Off coure. If I chomp someone's arm with a nice axe there should be some negative result for that arm.

It could be done by damaging attributes/skills (like for instance resulting in less ability to use a weapon or shield when an arm has been chomped), or it could be done by crippling the limb that's been hit.

Not especially, but it's not something that would reduce my enjoyment if included. Locational damage doesn't mean much if your character likes to cast fireballs.

I dislike this attitude that power should be shifted away from the character and towards the player... It contradicts one of the basic fundamentals of a role play game...

hitting the body would allow fire to spread faster than hitting a shin or forearm would it not?

The depends on the temperature of the magical fire and the spark point of your opponent's attire.

Why? You ability to succeed with a blow to a limb could (and should imo) still be dependent on your skills.

Although while these threads have some nice ideas, I think some of them are unrealistic. If Bethesda managed to make a combat system that deep, the rest of the game would probably suffer as a result. Maybe if we're willing to wait another 3-4 years and if we send our paychecks to Bethesda then we can get the game we dream of.

Hmmm, now there's an idea...

Not really. The extent to which it does now is ridiculous, and the idea that blade or bow skill affects damage is also ridiculous. Please don't selectively quotes me as it makes it easy to twist around what I've said, without letting people see the rest of my opinion.

I agree. And although I know Bethesda will make adaptations to suit a wider audience (Oblivion) I don't think they'll uproot the foundational RPG elements like these people seem to want.

Although on these forums there seem to be a lot of people who want this, the forums represent a very specific demographic, and i don't think it's one that necessarily reflects any kind of global consensus.


But yeah.. locational damage works in Fallout 3 because of VATS. With VATS your to-hit is determined entirely by character skill and not by player skill - like it should be. If we put in too much locational damage in a game without VATS it would take away from the game's very nature as an RPG. And we can't put a VATS-like system in TES because.. come on people, it's TES.

I'm torn. Being an old geezer, I have an affinity for stat based performance. My character does more damage because he knows where and how to strike because I've been pouring points into his blade skill.

On the other hand, I love playing with my prey. Hamstring their leg, cleave their wrist, then put my sword away and practice boxing.

AFAIK people loved and praised the locational damage mod(s) for Oblivion...without VATS.

You said stats - strength is a stat. If you meant to say skills then your point makes sense.

I agree that skills shouldn't be as big a determining factor in damage - it should determine whether you hit at all.

I think they should blend Morrowind and Oblivion's combat together a bit. Where every time you slash your sword it can hit something (like Oblivion) but whether or not you do full damage or practically nothing is determined by dice rolls.


@Above: again, the mod community is a very specific demographic. There are plenty of people who love this kind of game who are so physically inept at playigng ames that they could never intentionally make a headshot. Those people would not praise these mechanics in an RPG.

You can have locational damage and maintain RPG mechanics IMO: just make the amount of extra damage done and chance of decapitation or whatever dependent on character skill and enemy toughness/state (you won't decapitate a minotaur at level one but you can decapitate a wounded and low level bandit at level 30 if you're skilled enough both as a character and as a player). That way it still remains an action (because some people tend to forget this word when talking about combat mechanics in these games) RPG.

This would make game over so quick though. If the NPC really saw me ducking to poke his legs, just a clean swing to my neck would knock me out. Being that armor is on the legs and on most of the body of the NPC's; realistically how much damage you would really have to do to cripple somebody with steel leggings on.

I'm for it. Like it or not, Bethesda has made an obvious shift towards making action RPGs. While I may not like that they applied this paradigm to the Fallout franchise (which was originally meant to simulate GURPS before they switched to SPECIAL), it makes perfect sense that they would do so for TES, which has always had at least a small action component to it. So that being the case, I believe that they should always move toward making the action support the role play which, to me, means immersion over arcade.

Here's my take on how it could work in the context of a TES game.

Where you hit would be determined by player actions. With some minor tweaks to the Oblivion approach, this could work for locational damage. I posted this back before Skyrim was announced, but I'll repeat myself rather than link for readability's sake. Also laziness' sake. I don't want to look it up. The direction + attack method of determining your attack type should be kept, but the specifics would need to be altered to allow for targeted shots. Don't worry, I'm not talking about anything major. Remember: minor tweaks. Basing this on a sword (obviously something like a mace or axe is going to have their own attack methods), it would go as follows:

F = Forward B = Back R = Right L = Left A = Attack

A = Thrust at Center
F+A = Thrust at Head
B+A = Thrust at Legs
R+A = Slash to the Right at Center Level
L+A = Slash to the Left at Center Level

Movement directions could be combined so that, for example, F+L+A would be a slash to the left at head level. What this accomplishes is the ability to, with practice, attack any part of the body (on a human sized target) without having to completely reinvent the wheel.

