In previous Bethesda titles, it seemed like monsters would just rush you with 100% fearlessness, even after seeing you dispatch the first 5 bandits with ease. People just don't work like that. Sometimes when they are scared they act tougher, try to inflate themselves to puff up and scare you more in return. Sometimes people get very angry in order to find the strength to fight you. Sometimes things go wrong in combat, and while they should react to those things, in previous titles they just kept swinging and swinging and would often run around in a circle while buffing a spell or healing or something, and then run right back in and continue fight. They were just like Terminator Robots, no fear, no emotion, nothing but action action action. I would like to see more humanity creep into the next batch of A.I.-enabled humanoid NPC's and enemies.

The reason is that if they have more emotion, then we also can feel more emotions as a result. When they taunt us, they piss us off, and we want to really hurt them. When they break, becoming sorrowful for attacking us, we also have a chance to show mercy. Perhaps Radiant Story could then use them to later to hunt us down, or if it wanted to throw less predictability into the mix, they might even become our friend after seeing we are capable of mercy.

Sometimes the enemy has fears that make him more human, less robotic killing machine, and sometimes when our blow strikes it would be nice if the enemy cried out and spent a few moments groaning and reacting to the pain we've just given him or her. Maybe a woman we are battling could become this super sensitive soft, gentle creature that we hate ourselves for fighting with, instead of the newest female cyborg death robot with a pretty face (Sarah Conner Chronicles) ....

SO ....


If you have some other ideas, let me know ... make your own list! I'm very curious what you could add to this!

Thanks.

I'd like it if some enemies tried to run away if they got too injured - why would you stick around if it seemed that you were massively outdone and about to die? I like the dialogue options in the poll, and I hope they are more fitting in Skyrim. Sometimes I'd be fighting someone and they would cackle about watching me bleed to death (even though my health was fine) seconds before they died themselves.

I don't think stunned means dazed and confused, looking around casually with stars around your head or anything. It's just when you are shocked somehow, such as being hit really hard, so that you lose the physical and mental ability to react properly to the situation, like when you are punched correctly in the solar plexus and get winded.

In Oblivion I played first-person, because third-person was very awkward to play in. IIRC, Oblivion 's enemies taunted you and voiced their pain in combat. They even staggered back sometimes when they got hit. But alot of the time I faced my enemies, they would always give that same mean, angry look. When I read this threat and starting voting, I realized how much I actually paid attention to the NPC's face. And it made me realize how boring and dull it was. I voted yes to all of the options, but really NPCs should react to any changes in battle appropriately. Especially when I torch them on my Fire Mage, I don't want complete ignorance of their physical burning state, scream in agony, feel the burn! :flamethrower:

Here are some examples, as always:

• If they step on a rune, I want to see an "OH S#!T" expression on their face.
  
• If I vanish from sight, I want to see the confusion and irritation on their face as they search for my whereabouts.
  
• If I hit them on the legs, the arms, etc., I want to see them grimace in pain, and possibly look at the damaged part in question for a second.
  
• If I hit and kill an enemy next to another NPC with an arrow, I want to see surprise and hopelessness on the witness NPC, and fear on the soon-to-be-dead.
  
• If the NPC is very strong, armored, has high Endurance (if it's in), or just didn't suffer much damage overall from one attack, I want them to ignore it, and possibly become more enraged, voicing what less-than-moral actions they will do to my corpse after I die. (And give me, the player, an incentive to survive the fight! >.<)

I could come up with others, I should be sleeping, but in the end, NPCs should show emotion and express their concerns. That way, we could read and capitalize on their weaknesses, or watch for their strengths. One of the games I love is Monster Hunter, and in the game series you hunt monster creatures many times you size in most cases, and the key to success was to watch for certain expressions or motions that would signal when it was time to attack or time to evade attacks. If combat is really improved, and I have to stare at my enemy face-to-face, I'd like them to give me the impression I'm battling something that is mortal and fears death. IIRC from the GI article, third-person is being improved, and if that's the case, I'd love to see the battle scene in it's entirety, focus on their animations, and if I get it for PC and can see it, their expressions. From there, I can plan my next move, and the battle is less "Who has more health?" and more "Who can't take a blow from my attacks?".

In FO NV they sometimes ran away and stayed in cover while crying.
I don't know whether or not this was in in FO3 but guess it would be cool seeing this feature improved in Skyrim.
hm, don't find a video showing the nv style

I would like to see the lone survivor to bring forth some courage to attack out of desperation.

