Combat is boring, a note to Henrik.

[ThaBadMan]

This is a strawman argument. Feedback has been provided, and the feedback was the desync was making it impractical for anyone outside of EU and perhaps east coast of NA to actually play and compete with EU counter parts. Feedback was also provided by many saying that they should consider having a NA server. What do you want me to tell you? Henrik is going to do what he's going to do. They only want the feedback they want, and some things he's not going to budge on. It was the same deal with MO1, the only difference being is they didn't know any better back then.

You do know one of the best players during the MO2 Alpha was/is an American ?

So how does that arguement hold any truth ? If 1 American can overcome ping why cant the rest ? Why do all Americans who cant get good blame things out of their control when we know of NAs who can beat EUs ?

I dont believe you played before and after ping normalization since you think desync was present. Ping was present making "desync" vs lower ping players as their attacks cut the animation short and hits went through blocks, this is still happening now vs UK players.

Now on to some desync issues that worsened over time from faster combat to alot slower combat.
Humanoid bug was introduced with the Bakti patch when combat was at its lowest so far in Alpha, warping/teleportation during group fights was introduced with Bakti patch(small movement sync issues was always present but warping/teleportation came Bakti patch), stuck on your screen humanoid bug came with Bakti patch.

Feedback is a weird thing when bias is allowed.
In the beginning of MO2 Alpha movement was faster than now and swing speed was faster than now. Both was increased in first patch due to massive feedback from testers.

Fast forward some weeks after more players join and the top players have learned the combat and is dominating being able to beat upto 10 guys in a row, No healing ingame meaning unless you died there was no way of gaining health. As said a few weeks gone with no complaints and suddenly complaints start about combat being too fast. This did not stop until combat got so slow and easy its now known as Parrywhore Online 2.
All the while nerf after nerf came to limit the skill ceiling the ones who complained was getting humiliated in combat, first with Meduli patch did the worse part of the testing community start to manage to block the right way since they now have enough time to react for their lack of training and experience.

Now the exact same thing happened in MO and you guessed right, its the same goddamn players influencing the imo negative changes. Coincidense ?

Then now my question is did they not learn anything from MO, do they think MO2 will have any other result than MO if you copy the development direction and doing the same mistakes once again ?

 

[ThaBadMan]

I'm not against them adjusting numbers, I'm just trying to make sense of the argument. The combat is slow, but slow compared to what? What is "slow" ? the way characters move? The swing speed? All of the above?

Slow compared to their original vision, slow compared to average human reaction times.
When going by granpa speed, your nowhere near average reaction times even.

Both MO and MO2 started out with fast paced combat systems, this is to draw in the desired playerbase. Once drawn in they are dismissed and direction of development changes drastically.

What SV so go on to do is listen to the wrong crowd and dumb down their game making it easy and the desired player base leaves and the influencers stay whining theres no population while jerking each other off.

Whats a better arguement than being bad and blaming speed in combat desyncing you so you lose ? Almost no way to find out whats reality, that is except when people record you doing what you say you cant.

Valoran has been the longest supporter of granpa speed in combat, hes an Aussie with horrible ping and he blames desync and ping means he cant parry EUs, if you hit my youtube up you will find duels against him where he can parry most of my hits but clearly see he lacks combat experience and skills.
Hes been playing MO for years and still havent learned the combat fundamentals but still influence the combat of the game in a negative way to be able to stand his ground vs better players.

This is a trend you can see in every player whos against faster combat, especially now after ping normalization vastly improving low ping vs high ping.

They managed to ruin and kill MO, im doing all in my power to save the sequel so MOs original vision finally can shine.

 

[Handsome Young Man]

If they sped combat up, etc and the issues (desync, etc) get worse, what will the argument be?

Having played combat before all the changes, and after I can say that the over all performance of combat has increased dramatically. It's not perfect, desync still happens, and hopefully they can fix that even more. I will say it went from barely playable in a lot of scenarios, to fair and playable.

