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STEALTH
zeroumus
Member Posts: 54
never thought of Stealth as a good mechanic, a good game will not have stealth.. the problem with stealth in current games is the victim has no involvement in the process. You simply find your self down 1/2 health and under attack, and no amount of real-skill can really stop this. In a game like Team fortress, people say to defend against spies by spy-checking, but what they are really doing is spamming. the dreaded pyro spam. While TF2's mechanic for the spy is actually not that bad, it kind of falls apart with the instant death back stab. there is no real skill that can counter this other than maybe keeping your back to the wall at all times. ( hardly a skill , but you know what i mean )
but since i am not going to win this battle, here is how I think it should be handled. ( in an MMO ) Basically, I think stealth classes should actually have to act like a stealther would in real life, you should have to hide in the actual shadows, darkness, and behind objects. You should not be able to stealth in areas where in real life you could not do it, as in, you cant stealth in a open field.
so how would I implement it in a video game, since that what makes making stealth class hard to deal with in games.
1) I said i would only allow players to enter stealth when in a shadow, and I mean literally in a game rendered shadow, these could be little shadows from local trees, to big shadows created by large forests with trees overhanging, or large mountains, or buildings. You would have a small cool down time where you could leave the shadow and launch an attack on passing player. maybe 3-5 seconds. I would possibly allow players to enter even without a shadow or darkness, but it would be still limited by the 3-5 rule
2) Some areas are just plain dark, dungeons, nigh time, these would in effect make large ares and zones that are full stealth, to limit abuse here, there would be the traditional global timer of maybe 30 seconds of stealth before you must drop invisible and recharge.
so if you combine 1 & 2, you essentially get two limits. your stealth time is limited by the first of to conditions, 3-5 seconds of time out of shade, or 30 seconds total. don't worry about the exact numbers, these can be tuned later.
3) the best suggestion i think I got. people have always asked, how do I simulate the ambushing that the stealth classes really do in real life. My suggestion here is, long before the player uses stealth to close the gap on a enemy, the stealther should have to use and ability that simulates him being able to hide behind something, but yet see his enemy coming. i thought, how could you simulate a player hiding behind an object, waiting for the victim to pass undetected. Why not give the stealther an skill that allows limited ability to see though objects when the skill is active. maybe wire frame vision of other players within a certain radius when activated. ... this would simulated the steather hiding behind a tree, but just ever so slightly poking his head around to see where is victim is, the stealth can then maneuver around the tree as the player approaches and get in behind without the victim knowing....
4) NO instant kills, does this really need explaining, its no fun at all.
if you combine all 3/4 points in the way I am in-vision, what i hope for is this....
1) stealther see a victim long range, hopes that victim has not seen him ( maybe stealthers could have longer range vision )
2) stealther asses areas where he can hide, also considers shadows bonuses
3) moves into position, activates his "see though ability" ( also has a cool down so he can not use all the time
4) player gets close, stealther still with his see though ability makes final maneuvers to to get in behind, he has to be careful though, while see-though is nice, if he does not maneuver well, the other player night see you standing behind that small object. moving while keeping out of the line of site could be difficult behind a tree.
5) stealther activates stealth mode, stealth is essentially the skill to use to close the final few feet on the victim
6) launches back attack
----
why i think this is a better way to do this. The reason is simple...
a) it simulates real hiding and promotes spacial awareness. Your environment now has to be considered when launching an attack. its no longer just a button, or just a quick button mash you do to get behind someone. now its actually involves the terrain.
b) it gives the victim small feedback as to what areas could be dangerous. instead of just getting frustrated about be 1 shotted anywhere outside the safe area. now you know you are pretty safe in a field, but you start to feel nervous when walking in wooded areas. you experience the real feelings of fear when you walk in dangerous areas. In the end, you really experience the feeling of the victim, the victim is almost playing the class along with the stealther .
c) of course, all the good loot is going to be in areas where stealth happens more often. Did you expect anything but ! hahahahah.
comments welcome, bring on the RAGE! just kidding, you know what, I am not trying to start anything, at $775 spent, I will be dam happy if the game simply uses standard mechanics, I am just making a suggestion that i think could improve the role of stealth.
Comments
OPTIONS
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option 1
I suggested that entering stealth should be limited in effectiveness by being in the shade or darkness. Another bonus could also effect the length of stealth could be as follows. A bonus is added if at the time of entering stealth, if the player and victim are not in “line of site” another few seconds are added
so I suggested that the stealther gets a maximum of 3-5s seconds upon leaving the darkness, but with this option, maybe the max would be 2-3 seconds, but if the stealther is not in LOS, then he gets 3-6 seconds.
