Fallout has distorted the way many Codexers think of combat difficulty in CRPGs

The only trolls being fallacious here are the ones arguing that Fallout would have been worse with better combat.

My mind cannot comprehend of the sheer fanboy fanaticism that is required to demonstrate such levels of incompetence.

Nor that interesting... good thing that's not what is being discussed in this thread at all, huh?

 

Yes. Because the thread title got discredited right on the first page.

 

People are really incontinent with normative language

 

Normative assertions are de facto unverifiable.

 

I should probably point out that I'm not, by any measure, a Fallout fanatic. I think it's an ambitious but deeply flawed game that nonetheless averages "good", though not great, mainly because the game is so short and easy that it doesn't quite run out of charm and novelty before the game ends.

My argument in this thread is that the quality of a particular combat system shouldn't be discussed in isolation, but in the context of the overall design of the game. That would also be why I brought up board games like Go and Chess to trais - that's what a good combat system in isolation is. Good RPG combat is different because the combat needs to interface with other systems that make up the game, and so what "good combat" is depends on what those other systems are. Design choices that are good in a dungeon crawler are not appropriate for a tactical RPG, a sandbox game or a monster breeding simulator. What role does the combat play in the game? Is it for the fun of it? Is it a way to test out your build? Is it there for attrition and grinding to limit the speed of the player's progress and exploration in a big, multi-level dungeon that's arbitrarily full of monsters? Is it the major attraction, or just one tool among others for the player to interact with the world? All these call for different combat systems.

For Fallout, a "violence system", as Gozma put it, is the most appropriate type of combat system, even though such a system would seem pretty bad in most other games. It's what works well with the rest of the game. Much could be done to improve combat in Fallout, but the goal of such improvement should be to make a better violence system, rather than, say, a squad-based tactical combat system. But that's just my opinion, so you're welcome to disagree.

 

All party CRPG combat is so crappy people are unable to imagine what good combat would be like. It's like if you grow up staring at paintings from the Middle Ages you'll never have any idea that beautiful hot as heck babes might exist.

 

Ok, but that is what I have found personally in many cRPGs, be it Fallout or not.

 

Your argument boils down to the completely nonsensical "if they make a system good enough, they must make it the focus of the game to the detriment of other systems."

That is obviously quite false. That it doesn't come from fanaticism towards the game only increases my wonder.

There is no real argument in your posts, only statements. For example:

This is just a statement saying "Fallout is better because of simple combat" but there is no argument there. The only supporting argument one can possibly dig up if the reader him/herself really digs into your post is that somewhere in it you buried a "good combat takes longer and takes more focus."

But even here your argument is obviously wrong. If it was true, why is there so much potential fighting in Fallout? What's with the constant random encounters? For argument's sake they could have made a solid, squad-based system with deep tactical combat and reduced the amounts of fights. You're also drawing a false conclusion when you claim that good combat is slow combat, or anything of that sort.

If it seems like I'm trying to guess when repelling your arguments it is because I can't find much of an argument in your posts. It's just you saying "Fallout was better because of worse combat" and then some unsupported statement that combat would have become the sole focus of the game had it not been so shitty.

Oh, and may I remind you we have posters on this forum who actually stated that besides JA2, Fallout had the best combat of any RPG ever?

 

You're lying.

 

Ask Awor and the people who fisted him when he said that.

 

Simple is not the same as bad, and I don't think a really detailed complex combat system would necessarily make Fallout better. I think simplicity is part of the appeal. I think a lot of what made Fallout great was a number of simple systems interacting with each other. This in turn created emergent gameplay while also allowing players to easily comprehend what the results would be from their actions.

 

Nobody said that. Fallout's combat isn't lackluster because it is simple.

 

It's lackluster because it's simple, easy, non-party based (which is terrible for turn-based games), and lacks strategy beyond "pump all your points into gun/energy weapons and aim for the eyes".

 

Well then we're in agreement.

 

Asking him now.

 

I don't see why that's problem beyond lacking in execution.

This is true.

 

I've thought this through bros, and came to the conclusion that people who criticize Fallout's combat while championing Baldur's Gate combat (as opposed to ToEE, for example), are nothing but closet biodrones, using the combat discussion as a self-deception, in order to feel better about their own forbidden love for mediocre Bioware writing, their shallow characters and forgettable stories.

This is my final contribution to this thread. Good night, and good luck.

 

Controlling one character in a turn based RPG will almost always turn into one of two games:

- Battle of mindless attrition.
- 1-2 turn/round combat where you hope you are lucky.

A pretty good example is the solo battle in FFT where you versus Wiegraf. You pretty much get to do one of three things:

- Find a way to outlast him (typically Yelling until your speed is outrageously high).
- Bum rush him.
- Die.

Because of design, controlling only a single character in turn-based combat is inherently less strategic. Compare this to games where you have multiple characters. You can do much more with your tactics such as flanking and party roles. (healer/tank/sniper/etc).

 

I remain skeptical until I play it. I have NEVER played a cRPG with a good single-character turn based combat system. It almost always devolves into what I posted.

 

I thought it was still in development.

 

I don't think AoD's combat is that great, but it is certainly much, much better than Fallout's.