JanosGolya的最近内容

That's great news! As far I manage to play along on this save using cheats - when setting up the siege, militia will always go out for battle, so I use a cheat to win this, and what's left in town is the normal amount - so I can fight them as usual fair and square. Havn't noticet for this bug to reapear afterwads in any case when I "clean up" town this way. But the cheat mod is very bad for performance.

On a new save this didn't happen at all so far.

Done. Thanks for help!

I also started a new campaign and this bug is not present so far. I will keep you posted if it shows up.

In my opinion and experience: blocking with a shield isnt the problem for untrained man (but it can be an art of course). The problem is to pass the shield for the attacker. The bigger the shield, the easier to block attacks. Big infranty shields purpose was to create moving wall as you said.

Small shields, especialy small bucklers were meant for fencing and more sophisticated skill was needed. Thus any peasant could use big infrantry shield, but buckler required quite a skill.

Big infantry shields were particulary heavy thus making them slow and stationary cover (they were mainly used as cover for crosbowmenn and gunners and was ment to be just transported and set on place, not block with them) Usually crosbowmen carried additional buckler for close combat defence. Also any roman like infantry shields were used mainly to cover the body by just holding them in front of you, making almost impossible to hit the body. medium shields used by XIII century crusaders were quite light and operable. You could just hold them in front of you and the opponent would have quite a problem to get pass it, as it covers most of your body. Of course you could use it also as offensive weapon if you were skilled enough. You have to also consider the fact that most of medieval shields had additional strap around your neck and shoulder to make holding the shield easier and avoid loosing it.

There is no such thing as "a blow that could get pass the shield" when using one handed or two handed weapon. This a fantasy myth.  Shield wasnt only a piece of wood. It was covered most of the cases with hardened leather, most of them were very strong and durable. The resistance for damage of M&B shields is a joke. I have my shield for years and i used it quite a lot and i have just few scratches on the leather. Of course sharp weapons would make much more damage but make it even triple the current ones does, and the shield would last for more then 50 duels - that means thousands of hits (my shield lasted more than 200 dules by now).  Of course more skilled fighter, more time will shield last. Unexperienced fighters have a tendency to block with the edge of the shield, you can destroy the shield easly with that.... but not after one fight!!!.
The only way to get pass the shield are: feints, throwing out of balance, proper timing hits (counters - when opponents sword making attack, his shield often is lowered a bit), or exhausting of the opponent. Only the last one is slightly close to the allmighty "pass the shield blow", cos the enemy dont have a strenght to hold the shield up. And of course throwing him to the ground by horse charge with  lance (if you aim fot the shield, not the head as you suppose to). The iron tip of the lance could penetrate it, but rarely strong enough to hit the man behind the shield, not to mention breake it to pieces. But this is just assumption, no one as far made such a tests in modern times. But horse charge with lance is I think the only possibility to get pass the shield in one hit. Maybe crosbow could do the same with very bad made shields. I dont know.

So I would consider those, making parameters for shields.

I readed this topic about captain, i think it is very good idea, and i think my idea for learning system would fit this idea quite well.


As for the "70 miles anime" issue - it is a typical problem in real life too - most of dueling techniques doesnt work when in formations, you dont have anough space for them. You cannot dodge for example But many techniques was designed esspecially for formations - grabs, and finishing the clashes, fighting with polearms on foot, throwing to the ground, shield bashing, particular charge with shield techniques... all of this is there in medieval manuscripts. They split techniques to dueling and battle ones. So could you, with learning system - some players would be focused on jousting, wining battles by pure calvary charges and good armory. They would choose dueling lessons. Some would focus on Infantry battles - they would choose battle fighting lessons.

In Poland Kingdom infantry unit leaders role depended on the size of the unit but it is untranslatable so lets assume that it english i was "100 men leader" for captain and "10 men leader" for sergeant. Of course rarely Captains unit was full 100 men. Captains in real life commanded units of 20-100 men, and their main role was to make sure army commander units were followed. Sergeants role was to make sure ranks are in order, each rank had two sergeants on sides for a full controll of the rank. But calvary units were slight different. They were orginised by "Lance" sub-unit (of course polish term for that unit translates to lance). Each lace includes A knight, his pages (armed similar to the knight), some crosbowmen, servants. So it was about 10 men. So one calvary unit was 2-50 lances each (sometimes more). 
This organisation was quite common all over Europe as far as I remember, with slight national difrences. Of course i described it with much simplicity, it was more sophisticated orginally.


