Armor Classes and Damage Types

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NikitaTheTanner
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Armor Classes and Damage Types

Post by NikitaTheTanner »

Kinda related to our weapon and armor discussion, but this topic is a little more about gameplay balance, not about technical implementation or particular designs. Just had these thoughts today and don't want them to get lost in the middle of a discussion, so I decided to branch out into another topic.

So, we have a huge variety of weapon types and armors. How to make them more unique? They need to have some distinct properties. Some weapons should have advantage over some types of armor and disadvantage over other types, at least to a certain extent.

What I propose, is to divide Physical Damage into three categories - Piercing, Slashing and Bludgeoning.
Armor types would be divided into three classes as well - Light Armor, Composite Armor and Plate Armor.

Kinda like in original game, we had Leather, Chain and Plate, but some armors will need to be shifted, so there is more variety in other categories.

In general, the idea is that certain weapons will deal more damage of certain type. For example, blades will mostly do slashing damage or piercing damage if you stab with them. Axes will also slash, but will do extra blunt damage due to their weight. Hammers will crush with bludgeoning damage.

Now armors will protect differently. There will be variety inside each class and some armors will be more versatile, have various special properties, but in general the idea will be:

Plate Armor - good against Piercing and Slashing, but not so much against Bludgeoning. It's still the best armor in the game and to negate that, it reduces player's speed, eats more stamina, and reduces magic effectiveness(raises spell cost).

Image

Composite Armor - good against Slashing and somewhat reduces Bludgeoning damage, but weak against Piercing damage. It's a good armor overall and to balance it, slightly reduces player's speed, eats a little more stamina, and reduces magic effectiveness a little bit.

Image

Light Armor - somewhat protects versus Bludgeoning and Slashing damage, especially weak against Piercing damage. It's not a good protection, though it doesn't affect player's speed, or stamina, but still reduces magic effectiveness a little bit.

Image

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It's a very D'n'D system it seems, though I am not very familiar with the games to be fair. But it seems more or less logical to me. Tell me if I am wrong.

Slashing damage seems at the most disadvantage here, but that also makes sense. Instead, it will be highly effective against unarmored opponents and monsters, potentially we can even include bleed mechanic. And it should still damage even armored opponents, after all it's a game and armor isn't 100% protection.

This system is really versatile I think, as it can make even similar weapons, for example, maces and morning stars, distinct from one another. Plus, every weapon will have different reach, speed, durability, potentially even animations for some weapons. I think this is the direction we should take. At least more or less, maybe with some alterations down the road, if something doesn't work.
Last edited by NikitaTheTanner on Sat Aug 26, 2017 10:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Jay_H
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Re: Armor Classes and Damage Types

Post by Jay_H »

Neither adding to nor subtracting from what you've written here, I've thought of two ideas that come to mind on this topic:

1. Armor weight affects movement speed and agility, similar to what you said about heavy armor. Clunking around in full steel armor could levy a -25 penalty to speed and -15 to agility, whereas lighter armor could have no penalty. Could be mitigated by higher strength stat.

2. Each individual armor piece you find could have specific and randomly chosen bonuses (perhaps when magical items only), such as "Iron Left Pauldron (+2 Str, +3 Int, -5 Max HP, swing speed +6%)." It has sort of a Diablo feel to it. This could add some interest in continuing to search for treasure, as compared to classic where you just load up the entire wagon with the most expensive materials and ignore everything else. It could add some meaningful strategy and builds, making armor choices more significant.

Al-Khwarizmi
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Re: Armor Classes and Damage Types

Post by Al-Khwarizmi »

Note that the original game already doesn't treat the damage from different weapon types in the same way. I don't remember many specifics of how it worked (and I probably never knew in detail, as I was an unspoiled player), but I do know that you deal more damage to skeletons with blunt weapons than with blades, for example.

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NikitaTheTanner
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Re: Armor Classes and Damage Types

Post by NikitaTheTanner »

1. Armor weight affects movement speed and agility, similar to what you said about heavy armor. Clunking around in full steel armor could levy a -25 penalty to speed and -15 to agility, whereas lighter armor could have no penalty. Could be mitigated by higher strength stat.

