Weekly Update 235 – Improving Combat Dynamics & Positioning!
Hello warriors!
Even though we're in the middle of the current ranking season, after having many discussions in our Discord regarding the planned changes to combat, we’ve decided to not wait to implement them for the end of the season. We’ve just introduced them in this update and gave you a free Ability Reset – read below for details!
See you in battle!
[h2]Changelog v.0.9.4.2[/h2]
[h3]Combat Changes:[/h3]
As some of you might have seen, lately there was a global test server open for everyone. We have been testing some changes widely discussed over our Discord channel. Very important part of the combat is having a responsive controller, but at the same time, as Gloria Victis is an MMORPG game, the timings need to be adjusted to fit the player reactions and average ping.
While blocking enemy attacks, we either do that with Shield or Weapon – weapon has its "power bar" while blocking which allows us to save stamina while blocking on Red power bar, but also inflict the longer "attack cooldown" on the enemy attack. The attack cooldown is the part of our game, without which it would be full spam-to-win, because it gives the blocking person time for a counter-attack.
Inside our team, we use the "Perfect Block and Imperfect Block" terms. The Perfect Block saves stamina and until now was putting 1.4 seconds of enemy attack cooldown, while Imperfect Block [blocked with a weapon, outside the red blocking power bar] until now was putting 1 second of enemy attack cooldown.
Every similar game, like Warband, Mordhau or even The Witcher, has the attack cooldown for those obvious counter attack reasons, but at the same time due to length of attack cooldown in our game [which is much longer than in any of above games], it makes much of the “clunky” feeling, same time making 1v1 battles much more stale – as you can successfully start blocking while having the attack cooldown.
The attack timers in Gloria Victis vary about 800-1300ms, depending on weapon type, attack side, power bar, etc. When we successfully block, if we want to counter-attack – there goes half of ping + frame time of both client and server (let's use 75ms as average amount) – we need to react (let's say its 250ms for average player) and after we do that we need to click the attack to the server to proceed (half of ping + frame time of both client and server so another 75ms as average amount).
In total, we already used 400ms, which is a reliable time at full focus, not including choosing the attack side or simply playing on the higher ping. So let's use 500ms for further calculations. Difference between fastest dagger attack and slowest two-handed spear attack is those 500ms – so it means that already we need to make sure the very minimal attack cooldown would need to be longer, at least 750ms, but it is still 250ms lower than what we have already.
For the reason of speeding up the combat, we set both Perfect and Imperfect Blocks attack delay’s into 750ms [which would make battles, especially 1v1 more dynamic].
At the same time, we knew that we needed to do further changes, as on the bigger scale battles could get a bit more spammy. After lots of chat with the community together we found potentially best further changes that should make combat more position related.
Those changes are:
– Hits which went through ally won't be interrupting further hits [which will require proper positioning of forces while fighting, and give some additional chances while fighting outnumbered and enemies hitting through their forces]
– Cleave hits through enemies were not interrupting them on the server-side at the global servers already, but we found out the client-side representation was bugged which led to ghost hits, as client-side animation was interrupting attack, which was not interrupted on the server. It was fixed now so it is consistent between client and server now.
In short words – if our attack will pass through the allies before hitting the enemy, or we already hit and interrupted the enemy with a cleave attack, and a further hit of this attack won’t be interrupting the attacks. For that reason, if you fight 2v1, this update makes the battle harder for those 2 only, because the only new thing is that they cannot interrupt if they hit trough the ally.
– Archers interrupting on the global version of the game was related only to shooting using full charged attack (“Red Power Bar”), it allowed non-archers to pick any bow and shoot interrupting the enemies fighting in melee, which many players felt was not fun.
– For that reason, we have added an additional requirement, except for the full charged attack, which is having unlocked top tier skills related to archers. The new skill has been added, and we will be giving a free Abilities Reset to the notification center for everyone which can be used within two weeks of this update.
– Moving backward is now 15% faster, which leads to more positioning during the battles combined with hits that don't interrupt while hitting through an ally.
– Some skills, like “You Shall Not Pass” due to recent changes in the above system should be much more usable, even though there were no direct changes in them.
– We have fixed the bug when the interrupted attacks didn't turn off the power bar interface on the client-side which was misleading players a lot.
We would like to thank everyone who participated in the test and chat about the changes with us, we do believe that the best possible way to improve our game is to directly speak with the players, for that reason we are finishing the in-game voting system where we will be asking you about changes like those. We are already doing that on Discord but we know doing that outside the game gives results only from a fracture of our player base.