The ping normalization was only half of the solution, slowing combat pace down was the other half. What they're trying to do is impractical with one server. Even dark fall online had regional servers and that was without having directional combat. The compromise is this, one regional server with slower combat and ping normalization or two regional servers with faster combat and less or no ping normalization. You can't have both from a technical stand point. Companies with more money than SV have tried. For anyone that means the EvE comparison, that's a terrible example because of the fact combat in the game is as slow as it gets, and it gets even slower with time dilation.

It's not like MO2 is skill less. The better player will usually win more times than not still.

I don't want to seem like I'm attacking you or anything ,I think we both want MO2 to be successful. Having some experience on other (although far smaller) projects has given me insight as to what kind of rabbit hole these types of games can dig for themselves when it comes to network infrastructure and trying to accommodate players from various regions. There is no catch all or silver bullet for what they're trying to do. If they want to have the one regional server located in EU, and still want to encourage NA and other regions to purchase their product they need to bend the knee to them some how. That usually means making compromises.

If it didn't work, then we'd go back to the drawing board and try to find other solutions. I just feel a bit slighted that we never got to experience it without the slowed down combat.

 

[Javelin]

If it didn't work, then we'd go back to the drawing board and try to find other solutions. I just feel a bit slighted that we never got to experience it without the slowed down combat.

In MO1's combat alpha the combat was pretty fast, movement was fast once you trained up and when there weren't hundreds of players on screen the game was fun. You could fight off multiple opponents if you were fast enough at reacting and aggressive enough. Some weapons felt like they had a purpose, for instance spears had a slight knock back that was very useful to solo players when outnumbered. You could keep enemies at bay and tactically deal with situations.

But this... this has turned into a stand still and swing parry trade system that simply isn't fun. That's the biggest thing here guys it's not fun and combat is king. Above all other systems if combat sucks your game fails period. It's the backbone that adds purpose to all other systems.

 

[Handsome Young Man]

Yeah this combat is hit trading, riposte holding, and parry-botting.

 

[Wesley Snipes]

You do know one of the best players during the MO2 Alpha was/is an American ?

I dont believe you played before and after ping normalization since you think desync was present. Ping was present making "desync" vs lower ping players as their attacks cut the animation short and hits went through blocks, this is still happening now vs UK players.

Now on to some desync issues that worsened over time from faster combat to alot slower combat.
Humanoid bug was introduced with the Bakti patch when combat was at its lowest so far in Alpha, warping/teleportation during group fights was introduced with Bakti patch(small movement sync issues was always present but warping/teleportation came Bakti patch), stuck on your screen humanoid bug came with Bakti patch.

You can believe what you want honestly. Playing from the west coast was a great big shit sandwich experience back then compared to now. I'm definitely not a fan of the perpetual parry wars combat has become, but that is actually pretty fixable (and something that will be fixed).

Whats a better arguement than being bad and blaming speed in combat desyncing you so you lose ? Almost no way to find out whats reality, that is except when people record you doing what you say you cant.

Obviously there's those that will blame ping for everything, but I think as far as MO1/MO2 is concerned, ping WAS a huge issue. As a developer you never want your players fighting against the game; which was a constant issue.

 

[ThaBadMan]

You can believe what you want honestly. Playing from the west coast was a great big shit sandwich experience back then compared to now. I'm definitely not a fan of the perpetual parry wars combat has become, but that is actually pretty fixable (and something that will be fixed).



Obviously there's those that will blame ping for everything, but I think as far as MO1/MO2 is concerned, ping WAS a huge issue. As a developer you never want your players fighting against the game; which was a constant issue.

Dont know what to say here honestly. Blaming a combat system for technical faults. Combat systems have nothing to do with the technical side.
Bad code, bad optimization, bad polish, bad hardware, etc was the reason early MO was bad for most people. Their computers could literally not handle the game neither could the servers.
Dont have a good enough PC, Internet, use wireless ? Yes you will have TONs of issues in MO/MO2 that noone else will have from the getgo.

Yea as you say believe whatever the fuck you want, just dont expect people to buy it up.

