Reaching a stable saber system via minor tweaks

[Stassin]

This is my spec/possible changelog on how to obtain a stable saber system from 1.4.5, designed and simplified primarily with open mode in mind, with the least amount of minor tweaks possible (meaning the current 1.4.5 general design for sabering mechanics would remain the same). My primary reason for writing this small spec is that the dev team intends to settle the saber system design issue sooner rather than later, and as such intends to refrain from implementing major revamps which could easily require a few more years to fully balance. I believe Tempest (currently the one other dev bent on designing the saber system) has somewhat taken that to heart recently, but regardless i wish to write down my own spec down independently from his vision on needed changes, and i hope in the end a reasonable and simple compromise will be found so that we can finally and happily stop touching the saber system.

This would normally rather be intended for private dev discussions and is more specifically meant for Tempest and other devs interested in gameplay, but since there are few of us i believe it is appropriate to post it publicly.

Design keywords for this spec: minor tweaks, simplify, open mode.


######## Changelog ########

General tweaks for saber vs saber:

• Removed perfect parry.
• Reintroduced semi-PB and nerfed it (25% or 50% damage instead of 0%, if needed).
• Reinstated fast PB counter on every full-PB rather than only on mblocked swingblocks, and it drains normal damage (instead of the increased damage from 1.4).
• Increased global parry drains by giving them 25% (or possibly less, if that is still too much) of the damage of a bodyhit.
• Reintroduced chaining direction restrictions: general restrictions reverted to a gap of two quadrants between consecutive swings as it was before 1.4, instead of 1 or 0. Some styles (Red, Purple, Cyan, Duals) have different restrictions, see Style tweaks for details.
• (Possible: introduce some sort of visual-only nudge in order to address the issue of sabers idling into people and passing through each other when blocking or idling)
• (Possible: make mblocking swingblocks flinch - not stagger, flinch is less disabling - the opponent for all styles)

Style tweaks:

• Blue: removed all perks (reverted max swings in a chain to 2 if 3 is too strong).
• Yellow: removed all perks.
• Red: removed all perks. Increased AP and decreased BP (if needed). Added chaining direction restriction: 3 quadrants between consecutive swings.
• Purple: removed current perks and added a single perk dealing with ACM gain and loss. Increased AP and decreased BP (if needed). Added chaining direction restriction: 1 quadrant between consecutive swings to make it harder to PB (possibly).
• Cyan: removed all perks. Increased AP and decreased BP (if needed). Added chaining direction restriction: 3 quadrants between consecutive swings.
• Duals: removed all perks, kept only the higher defense arc vs both sabers and guns. Added chaining direction restriction: 1 or even 0 quadrants between consecutive swings. Reduced BP for balance (possibly).
• Staff: removed all perks (possibly kept mblocks requiring only correct movement and timing, to see), kept the higher defense arc vs both sabers and gunners. Reduced AP for balance (possibly).

General tweaks for saber vs gun:

• Reduced the FP regen debuff period when shot to 0.5s from 1s.
• Kept the low FP drain cooldown (50ms) but reinstated a middle-ground from v0 (where the FP drain cooldown was 200ms) by having all additional shots only drain about 0.5x FP during a window of 200ms after having been shot once.
• FP drains when blocking/running tweaked to balance the above change.
• Reverted Deflect 3's FP draining to 0 (it still prevents FP regeneration). Added Deflect 1's 5 FP drain to Deflect 0, so it applies all the time to mblocking.
• Reverted the removal of saber melee moves while flinching.

######## Explanations/Spec ########

Goal: reach a stable and simple saber system designed primarily for open mode, via MINOR tweaks from 1.4.5.

Principles: "defense" refers to aiming for a win (in any type of fight) over time, prolonging engagements and relying on superior stamina while taking little risks. "offense" refers to aiming for a win (in any type of fight) quickly via heavy power at the cost of bigger risks and the inability to endure for long.
Principles for tweaks: basically take styles as they currently are without major changes (swing speeds, animations, HP damages, movement slowdowns etc. which are the defining factors for the styles), and deduce the role that each one should have, from which their needed features for a simple, structured and yet still highly challenging saber system stem from.