Still – please feel invited to join our Discord channel, and after trying the latest changes, let us know what you think on the #combat-discussion channel.
[h3]Map Update:[/h3]
Thanks “Siege Survival”, a game developed by FishTankStudio which is set in the Gloria Victis world, we have changed the visual display of our map! It is another feature we have received from this fruitful cooperation.
Also, it has opened new opportunities. Expect during the few weeks dedicated maps for the Valley of Death Tournament and arena – no more lacking of the location map!
The whole map is generated automatically but, in our opinion, it looks much better than before.
How do you find this change? Tell us in the comments!
[h3]Saturday State of War Deactivation:[/h3]
As we want to create leaders and battle commanders, we have decided that we need to give players opportunities to take over the leadership. We have connected that with the deactivation of Saturday SoW – an activity for the big groups.
From now, if the leader of the party belongs to the Alliance, all party members get the bonus Deactivation progress for every player who is not from their Alliance. Sounds a bit complicated? Well, simply it is worth gathering as many players for events like Brandon, Ragi, Sirius, or SoW attacks as possible to faster achieve deactivation of the Saturday State of War. Also, we have changed the display of progression from percents to raw numbers due to user experience.
It is not the end. According to some players' suggestions, we are going to add the possibility to increase reward from Saturday SoW instead of deactivating it. Some players do not want to turn off that State of War so we have decided to reward them for such great activity!
[h3]Quality of Life:[/h3]
– Added ballistas all around the main building’s roof
– Implemented debuff dealt from Emperor's Flames to players from you nation
– Increased charging time of Emperor's Flames from 10 to 15 seconds
– Improved sounds of jumping horses, shooting and landing of stones from catapults and trebuchets
– Improved horse rig – in some animations, the rider was clipping with the saddle. Now it should look better
– Increased number of Daily Challenges to choose from 2 to 3
– Reduced HP of Workshops and Inns – as it was sometimes used as an additional defence at Guild Provinces and its hp was close to the palisade, we have decided to make it more vulnerable
– Increased cooling downtime of some meals from 2 to 4 hours – due to the introduction of Gout debuff, we have observed that cooking gets much harder. We have decided to make it a bit easier to keep it interesting without doing hardcore mode from some additional feature
– Changed name of the Skeleton to Undead – as Story says about “souls who have come back from the Realm of the Dead via foul pagan rituals”, we have changed their names to more adequate to the situation and their look
– Added decoration recipes as a reward to some quests from the Raven Inn, Happy Rams Inn, and also Mines and Lumbermills
– Added Journeyman's Fishing Rod and 50 Fishing baits – Worms as a reward for third chain quests (Claretta, Bjorn and Allan quests)
– Introduced special battle effects to bosses: Brandon, Ragi, Sirius, Bernie, Glutton and Spectre from the catacombs – from now expect burn or bleeding when they have more or less HP!
[h3]Fixes:[/h3]
– Fixed visuals of Metallurgist's Workshop – one model wasn’t displaying
– Fixed Gunnhild dialogue – there was edge case not allowing Ismirs to continue their quests
– Fixed issue causing that sounds of blocking by hands wasn’t playing
– Fixed more than 130 Level Design bugs reported by players – issues with terrains, levitating benches, holes, and places where you could get stuck
– Fixed collisions of Stalls and Inns – some objects had collisions but couldn’t be damaged
– Blocked dealing dmg to friendly NPCs by Emperor's Flames
– Fixed collider of trebuchets – from now it can be damaged by archers and ballista
[h3]Minor Update 2020-08-17:[/h3]
– Added bonus rewards for the active players, connected with Saturday’s State of Wars – some players have pointed that they want to play actively but they don’t want to deactivate the SoW. According to that, we have added “Saturday’s State of War (Challenge)”; it may be enabled at the guild window, after filling the progress bar. After that, Saturday State of War will start in time, but defenders and attackers will earn some extra rewards for active participation!
– Added character titles, achievements and 6 new Steam achievements connected to Saturday’s State of War (Challenge) – achieve 100% activity as an attacker or do not let the enemy achieve full activity during this special State of War to earn them!
– Around 20 minor fixes to terrains and models reported by the players
– Few events will also give deactivation points to the Alliances from now – Black Sickle, The Griffins Company, Rogue Highlanders, Enclave of the Rejected, Outlumbered, Heathen Plague, The Grey Company, Temple of Doom, Catacombs, Volcano, and Sea Wraiths
Even though we're in the middle of the current ranking season, after having many discussions in our Discord regarding the planned changes to combat, we’ve decided to not wait to implement them for the end of the season. We’ve just introduced them in this update and gave you a free Ability Reset – read below for details!