 

[Wesley Snipes]

Dont know what to say here honestly. Blaming a combat system for technical faults. Combat systems have nothing to do with the technical side.
Bad code, bad optimization, bad polish, bad hardware, etc was the reason early MO was bad for most people. Their computers could literally not handle the game neither could the servers.
Dont have a good enough PC, Internet, use wireless ? Yes you will have TONs of issues in MO/MO2 that noone else will have from the getgo.

Your tech is going to be the deciding factor of what type of combat you're going to have. What do you think devs do, they just hot drop combat into whatever system and it just works? What do you expect the devs to do? Support combat on a back end that clearly can't handle it? You think they slowed combat down and implemented ping normalization because they wanted to? These were fixes for problems on the back end. Development is all about iteration, and they iterated their way to an acceptable solution in their minds. It's funny because if MO1 started off where MO2 is today we wouldn't even be having this debate.

I can understand why you're getting hot and heavy. You have no real argument, you just want something but you don't understand why things are the way they are. It's called being objective, and not everyone can be.

 

[Handsome Young Man]

Your tech is going to be the deciding factor of what type of combat you're going to have. What do you think devs do, they just hot drop combat into whatever system and it just works? What do you expect the devs to do? Support combat on a back end that clearly can't handle it? You think they slowed combat down and implemented ping normalization because they wanted to? These were fixes for problems on the back end. Development is all about iteration, and they iterated their way to an acceptable solution in their minds. It's funny because if MO1 started off where MO2 is today we wouldn't even be having this debate.

I can understand why you're getting hot and heavy. You have no real argument, you just want something but you don't understand why things are the way they are. It's called being objective, and not everyone can be.

What lol.

 

[Wesley Snipes]

What lol.

Which part did you not understand?

I want to have X combat in Y game. Well okay, what kind of solutions can we buy / make to support X combat In Y game. Ultimately it becomes what can we do to make combat work with the tech we have and still achieve an acceptable result. For most small indie studios they live and die project to project. SV doesn't have a 100 man team working on MO2, they don't have an army of engineers to get the "best result". They can manage a workable solution tho. I guess what I'm saying is your expectations are way too high for the size of the team tackling a project as big as this. The network side alone must be hell on wheels to make directional melee based combat work on a single world server and accommodate people from around the world. That type of combat is a real son of a bitch to work with, and there's a real reason why MMOS generally don't tackle it. If they can speed up combat and keep the ping and desync issues marginalized, that's great. If they can't tho, well, I guess people are just going to have to settle for what they give us or move on.

Playing from the west coast, the game feels significantly better.

 

[Handsome Young Man]

Which part did you not understand?

I want to have X combat in Y game. Well okay, what kind of solutions can we buy / make to support X combat In Y game. Ultimately it becomes what can we do to make combat work with the tech we have and still achieve an acceptable result. For most small indie studios they live and die project to project. SV doesn't have a 100 man team working on MO2, they don't have an army of engineers to get the "best result". They can manage a workable solution tho. I guess what I'm saying is your expectations are way too high for the size of the team tackling a project as big as this. The network side alone must be hell on wheels to make directional melee based combat work on a single world server and accommodate people from around the world. That type of combat is a real son of a bitch to work with, and there's a real reason why MMOS generally don't tackle it. If they can speed up combat and keep the ping and desync issues marginalized, that's great. If they can't tho, well, I guess people are just going to have to settle for what they give us or move on.

Playing from the west coast, the game feels significantly better.

Did you play MO1, if so who did you play on; and who do you play on MO2?

 

[ChonoKhan]

Disagree, even though I'm still new to the game, I find the combat much smoother. It's also simple and easy to use, unlike combat in MO1 which relied on spamming the fastest, hardest hitting "flavour of the month" weapon and abusing lag.

I hope they keep this system. It's not as advanced as Mordhau's combat, but its better than the previous MO.

 

[Wesley Snipes]

Did you play MO1, if so who did you play on; and who do you play on MO2?

Both under my forum name. I played MO1 for a few months during steam release with a group and friends (all of us left the game because it was a hot mess). In comparison MO2 is a step up.

