Specials

[Laurel]

Ladies & Gentlemen,

is there ANY particular reason why all fighter guilds HAVE to manually type their charge/chop/smash/crush/kattack/battack/swarm/jab/sling/pbash/slash/impale/mattack/crush/smack/etc. each time it's off cooldown?

I mean really - any logical reason at all? Is Calian riposte executed based on a command, or automatically?

If we had it automated, wizards could make bouncing even less possible with (for example) introducing random execution/cooldown times. Explanation:
1. special is executed 3 sec after being prepared and is on cooldown for 7 sec after being executed
2. total usage time of this special is 10 sec
3. by randomizing execution and cooldown times within those 10 seconds, you could sometimes fire 2 specials within 2 seconds and sometimes not fire a special for 19 seconds at all

Why was autorepeatable slash in old BDA deemed inappropriate anyway? Surely RP is not an issue ("oh, I feel like I can use this special attack now, but the other I have I still cannot ... oh, now I can!"). Surely "tactics" is not an issue neither (there's only place for tactics when you have a stun - those specials could still have triggering commands).

Making all those specials autoexecuted would decrease the amount of triggers needed for playing Genesis (thus making playing pure telnet or other straight forward solutions a more viable option). It would also allow to introduce this random timer I mentioned.

What are the cons?

[Makfly]

Cons:

• Maybe you do NOT want to use your specials for whatever reason. (Perhaps due to some special mechanic in PvP or on some NPC)
• Making the game feel even more automated than it already is.

Honestly though, I don't think either cons are particularly strong arguments for not going with your suggestion.

[Laurel]

Honestly though, I don't think either cons are particularly strong arguments for not going with your suggestion.

My thoughts exactly.

[Celephias]

There are situations when I don't want the kill or don't want it to happen until I'm ready. If we assume that the specials are where the real damage is, controlling when it fires let's you control when you'll kill the target (in an admittedly coarse grained way - you can still kill with the weapon alone).

That being said, I think the benefits of it autofiring outweigh the negatives from what I can imagine. I don't know if it should be too variable or random though. I can imagine the complaints when it seemingly doesn't fire enough. When you control it by typing the command, you know it fires every time it can.

I think Laurel's idea is a fine one.

[Zorath]

I like it the way it already is.

I know bouncing is in general frowned upon, but I couldnt find any rules in the game, that it is illegal.
And these days it seems you have to be either in a really good guild or really big or both to be able to take down "any" mob that has some good equipment in Genesis.
So, I think your idea makes it even harder for smaller players to have fun.

Just my thoughts..

[Strider]

I agree that Genesis should not be a fast-twitch, 'net speed, trigger coding, etc. competition, but I am not sure that Laurel's suggestion is the best solution or that greater variance in any particular or every special's execution or cool-down times is particularly desirable.

I think the better solution might be queuing combat commands, rather than the current time-based execution failure. I don't have a fully baked proposal, but think that a single-threading is probably insufficient and that complicates needed commands to view or clear the queue. Such a system does allow magic and other combat influenced commands to be put in the mix, as well.

Barring that, I think Laurel's suggestion might be improved by simply having auto-execution be a mode, with a guild or game based option setting.

[Laurel]

So, I think your idea makes it even harder for smaller players to have fun.

waaaait - would that mean that bouncing is a major factor in your fun in Gen?

[petros]

If we had it automated, wizards could make bouncing even less possible with (for example) introducing random execution/cooldown times. Explanation:
1. special is executed 3 sec after being prepared and is on cooldown for 7 sec after being executed
2. total usage time of this special is 10 sec
3. by randomizing execution and cooldown times within those 10 seconds, you could sometimes fire 2 specials within 2 seconds and sometimes not fire a special for 19 seconds at all

this is already implemented in all recoded specials. randomizing is also beneficial in that enemies can't necessarily predict when the next special will hit.

[Zorath]

So, I think your idea makes it even harder for smaller players to have fun.

waaaait - would that mean that bouncing is a major factor in your fun in Gen?

Nah, just the last chance sometimes to be able to kill something.
And no, it is not fun to have to do that.

[Avarel]

Laurel, you could also have a command that would turn off the auto-repeat for the special, if you choose not to use it for whatever reason. This would mean that if you later want to use it in the combat, you have to manually initiate it (or maybe just turn it back on).