Hard West - tactical turn based + wild west setting

[ArchAngel]

What new mechanics?
BTW, if you have access to the game can you explain to me how the Hit chance vs Luck works? Also what are the exact effects of Cover?

 

[veevoir]

What new mechanics?
BTW, if you have access to the game can you explain to me how the Hit chance vs Luck works? Also what are the exact effects of Cover?

Those mechanics

In backer demo (the one with Bank Job only) the luck mechanic was not implemented yet. As for cover - characters hug to it when parked next to it (can be a bit wonky when going from non-combat into combat), reduces chance to hit and damage taken.

 

[Jimmious]

Can someone explain why does this game has a decline tag?

 

[ArchAngel]

Those mechanics

In backer demo (the one with Bank Job only) the luck mechanic was not implemented yet. As for cover - characters hug to it when parked next to it (can be a bit wonky when going from non-combat into combat), reduces chance to hit and damage taken.

So can you share details about Luck mechanic?

Can someone explain why does this game has a decline tag?

My guess would be because it reminds too much about nuXcom and people on Codex are allergic to any mechanics that were invented after year 2000

 

[veevoir]

So can you share details about Luck mechanic?

Yes, after 4th November when backers will get a version that has it.

Unmonocled toilet paper IGN describes it as follows:

Luck is a meter that each of your characters has in Hard West. It starts full, and every missed shot by the enemies depletes that meter. When a character gets hit, the Luck meter fills back up. What’s more, Luck is also used to perform special abilities. One of my cowboys had a Ricochet skill, meaning he could bounce his bullets off of a metal object, bypassing enemy cover – which he used to perform trick shots, getting out of a tough situation.

It also adds another tactical element – I had one character with low hit points facing two enemies. I instinctively used a powerful skill of hers to instantly take down one of the enemies. Moments later I realized I’d drained almost all her luck, leaving her almost totally defenseless.

Which would also suggest lower the luck - lower your defences. But it is IGN, so it is not exactly word of god.

We could always get Kacper Szymczak out of hiding to explain it more in detail.

 

[Neckbeard Shitlord]

Well.. I don't know if this is good or bad, I do have the backer access so as long as I get to test the new mechanics I'm good.

4 microissues remaining.

 

[PeachPlumage]

Awesome. Thanks for the update, Veevoir.

 

[Saduj]

My guess would be because it reminds too much about nuXcom and people on Codex are allergic to any mechanics that were invented after year 2000

What are the gameplay advantages of nuXcom combat over action point based systems? If you're going to bother making a tactical combat game, why would you intentionally choose a system that favors ease of use over tactical decision making? Dumbing things down IS decline.

Having a QTE that affects combat was also a very unpopular decision. Not sure if that made into the game though.

 

[ArchAngel]

What are the gameplay advantages of nuXcom combat over action point based systems? If you're going to bother making a tactical combat game, why would you intentionally choose a system that favors ease of use over tactical decision making? Dumbing things down IS decline.

Having a QTE that affects combat was also a very unpopular decision. Not sure if that made into the game though.

Makes combat faster and easier to understand to more people not used to turn based system and especially to complicated turn based systems. Maybe it is dumbing down, but it does not need to be automatic decline. Actually this game seems to have some innovative stuff that certainly not about dumbing down or decline.

 

[ArchAngel]

Yes, after 4th November when backers will get a version that has it.

Unmonocled toilet paper IGN describes it as follows:


Which would also suggest lower the luck - lower your defences. But it is IGN, so it is not exactly word of god.

We could always get Kacper Szymczak out of hiding to explain it more in detail.

Now the part I am not sure of but would like to know if there is any RNG left in combination with this Luck mechanic. Eurogamer video preview was mentioning something about enemy hit chance needing to be higher than your luck so they can hit you, but he wasn't definitive on what happens exactly if it is lower. Do enemies miss automatically or is there a roll. And if higher then luck value, is that automatic hit or again some roll.

 

[Saduj]

Makes combat faster and easier to understand to more people not used to turn based system and especially to complicated turn based systems. Maybe it is dumbing down, but it does not need to be automatic decline. Actually this game seems to have some innovative stuff that certainly not about dumbing down or decline.

It isn't as if action points systems are so hard to understand. If you're going to make a game where the core gameplay is tactical combat, then that tactical combat should be as interesting as possible. Faster and easier is not interesting. A turn based tactical game is supposed to present a challenge.

I agree that the game has other things going for it and I may still buy it. But the decision to go with a weak system for core gameplay is a disappointment. Even Xcom split its focus between combat and base management with the base management being the more challenging aspect of the game.

Edit - And really, I only responded to what you said because you made a comment about Codexers just rejecting things that are new. Has nothing to do with that. New is fine. New but worse is decline.

