Remove quickswapping?

[yerkyerk]

One feature I never liked in these games was the ability to quickswap. All it did for me was making me feel inefficient for not swapping my weapons constantly around to get the best use out of it. I used it pretty much only for storage space and actually using it in-battle felt like cheating.

Also, I can't seem to find a valid reason to allow quickswapping. Diablo used it, but they also used tp and id scrolls, durability, stamina, inventory charms and other such nonsense. I believe quickswapping falls in this category.

[Renevent]

I don't see a reason to remove it...and I rarely ever used it except rare cases when I wanted to pull out a bow or something.

And a valid reason to keep it? Some people like having multiple weapon set easily accessible and changeable without going into the inventory every time.

Personally while I don't make great use of it, I think there's a very valid reason to have it.

[Malpheas]

Hey, inventory charms was a freakin BRILLIANT idea, Yerk. Although, yeah, many anachronisms coming out of ARPGs from the Diablo Era.

Maybe there needs to be an evolution of "swapping". Make another inventory panel specifically for swapping. MWU / MWD for swapping, I dunno.

[Shattered.likeness]

I wouldn't nessecarily say to remove it, as it can be quite useful to pull enemies in, especially when we were playing the UberMod and UnderLord Mods. It could be improved though to have it drop one weapon set to equip the next. Then you have to remember to pick up your other weapon, as you would have to in a real battle.

[Renevent]

"Diablo used it, but they also used tp and id scrolls, durability, stamina, inventory charms and other such nonsense."

Also wanted to reply to this...quick swapping is probably more often viewed as an extended option, while those other features you mentioned can be seen as things that may hinder/annoy players. They were also in most cases not really optional.

[cel]

There ain't any good reasons to remove it (it's 100% optional and removing it would only waste time), but there are tons of reasons not to; The biggest of them being that without hotswapping, it's impossible to create a hybrid that can use both ranged/staff and melee weapon skills (regardless of how rare such class/tree combinations are, they still exist).

That being said, there's no logical reason to remove it, case closed.

[medierra]

Ok, I'm going to pretend that I didn't see this. ;)

[mamba]

There ain't any good reasons to remove it (it's 100% optional and removing it would only waste time), but there are tons of reasons not to; The biggest of them being that without hotswapping, it's impossible to create a hybrid that can use both ranged/staff and melee weapon skills (regardless of how rare such class/tree combinations are, they still exist).

That being said, there's no logical reason to remove it, case closed.

Full agreement, I used it to change between sword and bow. Not using it is up to the player - and other than plain laziness I cannot think of a reason why you would not be swapping every once in a while at the very least.

[yerkyerk]

Well - than why not implement a quickswap button for every piece of equipment? And while we're at that, why not, instead of one alternate piece of equipment, have 4-5 swaps? I mean, by the logic of "there ain't no good reason to remove it", there's no real good reason at all to limit players in swappability like they are now, is there?
Having more quickswaps would definetely help out hybrids even better and it allows you to adapt to your enemies on the fly, without the hassle of hotswapping. Insectoids? Switch to anti-insectoid gear. High damage, slow moving zombies? Switch to undead ranged gear. Getting zerged? Switch to pet summoning
gear. Etc...

I would at least like to see some rational for keeping it. And keeping it limited to a single weapon swap.

[Sandirk]

I think that having slow-swap in place of quick swap would be my preferance.

the ability to change from ranged to melee or say from slashing weapons to blunt if up against undead for example is all well in good, but just add in some form of delay inbetween changing sets to simulate holstering or stowing a weapon in favor of another one.. maybe you could have a stat on a weapon like weapon speed that effects the swap speed, and in hybrid classes have a skill or passive that reduces the swap delay.

[yerkyerk]

Animated swapping would be buttrock! :D

[Sandirk]

I guess the reason i had for the delay over a cooldown was that i thought that the delay time could be altered between weapon types etc .. for example swaping from a great axe to a sword should take a bit longer than swapping from a mace to a dagger.

i like this idea it would add to the experiance for me in chosing weapon combos and such but i can see how others might not like it.

the other reason was that classes that benifit from swapping more than others could have skills and such attached to reduce the swap times (not knowing a lot about programing i thought this might be easier to do than reducing cooldowns on a single skill)

[Scryer]

Quick swap slots are pretty much just cheese, an extra storage space.

It would be better to add an animation, or add a casting timer.

At least to that point it takes 2 or 3 seconds to pull out your other weapons.

I can't help but agree with Yerk on this one, Quick swap is cheese, you need to add a cast timer to make it something the player has to think about doing.

Most people here seems to like swapping weapons, how could you say you would hate a cast timer. A timer would make sure that weapon swaps won't be spammed, and would make sure that it's a strategic decision, rather then spamming back and forth for maximum benefit.

Also, this particular feature is totally unnecessary. Swapping weapons in the midst of battle doesn't really add to the battle experience, it's like, deciding that it's better to use a broad sword rather then an axe. It's totally pointless, because they do the same thing. (They both deal damage).

However, if this feature is added, it might be better to reduce the cheese that it is, by implementing either a short cast timer or a cool-down timer or an animation.

[Sandirk]

Also, this particular feature is totally unnecessary. Swapping weapons in the midst of battle doesn't really add to the battle experience, it's like, deciding that it's better to use a broad sword rather then an axe. It's totally pointless, because they do the same thing. (They both deal damage).



this is correct in part but if they were to add resistances to creature types it would become more useful.

Eg. Skeleton -
x2 from crushing
0.5 from slashing
0.25 from Piercing

sure hacking away with a sword will get the job done , but changing to a mace will be better

[mamba]

Well - than why not implement a quickswap button for every piece of equipment? And while we're at that, why not, instead of one alternate piece of equipment, have 4-5 swaps?

I would at least like to see some rational for keeping it. And keeping it limited to a single weapon swap.

You got the reason for weapon swap, there are different weapons for different conditions sword or bow, or staff etc.

