Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Size classes for items

JADE 0.1.3 will (among many other things) introduce size classes for some items. Specifically weapons and all wearable items (except for rings) will have a size class that modifiers its behavior.

Larger weapons naturally will cause a lot more damage, smaller ones less. Larger armor will have a better DV, smaller armor less. And naturally there are restrictions to what a being might wield or wear (e.g. a weapon one size class larger than the potential wielder will be two-handed, two or more size classes larger is just too large; for armor the restrictions will be tougher - you will need to find your exact size class).

Why this additional detail (or complexity - depending on your view)?

Making beings equal to the PC also causes (e.g.) giants to just wear armor and wield weapons. Naturally their armor and weapons should behave slightly differently without having to introduce copies of all standard items. Thus I decided to include size classes so that huge two-handed swords pack more "ooomph" than tiny ones. Hopefully this will be an interesting and colorful addition.

Comments as usual welcome.

20 comments:

  1. Surely there would be magical means to contravene the standard size restrictions, either temporarily or permanently.

    But yeah sounds great, another promising addition to the game, can't wait to try this next version.

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  2. I'm assuming that "more oomph" also means things like slower speeds due to weight, etc.

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  3. This would be awesome, especially when coupled with a corruption that changes your character's size!

    You are corrupted! Everything around you suddenly appears to be shrinking in size. You're too big for your adamantium plate mail, and it bursts apart! You're too big for your seven league boots, and they burst apart!

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  4. As long as there's ways to change the size of things. Otherwise I can imagine this adding to frustration.

    You found a pair of Seven Leagues Boots!!!! But they're small size and don't fit you :(

    Although it might be interesting in other ways. For example, if you're a hurthling, it would make sense to shop from gnome/hurthling/dwarf armour shops instead of human/elf armour shops, as they would mostly stock small size items.

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  5. Shouldn't larger armor has less DV (bigger target is easier to hit) but more PV (harder to do damage to)? Hopefully there will be no more than three size classes (small, standard human-size, large). Will this apply to all wearable items?

    Magic items that can change sizes would be a good touch in any case. Also consider rubber items (eg. gloves, shoes) that can fit anybody.

    Size-changing corruption (or something to that extent) is a good idea.

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  6. I'd say that bigger targets will generally have lower DV. DV, logically, decreases with size and increases with the speed you're moving. I think that the decrease of DV on armor is generally because it limits your movement -- its weight plays a part in encumbrance DV reduction.

    So I'd say that if you enlarge a suit of armor, the DV might stay the same as it will limit its intended wearer the same (wearing an off-size armor would come with a DV penalty, of course). PV would increase since that's affected by the sheer amount of material.

    Will the armor affect stabbing, slashing and blunt attacks separately?

    Each physical attack is designed to transfer the kinetic energy from weapon to the opponent, causing damage. Armor can either stop an attack, preventing it from going further, or redirect it, changing the vector of kinetic energy to a harmless direction so that only a part goes further.

    If a stabbing or slashing attack is merely stopped by armor, its kinetic energy still goes through, but since these weapons are normally light, the result is like a blunt attack with a weapon of equivalent weight that might still leave a bruise. That corresponds to PV, I guess. Redirection would lessen the impact for all kinds of attacks, reducing the damage further. But when a blunt attack is stopped by armor, it's not really stopped since its full energy still hits the target (and blunt weapons are heavy since they have to use their mass).

    From what I saw in JADE so far, the weapons have critical hit percentages. I'd suggest that while slashing/stabbing weapons deal bigger damage on critical hit, blunt weapons should bypass or reduce enemy's PV on critical hit -- for slash/stab, critical hit represents hitting an especially vulnerable place, but for blunt weapon it represents transferring the energy through armor without redirection.

    This actually leads to a question why would mithril, which is lighter than iron, make a better mace? Shouldn't the iron mace deal bigger damage exactly BECAUSE it's heavier? (Been playing Dwarf Fortress recently...) Lead would make even better mace material, like Big Punch in ADOM. And if we want some higher metals, how about a platinum mace? Platinum is a VERY dense metal.

    Maybe "higher" metals would give blunt weapons additional properties, such as greater chance of magical affixes...