 

[ArchAngel]

nuXcom brought incline to Turn Based games a whole. Without nuXcom there would be less other turn based games now. It introduced turn based to many many new players. Many of those after that are more open to trying other turn based games.

And action points are hard to understand for people that never played turn based. And modern audience are not known for putting lots of time into one game until they learn it.
It is not like in the past where when you get one game and you got nothing else to play but that for a while. So I made damn sure I got most of that Jagged Alliance 2

 

[Saduj]

nuXcom brought incline to Turn Based games a whole. Without nuXcom there would be less other turn based games now. It introduced turn based to many many new players. Many of those after that are more open to trying other turn based games.

And action points are hard to understand for people that never played turn based. And modern audience are not known for putting lots of time into one game until they learn it.

Isn't dumbing things down in order to appeal to a wider audience pretty much what "decline" boils down to as the word is used here?

Also, I think we strongly disagree as to the difficulty of understanding actions points. And modern game engines can easily use graphical representations to help a player understand how many action points are being consumed by a given move and how many will be left afterwards.

 

[Zombra]

Eh, it's still true that a fine AP system encourages static tactics, since every move you make means less ability to shoot. Run to ideal positions, shoot shoot shoot, overwatch overwatch overwatch until the AI isn't aggroed any more, run to next ideal positions, overwatch overwatch overwatch. Even if your position sucks, you're still encouraged to sit still and shoot a lot. Slam XCOM all you want, but its system did promote more dynamic movement.

 

[ArchAngel]

Isn't dumbing things down in order to appeal to a wider audience pretty much what "decline" boils down to as the word is used here?

Also, I think we strongly disagree as to the difficulty of understanding actions points. And modern game engines can easily use graphical representations to help a player understand how many action points are being consumed by a given move and how many will be left afterwards.

It does represent decline for alive genre, but turn based was basically dead before nuXcom. After nuXcom many new turn based games appeared.

 

[Saduj]

Eh, it's still true that a fine AP system encourages static tactics, since every move you make means less ability to shoot. Run to ideal positions, shoot shoot shoot, overwatch overwatch overwatch until the AI isn't aggroed any more, run to next ideal positions, overwatch overwatch overwatch. Even if your position sucks, you're still encouraged to sit still and shoot a lot. Slam XCOM all you want, but its system did promote more dynamic movement.

Underrail has movement action points and general action points, which encourages you to move more. Also the general difficulty of the combat necessitates that you move.

Silent Storm had destructible environments so your cover might not last for long if you're staying still. Certain maps also have enough enemies that rush in from other areas to guarantee that you'll be flanked if you stay still.

Hell even Fallout Tactics *at times* used enemy and map design to force you to move aggressively, particularly when you first run across super mutants.

Boring tactics are a result of boring enemy/map design mostly. NuXcom is really no different. If you can turtle and shoot/overwatch until everything is dead then that is what you should do. And there are plenty encounters where you can do just that. The best moments really come when you're facing enemies that can punish you for doing so - sectopods, ethereals, floaters (to a much lesser extent). Also, sometimes chryssalids are placed in such a way as to make things interesting. I never felt any need to move just because the system encourages it. The enemies had to make it necessary, just like in an action point based game.

 

[Zombra]

Of course encounter design can encourage or discourage movement. None of that has any impact on my argument ... when all else is equal, the granular 2AP system encourages movement more than a traditional AP system does.

The point is that neither system is flat out superior even from a strictly hard core viewpoint. A system that encourages a fluid battlefield is interesting in ways a static-incentivized one is not. I'm not saying Hard West will be better than Jagged Alliance - I'm just saying that a 2AP system doesn't automatically disqualify a game from realizing its potential, or even make it automatically "dumber".

 

[Infinitron]

Somebody should probably remove the Decline tag from this thread, yeah. This is like Banner Saga where people got butthurt with the devs for some reason instead of going "Whatever, it's not JA2, but another turn-based game is always nice".

 

[Zombra]

Might as well wait a couple weeks and see whether it's terrible

 

[Saduj]

Of course encounter design can encourage or discourage movement. None of that has any impact on my argument ... when all else is equal, the granular 2AP system encourages movement more than a traditional AP system does.

The point is that neither system is flat out superior even from a strictly hard core viewpoint. A system that encourages a fluid battlefield is interesting in ways a static-incentivized one is not. I'm not saying Hard West will be better than Jagged Alliance - I'm just saying that a 2AP system doesn't automatically disqualify a game from realizing its potential, or even make it automatically "dumber".

My point was that when all else is equal, neither encourages movement more than the other. Either the encounter necessitates movement or it doesn't. If you can stay in cover and pick enemies off, that is what you're going to do regardless of the system.

