Stats vs. Player Skill: Is Autoresolve the only solution?

[AetherVagrant]

So Stats vs. Player Skill.
Kodex Kritikal Konsesus seems to be that real-time RPGs rely too much on Player Skill, and that Turn-based is the solution. However, this only transfers the required player skill. Instead of twitchy reactions, you need more tactical skills.
Yet, it still comes down to player skill, except if the AI has exactly the same skill level you have, in which case the skill equals out and the stats become more important.

The problem with autoresolve is that you know you could have done better, especially if you can watch the battle, and see the AI commit atrocious errors. Perhaps this is the reason I like the combat of Settlers 2 so much: It has absolutely no player input, the only difference between two duelling knights is their experience level. But the combat system itself is so simple that the AI cannot make errors - instead of knowing you could do better, watching the battles becomes a suspenseful experience.

But this got me thinking: perhaps the best solution is a very simple combat system that is not influencable by the player, a kind of Settlers 2 combat for RPGs.
Perhaps this idea is also completely stupid, so ... DISCUSS!

This sounds like a Sawyerian solution. Better results and/or "more fair" dont always equal to more fun. Player skill and stats are important because each allows a different type of person to still progress and have fun with the game. If someone is skilled in the mechanics of the combat (whether rt or tb) then they can use that to compensate for their lack of stats, or play less of the "preparation game" and more of the actual fighting. The stats let someone who cant win that combat become more powerful and reduce their handicap through more work or critical thinking prior to battle. Both elements are essential for player satisfaction over a broad audience. I DONT think that stats should affect to-hit chance in a real time first-person-sworder, because it breaks the immersion too much to have a point blank pistol shot miss when an blind autistic kid with a seizure should have hit the thing. Theres no reason to have a combat system and have it autoresolve. if you want to reduce player input than maybe the choices made prior to the battle, or a choose-your-path style options could be utilized. A game with a combat system that looks like it should be manual (watching movement and attacks etc) just with an Ai controlling it all is even more boring than watching your mom play final fantasy 11

 

[Neanderthal]

Playing Ultima VII right now which has a near autoresolve combat system, and believe me it's not bloody pretty. Fantastic game in so many ways that pisses all over a lot of modern ones but when combat swings around...well it all goes to shit. Damn pity.

 

[Naveen]

If I understood it correctly, the OP idea isn't a bad one if you understand that, probably, you'll be designing a game for another genre (or some hybrid). In fact, I have actually thought about such hypothetical games a lot. In The Settlers example, the thrill isn't the constant combat but the grand strategy and city-building. Seeing your soldiers winning is a confirmation of all your previous work. It is a game for a general: You set things in motion and you watch your inevitable victory. That's not a very good design for an rpg about a hero and his party of misfits. Unless, of course, you want to make an adventuring simulation game with some rpg elements: You train your heroes, micromanage their equipment, choose their abilities, give them some basic orders and then... let's see what happens. I can actually see a good game out of this, but it would be a different genre. Perhaps even a new one.

There is, however, another option: the tactical view, instead of the strategic one. You don't manage the grand strategy but the tactical combat decisions, but this only works for turn-based games or simultaneous turn-based games. I think the last option is the best one. Have you played Frozen Synapse? Every turn is 5 seconds and they are simultaneous, which means you give your orders for those 5 seconds and the machine (or another player) does the same, but you only see the result after you commit your orders when both click "finish turn". Then the computer does its job and you watch your soldiers die like idiots. It will be difficult to implement in a pre-gunpowder setting, mostly because of close combat and arrows and, well, everything that is common in an rpg, but I guess it could be done.

Of course, all I have said doesn't take away your ability or interaction as a player, that would be silly, it just shifts it to another set of abilities. A game is still a game.

 

[DavidBVal]

I think a good way to look at the two options is comparing Morrowind to Oblivion.

I love turn based games, and generally enjoy them more than action-RPGs. But Oblivion combat was more fun than watching Morrowind auto-attacking while sipping my coffee.

IMHO, both paths can be real fun and make a great game, there's no "better way". Leaving aside that all RPGs should pack a good story, not every game has to have everything. Some can be fun because of action is well designed and challenging, with RPG elements adding new mechanics to it. Others can be fun because of munchiking through a well-designed system allows endless possibilities and tactics. Just enjoy each on its own.

 

[Bruma Hobo]

Umm, no. Anything aspiring to be a game should not minimize what makes it one. Especially given that pretty much every game (excluding vehicular sims and such) does a good enough job isolating those player skills that can at all be isolated from their in-game performance by the virtue of interface limitations alone. From that point onward making an RPG is not the matter of eliminating player skill, but enforcing character skills as upper limitations of what player can do with given character.

You can pretty much implement as good a cRPG as you can physically hope for inside any genre that has you control a single character or a small group.

