Neftan's "Horse Brain and Mounted Combat" Suggestion

[Neftan]

Mounted Players should NOT be a double layered tank, hitting for high damage.

They should be a foot warrior, moving faster and being higher up. Their advantage is flat terrain speed, and being able to charge to knock people over, and easy access to their enemies heads.

I also feel as though dismounting as a mechanic should be changed. If the horse sustains a good blow, it should panic and make the rider unable to control it as well, or at all. If the rider IS ever dismounted, I feel like it should be a much faster, fluid animation, not a near death sentence, more a transition. The downside of being dismounted should be drawn away from dying, and more about losing the horse. When dismounted in combat, the horse should panic and bolt, and not respond to calls for a few minutes.

So...

I believe Horse Brains should make a return to MO2.

Horses should not be mighty tanks that help render mounted players near unkillable - they should be there for mobility.

• Horses should react to their environment while being ridden
  • All mounts should
  • -
• When a mount takes more than a small threshold of damage in combat, it should act erratically and become hard to control for a moment
  • If the damage is high, you should lose control
  • The severity of this effect would be controlled by:
    • The Players Riding Skill, Balance Skill, and the Players Lore skill for the mount, and,
    • The Mounts Intelligence, Willpower and Endurance
  • -
• If a player is dismounted, I believe there should be a total change in animation from MO1
  • In MO1 there was a long animation to stand back up, often leading to death of the player
    • Due to META builds often being wheelchairs (NEEDING the horse to do anything) this meant death even if they didnt actually die during the animation
    • -
  • I think the animation should be streamlined unless the wearer is in very heavy armor
    • The player should not be stuck in a standing animation but rather stand nearly instantly to be able to return to combat
    • -
  • To counter this, upon dismount, the horse would panic and flee in a random direction, and not respond to commands
    • The horse has a change to knockdown any players that are in the way
    • -
  • This would make it so the mounted player would be able to defend themselves, but not remount, levelling the playing field

 

[ThaBadMan]

Exactly how it should.

MO also had horses fleeing at one point between the original horses, the second and third parts we saw in MO.
Ofc mounteds cried their way to have it go away due to not wanting to get killed every dismount and could not remount. I however think its fitting and severly makes retard builds punished as it should. That was also coupled with the fact that they where almost immobile due to focusing all attribute and skills toward being as best as possible and disregard movement on foot while having insane weight armor for best protection while using a heavy as shit weapon that was horrible on foot and super easy to parry.
Every death was costly because of armor, weapon and mount was all highest tier end game.

As it was in old MO was almost like the suggestion where you was a footsoldier with normal weapon and mount pre breeding where all same type mount was the same stat wise.
Bullhorses tanky and slow, mongrel peasant tier, Steppe a average one, desert quick but weak and low HP and a special 2 at same time at different spawns at once in wilderness which was jack of all trades so less tanky than bull, almost as fast as desert and less strong than bull horse so could carry between bull and steppe.
Health was between 3 good hits on desert to around 8 hits on bull.
Molva was super strong, insane slow with a short yet quick sprint and probably somewhere between 12 and 15 hits to kill. And you where very high up so needed long handle weapon against anyone not mounted on horse/molva. Was also harder to hit rider with shorter weapons.

 

[Solairerection]

I agree with the above.

I would like to add about fleeing part: Could add to breeding that bred horses are less likely to run away, or will obey commands fully (aslong as they have loyalty, ofcourse). Maybe the option to bond with your pet to make it less likely to run away could be added aswell, something that can be trained over time with your pet, but added full effect instantly via breeding.

 

[Neftan]

I agree with the above.

I would like to add about fleeing part: Could add to breeding that bred horses are less likely to run away, or will obey commands fully (aslong as they have loyalty, ofcourse). Maybe the option to bond with your pet to make it less likely to run away could be added aswell, something that can be trained over time with your pet, but added full effect instantly via breeding.