I like the injuries in Red Dead, it be cool to see my opponent limp after he gets an arrow/axe in his leg, or switch weapons arm after his primary arm sustains an injury, I also like games where the npcs isn't either lethal or dead, but sometimes gets so injured that he/she becomes harmless, like just lying still or trying to crawl to safety, leaving me options to leave him/her to fate or just finish them off

Yes, all of them /thread.

That's awesome! It fits in well with the point of my thread, thanks!

A group of bandits should behave in the following way, but I know this might be too much, even for the new engine:

If one of them gets hurt and they realize you could easily kill the three of them, so they start to retreat, the wounded the furthest away from you and the strongest two backing as fast as they can, turning around and running in turns to get as far away with as little stamina consumption. They would be faster than the PC this way.

But if they are not co-operative amongst themselves, one of them might just randomly start running straight away from you and the others, saving his own ass.

Yea, the combat reaction in oblivion was not as good as Skyrim's should be. Why would a bear relentlesly persue me through the forest? Bears don't attack generally unless they are diseased, protecting they're young, or you somehow threaten them. A lone wolf will not follow you miles through the land and across rivers until some guard finds them following you. Bandit's and Marauders should start to retreat. If I saw all of my allies killed and the enemy doesn't even show signs of tiring, I would run.

And in Fallout 3, Raiders will ocasionally yell something along the lines of "**** this!" and run away.

If enemies did run away intelligently (like when they knew they were outmatched) then it would be time for bolas to make a come back! As they're running away, you toss that three-balled rope around their ankle and trip up at least one of them ... nothing make you feel more powerful than when the enemy is running away and you have the upper hand ...

If they are running away and you give chase, they might all shout near obsenities while crying "Leave us be!" or "Mercy M'lord!" ... and you can perform a taunt like "I got your mercy RIGHT HERE!" :poke: :rofl:

Dark Messiah had more intelligence in this regard and hopefully some elements will influence Skyrim. Freeze spells 'froze' your foes inplace, fireballs set your enemies aflame and they danced around screaming, enemies called for help and tried to escape when sufficiently injured. Goblins would actually run and hide and you'd have to chase them down.

No, none of them. /thread

What's wrong with, y'know, fighting while in combat? All of these are ridiculous. If I'm fighting someone I want them to be fighting me too. I don't need them acting all ridiculous while we fight.

Also, TES doesn't have a Sleep spell.

I would like to see most if not all of them, however not very often. I would like to actually fight them as well.

As for setting enemies on fire, and freezing them in place, I think that should be chance based (very small chance), depending on their resistances.
I actually hate that duration effect on fire spells, for the reason that whoever you set on fire they just take it like no big deal.
Stop, drop and roll, I know I would, I had my leg set on fire, in real life, it's not fun.

Ahh, come on, don't be such a spoil sport. All of these are very very fast, and all of these effects don't happen every battle. Maybe only 1-2 items per battle, and in the next battle who knows what 1-2 will creep up. We're talking seconds, not hours, or even minutes... seconds. The reason you thought it took longer was because you took 20 minutes to read the thread and thought that's what the battle would be like.... (wink) .... J/K !

Besides, if you want to fight robots that swing and swing and swing and can't navigate a hill to get to you while you plunck them with arrows from total safety, then more power to you, you should stick with Oblivion, it doesn't seem like you need an upgrade. But a lot of us do.

I agreed with a lot of the ideas, like fire and ice spells actually having different effects and enemies showing more fear and pain.
I mean if I kill 10 gaurds in as many seconds I expect the next gaurd I see to be cowering in the corner, not charging at me screaming about how he 'eats punks like me for breakfast' or whatever.

Well, I'm afraid I had to vote "No" to some of them, because they seemed to disrupt the flow of combat too much. (The "dazed" condition, dancing around on fire, and passing out from "Fear")

I'd love it if they actually responded to being hit, since Skyrim's combat seems to emphasize a more dynamic experience than the standard battle-of-attrition. If the attack doesn't do much damage, they should taunt and laugh it off, and when set on fire, reply with an infernal retaliation. No longer are you fighting a tough marauder, but fighting a Tough Marauder who's now on fire. Replacing some of the "Staggered" animations with dynamic reactions would be really good. I like how most of them, though, don't interrupt the flow of combat at all.

I also like the idea of having the NPCs have a sense of self-preservation.

They should act winded when fatigue is in the middle range, and sleepy/drowsy when suffering low fatigue and under the effects of a "Drain Fatigue" spell. (Which is supposed to be the equivalent of a TES sleep spell, but is usually too weak to matter)

More ham-acted dialogue in combat please!

