Defence & 2 Handed weapons

[Alphi]

I'm only new but I have noticed nearly everyone who plays the  game does so with 2 swords..
I tried it with a sword and a shield and basically from what I could tell the shield was really ineffective.

perhaps if the sword arm and shield arm had a handicap so that if you placed a sword it the shield arm it would be less effective and vice versa ?

also the use of 2 handed weapons.. one in each hand ?
players should have to choose between one 2 handed weapon or 2 single handed weapons. (or single and shield combo)

that would be nice..

[neko kyouran]

shields are only for decoration purposes right now. its being worked on.  thats why you see many people with two.  when shield work, then things will more than likely change.

[Alphi]

handicaps for each arm and strengh limits for swords would also be handy though..

Say for example the Sword arm has a +1 for swords and a -1 for Sheilds.
and the shield arm has a +1 for shields and a -1 for swords.

[neko kyouran]

true but if you are left handed, then you would have to switch the numbers around.  a left handed person isn't going to have the same stance as a right handed person, usually.

[zanzibar]

I wasn't going to post, but...


If you use two weapons long enough, you'll eventually become ambedexterous.  It seems like a lot of unnecessary coding to account for the transition.

[neko kyouran]

Right, which is what i was trying to say, only it didn't come out that way i guess.  Too many other things going on at one time for me tonight.

[IronHead]

I think that having strenth that changes by training with each indevidual hand would be a little frustrating
it would be interesting if you could switch from left hand stance to right hand stance tho.  just to add that extra realism just for the look of it and being able to make the charachter more like yourself

[Alphi]

Thats not true about ambidextrous.

Just look at the 2 Handed Samurai sword technique using the Katana and the Wakazashi.
We're talking real life now.

One arm is always stronger and more agile than the other for cutting.. thats why the wakazashi is smaller than the katana and is held in non sword arm..

the katana deals the main blow.. its longer and heavier and balanced so that the cut can slice through a person with a single stroke.
The waklazashi on the other hand is much lighter and shorter allowing it to be manouvered as a stabbing tool or being used for inner body cuts...

the idea of people running around with 2 claymores one in each hand is just plain silly.. you owuldnt be able to swing either of them unless you were a giant.


the point being that there is no such thing as ambidextrous in swordplay..

2 swords dont give you twice the cutting power.. and the cutting power is not evenly distributed across both hands.


and as for the point about left hand versus right handed players its a simple matter of inverting the 3D model. I'm not sure how this is done with the GNU c++ coding used for this game.. but if you were to do it in Direct X its just a simple matter of using a Transform Matrix.
 
the extra coding for handicaps isnt so great a deal either.. all you do is apply a factor to each swing... the swings of each hand are already calculated seperatly.. so all you do is apply a small handycap when calculating the swing for the left hand then then right hand.

No biggie

[dying_inside]

The idea of hanving a strength factor on each hand sounds a little to much to be honest. As for double swords,
I agree with the claymore point, Its hard anough to swing one claymore about as it is let alone one in each hand.
But they will no doubt apply some sort of two handed weapons thing soon(TM).

To be honest I think that as far as animations are concerned there is alot to do, even just in combat. Seeing as the team seem to want to give each race an indiviual attacking pattern, they would have to do one handed weapons, and then two handed weapons (In the far future of course). Stick the bows and possible crossbows, all sorts of other weapons, on top of that and it turns into quite a project. 

[Zan]

I expect the dual sword wielder to disappear into the background as soon as shields start working, assuming shields have a good blocking/damage reducing percentage.

As for two-handed swords wielded in one hand, that should be possible but hard. I'm thinking of a double set of requirements for the claymore for example. There is an initial strength, ... requirement to wield the weapon with both hands and a secondary, much higher, requirement to wield the weapon in one hand.

[Alphi]

I dont think you would need to calculate different strengths for each hand...

all you would really need to do is add a weight factor into the hit/miss/damage calculations for each swing.

for example heres some psuedo code..

funciton SWING

If hand = left then
chance to hit = chance to hit - %10
if hit then damage = damage - 10%


If hand = right
then chance to hit = chance to hit + %10
if hit then damage = damage + %10


then the same applies for:

function Block

if hand = right then
chance to block = chance to block - %10
if hand = left then
chance to block = chance to block + 10%



very very simple and minor adaptation to the swing and block code...
all of the strength and weight factors remain exactly as they are

*edit*

also with the two handed sword issue ..
the logic is also straight forward..


if the weapon is two handed it has a strength factor..
if there are 2 of them then the player needs double that strength to effectively wield both of them...

as for agility this also needs to be higher (although not double) because you need to be a little more skillful  in order to coordinate both attacks.

heres some example psuedo code..

Claymore = Strength minimum 60
Short Sword = strength minimum 30

strength to wield claymore + short sword = 90

this example is simplified and if Strengh is a measure of both sides of the body then you would assume that if a person was split down the middle their strength would be halved ... so in for a more accurate calculation you might need to double the strength requirement for the heaviest weapon

To wield a claymore and a short sword you'd need 120 strength.

Agility may could be  %50 factor

so if claymore = agility minimum of 40
and short sword = agility minimum of 20 then

Total agility needed would be 40 + (20 * 50%) = 50


ofcourse to make it even more realistic you could force them to develop the DUAL SWORD Skill..
but that might just be a little too much work...

[BlackAcre]

Some people are going to be naturally better at using two weapons as well.  Hand/eye coordination is not uniform across the entire population.  Of course, we don't play video games to suck at things like hand/eye coordination the way we (might) in real life. 

There is a very good reason that almost every ancient/medieval culture developed either the sword and shield combo or two-handed weapons.  The former has an obvious advantage while the latter has the advantage of defending against potential attackers at a distance.  Using a shield takes very little training, and using two-handed weapons requires virtually none (with several exceptions like the Claymore), while using a weapon in each hand requires a greater degree of control.  Which is probably why it wasn't generally used by military formations. 

I guess this is kind of a pointless observation in a fantasy milieu, however, as weaponry is more or less developed on a completely different evolutionary path than real world weapons were.

[Alphi]

that and also the cost factor...

most armies in ancient times simply had more men than weapons.
it was impractocal to give each person more than one weapon when you didnt even have enough resources for one each..
typically shields were a lot cheaper and easier to  create as most of them were wooden and leather constructions.

2 sword techniques like those developed in japan were only really used by Ronin which were masterlesss wariors who wandered around and forged their own destiny, or Daimyo which were warlords.. prety similar essentially what the planeshift characters are.
 
as you rightly put it a lot of weapons in RPGs are based on fiction... with only a hint of truth..  a lot of medieval weaponry such as Morning Stars, Hammers and Claymore type swords were only developed at the time that full plate Armour became popular with the knights around the time of the crusades. Such massive and weapons with a lot of weight behind them were really only used  as bashing implements to try and knock a fully armour clad man off a hourse and bash him to death...

before the days of FULL platemail  BODY armour such weapons would have been  too cumbursome and innefective againts a more mobile foe...