I never played M&B. But was there a marksman skill that affected the size of the circle as well? Or would it be reduced to the same size regardless of how "skilled" you were?

Nearly all of this is available in Duke Patrick's Combat Archery mod for Oblivion. It does make being an archer a lot more fun.

In my opinion, there should be no form of auto-aim in Skyrim at all. Perfect ability in a skill should result in the player's actions being translated perfectly, with lesser skill resulting in a deviation from that perfect translation.

A system where the player's own skill is removed from the calculation is better suited to a pseudo turn based system like Fallout 3's VATS system. That is what VATS was designed for.

I tried DPs mod, and I do agree that it made archery a whole lot more fun. But if I remember correctly, accuracy wasn't affected in the way suggested in the OP? The way I recall it, it added a chance for every arrow to deviate when you released. It either deviated dramatically("failed shot"), or not at all. Is this correct, or was accuracy covered in some other way?

It deviated by a random amount within a range determined by your skill. The higher your skill, the smaller the possible deviation. It didn't have the large and small circle in the HUD, but the effect was the same. Standing still, crouching, holding your breath all lessened the deviation. There was also an optional bow sway that could be used along with the calculated deviation. Standing still, crouching and holding your breath also affected the amount of bow sway. Holding a shot too long resulted in your hands shaking. Holding your breath too long resulted in sudden exhalation and your aim swinging. Bows had to be fully drawn to have maximum effect, and a half-drawn bow had significantly less power. Different bows take different amounts of time to draw fully, affected by your strength as well.

Some of this has already been reported to be included in Skyrim, so I'm hoping a lot of it made it through.

If not, it proves that this stuff is possible with after release scripting at least.

I mentioned auto-aim in another thread but after reading this discussion. I now see it can really get complicated. Especially convincing people on how to preserve player skill. I want my player skill to be the satisfactory element. I come from a FPS games background, so hear me out.

I will try to show how auto-aim can be integrated seamlessly to dispersion circles idea without sacrificing manual aiming. Because I think dispersion circles idea is already a part of this RPG/simulation of controlling a character via video games aspect.

Dispersion circles:
I will offer two ways to add auto-aim.

1. Since the circles will get narrower and narrower to a small point, I offer going past that point so the circle will begin to expand beyond that zero point(changing color and reversing shape!). This new circle area would be the auto aim area. Since it is animated, release time can be synced with zero point for manual aim.(I am thinking ping-pong animations, gives two perfect moments for manual aim shot and a moment for auto-aim)

2. Don't go all the way to zero with circle. After 75 fix the circle to a ~%33. Since there is randomization already, just override randomization with auto-aim(with more luck while skill is affecting other things like draw time, arrow loading etc.). You can add a manual aim perk(with a cool name) to get rid of this for those who want manual aim.

Just trying to show auto-aim can find its way in a system like this. I wonder since the game will be hudless, using above methods but not showing it to player can make it fun predicting how the game works. You know like football games where you try to understand how freekicks work.(I like how Todd Howard think of sport games, as I also think they are really good examples of player-character skill combinations, like PES 6.)

PS. Auto-aim(or assisted aim) can be increased/activated with long range shots and/or snap-shots too.

There are 2 problems with archery auto-aim that doesn't apply to guns:

1) In TES-games, you have to factor in superelevation. Knowing how high to aim in order to compensate for arrow drop is essential to playing as a succesful marksman. If you introduce auto-aim, the game will tell you how high you have to aim in order to hit each target, if it forces your reticule on to the target itself, the shot will miss. So it isn't merely a convenience, it takes away alot of the "thinking" part of the marksman skill.

2) Arrows are much slower than bullets. That means that applying automatic lead based on target movement up to the point of release ("dynamic lead") will be much less reliable, even (especially?) for the auto-aim-system. It may end up causing more misses than hits, because even small changes in target direction/speed is enough to cause a miss.

If that was the case, then that's very well. It means it will be possible to mod into TES V as well.

I just have to say, that isn't how I remembered it. Reading up on the mod description now, I can't make out for certain just how it worked. My impression was always that with a LOW marksman skill, a higher number of arrows would deviate randomly. Improving the skill would reduce the number of arrows that deviated, and the ones who didn't deviate behaved as normal - ie no deviation. (I remember arrows deviating at at least 25-20 degrees as an expert marksman.The ones that didn't deviate always seem to hit very accurately.) Now, if you're absolutely certain that every single arrow you fired really did deviate, I won't argue with you - it's been some time since the last time I played.

OP:

Congratulations, you have now made Skyrim look bad as it is very possible that this will not be in.

