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[syvarris]

I wrote up my own version of the turn, because I am amazing at time management, but PW ninja'd me.  Oh well.

I'll comment on his version anyway, though.  I think he's messing up with the stances; Most obviously, at the end of the turn, he listed Spaz as being in both aggro and def stances.  Spaz is in Def, Egan is in Aggro.  Also, Spaz dealt two damage to Whisp, not one, because he was in Aggro while Whisp was in def--they essentially nullify each other.

Finally, you're actually nerfing knives there, Peedubs.  Under normal circumstances, a knife fighter can assume aggro stance to counter defensive, which grants them +1-1 damage, leaving them with one damage, twice per turn--equal to katanas and kopeshes, just with worse range and better incrementing.  Not that knives don't deserve a nerf--in double aggro battles, they deal 1+1+1*2 damage, better than a kopesh's 2+1+1, again with better incrementing.  Double aggro honestly seems to be the way to go most of the time, unless your opponent is just built better than you.  Nerfing knives to two tries at a three damage attack seems like a good idea--it's worse damage than a kopesh, but more chances to use the damage buff, and three's all you need for an instakill on the head.

Though, double aggro grants an effective +4 to-hit, so maybe the double strike isn't really a benefit.  And the knife does have a range disadvantage, which is problematic... The knife does have crippling blow, though, which can enable up to twelve damage in a single turn... but it only targets limbs, which reduces its utility against unarmored people a fair bit, due to the low limb HP...  and kopeshes are built for anti-armor already.

Yeah, you probably shouldn't nerf knives like that, PW.

Spoiler: @Spaz (click to show/hide)

You're already in defensive stance, PW just made an error.  Also, you've gotta specify which cards you want to regen.

Waiting is a bad idea anyway, because it's sacrificing advantage for tempo.  You're not losing tempo yet, so it's just a penalty to you.

Also, hack is essentially just a normal attack.  It only deals bonus damage to armor and shields, and nobody grabbed any armor because you're all fools too nice.  Also, you should move out before attacking, because then you'll have a +1 to-hit against Whisper.

Oh, and a bit of free advice: Use "defend" as your first action.  Egan is going to launch three attacks as his first action, and they'll probably be directed at you.  If he targets your head, he could instakill you on the first instance next turn, but defending will grant you +2 def against each strike.

Spoiler: @Egan (click to show/hide)

You used quick draw as your last action!  I'm not sure whether to point out how you're almost cheating by not specifying the target, or whether to pity you for telling your opponents exactly which round they need to defend on. 

[spazyak]

oh thanks Syv.

[piecewise]

I wrote up my own version of the turn, because I am amazing at time management, but PW ninja'd me.  Oh well.

I'll comment on his version anyway, though.  I think he's messing up with the stances; Most obviously, at the end of the turn, he listed Spaz as being in both aggro and def stances.  Spaz is in Def, Egan is in Aggro.  Also, Spaz dealt two damage to Whisp, not one, because he was in Aggro while Whisp was in def--they essentially nullify each other.

Finally, you're actually nerfing knives there, Peedubs.  Under normal circumstances, a knife fighter can assume aggro stance to counter defensive, which grants them +1-1 damage, leaving them with one damage, twice per turn--equal to katanas and kopeshes, just with worse range and better incrementing.  Not that knives don't deserve a nerf--in double aggro battles, they deal 1+1+1*2 damage, better than a kopesh's 2+1+1, again with better incrementing.  Double aggro honestly seems to be the way to go most of the time, unless your opponent is just built better than you.  Nerfing knives to two tries at a three damage attack seems like a good idea--it's worse damage than a kopesh, but more chances to use the damage buff, and three's all you need for an instakill on the head.

Though, double aggro grants an effective +4 to-hit, so maybe the double strike isn't really a benefit.  And the knife does have a range disadvantage, which is problematic... The knife does have crippling blow, though, which can enable up to twelve damage in a single turn... but it only targets limbs, which reduces its utility against unarmored people a fair bit, due to the low limb HP...  and kopeshes are built for anti-armor already.