 

[ThaBadMan]

Your tech is going to be the deciding factor of what type of combat you're going to have. What do you think devs do, they just hot drop combat into whatever system and it just works? What do you expect the devs to do? Support combat on a back end that clearly can't handle it? You think they slowed combat down and implemented ping normalization because they wanted to? These were fixes for problems on the back end. Development is all about iteration, and they iterated their way to an acceptable solution in their minds. It's funny because if MO1 started off where MO2 is today we wouldn't even be having this debate.

I can understand why you're getting hot and heavy. You have no real argument, you just want something but you don't understand why things are the way they are. It's called being objective, and not everyone can be.

I am a player, a player who test games. I dont claim to know game development at its core, but I know it from the viewpoint of a player and a tester.

If very fast paced combat performs just as well as very slow paced combat I know the tech can handle it and that issues higher pingers have is due to higher ping and not the fact that the server and hardware cant handle it.

My arguement is that since theres no gain to slowing down combat except for the few very high ping players present, why do we do it when the result is ruining combat for the 98% players who dont have the high ping problems ? Its kinda a lose lose situation.
Ping normalization is the first fix to ping that has worked so far, after it arrived there hasnt even been a attempt to raise speeds to improve the game.

What we are plagued with is an unoptimized and unpolished game that struggles with movement syncing when many players are at the same spot, which has little to do with the pace of movement or speed in combat since we had the problem with higher speed and we continue with the problem now with snail pace.

Sad when you speak of objectivity when you scream bias from your posts. Such sad much wow.

 

[Wesley Snipes]

I am a player, a player who test games. I dont claim to know game development at its core, but I know it from the viewpoint of a player and a tester.

If very fast paced combat performs just as well as very slow paced combat I know the tech can handle it and that issues higher pingers have is due to higher ping and not the fact that the server and hardware cant handle it.

My arguement is that since theres no gain to slowing down combat except for the few very high ping players present, why do we do it when the result is ruining combat for the 98% players who dont have the high ping problems ? Its kinda a lose lose situation.
Ping normalization is the first fix to ping that has worked so far, after it arrived there hasnt even been a attempt to raise speeds to improve the game.

What we are plagued with is an unoptimized and unpolished game that struggles with movement syncing when many players are at the same spot, which has little to do with the pace of movement or speed in combat since we had the problem with higher speed and we continue with the problem now with snail pace.

Sad when you speak of objectivity when you scream bias from your posts. Such sad much wow.

Your argument is "Fuck you cause I want mine". Where are you getting these statistics from? 98% of players from where? 98% of the small base of veterans? 98% of europeans ? You know this game is being released on steam right? Who is henrik making this game for? Let's be honest he's making the game for himself, and we're just along for the ride. Is there even an argument that MO1 was absolute diarrhea when it came to all the lag switching, animation glitching and other BS people had to do to "compete". You think henrik, or any sensible developer would want that in their game? If MO2 wants to entice people to play it, and even more people to stay it needs to have solid, fair and functional combat that works for everyone. None of this getting swooped from 10 ft away because you're next to the guy on his client, but not on yours.

I can only attest to combat as someone who played MO1, and the earlier versions of MO2. Yes desync still happens with the changes, but far less than before. That's an improvement. If they can "speed up" combat and keep the improvements made I'm okay with that, and if they can't I'm fine with that as well.

 

[ThaBadMan]

Your argument is "Fuck you cause I want mine". Where are you getting these statistics from? 98% of players from where? 98% of the small base of veterans? 98% of europeans ? You know this game is being released on steam right? Who is henrik making this game for? Let's be honest he's making the game for himself, and we're just along for the ride. Is there even an argument that MO1 was absolute diarrhea when it came to all the lag switching, animation glitching and other BS people had to do to "compete". You think henrik, or any sensible developer would want that in their game? If MO2 wants to entice people to play it, and even more people to stay it needs to have solid, fair and functional combat that works for everyone. None of this getting swooped from 10 ft away because you're next to the guy on his client, but not on yours.

I can only attest to combat as someone who played MO1, and the earlier versions of MO2. Yes desync still happens with the changes, but far less than before. That's an improvement. If they can "speed up" combat and keep the improvements made I'm okay with that, and if they can't I'm fine with that as well.

This is where you can say I am totally unbiased and completely objective.