See you in battle!
[h2]Changelog v.0.9.4.2[/h2]
[h3]Combat Changes:[/h3]
As some of you might have seen, lately there was a global test server open for everyone. We have been testing some changes widely discussed over our Discord channel. Very important part of the combat is having a responsive controller, but at the same time, as Gloria Victis is an MMORPG game, the timings need to be adjusted to fit the player reactions and average ping.
While blocking enemy attacks, we either do that with Shield or Weapon – weapon has its "power bar" while blocking which allows us to save stamina while blocking on Red power bar, but also inflict the longer "attack cooldown" on the enemy attack. The attack cooldown is the part of our game, without which it would be full spam-to-win, because it gives the blocking person time for a counter-attack.
Inside our team, we use the "Perfect Block and Imperfect Block" terms. The Perfect Block saves stamina and until now was putting 1.4 seconds of enemy attack cooldown, while Imperfect Block [blocked with a weapon, outside the red blocking power bar] until now was putting 1 second of enemy attack cooldown.
Every similar game, like Warband, Mordhau or even The Witcher, has the attack cooldown for those obvious counter attack reasons, but at the same time due to length of attack cooldown in our game [which is much longer than in any of above games], it makes much of the “clunky” feeling, same time making 1v1 battles much more stale – as you can successfully start blocking while having the attack cooldown.
The attack timers in Gloria Victis vary about 800-1300ms, depending on weapon type, attack side, power bar, etc. When we successfully block, if we want to counter-attack – there goes half of ping + frame time of both client and server (let's use 75ms as average amount) – we need to react (let's say its 250ms for average player) and after we do that we need to click the attack to the server to proceed (half of ping + frame time of both client and server so another 75ms as average amount).
In total, we already used 400ms, which is a reliable time at full focus, not including choosing the attack side or simply playing on the higher ping. So let's use 500ms for further calculations. Difference between fastest dagger attack and slowest two-handed spear attack is those 500ms – so it means that already we need to make sure the very minimal attack cooldown would need to be longer, at least 750ms, but it is still 250ms lower than what we have already.
For the reason of speeding up the combat, we set both Perfect and Imperfect Blocks attack delay’s into 750ms [which would make battles, especially 1v1 more dynamic].
At the same time, we knew that we needed to do further changes, as on the bigger scale battles could get a bit more spammy. After lots of chat with the community together we found potentially best further changes that should make combat more position related.
Those changes are:
– Hits which went through ally won't be interrupting further hits [which will require proper positioning of forces while fighting, and give some additional chances while fighting outnumbered and enemies hitting through their forces]
– Cleave hits through enemies were not interrupting them on the server-side at the global servers already, but we found out the client-side representation was bugged which led to ghost hits, as client-side animation was interrupting attack, which was not interrupted on the server. It was fixed now so it is consistent between client and server now.
In short words – if our attack will pass through the allies before hitting the enemy, or we already hit and interrupted the enemy with a cleave attack, and a further hit of this attack won’t be interrupting the attacks. For that reason, if you fight 2v1, this update makes the battle harder for those 2 only, because the only new thing is that they cannot interrupt if they hit trough the ally.
– Archers interrupting on the global version of the game was related only to shooting using full charged attack (“Red Power Bar”), it allowed non-archers to pick any bow and shoot interrupting the enemies fighting in melee, which many players felt was not fun.
– For that reason, we have added an additional requirement, except for the full charged attack, which is having unlocked top tier skills related to archers. The new skill has been added, and we will be giving a free Abilities Reset to the notification center for everyone which can be used within two weeks of this update.
– Moving backward is now 15% faster, which leads to more positioning during the battles combined with hits that don't interrupt while hitting through an ally.
– Some skills, like “You Shall Not Pass” due to recent changes in the above system should be much more usable, even though there were no direct changes in them.
– We have fixed the bug when the interrupted attacks didn't turn off the power bar interface on the client-side which was misleading players a lot.
We would like to thank everyone who participated in the test and chat about the changes with us, we do believe that the best possible way to improve our game is to directly speak with the players, for that reason we are finishing the in-game voting system where we will be asking you about changes like those. We are already doing that on Discord but we know doing that outside the game gives results only from a fracture of our player base.