I have no issue with expanding on the concept, just with taking it away ;)

That being said, switching weapons in real life is rather easy compared to switching armor. Removing armor and putting on different armor takes a long time, sheating your sword and grabbing your bow does not, so I guess this is why it is a) limited to weapons and b) limited to two (you do not really carry around more easily accessible weapons).

[mamba]

I'm totally down with animated swapping though, that takes time and thus serves as a disadvantage to simply swapspamming.

Most people here seems to like swapping weapons, how could you say you would hate a cast timer. A timer would make sure that weapon swaps won't be spammed, and would make sure that it's a strategic decision, rather then spamming back and forth for maximum benefit.

Why would you even 'swapspam' to begin with ? There is no inherent benefit in swapping weapons as fast as possible.

I have never seen anyone swapping back and forth 5 times a second to be able to maybe hit 5% faster (not even sure if this were possible, but if it is not, your whole argument becomes groundless). If someone can do this and actually does, fine, I do not care, removing the option to swap weapons to prevent this is like killing your baby because it might get sick.

Allow swapping, do not introduce any delay, that would be my vote. A delay might be more realistic, but so would be having to sleep 6 or so hours a day and eating and drinking, none of this adds fun imo and ultimately I do not care about realism, I care about fun.

[Scryer]

How do you use ranged skills with a melee weapon?

How?

By allowing the player to dual wield a sword and a gun. That alone removes the need for any swapping.

[cel]

By allowing the player to dual wield a sword and a gun. That alone removes the need for any swapping.

The need to swap weapons is not limited to that particular combination, it also contains staffs and bows and a number of other weaponry depending on what the game will have (even weapon+shield) that may not be dual wielded with guns.

[Scryer]

I think it's pretty safe to assume that if you've chosen a ranged mastery and a melee mastery, you can either dual wield a gun / one hander or focus on one or the other. Also, they could easily just add Short Staves that could be dual wielded with a gun or a sword or any one handed weapon for that matter.

I think bows would be for players that want to focus on full ranged attacks.

Simple solution to players needing more then one weapon type - make a one handed version of each and allow the player to dual wield them.

[mamba]

Cel, you're just arguing for the sake of argument.

When arguing wether quickswapping should be removed or not, it's logical to bring forth arguments why quickswapping is there in the first place - and that also means why it's limited the way it is.

I still have not seen a reasonable argument for removing it. Your feeling inadequate because you do not constantly switch between weapons (when noone else does either) does not really qualify as a valid argument in my book.

Maybe I missed something, but I have not seen any better argument than that against it in this thread yet - and if that is the best you have, it definitely should stay in :D

I think it's pretty safe to assume that if you've chosen a ranged mastery and a melee mastery, you can either dual wield a gun / one hander or focus on one or the other. Also, they could easily just add Short Staves that could be dual wielded with a gun or a sword or any one handed weapon for that matter.

I think bows would be for players that want to focus on full ranged attacks.

Simple solution to players needing more then one weapon type - make a one handed version of each and allow the player to dual wield them.

Yeah, dual-wielding a shortsword and a shortbow to not have to swap weapons. Brilliant solution to what isn't a problem right there. This sure makes me want to have that over the ability to actually swap weapons. Sorry, I honestly cannot take something like this serious (although you appear to).

[Scryer]

Scryer: Don't you think that's a bit overcomplicated way to deal with a problem that having the swapslot already resolves?

What's over complicated about it? It's a very simple solution to a very simple question that you posed.

Swapping weapons still feels like cheese without a cool-down, animation, or cast timer, it's just an extra slot for your gear.

My solution cuts out the cheese and is pretty elegant. Just by letting players of 2 different masteries carry the 2 types of weapons they could ever want, solves it pretty easily.

Swapping weapons is pretty much just cheese, I.E. a mechanic that doesn't really add to the experience of the game, and in fact just adds something that wasn't intended of it originally (which is just extra storage space in this case.)

[mamba]

Swapping weapons still feels like cheese without a cool-down, animation, or cast timer, it's just an extra slot for your gear.

It is not as has been shown several times in this thread already, pointless to repeat this if you still do not realize this.

As to cooldown, it may be realistic, fun it is not.

My solution cuts out the cheese and is pretty elegant. Just by letting players of 2 different masteries carry the 2 types of weapons they could ever want, solves it pretty easily.

your solution is downright ludicrous and does not solve anything, so when I want to be able to use ranged and close-combat weapons I have to do so at the same time ? I cannot use a sword and a shield and switch to bow / staff / gun for ranged attacks (without going into the inventory) ? If what you want to achieve is making this a nuisance, your solution is certainly superior to a swap.

Swapping weapons is pretty much just cheese, I.E. a mechanic that doesn't really add to the experience of the game, and in fact just adds something that wasn't intended of it originally (which is just extra storage space in this case.)

If it is extra space for you don't use it, it sure adds something for me that your 'solution' (and I use this word reluctantly) does not address.

[Scryer]

I've never advocated removing weapon swap entirely, just adding a cool-down or a cast timer, obviously you agree with me that weapon swap is a cheese mechanic.

If you wanted to switch from a shield/sword to a staff/gun you could, but it should still feel like a choice that the player has to make.

Swapping weapons without an animation / cast timer is a pretty clue-less decision to make, but in the midst of battle, with a cast timer it becomes a strategic decision.

what's disagreeable with that?

[mamba]

I've never advocated removing weapon swap entirely, just adding a cool-down or a cast timer,

this to me sounded very much like you were advocating removing it entirely :

I think it's pretty safe to assume that if you've chosen a ranged mastery and a melee mastery, you can either dual wield a gun / one hander or focus on one or the other. Also, they could easily just add Short Staves that could be dual wielded with a gun or a sword or any one handed weapon for that matter.

obviously you agree with me that weapon swap is a cheese mechanic.

I have no idea why this is obvious when I obviously said the opposite ;)

Allow swapping, do not introduce any delay, that would be my vote. A delay might be more realistic, but so would be having to sleep 6 or so hours a day and eating and drinking, none of this adds fun imo and ultimately I do not care about realism, I care about fun.