In my oppinion it is a great idea to add at least captain role (i would add sergeants too). I think it could be hero skill or captains could be hired in taverns. Im not sure whenever they should be immortal or not but I am sure that heroes should be able to act as captains. I think that their role in game should be:

1. Leadership advantage for any particular unit.
2. Abilty to act at will if that order is given.
3. Their presence strongly increase units ability to hold formations, rally fleeing units etc.
4. Increased party ability to lead battles without player involvement (when player is wounded and orders to charge without him).
5. Train unit in certain tactics - as was stated before - calvary captain would be less effective leading infantry, but leading calvary he could gave them some special tactical abilities like certain formations or hold pikes to the ground, etc.

All that should be of course dependent on level of particular captain.

heh, this Achilles combo was just an example that even in real life you can combine some moves to acheive certain goal and do that in sequence every time the same. In this particular attack I move quickly from side to side runing towads the opponent (much like in basketball) to disorient him and then jump toward his shield (not his pke or sword ) to hit him in the left shoulder over the shield. If he is experienced and fast he will easly just rise the shield. If he is not experienced too much he will get hit. But i wouldnt use that in real battle, cos there are much better moves to eliminate the enemy. this was purely for fun.

I was analysing your arguments and came to some conclusions.

First the locking system. I am still not convinced that you are able to hold steady view on the oponnent, strafing and attacking him the same time, especially if you have to use the mouse to determine the direction of the attack. In some moment, especially in very close combat, you will loose your opponent from sight. It doesnt happens in reality, unless you are hit, or pushed or tricked in some other way, you are naturally looking at enemy. Dont tell me it is hard to implement into the game cos every AI in M&B already have this. If you will let the player enough controll on it it would help him fight. One other thing that determines the usual chaos during the fight is almost in every game without locking, characters are running during the fight. You dont run during the fight in real (unless you are making charge for purpose). You step around or forward or back but you step. In M&B you run. You run much slower then other games but it is still running, and for sure it is far for typical fighting steps. Theese steps are faster or slower, sometimes you can be extreamly fast with them but they are still quite broad steps. If you think that locking is not needed, i could agree with that if my character would step in proper way. Only then the overall controll on looking direction would be sufficient enough for my hand and mouse react accordingly and similar to natural habit. yhe closest and very recent example of good locking system is in the GTA IV. The fist fights look so real! too bad they dint give more control on the moves to the player, to choose the direction of attack. But the system tahat you lock with right mouse and block with space is working very fluently (actually I will probably switch keys for defence and blocking for even more fuid fight, it is a habit from M&B to block with RMB). It could be done right with little effort. ANd you dont even have to use the system, it depends entirely on you if you choose it. I fought 1vs1 and tried 1vsMany also and it works fine. It is much less sophisticated then in Severance, or Knigthts of the temple, and it works swiftly.

Second, the combos thing. I agree that too much combos could kill the fun and flow of the fight. That is why I hate all the Mortal Combat and similar games. After many arguments you wrote I thought that it is not nessesary to use any combos and echieve the same result of real life sequences. I analised it on one example - the grab. Usually the grab takes place if I push my body forward during blocking, making sort of clash, i grab the opponents right hand. And this is the moment usually leads to some complicated combo in games. But in reality I have some choices - I can move the hand to the sides or top or bottom, pull it or push it. Then depending on what I did, I will be prepared to execute one of many finalizing moves. Throw him out of balance to the ground, step in - putting my leg behid him and push him over, relase my sword hand and stab him in stomach or hit him with pommel, take his weapon out, pull him with turn so i will make Aikido like throw (there are lot of similiraties between Aikido and medieval texts in case of of movement, dodging and grabs). If the game reflects that, if we split the "combo" to sequences  (grabbing - choosing direction of push/pull - final action), in each giving the choice to player, it would give us quite many possibilities and a feeling we are in control of the fight. We will use moves - not combos, just as it is in real life, cos every real life "combo" like the achilles one, could be changed to some differnt move almost any moment, if I wish to.