Notes:
- Style switching is fine even without nudge since you can't switch while in a blocking animations i.e. while being pressured.
- A "quadrant" just refers to a possible direction for a saber swing.


General tweaks for saber vs saber:

• Keep nudge removed for all styles.
• Remove perfect parry (completely unreliable feature that doesn't add anything to any role, the only style it can almost reliably be done with is cyan with its full swings but it still isn't really reliable, but in general it does nothing but slightly favour parrying stalemates).
• Reintroduce semi-PB and nerf it if needed (make it take 25% or 50% damage instead of 0%). Semi-PB is necessary to allow some intermediary blocking potential while in an attacking combination, so as to be able to close in on the enemy more easily as well as engaging at a longer distance. The fact that camera aim-based PBs are easier to land on attacks which come from a distance should be addressed by not tweaking PB itself but favoring better attack options from long range. Feints and swings in the air are the currently existing mechanics which can help with that, they need to see more use and be buffed if that's necessary (mostly for slower styles); reinstating semi-PB does buff them.
• Reinstate fast PB counter on every full-PB rather than only on mblocked swingblocks, and have it drain normal damage instead of increased damage. This makes duels much more dynamic and allows for proper defense against an enemy swing chain since a normal counter will often be interrupted by such a chain (depends on the style).
• Increase global parry drains by giving them 25% (or possibly less, if that is still too much) of the damage of a bodyhit (1.4.3 proved that 50% was too much already). This buffs heavy styles allowing them to break the parry spam stalemate against lighter styles and further nerfs the ability to evade an enemy via parry spam as a tactic used for comebacks, since being parried with too low BP will prevent further chaining. The ability to bait an attacker into chasing while not even having low BP yourself is more than powerful enough a tactic and should not be viable while having low BP.
• Reintroduce chaining direction restrictions: general restrictions should be reverted to a gap of two quadrants between consecutive swings as it was before 1.4, instead of 1 or 0. Give some styles (Red, Purple, Cyan, Duals) different restrictions. This helps introducing limiters, obstacles to learn for new players, its removal was generally rather poorly perceived; also it buffs PBing in general which is good to further reduce parry spam, and it can introduce differences between styles while respecting their roles.
• (Possible: introduce some sort of visual-only nudge in order to address the issue of sabers idling into people and passing through each other when blocking or idling)
• (Possible: make mblocking swingblocks flinch - not stagger, flinch is less disabling - the opponent for all styles)

Style tweaks (note, this keeps in mind style switching):

