Physics based melee

[Omnires]

I'm not going to lie, wanted to start this topic after seeing the new video of Armored Core 6 and noting that kicking is part of melee now in the game. Something that never part of the old AC games. Anyway is not fact that the mechs can kick now that got me thinking. But how the kick is done. In video that was shown the player used their boosters to jet into the enemy for the kick to push them backwards. And that got me thinking about momentum based combat and that in many games the momentum of the characters almost never accounted for when it comes to the amount of damage done nor the effects of the attack. For example. Me attacking a target with a over head strike while standing still will do some amount of damage. But that amount of damage is nothing next to me doing the same attack while jumping down from a say a tree or second story window. In most games the damage of the attack is always the same despite the fact that we are all aware of that is not how things work in real life. And in the few game that do account for things like momentum in combat is often far and few between.

So I was thinking. Could it be possible for Em-8er to account for momentum when doing things like melee attacks? Because me charging into an enemy to push them back or stagger them is going to be effected by how fast I'm moving when I hit them. And it would give those of us to like to build super high speed melee mechs a reason to get those high output high energy drain booster that only work in short ranges as means to help buff up some melee attacks by using the boosters as part of melee combos build speed and momentum. Because in life things like momentum and inertia play a key part in all combat, no matter if it is melee or ranged or even AOE.

P.s.
For those that don't know what Armored Core 6 video I'm talking about, here is a video breakdown of the new press release stuff.

 

[Pandagnome]

For closer range heading butting could be interesting with heavy mechs.

Beware not to lose your head

What about vehicles that build up speed to knock opponents off their feet such as a big space truck with a bull dozer add on. Could use to pile dirt or scrap or push obstructions such as old wrecks out the way better and reducing the damage to the front of the space truck.

 

[Omnires]

That reminded me of things like space trains (like Galaxy Express 999) and space trucks. Hell there is a new space trucker game coming out soon. lol

So I can totally see NPCs using things like trains and trucks to ram into enemies to kill them or at least stun them just long enough for players to kill them off.

Plus it is not like things like that has not happened in games before. One famous example is Hell Train from Final Fantasy.

 

[Pandagnome]

That reminded me of things like space trains (like Galaxy Express 999) and space trucks. Hell there is a new space trucker game coming out soon. lol

So I can totally see NPCs using things like trains and trucks to ram into enemies to kill them or at least stun them just long enough for players to kill them off.

Plus it is not like things like that has not happened in games before. One famous example is Hell Train from Final Fantasy.

Some nice physics

 

[Omnires]

Some nice physics

A good number of those clips are from "spinner" type bots that used momentum as weapon. Mostly by having something that they use like a small hammer and just have the hammer spin around really fast to build up as much momentum as possible. So when they do hit something they send that things flying.

But that also reminds me of things like Gurren Lagann's Giga Drill Breaker. I mean the Thumpers do have things like drill arms. Just let me use my boosters / thrusters while also using my drill as fly full speed into an enemy or group of enemies. And for the people who never seen the classic Gurren Lagann anime here is one example of the attack.

Because do not think that for movement, as soon as Em-8er comes out that one of first builds I'll try to make is not going to be a high speed flying drill that rams into everything in it's path is laughable.

P.s.
This is for the people who never played any of the Armored Core games before and don't understand why some of the fans of those game say things like "Armored Core was Dark Souls before there was a Dark Souls."

 

[farias]

Em-8ER would be awesome if it accounted for momentum in melee attacks. Imagine the possibilities! Charging into enemies at high speeds to push them back or stagger them would actually be influenced by how fast you're moving when you hit them. It would make those of us who love building super-fast melee mechs have a reason to get those high-output, high-energy-drain boosters. We could use the boosters as part of melee combos, building up speed and momentum to unleash devastating strikes. That would add so much depth and excitement to the combat system!

 

[Pandagnome]

What if the energy of momentum could also be filled or stored into a device that can be relayed to the specific weapon, Device or even body segment.

The choice there would help benefit whatever play style, if they rather go slower and boost their utilities capability or if they are more offensive to output even more damage etc etc

 

[farias]

What if the energy of momentum could also be filled or stored into a device that can be relayed to the specific weapon, Device or even body segment.

