Aw hell yeah AoD combat/teaser demo! The sporadic lurker/poster comes here expecting a "2009-Year In Review" article and gets something even better to bitch about instead. That is, constructive bitching, of course, which is the spirit of rpgcodex and definitely not christmas.
At first it was a bit frustrating, but you learn to deal with the stuff like the bugs and the crashes and the game short fusing your power supply while crashing, overheating your rheostat-lamp plugged to the same multiple plug causing a weird electrical reaction creating an EMP shockwave taking out all the lights in the neighborhood incinerating the brightly-lit christmas tree melting the little angel on the top mutilating santa who just came from the chimney chilling in your restroom in his red underwear. These things are to be expected in early builds especially if you're dealing with an indie.
Finally it starts getting exciting and fun once you've figured out what to do and you're trying out the cool stuff, experimenting a bit etc. But then you realize, dude, this is a one-man turn based tactical combat system and somehow it's even slightly more simplistic than its already simplistic role model granddaddy Fallout's system it's obviously emulating or aiming to improve upon or taking examples from or whatever there aren't that many turn based tactical stuff using APs where you're strictly commanding a single duder. Of course, I'm not just basing this assertion on the fact that there ain't no option(s) for groin shots in this game, why can't I shoot people in the dick with a heavy crossbow this is like elementary stuff that just had to be included etc.
Tactical turn based combat usually works best with "squad-based", "party-based" games for a reason and I'm not talking about "companion based" mind you, you should be fully commanding all the dudes you're traveling with pre-generated or not, being able to issue some simple commands doesn't cut it either. The variety of the short term and more importantly long term decisions built up from your turn-by-turn decisions can be implemented as complex as it gets which has the potential for stimulating some neurological activity other than boredom from repeating the single most sensible stuff in almost all circumstances ad infinitum until you win. (shoot them in the... why, in the eye of course! That's where it hurts the most! Don't do anything else because it's either fairly useless or arbitrary!) This is why we get so much fun from playing Jagged Alliance and Blood Bowl because there are so many tactical shit you can take your time deciding with multiple elements on the table to manage AND you've got your long term strategy to worry about in the long run meaning gawd knows how many more turns you have to duke it out against all odds to pull through as gloriously as possible. Always playing it safe spamming the safest, the most obvious thing to do at every turn at every level to win makes you lose because there is no such "ultimate" thing in these games. There are multiple good tactics for different situations of course but they are anything but obvious and requires some level of thinking. That's why dumb people don't like them, read the YouTube and the Piratebay and the 4chan comments on Blood Bowl/JA2 and you'll see.
Due to the sheer tactical complexity the best amongst such games usually keep it small scale without legions of stuff to command and fight against, right? Because you've got all the time in the world to play with the amazing plethora of meaningful stuff to do because y'know it's liek turn based...and...tactical?
It just doesn't feel right when you've got shit tons of more tactical options when commanding a solo character in ToEE for example which is meant to be played with a party of five to seven characters than Age of Decadence where you have command over strictly one character. This goes for the encounters too since you can't realistically fight thirty enemies unless you're dealing with a Stephen Hawking clone brigade with 3% to hit. 3 HP and 1-3 dmg with a DR of 3 (electric wheelchair) or whatever. Why can't we get the stuff like St. Toxic briefly listed ITT for a one-man TB combat system? We could have things like stat altering combat stances affecting the long term battle geared towards more gambling or less gambling with your chances you're willing to take after assessing the threat priority. Taking combat stances or perk-like abilities that could give me certain penalties and bonuses for a turn or two like a charge-attack stance giving you the ability to bullrush a dude discarding/halving the movement AP and gives bonus to damage proportional to the amount of the unblocked, straight line of distance between you and the enemy causing a massive to hit % bonus for your enemy/enemies next turn leaving you much more vulnerable to attack. From the start of the battle I'm thinking that Ordu Archer will cause me a lot more trouble in the long run so instead of playing it safe I charge-attack the archer hoping to knock him down- do as much damage as early as possible to him leaving myself much more vulnerable to his swordsman buddy earlier in the fight because I'm thinking the Archer is more trouble for my character in the long run and even maybe my choice of defense against the swordsman kind of melee fighter is better than taking shots from an Ordu Archer with a composite longbow. I can't really foresee if this gamble is gonna work for me in the upcoming turns instead of playing it safe in the normal move-attack kind of fighting but I'm glad I have a choice other than the normal move-attack fighting. I might turn out right or wrong for bullrushing the Archer like a maniac leaving myself more vulnerable to the swordsman earlier in the fight but I want to be able to take that chance goddamit. Gambling more should be able to turn out better than playing it safe in certain situations. Seeing all your options clearly, utilizing everything from terrain, line of sight to a more varied way of spending your APs forces the player to do a lot of long term planning deciding a course of action whether it's gambling for a plan based on a foreseeable outcome fucking owns. This goes beyond simple number-crunching and assburger char-build planning. A lot more distinction between weapon types would also be welcome which could make way for even more defined fighter archetype stuff like an awesome legionary style higher AP consuming tower shield bashing techniques best used with a low AP consuming short gladius than the other kinds of longer one-handed blades for example. This is like the C&C of tactical combat and the good designer is the one that can throw around a lot of choices with tactical consequences that actually matters. Seems familiar?