Again, dont worry about the exact number of seconds, that stuff can be fine tuned later
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option 2
Make stealth gear ( or all gear ) have camouflage characteristics ( stats ). if your in the woods, your gear needs to have the right camouflage to gain bonuses. this gives the stealther a lot more trade-offs to consider. Will he be well equipped for any situation? Well great stealth gears have good general stats or not. Will the stealther specialize in ambushes in a particular area or environment?
in this option, there would be types of cammo that is harder to get than others ( just like anything in an MMO ), for CU specifically, all this gear should be crafted. decay in some gear could make it less unlikely to stealth in some areas compared to others.
Without saying, there should be bonuses for operating in areas that the player/guild controls. Guild forts or player structures .
Stopped reading after this.
Emeryc Eightdrakes - Ranger of DragonMyst Keep - Percival
RED IS DEAD!
What you don't realize is most games it really isn't very easy to achieve... A lot of attacks may get a kill but is suicide
Or you miss openings and get raped
My point is just because kills are faster from them it isn't easy to achieve
People complain and whine for realism, an assassin would kill you before you can defend everytime so you people are always complaining about something
Anyway in before lock
Ozek - DAOC
Niix - Other games that sucked
Some very good ideas OP. I too would like to see some more realistic stealth mechanisms like those you outlimed by implimented into a game. Will it be this game? No idea. Hopefully at least the camouflage system will reflect some of the considerations you've highlighted.
That said, the problem many people will have with forcing 'realism' onto stealth in a fantasy RPG is that, well, it's fantasy. Realism doesn't necessarily need to limit stealth when you have mages slinging fireballs, etc. But I do agree, if the lore supports the notion of your classical fantasy-based rogue, that is simply adept at hiding and sneaking and moving unseen, then these limitations make sense. Most 'rogues' are not just mages that cast 'invis'.
Will be interesting to see how the archer's camouflage and the veilwalking system play out here.
Also this game is Rock Paper Scissors so it's easier to have stealthers as they fit in
Ozek - DAOC
Niix - Other games that sucked
One of my biggest gripes with how many games handle stealth involves just that. All too often, when a stealther fails to initiate his attack properly, he is given way too many escape tools so that he essentially can choose his fight and even escape when he makes a mistake simply to try again ad nauseum.
fair point. I do realize this. not trying to take this away either.
all I am trying to accomplish is to give the victim some involvement. It may not be much, but knowing your walking into a danergous area does accomplish this.
other than that, its really just bonuses and a few tweaks. The base mechanic stays the same, you go invis, go behind someone and launch an attack.
Why do you suggestion this is to be locked. Its a fair post.
you guys are going to make me edit the first part out
Generates to much hostilities at the start
you actually enlightened me a little, I actually never thought of the stealth class as anything but non-fantasy. I always thought it was ONLY a theif class.
that being said, there could be room for both. One class works with realism, and one works with magic.
The physical/"thief" stealther might have stronger attacks and some awareness advantages
The magical Stealther could have weaker attacks, but have more flexible/longer steathing. Or maybe the attacks are not weak at all, but some mechanic that makes it play totally differant to the "thief" class
I think you (we) may end up liking the archer's camouflage system very much as a compliment to the proposed veilwalker's more traditional stealth system.
@OP
Have you listened to any of MJ's ideas regarding veilwalkers? It sounds like a very interesting and unorthodox way of handling something quite similiar to stealth in certain aspects but also very different.
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/13861848/camelot-unchained/posts/464295
But you're right the main issue is people require only things they want to be realistic, and over look the rest of fantasy part of the mmo
Non of that matters if you have a fair balanced system in place, game is about fun right? That's the goal I thought so that's priority not realism.
There are a few things that people complain about stealthers and propose massive changes, you can do other systems if you want but making changes to current system can work as well
Like someone pointed out games have given them ways to not be held accountable for failures and its caused most issues
Openers are usually a tad high but stealthers should be high risk high reward and shouldn't be easy to get off those big openers and when they do yes you should die lol
Ozek - DAOC
Niix - Other games that sucked
Ozek - DAOC
Niix - Other games that sucked
I just read MJ's post about stealth.
What I got out of it was 2 points
1) essentually, a counter class that can basically see the other. so these two classes will get to play directly against eachother. if you dont have the detector class, then your SOL. standard Stealth mechanics. In any large scale PVP this should not be a problem
2) the stealth classes will have advantages to gather information, it sounds like when in stealth mode, they will actually move faster and counter obsticles. he goes on to say though that some things the stealther sees may not be right. I am not sure how he plans to do that part, but it will be interesting to see what this means.
