Infusion Dev Log #7: New Armor Mechanics

[Infinitron]

What dirt did Sawyer dig up on Styg to force these changes to the game? Is he holding you at gunpoint? Blink twice for yes.

This is a new game, not an update for Underrail.

 

[CHEMS]

so not getting hit in first place will be even more important!

sneaky stealth chads just can't stop winning

 

[thesecret1]

Look pretty good, though the formula makes me worry you won't ever really know just how effective an armor is save that higher number equals better (because who has the time to run the formula for each damage number?). Would be nice to have a tooltip describing just how good the armor is somehow

 

[Mauman]

For now, I have no intention to allow the player to choose which part of the target's body they're attacking

Why?

My guess is Styg doesn't want to deal with balancing around the old fallout strategy of "stick barrel in enemy eye, pull trigger".

 

[agris]

Look pretty good, though the formula makes me worry you won't ever really know just how effective an armor is save that higher number equals better (because who has the time to run the formula for each damage number?). Would be nice to have a tooltip describing just how good the armor is somehow

Seems like an academic concern. You’ll know how well a piece performs based on combat. If it performs well, that number(s) for protection is good, lower is worse. Performs poorly? You want higher.

Not everything has to be on a silver platter, nor should it be.

 

[thesecret1]

Seems like an academic concern. You’ll know how well a piece performs based on combat. If it performs well, that number(s) for protection is good, lower is worse. Performs poorly? You want higher.

It more about when comparing two pieces of gear and they have pros and cons. I see one had 10 defence more, but lacks some cool effect. Is 10 a lot, or only a little? Obviously you don't want to have to test both the pieces in combat just to pick one.

 

[agris]

Seems like an academic concern. You’ll know how well a piece performs based on combat. If it performs well, that number(s) for protection is good, lower is worse. Performs poorly? You want higher.

It more about when comparing two pieces of gear and they have pros and cons. I see one had 10 defence more, but lacks some cool effect. Is 10 a lot, or only a little? Obviously you don't want to have to test both the pieces in combat just to pick one.

You’ll have a sense of that already, because that piece with a 10 likely superseded a piece rated at 8, which superseded one with a lower ranking…

That’s what I mean by your concern being academic. In practice, you’ll have the context to evaluate.

 

[Dadd]

For now, I have no intention to allow the player to choose which part of the target's body they're attacking

Why?

My guess is Styg doesn't want to deal with balancing around the old fallout strategy of "stick barrel in enemy eye, pull trigger".

He should do something about it, since the game would feel extremely incongruous when you have detailed layered armor and coverage but no way to aim at body parts without using stances or special attacks. This is a salient problem in games like CDDA where some parts of the game are extremely detailed while other closely related parts are perfunctory at best. The games end up feeling arbitrarily designed, which hinders roleplaying and how players learn the games.

 

[agris]

For now, I have no intention to allow the player to choose which part of the target's body they're attacking

Why?

My guess is Styg doesn't want to deal with balancing around the old fallout strategy of "stick barrel in enemy eye, pull trigger".

He should do something about it, since the game would feel extremely incongruous when you have detailed layered armor and coverage but no way to aim at body parts without using stances or special attacks.

But stances and special attacks are ways to aim at specific body parts, so having “no way to aim at body parts” isn’t really the case

 

[Dadd]

For now, I have no intention to allow the player to choose which part of the target's body they're attacking

Why?

My guess is Styg doesn't want to deal with balancing around the old fallout strategy of "stick barrel in enemy eye, pull trigger".

He should do something about it, since the game would feel extremely incongruous when you have detailed layered armor and coverage but no way to aim at body parts without using stances or special attacks.

But stances and special attacks are ways to aim at specific body parts, so having “no way to aim at body parts” isn’t really the case

I said "no way to aim... without using stances or special attacks"
Why shouldn't you be able to aim at specific areas without special attacks? Is your character supposed to be retarded?

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

For now, I have no intention to allow the player to choose which part of the target's body they're attacking

Why?

My guess is Styg doesn't want to deal with balancing around the old fallout strategy of "stick barrel in enemy eye, pull trigger".

He should do something about it, since the game would feel extremely incongruous when you have detailed layered armor and coverage but no way to aim at body parts without using stances or special attacks.

But stances and special attacks are ways to aim at specific body parts, so having “no way to aim at body parts” isn’t really the case

Couldn't "normal" attacks also have a change to hit different bodyparts?
I hate it when locational damage is treated just as a magic special button.

 

[agris]

For now, I have no intention to allow the player to choose which part of the target's body they're attacking

Why?

My guess is Styg doesn't want to deal with balancing around the old fallout strategy of "stick barrel in enemy eye, pull trigger".

He should do something about it, since the game would feel extremely incongruous when you have detailed layered armor and coverage but no way to aim at body parts without using stances or special attacks.

But stances and special attacks are ways to aim at specific body parts, so having “no way to aim at body parts” isn’t really the case

Couldn't "normal" attacks also have a change to hit different bodyparts?
I hate it when locational damage is treated just as a magic special button.

That’s exactly what Styg lays out at the top of his post

Head (5%), Torso (55%), Arms (10%), Legs (including the pelvis) (25%), Feet (5%). The number in brackets is the current working chance to hit distribution for a generic ranged attack.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

For now, I have no intention to allow the player to choose which part of the target's body they're attacking

Why?