See my thread on AI: https://mortalonline2.com/forums/threads/neftans-ai-npc-interaction-and-npc-roaming-suggestions.22/ , where i have already suggested a bond mechanic for all pets.

However in this case, I feel bred and wild horses should not differ. Perhaps if a bond is present or not yes - as based on my other thread, but there shouldnt be a large promotion of bred over wild horses.

 

[Amadman]

I agree with everything except the knockdowns. If they do have it I hope they do it like you suggest with dismounts. I don't have any love for the freezing of my character. Chained knockdowns with no opportunity to react was awful. Damage and camera disorientation with a quick animation should be enough for both.

i especially agree with the part about a horse reacting to damage. A rider should always be wanting to avoid getting their mount injured. Not using them like they are extra hitpoints.

 

[ThaBadMan]

I agree with everything except the knockdowns. If they do have it I hope they do it like you suggest with dismounts. I don't have any love for the freezing of my character. Chained knockdowns with no opportunity to react was awful. Damage and camera disorientation with a quick animation should be enough for both.

i especially agree with the part about a horse reacting to damage. A rider should always be wanting to avoid getting their mount injured. Not using them like they are extra hitpoints.

/Agree.
Knockdowns and sprint breaks was some of the worst additions to MO, everything that hinders movement in games like MO is bad imo.

 

[Rhodri_Taliesin]

I will start by saying I didn't read the whole suggestion: The part I will comment on is that idea that "horse brains" should in any form make a return. They should not, and anyone who actually dealt with "horse brain" in the game can tell you it was a cancer. Between delayed actions to command inputs, as well as borderline retarded moments where the horse becomes unresponsive and drives the rider off of a cliff and to their death, or into water and to their death, and so on and so forth were the motivations for removing it.

Unless you are saying that your goal is to try and make horses so onerous, unreliable, and punitive as to satisfy some deep seated hatred for the playstyle counter to your own, I'd find that any suggestion to implementation of "horse brain" is argued from ignorance to the reality at best, or from malicious and intellectually dishonest arguments at worst.

 

[Neftan]

I will start by saying I didn't read the whole suggestion: The part I will comment on is that idea that "horse brains" should in any form make a return. They should not, and anyone who actually dealt with "horse brain" in the game can tell you it was a cancer. Between delayed actions to command inputs, as well as borderline retarded moments where the horse becomes unresponsive and drives the rider off of a cliff and to their death, or into water and to their death, and so on and so forth were the motivations for removing it.

Unless you are saying that your goal is to try and make horses so onerous, unreliable, and punitive as to satisfy some deep seated hatred for the playstyle counter to your own, I'd find that any suggestion to implementation of "horse brain" is argued from ignorance to the reality at best, or from malicious and intellectually dishonest arguments at worst.

Your reply is soaked in jaded bias, Rhodri. Of course I do not want such broken instances to happen. This suggestion is based on the prospect that the new engine and larger team will be able to handle such tasks competently.

 

[Rhodri_Taliesin]

Your reply is soaked in jaded bias, Rhodri. Of course I do not want such broken instances to happen. This suggestion is based on the prospect that the new engine and larger team will be able to handle such tasks competently.

Call it healthy skepticism laced with some cynicism; SV's track record is anything but shining and I'd imagine that any attempts to fumble through such a utopic vision would be pockmarked with pitfalls and fumbles so onerous and infuriating as to defeat the purpose of mounted combatants.

The fair and simple truth is that *most* people who complained about mounted players, did so because they got stomped by them in open terrain, and refused to do simple things to minimize the efficacy of cavalry. Such things like holding tight formation and group cohesion with their mates, carrying shortbows or longbows and arrows to grant options to strike at cavalry from a distance, usage of terrain, foliage, rocks, and buildings to minimize the options of cavalry, kitting with heavier "dismount/knockdown" weapons, having mages to cast Earth Quake (this last one groups started doing around the time I called it quits).