We have something like this in real life, which is the kinetic energy recovery system (KERS) used in Formula One cars when they use the brakes. The energy recovered can be used to boost acceleration in some sectors of the tracks to help in overtaking other cars.

 

[Omnires]

In some games I've played there was a few abilities or skills that acted like an KERS by having that ability charge up another ability or reducing the cool time of another ability. The ability itself often doesn't do much of anything on it's own. But because it enables you use other high powered abilities in a shorter time scale than normal, it can boost your DPS.

For example, let's say you can only naturally use a super attack every 5 mins, because you need to build up energy to use the attack or have to wait until the cool down is over. In most normal game play this is nothing. But when time comes to fight something like a raid boss or a world boss those 5 mins between super attacks can feel like forever. But you can use this other ability that has a long cool down to shorten the time you can use your next super attack. So you might be able to get off 3 or 4 super attacks within the time it people playing other classes only 2 super attacks. Mind you that for balance reasons often times this kind of ability is only given to high risk high reward classes. Like the melee glass cannons or traders (a class type that can buff teammates by lowering their own stats for awhile. Example giving your teams greater max HP by lower your own max HP by an near equivalent amount. They work on a give and take play style. For them to buff something they have to take it from somewhere or someone else.).

So having a system like a KERS within the game would be nothing new to people who like to high risk high reward classes or to people who like to play things like flight sims and racing sims. As in things like flight sims you have to know what movements feed into each other to both gain and lose energy to you can gain or lose speed while also saving fuel. Hell, you even do things kinetic recovery in your normal everyday life just by walking or running. Or when you catch something heavy and spin round with it before throwing it again. Momentum and knowing how to use it is a key part of every day life.

 

[Omnires]

I was rewatching some old anime and seen a really funny example of momentum in the whole "for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction". Though this is a trick that only anime girls can do or a make with some kind bouncy shock absorbers on the chest. lol

 

[Pandagnome]

I was rewatching some old anime and seen a really funny example of momentum in the whole "for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction". Though this is a trick that only anime girls can do or a make with some kind bouncy shock absorbers on the chest. lol

The sound effect @0 - 0.1 is very satisfying i wish my bicycle gears made that sound hmm

The belly is used to great effect here as you can see this could also be used for defense such as repelling tsihu against other tsihu !

 

[Omnires]

That reminds me of the whole hard armor vs soft armor thing when comes to combat. Because a lot of people never seem to think of soft armor as an option. I guess it doesn't help much that in most media like movies, tv shows, comics, and games the one's with soft armor are often time the bad guys or are made out to be this odd beings who think outside of the normal and not in a good way.

For example, in games how many types have you ran across a large enemy that pumps itself up like a balloon and/or used it's soft flexible body to block and absorb almost all the attacks you use it. Only to be forced to look for the one weak spot on it that you can damage normally or you have to use different attacks that can break or bypass the armor. For example being forced to use something like ice magic to freeze the enemy solid to break it or being forced to use stably piercing melee attack or being forced to use armor piercing ammo. And if you don't have any of those things the fight is all much impossible to win.

And the few examples of games that let people use soft armor as an option they tend to go over the top with them and almost go out of their way to make the armor look bad or silly. Or rank classes that use such armor over hard armor as low ranking. For example things like the onion knight meme. Or like how Fat Man from Metal Gear Solid 2 was basically just a crazy guy wearing a bomb disarming suit while roller skates.

For the people who never played MGS2 or just forgot who Fatman was.

But given how soft armor has the ability to absorb the force of momentum just like hard armor can. And it can also throw some of that force back at the attacker going by what the armor if made of and how it stops of the force. It is a great option to pick going by what you are fighting and how you are fighting it.

So what kind of soft armor do you think could or should be in Emb-8er. Be it realistic or meme.
I mean the oversized bouncy body part meme is always going to get a vote. Be it breast, butts, or bellies for humans, and things like cheeks and other air sacks for non-humans (like frogs and fish).

 

[Pandagnome]

I like to see rope dart with various end attachment changes. Perhaps originally it is a grappler and with different attachment could change e.g. to a dart for more pierce attacks rather than swinging across to get distance or picking a small objects to release on to a target.

Then for dancing it could be a glow orb attachment synced to compatible razor devices for all that fun combos & light sequences.