Still – please feel invited to join our Discord channel, and after trying the latest changes, let us know what you think on the #combat-discussion channel.
[h3]Map Update:[/h3]
Thanks “Siege Survival”, a game developed by FishTankStudio which is set in the Gloria Victis world, we have changed the visual display of our map! It is another feature we have received from this fruitful cooperation.
Also, it has opened new opportunities. Expect during the few weeks dedicated maps for the Valley of Death Tournament and arena – no more lacking of the location map!
The whole map is generated automatically but, in our opinion, it looks much better than before.
How do you find this change? Tell us in the comments!
[h3]Saturday State of War Deactivation:[/h3]
As we want to create leaders and battle commanders, we have decided that we need to give players opportunities to take over the leadership. We have connected that with the deactivation of Saturday SoW – an activity for the big groups.
From now, if the leader of the party belongs to the Alliance, all party members get the bonus Deactivation progress for every player who is not from their Alliance. Sounds a bit complicated? Well, simply it is worth gathering as many players for events like Brandon, Ragi, Sirius, or SoW attacks as possible to faster achieve deactivation of the Saturday State of War. Also, we have changed the display of progression from percents to raw numbers due to user experience.
It is not the end. According to some players' suggestions, we are going to add the possibility to increase reward from Saturday SoW instead of deactivating it. Some players do not want to turn off that State of War so we have decided to reward them for such great activity!
[h3]Quality of Life:[/h3]
– Added ballistas all around the main building’s roof
– Implemented debuff dealt from Emperor's Flames to players from you nation
– Increased charging time of Emperor's Flames from 10 to 15 seconds
– Improved sounds of jumping horses, shooting and landing of stones from catapults and trebuchets
– Improved horse rig – in some animations, the rider was clipping with the saddle. Now it should look better
– Increased number of Daily Challenges to choose from 2 to 3
– Reduced HP of Workshops and Inns – as it was sometimes used as an additional defence at Guild Provinces and its hp was close to the palisade, we have decided to make it more vulnerable
– Increased cooling downtime of some meals from 2 to 4 hours – due to the introduction of Gout debuff, we have observed that cooking gets much harder. We have decided to make it a bit easier to keep it interesting without doing hardcore mode from some additional feature
– Changed name of the Skeleton to Undead – as Story says about “souls who have come back from the Realm of the Dead via foul pagan rituals”, we have changed their names to more adequate to the situation and their look
– Added decoration recipes as a reward to some quests from the Raven Inn, Happy Rams Inn, and also Mines and Lumbermills
– Added Journeyman's Fishing Rod and 50 Fishing baits – Worms as a reward for third chain quests (Claretta, Bjorn and Allan quests)
– Introduced special battle effects to bosses: Brandon, Ragi, Sirius, Bernie, Glutton and Spectre from the catacombs – from now expect burn or bleeding when they have more or less HP!
[h3]Fixes:[/h3]
– Fixed visuals of Metallurgist's Workshop – one model wasn’t displaying
– Fixed Gunnhild dialogue – there was edge case not allowing Ismirs to continue their quests
– Fixed issue causing that sounds of blocking by hands wasn’t playing
– Fixed more than 130 Level Design bugs reported by players – issues with terrains, levitating benches, holes, and places where you could get stuck
– Fixed collisions of Stalls and Inns – some objects had collisions but couldn’t be damaged
– Blocked dealing dmg to friendly NPCs by Emperor's Flames
– Fixed collider of trebuchets – from now it can be damaged by archers and ballista
[h3]Minor Update 2020-08-17:[/h3]
– Added bonus rewards for the active players, connected with Saturday’s State of Wars – some players have pointed that they want to play actively but they don’t want to deactivate the SoW. According to that, we have added “Saturday’s State of War (Challenge)”; it may be enabled at the guild window, after filling the progress bar. After that, Saturday State of War will start in time, but defenders and attackers will earn some extra rewards for active participation!
– Added character titles, achievements and 6 new Steam achievements connected to Saturday’s State of War (Challenge) – achieve 100% activity as an attacker or do not let the enemy achieve full activity during this special State of War to earn them!
– Around 20 minor fixes to terrains and models reported by the players
– Few events will also give deactivation points to the Alliances from now – Black Sickle, The Griffins Company, Rogue Highlanders, Enclave of the Rejected, Outlumbered, Heathen Plague, The Grey Company, Temple of Doom, Catacombs, Volcano, and Sea Wraiths