This first thing that comes to mind when I here his idea of being in stealth and mine is, it sounds like my, "see players though obsticles idea", could fit in there a little.
I disagree with this, because it can happen anywhere, as a victim of a stealth attack, i just get desensitized to it. so much so, that it is not about fear, but just being annoying. it really just ranks up there with my game client crashing, its that un-interesting and frustrating.
I find the idea of knowing I am walking into an area that may have someone hiding in it tense.
When that area is EVERYWHERE, then it no longer becomes tense, it just becomes bad luck
Meh, this is a very minor consideration IMO. I always have to worry about being jumped anyway, regardless of stealthers. I mean, look at UO. No PvP character even trained stealth. They were better off with the real combat (etc) skills, and that game obviously had that 'dangerous' atmosphere more than any other. Death having consequences is more significant, here.
I like the sense of danger you get when entereing an area with clear hiding places, because you then need to pay attention to your surroundings and keep a watch if anyone is hiding behind a tree. With typical stealth implementation awareness is irrelevant because the stealther is invisible.
Exactly
i suggested a similar stealth mechanic a whlie back myself.
i like the idea, obviously. and i support yours!
although the veil-walker/stalker mechanic does intrigue me.
Tusken Raiders - Your Italian Guild on Star Wars: The Old Republic
When you start your story with 'a good game does not have stealth', you basically set a lot (not all) of daoc players against you. After that, as an example, you take TF2 spy stealth, which tells me that 1: you haven't played daoc and 2: you call both daoc and TF2 bad games. Also stealth mechanic in TF2 is a LOT different from that in DAoC.
People that have actually PLAYED an assassin in DAoC know how that stealth mechanic works.
For me as an infiltrator in DAoC, it was quite a challenge to make a kill and get away clean. You can make a kill and die, which is an exchange of RP's... fine. But making a clean kill could take quite a while..
And as always: try to play an unbuffed infiltrator/scout against other unbuffed player.
infiltrator vs melee dps-> infil loses most of the time, unless crit strikes/luck works out.
infiltrator vs tank -> infil loses most of the time.
infiltrator vs caster -> infil wins most of the time.
infiltrator vs other stealther -> hard to predict the outcome.
People often forget that playing a stealther takes a lot of patience on the part of the player. What you're suggesting would take even MORE patience. At a certain point the added patience degrades the fun the player has in playing that class. And that's certainly not desirable.
So, in conclusion: you try to make it less fun/harder to play a stealther in CU, but your arguments about the current games or why stealth isn't good are subpar. The problem in DAoC with stealthers was buffbots. that... and only that. (in my not-so-humble opinion ;-)
Methos, Armsman, EU Excalibur
Jager, Infiltrator, EU Excalibur
Phos, Cleric, EU Excalibur
Mortify, Sorcerer, EU Excalibur
TF2 is an awesome game, just to set the record right !
and. yes, i did not play DAOC, one of my biggest regrets as a gamer. Somehow we did not meet.
Regardless, I just don't want the stealth mechanic to be "single player", by that I mean, its all nice that it can be hard to get into position for the stealther, but there is not involvement with other players/victims in the process, and there needs to be to make things fun for everyone. Fun is whats important.
It just shows you clearly havn't played a game with stealth done differently then stun-lock wow.
Stealth was never a single player game in daoc except when stealthers would 2 shot casters, which i think 99% of people would agree was a bad implimentation, wasn't the fact they had perma stealth at all... If perf/backstab did half damage to casters, I bet most casters would have beat stealthers. If you QC a root or stun or mezz, you would rape them before they got back to you, if you surprised them you would 2 shot them, so I never understood the complaint ... sounds to me like you arn't in favor of a rock paper scissor combat system.
The whole point of stealthers is the excitement of that player knowing you don't know he's there, the shock when boom he is there. I can't fathom people not being tense / nervous when they're walking around through a choke point believing there might be a stealther roaming around.
Ozek - DAOC
Niix - Other games that sucked
You still can play DAoC, on Live(paid) and on Uthgard(free).
It's not just the 'getting into position' that's hard as a stealther. Constantly you have to be aware of where you are, where you want to go and how you want to get there.
And actually why would there NOT be a way to solo? There's no PVE to solo in... a big part of crafting is also done in rvr. So what can you do to have fun if you WANT to solo?
For me, in DAoC, playing infiltrator was good fun solo.
You say Fun is what's important... What if my fun is to occasionally play solo in CU? Part of being a sandbox MMO is that you're not forced to do something, so why should this be any different?
Methos, Armsman, EU Excalibur
Jager, Infiltrator, EU Excalibur
Phos, Cleric, EU Excalibur
Mortify, Sorcerer, EU Excalibur