I take it you are convinced the manual aim can be preserved. So we have given those who want manual aim. Your concerns about auto-aim can be addressed too but only the auto-aim ones. I can give you both, but not at the same time. If you want an omelette you need to break some eggs.

It will be obvious that you have to aim higher for a lethal shot. But that doesn't mean the game will tell you how high or low you can aim where the solution is obvious. Why leave something in our control to the game, where we can leave something we are not controlling? The draw amount. I can imagine how my character changes draw amount according to the distance and how high I'm aiming on the fly. I can see the animations.

Let's take wind for example. The wind will affect the line your arrow travels. Also a quirk at the last moment can make a further curve(within the skill). You can see the wind direction on the trees/grass but the exact amounts are beyond our player skill controls so we can/should leave it to our character to determine.

Also the game can control both the arrow and target. Targets can dodge an arrow every single time(if it is not point black), like you said, arrows are too slow. This can be overridden both ways. So that you can watch low level bandits literally heading your arrows.

Off course I don't want something extreme to shatter suspension of disbelief. This is for uber skilled archers like Legolas. We can't be a Legolas but we can play a Legolas.

Like I said, snap shots could have more auto-aim and also for long distance shots where wind will affect our arrow path too much. But luckily our character with high marksman skill will calculate the amounts better than us and make a headshot from very long distances.

And finally I already proposed two methods to preserve manual aim in my previous post.

I won't guarantee absolute accuracy in my statement, but I did have a fair bit of discussion with Duke Patrick about the functioning of his mod. Also keep in mind I am referring to the second generation of his Combat Archery mod which used OBSE and far more sophisticated calculations than the first generation version of the mod. Duke Patrick has archery as a hobby and was very specific about getting the mechanics as correct as the game would allow.

Auto-aim, if it exists, should be able to be turned off. I want to make my shots with no interference from the computer (except the simulation of error).

In other words, the computer should only make my aim worse....never better.

I think it's a good way to more realistically reflect the way archery works. What I actually really like in the OP was an affect of the quality of bow you are shooting. I think that's at least as important. Take a game like Warband for instance, here bows have accuracy ratings as well, and it would add to the joy of finding a good bow if damage wasn't the only variable.

What I don't like about this idea, however, is that it will take away some of the natural feel of shooting a bow (if the circles are shown that is). I like the way it is right now, where all you really have is a small dot. It's more of a 'raw' feeling. Then we'd have to get into things like fitting an aim on your bow, which is really a modern thing and shouldn't be possible in a fantasy game.

But a really good idea OP!

The circles weren't supposed to be shown, that's just ideas that are being played with a bit. From the original post:





Yeah, I saw them, but I'm not 100% sure I understood your point correctly. I read your first suggestion as having auto-aim only being active within a defined circle, which expands after "max accuracy" is reached to increase the area "reached" by auto-aim? And if the proper aiming point (that is, a point above the target to compensate for gravity) is within that area, the character will aim at that point, not the reticule at the centre of the screen?

First question, yes.(It will go back to max accuracy for a second manual aim chance if we add a ping-pong animation. Concentration, timing.) For second question, it doesn't matter. If player aims at the center, character will draw more for a faster shot. If player aims higher, character will draw less for a slower shot to balance it. And auto-aim is for higher skills, like 75 and beyond. Below that, player mistakes can be seen as character mistakes.

I think there are many variables in archery that our character will evaluate better than us. I am researching and I read things about spine, weight and straightness, wind, used arrows. Some would be under our strategy but many will be last second decisions by our character.

OK, so you're basically leaving superelevation to the "ballistic computer" of the character, completely eliminating the need to estimate range....

Yes, you are quite correct in the fact that there are many, many ballistic factors that will affect the trajectory, and most of these are not a part of archery in the game. The MOST important one, however, is gravity, (Arguably wind is as important, but that depends on the wind strenght) and it is a constant factor - which means it's fairly easy to get used to it, once you manage to estimate ranges. As of TES IV, it is the only part of archery, apart from lead, that actually requires player skill. I wouldn't want to see it removed, it would eliminate most of the challenges of using marksman weapons. I wouldn't want this removed, succesfully landing difficult shots is what makes archery in Oblivion fun. Leaving everything to the "ballistic computer" would mean there would never be any difficult shots. I want a completely manual aim system.

Are we still discussing or have you already made up your mind?