If you wanted to switch from a shield/sword to a staff/gun you could, but it should still feel like a choice that the player has to make.

Swapping weapons without an animation / cast timer is a pretty clue-less decision to make, but in the midst of battle, with a cast timer it becomes a strategic decision.

what's disagreeable with that?

Everything (see my quote above). Yes, it becomes more strategic, but I do not see this as inherently better, I prefer immediate swapping for simplicity.

[Renevent]

It's there in the first place because it's one of those optional "nice to have" features that many people seem to like. I'm not sure why that's such a foreign concept.

Regarding "spam swapping"...I gotta say...in all my years of playing these types of games I really have never seen people do what you are describing. People just swap to a bow to pull some mobs or things like that. Swapping doesn't really give you an advantage.

Anyways, I don't know why you are acting like I am attacking you...I think I have been pretty civil in my posting.

[cel]

Anyways, I dont know why you are acting like we are attacking you...I think we were pretty civil in our postings.

Fix'd for you~ :p

What? I was! Honest!

[Renevent]

The argument doesn't really matter...I can't read minds but based on the short post by medierra I don't think swapping is going anywhere :p

The mechanic is already built into the TQ engine so it's not like this is something that even needs to be debated about whether or not to include...it's already there!

Again, I rarely use it, but it can be useful at times and I get why people like it. Plus, it's completely optional...and not using it doesn't effect anybody either.

It's a win-win situation for all!

[Scryer]

Yes, it becomes more strategic, but I do not see this as inherently better, I prefer immediate swapping for simplicity.

I understand it's easy to disagree with game design that limits players.

However, you're just saying that it's pointless to limit players because the mechanic isn't broke. Well, I'm saying the mechanic is broken because it doesn't provide any interesting choices for the player. I understand that you disagree with that.

The mechanic is simply cheesy, it doesn't provide any provocative thought on the player's behalf, it's just there to be there.

A feature in any game should have more of a meaning then that.

[mamba]

Anyway, my argumentation mostly consisted of arguing why it's there in the first place. As to me it seemed to be a leftover from an older generation of aRPG's. Even if it's not even considered for removal (as medierra pretty much made clear), I would like to have a good reason for it to be in. Just to have peace with the, right now imo, quirky mechanism.

Here's why I would like to see it removed;
It feels like a cheesy mechanism
It can be abused (having debuff equipment on secondary than swapping back and forth for every creature - could be limited to only powerful creatures if you're lazy)
It eliminates the gun+sword combo (which would fit for hybrids), since you can have both magically available on swapping.

I pretty much mentioned these before, but if it might make you feel better ;)

- usefulness of different weapons for different enemies (e.g. clubs vs. skeletons) or simply different situations (ranged attach / close combat)
- limit to two because realistically there is a limit to the weapons you carry around easily accessible (the limit ain't 1 though ;) )
- limit to weapons because you cannot switch armor fast realistically (I would not mind having an armor swap and a separate weapon swap though, realism is not why I play games in the first place)
- noone constantly toggles between debuff and damage dealing weapons, making your feeling of inadequacy surprising - the closest you would see to that is dual wielding one of each (which obviously would still be possible)
- not sure why you would prefer a sword+gun over sword+shield swappable with gun in the first place

What ? A limit on 4 images ? maybe smileys should not count towards that limit....

[mamba]

I understand it's easy to disagree with game design that limits players.

However, you're just saying that it's pointless to limit players because the mechanic isn't broke.

No, I say it is pointless to limit players for the sake of limiting them. Limitations should have a good reason and not just be there *because it can be done*.

Well, I'm saying the mechanic is broken because it doesn't provide any interesting choices for the player. I understand that you disagree with that.

The mechanic is simply cheesy, it doesn't provide any provocative thought on the player's behalf, it's just there to be there.

A feature in any game should have more of a meaning then that.

It has more meaning than to simply be there, as has been mentioned repeatedly. If this were not the case why even argue for a cooldown instead of for a removal ?

[Scryer]

Yes, it becomes more strategic, but I do not see this as inherently better, I prefer immediate swapping for simplicity.

Once again, I must quote you, you even agreed that it would be a more strategic decision to make.

The only reason you don't see it as being better, is because you dislike limitations.

Designers often have to make tough decisions like this to ensure a game's integrity, if you don't limit a player they can find ways to abuse the system or worse.

Also -

No, I say it is pointless to limit players for the sake of limiting them. Limitations should have a good reason and not just be there *because it can be done*.

I think Yerk and I have given many *good reasons* why it should be limited, you obviously disagree, but that doesn't invalidate our arguments.

[shawnmck]

I personally like the ability to quickly swap to another weapon set.

Because if we couldn't, then you are basically forcing us to plan attacks in advance & know where certain enemies are located and find a nice safe spot in advance to switch weapons.
That just sucks in my opinion.

Giving us the option is a good thing....but if you don't like it then you don't have to use it.

[andreyy]

Swapping must stay if we're to have guns. That's exactly what it should be for.

But I'd love to have separate swapping for each hand. I always hated that I can't do that. Most common situation: I have 2 weapons for different uses, but one shield. So I'd use the shield with both weapons. Swap swaps both.

[Yggdrasil]

Also, I can't seem to find a valid reason to allow quickswapping. Diablo used it, but they also used tp and id scrolls, durability, stamina, inventory charms and other such nonsense. I believe quickswapping falls in this category.
You forgot light radius.:)

All these mecanisms are annoying (sometimes a true pain in the a*s) and bring nothing in terms of fun.
However quickswapping is different. I never used it, but I understand people who like it. I mean, quickswapping don't bother me when I play, so I can't see any reason to remove it.

[mamba]

Once again, I must quote you, you even agreed that it would be a more strategic decision to make.

The only reason you don't see it as being better, is because you dislike limitations.

I disagree, I do not dislike limitations per se, I dislike this limitation

I am fine with e.g. having 2 instead of all masteries / skills available to a single char, I am fine with stat requirements on gear, I am fine with having fewer skill points than could be spent etc., all of which are limitations.
These are limitations which further the game, which is a) why they exist and b) why I do not object them.

