Addressing Melee

[Elixiar]

One of the longest standing issues I feel this game still has is that a melee pawn stands 0 chance during a base rush. The fact multiple pawns can occupy a single tile to attack is probably the biggest issue about this. Is there any plans to make melee colonists viable? I groan every time I get a brawler, and a brawler should be an asset as someone who can freeze a chokepoint... not a hinderance.

It's been an issue since release more or less but 3 years on I'm hoping for some sort of major change now...

[Trylobyte]

There are a few problems with melee, I think.

1)  They can't avoid taking damage.  Being in a melee means they're likely to be hit, since even 20 melee skill only gives a 50% dodge chance and armor doesn't block everything.  And that's just in a melee with another melee user.  Even masterwork shields will only block the first volley of fire (if that) of a medium-sized raid and raiders don't care about shooting into a melee and killing their mate to kill your colonist.

2)  The larger the raid gets the more outnumbered you are.  Even a level 20 brawler with legendary power armor, legendary shield belt, and legendary plasteel longsword can get downed when he has to fight waves of tribals with spears while also being shot at.

3)  They can't disengage.  Once a melee fighter gets into a brawl they're stuck there until they run out of enemies because of the movement speed penalty inflicted by being attacked.  Not even being hit, just being attacked.  Ranged people can break off before melee get to them, but once you're in melee you're in trouble.

4)  Friendly fire.  You can position your ranged characters so they don't run the risk of shooting each other, but not so with melee guys - They will, due to scatter, always have a chance of getting shot by their allies if the allies decide to shoot at whoever they're fighting.  Given there's no way to tell them who to target or who not to shoot...

5)  Grenades.  Any decent ranged character can avoid them by outranging them.  Any melee character will have to face-tank them.

6)  Targeting.  This is mainly a problem when trying to use melee offensively.  Put simply, a ranged pawn will shoot at any pawn in their range.  Melee pawns need to chase their targets, something drafted pawns will not do unless specifically told to.  This essentially demotes them to roadblocks, since managing them in combat requires a great deal of micro as you constantly have to give them new targets.  Frustratingly, the better they are the more this becomes a hassle since they will kill their target in a few swings then stand there doing nothing until assigned a new target.  While I can always set them to aggressive then undraft them I prefer to avoid losing that control since they're just as prone to wander off as they are to fight.  I'd love the option to 'release' them like I release hunting animals, to let them run around and hunt enemies down on their own once all the priority targets are dead.

Even with mods that make the game a lot more melee-friendly - We're talking 90-damage weapons with a half-second swing time on pawns with 700% move speed - I find myself always going back to ranged weapons.  Late-game raids turning into zerg rushes are always what kills my enthusiasm for melee - 10 maxed-out melee colonists can't do what 10 middling ranged colonists with decent weapons can do a lot quicker and safer.

[erdrik]

I thought the "all standing on one tile" thing was already addressed?
Near as I can tell they only do it while moving long distances now...

Things I would like to see in/for melee:

1.

• 
  Pawns standing behind a target have a greatly reduced chance of getting hit by ranged attacks that miss the target:
  E = Enemy
  T = Enemy Target
  S = Colonist Shooter
  (E-T--------S) = E is covered by T and so will benefit from reduced chance to get hit by missed shots from S
  (T-E--------S) = E is not covered by T and so will have the normal chance to get hit by missed shots from S
  
  Why do I want this? Because then you can position your brawlers behind incoming enemies and they will be relatively safe from friendly fire. It even comes with a counter balance in that it also protects the back lines of the enemy raiders from your ranged fire(which should make sneaking behind the enemy with brawlers more useful).
  
2.

• 
  Armor should have a Minimum Damage Threshold. Any damage dealt that does not exceed the armor's Minimum Damage Threshold is 100% negated and does not harm the wearer(but still damages the armor).
  
3.