• Blue (the most defensive, excellent mobility and interrupting potential, best style for constantly pressuring targets - with interrupts and ACM in particular vs sabers): remove all perks, keep a max of 3 swings in a chain if it appears balanced (against gunners & saberists), revert to 2 if it is too strong.
• Yellow (middle ground, decent mobility and excellent burst damage against gunners, best style to adapt to all situations): remove all perks.
• Red (the most offensive, huge burst damage against both saberists and gunners with low mobility and stamina, best style to quickly finish an opponent which isn't correctly prepared or gain a sudden significant advantage): remove all perks (strong parry damage removes the need for a stagger, since red will be able to damage all other styles significantly, while being severely prone to interruptions from faster styles - that is all other styles). Potentially tweak its AP and BP vs sabers, to make it more damaging if the current values aren't enough. Chaining direction restriction for Red: 3 quadrants between consecutive swings. (Red is still able to perform counters against gunners now that nudge is gone, so its potential other than the decently quick top-right swing isn't nil; on the other hand the harder chaining restriction helps opponents with PBing Red since parrying it is dangerous)
• Purple (defensive style vs saberists, offensive style vs gunners, vicious style with low raw stamina but the ability to gain or lose ACM very quickly, excellent damage against gunners despite much faster and mobile swings compared to Red, excellent style to deal mobile burst damage vs gunners and to strategize high ACM pressure vs sabers): remove current perks and add a single perk dealing with ACM gain and loss (able to gain ACM on every bodyhit of a chain, or able to gain ACM via full PBs, or something similar, and able to lose ACM faster than other styles in some way aswell). Tweak AP and BP values if needed to reduce its stamina and potentially once again increase its damage (more middle-ground between Yellow and Red). Chaining direction restriction for purple: possibly 1 quadrant between consecutive swings to make it harder to PB, but it could just keep the standard 2 quadrants.
• Cyan (offensive style, fastest full swings for excellent quick engaging potential vs gunners and sabers alike - very difficult to PB - with high mobility but weak chaining in the air, excellent style for engaging): remove all perks including perfect parry, increase AP and decrease BP if needed (so that it deals pretty decent damage against saberists despite being a fast style, yet still gets defeated by heavier styles when it comes to parries, and so that it is unable to tank like Blue, or even possibly like Yellow). Keep the reduced max swing chain count (4). Chaining direction restriction for Cyan: 3 quadrants between consecutive swings. Cyan's defining trait lies in its super-fast starting swings, this aspect is reinforced by weakening its chains.
• Duals (a powerhouse with the same type of role as Yellow but more offensive, fast and damaging swings against both sabers and gunners, weak defense vs sabers, uses both raw damage and ACM gain for quick draining): remove all perks, keep only the higher defense arc vs both sabers and guns. Chaining direction restriction for Duals: 1 or even 0 quadrants between consecutive swings. Possibly reduce BP for balance.
• Staff (a tanky style with also a role similar to Yellow but much more defensive, decently fast swings and good damage vs gunners, great defense vs sabers, medium damage vs sabers but uses superior stamina to overwhelm in the long run): remove all perks (possibly keep mblocks requiring only correct movement and timing, to see), keep the higher defense arc vs both sabers and gunners Possibly reduce AP for balance.

General tweaks for saber vs gun:

• Reduce the FP regen debuff period when shot to 0.5s from 1s, still have it ramp up to 2s or maybe 1.5s from being shot several times consecutively.
• Keep the low FP drain cooldown (50ms) but reinstate a middle-ground from v0 (where the FP drain cooldown was 200ms) by having all additional shots only drain about 0.5x FP during a window of 200ms after having been shot once. Will greatly help with jedi/sith 1vX.
• FP drains should remain quite low when blocking (1.4.5 standard is probably ok given the FP drain cooldown tweak above which nerfs it) and high when running, but will have to be tweaked (nerfed) given the buff above.
• Instead of having deflect 3 drain FP when the FP regen debuff is active, simply have it drain something like 1 FP per second, or just revert it to no FP drain (but still prevents FP regen of course) given the global FP drain tweak above which may nerf deflect (reminder: level 1 can't deflect at close range, can deflect one shot every 750ms and drains about 6 FP per second; level 2 can deflect at close range, can deflect one shot every 500ms and drains about 3 FP per second; while level 3 can deflect 1 shot every 250ms). Also add Deflect 1's FP drains to Deflect 0, so that mblocking vs sabers always has a cost (and Saber Deflect thus improves mblocking on top of deflecting).
• Revert the removal of saber melee moves while flinching. It was intentional, as you are completely vulnerable against shots while slapping even though flinch allows you to block shots if pressing altattack, so slapping in that situation is most often not a free advantage.

 

[Stassin]

@SeV

- Perks: yeah, i think we more or less agree there. Staggers, ACM-related perks are pretty bad; tbh i never really gave them much thought, i just felt pressured to do something because of cyan/purple being role duplicates of blue/red back in 1.1, and i just didn't really know what to do. I also felt pressured to give them perks that made them powerful in some way, due to the point cost system which makes buying several styles very costly, so all in all it was just poor decisions partially due to other problems mingled in together. But anyways i know what to do now. "Perks" should refer to even just the basic mechanics that are already in place, like you said blue having 3 swings and the powerful lunge special move, or things like red having nudge. As for purple, well i'm unsure what to do. I'm talking about an ACM perk for it because i haven't brainstormed anything else that could give it short-term survival and long-term overwhelming power, while still having it retain a rather low BP and high AP. I suppose we could just change it completely and give it a very high BP like blue, and mediocre AP, to solve the short-term survival issue, but then it'd still lack long-term power.