I like how you say you don't agree with me at first only to turn around and praise the majority of the ideas anyway. You, good sir, can criticize me like that any day, hahaha....

A problem with enemies running away when they are nearly dead, is that I feel bad for killing the weak fools who will no longer trouble me, and then I will rarely end up finishing someone off, and the game will not be very fun :S There is much less satisfaction in shooting a fleeing enemy in the back than stabbing one who is trying to kill you.

It was in Fallout 3 to, has sometimes had enemies run away in Oblivion a couple of times to but it's rare and only at low level.

One cool idea, you enter a level 10 dungeon as level 8, the bandit at the entrance attacks you as he figure he can kill you and keep your stuff for himself, you enter at level 20 and he runs to the rest of the bandits for help and they ambush you as a group.
Now if your level 8 character hurt the bandit at the entrance badly he might also try to run to his friends, giving you the option to hit his back, however if you are slow or do ranged attacks and he disappear behind cover he could manage it.

That is not a very coherent thought, sir or madam. Do you mean to say that you will not enjoy the game if you encounter enemies that retreat? Do you mean to say that you will not enjoy not killing wounded enemies because you do not wish to kill wounded enemies?

Aside from that...

I would very much like to see much more - dare I say - organic combat. The entire combat system in Oblivion/Fallout was very lackluster in my opinion. Aside from the occasional staggering effect, I never felt as though I hit the enemy with my sword; it seemed as though I were simply waving my weapon at the enemy until they suddenly died. Don't get me wrong: I thoroughly enjoyed all my Oblivion duels, but I always was a bit disappointed in retrospect.

Magic on the other hand was so bad it was funny. I got so bored with flinging elemental orbs at the baddies that I very quickly gave up and never returned. Not only did the attack spells look incredibly lame, but every single magical engagement was little more than strafe - fire - strafe - fire - strafe...boring

I do want to offer up hope on the subject, but I do have a few more complaints to file... :flame:

The highlight of Oblivion combat blandness was when it was carried over into Fallout. While Fallout 3 and New Vegas made very honest and diligent efforts towards being a shooter/RPG, the combat system was so obviously melee based that any gunfight would quickly become a comedy of errors. NPCs would rather stand in the middle of a road firing or take their lead pipes and charge right into the muzzle of a machine gun than engage in a sensible firefight. I found that very long range combat was the only solution being as I never felt like waving someone to death with a baseball bat...
I shan't complain too much though. (I just started a new New Vegas game)

Anyway, with all the talk about new DYNAMIC combat, I am very hopeful that Skyrim fights will actually feel dangerous. I could certainly do with a wounded enemy (or myself) writhing on the ground or limping down a back alley. But I really hope the whole system of waving swords and axes at enemies until they drop is gone. I have no doubts that Magic combat will be completely revamped and awesome.

My hope is that a stab is a little like what Bad Company 2 does. (Only better - I want to see my weapon inside my enemy)

Bah why is it when I make a topic no one pays any attention, but when someone else does almost the same thing it gets all the useful responses

Anyway obviously I started a similar thread(more about NPCs having situational awareness) but same basic idea: Give NPCs personality.

Edit: I know this may cause some hate, but Fallout would have greatly benefited from a cover system.

I recall a quote of "bleeding out", which would suggest that more realistic wounding is in. Given this quote (if it is correct) and the damage model in Fallout 3, I expect locational damage, and effects such as limps, broken limbs etc. If they've gone to the trouble to build a better damage model, I expect they will have improved combat behaviour, at least as far as having foes run away if they're hurt.

Ah, dude, I'm sorry. I didn't know. Thanks for taking a moment to reply, that shows sportsmanship. It may have nothing to do with anything other than timing, or it may be because of the numerous options in my Poll giving rise to numerous complicated ideas that stimulated readers to post. Out of curiousity, how elaborate was your poll?
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I like the way you worded your post "Situational Awareness ... " because that's exactly what I was asking for here, but didn't think to use that term. They basically keep doing the same thing over and over again despite total failure to accomplish their objectives. Einstein called that kind of thinking "insanity" the actual quote was "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again under identical circumstances while expecting different results." The enemies of Oblivion in the outdoors always were insane, by this definition. Unable to comprehend "being stuck" or failing to do damage while engaged in a combat situation while simultaneously TAKING damage consistently. This to anyone would equal the same as an expression: "RUN FOR YOUR LIFE!"

Hahaha.