPS and RPG. Individual enemy AI is usually pretty bad in these genres, so they probably just don’t have the capacity to act smart enough to act scared. Of course, it’s a main feature in some tactical games, like the Total War series. That’s more of an explicit mechanic though.
AlienRobot 4mo ago
That's because the only thing that became "realistic" were the graphics. People don't really want realism anywhere else, because realism means infinite complexity. They just want to hack'n'slash.
- ASalazarMX 4mo ago
  I'd argue that people want entertaining mechanics, not just mindless action. At least not always.
- tayo42 4mo ago
  Realistic Cod would be a nightmare lol
ASalazarMX 4mo ago
It's hard to make enemies behave realistically because people will quickly catch on their patterns. Fallout 76 mobs, for example, make use of line of sight harder than other Bethesda games. They won't spawn where the players are looking, and prefer to spawn at their backs to get a free cheap shot and stagger. With enough players looking everywhere, they might be forced to spawn visibly, but near an object they can use as cover. Also, they have a sixth sense that makes them walk towards a cover if you aim your weapon at them from afar while hidden. It's also notable that a near-death enemy will sometimes flee out of your reach to regen health, and attack you again when it's healthy enough. They will also flee/cover if they're a melee type and you climb where they can't reach you, waiting for you to climb down. I guess the idea was making them realistic, but sometimes this behavior devolves into hide and seek, which can become frustrating as they can use ridiculous things as cover, like chain link fences, floor grills, or a sapling. I have enough realism IRL, I prefer games that prioritize entertaining mechanics rather than frustrating realism.
carlosjobim 4mo ago
They're just games. If you want a more realistic challenge, there's plenty in the real world. And it doesn't have to be violent.

by myfonj 4mo ago

yomismoaqui 4mo ago

The solution for your problem is playing a Souls game

scotty79 4mo ago
How would roleplaying a victim help his problem of not being feared sufficiently by little computer people?

rootlocus 4mo ago

While I agree it's incredibly jarring in some games, I'm always thinking back at a presentation by David Rosen on procedural animation: "First, do no harm to the gameplay". He's talking about animations in particular, but I feel that should be a core pillar for any game designer. Many things are unnatural in games: you don't instantly recover from a beating by eating one apple in real life, but we're ok with it in games because it makes the gameplay fun. https://youtu.be/LNidsMesxSE?si=fGFCTCHm77OJiYu3&t=260 https://youtu.be/LNidsMesxSE?si=fGFCTCHm77OJiYu3&t=260

fc417fc802 4mo ago
> you don't instantly recover from a beating by eating one apple in real life, Contrast with Dwarf Fortress where you'll end up as a crutch user because it's more ¡FUN! that way.

pprotas 4mo ago

Game developers (mostly... hopefully?) try to optimize for the "fun" aspect of a game, not the "realism of the flight/flight instinct" aspect

myfonj 4mo ago
Sure, but I don't think they must be mutually exclusive; on the contrary: in the late stages when your character is a tank, swarms of minions that posed a challenge in early stages become just a nuisance, mostly. You are walking legend slaying dragons for breakfast, everybody and their dog knows about your invincibility … but instead of giving you some respect, they try to bite your heels on the first sight. I guess the "fun aspect" of seeing them flee and not restraining your movement at all could be slightly more satisfying than taking them down in a single hit one-by-one for the thousand time.
- card_zero 4mo ago
  Similarly, a mindless swarm doesn't present much opportunity for tactics, compared to a group with individual self-preservation instincts, and a manipulatable group morale level, or individual fear level mechanisms. On the other hand it's true that realism is not the goal. Reality is no fun, that's why we're playing a game. But it's a sort of distorted echo of reality, I suppose. I see somebody in another comment complaining that enemies who get frightened rob the player of the fun of battles. So it depends what it's all about.
- Jensson 4mo ago
  > I guess the "fun aspect" of seeing them flee and not restraining your movement at all could be slightly more satisfying than taking them down in a single hit one-by-one for the thousand time. Chasing enemies is much more annoying than them coming to you, so that would be a punishment to the player. Players don't like when you punish them in that way, they want to kill the monsters they don't want an upgrade that makes you more powerful make it harder to kill monsters since now they start running.
  - myfonj 4mo ago

SubiculumCode 4mo ago

This is, IMO something that has infected modern mainstream TTRPG: Monsters hardly run away, even if a fireball just killed half of you. One thing B/X AD&D got right were the heavy use of Moral Checks, e.g. Check their morale on first death in enemy party, when half have died, etc. In fact, fighting is deadly and scary. And these morale checks differentiated undead as that enemy that knows no fear and had no morale checks, unless forced upon them by a Cleric's Turn Undead.