- ACM: well, i think i can agree that ACM kicking in only after you have a significant lead like it used to be, is probably better than the current version. You're right about removing perks not being much of a factor in encouraging style switching, but all the same i don't really understand why you're saying reinstating the old ACM helps it at all. I mean in v0, you lost all ACM just from switching style or turning off the saber... it certainly didn't encourage it. Now ACM is at least saved for each style, so that's better. But honestly, what encouraged it the most by far is probably the buying system and point costs. On the other hand, i totally agree with having potentially higher BP drains overall but more importantly a slower regen than it currently is, and that would encourage style switching as you said. I'm not entirely sure if you also meant that gaining ACM on one style would also make you gain ACM on other styles somehow without being OP (you said "You'd have to revamp ACM so it translates to all styles and somehow that doesn't result in cheesy mechanics. So you can't grind ACM with a fast style, switch to a heavy style and destroy."); i think that may be a good idea, so that ACM represents your general momentum and lead in the fight, rather than your lead only when it comes to a single style, which is kinda stupid like you said especially since we want style switching. But yeah, i dunno how we'd implement that. All in all, i think the biggest obstacle to style switching that needs to be addressed is in fact the point costs, as was mentioned by other players. It's kinda obvious, and "simplifying" styles are more minor things for it, but i didn't really consider that problem anymore because the current point costs... are the result of much error and trial, and the best compromise we could possibly muster given the limited code options we have for it and the fact that people unconditionally want total freedom of choice for the different styles. So i'm unsure what to do in that department. Maybe Tempest can figure something out.

- Removal of nudge and difficulty to attack: yeah, i guess we really do disagree on that completely. In my experience it's not very difficult to attack without nudge at close range and make it very difficult to PB, just like how it is with nudge. Except with Red of course, though even with Red it will still work against bad and even average players, and generally Red is manageable without nudge and without staggers, it just needs to have its AP increased again to balance that out if needed. So then i also disagree that swinging in the air etc. is problematic for long-range attacks and for open mode, i mean swingblocking is there to help with being shot and even if you have to run to make yourself more unpredictable, you only need to run in very short bursts so i hardly see that as an issue. With what Tempest is adding, aimed full PBs would still exist so attacking from long range or, for you, attacking without nudge would still be a pain anyways. That said... i still agree that nudge is good, i mean i dunno exactly the detailed reasons why Tempest removed it (because 1.3 players cry about it being a crutch ? because it's visually weird ? hard for new players ?). And... even if i think there are enough ways to get around "ez-PBs" as you called them, i still agree that not being able to hit a simple full swing from long range, to start an engagement in the most basic way, without being heavily penalized, is not good design. You're even more penalized with fast-counters being a thing, but you're still penalized even without them anyways... in a yellow vs yellow fight the one who PBs first will have the advantage of having started his combo later. So regardless of nudge being in or not, i think there should be some change to help only starting swings, maybe that they could only be semi-PBed, never full-PBed ? Just a possibility. And of course, halfswings and any other swings, you'd still be able to full-PB all of them.


- As a side note, you said you liked RC1 style saber clashing that could replace nudge. But i tried that in 1.4.3, even if it went kinda unnoticed, by triggering a blocking anim on a saber clash (instead of a nudge), the same blocking anim than when you are hit or shot, which enables you to do a normal counter/halfswing. But that felt rather annoying if i recall. Everytime the same clashed, you'd be stuck in the blocking anim. I think in RC1 it was bearable because the blocking anim made you stuck MUCH longer, so you were kinda intuitively forced to proceed with the counter, but now the blocking anim is very short so in 1.4.3 it spammed blocking anims and just removed your control annoyingly. And i don't think we want the RC1-style one either, because even if it felt intuitive and good at the time, it still locked you in the blocking anim for so long... we already discussed and tried that out when making 1.4 i believe.


- Also you said something. That i made the system less "random", with competitive dueling in mind rather than open mode. That is not the case, on the contrary. Randomness was more acceptable in duels because you'd duel again and again to even out the randomness, and it felt spicy to have difficult/unreliable mechanics; however in open mode, a single random PB would mean you'd instantly die because you failed to finish off a 0 BP enemy saberist when his gunner allies arrived, so you'd no longer be able to run away from the gunners because he'd push/pull you. What i mean is that it was extremely unforgiving (perceived to be unforgiving) to get unlucky with the randomness in open mode, and not so much in duels.