Delaying weapon swaps adds nothing for me, in fact it is detrimental, hence I oppose it.

I think Yerk and I have given many *good reasons* why it should be limited, you obviously disagree, but that doesn't invalidate our arguments.

Actually I did not see a single good reason, you gave two valid reasons though (I guess this is my disagreement)

- it is more realistic (but so is eating and sleeping, realism for realism sake is usually a recipe for disaster)
- it might at times have strategic impact (but >99% of the time I do swap weapons is when there is noone attacking me, so there is no strategic decision, just a delay in gameplay)

Feeling inadequate for not constantly using it, not using it at all and using the swaps as extra storage and carrying a bow and sword at the same time so you have no need to swap are not reasons at all.

[mamba]

Swapping must stay if we're to have guns. That's exactly what it should be for.

But I'd love to have separate swapping for each hand. I always hated that I can't do that. Most common situation: I have 2 weapons for different uses, but one shield. So I'd use the shield with both weapons. Swap swaps both.

Yes, separate swapping would be nice.

Actually I still would prefer a single button for this but some more logic in the actual swap.

If the weapons / shields in both sets are one-handed, only exchange weapons / shields if the hand in the second set is actually wielding something.

So if I had a sword and shield in the first set and a mace and bare hand in the second, the swap would make me wield a mace and shield (or sword and mace, depending on where I placed the mace), not just a mace.

[medierra]

I've gone through and deleted all or at least most of the nonsense from this thread. History has been erased and you have a second chance to act like the reasonable, intelligent, good-spirited people I know you are deep, deep, down inside somewhere. ;)


Lets try to keep it to constructive discussion please.

[TQIT]

Just read the whole thread (or what Medierra left of it... don't know what I've missed...) and I came with an idea. It is just an idea, so feel free to argue about it if you want!

What if quickwapping became a skill?? Only one class could learn this trick and benefit from it (a bit like dualwield in TQ). It could be implemented in many ways, here's one:

attack skill: when you want to switch your weapons, you use this skill on one enemy (or in the air) and your toon will perform the swap and then unleash a powerful attack depending on the new weapon he took out(melee=powerful bash, ranged=powerful shot). mana cost=yes(on enemy) or no(in the air), cooldown: no or little, cast time: requires the time of two hits (one for the swap, one for the power hit)

Anyway it's just an idea, maybe it should be developped a bit more, or simply burried and forgotten...

Another thing: about the current swap button, one disadvantage of it is that it is a game function that could overpower some game skills. The thread "Sword and gun!" turns a bit around this problem. This is why I came with this idea of turning this swapping function into a skill.

And that's it, you can restart your discussions if you like.

[Sandirk]

What I have got from this thread is that there are very few people that use weapon swapping in its current form but there seems to be a reluctance to look into it and would prefer to take the "if it's not broke, don't fix it" stance or it's a staple of ARPG so it must be there even if only 1 in 100 use it.

the "not Broke...." stance is a pet hate of mine , how can anything progress if you don't even look into improving things, if you want to play a reskined version of TQ get masteries mod or similar and be done with it. without change things will stagnate and in my opinion this is not what the genre needs.

I think we need to look into why very few people use weapon swapping in the first place, the main reason I can think of is it is of little to no benefit to the average player.

one idea I think would work would be having different stances that you can change to suit the situation and each stance being able to have a different weapon set. So if you changed stances and had a different weapon combo set to that stance it would change it for you. this would allow you to equip what you want to each stance and allow changing on the fly .. the change from stance to stance should have a short delay 0.5 - 1 sec (this can be changed to no cool down as adding any semblance of cool down to this type of thing incurs a lot of rage for some reason).

Example Stances with benefits
(just ideas to get the ball rolling)

Offence
Add 5% chance to crit
Add 10% increase to damage
Decrease armour by 25%

Defence
Add 5% chance to block
Add 10% to armour
Decrease Damage output 10%

Ranged
Increase the max range of ranged items by 15%
Add 5% chance to snare per hit
decrease armour and melee damage 10%

[Void(null)]

Why change what isn't broken?

Weapon Swapping is an ARPG and even an MMO standard, one to which I do not feel gives any major exploitative advantage or disadvantage.

The use quick swapping is to switch from a melee weapon to a ranged, or Sword & Board to Two-Handed. To me it was very useful in Diablo, very useful in Titan Quest and very useful even now in LOTRO.

I really don't get why this is such a big deal that it needs some arbitrary rework or to be set on fire. A lot of what I have read in this thread feels like change for the sake of change.

Let me ask a question. To the people who say its a useless feature, do you mostly play caster classes? I can see it not being all that useful for casters, but as a Melee player weapon quick swapping is something I use a lot.

As for why not just have every piece of equipment hot swapable.

From a world mechanic perspective, weapon hot swapping is you sheathing one weapon and drawing another. Something that is fairly quick to do in the real world, and follows the Hollywood epic battle feel of "They are closing in, sling that bow over your shoulder and go stab someone!" Where as taking off pieces of armor takes time, a lot of time, and if you are doing it yourself without the aid of another it also requires you to be sitting for the most part.

Weapon hot swapping is easy to accept, Armor hot swapping breaks suspension of disbelief.

[mamba]

What I have got from this thread is that there are very few people that use weapon swapping in its current form but there seems to be a reluctance to look into it and would prefer to take the "if it's not broke, don't fix it" stance or it's a staple of ARPG so it must be there even if only 1 in 100 use it.

Ok, so there are two people with issues and two people defending it. And you somehow turn this into 'very few people using it'. How about 'very few people not using it' ?

the "not Broke...." stance is a pet hate of mine , how can anything progress if you don't even look into improving things,

we are looking into it, we just disagree on whether something new is better ;)

Change for the sake of change is not going to improve something either, so unless you can improve (and to me this is what is being debated here), leave it alone.

one idea I think would work would be having different stances that you can change to suit the situation and each stance being able to have a different weapon set.