There were always options, the problems that I observed were people ran around in loosely spaced groups in the middle of the Meduli Plains or Central Steppe and then had a surprised pikachu face when cav seized opportunities and hit them hard.


From my own personal experience I was a heavy footsoldier/ melee cavalry build hybrid, not one of these "Wheelchair" builds. I did not play into the "min/max" game, and yet there is disappointment and frustration in knowing that you cannot utilize their cavalry effectively because your enemy has mages who "may" have an EQ charged, but you can't tell because there's no visual or audio indicator that they indeed have a spell charged. That delay in action of course means your foot guys don't have you to back them up and cause damage when and where you need to.


Am I biased in favor of mounts? Sure, it was my preferred playstyle, and I'll own that. Does that take away from my arguments though? Am I making points that are patently false or logically and rationally unsound?

 

[Neftan]

Call it healthy skepticism laced with some cynicism; SV's track record is anything but shining and I'd imagine that any attempts to fumble through such a utopic vision would be pockmarked with pitfalls and fumbles so onerous and infuriating as to defeat the purpose of mounted combatants.

The fair and simple truth is that *most* people who complained about mounted players, did so because they got stomped by them in open terrain, and refused to do simple things to minimize the efficacy of cavalry. Such things like holding tight formation and group cohesion with their mates, carrying shortbows or longbows and arrows to grant options to strike at cavalry from a distance, usage of terrain, foliage, rocks, and buildings to minimize the options of cavalry, kitting with heavier "dismount/knockdown" weapons, having mages to cast Earth Quake (this last one groups started doing around the time I called it quits).

There were always options, the problems that I observed were people ran around in loosely spaced groups in the middle of the Meduli Plains or Central Steppe and then had a surprised pikachu face when cav seized opportunities and hit them hard.


From my own personal experience I was a heavy footsoldier/ melee cavalry build hybrid, not one of these "Wheelchair" builds. I did not play into the "min/max" game, and yet there is disappointment and frustration in knowing that you cannot utilize their cavalry effectively because your enemy has mages who "may" have an EQ charged, but you can't tell because there's no visual or audio indicator that they indeed have a spell charged. That delay in action of course means your foot guys don't have you to back them up and cause damage when and where you need to.


Am I biased in favor of mounts? Sure, it was my preferred playstyle, and I'll own that. Does that take away from my arguments though? Am I making points that are patently false or logically and rationally unsound?

I know your backstory. I have been around. I have fought you, and also been saved by you. I am not asking for your story. Nor am I asking for skepticism toward SV in my threads. I am trying to look at this positively, and shake off the doubt. Please do not jam it back into the foreground for me by hitting my threads with it.

As for beneficial feedback, I don't really see any. Yes, of course, no one really grouped effeciently so you said, that one has it's pull, but it doesnt change what end game MC play was like.

My suggestion was not even to implement the same horsebrain as was in MO1, what I suggested is outlined clearly, and you didnt bother to read or reply to it directly.

 

[ThaBadMan]

The fair and simple truth is that *most* people who complained about mounted players, did so because they got stomped by them in open terrain, and refused to do simple things to minimize the efficacy of cavalry. Such things like holding tight formation and group cohesion with their mates, carrying shortbows or longbows and arrows to grant options to strike at cavalry from a distance, usage of terrain, foliage, rocks, and buildings to minimize the options of cavalry, kitting with heavier "dismount/knockdown" weapons, having mages to cast Earth Quake (this last one groups started doing around the time I called it quits).

There were always options, the problems that I observed were people ran around in loosely spaced groups in the middle of the Meduli Plains or Central Steppe and then had a surprised pikachu face when cav seized opportunities and hit them hard.

Not everyone was that who wanted mounts back to its original place as a movement utility rather than that as well as a moving fortress that took away any form of retard action made by the mounted and give away any punishment for errors.

