Pnakotus 说:
Hmm, that's a good point. I'm a cavalryman, so my experiences with foot combat are very brief me-vs-the-world situations. I know what you mean now: it's particularly bad when you're in heavy armour and most of the hits are doing zero or one damage, but they still make you unable to move, attack, block, or anything.
Moves away from hitpoints are always good in principle (I hate the magic number too) but I'm not sure what'd be involved in implementing them. I'd actually been interested in a more Games Workshop way of doing it, where armour, level and ironskin increases your resistance to damage, but you have some fixed low amount of hitpoints. It's better than the 'hitpoint/damage inflation' you get with hp systems, where highlevel guys have totally different weapons which somehow do more damage than older weapons.
Hit points could be replaced with regenerating stamina. Both hard physical activity (sprinting in heavy armor, swinging etc.) and taking hits would reduce stamina, and characters with low stamina would be a bit slower and less effective. If it went to 0, the character would be knocked over and helpless for a short time during which an opponent could finish them off Gothic style. On top of the stamina system, there would be various wound effects which could be applied to various weapons and hitboxes, and a hit which penetrated the armor would check through the wound table and apply the wound for its damage range. Armor would work by providing both deflection and padding. Deflection would prevent the weapon from contacting flesh and reduce the depth of a penetrating wound. There would also be a coverage stat determining which hitboxes it protects and some reworking of the encumbrance system so that slowdown and fatigue effects are separate. Padding would reduce the blunt trauma a weapon inflicts through armor, which would have both be able to cause wounds and reduce stamina. Weapons would replace damage with Penetration, Impact and Lethality (a number generated to represent the severity of wounds it causes) to go with the new armor system.
Here's a concrete example of how my ideal combat would work in game:
A Dark Knight rides past you on a charger and you swing a blow at its legs. The speed of the galloping horse provides a big damage multiplier, and the multiplied damage is checked against the horses leg hitbox armor. The high damage of the weapon, speed multiplier and lack of leg armor allow a lot of damage to get through, applying the worst possible leg wound to the horse - its' leg gets hacked clean off, sending it tumbling to the ground and throwing its rider. Unfortunately, the dark knight manages to get back up before you can finish him off and takes a swing with his mace. You manage to parry it in time, and by holding the attack button as you release the guard* button you convert the parry into a riposte. However, the Dark Knight is wearing full black armor and the quick riposte doesn't have much force behind it; it doesn't do enough penetrating damage to get through his armor. A couple of stamina points are reduced from the blunt impact, but most of it is absorbed by the padding worn under the plate. Your opponent changes his tactics and raises his shield to unleash a brutal bash (if the player were to do this, it would be done by holding attack while releaseing the guard button with a shield equiped), hitting you in the chest and causing enough impact damage to apply the stagger effect. You manage to recover and parry his next few attacks. You sense he is slowing down (swinging a mace repeatedly is bad for stamina, as is falling off a horse) and respond with a full force blow (regular attack). The greatsword manages to penetrate his armor, but only just. He recieves a minor cut, reducing his stamina regeneration. The main effect of this hit, however, is the impact damage. As he is already quite low on stamina, it knocks him to the ground. You step forward, aim down and press the use key, sending your character into a finishing off animation - you kick off his helmet and drive the blade of your sword down into his face.
The fight would have played out pretty differently if you had a pick - it would have been unlikely to kill the horse in one hit (picks only have severe wounds on their head and upper torso table), but once the Dark Knight was down it would have been much more effective against the plate armor. It also would have been very different against a lightly armored enemy, as the greatsword would have been quite likely to kill in one go. Quite a lot of work, but I think it would be worthwhile. It would add a whole lot of variety, realism and excitement to combat without compromising the balance or fun. It might be an idea to also add a toggle for some of the grislier animations this system would provide.
*I'm calling it the guard key, but gameplay wise it would be identical to the current block key. The difference is that it would put your character into a guard position from which he would automatically perform parry animations against attacks directed at that guard. This should put a stop to the complaints about static blocks stopping greatswords without compromising the gameplay and make it look nicer at the same time.