Example Stances with benefits
(just ideas to get the ball rolling)

Offence
Add 5% chance to crit
Add 10% increase to damage
Decrease armour by 25%

Defence
Add 5% chance to block
Add 10% to armour
Decrease Damage output 10%

Ranged
Increase the max range of ranged items by 15%
Add 5% chance to snare per hit
decrease armour and melee damage 10%

Ok, how is this different from what weapon swapping does, other than you now offering 3 sets to switch between ? Is the stance giving these bonuses on top of what the gear offers ?

I am cool with that idea (the bonuses might need to be looked into a bit ;) ).

[Void(null)]

the "not Broke...." stance is a pet hate of mine , how can anything progress if you don't even look into improving things, if you want to play a reskined version of TQ get masteries mod or similar and be done with it. without change things will stagnate and in my opinion this is not what the genre needs.

Innovation is good, design for the sake of it is bad. The "Why fix what isnt broken" is so that we can avoid this:


http://i39.tinypic.com/34smc5u.gif

Innovation is great, but the inner workings of the Toaster (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toaster) have not changed all that much in 105 years, and the pop up design that we know today has been around since 1925 (85 years.) Over the century people have tried to reinvent the Toaster but the classic pop-up design is what we all have in our kitchens. Why is that? Because its simple to use, it makes toast and doesn't really need any extra design to serve its intended purpose.

[yerkyerk]

I think hotswapping can be seen as manually replacing equipment pieces you have in your inventory, whereas quickswapping is swapping to a secondary piece of equipment as meant by game mechanics. That's just semantics though.

But quickswapping is broken. As said, you can apply debuffs to your enemies with a quick debuffing weapon/+skill and than attack them with a high dps weapon. You can also buff yourself in battle than switch right back and continue hacking. That's pretty ugly micromanagement to get an, in my eyes, unfair advantage, but that's one reason I'd like to see it removed or at least nerfed.

And from my view, swapspamming also breaks the suspension of disbelief. It feels dirtcheap to use, in my eyes and shouldn't be possible. The solution to this would be to still allow swapping, but disallow the player from swapping too fast. By animating the swapping, there will be a proper delay and realism is improved, as is the coolness factor.
The cheap answer would be to give swapping a short cooldown timer.

On a side note; what I also think would look cool is if the character wore the secondary armory visually (one-handed weapons in a sidebelt, twohanded weapons and shield on back).

[mamba]

But quickswapping is broken. As said, you can apply debuffs to your enemies with a quick debuffing weapon/+skill and than attack them with a high dps weapon. You can also buff yourself in battle than switch right back and continue hacking. That's pretty ugly micromanagement to get an, in my eyes, unfair advantage, but that's one reason I'd like to see it removed or at least nerfed.

Seriously, I have never seen anyone do this. You brought this up as if it is commonplace when noone ever does this. Having the ability to switch to a second weaponset is good. Not having a delay is good as it would only introduce unwanted stops in gameplay when you do switch weapons.

Nerfing something because it could be used in a way when noone actually does use it like that is plain stupid. It is like banning cars because you could run people over with them (actually this happens more frequently by accident than swapspamming does..).

[Void(null)]

I will toss my hat in as well to say I have never seen anyone swap spam in combat. Messing around in town once or twice but I have never seen it done in combat and I cant see why anyone would think it would give them any sort of advantage.

[Renevent]

Nobody does it...not even the people bringing it up. It's a made up scenario that really doesn't happen.

In TQ, you would have to swap, hit the enemy, then swap back and start hitting again. Not only is doing this constantly very clunky and slow you down, but the amount of time wasted doing it probably brought down your DPS overall more than you will recover with the + damage from the debuffs.

[yerkyerk]

It is recommended in one of Poinas guides (the Spirit one), where, by using Phantom Strike, you can distribute -resistance with that -resistance stick (what's it called again?) than switch to staff attack and obliterate everything with Ternion. In a game that challenges the player to build the most effective build there is, this will be used. The only reason players won't go full-out abuse it is because it's a single player game, but leaving a game unbalanced because it's single player and not everyone will abuse the possibilities doesn't produce proper balancing.

In D2, where +skills matter more than in TQ, quickswapping to get a boost to self in-battle, or get more powerful summons is often used. From what I've heard so far, GD will have a wider distribution of +skills.

Quickswapping itself is probably not used by many people, but it's than more of a question of those who do use it, how many of them abuse it?

A nerf to quickswapping would prevent abuse and make it feel less cheesy, while keeping the ability to switch to secondary weapons.

[mamba]

It is recommended in one of Poinas guides (the Spirit one), where, by using Phantom Strike, you can distribute -resistance with that -resistance stick (what's it called again?) than switch to staff attack and obliterate everything with Ternion.

EDIT: after looking around a bit, I guess I found the guide (http://www.titanquest.net/tq-forum/showthread.php?t=25924) you were talking about. Certainly the first time I saw a mage use Phantom Strike ;)

I stand by what I said, if this is being used at all, it is almost never. This is analogous to banning cars because you can run people over with them.

I do not want any delay in changing weapons, > 99% of the time the delay just a nuisance and not something that prevents abuse - I for one am willing to live with the chance of abuse in order to prevent this nuisance.

It is also mostly a matter of gear and skills here, as long as you have access to any gear, most decent builds will be very good at killing things, this has very little to do with quickswap (the build would work just almost as good without it).

[cel]

Quickswapping itself is probably not used by many people, but it's than more of a question of those who do use it, how many of them abuse it?

So you're more concerned about how other players will play their game even when it has no effect whatsoever in your game?

If it was only about preventing abuse/cheating in MP, then you should start figuring out how to prevent any and all alterations to the characters through savegame editing or involvement in custom maps - oh wait... that's not possible as long as the data isn't being stored on official servers, so it all comes down to pissing on the people who have a legit need for it based on the arbitary assumption that every player out there will abuse everything as much as they can. The argument used here is a well known fallacy - the slippery slope (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slippery_slope).