I am giving you the manual aim. It is complete in every sense. Since you are OK for randomness. For this yin, I am adding yang to it. Yang will be the auto-aim because I think a high skilled character has the right to go beyond player skill and override randomness. It shouldn't bother you since you are not gonna use it, if I understand correctly. It is not cheating or something. Do I have a master archer or not? I thought that's an excellent balance. Combining both in one system without need for a hardcoe mode.

I think accuaracy should be affected by marksmanship and where you aim... I always used bows and arrows in Oblivion (history will repeat itself in Skyrim) so I want to see improvements in Skyrim... I can't wait to see gameplay!

Obviously I have made up my mind, as have you. I don't want to use auto-aim, you do.



Well, your descriptions aren't exactly easy to decipher, they still don't make proper sense to me. As long as auto-aim can be COMPLETELY left out if I should so choose (not by "minigames" or launching the arrow at the correct time - completely left out and without any effect on my aim no matter what), I don't care if it's included as an option. As I've said before, the "master archer will hit targets better than the player"-argument isn't really that valid, taken to its extreme it means disconnecting the character from the player, turning the game into a movie.

And I don't understand why you bring up randomness, it doesn't apply to the auto-aim-discussion. The randomness I talk about is the sum of human error and the weapons own dispersion. It doesn't have anything to do with auto-aim.

Auto-aim that can be completely shut off is fair in my opinion. Honestly, I've never figured out how console players can hit a target at all.

For my playing, however, I consider myself to have the best possible conditions for targetting an enemy. I have better vision of the enemy than I have any right to, I'm sitting comfortably, I have a cup of tea. My own aiming is optimal because of this.

All I want is for the computer to simulate the sub-optimal conditions my character is experiencing, and for my characters skill to mitigate the effects of those conditions. That means the computer should mess up my aim a fair bit with very low skill, and not interfere at all (except constants like wind and gravity) when the skill is mastered.

I'd also like to remove any guaranteed "sneak critical" from the equation. A sneak shot should increase my chances of getting a critical because the enemy doesn't defend himself, so I have a better chance of hitting something critical. It shouldn't give me a critical hit bonus for taking out the guy's left big toe.

I didn't, haven't made up my mind at all. That's why I am building different methods. I thought maybe someone else can take it further, it is food for thought. And I would like you to here me out first before making your mind.


They are just random thoughts which I think could be melt into something better... Also English is not my native language.

If randomness is result of human error(the character who can be a non-human too), the human success must be the part of it too. It is really interesting to include character's error rates but not success rates. It is a yin-yang. You are willing to let go your arrow in some situation beyond your player skill but that doesn't disconnect you from character? You are thinking auto-aim as some low-life principal. Which it can be, but with careful design, it doesn't have to be.

Like you said, there are many things that affect trajectory and character can evaluate those better than the player. I am asking you to evaluate these things, and decide what part of it should be at player's hand what will be left for character's. Surely we can't have everything to be in player's hands. We only has a mouse button. There are many things and I think you will have to sacrifice some parts for to be left for character. Or we can discard those and have something very basic, reminiscent of basic FPSs. We want more flavor to it, don't we?

I come from FPS background, I like my aiming skills and enjoy it. I will use manual aim myself with all kinds of disadvantages. But I find users with a mouse button and screen centering skills thinking they can simulate aiming, ridiculous... I am an open minded person, I can't help it but to be devil's advocate.


PS. Manual aiming is completely optional in every sense. Just take manual aiming perk at 75. Or let's revert it, for who wants it, they just take an auto-aim perk at 75.

Well, your thoughts are quite similar to points that have been made previously in the thread, so my mind is pretty much made up as a result of them. That being said, with the proper amount of reasoning anyone can change his mind. It's going to take something quite special to convince me that auto-aim is a good idea, tho.



This paragraph is pretty tough to understand.

The skill as suggested here introduces a random deviation based on the players skill. The poorer the skill, the higher the deviation from the aiming mark. Therefore, as your skill increases, your success rate will increase as well. So yes, success rate is involved, obviously.



We definitely want more flavor, and introducing auto-aim takes away flavor. More flavor would mean accounting for wind, weather (rain), etc. The only "flavor" left is compensating for gravity drop, which requires range estimation and at least a very basic understanding of ballistics. Taking away that reduces flavor by reducing archery to "point-and-shoot".



I don't play much games, my suggestions are based primarily on my military experience. The "dispersion circles" are abstract ideas explained to new riflemen to explain how gunnery training will improve their accuracy.



When I say "optional", I mean an ability to turn it off completely in the options menu.

I see, I was a little late. Maybe there will be a second thread?