I merely want the games original vision to be complete. The game sold to me in 09 that has yet to arrive.
You can say I am the games most loyal fan, I am the guy that will be here through thick and thin reminding the devs of their original vision that they sell out on time and time again.

I was here for the ride and I loved it, then te ride got changed and now I want the ride I was promised, bought and have supported for over 10 years.

The most unstable MO2 has been was on patch day in Bakti. Thats after all slow downs to combat. I have been here testing non stop since day 1 of Combat Alpha, lying dont get you anywhere here dude. Lying dont make your arguements any better either so better stop that, I know your riding your agenda here but wont work.

And ofc im talking about percentage of testers here. I have dueled pretty much all testers too many times to count, I know when theres ping issues or simply mistakes being made. So from that experience almost all players testing this game have no problem with the parry system now nor had any problems parrying when combat was faster.
So again just because 2% have ping problems thats only fixable by ruining the fun fast paced combat for the rest of the 98% of testers, is that a good enough reason and big enough reward for such negative result ?

 

[Wesley Snipes]

This is where you can say I am totally unbiased and completely objective.

I merely want the games original vision to be complete. The game sold to me in 09 that has yet to arrive.

That was a different game tho. This is Mortal Online 2. In fact, I'm willing to argue that that game wasn't ever really going to work the way they wanted it to. This is kind also the opposite of unbiased and objective one you inject what you want. You're only looking at it through the perspective of what you want, and what was sold to you. My argument has never been "I don't want faster combat", in fact I'm not really arguing anything besides the fact I understand why they would've made that change on the technical level.

I was here for the ride and I loved it, then te ride got changed and now I want the ride I was promised, bought and have supported for over 10 years.

This usually happens with games, especially sequels. The developers go back and look at what worked and what didn't.

The most unstable MO2 has been was on patch day in Bakti. Thats after all slow downs to combat. I have been here testing non stop since day 1 of Combat Alpha, lying dont get you anywhere here dude. Lying dont make your arguements any better either so better stop that, I know your riding your agenda here but wont work.

Everyone that disagrees with you is a liar and has agenda; but you don't. Gotcha. I just call a spade a spade. I'm guessing you mean this last patch day with the stress test? Well no shit man, but I doubt that had more to do the 2000 or so players and not so much the changes. Like I said, combat isn't perfect, they still need to iterate on it more. On a personal level, the difference between march/april and now is night a day difference. I went from visible watching people hit me from a significant distance away, to actually being able to having a fight with someone with much fewer instances of desync or goofiness.

And ofc im talking about percentage of testers here. I have dueled pretty much all testers too many times to count, I know when theres ping issues or simply mistakes being made. So from that experience almost all players testing this game have no problem with the parry system now nor had any problems parrying when combat was faster.

How do you tell the difference between the two? I doubt you truly know to be honest unless you're sitting on the other side watching the screen, and I'm not sure where you're getting these statistics from. If you want to talk about lying and agenda you're display a good example. Make up statistics, and then deny deny deny.

This video is a good example of what a player with severe desync issues. Yes, he makes mistakes, but that doesn't invalidate that there was/is a network problem with the game itself.

 

[ThaBadMan]

That was a different game tho. This is Mortal Online 2. In fact, I'm willing to argue that that game wasn't ever really going to work the way they wanted it to. This is kind also the opposite of unbiased and objective one you inject what you want. You're only looking at it through the perspective of what you want, and what was sold to you. My argument has never been "I don't want faster combat", in fact I'm not really arguing anything besides the fact I understand why they would've made that change on the technical level.



This usually happens with games, especially sequels. The developers go back and look at what worked and what didn't.



Everyone that disagrees with you is a liar and has agenda; but you don't. Gotcha. I just call a spade a spade. I'm guessing you mean this last patch day with the stress test? Well no shit man, but I doubt that had more to do the 2000 or so players and not so much the changes. Like I said, combat isn't perfect, they still need to iterate on it more. On a personal level, the difference between march/april and now is night a day difference. I went from visible watching people hit me from a significant distance away, to actually being able to having a fight with someone with much fewer instances of desync or goofiness.