• 
  EDIT: Nvm. It seems this one was already fixed in A17.
  Damage that armor takes should be reduced by what the resulting damage dealt to the pawn would be. Currently shoddy armor with lower reduction values last longer than legendary armor because armor just takes what it isn't dealt to the pawn. 10 damage at 10% reduction means shoddy armor only takes 1 damage, but a Legendary armor that reduces at 100% takes 10 damage and degrades faster.
  It is:
  10 incoming damage -> Reduced by 40% = 6 damage to the pawn and 4 damage the armor
  10 incoming damage -> Reduced by 90% = 1 damage to the pawn and 9 damage the armor
  It should be:
  10 incoming damage -> Reduced by 40% = 6 damage to the pawn and 6 damage the armor
  10 incoming damage -> Reduced by 90% = 1 damage to the pawn and 1 damage the armor
  
4.

• Multi Targeting. Brawlers in melee are currently too focused on one target when they are surrounded. They should focus their attention on the most immediate threat(Enemies who's attack swing is not currently on cooldown), and should get a dodge bonus against which ever enemy they are currently focused on.

[jamaicancastle]

3.
Damage that armor takes should be reduced by what the resulting damage dealt to the pawn would be. Currently shoddy armor with lower reduction values last longer than legendary armor because armor just takes what it isn't dealt to the pawn. 10 damage at 10% reduction means shoddy armor only takes 1 damage, but a Legendary armor that reduces at 100% takes 10 damage and degrades faster.

I'm 99% sure this was meant to be addressed in A17 - was it not?

[erdrik]

...
I'm 99% sure this was meant to be addressed in A17 - was it not?

Oh. Was it? I guess I missed that. I wonder how it was addressed...

EDIT:
Ah. Yup. I must have missed that when I read the update list before.

Armor now takes a constant fraction of incoming damage instead of absorbing all prevented damage. This solves an issue where good quality armor would be destroyed sooner.

[Ser Kitteh]

You know what'd be great? Shields, as in one you hold in your hand. Melee sucks because guns are better, and no amount of Adam Jensen-ing and Power Armor-ing your Colonist will fix the core issues which has been explained quite nicely by posters above.

[Britnoth]

Melee combat while using a personal shield.... err... shield belt is still very strong in certain circumstances.

But that shows just how strong the shield belt is. Considering it is entirely possible to mow people down with a minigun while using said shield belt and that finding a really good melee weapon is a lot harder than finding usable gun... that isn't really helpful for brawlers.

The change to allow guns to be fired while being attacked in melee essentially removed the main benefit of melee combat. IF the AI had been changed to reflect the game mechanic change this would be even more obvious. 

[Canute]

Maybe try out the Star Wars lightsaber+force mods.
Lightsaber area bit overpowred compared to vanilia, but your mellee fighter geting new ability to deflect incoming bullets and with force skills they can like a jedi reflect them.
Surly a great improvment for mellee fighter.

[Bozobub]

[offtopic]Interestingly enough, slug-throwing weapons are actually the bane of Jedi in the Star Wars universe.
- They have a much faster rate of fire than blasters; Jedi are badass, sure, but still have limits.
- Blaster projectiles are slow, unlike bullets.  You can SEE blaster shots move.
- Bullets are harder to see than slow, glowing blaster shots..
- Unlike blaster shots, bullets vaporize when they hit the saber's "blade"; they can't be deflected to other targets.[/offtpic]

This Google search on the subject is pretty amusing reading.  Another good one is the "Ewok Apocalypse" .  Man, the Rebels are assholes![/offtopic]

[Canute]

Thats hollywood show, blasters are energy based do you realy think they are slower then laserbeams ? :-)
And btw. didn't train jedi with mask to sense incoming fire with the force. But i would agree, a jedi wouldn't be able to deflect any single bullet from a minigun ! :-) As Jedi i just would turn the pawn so he shoot at his own people ! :-)

No i don't want now start a star wars debat, i don't realy care about it. I just want point at these mods that made brawler/mellee very dangerous to even mechanoids. To bad a A16 mod about mellee didn't got updated yet.

[RawCode]

problem is numbers, instead of facing harder and harder enemies, default game throws more gun folder, eliminating any strategy or tactics, only raw gunpower matters in such conditions.