It comes to opposites, again. You are hurting my player skill with additional elements. With good reason. Assisting my skill isn't too far. Obviously this is for RPG gaming purposes. We are playing a character. It is not only a simulation. It is a simulation of combining character and player skills. It is already like that. We are trying to improve it.



I want those things. But you're being one dimensional here. You are making a system for everyone while only thinking yourself. I offered a way to hold elevation left for player, draw amounts for character. Or draw amounts for character and elevation for player. If you think those other things will be assigned to character, then you can accept that those can override randomness. Is it really a far away notion?

My question still remains. Elevation and range estimation can't be all about archery. What parts do you want to leave to character?

I used my two cents already. Please join me in brainstorming, I feel myself alone here. Since you are only thinking manual aim, auto-aim is already outside. You have to accept the notion first to critique it.


I think it can be added to menu. I am just against a hardcoe mode. It is too much cluttering. And perks are a really good way to integrate it without resorting to hardcoe mode or gameplay options.

Failure is the absence of success. Your point about failure vs success still seems pretty vague. If you're worried about balance, we can up the damage inflicted, quite considerably.



It's a difficult notion to reply to, because I don't fully understand what you're saying. Saying that you're leaving elevation for player and draw amounts for character is just an euphemism for auto-aim. The aiming point will still be at the centre of what you want to hit - so there is no need for range estimation and superelevation. And I absolutely do not see how they can "override randomness", the random deviation is caused by errors unrelated to aiming and superelevation.



Well, I've answered this plenty of times in my previous posts. The aiming reticule is already grossly simplified, as it eliminates the need to align sights, it eliminates parallax errors, etc. So that's left to the characters skill. Deviation caused by errors in release is still left to character, and THIS is what's causing the dispersion circles to change size. The only thing left to the player is pointing the weapon in the right direction and estimating super-elevation and lead.

To sum it up (a bit simplified): The player determines what point in space the character should attempt to hit by pointing the weapon, the character skill determines how succesful he is in hitting it by reducing dispersion. It seems like a good compromise.



I've read both your and previous posters statements on auto-aim. I have thought about it, and it seems like a poor idea because it eliminates an important part of archery. I do not have to "accept it" in order to criticize it.



Oblivion doesn't have auto-aim, and that can hardly be called hardcoe. And leaving it as a mastery perk means it will only be usable to those characters who have devoted themselves to the skill in the first place - probably the ones least interested in it.

That's quite unrealistic for me. I am starting to think damage sponges and pincushions. There is a base success. You can decrease it with additional elements or increase it.


If unrelated to aiming things determine the hit, then yes. They can override the randomness.


This seems to be the same thing I am talking about with different wording. I will re-read your previous posts.


You don't have to but you can try. I think things I offered are giving both parties what they want. Each party can only criticize what they use. Unless they want to use both. Using empathy, putting yourself in others shoes helps to understand other people's views. And will extend the scope of your ideas to embrace more people. I tried hard to combine both in one system.


Am I understanding you correctly? Are you saying only the players interested in traditional FPS aiming will play archer characters? That's not correct at all in RPG games. And who are we to shut those supposedly few people?

Haha. I feel like a veteran RPG player now.

i like the idea of hold for a period to better make a shot and the time it takes shortens as you progress and also holding for too long causes you too start to weaken thus loosing accuracy after a bit also,... but that is as real as it should be any more real would be near impossible as a screen just couldnt do it right vision wise unless they switch this to a archery only game and that I would never buy

Allright, I'm on the verge of giving up on understanding the point you are trying to make about failure vs success. Having a high marksman-skill will cause your character to hit where you want more often. Hitting means success. Therefore, having a high marksman skill means more success, having a low skill means more failure. This is realistic because this is how it works in real life. A poorly trained gunner misses more often than a skilled one. I can't see what the problem is here.



You have to use other words than "override the randomness". It doesn't make any sense, to me at least. The randomness will ALWAYS be there, but it will be within progressively smaller circles as your character improves his skill. The size of the circle is the ONLY thing that affects the "randomness", arrows will strike within the circle, completely at random. There is nothing to "override" it - that would eliminate the point of the skill.



No. I am saying that the players that are the most dedicated to archery and marksmanship are the most likely players to actively use the marksmanship skill in the game, and thus the most likely group to reach high enough skill level to unlock "auto-aim" perks.

The players that are the most dedicated to archery and marksmanship are also the ones that are the most likely to want archery in TES to be realistic and challenging.

Therefore, it is probable that the amount of players who would welcome auto-aim would be smaller in this group of players than in the group of players who are less interested in archery.

That means that auto-aim as a perk would enable it to the group that found it the least desirable, relatively speaking.