 

[Omnires]

I've said this a few times before and I'll say it again. Because of the biofeedback system in the omniframes it means that the pilot has as much control over the frames as they do their own body. Meaning that different physical traits between the pilots play a much larger role in how the frames moves and even how some of the gear works. It is not like giving a group of people the same make and model of car then telling them to all drive at that is speed from point A to point B. Because the physical traits of each driver doesn't really mater as long as they can keep the speed the same and drive in a line. But with biofeedback systems even if everyone is using the same make and model of omniframe each person's walk and run is going to be a little different based on their body type, center of balance, proprioception, and kinesthesia. Not even counting things like personality types and training. Because of this the body type and background of the pilots not only matter in the story and plot of the game, but also in how the mechs act and move.

Take me for example. The way that I stand, walk, and run is going to be different from other people just do fact that I'm a tall man with a fit build. I have a habit of standing, walking, and running on the balls of my feet because that feels the most natural to me ever sense I was a baby. Because I do this my legs are stronger than normal and I'm light on my feet (having high agile) despite my larger body size. I use this to my advantage in fights because I can move in ways that a lot of people don't think that a person of my build should be able to move. And I use my high speed along with my body mass to make even simple attacks do a lot of damage. Because of my habit of walking on the balls of my feet I make little to no sound when I move around. So as a child some of the adults would tie little bells on me as if I was a cat so they can hear where I am. I was almost stabbed by mistake a number of times growing up by people cooking, or eating, or just at school from teachers and students because no one can seem to sense me approaching them. Even though from my point of view I thought I was making myself known long before I got that close to them. *Has a flashback to his grade school and middle school days when a lot of the other students thought that I was a ghost or something because no one ever seemed to notice me enter or leave a room. To them it just looked like I appear and disappear randomly.*. Plus with my background of street fighting (grew up in some bad neighborhoods) and martial arts. The way that I stand and move doesn't match that of a "normal" person. To point that other people who also have experience in things like martial arts and dancing could pick me out of crowd. As people who are experienced in dancing or martial arts carry their weight and move their center of mass different from normal people.

This is also why I said in the past that having different animation patterns for the players to pick from would be a great help to the game in the end. As it would add more personality and customization to each omniframe making them each their own. Plus in a chaotic battle where everyone looks the same, some times the only way you can tell some people apart is by how they move. But that could just be a thing that we fighters do that normal people doesn't know about.

In some comics and even a few anime this is a topic that some of them touch on when it comes to different characters and how they control their mecha. I can't remember the name of the show. But there was a short Irish or Scottish girl who was the pilot of one of the mecha with a brain link biofeedback system. But unlike the other pilots she would always mess up in training or her movements would always be off making her clumsy while piloting it. Then one day it dawned on her the reasons way. The mecha was to tall. Because she was not use to doing things like looking down on people or having such long legs it was messing with her sense of balance and space. But when she told the crew to mod her mecha to have smaller body parts she was able to control it normally with her sense of balance not being thrown off. That was because do the nature of high level biofeedback systems the more that you feel like the mecha is apart of your body or that you are the mecha the greater the control that you have over it. To the point that you can push the mecha to do things outside of the limits of what it was designed to do.

 

[Pandagnome]

it was messing with her sense of balance and space. But when she told the crew to mod her mecha to have smaller body parts she was able to control it normally with her sense of balance not being thrown off.

So perhaps the discovery of finding the mech, mods and adjustments that suits the pilots strengths is going to make it more interesting than have standard things such as cars with set parameters as you mentioned.

As much as speed is great fun the most fun with speed to me is in a vehicles or gliding the sense of freedom to go across various terrians and head to your buddies.

When playing a pilot i'd probably have 3 types

- Shorty, non-human with high agility/speed and low profile to hide not so strong and good with gizmos

- Medium built, human or mutant with higher tolerance to impact but lacks endurance with the use of burst explosive power

- Heavy built, Cyborg or Alien with increased strength for heavy lifting and repairing during intense battles and not as fast.

The frames most likely would depend on the situation and since shorty pilot is my primary for the time.
Would link with a light Mek or medium then customize to be a super speedy support / speedy nuisance
with the use of stealth and even nice gizmos.

I'd like to think as a mash between Batman + metal gear solid Raiden in a smaller shell yep
With good investigation, utilities and top sneakiness it could be super!