2. Each individual armor piece you find could have specific and randomly chosen bonuses (perhaps when magical items only), such as "Iron Left Pauldron (+2 Str, +3 Int, -5 Max HP, swing speed +6%)." It has sort of a Diablo feel to it. This could add some interest in continuing to search for treasure, as compared to classic where you just load up the entire wagon with the most expensive materials and ignore everything else. It could add some meaningful strategy and builds, making armor choices more significant.
Yes, exactly what I am thinking about. But these stats will not be an enchantment, of course, just side effects. Kinda like Dark Souls where each piece is unique and while certain armors and weapons are objectively better, each set and item has certain unique properties which make it good for certain builds and situations. I am not sure about particular implementation yet, as I would prefer to avoid changing Attributes or Stats directly, but instead affect hidden character stats if possible(e.g. not Speed, but movement speed, etc.).

Plus, I think you should be able to upgrade your weapon and armor, either yourself or with a smith, if you have money and materials, so even low tier items remain useful in late game. High Tier items will be harder and more expensive to upgrade as well.
Note that the original game already doesn't treat the damage from different weapon types in the same way. I don't remember many specifics of how it worked (and I probably never knew in detail, as I was an unspoiled player), but I do know that you deal more damage to skeletons with blunt weapons than with blades, for example.
Yeah, I remembered that. I just hope to build on that system. Skeletons will be almost fully immune to slashing damage, get some damage from piercing attacks and bludgeoning will do full damage to them. Zombies on the other hand will be resistant to bludgeoning. If the base system is reliable in the game, we might be able to build on top of it, instead of designing it from scratch.

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Jay_H
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Re: Armor Classes and Damage Types

Post by Jay_H »

NikitaTheTanner wrote:Plus, I think you should be able to upgrade your weapon and armor, either yourself or with a smith, if you have money and materials, so even low tier items remain useful in late game. High Tier items will be harder and more expensive to upgrade as well.
A great idea. This would give something to sink those 20,000,000 gold pieces everyone has by level 15 into.
NikitaTheTanner wrote:Yeah, I remembered that. I just hope to build on that system. Skeletons will be almost fully immune to slashing damage, get some damage from piercing attacks and bludgeoning will do full damage to them. Zombies on the other hand will be resistant to bludgeoning. If the base system is reliable in the game, we might be able to build on top of it, instead of designing it from scratch.
If so, I would personally want a warning on the top of the screen, similar to how weapon restrictions currently work: "The Skeletal Warrior takes little damage from this weapon type.", maybe on the first swing only. It'd be quite a surprise to a veteran player like me to smash a skeleton with my Elven Claymore 20+ times without it dying :) And you're both right: in classic, skeletal warriors take 50% damage from non-blunt weaponry.

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NikitaTheTanner
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Re: Armor Classes and Damage Types

Post by NikitaTheTanner »

If so, I would personally want a warning on the top of the screen, similar to how weapon restrictions currently work: "The Skeletal Warrior takes little damage from this weapon type.", maybe on the first swing only. It'd be quite a surprise to a veteran player like me to smash a skeleton with my Elven Claymore 20+ times without it dying :) And you're both right: in classic, skeletal warriors take 50% damage from non-blunt weaponry.
There should be some warnings, but I would prefer them to be subtle rather than shouting at you. Sounds and perhaps particle effects will alert you on how much damage you do. I would really like effective attacks to make gory and satisfying sounds and splashes, while ineffective ones just slightly flop.

Plus, it should be quite obvious, like slicing the skeleton and trying to make it bleed is rather dumb, don't you think? ;) But even a sword could do minimal amount of bludgeoning damage if you use it like a club, so it's not completely ineffective, just really inefficient compared to a warhammer, for example. It should make you carry extra weapon, just for situations like this.

daggerdude
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Re: Armor Classes and Damage Types

Post by daggerdude »

I think physical damage and armor overhaul does an excellent job of improving the game's armor system, and for the limitations of daggerfall i think it does well.

I would like to see a borderlands or diablo type loot system that makes magical weapons more common and makes armor and stuff more interesting. or even the type of system seen in mount and blade.

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