Third, the automatic defending and implementation of it - the beauty of M&B is that it already have the basics for such system. If you push the right mouse button your character will defend from the proper direction according to the attack (depending on the difficulty settings).  Moreover, somtimes AI makes fake attacks or very fast double attacks on diferent sides (I dont know it was purposely included by Devs or not but sometimes it happens).  The system is already in the game. It is the only reason I decided to talk about it here. Cos the engine is very promising of the fighting system that would really reflects real life one. But it would need a lot of effort and good design of course to make it one. To create convincing defending system, Devs should expand existing defending system making many new animations, and give them some variety for particular direction. F.e two or three diferent  stances for right defence, with random choose of one of theese three animations. And the fights will look soooo much better. That what I would do as a first step. Then adding some new features, whenever it would be shield bashing, dodgeing or grabing etc..

Fouth - the learning system. I dont know what is wrong with this for some of you. It is natural for people to learn pre-described moves. If you go to Karate lessons they will teach you basic moves first, then dificult moves, and then some sort of tactical improvisation with them. If you take Tango dance lessons, they will also teach you certain steps and moves first, and then some improvisation can be done. When I teach somebody how to fight with sword  I tell them - "there are 5 basic lines of attack and five basic directions of defence, for every line and direction there are several moves to choose from. For every attack type, there is some type of defence, some of defences could be used for several attack types" and then I will show them the moves and ask them to repeat as long as they become natural. And then I teach them tricks - feints, dodges and grabs. And at the end the improvisation and adaptation, and tactics. I dont want my character in a game to learn combos, combos sucks. I want my char to learn different styles and combine them to his own. To learn moves. I want him to learn some tactical skills also, like the ability to fix the butt of a pike to the ground to fight against calvary, and then with proper trainer level, to teach my soldiers how to do that. Or to keep certain formations. Now in M&B the only real advantage of learning is that I can be faster and toughter. But when i will fight with faster and stronger NPC, would it be a peasant or Noble - he wins, no matter what I will do, cos I cannot use any advantage of better fighting technique. If I could move myself into the game with my current real life abilities I would defeat every level opponent by simple fighting techniques he doesnt use right now. But I cant use my hard learned abilities cos every god damn NPC, is it a King or Peasant figts eaxactly the same way, the only difference being speed, health and armour. And I want MORE!!

And maybe some of Devs will hear my begging Of course I am not sure if my idea will work fine but observing other games I can see that many other desiners are trying to use similar ideas and that some of them arleady works in games and are good.

I understand the point about manual control for any of my ideas. I think it should really depend on personal preference of the player and affect overal dificulty settings just as it is now in M&B.

I don't agree that sticky lock wouldn't work on multiple opponents - in contrary, in games where this system was included, usually you fought with multiple opponents at the same time. CrazyEyes, you are right about obvious tactics of attacking weaker enemies, it is how it's actually done in most reenacting battles I've seen (at least in melees in Poland), but you don't have to "look your enemy in the eyes" to beat him. You just lock YOUR view on YOUR target. It is his problem if he looks at you or not. It is a human habit. Your whole body reacts according to that habit. And it is doing it EXTREAMLY fast. You can't achieve that with mouse, cos very different set of body controls is used. Of course many hardcore players train that, but I have casual player on mind inventing such a system. If you have the ability to switch it off it wouldnt be e problem for you, you dont have to use it. The system HAVE TO be intuitive and natural, as it is in real life, to be enjoyable for players. The advantages of that system is that you are focused more on the actual fighting, especialy when mouse is used to determine the direction of the attack.