When I talk about minimizing the player's skill I talk about reducing its influence in the resolution of the game. Theoretically there should be no problem in allowing the player to have some real-time "action" combat for immersion purposes or to give more control to the player if the character attributes can determine the effectiveness of all his maneuvers (combat accuracy, movement speed and finesse, etc.), the thing that Morrowind tried to accomplish. Implementing such a beast is the tricky part (Morrowind for example allows the player to easily dodge projectiles and melee attacks with supposedly very slow characters), and by embracing turn-based gameplay developers avoid this problem almost entirely.

Role-playing games are about making decisions, the player must act in the shoes of a specific character with determined skills (stats, classes, perks), a character that is different from the player. That's the game. Given this premise, by having the player skills determining the outcome of the game, even by a small margin, you're going against the spirit of the genre and making a hybrid. But, because RPGs ARE about decision-making, they should always allow strategic and tactical gameplay, and enough freedom to do everything the PC could. Not even the character's intelligence should interfere, but it could limit learning skills, crafting, involuntary behavior like fear or sub-par dialogue options, and so on.

What I'm trying to say here is that a "pure" CRPG would not auto-resolve at all, that's just dumb.

Spoiler

But first we have to ask ourselves what is an ar pee gee.

 

[:Flash:]

If I understood it correctly, the OP idea isn't a bad one if you understand that, probably, you'll be designing a game for another genre (or some hybrid). In fact, I have actually thought about such hypothetical games a lot. In The Settlers example, the thrill isn't the constant combat but the grand strategy and city-building. Seeing your soldiers winning is a confirmation of all your previous work. It is a game for a general: You set things in motion and you watch your inevitable victory. That's not a very good design for an rpg about a hero and his party of misfits. Unless, of course, you want to make an adventuring simulation game with some rpg elements: You train your heroes, micromanage their equipment, choose their abilities, give them some basic orders and then... let's see what happens. I can actually see a good game out of this, but it would be a different genre. Perhaps even a new one.

There's another aspect that came to my mind that makes RPGs different from the Settlers example: The connection to the characters. In an RPG you are supposed to care about them - having to look at an autoresolve combat that harms them breaks the bond between the player and the characters. In Settlers the guys are more or less cannon fodder, you care about them because they equal the resources that you invested into them (which makes the nail-biting combat fun), but not on a personal level.

 

[DraQ]

When I talk about minimizing the player's skill I talk about reducing its influence in the resolution of the game.

Again, no.

You don't want to minimize player's skill's influence on the resolution. What you do want is maximizing character skill's influence.
Those two are not mutually exclusive.

Theoretically there should be no problem in allowing the player to have some real-time "action" combat for immersion purposes or to give more control to the player if the character attributes can determine the effectiveness of all his maneuvers (combat accuracy, movement speed and finesse, etc.), the thing that Morrowind tried to accomplish. Implementing such a beast is the tricky part (Morrowind for example allows the player to easily dodge projectiles and melee attacks with supposedly very slow characters), and by embracing turn-based gameplay developers avoid this problem almost entirely.

Morrowind is hampered by stupid AI and badly designed encounters.

Besides, TB always comes at the price of fine control. Some things are worth this price but some aren't. Single character TB in particular doesn't bode well for the gameplay at all.

Role-playing games are about making decisions

All games are, come to think of it.

the player must act in the shoes of a specific character with determined skills (stats, classes, perks), a character that is different from the player. That's the game.

No, that's the Role Playing. The Game is when the player uses their own skills to win or at least keep not losing.

An RPG gives, or rather lets the player build their own "tool" for interacting with the game - that's their character - and then let the player use this tool to play the actual game, possibly iteratively (level ups). A well designed RPG also makes the optimal way to play the game with given character not too different from how this character would actually act in game's fiction.

Given this premise, by having the player skills determining the outcome of the game, even by a small margin, you're going against the spirit of the genre and making a hybrid.

Umm, no. Having player's skills determine the outcome only goes against the spirit of screensaver. Since we are discussing Role Playing Games, not Role Playing Screensavers it's a good thing.

And *all* cRPGs are hybrids. It doesn't matter if the particular genre involved is an FPS, third person slasher, stripped down RTS or a TBS with one piece and a forrest. They are hybrids by the virtue of core cRPG gameplay being not nearly enough to build a complete game around.

Not even the character's intelligence should interfere, but it could limit learning skills, crafting, involuntary behavior like fear or sub-par dialogue options, and so on.

If you have such attribute then of course it should interfere. Thus the question is whether or not something as mercurial as intelligence should make part of the character system at all.

What I'm trying to say here is that a "pure" CRPG would not auto-resolve at all, that's just dumb.

Of course a pure cRP should autoresolve. It would be a chargen followed by screensaver, basically. Thankfully there are no pure cRPs but rather different varieties of inherently impure cRPGs (badly designed most of the time, sadly).

 

[Iajawl]

As someone who mostly plays RPGs for the combat your idea is a bit horrifying.