Last Man Standing: Alternatives to Ending A Battle

[JohnathanStrange]

What would be some good alternatives to our fight-to-the-death battles?
Should morale be more of a factor - it could hardly be less of a factor now - and in what way?

Certain battles, I would think, could be ended by the death of an enemy captain - in the same manner, that our side loses the fight when our hero is knocked out. Do you think that would lead to easy victories for us? I know I'd target their warlord.

Other battles, assuming different combat goals are given, like "protect the prince" or "guard the royal tax caravan" could be fought with the vulnerable target on the field and open to attack. If captured or killed, battle over.

Some battles could end when one side's morale breaks due to heavy or one-sided casualties - say if 50% of a river pirate war party lies dead on the field, the survivors run for their lives - or perhaps when one side's losses are a certain percentage of their total force and twice the percentage of the enemy's losses.

We might have a timer - survive x minutes and you can go on your way.

We have these great combats but they're virtually always fights to the death on the A.I.'s side. Any constructive thoughts?

 

[Ingolifs]

mm yeah, sometimes i just want to intimidate enemies because i'm too lazy to actually fight them. This applies often around Tulga bacause of those damn khergits and my mainly infantry army.

 

[Deestan]

When most of the bandits are dead with arrows through their skulls before they are halfway close to me, I think the remaining bandits show heroistic optimism when they keep running towards me.

 

[godot]

I think that whenever the enemy AI starts to look like this...

...they should be able to retreat from the battlefield.

 

[JohnathanStrange]

mm yeah, sometimes i just want to intimidate enemies because i'm too lazy to actually fight them. This applies often around Tulga bacause of those damn khergits and my mainly infantry army.

Hmm, avoiding the battle altogether would be a different way to end a battle - by not even beginning it.

One of the reasons I was thinking that morale could be helpful would be reduce unbalanced fights that you know you'll will but the AI thinks he's got a good chance of succeeding in.

I wouldn't want an AI that rarely attacks anymore than an AI that attacks anything that moves, so balance would be necessary.

You know, Armagan deserves more credit than we give him. So much of the overall feel of a land in turmoil is there without AI glitches that could have all enemy warparties in one giant melee in the center of the map.

 

[Orion]

i like that "all war parties in a giant melee in middle of map" thing... Maybe we could make a mod that does that...

I'd love to jump in to that with my big axe

 

[Sir Saladin]

I don't think the killing the captain idea would work out too good because he could get a bolt in the skull in the first 20 seconds. But if one side could lose enough morale so that you could rout them that might be fun but its probably more trouble to program than it would be worth. Maybe you could get the message on screen "Enemy is fleeing!" and then you could loot their fallen comrades. And then the next message would be "Your standing with the Vaegers has gone from -150 to -250." hehe.

 

[Ingolifs]

Tie this idea in with AI. We all know the actual enemy party AI is fairly dumb. They attack in loosely formed waves and get ploughed by soldiers in a tight formation. If team AI is improved, and enemy footmen and archers know to huddle together on top of a hill when faced with your cavalry, we could make it a feature that this tactical ability disappears once you kill the captain, and they just resort to the standard move-towards-you-as-a-mob-and-get-annihilated-by-your-superior-organization strategy.

 

[eatgreencrayons]

Worked for the romans.

 

[Kniggit]

yea, umm, considering my 7 person party can take out Vaegir Warparties, by eliminating them one by one, it would put a real damper on it for me

OR

maybe its time for me to start a new charachter?

I wouldnt mind bieng able t put my sniping abilities to good use, like, say if i solo against 30 sea raiders, i kill the first wave, then thier commander doesnt show until the last wave, and on that wave, if i have killed half thier men AND thier dumbass commander, they should look at me and say "hey dudes, that guy with the crossbow, has killed like 25 of us, what could we do?!?" and split

Meanwhile i am pelting thier asses with bolts

I like the idea

 

[Sir Saladin]

Kniggit is a skirmishing god, most peoples results will vary.

 

[Temujin]

he should teach me his secrets one day