Most of us was furious by the fact that mounteds could run into a group of 10 foot fighters and get hit several times by all 10 and continue to run away like it did not happen only to chug potion and come back a minute later.

Original mounts had to think tactically and use a brain in combat or else your mount was killed as soon as you came to a stop inside a foot group. Thats how it should be, as a mounted you should find opportunities to dmg people on a groups flank rather than tank into a group hitting a few times then move out to rinse repeat a retarded action.

If you move into a group and said group halts your horse, your horse SHOULD die in seconds o punish such retard behaviour.

Now that was most players issue with mounts in MO, that and the fact they could climb terrain better than players on foot.

 

[Amadman]

Not everyone was that who wanted mounts back to its original place as a movement utility rather than that as well as a moving fortress that took away any form of retard action made by the mounted and give away any punishment for errors.

Most of us was furious by the fact that mounteds could run into a group of 10 foot fighters and get hit several times by all 10 and continue to run away like it did not happen only to chug potion and come back a minute later.

Original mounts had to think tactically and use a brain in combat or else your mount was killed as soon as you came to a stop inside a foot group. Thats how it should be, as a mounted you should find opportunities to dmg people on a groups flank rather than tank into a group hitting a few times then move out to rinse repeat a retarded action.

If you move into a group and said group halts your horse, your horse SHOULD die in seconds o punish such retard behaviour.

Now that was most players issue with mounts in MO, that and the fact they could climb terrain better than players on foot.

100% this.

Lets all hope that SV sees it like this now as well.

 

[Rhodri_Taliesin]

If you move into a group and said group halts your horse, your horse SHOULD die in seconds o punish such retard behaviour.

Now that was most players issue with mounts in MO, that and the fact they could climb terrain better than players on foot.

See you keep quoting this, and I never actually saw cavalry players do what you claim they did. Only idiots on horseback charged into a tight formation of 10+ individuals. Now unless you're misleading me with the narrative and obscuring a fact like a "group of 10+ footies who were actually spaced out had mounted players rip down the middle of their loose packed formation" then that might be more realistic, and still super reckless if that footgroup had a mage with a charged EQ.

The only mount that climbed better than players on foot were First Gen Lykiators, which SV nerfed into the ground, along with their jumping abilities and speed. Really anything that made Lykiators distinct rather than "Horse but in lizard skin" was nerfed.

Also aimlessly whiffing and swinging at a guy on horseback should not be immediate death, horses are hardy animals, and if you wanted to kill them properly, it usually required piercing their sternums and hearts or lungs, they are heavy animals that knocked people aside when charging after all.

Most of us was furious by the fact that mounteds could run into a group of 10 foot fighters and get hit several times by all 10 and continue to run away like it did not happen only to chug potion and come back a minute later.

Original mounts had to think tactically and use a brain in combat or else your mount was killed as soon as you came to a stop inside a foot group. Thats how it should be, as a mounted you should find opportunities to dmg people on a groups flank rather than tank into a group hitting a few times then move out to rinse repeat a retarded action.

But this kind of stuff, I never actually saw anyone doing. I saw more of the attacking on flanks and whatnot, which more often than not got countered or disrupted with EQ's since mages with EQ are pretty standard in any group.

Edit: In the interest of being intellectually honest in discussion, I will admit that my experience with MO ended around 2016 or early 2017. I haven't played the game since then as I've been getting my life in order.

 

[ThaBadMan]

See you keep quoting this, and I never actually saw cavalry players do what you claim they did. Only idiots on horseback charged into a tight formation of 10+ individuals. Now unless you're misleading me with the narrative and obscuring a fact like a "group of 10+ footies who were actually spaced out had mounted players rip down the middle of their loose packed formation" then that might be more realistic, and still super reckless if that footgroup had a mage with a charged EQ.

The only mount that climbed better than players on foot were First Gen Lykiators, which SV nerfed into the ground, along with their jumping abilities and speed. Really anything that made Lykiators distinct rather than "Horse but in lizard skin" was nerfed.