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  7. I completely approve of this, logical flaws, such as the one being addressed, have bugged me for ages in games. Besides, its always good to have more variety.

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  8. beside all the obvious benefits, "things you can't use" mean less hesitation when selling junk ;>

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  9. While talking about selling stuff: The price of an item should of course depend on size, but also on who you are selling it to. While small-sized armor might sell at 60 % in a human settlement, it has full worth in a hurthling town. If you save all your large items for when you find a giant town, you'll earn a fortune.

    Also, a clever merchant should be able to base the price on your size: A human trader in an all-human town might still pay less for a medium-sized armor if you are small, as he knows that no matter how little he pays you cannot find other use for it (of course, besides other merchants).

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  10. Personally I do not believe in the "larger = slower = less DV" theory. Tell that to an ant trying to hit a human. Due to the size difference alone they should be able to hit automatically if there theory were correct ;-)

    And I also do not subscribe to the "more variety is always better". Dwarven fortress being a prime example of that. I just yesterday talked to a colleague who loves Minecraft and usually also loves tickling with complex things but DF just does not seem to be worth the effort involved (for him). Judging from money influx alone this (as far as DF and MC are concerned) this seems to be generally true.

    Therefor JADE will keep one PV value for all kinds of damage although the infrastructure is there to have different PVs for different attack types. IMHO it's just not worth the effort ;-)

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  11. I think rather than having PV types, PV's effect could simply be modified by a scaling factor based on the involved weapon. If a sword strikes your ring mail, it fails to complete the intended action (stab or cut), even if there is still an impact. If a mace hits your ring mail, it still crushes the things it was supposed to crush pretty efficiently.

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  12. I'm not sure what the ant/human example was supposed to prove -- if the ant passes a Stealth check and gets close enough (they have VERY small reach), they DO hit more or less 100%.

    Maybe better comparison would be a rat vs. human. Does a real-life human have enough DV to avoid an attack of an enraged rat?

    What do you think about the idea of penetrating critical hits for blunt weapons, please?

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  13. I think people are failing to take into account that very few things in real life are a linear function. As with most things, protection can be a help just as much as a hindrance (which is why our armies no longer wear plate mail, but instead use kevlar and ballistic plates). There will always be a discontinuity in games because mimicking the drop off function is difficult. Most games have a strength requirement to use certain equipment because it mimics the weight drawback to heavy armor. Barring that requirement (and only having a weight carrying requirement), the system is always going to be more in favor of "bigger is better".

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  14. I love the idea for a corruption that affects your size! How about one that causes you to sprout an extra arm? A hurthling with a third arm could wield that huge two-handed sword. It would complicate the equipment management.

    Dual-wielding weapons is really badly done in ADOM. Can JADE handle tri-wielding?

    I also really like the idea of finding items that don't fit, but instead of simply having to sell them, how about some wearable items being able to be resized? Find a magic ring, but it's too big? You can wear it, but it will fall off at random times. Go to the village and visit the jeweler and he can resize it for you. Take the 7-League-Boots to a cobbler and see if he can alter them to your size.

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  15. We need potions of shrinking and growing. Those could be either drunk, or be used to dip items in them.

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  16. Laukku's idea is a great one; growing/shrinking potions for dipping would be the perfect solution.

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  17. I like the potion idea too. Could have different percentage chance that a potion would alter the size to your exact size based on the blessed, uncured, cursed status of the potion too.

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  18. Struds: couple that with the ability for companions to wear armor and you just might want to curse that potion for the chance that it will become big enough for your stone giant lord to wear!

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  19. It would be a cool addition that sized weapons can function at less/greater efficiency with certain minimum stats. A "large" great axe wielded with less than 16 strength increases the energy cost of wielding it by 20%. Or some such.

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  20. It would be nice if each player's size, strenght etc. would be different, and each weapons size, shaft lenght, weight, etc. be different too.

    Finding the best weapon for you would not be a matter of fiding a +4 weapon is yours is +3, but finding the best suited weapon for your skill and size.

    The higher your skill, the better you are at using difficult weapons of that kind (heavier swords, for example). Using two hands to wield a sword at low skill level, to later switch to one hand when your skill gets better.

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