[yerkyerk]

The fact that it's in perhaps the most popular build guide for TQ toons around might mean that it's actually used... and you don't use Phantom Strike with the staff obviously, you use it with your secondary weapon, some melee club, than switch to a staff and start dealing damage. This can still be done with a nerf, but will take more time since you actually have to switch weapons instead of magically replacing your arms.

I do not see it as a nuisance at all, really, but I guess that's personal. And since you're not abusing it anyway, why would you care about having the possibility to abuse it removed?

Your car analogy makes no sense, replacing car with a random noun will result in many random outputs, while retaining the same validity.

[Sandirk]

Ok, so there are two people with issues and two people defending it. And you somehow turn this into 'very few people using it'. How about 'very few people not using it' ?

Ok, rereading the posts I'm not sure how I came to that, but with no real data of quick swapping use available I guess I will retract that comment.

Change for the sake of change is also not a good thing, I seem to have trouble putting what I am thinking into words. I see these boards as a place to throw out ideas and if these ideas grow and get built upon then great its cost the Dev's nothing and if things are impractical or just don't fit/work with what they have in mind then there is still no cost. Every now and then something good may come from kicking ideas back in forth .. but when things just get to " tell me why we should change it" ... "tell me why we shouldn't" and so on it gets frustrating.

On the Toaster, sure it has not changed much over the last 85 years but the changes it has had are small but useful. being able to toast Crumpets and English Muffins, thick toast, crumb trays for easy cleaning. that is what I was hoping to achieve with suggesting a cool down and now with the stances not a complete rebuild just some tweaking to make a skill I didn't use a lot as it didn't seam to benefit me much to something with a wider use.




Ok, how is this different from what weapon swapping does, other than you now offering 3 sets to switch between ? Is the stance giving these bonuses on top of what the gear offers ?

I am cool with that idea (the bonuses might need to be looked into a bit ;)
).

it's not really any different just altered slightly and may not be of any use but it's an idea and people may not like it but I think it would make me use quick swapping more if it had more point than just a gear change so just throwing it out there .. not going to be crushed if it gets kicked to the curb :D

As for the stances, yes in each stance you would get a passive buff and debuff that effected your stats. you would be able to use the same weapons in multiple stances if you wish.
And yes the suggested pros and cons for each stance atm are rubbish but are just a start:)

[mamba]

I do not see it as a nuisance at all, really, but I guess that's personal. And since you're not abusing it anyway, why would you care about having the possibility to abuse it removed?

Just because I am not abusing it, does not mean that I am not using it. I am not surprised that someone who does not use the feature does not see the delay as a nuisance, but I certainly do.

I used it pretty much only for storage space and actually using it in-battle felt like cheating.

Your car analogy makes no sense, replacing car with a random noun will result in many random outputs, while retaining the same validity.

ok, so just because this is not exclusive to cars it makes no sense ? The argument is not about the car, it is about the banning because something can be abused. I agree that this is not only true for the car but a lot of things, none of which got banned just because they could be abused. You on the other hand want to ban quickswapping because it might be abused. Still no valid analogy ?

[cel]

I agree that this is not only true for the car but a lot of things, none of which got banned just because they could be abused. You on the other hand want to ban quickswapping because it might be abused. Still no valid analogy ?

He propably drives a car, so banning cars would have an adverse effect on his life, thus the analogy is lost to him as he does not use the quickswap. (10 bucks says this is interpreted as an insult and will result in the deletion of this post).

Other than that, cheating / abuse can never be removed from the game for as long as the game data isn't being stored and calculations done by a secure server, so justifying the addition of an annoying feature to prevent what is most likely the mildest form of cheating in the game doesn't accomplish anything.

Perhaps I should suggest the removal of all modifiable character data from the game as it would prevent cheating, sure, it would have quite an impact on the gameplay experience for anyone who has a character, but hey, it would prevent cheating and I like looking at the main menu instead of actually playing.

[yerkyerk]

ok, so just because this is not exclusive to cars it makes no sense ? The argument is not about the car, it is about the banning because something can be abused. I agree that this is not only true for the car but a lot of things, none of which got banned just because they could be abused. You on the other hand want to ban quickswapping because it might be abused. Still no valid analogy ?
It is not might be abused, it is abused. If whatever [random noun here; e.g. gun, dynamite, paint] is hardly used, but part of the using community is abusing it, is it a valid reason to ban it or protect the [random noun] from abuse?

Cars are widely used (unlike quickswapping), cars are not often abused (we don't know that about quickswapping), abusing quickswapping, unlike running people over with cars, gives the player a benefit. Unless you're playing Carmaggeddon ofcourse, than you also get rewarded for car abuse.

There's no proof how many people use and how many people abuse quickswapping. It is being used, as well as abused. Banning quickswapping however, is off the table, the reasons discussed in the last few pages were to prevent its abuse, and that can be achieved by implementing a or animating a cooldown. In your analogy that can be seen as a safety bumper.

[medierra]

the "not Broke...." stance is a pet hate of mine

A pet hate of mine is "innovation" for the sake of change. This is probably the number 1 reason that developers fuck up working game mechanics. There is so much room for improvement of systems that really aren't working or could be working a lot better. We tend to target areas for improvement either when we happen come up with what we think is a great new idea or we see an issue being raised frequently by our fans that we agree with. This falls into neither category. I wouldn't even know where to start in trying to "innovate" here because I just don't see a problem and have no ideas on how to improve it. I think it works very well as it is. Also, note that weapon swap wasn't arbitrarily added in because it was in D2, we got to a point in development were we decided it was needed to accommodate the play-styles of people on the team and certainly skill synergies. I'm not sure how much people use it for this but one mastery we had in mind when adding weapon swap was hunting.

how can anything progress if you don't even look into improving things, if you want to play a reskined version of TQ get masteries mod or similar and be done with it. without change things will stagnate and in my opinion this is not what the genre needs.

