[MUD-Dev] Re: Leaving characters in play

[D. B. Brown]

J C Lawrence wrote:
> The problem is that it is still dependant on a "combat state".  I have
> utterly failed to determine any sort of pattern which can be used to
> determine when a combat state actually should be incepted, which
> actions pertain to combat and which don't, and when a combat state
> should be closed.  It gets even messier for multi-character and
> multi-ranged (Bubba is firing arrows from the other side of the river,
> Boffo is hacking with a sword, and Bernie is doing his thing with the
> fireballs thru the magical portal) combats.

Just to throw out my combat system, as I have fiddled around with
the concept of 'combat state' and have some parts of the system set
up which make first-blow kills very unlikely (between two fighters
of skills within the same league -- in my system, it is still rather
easy for a veteran knight to kill (or incapacitate, as my mud does
make a distinction between 'defeated' and 'slain') a novice mage
in a single strike, but mages are *highly encouraged* to have an
escort with them if there is any chance of danger).

First, the definitions of the parts of my combat system:

Attacks -- Attacks are the most basic part of the system, and the
part which sets it apart from most others I've dealt with.  An
attack is the abstraction of anything which can effect a character
in any way (non-social, of course, but anything which can change
the game state of the character has to be an attack).  Attacks
store information on themselves -- primarily their attack type
(a list of the defense types which can defend against the attack,
see below), their damage type (what kind of damage is done, or what
the source of the effect is), the skill (or skills) from which the
attack sprang from, the attack's strength, the damage done (or
a function causing some effect), the time required to execute
the attack, and a roll to hit.  Attacks can also be flagged as
benevolent.

Defenses -- Abstractions of anything that can protect a character
from an attack.  Defenses store their defense type, a defense roll
and a strength by default, but are not required to be solely this --
a defense could be coded to have extra defense against attacks of
certain damage types, or from certain skills.  Defenses also store
the amount of time it takes to 'ready' the defense -- most defenses
can't be used continuously, but only once per X amount of time.

Combat state -- Combat state begins when a character receives any
non benevolent attack (the attacker is added to a list of attackers
of the character) and lasts until ten seconds after there are no
attackers present or nearby to the character.  While in combat
state, actions (especially movement) take more time.

When combat state ends, all of the character's defenses are 
'timed-out' and can be immediately utilized.  Since any character
entering combat has all defenses primed, the chances of being
slain on the first attack are considerably small.

One thing to note is that defenses usually have a very high chance
of stopping attacks that are aimed at them.  Since a typical fighter
will have three defenses available to the first attack (a parry, a
shield block, and a dodge), the chance of that first attack going 
through are pretty small.

One sidenote to this:  This doesn't include surprise, it is possible
for a surprised opponent to be defeated in a single blow.  However, 
for combatants in the same league, this will mostly happen whilst one
is asleep.  For this, my mud world has inns.  Since I'm not going
to require people to sleep on a regular basis (only to regenerate
mental & physical endurance as well as wounds faster), I don't have
pity for people who sleep in some unprotected area.

--
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|Do you ever get the feeling that the story's|D. B. Brown            |
|too damned real and in the present tense?   |dbrown1 at stny.lrun.com  |
|     -Ian Anderson                          | "..."                 |
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--
MUD-Dev: Advancing an unrealised future.