Now why have multiple ways to attack the head, you say? Why not just say that F+A is a head attack and leave it at that? Well in order to overcome an upgrade in defensive abilities, i say. Manual shield blocking was a nice addition to Oblivion's combat system, but I feel that, especially if a locational damage system was added, Bethesda can do better. In some ways, Morrowind was the more realistic of the two games, even if Oblivion had a more immersive combat system. If you've ever watched medieval reenactment combat or a SCA tourney, you may notice something about the people fighting. They don't fight with their shields hanging uselessly at their sides! When you are in combat, you are always blocking. The question then becomes not "are you blocking?" but rather "what are you blocking?" A simple change here fixes things up nicely.

When you have a shield equipped in combat, your shield is always at center level. What that blocks would depend on the size and shape of the shield. When you hit the block button, you simply raise the shield to block against a head shot. So why not just equip a larger shield and keep it raised to defend against both head and body shots? Two reasons. First, your legs are wide open. Second, it's kind of hard to guard your head with a shield and still be able to see anything other than the back of your shield. A wiser fighter would raise it to block the shot and then quickly drop it back to normal position. So if a shield is always blocking the torso, what good would attacking at center level do? Well since we are talking locational damage, the answer is "plenty, if you happen to be attacking from his sword arm side where there is no shield." Suddenly, rather than holding block as you main (I'm sorry, I meant only) viable method of defense, positioning and good timing are more important.

Not quite done with defense, though this is a bit hazier. Another thing about shields. They don't magically make you incapable of parrying. I propose that you should be able to parry with your weapon even with a shield equipped. I haven't completely decided on the how of it yet, though I have some thoughts. One way would be a fallback to Morrowind. Pure chance ( based upon block skill) that an attack on your weapon side is parried by your weapon. I don't like it much though, since it takes control away from the player and could cause some rather glitchy looking animations if you happened to be in the middle of an attack. Another way would be to add a parry button. I don't really like this either for the same reason that I didn't really like the extra button approach that Deadly Reflex uses. I have two hands. The right one is taken by the mouse, and the WASD keys get jealous when my left one strays in the middle of combat. Maybe if it was once of the convenience keys, like 'E'. Finally, you could simply have it use the same button as the shield and have the game detect which side the attack is coming from in order to decide which type of block your character uses. This, too, has a downside. What happens when you are flanked by two enemies? As I said, the how of the matter is bit fuzzy.

Sooooo... I just spent a few paragraphs talking about the action side of the equation, so what about the RP bit? I'm talking about stats here, not acting out your character. Well, for starters, Unless the hit detection is quite advanced, we aren't likely to get more than head, arms, torso and legs (maybe groin if they want to throw in a Fallout easter egg). This is where character skills take over. A skilled character is going to be more likely to find the seams, straps and other weak points in armor, thus doing more damage to the opponent, their armor, or both(we're going to be original and call this a 'critical strike.' ) . A skilled marksman will retain their (player controlled) accuracy over longer distances. Differences in combat skill between a character and an NPC could affect the NPC's AI. There's lots of ways that character skill can matter that doesn't actually take the action out of the player's hands.

If I had my way, Skyrim would be a much more dangerous place because damage would be effect based, not HP(yeah, it's a radical change that would never happen, but I can dream). A good solid hit to an unarmored head could potentially kill, and good strikes to other parts wouldn't be much better. Armor would be less about decreasing damage and more about keeping the really bad effects away (until a skilled character finds those seams and straps I mentioned above). Assassins could kill an unsuspecting victim in one sure strike, and mage's fire would be something to fear. Maneuvering would trump endurance. Combat would feel visceral and look more like combat than two girls slapping each other.

But that's another matter...

I agree. Character Skill takes precedence over player skill. I hope Bethesda remembered this.

Y'know... That's so blindingly obvious that I don't know why it never even occurred to me before. I imagine the chance-to-hit would be the same for each body area, but the damage would vary given the weapon's effectiveness at doing that particular job. In the end we come out with a system which gives the player the ability to easily target a particular body area, but with the underlying RPG mechanics determining chance to hit and damage done. Since each attack type would trigger an animation swinging at that part of the body, it would be easy enough to have that animation miss if the player's stats weren't high.

Not only does it keep true to the underlying principles of an RPG, but it also embraces progress in gameplay mechanics, proving that the two need not be mutually exclusive!



*cue these posts disappearing into the mess of 15 different threads on "hardcoe mode", the game engine, and "perks in Skyrim"...*

There are headless zombies too, why would headshots harm then any more than body shots? Or are you making a joke?



Glad you like the ideas. I actually told them I could work as a co-designer, but I don't think they took me seriously.

I don't the Fallout thing... if you want the Fallout style, just play the game...

I want locational damage for head shots... and it would be great if the enemy would react to the hit... which means that he wouln't just not react to every hit we make... If we hit the leg, the enemy could just lose his footing/fall, and then get back on his feets.