This is borderline insulting. Despite all of the new features we're adding to Grim Dawn we're apparently not going to make any real progress until we tackle weapon swap? A non-issue that doesn't need to be solved?

The areas we've been targeting for improvement are those that fans have been most vocal about over the years since TQ was released. The new features we're adding are the result of ideas we've had that we think are well suited to the game we're creating. This is the first time anyone has ever brought up weapon swapping and, frankly, I think the argument for changing it is misguided.

One of the points people seem hung up on is concern that players are "abusing" it to debuff enemies... uhh really? That sounds like an awesome tactic to me! Although, maybe a bit too much work... ;)

[ASYLUM101]

I can't even comprehend why you folks are arguing about this, I mean of all the possible things to improve upon?...

[medierra]

There's no proof how many people use and how many people abuse quickswapping. It is being used, as well as abused. Banning quickswapping however, is off the table, the reasons discussed in the last few pages were to prevent its abuse, and that can be achieved by implementing a or animating a cooldown. In your analogy that can be seen as a safety bumper.

Why is using weapon swap in the way described an abuse? It sounds like a fun and creative strategy that gives weapon swap even more purpose.

I mean, first the argument was that weapon swap wasn't useful (although at least subshape and I use it) and now people have identified a use and are arguing that it should be eliminated. Is this turning into a witch hunt? :p

[Scryer]

Medierra, if you like that people find interesting strategies with this mechanic, then that's up to you, as a game designer.

To me it feels like most players use it as extra storage, if that's you're intent, then hell, we're complaining about nothing.

[Kirii]

Burn her! BURN HER!!!!!

I have always used "W" to switch to my bow to do some pulling. Or if I am a ranged class I switch to my melee when needed.

One thing I think can be improved though is if there was an actual animation of the weapon switch. This would also increase the time to switch making it a little more costly to do so.

[medierra]

Medierra, if you like that people find interesting strategies with this mechanic, then that's up to you, as a game designer.

To me it feels like most players use it as extra storage, if that's you're intent, then hell, we're complaining about nothing.

It's my job to build the potential for interesting strategies into our game systems and if weapon swap is allowing for that, even in unintended but not harmful ways (which I believe it is), then that's one for the win column.

My intent in adding weapon swap was not to provide an additional weapon storage space but I don't think that is a problem if some people use it for that. I know I have in the past. In this case though I think it is more important that the minority may be using it as intended to accommodate different types of multi-weapon class builds and tactics.

While in D2 and TQ I've sometimes used weapon swap as a storage slot with chars that didn't have any other purpose for it, with other chars I've used it to switch between ranged and melee, weapons with different bonuses, or even 2h / dual wield and 1h and shield. I don't expect most players to do this with every character. There are only a few builds that require weapon swapping but without weapon swapping, those builds wouldn't be possible. Swapping between bow and spear for the hunting class was one of the originally intended uses. Unfortunately, I think other game mechanics may not have supported this intended weapon swapping tactic but that is something I hope to improve with better system balancing.

I also personally like the idea of pulling or softening enemies with ranged weapon skills before switching to melee or even of just switching from one to the other based on the type of enemy you're fighting. There may also be reasons why a player might want to switch from dual wield to sword and shield or just to a weapon with different bonuses to overcome a particular enemy type with strong resistances to your primary damage type.


I know as a hardcore ARPG player I'd be pretty annoyed if weapon swap was removed. I also thinking it would be annoying and defeat some of the purpose of weapon swap to add a delay either through animation or otherwise. Why do people want to limit the usefulness of this ability?

[mamba]

It is not might be abused, it is abused.

by a smaller minority (percentage wise) than are abusing guns

In your analogy that can be seen as a safety bumper.

more like an enforced speed limit (i.e. enforced by the car engine, not the police) of 5 mph

I do not care that it is abused by 2 out of 100,000 people, let them. The delay to me is worse than having a few people 'abuse' it.

[Scryer]

My original thought about quick-swapping is this - for the majority of playable classes it's an extra storage space, it doesn't give the player any real tough decisions to make, and without knowing the original intent behind the mechanic I assumed it was easily abused.

So, as you said Medierra,

- You don't mind if people simply store weapons there.

- You intend the mechanic to be used in interesting ways (like taking advantage of debuffs.)

- You don't mind that the player have a quick weapon switch in any situation.

I can respect your choice in game design. It's nice to know your reasoning sometimes, I think when it comes to this particular mechanic it's helpful to understand your intent, even though it would be impossible to do that for every mechanic.

Thank you for your input Medierra.

[MadWasp]

Weapon swapping is a good feature. I use it.

[Sandirk]

This is borderline insulting. Despite all of the new features we're adding to Grim Dawn we're apparently not going to make any real progress until we tackle weapon swap? A non-issue that doesn't need to be solved?


No insult or slight was intended on the the work being done in Grim dawn or in TQ. I enjoyed TQ a lot and am sure i will enjoy Grim Dawn. I have faith in the project and have Preordered as im sure it will be great.

as i have put in my last post I find it hard putting my thoughts to paper,
I agree Change for Change sake is not a good plan either but i was under the impression this thread was about Quick swapping, keeping it , shelving it or changing it and was in no way intended to be a slight on other areas of Grim Dawn.

Things were going sideways - got frustrated - blurted stuff.
I still belive that i have tryed to add constructive suggestions to the topic but if you think its fine the way it is thats your call as it your baby.
I personally dont use quick swap much and was just offering up ideas i think would improve it so that i would.

[Kirii]

I agree weapons swap should not be touched.

I also thinking it would be annoying and defeat some of the purpose of weapon swap to add a delay either through animation or otherwise. Why do people want to limit the usefulness of this ability?

