2x2 strafing undermines character building [edited]

[\/4n!ll4 ][c3]

character speccing does have very large, and very noticeable benefits in this game. could things have been done to make them more meaningful? yeah, absolutely, and i think balancing them would be a very welcomed change. but there are too many things about the game that have to be rebalanced to accommodate this, which would then make this a completely different game. it would turn it into a hack and slash dungeon crawler rather than a strategic dungeon crawler.

What strategic about 2x2 dancing?

It is THE answer to anything in combat. And much more important then any choice you do for your party.

i never said it was a complicated strategy, but even the simplest of strategies is a strategy. and dancing around an enemy attempting to bait it arouond while your cooldowns refresh, attemting to get them to trigger their own by wasting an attack on thin air is much more of a strategy than standing there taking unnecessary hits.

what you just said is the equavalent to saying bobbing and weaving in boxing is not considered a strategy.

also, if you need to, you can continue to kite them around in circles while mixing up a healing potion in case on of your characters takes a massive hit, as is oft to happen when going against ogres and golems. or the wardens.

and if you think it is so much more important that how you choose to spend your spec points, go through the game without spending a single one and see how much of a difference it makes. you know, not gaining a single point of evade, no health, no strength or dex, or armor proficiency, weapon proficiency, any of that. see how difficult it is even to kill the spiders. doing 4 damage per attack every 4 seconds.

[Eobersig]

... since i knew this going in to the game, i knew that meant i needed to focus on damage for my back row and defense for my front row. ...

You don't even need to focus on defense for the front row. I have a 4 rogue team too - and they all go only for damage, no defense whatsoever.

Front left is dagger, front right is unarmed, back left missiles and back right throwing weapons. If you find any light or heavy armour, just throw it away. If you find any other weapons, just throw it away.

Granted, they're only at dungeon level 5 now, thus I can't comment whether they're viable later on, but until now they're dolng better than my other teams.

[Kostas]

Eye of the Beholder 2 and 3 tackled this problem a bit.
They gave some mobs the ability to strafe attack you too. Also if you did more than one attack per (your) movement your next movement could get delayed and enemies might get to counter attack you before you moved. (this is from my memory of farming the 4 skeleton warriors in EotB2 that spawned in a room endlessly)
EotB 3 also gave us ALL ATTACK button too.

[Darklord]

Some LoG enemies can strafe, Crabs for example.

Daniel.

[1varangian]

This has been said before...

If the devs want combat where strafing is the key to winning rather than character building, they need to develop skill trees that support that playstyle. What we now have is skills that almost never come into play because you can simply not let the monsters attack you.

If they want RPG based combat (which this essentially is already), then the strafing needs to support that playstyle. Which means some kind of limitations to how much the player can manually dodge or "drive-by attack" without counterattacks.

Lastly, combat would surely be much more engaging and keep you on your toes if kiting wasn't as safe and reliable.

[Kostas]

Some LoG enemies can strafe, Crabs for example.

Daniel.

I'm new so I don't know about later levels, thanks.
BUT do they strafe and attack you almost immediately or can you still escape and avoid damage?

But really, if you make combat more dependent on stats than on 2x2 strafing then you need to add more on the stats side to make it viable (it's too hard currently isn't it?)

[1varangian]

The strafing monsters tend to be so slow you can still merrily dance around them.

Good point about the stats. Most monsters have a crazy HP pool compared to your characters.. like hundreds and hundreds of HP. That's also a side effect when monsters stats have to be balanced against player strafing. And certain monsters hit ridiculously hard to pose any kind of threat against strafing.

Let's think of 2 scenarios where the party is taking down a big brute of a monster.

currently...

1) You strafe in circles or otherwise exploit the AI while slowly depleting its massive HP pool. Strafe - attack - strafe - attack -strafe - attack.... It can get mildly exciting if another creature is nearby to block you from strafing and expose you to an attack, though it is nothing that can't be circumvented by luring the monster to a more favourable position.

..while it could be...

2) Brute charges.. you strafe to the side and quickly prepare. Mage casts Stoneskin on Fighter to make him last longer. Brute closes in. Warrior uses Warcry to taunt it and draw aggro away from the squishier people. Rogue attempts Crippling Strike to slow down its movement or attack speed. Mage casts Disorient to reduce its accuracy. Brute targets warrior first but after taking a few hits from others, charges the whole group again. Party takes a bad beating and must retreat. They flee to a hallway while chugging a few potions and Mage casts Wall of Stone in the brutes face, barely making it in time. A collective sigh of relief is broken when the brute smashes through the wall and battle continues...

[Saice]

Thing is with current 2x2 dancing system - your choice of starting party, your skill selection, your stats, your equipped items - they don't really matter much compared to your 2x2 dancing skill.

What topic starter say: your skill in 2x2 dance is 1000 times more important then any choice you do in character building, character equipement, character stats/skills, party composition.

The same can be said about your puzzle solving abilities.

The issue is there is no real easy fix to the combat system since it was built with this in mind from the get go. You would need to overhaul the whole system making it so mobility did not mater and skills, stats, and gear did. But Then your combats would be Step up to monster stand there and click your attacks until you win or lose.

[1varangian]

Thing is with current 2x2 dancing system - your choice of starting party, your skill selection, your stats, your equipped items - they don't really matter much compared to your 2x2 dancing skill.

What topic starter say: your skill in 2x2 dance is 1000 times more important then any choice you do in character building, character equipement, character stats/skills, party composition.

The same can be said about your puzzle solving abilities.

The issue is there is no real easy fix to the combat system since it was built with this in mind from the get go. You would need to overhaul the whole system making it so mobility did not mater and skills, stats, and gear did. But Then your combats would be Step up to monster stand there and click your attacks until you win or lose.

I think the optimal and most engaging system is somewhere between. Movement needs to matter but it just can't be > all. I don't think anyone is advocating a system where you just stand still and click, that would be a different game.

I'd like it if it was possible to play a party of 2 Rogues with movement skills, strafing like a ninja as is, or a balanced party of 4 that wouldn't be quite so stealthy but had better dynamics and could stand toe to toe with monsters.

[Jack Dandy]

I think the a certain change that should be in the game is the way weapons and magic work.

Instead of just damage/speed, each class of weapon and magic should have something special about them. Like, axes would have swinging arc attacks, ground magic would doe AOE damage around your party, stuff like that.