 

[SSH83]

That's not physic based melee.
If you run and do a basic melee swing attack, the run doesn't add force to the basic attack.

It's just integrating player movement into some special attack. Fireball had slam attack that consider height I think.

 

[Pandagnome]

The ways i could imagine with physics based melee could be:

- Sliding down slopes depending on height and speed to bash opponent away (Heavies with big shield would be good at that)

- Jumping off against a wall dashing onto an opponent and launching a melee strike (Light frames would have fun at that i'd imagine)

- Pendulum affect where pilot spins and unleashes grappled object e.g. opponent or object to a specific target. Think like an Olympic hammer throw

How much work would it take to add the calculation from a simple action to a chained one then applying such types of force to the melee action outcome depending on those variables?

 

[Tragedy]

I'm not going to lie, wanted to start this topic after seeing the new video of Armored Core 6 and noting that kicking is part of melee now in the game. Something that never part of the old AC games.

You could kick in Armored Core V, unless you're suggesting Armored Core V isn't one of "the old AC games."

I was going to accuse you of being a fair weather fan, but it seems you were the first person to reply to my thread 6 years ago, happy to see a real fan in the sea of dark souls children.

https://forums.em8er.com/threads/suggestion-taking-inspiration-from-armored-core.990/

 

[Omnires]

So perhaps the discovery of finding the mech, mods and adjustments that suits the pilots strengths is going to make it more interesting than have standard things such as cars with set parameters as you mentioned.

As much as speed is great fun the most fun with speed to me is in a vehicles or gliding the sense of freedom to go across various terrians and head to your buddies.

When playing a pilot i'd probably have 3 types

- Shorty, non-human with high agility/speed and low profile to hide not so strong and good with gizmos

- Medium built, human or mutant with higher tolerance to impact but lacks endurance with the use of burst explosive power

- Heavy built, Cyborg or Alien with increased strength for heavy lifting and repairing during intense battles and not as fast.

The frames most likely would depend on the situation and since shorty pilot is my primary for the time.
Would link with a light Mek or medium then customize to be a super speedy support / speedy nuisance
with the use of stealth and even nice gizmos.

I'd like to think as a mash between Batman + metal gear solid Raiden in a smaller shell yep
With good investigation, utilities and top sneakiness it could be super!

I always liked games where the character's background and even some times their childhood is reflected in the game play. Although this is more common in things like RPGs, colony sims, and dating sims. For example someone with pyrophobia would do everything within their power to avoid fire and run away from it. And in some game's that is what happens. Characters marked with the pyrophobia tag will refuse to help in putting out fires and will some times even have a mental breakdown when around large fires and flames. *Thinks back to a playthrough he had in the game RimWorld where half the forest and 3/4 of his base was burned down in the thunder storm because the other members of the colony was away trading with a near by city and only people left in the base was a baby and old super soldier who had pyrophobia. I spent so much time trying the get the baby somewhere safe as she would drop the baby on the ground every time she had a little mental breakdown. lol.* I would be nice if different NPCs also had different traits that change how they will or will not help us, regardless of if we was friends with them. And what if we players could also be giving a few tags that change things about us. Like how in some games having different personality traits will also change dialogue options and even some quest rewards.

Again using myself as an example some of the traits I could be tagged with are ambidextrous, tall body, hyper, and mimicry (I'm one of those people who can learn really fast about something if I see someone else do it first. Even if I only ever seen them do it once.). The more types of different meaningful tags there are the better a game could be as different types of people could get different outcomes from the same missions. Like how in same games even the age and sex of the character plays a role in what happens. For example in games like Mabinogi there are a few bosses that only show up if you are alone and are a male, while there is a different type of boss that only shows up if you are alone and female. If you try to do the run within a group a different boss shows up. I don't think that Em-8er has to do any of these things mind you. But it would be funny if we could pick NPCs to team up with in missions and going by who we pick the outcome might be different.

That's not physic based melee.
If you run and do a basic melee swing attack, the run doesn't add force to the basic attack.

It's just integrating player movement into some special attack. Fireball had slam attack that consider height I think.