Why limit the usefulness of anything? Why put a cooldown on skills? On potions? Why not give each character four arms?!!:rolleyes:

Even without the delay (or maybe less than a second) I still think an animation would be a nice touch. I suppose every new animation adds so much to the budget. And you would have to add one for each type of weapon but I just find it cool when my dual-wield warrior reaches back to pull out his swords:cool:

I was recently trying out Divinity 2 and kind of liked how you would sheath your weapons when talking to npcs in town. It had a toggle to take the weapons out and there was a delay but even with no delay I think sheathing your weapons in towns and safe areas adds just a slight more depth to your character. It would add to the feeling that I am safe here in town, I can relax a little a do my shopping without accidentally stabbing the poor plump vendor :(

[myrmidon]

+1 to medierra


but seriously why are you talking about this. if you don't like weapon swap here is your choices.

1.don't use it.

2. deal with it .

3.don't play the game .

"abuse"? well if you use a weaken them with a weapon and the switch to kill them i call that a stratgy not "abuse". and a use for weapon swap i was playing diablo 2 earlier. and found 1 you run out of ammo for your bow switch to your crossbow instantly. without having to go to your inventory and die by the boss by the time you switched.

but this all is opinion based!

[Rhis]

This thread seems to be cooling down at last, so let's try to keep it that way.

Please remember to stay on topic, and attack the arguments, not the people.

[alexei]

What can I say. It's really great to have such a constructive discussion. What a great community we have here.

Yep I felt a bit hot reading through here.

How about switching your view here? Agree to disagree, disagree to agree. Maybe you could understand/accept something that you cannot see before.

OT: I don't really use weapon swap, but sometimes I do.
- Early games. For collecting junk to get more money. In other word, extra storage.
- Mid game to late game. For alternate weapon, whether for bow, different sword/shield set, high damage set, or for certain resistance set.

I rarely use it but it is useful (and to me to remove it completely will make a portion the ARPG magic reduce).

Even though I will not use it at all, it's still much much better to have it than to throw it. Considering other people. Why care so much about the abusive use? It's not abuse at all. It's just a way to play. Do you know about EVE Online? Scamming, steal loot, cheating is allowed all the way. It's part of the gameplay.

Just an opinion. Have a nice discussion! Keep it up.^^

[Yggdrasil]

I'm not sure how much people use it for this but one mastery we had in mind when adding weapon swap was hunting. [...] Swapping between bow and spear for the hunting class was one of the originally intended uses
Heretic !!!
The true hunter needs only a bow. He uses 'hit and run' to evade ennemies and plays with his bowstring like a singing harp.
:D

[nzone]

Oh dear God! I've read through 7 pages.
1. If you use the feature, all power to you. That's strategy.
2. If you don't use it, that's too bad.

If the argument is it is useless and it's there as an extra storage area, you might think about delete unwanted stuffs in the inventory + the 3 bags + the caravan. The argument doesn't carry any weight. It's grasping for straw kind of argument.

For short example: TQ/IT Warden. Using range attack with Bow. Switch to melee weapon as a strong melee enemy dashes toward you. This also true for any mastery that combines with Defense mastery. There is no cheesy here. It is vital and useful for hybrid melee.

The same concept as bathroom. You don't use it frequently, but that doesn't mean you can use it as a storage room. Likewise, you cannot build bathroom too far either (equivalent to add delay/cool down timing). :eek:

[PureKnickers]

Oh man, if you haven't tried a class that uses the quickswap I greatly encourage you to do so! I recommend a melee/bow oracle or a poison illusionist that uses a necromatic weapon in the other weapon set.

As far as adding a delay or animation, please don't. With my oracle class I mentioned above, switching from bow to melee already felt panicked enough when mobs beelined it for my character. Any more delay than human instinct and the cooldown from the previous bowshot would make quickswapping near useless.

The apparent abuse that was mentioned seems more like a fantastic strategy to me. I've never seen the quickswitch spamming abuse though, and I'm not sure it's actually that feasible/useful as I believe switching weapons requires you to retarget (reclick left mouse). Timing that perfectly throughout battles would be impossible considering the pacing of TQ.

Anyhow, in all those 7 pages, someone mentioned a FANTASTIC idea and it was seemingly glossed over except by mamba. andreyy mentioned intelligent quickswapping. Please, THAT would make quickswapping far more useful and require a whole lot less tedious inventory management when deciding on new shields and charm set ups. Perhaps it would even encourage some of the users who don't use it to incorporate it into their battle plan.

[eisprinzessin]

Hotswapping was discussed before (http://www.grimdawn.com/forums/showthread.php?t=426) ... and I find it a cool tactic:
My conqueress benefits from additional damage, when switching to dual wield for a whirlwind attack
Any cool down would ruin this, as I usually switch back immediately, so that I'm protected by my shield and benefit from my shield skills.

[Fortuitous]

I think that having slow-swap in place of quick swap would be my preferance.

the ability to change from ranged to melee or say from slashing weapons to blunt if up against undead for example is all well in good, but just add in some form of delay inbetween changing sets to simulate holstering or stowing a weapon in favor of another one.. maybe you could have a stat on a weapon like weapon speed that effects the swap speed, and in hybrid classes have a skill or passive that reduces the swap delay.

I don't know how others feel about it, but personally despite the fact it would be more realistic it would make the quickswap less useful then it is. For example, if I were say using a spear and slow swapped to a mace to deal with the undead threat, I better hope that they don't hit me too hard during the swap (not only that you would loose all the buffs and benefits of that weapon/shield during the swap process).

One thing I would like to see in swapping equipment is the ability to swap individual hands so that if you have an amazing shield that you would like to use with 2 different types of melee weapons you could do so without having to find the same shield again for the swapped configuration.

[medea fleecestealer]

Personally, ALL my characters use weapons swapping. My casters use different damage type staves against different creatures, for melee I keep a lower damage set for mobs and use the higher one for bosses and ranged characters can do both ranged and close combat damage with spears, swords, axes or clubs.
Weapon swapping is also used to good effect in Two Worlds (3 slots provided) as the various foes have either bludgeon, piercing or slashing weaknesses.
I hated the fact that I couldn't swap weapons in Oblivion once an enemy was in range, even if I couldn't see it. Heck, even in real life I could drop a bow and pull out a melee weapon, but not in Oblivion.
If you don't want to swap weapons, don't put anything in the slots - it's that simple.