» Sat May 11, 2013 5:20 pm N.B. for the purposes of this thread CD = collision detection.
We have had numerous debates about the merits of collision detection as a mechanic. Lots of people pointing out how tactically important it is and lots of people pointing out how much CPU it uses.
What if instead of having general CD on all players there was a passive “tanking” skill called shield wall that meant that blocking made you impassable to hostile players. It might be in the heavy armour skill tree and it would work something like this:
- You level up your heavy armour skill until you could buy the ‘shield wall’ skill.
- You now have this as a passive skill, when you are standing still and blocking your shield becomes a solid barrier to any hostile player or mob.
- You cannot hold a position indefinitely as blocking uses stamina (I believe this is already in the game).
- You can still take damage when you are acting as a shield wall but as you are blocking the damage will be reduced.
- You have a percentage chance to intercept any missiles (arrows/spells) that are shot at allies directly behind your position.
This means that having a heavily armoured front line is a valid tactic, as they can form up as a shield wall, and maybe hold a bridge/door. However for a few reasons this should use less CPU:
- Not all the players are solid, only a minority
- The solid barrier created would be a simple rectangular shape instead of a complicated character model
- The solid barrier is stationary once it is created (From my limited experience of making games this is way easier to deal with)
Anyway what do you guys think?