I see an action point system as superior because its just more flexible. The player has more options IF the encounter necessitates real decision making.

 

[ArchAngel]

Well Xcom had meld that disappeared if you overwatched too much. And in Long War it lasted ever shorter and it was even more important to pick up as much as possible.

 

[Nostaljaded]

The art, presentation and graphics looks mightily fine, especially the range modifier UI.

What's concerning is the seemingly weak AI.
In the video, they do not actively stay behind cover as well as their uncoordinated/individual attacks.
(Hopefully this only applies to cannonfodder/untrained enemy types.)

Seems like there's no noise for movement and a single-firearm hearing range gameplay mechanics.

Probably just HP, To-Hit and resource modifiers for their difficulty-settings tweaks.

P.S. Increasing-reinforcements waves can easily create the time-pressure for some of the scripted maps.

 

[deuxhero]

Silent Storm had destructible environments so your cover might not last for long if you're staying still. Certain maps also have enough enemies that rush in from other areas to guarantee that you'll be flanked if you stay still.

Then Sentinels fucked that up by increasing movement so much that anyone who tries to flank is just a sitting duck and won't actually get into position in meaningful time.

 

[Kacper Szymczak]

Hey, thanks for the lively interest!
Sorry for the slow reply. Guess what I was busy with

I'm well-aware that there are some exceptions but I'm positive that most of those decent games would be even better if they ran on a more competent engine.
(...)
Anyway, I hope Hard West proves to be one of the exceptions.

It's a business thing. The moment we started working on Hard West we had a history with Unity, it still was a better deal at the time, and we got fucked with our previous game, so didn't really have any room to improve on that.
I personally would prefer Unreal (used to do a lot of Unreal Tournament maps in early 2000s) but our programming and art depts. are more than competent and you can it shows. Made a lot of effort so that you can't tell that it's on Unity. And most people are surprised when we say it is. So there's that.

I think that a lot of that comes from the fact that 1) unity was cheaper, so dipshit crews used unity primarily 2) a lot of visual effects aren't build in and you have to be competent enough to know you need them; we are

I don't want to be too ballsy here, sorry if it looks so. Guess you'll just have to see.

After the release of Fallout 4? I wonder how this is going to work.

Apparently in our weight it is crucial to get the reviews in before the launch. I dunno, not my thing. I just got more time to tweak.

BTW, if you have access to the game can you explain to me how the Hit chance vs Luck works? Also what are the exact effects of Cover?

There's a classic Chance to Hit calculation (based on char aim, weapon mod, cover, elevation, range, etc.etc.).
Every character has a luck param (and a max luck cap).
If shooter's CtH = 100%, it's a hit.
If shooter's CtH < 100% AND it's > target's Luck, it's a hit.
If shooter's CtH < 100% AND it's < target's Luck, target's luck is reduced by shooter's CtH.
If shot, your Luck is replenished a bit.

So, basically, if shot at, you eventually run out of luck.
Luck is also like MANA in terms of trickshot and ability usage. So if you're focused on 'casting', you'll get shot easily.
Also, world map exploration and adventures modify your starting luck.

If you're going to bother making a tactical combat game, why would you intentionally choose a system that favors ease of use over tactical decision making?

It's just a matter of focus.
AP calculations are not in the center of the game, and the player is preoccupied with other things, that were not present in any other game you compare this to.

Having a QTE that affects combat was also a very unpopular decision. Not sure if that made into the game though.

It got cut.

Slam XCOM all you want, but its system did promote more dynamic movement.

Well Xcom had meld that disappeared if you overwatched too much. And in Long War it lasted ever shorter and it was even more important to pick up as much as possible.

Compared to XCOM, Hard West promotes aggressive gameplay even further:

- Cover not only reduces CtH, but often (depends on the weapon) also drastically reduces damage. Flanking not only is better, but actually substantial.
- There's no overwatch (except for when you rush an AI character who sees you).
- Nothing good ever happens if you pass a turn (well, unless you're using hp regen items or something, but that's rather rare).
- You're always heavily outnumbered, and simple shot exchange results in a game over screen.

That was actually one of the cornerstone assumptions underlaying all other design decisions.


Oh, a bit more on the reaction shot:
- On adjacent tile Damage penalties are ignored, CtH is 100%.
- Within 5 tile radius CtH is always 100%.
- BUT if you try to rush an enemy who sees you, he'll get a free reaction shot.
- BUT if you rush them when they're not expecting, there's no reaction shot.

What's concerning is the seemingly weak AI.

That is exactly what the design team is focusing during the delay we got.

 

[ArchAngel]

I just hope the delay is worth competing vs Fallout 4 :D :D
At least delay it one more week.