How do you tell the difference between the two? I doubt you truly know to be honest unless you're sitting on the other side watching the screen, and I'm not sure where you're getting these statistics from. If you want to talk about lying and agenda you're display a good example. Make up statistics, and then deny deny deny.

This video is a good example of what a player with severe desync issues. Yes, he makes mistakes, but that doesn't invalidate that there was/is a network problem with the game itself.

A different game with the same vision and the same goal.

If they already knew combat needed to be slow then why did they start out with a faster pace ? And why did they increase the speed in first patch ?

No, those using false info and make up shit to suit their arguements are liars.

Bakti has been here longer than the stress test, another proof you dont know what your talking about.
Below 100 players outside Bakti was enough to make the server severly unstable.

The stress tests 2k players made many more issues pop up, but I must say the server handled it way better than I thought. Rubberbanding players was all over the place during stress test first day.

All highest pingers hit you from far away back then and now, nothings changed unless you test for 5 min and conclude everything is fine ofc.

Thats literally the worst example you could possibly use. Lets just end it there. Potatoes nor calculators should be used playing MO2, the amount of INI changes done in the making of that video is insane. Its probably good that guy wont be playing MO2 since they dont allow such anymore.

There are things you cant fix no matter what SV tries. Bad computers and bad internet is a sure way to gain a plethora of issues most of which yes can be blamed on desync.
Some things are just unfixable sadly. Again no need to ruin combat for the rest of us because of a few percentages of "gamers" with dinosaur era equipment. Not our fault they didnt adapt to times irl.
Anyway think im done with you, im not here to simply argue for nothing while not having knowledge of what im argueing about...

 

[Wesley Snipes]

A different game with the same vision and the same goal.

If they already knew combat needed to be slow then why did they start out with a faster pace ? And why did they increase the speed in first patch ?

That's how development works. You try something, you test, you review the data and you iterate.

There are things you cant fix no matter what SV tries. Bad computers and bad internet is a sure way to gain a plethora of issues most of which yes can be blamed on desync.
Some things are just unfixable sadly. Again no need to ruin combat for the rest of us because of a few percentages of "gamers" with dinosaur era equipment. Not our fault they didnt adapt to times irl.

So we're just going to hand wave the west coast of NA under the banner of "bad computers and bad internet". Henrik once said that the MO 1 NA community made up 65% of game's population. That's quite a lot larger than 2%. If 65% of your game pop is experiencing various amounts of desync fairly often in a full loot pvp game you've screwed the pooch. Sorry, henrik isn't developing the game for TheBadMan and his five friends.

Anyway think im done with you, im not here to simply argue for nothing while not having knowledge of what im argueing about...

Haven't you been doing that all along?

 

[Skydancer]

Buying an idea is an investment - something that is not material. Investments carry risks - the idea may not ever be realized, or not fully realized. I think SV have made it clear what their technological hurdles have been in MO2 and how they have been addressing them, and what their future intentions are in melee combat strategy options. SV are conforming their vision with their reality and not everything makes the cut. Our ideas as players are no different.

My take on making combat less boring:

Observation: combat rewarding wild spinning to throw off prediction and to mask your directional draws and blocks puts a toll on the prediction code, and blocking/parrying.

Proposal: Introducing other ways for combatants to be strategic without this would reduce the need for players to resort to these 'gamey' tactics resulting in a smoother combat experience for those participating and observing, while ensuring prediction is more effective at tracking movement and position.

A larger variety of attacks and counters increases strategic choice and in turn the skill ceiling

• shield breaks
• bring back double tap dodges for closing distance and retreating!)
• introduce effects for landing a hit based on hitbox - hit an arm to make the reaction time for the arm temporarily slower (helps a skilled player control the fight, reduces enemies reaction in attack and defense

Success measures:

• Reducing the time to kill in duels between players with large discrepancies in skill level
• Increasing the tactical options available to all players in melee combat
• no observable increase in sync and ping related areas, preferably an improvement

Some of these might help make combat less boring without the limiting factor be the prediction or ping normalization. Now it's up to SV to mine these threads to take on suggestions they think are in line with their goals and within their technological constraints.