Yeah, you probably shouldn't nerf knives like that, PW.

Spoiler: @Spaz (click to show/hide)

You're already in defensive stance, PW just made an error.  Also, you've gotta specify which cards you want to regen.

Waiting is a bad idea anyway, because it's sacrificing advantage for tempo.  You're not losing tempo yet, so it's just a penalty to you.

Also, hack is essentially just a normal attack.  It only deals bonus damage to armor and shields, and nobody grabbed any armor because you're all fools too nice.  Also, you should move out before attacking, because then you'll have a +1 to-hit against Whisper.

Oh, and a bit of free advice: Use "defend" as your first action.  Egan is going to launch three attacks as his first action, and they'll probably be directed at you.  If he targets your head, he could instakill you on the first instance next turn, but defending will grant you +2 def against each strike.

Spoiler: @Egan (click to show/hide)

You used quick draw as your last action!  I'm not sure whether to point out how you're almost cheating by not specifying the target, or whether to pity you for telling your opponents exactly which round they need to defend on. 

Fixed the mistakes, but knives only attack twice per instance, not three times, which you seem to think?

[syvarris]

You misunderstand; the "1+1+1" is a single attack, and the "*2" indicates two attacks.  If both people have aggro stance, a knife deals three damage, and attacks twice, for a potential of six damage.  A kopesh or katana does four damage in a similar situation, and makes or breaks all that damage on one roll, where the knife gets two chances at three damage.  Also, three damage is equal to a head's HP, so the knife user essentially gets two rolls to instakill their opponent, while their opponent gets only one.

In a defense vs aggro battle, the knife does two one damage attacks per turn, while the opponent does one two damage attack per turn.  They have identical potential damage, but the knife user gets two chances at a head hit, stunning their foe if either attack hits. 

Basically, in a normal battle, the knife always has the advantage.  Even factoring in special attacks, the knife's got it pretty good; crippling blow grants a permanent *2 to damage on a certain limb (which I think is slightly better than the katana's quick draw).  It does have the disadvantage of lower defense due to range, but that's mitigatable (through armor--see below).  Only the kopesh's cleave ability is on a similar level, and even then only when the knifer has heavy armor and assuming cleave ignores armor.

Hence why I end up saying the knife shouldn't be nerfed.  If it were, the kopesh is the undisputed king.  As it is, there's two valid munchkin builds:

Spoiler: Oro's Havelmonster (click to show/hide)

((Oro refers to the dickish guy who does Dark Souls PvP by overbuffing a katana, making each slash do over a thousand damage, not this game))

Weapon: Dagger and greatshield
Armor: Medium armor on all limbs and head, heavy armor on torso

Weight is 4+1.5*5+3=14.5, for a -4 to defense.  Greatshield raises that up to effectively -2 defense.  It could be upgraded to full heavy, but I think that would be more trouble than it's worth, because it'd get -7(-5) to defense.  The point is probably moot, as this build will probably want to stay in double aggro at all times, but having the option of defending is nice.

Deck would have 3x crippling blows, and LOTS of attacks.  A few feints might be nice, but I don't think they'd be useful against anything aside from another havelmonster.  The best strategy would probably be to crippling blow a leg, then just spend every attack on killing the legs.  With crippling blow and double aggro, it only takes two hits, for three total.  If the opponent goes defensive, havelmonster still has the advantage because its not that easy to hit, and can tank a lot of damage while having the best DPT in the game.

Oh course, kopeshes are a hard counter if Cleave ignores limb armor, which is why I have two builds listed.

Spoiler: Kopesh Knight (click to show/hide)

Weapon:Kopesh and Greatshield
Armor: Medium armor on head, naked otherwise

Weight is 4+1.5=5.5 for a -1 to defense.  Greatshield raises that up to effectively +1 defense.  You could use a normal shield instead of a greatshield, but that prevents you from wearing a helmet, and I'm not even sure it would provide any benefit whatsoever.  Maybe against Feints and Cleaves, but the former isn't actually that bad (your opponent might trade a turn for one of yours), and the latter is still hard to land.  Then again, this build relies upon both those moves, so...