I agree that automatic defending could be switched on or off by pushing the defence button as it is now in M&B. Again it should depend on personal preference. I think it would be nice for a hardcore player to be able to not only defend on his demand (by pushing a button) but also to control the direction of defence to make thnigs tougher. But the defence itself should be more sophisticated.  Currently you have only simple blocks and those blocks are done in rather lazy manner - usually when you block in real world, you should face the attack with your body, not only move your hands there, otherwise strong blow will hit you. Analising current blocks in M&B - most of them wouldnt hold the attack. But that is a matter of simply reworking the animations. Give me the proper tools and I will do that for you
But wouldnt be fun if you could switch the type of defence from block to parry, or grab, or clash, or dodge, during the fight? By just pushing the "style change" button? Wouldn't be fun if you could make your own style presets, by learning different moves and choosing how to react on different attacks or defences? Thats what we do in real life. It would be fun for me in M&B I am sure

CrazyEyes 说:

As for defense being reflexive - that all depends on the training of the opponent. Not everyone in the realm of Calradia has held a sword for ten years. You assume that all the opponents on the battlefield are in SCA, or something. The average peasant levy would see a guy striking and, at worst, freeze up. At best, they would place their weapon in the general trajectory of the opponent's, flinch, and hope for the best.

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You are right about that, I was describing a possible situation of facing equal or stronger opponent. But it is obvious for me that low level opponent woludn't be able to do the same things as high level. It really depends on the balance of the game. We can assume that simple peasant don't know any special moves, he defends badly or not at all, and flees whenever he feels danger. And we can also assume that Sea Rider, which is very similar in apperance to Vikings, could be trained by his tribe elders in basic fighting skills, formations, and much braver then simple peasant (as Vikings were in real life). Then, some hero characters or lords would be well trained by teachers and experienced in battles, and awould be able to chalenge you in a very sophisticated fights, on the arenas, in honourable duel, judge court fights, or when 1 vs 1 situation occurs on the battlefield.

CrazyEyes 说:

The feint/grab/whatever design describes an atrocious combo-esque repetitive system of combat found in games such as Assassin's Creed.

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I don't base my ideas on other games, I am trying to base it on real life. And in real life combat, you have pre-learned moves. Some of them are simple, some of them are very sophisticated. What we use is based on actual medieval texts, mixed with our real life experience. And those of us who learnded moves from medieval texts wins with those who didn't. As simple as that.
Currently in M&B you have moves as well. They are repetive also, cos you know what your character will do when you hold the button and move your mouse right or left - it does that every time exactly the same. It is not Die By The Sword.
And I would like to use more types of this moves, i would like to choose what kind of move my character will use depending on the style I  learned (and paid the teacher to teach me one ) and set up in my custom style. I know from experience, that specific kind of grab works on almost every opponent, and with few combined moves I can throw him to the ground, and I can repeat that almost every time exactly the same. And I learned that from medieval book. You can call it combo if you like, I don't care, but it works for me Moreover, you probably remember very Hollywood combo Achilles (Brad Pit) does in Troy movie? When he jumps and stab the enemy in the neck? I tried it on my opponents just for fun and for simple show. And here is surprise - it works on unexperienced opponent and works very fine. But it is a combo int it? And a movie one

CrazyEyes 说:

And your "learn a move" idea would shove the game dangerously toward a ****ty RPG/fighting game genre blend.

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Usually mixed genres works very fine. How would you describe M&B? It have levels, XP points, and quests - so it is RPG. You have armies (parties), sieges, city mangement, resources, battlefields with real life strategic situations - so it is RTS. You have real time 1v1 or 1vsMany swordfights, character fully controled by the player - so it is pure fighting genre. So M&B IS a "****ty RPG/RTS/Fighting game genre blend". Yet you love that game, arent you?
I love that game too but I know that this excelent game could be even better. That is why i decided to join the disscussion, cos devs will apreciate for sure, every new idea, and they will choose whatever fits their vision. I have small chances to make my once designed game came to life, as i moved frome game industry to movie industry quite a while, but i can for sure share some of my design with them, as they actually make very similar design came true. I wouldnt be afraid to shift it to one genre or another, cos it is already mixed genre, and everybody finds something fun in it. I dont want to change what is good in it, but you must admit that combat system is far from being perfect.

As for battles I've read some of the topics Swadius mentioned, and I'am aware that most of the problems was thoroughly discused here. I wanted to point them in contrary to my real life experience. I will get in details on them on proper topics soon.l