EDIT: so in summary, what i believe should be added after hearing your thoughts and discussing, are:
- Reduced BP regen.
- Higher BP drains (though very slightly).
- ACM needs to kick in only when you have a lead, so that means only when the ACC counter (which basically counts your bodyhit lead) is like 4-5, instead of 1-2.
- Maybe some kind of ACM gain for all styles at the same time, but that's unclear.
- Do something for purple. A perk, i dunno what. And for staff maybe aswell.
- With or without nudge (i still dunno really if it should be kept or not), a very important buff for starting swings so they can't be full-PBed. Or something else with the same idea in mind.
- Maybe nudge as a perk for Red but i believe it's feasible without, given the above idea. And vs gunners you can use counters, that's pretty hard but Red with its huge damage is kinda OP against gunners otherwise.
- Something needs to be done about the point cost system so that getting multiple styles with complete freedom costs less, to encourage style switching. I dunno how though, since we've tried many times already.

 

[Chaos the Chaotic]

I lol'd at this whole concept. Stable saber system?

Completely subjective and everyone knows it.

 

[noel]

why is it always in favour of open? the saber system is used by far more people on duel than it is on open, so why is that always priority?

i'm not saying that open needs to be neglected, it obviously needs to balance well, it's just that it makes more sense for you to please the many and not the few

 

[{Δ} Achilles]

- Reduced BP regen.

If you reduce BP regen, you reduce the capacity to fight 1vX.

- Higher BP drains (though very slightly).

Yes, drains need to be much higher, so a skilled duelist can defeat a non-skilled duelist in just a couple of seconds.

- ACM needs to kick in only when you have a lead, so that means only when the ACC counter (which basically counts your bodyhit lead) is like 4-5, instead of 1-2.

Which would extend the life of duels needlessly and people would just run away before the opponent reaches that point to reset the fight. You could entirely remove the ACM system of MB2 had a chase mechanic to keep people from running and hopping away.

- Maybe some kind of ACM gain for all styles at the same time, but that's unclear.

No. Fast styles would just be used to gain ACM then swap to slow styles.

- Do something for purple. A perk, i dunno what. And for staff maybe aswell.

All styles should have duel based and open based perks. That adds variety, and it can be done in a balanced fashion.

- With or without nudge (i still dunno really if it should be kept or not), a very important buff for starting swings so they can't be full-PBed. Or something else with the same idea in mind.

Nudge should never be introduced, it made blocking a guess, and with PB counter it was a guess that could potentially destroy the attacker.

- Maybe nudge as a perk for Red but i believe it's feasible without, given the above idea. And vs gunners you can use counters, that's pretty hard but Red with its huge damage is kinda OP against gunners otherwise.

Red is not OP against gunners in any way. SBD is OP against Jedi/Sith, actually. Wookiee is borderline OP because it can kite a Sith forever.

- Something needs to be done about the point cost system so that getting multiple styles with complete freedom costs less, to encourage style switching. I dunno how though, since we've tried many times already.

I agree. Why don't you look back to 1.3 where I carried yellow/cyan/red at all times, or staff/yellow. Because they all had different play styles, purposes, and were affordable.

 

[hleV]

Reduce first swing's PB zone? Might feel inconsistent then though... dunno.

Meh, just bring back nudge.

 

[GoodOl'Ben]

@SeV- Reduced BP regen.
- Higher BP drains (though very slightly).

Perhaps even look at the possibility of increasing BP drains enough to warrant a slight boost in BP regen to compensate. I'd love to see the system move towards something that is quicker to the punish while being a bit more quick to recover. Players who have a chance at winning won't back down at low BP to regen as likely since a strong offense might be a better option.

I recall B17 having something along the lines of interrupts dealing large chunks of BP damage. Obviously it was a bit too much, but it did have nice punch to it. Made interruptive play very great and made for a good comeback mechanic.