Deck would have 3x Cleave, few attacks, lots of feints, all stances (and plenty of them), and a smattering of other cards for versatility.  Generally, the strategy would be to go into aggro stance, then repeatedly feint->cleave a leg.  Once a leg is missing, go for an arm.  Once both are missing, go defensive and either cleave another limb or just start hitting their torso, according to taste.  It shouldn't matter much; with def stance, this build has an effective +2 defense, and if the foe's missing an arm, that's up to an effective +4 (plus they'll find it really hard to hit anything except your torso).  They'll basically have to go into aggro to stand a chance of hitting you, so you don't even lose much accuracy.

The only counter I can think of is parrying the feint, and parry is generally pretty crappy otherwise.  Also, parry isn't compatible with shields or armor, so I doubt it would get much use if people were being serious.

Against a parry-heavy person, aggro-cleave-defensive-wait-anything might be a good turn order.  You can move cleave to three different spots in your turn order without any issue, making it hard to parry, and you only spend 2/5 turns out of defensive stance, which makes you really hard to hit if they stop the parry spam.

Katana should basically never be used.  Quickdraw is decent, but is too easy to counter and the katana only beats the dagger in raw damage if the dagger hasn't landed a crippling blow.  The katana will quickly run out of quickdraws, while both other weapons only need to land their special once per limb.

Maybe Kopesh and dagger are just OP, though.  It's hard to tell when we only have three weapons.


EDIT:
I just considered something.  The havelmonster literally doesn't care if its legs are chopped off, so the leg armor can be completely removed.  That gives it +1 defense until it loses a leg, which is nice.  By then it'll probably have chopped off your leg, so it balances out.

[spazyak]

As I see it the Kopesh should be slow with hacks and cleaves dealing tons of damage, Katanas are a good middle ground of speed versus damage, and knives being all speed little damage

[Egan_BW]

"If you two just keep fighting each other, I might have to leave!"
*Dark Souls laugh*

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Wait (regain Quick Draw, Quick Draw)
Quick Draw-spazyak-head
Attack-spazyak-head
Attack-spazyak-head
Attack-spazyak-head

[syvarris]

@Spaz
The "problem" is that speed == damage in this game, at least currently.  All the weapons are low damage, and buffs are easy to come by.  The minimum damage buff is +1, which is a +100% buff for a knife, or a +50% buff for a katana or kopesh.  Double aggro gives two such buffs, meaning a knife gains a +200% damage while the other two only get a +100%... and the knife further doubles that because it attacks twice.  And crippling blow doubles it again, though that's getting into the range of overkill.

The kopesh almost closes the gap with cleave, which can theoretically do 17 damage in one turn, but in practice that'll almost never happen because heavy armor is more trouble than its worth.  Also, the knife has a theoretical damage ceiling of 16 (1 damage, +2 aggro stances, +1 startup, *2 attack speed, *2 crippling blow), so... yeah.

This might change when heavier weapons are added to the game, or if range gets enforced, but currently the knife has the best damage under almost all circumstances.

[spazyak]

 I was trying to describe, albeit poorly, an alternative.

[crazyabe]

Just a thought but perhaps weight could be larger a factor, for example a Knife has little weight and can thus be blocked or parried by almost anything but very hard to dodge and can be used more quickly, while a Zwihander would be easy to dodge and take some time to wind up for a basic attack but almost impossible to block or parry without equel strength to it's wielder.

[piecewise]

For the moment it's more about finding a basic system that works rather than balancing one. I made these weapons up in like 2 minutes for a test, after all.

This card thing is one of a few methods that I thought of, after all.

