Print

[Shangalar]

Hello Wastelanders!

This time we will check out the gameplay mechanics in more detail, including Zone Control and the combat system.

The Action Points System

As stated earlier, every character has a fixed maximum AP of 100 but two different AP regenerations. The first is the standard one but we felt that it updated too slowly, with too much time inbetween ticks so we introduced a second one. The first AP regen is fixed at 12,5AP per second. The second regen however is based on the player’s Agility and adds another 4-8AP per second.

This second AP regen, the one that is based on AG, is always active, even while running. It only stops for 1,5 seconds after shooting to match the animation time so you do not gain AP while firing a gun. It also is affected by certain debuffs like super stim effects or Doc/FA. On a related note, there are also certain weapons that can afflict an AP drain on the target.

The Combat System

There have been numerous changes to the general mechanics of the game, ranging from small fine tuning to complete overhauls of certain scripts. In the following section, some of the new changes are explained.

Reload Cost
Reload time has been introduced as an important property for each weapon. While most pistols have a very small reload cost of only 10-20 AP, certain Big Guns like the Minigun have AP costs of up to 250. In order to compensate for that, Miniguns have big magazine and there is a new weapon perk called Partial Reload where the reload cost corresponds to the amount of rounds that are reloaded. In contrast to most of the hardcoded AP costs, this reload cost does not require the player to wait with the reload until he has enough AP. Instead, weapons can be reloaded at any time, causing the player’s AP to become negative, making it impossible to move.

Other notable changes include:

• AP costs for shooting depend on the weapon type you’re carrying. Some weapons fire faster or slower even in the same category. Concretely, it will be up to you to try them all and find your favorite.
• A fixed AP cost of 50 for equipping and de-equipping weapons and armor. Picking up items doesn’t cost any AP.
• Reversed firemodes for burst-fire guns, meaning that after reloading, the gun’s firemode defaults to burst instead of single shot.
• Autoaim which is compatible with all burst modes, meaning that there is no need to remove the autoaim when switching to burst fire.
• Detailed combat messages, meaning that the player knows who he was hit by and how many bullets hit the target. Partial armor bypasses also display the percentage of armor bypassed.
• Flexible onehex-bursts, meaning that the number of bullets hitting in a 1-hex burst depend on a value set individually for each weapon. Only SMG’s have a true 100% 1hex. 66% for assault rifles, 33% for light machine guns and 20% for miniguns.

Critical Hits

Sniping and critical hits have seen a lot of changes. In short, the critical chance modifier for all bodyparts is the same now, using the 6*LK formula that only was used for the eyes in Fallout 2. The difference in hitchance still applies though. To compensate for the overall buffed critchance, the base damage of sniper rifles has been raised significantly while the maximum possible damage multiplier from a crit is 2 to make for more evenly distributed damage and less “instakill” lucky shots.

There are two new temporary critical effects, disoriented and winded. While the first one is a five second blindless, the latter is a temporary slow that forces you to walk. The crippling and CC’ing has been reworked in a way that almost all SPECIAL stats affects some kind of crit effect roll, making every stat important. In addition, every armor and weapon also affect certain crit rolls, e.g. a weapons weight affects weapon drop chance.

Zone Control

The structured PvP on AoP is a flexible system that can be matched for any scenario, utilizing a new score system, called “Fame”. Each character has his own Fame score which is a highscore raised by killing and damaging enemies as well as healing allies.

The most basic ZC system is a 15minute timer that can be started by any faction. However, it does not really matter who starts the timer since with 8 faction on the server at some point in the future, every faction should be able to take part in a fight, not just the attacker and the defender.

Practically, the timer will just signify the start of a fight that every faction is able to join by entering the map with a team of players big enough to fulfill that zone’s requirements. While the timer is running, the Fame system is used to gather points for each faction and after the timer is over, the team with the highest number of points will own the zone. If a team is eliminated or forced to flee the zone, their points are reset to 0 so the last team standing should always be the winner. Only if two or more teams are still in the game will the winner be chosen by points.

Our goal is to create a structured PvP system that makes it possible for big factions to control the wasteland with sheer numbers but still allows small and skilled teams to technically win battles by points. In order to achieve this, small teams gain more points for killing and damage their enemies than more numerous teams.

Finally, the Fame score is also used to reward players for participating in ZC. While active participants can potentially gain a lot of XP, reputation and caps, possible leechers like alts created in the enemy faction that don’t have any score and are just there to scout or to loot, can be shot without any drop in Fame or reputation to minimize griefing.

Stay tuned for the next post which will reveal more information about the first two factions.