My guess is Styg doesn't want to deal with balancing around the old fallout strategy of "stick barrel in enemy eye, pull trigger".

He should do something about it, since the game would feel extremely incongruous when you have detailed layered armor and coverage but no way to aim at body parts without using stances or special attacks.

But stances and special attacks are ways to aim at specific body parts, so having “no way to aim at body parts” isn’t really the case

Couldn't "normal" attacks also have a change to hit different bodyparts?
I hate it when locational damage is treated just as a magic special button.

That’s exactly what Styg lays out at the top of his post

Head (5%), Torso (55%), Arms (10%), Legs (including the pelvis) (25%), Feet (5%). The number in brackets is the current working chance to hit distribution for a generic ranged attack.

I missed that bit when skimmign OP.

 

[agris]

He should do something about it, since the game would feel extremely incongruous when you have detailed layered armor and coverage but no way to aim at body parts without using stances or special attacks.

But stances and special attacks are ways to aim at specific body parts, so having “no way to aim at body parts” isn’t really the case

I said "no way to aim... without using stances or special attacks"
Why shouldn't you be able to aim at specific areas without special attacks? Is your character supposed to be retarded?

Let's think a bit harder about what you wrote.

You said that there's no way to do something, other than the ways to do it.



Well... yeah! But ok, I'll assume you rolled a natural 1 in rhetoric and really love Underrail and think "the game would feel extremely incongruous when you have detailed layered armor and coverage but no way to aim at body parts without using stances or special attacks"

Why are regular aimed shots having a chance to hit all body parts, and special shots / stances intending to hit other body parts, incongruous with a layered, bodypart-specific armor system? Is it more congruous to aim at the eyes with a shotgun? Or the feet with a minigun? Certain weapons make sense to have special attacks at specific body parts, e.g. knife and head (throat), scoped rifle and head, shotgun torso, etc.

As long as there is a robust bodypart aiming system implemented through weapon-appropriate special attacks, I don't see it as incongruous at all. Why do you?

 

[Dadd]

You said that there's no way to do something, other than the ways to do it.

Buddy, I clearly stated that I have problems with not being able to aim at body parts except with specific special moves. You are just repeating what I said, omitting a part of it, and pretending as if I'm contradicting myself. I'm not going to read the rest of your post predicated on this retarded debating tactic.

 

[Mauman]

Maybe Styg will put in a special feat that allows a special aimed shot, and give a cooldown so it can't be used every shot.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Maybe Styg will put in a special feat that allows a special aimed shot, and give a cooldown so it can't be used every shot.

Perhaps it could be mutually exclusive choice of "aim high" or "aim low" as a passive?

 

[Alex]

Additionally, each body part has its innate damage taken modifier and they are currently set to these values: head - 150%, torso - 100%, arms - 40%, legs - 60%, feet - 25%. So the armor value of your footwear is not nearly as important as your body armor, while if you don't wear a helmet to a gun fight, you're taking quite a risk.

If you're going to do this, maybe just go all out:

What do you think dmg range on weapons is abstraction of? With this system I hope it becomes constant?

Maybe bullets in Underrail's world are very non-standardised?

 

[Tigranes]

So, from a gameplay POV, I will be thinking:

1. Cool, new armour!
2. I get high torso defence but lower leg defence, how shall I assess this change?
3. Legs take less damage by default than torso, so I have to convert the defence value of the armour before I know how much HP I will actually lose more/less of
4. Legs usually get hit half as often as torso roughly, so I have to additionally run that calculation to see how valuable the leg defence is
5. Let's fight!
6. I was hit for 20 damage, what the fuck happened?
7. Wait shit my armour only covers 80% of the torso and the other 20% is covered differently
8. The bullet actually hit the overcoat and then the exposed part of the torso, whereas the other bullet hit the overcoat then the covered part of the torso, for different damage
9. But one of the bullets GRAZED instead of hit, so it also did half damage

Styg I am assuming that every single attack we will be provided with a god damn scan report

Infusion will require the latest CPU chips to run real-time calculations when players use shotguns, those on lower end PCs are advised to use different weapon types

 

[agris]

lol it’s good to see you back Tigranes , with you and Jaesun posting it feels like a mini renaissance

 

[Alex]

Styg

Have you considered doing a simple 3d simulation of the bullet path? It seems to me it could take care of this whole issue and other you might want to consider in one fell swoop.

Set up a simple 3d model of the creature being targeted, posed accordingly. Set a initial aiming point according to your preferences. From your post, I expect the initial aiming point would be the torso for human targets. Roll the firing character's attack and depending on how well he did, change his aim by x degrees on a random direction. Calculate where the bullet actually hits. With this, you could, at once:

1. Determine which body part is hit by the bullet.
2. Determine which armour layers provide protection to the area
   1. Armour cover no longer needs to be "one dimensional". Different armour can cover different "squares" of the 3d model. So, for instance, you could have an armour that doesn't cover the joints of the arm so well, but maybe provides better mobility.
3. Deal with obstacles providing cover for the target character.
4. Deal with different attack angles.
5. Deal with grazing hits by calculating the bullet trajectory inside the body and what areas are affected (a long trajectory inside the arm can be less harmful than a short trajectory through the vitals).
6. Deal with the possibility of the shot missing and hitting someone else.
7. Deal with the possibility of the shot blowing through and hitting someone behind.

I am not saying you should do this; but I was wondering if you have considered that possibility. And if so, what you think of it.