[Parisbre56]

Syv, I don't have the time to think about your analysis too hard, but have you taken into account battling multiple opponents? Because maybe that could change the balance, especially when you take into account that every time you switch targets you essentially get into maximum range with everyone else. Or maybe piecewise could have some weapons that are better against multiple opponents.

[Whisperling]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Wait (recover 2 attacks), then lunge at spaz's arm, then two attacks at the same arm, then parry, then wait (recover attacks).

[syvarris]

@Paris
Nope, I wasn't considering multiple opponents at all.  Kopesh probably has the advantage in that case, because it is hurt least by going into a defensive stance.  The knife relies upon aggro stance, but multiple opponents benefit more from the stance than the wielder.

Also, the knife user could potentially be perma-stunned against multiple people spamming feint.  A similar tactic, which would let the katana be more useful, is to use quickdraw and have an ally feint during your startup turn--if it works, you'll get a +2 to each katana strike.  It's still inferior to the other two weapons

Range is sorta funny, as it doesn't seem necessary for a knife user to close before attacking--PW let Whisp attack at range 1, with a range 0 weapon.  It only provides a benefit to the attacks of the non-knife person, which is more or less pointless against the havelmonster--it's already dumped defense down enough that maintaining a range bonus isn't worth it.


Oh, and in case it wasn't obvious, the knife build I presented is only good for one fight.  It essentially plans to have one or both legs chopped off, because the time spent doing that is time that can be spent on killing an opponent.  Kopesh is better for a character meant to survive multiple fights, because its wins are less pyrhic.

Spoiler: EDIT: I had a system idea (click to show/hide)

WARNING: I HAVE A COMPLEXITY ADDICTION.
Yes, all this probably makes the game too complicated, since one of the primary design goals is for Piecewise to be able to run it to be fast, so the game goes quick.  I don't care, I just like systems.




Same system, just add stamina.  Stamina is determined by a character's level or stats, and then reduced by weight; wielding fists while naked results in max stamina, while wearing full plate while wielding a greatsword and greatshield would result in massive stamina reduction, or possibly outright immobilization.

Every card gets a stamina cost to activate.  A knife's attack would be very cheap, but have little effect, while an axe would be expensive.  By default, you get to play three cards without penalty: one using each hand (and whatever said hand is holding), and one for your body.  You can play multiple cards, but each card past the first in a category costs extra stamina; your first right hand knife attack costs one, your second right hand knife attack costs two, then three, etc. but all of them have the same effect.  Also, if you're wielding a knife in your left hand too, you could play a fourth attack that uses that weapon, for only one (thus providing a benefit for dual-wielding).

Heavier weapons with very high stamina costs wouldn't have startup/recovery times by default.  Instead, they'd just be so expensive that normal people can't use them in one turn.  Instead, they are partially paid in one turn (or two turns), and take effect once their full cost is paid off.  This means stronger people would be faster with weapons, and excessively strong people could use greatswords like longswords--or conversely, a heavily armored person with low stamina might be forced to use a longsword like a greatsword.

Two-handing an item would either increase stamina, or reduce costs by a percentage, meaning it's easier to twohand a greataxe than onehand it.  The tradeoff is that you can use less cards in a turn cheaply, and you have less options.



I really like how this changes weapons, but I feel like this system doesn't handle defensive moves so well.  I think parrying, blocking, and dodging should be cards, but how would they work?  If they work like the system we have now, they'd have to be very expensive due to their power, which means you generally wouldn't be able to attack AND defend.  If you weakened them, and let people play multiple at one time, card draw is exaggerated.  You could weaken them and let people put arbitrary amounts of stamina into them... which would work decently well, but increases complexity even more, and also means defensive moves have very strong tempo.  Maybe that's not bad?

Perhaps for each parry/block/dodge card you play in a turn, you can P/B/D one attack, and you can spend arbitrary amounts of stamina to determine how much the P/B/D affects a roll.  Say, spending 1 stamina on a dodge card gets you +1 to your first dodge, and you could spend two on another dodge card to get two dodges at +1, or spend one more stamina on the first dodge to get a single dodge at +2?