True, but was know that in real life things like mass, size, and speed does matter in combat and would be good if all melee attacks toke that into account. And even some ranged attacks going by how you are throwing an object or what it is that you are firing. Because of the whole force = mass x acceleration thing a smaller light mass object needs to move a lot faster to do the damage as a larger slower moving heavy mass object on impact. With only really things like laser weapons not being counted in this as the speed of light is always the same in a vacuum no matter if the thing making the light is moving towards you or away from you.

So I would love it if the different attacks in the game did things like account for if I'm using my thrusters boost the speed and force of my attacks. This is also why in some sci-fi there are a few melee weapons with thrusters built into them. Namely hammers, great swords, knuckle weapons because they help boost the speed of otherwise heave weapons and give them much more power than they already have just do to their mass.

You could kick in Armored Core V, unless you're suggesting Armored Core V isn't one of "the old AC games."

I was going to accuse you of being a fair weather fan, but it seems you were the first person to reply to my thread 6 years ago, happy to see a real fan in the sea of dark souls children.

https://forums.em8er.com/threads/suggestion-taking-inspiration-from-armored-core.990/

I've been a fan since the days of Armored Core 1 on the PlayStation. My main AC build in all the Armored Core games I've played is a middle mass core, middle mass humanoid legs, and middle mass humanoid arms, with a head that has long range radar built into it. It end to use energy rifle or energy sniper rifle in my right hand and on my left arm is the Moonlight blade energy sword. I change out my back and shoulder mounted weapons based on the missions I'm on and who I'm fighting. And from Armored Core 1 to 3 always using the energy based OW (orbital weapon) cores over the OB (over boost) cores because the little flying gun turret never ran out of ammo as long as I remember to deactivate it so it could recharge itself before I sent it back out again. It was a easy why to save ammo on those longer missions where there was a lot of smaller weaker enemies because I had to save my limited sniper rifle ammo and homing missiles for the enemy ACs. I mess having orbital weapons in AC games, but I think they was removed from the game by the time AC 4 came out.

P.s.
I use to be a member of the old East Coast Alliance in the USA Raven's Nest way back in the day. When AC tournaments was done in game stores and convention centers and we had to use LAN systems. Nothing like showing off your AC to other people and having them laugh at you for your odd loadout not knowing that my AC moves faster and faster as I dropped weapons and armor near the start of match. It is why you should never laugh at someone who comes into battle with an AC that is over the mass limit if you are in a game where you have the option to gear on the ground make yourself lighter. lol

Hmm.. That is a thing. Could we have orbital weapons in Em-8er? Just little flying gun turrets or drowns that stay close to us and could attack anything that gets to close to us on their own.

 

[Tragedy]

I've been a fan since the days of Armored Core 1 on the PlayStation. My main AC build in all the Armored Core games I've played is a middle mass core, middle mass humanoid legs, and middle mass humanoid arms, with a head that has long range radar built into it. It end to use energy rifle or energy sniper rifle in my right hand and on my left arm is the Moonlight blade energy sword. I change out my back and shoulder mounted weapons based on the missions I'm on and who I'm fighting. And from Armored Core 1 to 3 always using the energy based OW (orbital weapon) cores over the OB (over boost) cores because the little flying gun turret never ran out of ammo as long as I remember to deactivate it so it could recharge itself before I sent it back out again. It was a easy why to save ammo on those longer missions where there was a lot of smaller weaker enemies because I had to save my limited sniper rifle ammo and homing missiles for the enemy ACs. I mess having orbital weapons in AC games, but I think they was removed from the game by the time AC 4 came out.

I think your memory is all over the place, but that's alright - I'm getting old too. Orbital Weapons were pretty niche for sure, I don't think I ever heard of someone using them. They were internal components in the early games, 1-3, then I think they were made into special cores in Nexus and onwards. I don't recall them being in 4+.

There's cool ideas in the early armored core titles, but they're pretty obsolete by today's standards. Aesthetically, I still think Armored Core 2 Another Age is peak Armored Core, but gameplay wise I think we should be looking explicitly at Armored Core V and Verdict Day for inspiration. They were poorly received at the time, but I think they've aged the best out of all the AC titles for obvious reasons.

Sadly, Armored Core 6 looks like a horrible union of classic AC and AC4, while failing to capture the essence of either era of games. It's like they weren't sure whether they should bring back the traditional AC gameplay, or go with the more popular For Answer gameplay, and we got the slop of compromise as a result.