Also aimlessly whiffing and swinging at a guy on horseback should not be immediate death, horses are hardy animals, and if you wanted to kill them properly, it usually required piercing their sternums and hearts or lungs, they are heavy animals that knocked people aside when charging after all.


But this kind of stuff, I never actually saw anyone doing. I saw more of the attacking on flanks and whatnot, which more often than not got countered or disrupted with EQ's since mages with EQ are pretty standard in any group.

Edit: In the interest of being intellectually honest in discussion, I will admit that my experience with MO ended around 2016 or early 2017. I haven't played the game since then as I've been getting my life in order.

Thats from 2015, covers everything except group of 10 but that was what happened in the end there, a mounted would dive groups and kill mages in the middle in 2-4 hits depending on weapon used. Did you quit by then or you should know this ? Look that horse climb that mountain with ease better than the player running away from him. LoL

 

[Rhodri_Taliesin]

Thats from 2015, covers everything except group of 10 but that was what happened in the end there, a mounted would dive groups and kill mages in the middle in 2-4 hits depending on weapon used. Did you quit by then or you should know this ? Look that horse climb that mountain with ease better than the player running away from him. LoL

So what I saw in that video, now that I have had a minute to look at it was this. Your mage did not use EQ to go for the knockdown. Your infantry were loosely spaced, providing plenty of room for him to maneuver. The perspective of the cameraman was that of a pole-troll (big shocker there ), with most of his allies carrying the same.

That group also did not have weapons drawn, and they were not focused on hitting the horseman. No bows, no real concerted effort to deal with the horseman at all.

However I will concede on the point that this particularly piece of terrain, which if I'm not mistaken is near Bak'ti, has weird rules around it for navigation that were not at all consistent with its texturing.

That said, if that video is from 2015 and I stopped playing around 2016 or 2017 then you and I should both be aware that they nerfed terrain negotiation on all mounts, not just horses, but lykiators and Molvas as well. You know what, the safest place for that particulary guy would have been either right next to his friends, or in that construction project or that tower down below in the valley, or up against a tree trunk. Hindsight is 20/20 though.

 

[Speznat]

+1
Smarter AI would be Awesome. in any way lets hope SV make everything better this time around.
Henrik and the Others have now a decade of Epxerience if They cant do that shit, than noone can.

 

[Rhodri_Taliesin]

+1
Smarter AI would be Awesome. in any way lets hope SV make everything better this time around.
Henrik and the Others have now a decade of Epxerience if They cant do that shit, than noone can.

You honestly think they can code a "smarter AI"? The same people who gave us the Risar and Sator Dungeons, etc? Who gave us "Death Knights" and "Tupilaks" ?

That's an awful lot of faith I'm not willing to give.

 

[Neftan]

You honestly think they can code a "smarter AI"? The same people who gave us the Risar and Sator Dungeons, etc? Who gave us "Death Knights" and "Tupilaks" ?

That's an awful lot of faith I'm not willing to give.

Why the fuck are you here then? Just fuck off if you don't have faith in a better game. That is what thew rest of us ARE here for. Your bitching and complaining and putting down of SV shape you as nothing more than an annoying, jaded cretin. Your posts are a massive waste of time and also just flat out depressing.

 

[Rhodri_Taliesin]

Why the fuck are you here then? Just fuck off if you don't have faith in a better game. That is what thew rest of us ARE here for. Your bitching and complaining and putting down of SV shape you as nothing more than an annoying, jaded cretin. Your posts are a massive waste of time and also just flat out depressing.

I'm being realistic. I think MO-I suffered mostly from technical and social issues and the Unreal 4 can resolve a great many of those technical issues, it's up to SV to have learned properly from development mistakes. I am jaded and cynical, being a blind optimist will lead to much greater tragedy than being pessimistic to be pleasantly surprised.