I feel each should provide different amounts of modification.  Spending two stamina on a parry might get you +1 on a defensive roll, and carries the benefit that you might make a person lose some of their stamina next turn.  Spending two on a dodge might get you +2 to the same roll, but you get no benefit aside from avoiding damage.  Two spent on a block roll might get you +3, but your shield will have to take the hit--not a good idea if your foe's using a greataxe.  Also, what you're using might affect the roll--a greatshield should block better than a buckler, and a specialized dagger should be better at parrying than a longsword.

Lastly, a dodge card should be able to spend stamina from the next turn, just like large weapons.  This allows "fat rolls", which is just great.



The final subject I'm unsure about it how to handle "spare" stamina.  Should it be stored, and used to recharge cards?  That adds a number that which must be kept track of.  Also, how are the cards bought?  Do you get a certain number of cards back after you've spent a certain amount of stamina waiting?  That means knife users are likely to get "tired" from card overuse far faster than greataxe users, but it means wearing heavy armor will make you tired quickly, and is a neat game mechanic.  Instead, should you have to spend X stamina waiting to recharge a card of X cost?  That makes greataxes more tiring than knives, but means armor does nothing beyond slow you down, not tire you.  Also, it's boring.

[piecewise]

My turn

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

1. attack at Whisperling's head
2. Feign attack at Egan
3. attack Egan's leg
4. move out
5. wait and regen Hack

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Wait (recover 2 attacks), then lunge at spaz's arm, then two attacks at the same arm, then parry, then wait (recover attacks).

"If you two just keep fighting each other, I might have to leave!"
*Dark Souls laugh*

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Wait (regain Quick Draw, Quick Draw)
Quick Draw-spazyak-head
Attack-spazyak-head
Attack-spazyak-head
Attack-spazyak-head

Hmm egan does an interesting thing here. Something I never said could not specifically be done, so I'm letting it happen. He waits and regens two quick draws.  Whisperling waits too.  Spaz, however, attacks whisperling's head. Rolls a 1, too low for the min to hit.

Now lets see, Egan attacks spaz, spaz attacks whisper, whisper attacks spaz. Egan and spaz are the same range, so we'll roll to see who goes first. 1 for spaz, 5 for egan. So thats a win for egan. Lets roll out his other two attacks and then spaz's defensive rolls. So 5,3,1 vs 3,2,3.  So he gets one hit in on the head. Normally he does 2 damage, but he's in an aggressive stance so he's dealing 3 damage. But spaz is in a defensive stance so reduces that to 2. Spaz's head HP reduced to 1, stunned. Ah, I guess it should reasonably stop this current instance too. That leaves whisper. Hmm rolls a 2. Moves in one on spaz, reduces range to zero, but fails to hit.

Ah, now we have three attacks all at once. Lets see...Spaz is stunned, Whisper attacks spaz, Egan attacks spaz. You guys need to start doing a daisy chain here, just an ouroboros of stabbing. Fits the game! Pretty sure whisper and spaz are at range zero now, so it's just a roll to see who goes first. 1,6. Ah well. Whisperling misses at least the first  attack, egan gets his attack in first. 6vs5 on spaz's head. Deals two damage, slices spaz's head clean off. Lets move whisperling's target to egan and vice versa. So he missed that first attack, got a 4-1 on the second, to which egan rolls a 1. Their two stances cancel, so he deals 1 damage to Egan's left arm.

Egan attacks head, whisperling parries. 6+1vs2+1+1 Parry fails, 2+1-1 damage to head.  Whisperling is decapitated!

Egan wins with a double decapitation in one turn!

[piecewise]

Ok, so ignoring the finer details of things like balance, and assuming that in the future there would be more cards, more special moves, magic, etc, what do you think of this kind of combat?

Do you think it's something you could enjoy? Or back to the drawing board?

Other people who were just watching can chime in too.