[Trylobyte]

[offtopic]Interestingly enough, slug-throwing weapons are actually the bane of Jedi in the Star Wars universe.
- They have a much faster rate of fire than blasters; Jedi are badass, sure, but still have limits.
- Blaster projectiles are slow, unlike bullets.  You can SEE blaster shots move.
- Bullets are harder to see than slow, glowing blaster shots..
- Unlike blaster shots, bullets vaporize when they hit the saber's "blade"; they can't be deflected to other targets.[/offtpic]

This Google search on the subject is pretty amusing reading.  Another good one is the "Ewok Apocalypse" .  Man, the Rebels are assholes![/offtopic]

Off-topic:  Even if a Jedi could reliably block or deflect bullets, the ultimate counters to a Jedi with a lightsaber would be shotguns (multiple simultaneous projectiles, you can't block all of them) and flamethrowers (a lightsaber will actually make this worse due to providing an extra ignition source).  Inaccurate but fast-firing weapons would also be dangerous.

On-topic:  Melee still falls over even with a lot of buffs because of the inherent weaknesses of close combat and combined arms.  I have a suite of mods installed in my current game that should make melee incredible.  Better shield belts, melee weapons that do incredible damage at insane speeds, even better armor, higher move speed to close combat distances better, you name it, it's all there.  All without any significant buffs to ranged combat, or at least nothing that comes close to the bonuses melee gets.  And you know what?  I still find myself going ranged.  It's due to the multitude of problems I listed above, and you know what, I'm even going to add a new one.  I'll post it here and there.

6)  Targeting.  This is mainly a problem when trying to use melee offensively.  Put simply, a ranged pawn will shoot at any pawn in their range.  Melee pawns need to chase their targets, something drafted pawns will not do unless specifically told to.  This essentially demotes them to roadblocks, since managing them in combat requires a great deal of micro as you constantly have to give them new targets.  Frustratingly, the better they are the more this becomes a hassle since they will kill their target in a few swings then stand there doing nothing until assigned a new target.  While I can always set them to aggressive then undraft them I prefer to avoid losing that control since they're just as prone to wander off as they are to fight.  I'd love the option to 'release' them like I release hunting animals, to let them run around and hunt enemies down on their own once all the priority targets are dead.

[erdrik]

...
6)  Targeting. ...  Melee pawns need to chase their targets, something drafted pawns will not do unless specifically told to.  ... they will kill their target in a few swings then stand there doing nothing until assigned a new target.  ...  I'd love the option to 'release' them like I release hunting animals, to let them run around and hunt enemies down on their own once all the priority targets are dead.

I envision an AoE targeting interface. Like a ranged colonist, if you right click with a drafted melee colonist it should register EVERY target within a radius around that enemy and then the melee colonist would run over at attack those targets. The Target Zone should only follow the primary target, and enemies that leave the Target Zone should be removed from the target list. Otherwise when the various enemies inevitably spread out of range of the Target Zone it could result in the melee colonist just running back and forth through the crossfire... If the Primary Target is downed or killed a new enemy already in the Target Zone should take over as Primary Target.

I think this would allow more control than just a "Release-like" mechanic.

[Elixiar]

You know what'd be great? Shields, as in one you hold in your hand. Melee sucks because guns are better, and no amount of Adam Jensen-ing and Power Armor-ing your Colonist will fix the core issues which has been explained quite nicely by posters above.

Agree with this. There needs to be a big change to the way melee combat works.

If a high level brawler get into range of gun users, they should be dead. Honestly melee should have a much much lower cooldown period between attacks since a person should be carved into slices before a pawn can aim and unload an M16 into said melee user.

[Trylobyte]

Agree with this. There needs to be a big change to the way melee combat works.

If a high level brawler get into range of gun users, they should be dead. Honestly melee should have a much much lower cooldown period between attacks since a person should be carved into slices before a pawn can aim and unload an M16 into said melee user.

This is already generally true.  A high-level brawler who gets in melee range of a ranged attacker -will- kill them.  The problem is that while they are killing them they will generally either get surrounded by enemy melee fighters, shot to death by their target's friends, or shot to death by their own allies trying to shoot the same guy or someone close to them.