Guerrilla tactics are something we don't want to lose in MUME. But maybe hit-flee has become too prevalent a tactic across all the classes when (as Elec says) this kind of tactic should be more of a scout tactic. The problem is that without the hit-flee tactic, there is currently very little tactics to playing a warrior (which is why I rarely do it). It's basically hit and bash as fast as possible (because the other warrior delayed skills like charge and kick are ineffective), so it's just a question of spamming bash and sometimes hit. (Or if you have a consistent link, you may be able to predict the timing of your bash correctly with practice.)Wobbler wrote:99% of all flees are nothing that would even remotely resemble a flight in panic in a real-life situation, but an attempt at either a tactical retreat by a group to reform the line (which the game forces players to do in another room instead of 50 metres back in the same room) or a manouvering by a solo player to make sure he does not have one opponent right in front of him and another right behind him. Think of a fighter moving about in a ring - he may step backwards many times without fleeing in panic.
You can also think of it as guerrilla tactics, where you try to hit a stronger enemy, quickly retreat along a pre-planned route and possibly try to ambush eventual followers before regrouping for the next quick attack, again followed by a pre-planned retreat. If things go as planned, you don't get more and more panicky with every iteration.
Given these facts, I'm not for penalties that are very likely to result from fleeing ('very' being the operative word here). (Like the old "You cannot attack and flee!" system, which was there 100% of the time.) However, we could, and perhaps should, increase the flee penalties somewhat.
I note that it (the flee penalty) has already been increased for scouts with the addition of the nosneak effect. But I can not see any reason why fleeing should incur any more penalty for scouts than for the other classes. In fact, given that scouts are the best fit for guerilla tactics, you could argue the opposite. Of course, now they have escape in a usable(?) form, so I won't bother with that argument, since, as Elec says, they should be using escape for this tactic.
I propose that the PANIC effect affects all aggressive actions, and all actions requiring any concentration (any spell, track, bandage, etc.). Let's split the effect into two first before I describe how each might occur.
Affected by:
- mild panic
Or
Affected by:
- severe panic
Mild panic would be like the current effects of panic: maybe a loss in effective level for everything except HPs, Mana and Moves, or a loss in effective skill percentage for things that are not affected by level. So, including OB, but also everything else that is level dependent (spells, backstab, etc.). It should be greater than the current loss. (Perhaps equivalent to losing two levels (or 20 legend levels) for things affected by level or say 10% skill level for things not affected by level?) The duration of this would be about 30 seconds.
Severe panic would mean that any aggressive action or action requiring concentration would not be allowed. So no hitting, bashing, backstabbing, casting, tracking, bandaging, etc. Sneaking and riding are more borderline. I reckon you could probably do both while severely panicked and they are neither aggressive nor requiring concentration of the delayed variety, nor requiring steady hands, nor contrary to expectations having just fled, but do require skill. So maybe someone's skill level for these two should be halved. (Haha! Lots of chance of ZBLAMs! This seems reasonable.) Or maybe level / skill level for everything should be halved, but everything allowed. The duration of this would only be a few seconds.
Severe panic should occur when you already have mild panic and one of the reasons in point 2 above reoccurs.A few changes (in italics) to what I already (in another [url=http://mume.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=653&p=3019#p3020]thread[/url]) wrote: 1. Panic-effect should not be automatic when fleeing a fight, even if you had a failed flee. The reason for this is that fleeing is the usual way to leave a fight quickly (for any of a multitude of reasons, including just not feeling like a fight right now (in this location)). Failing a flee is also normal and not worthy of panic. Given this...
2. Mild panic-effect should be acquired under any of the following situations and only these:
(i) failing a flee three times in a row (can easily happen in a closable, especially if all the exits are closed!) So people will need to be quick with the flee off button!
(ii) if a critical hit (i.e. wound) causes your HPs to fall below your autowimpy and you don't switch flee off before this causes you to flee out of the room.
(iii) if you are below your autowimpy AND fail (one or) two flees in a row.
N.B. Failing a flee while bashed or held should not count as one of these failed flees (as you are stunned or frozen and therefore not able to panic). Eating a bash will probably put you below your autowimpy anyway, so your chance of getting panic goes up.
(iv) other involuntary causes of fleeing such as failing to save the fear spell. Actually failing to save vs fear spell should result in immediate severe panic effect.
3. There could be a small random component in (iii). And/or a component based on your will power (wil) and/or the percentage of your autowimpy level your current hitpoints are and/or the amount of damage taken in the last two rounds.
If autowimpy is set to the max due to link-loss failed flees should not cause panic.
Likely effects:
1. Fleeing becomes slightly less attractive than now for all classes.
2. Players new to pking on MUME aren't left wondering how illogical everyone's fighting style is. (To such an extent: it's really only warrior vs warrior hit-fleeing that is illogical.)
There could also be a new 'bravery' cleric spell. It would remove panic and make the beneficiary immume to panic and possibly the fear spell for about two minutes (i.e. not long). Of course, due to panic, it should be difficult to cast on oneself after being paniced!
Discuss. There may be better ways of determining when panic effects are acquired. I went for the ones that seemed most realistic. I don't think the level or number of opponents are very good ones though, since it is not the act of fleeing that causes PANIC, but the continuous failure of fleeing attempts or talking lots of damage while failing to flee.