In games with a good tactical TB combat some players will always be able to read a combat encounter a lot better than others and take down an opposition that would be too much to handle for others and simplistic stuff like taking out the mutie with the most dangerous weapon with the help of the Awareness perk finding it out like in Fallout just doesn't cut it. If you keep it too simple without a lot of variables to deal with everyone will figure out the most sensible thing to do for almost every single situation and spam it in a conditioned manner like Pavlov's Dog on crack because either there's no other way to win or the other choices are too arbitrary or too obvious. There are tons of games with boring combat like this. Even Fallout combat was kinda like this. You don't just "figure it out" and repeat the absolute same thing in good tactical TB combat. That's why there are so few of them universally praised around here. "It's good for what it is!" doesn't count either, this game is supposed to kick some ass and chew bubblegum while pissing on all the mainstream crap people got sick and tired of. This combat ain't bloody enough for an indie revolutionary attempt and surely not enough to actually impress a lot of the veterans who has seen it all played it all and got fed up.
Having an extra layer of tactical decision making during combat sure wouldn't hurt. Actualizing a more complex combat system for a one-man TB game with a lot more stuff to do is even more necessary precisely because it's TB, and because it is extremely small scale compared to a squad based game desperate for more stuff we can fuck around with our single dude/dudette. Single character TB combat systems have a lot of room to tolerate really ridiculous amounts of complex tactical options unlike the unnecessarily "complicated" paradox studios stat-porn games assburgers feel intelligent playing with the stupid arbitrary, meaningless options just put there for the sake of complexity. But a single-char-TB game like like AoD can consume layers upon layers of "teh complexity" and be better from it. Otherwise it's really fucking boring meaning it would grow old real fast after a while. Why not remedy that by improving it accordingly? C'mon mengs you can do a lot better than this...
If a game doesn't need much thought to win then a TB system is a gigantic waste... It being simply "Turn Based" isn't enough to make it "good", TB is simply a tool which should be milked to its fullest potential for tactical awesomeness because it's TB and because it can. It simply enables complexity. Keeping it simple while keeping it TB is making it lame. This is especially true for a single-man TB combat that is slightly more or less simplistic than Fallout. Fallout combat was fun, but Fallout combat sucked. People don't praise Fallout primarily for its combat system. Heh, on the other hand, a lot of people don't curse it for being "bad" either because it's stylish and humorous and Fallout 1 wasn't exactly drowned in combat. I for one didn't care much for it and even found it p. boring at times, especially in FO2. Hey, I haven't read that LP thread at ITS I don't exactly know how much combat the game has. Even if it's really thinly spread, it's still no excuse for not making it a lot more fun while playing since some of the character classes are bound to spend a lot more time in combat than others. I guess I'll play the Grifter or Merchant first if you guys aren't improving the combat. I always wanted to play as an evil jew merchant named ARIEL EDENGOLDSTEINOVITZ anyways... :pollyanna:
I focused on the combat (which is not that terrible but not really good either) cuz it's the "combat demo" but my impressions on the art, interface, lore and the writing, atmosphere and especially the awesome indian/persian/turkish/roman/hellenic/dacian/nordic weaponry was positive from what I've seen here. Don't listen to the f-word haters VD, vulgarity is the heart and soul of post-apoc. Who would expect people to mind their manners in an age of decadence anyway? They're obviously all decadent sonsa bitches not beholden by some civilized world stopping them from crashing down the f-word like a mothafucka. Didn't they curse a lot shouting "COCK!!!" and "JUNO'S CUNT!!!" in the Rome tv-series instead of fuck? That's HBO improvisation for you. Just saying.
Qwinn.