SubiculumCode 4mo ago
I'd fix my typos and spelling now that I have my coffee, but it will not let me.
bee_rider 4mo ago
I wonder, could Morale checks have been inherited from Chainmail? I could see them coming from a wargame…
- SubiculumCode 4mo ago
  I believe it did, actually. Morale checks are pretty common in war games.
lopsotronic 4mo ago
I've retrofitted the Morale mechanic into DND5 and PFRPG1 as a Will Save. I generally run HERO System, though, for both Fantasy and for Star Wars. In HERO, minions of all sorts have to make EGO[1] rolls with cumulative minuses[0] for casualties AND for any BODY damage[2] taken. Fail the EGO roll and there is often is a "collapse cascade" effect as retreating/surrendering units are considered casualties, makes the steadfast units more likely to rout as well. Fighting hordes with one or two strong heroes, that's a good thing. You need to rout those mobs. Each additional engaged melee enemy makes it easier and easier to hit you, and before long the individually weak goblins are climbing all over you, taking off your armor (so they can shiv you to death), smear you with goblin fluids, among other indignities. Anyone with high EGO or strong Mental Defense- which is any Big Bad Guy, unless it is a "Big Bad Also Dumb Guy" like a troll or a rancor - will be harder to turn with a Morale roll. BBADGs can also be fun since you have a chance of stealing control from the bads, with a contested Skill roll (Animal Handling, Diplomacy, Tasty Snacks, etc). I always feel bad for the cave troll in FotR, so that's fun. This sort of thing works more or less the same in DND-based systems, just swap in Will save, and keep in mind the difference of standard deviation between 1d20 and 3d6. An impossible penalty with 3d6 is just another Tuesday with 1d20. [0] Like most things HERO, follow the rule of doubling. -1 for every halving of the original force. [1] i.e., Willpower [2] BODY is what kills you, disables your bits, makes you Bleed. PAIN is equal to BLEED is equal to the hit to Morale roll. Eh, my "stacking BLEED" is a houserule so, take that with $.02, it's not stock. HERO bleed rules are for pansies.

arc-in-space 4mo ago

The monsters running away when wounded is a basic element in the Monster Hunter games, which are still very unique in how they present the relationship between the player character and the world.

bob1029 4mo ago

It sounds like you might be interested in the idea of a PvP multiplayer game. I've never found myself concerned with the morality of camping/flanking/wiping an entire squad in BF6 without mercy because I know they urgently wish to do the exact same thing to me.

Cthulhu_ 4mo ago
But one where death is permanent / seriously bad; in Battlefield you just respawn so dying is not a major issue.
- bob1029 4mo ago
  World of warcraft and battle royale variants exist. One life across a 90 minute game is pretty high stakes, relatively speaking. https://store.steampowered.com/app/3028330/Battlefield_REDSEC/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/3028330/Battlefield_REDSE...
- butlike 4mo ago
  Check this one out: It's a F2P war game that ships with every new console. You only get one life in the game, so if you die, you can't play it anymore. It's not required to play, but heavily encouraged since it comes pre-installed.

arjie 4mo ago

There's a mod for Battletech (the video game) where people act realistically and it is catastrophically boring. The second you get sufficient advantage over an enemy they panic and promptly eject to save themselves at the cost of their company's mech. Yes, yes, it's what you would do, but it means I only fight 50% of the enemy.

no-name-here 4mo ago
Googling returned ‘PanicSystem’ https://www.nexusmods.com/battletech/mods/461 https://www.nexusmods.com/battletech/mods/461 which says it builds on 2 other mods - I don't know if you used this one or another it built on etc?

Modified3019 4mo ago

>CalebCity: “How fearless minions are in ANY video game” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OC375rujZhs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OC375rujZhs

bee_rider 4mo ago

IIRC the “Fallen” in Diablo 2 would sometimes run away. This is sort of funny because they actually did have a type of guy that could revive them. I think the Grunts in Halo would run too. Mostly it seems to be treated as a gimmick or joke in FPS and RPG. Individual enemy AI is usually pretty bad in these genres, so they probably just don’t have the capacity to act smart enough to act scared. Of course, it’s a main feature in some tactical games, like the Total War series. That’s more of an explicit mechanic though.

AlienRobot 4mo ago

That's because the only thing that became "realistic" were the graphics. People don't really want realism anywhere else, because realism means infinite complexity. They just want to hack'n'slash.

ASalazarMX 4mo ago
I'd argue that people want entertaining mechanics, not just mindless action. At least not always.
tayo42 4mo ago
Realistic Cod would be a nightmare lol

ASalazarMX 4mo ago

It's hard to make enemies behave realistically because people will quickly catch on their patterns. Fallout 76 mobs, for example, make use of line of sight harder than other Bethesda games. They won't spawn where the players are looking, and prefer to spawn at their backs to get a free cheap shot and stagger. With enough players looking everywhere, they might be forced to spawn visibly, but near an object they can use as cover. Also, they have a sixth sense that makes them walk towards a cover if you aim your weapon at them from afar while hidden. It's also notable that a near-death enemy will sometimes flee out of your reach to regen health, and attack you again when it's healthy enough. They will also flee/cover if they're a melee type and you climb where they can't reach you, waiting for you to climb down. I guess the idea was making them realistic, but sometimes this behavior devolves into hide and seek, which can become frustrating as they can use ridiculous things as cover, like chain link fences, floor grills, or a sapling. I have enough realism IRL, I prefer games that prioritize entertaining mechanics rather than frustrating realism.

carlosjobim 4mo ago

They're just games. If you want a more realistic challenge, there's plenty in the real world. And it doesn't have to be violent.