The eternal topic - MELEE and combat in general

[TrashMan]

How to make melee combat more attractive? How to balance combat better? Well, first we have to look at what makes melee combat undesirable:

1. Melee is risky. Closing distance is risky, fighting is risky due to injuries.
- proper shields and shield belts will make closing distance safer

- proper armor (add damage negation treshold to armor - any damage below X is negated) would make closing distances safer, and melee weapons more viable (as they do more damage than most ranged weapons). No more pistols killing a guy in power armor.

- increased HP of body parts and organs would make ALL combat better. Having a pistol shoot off an arm or a squirrel bite off a nose is just insane. Reduced chance of your colonist loosing limbs is melee makes melee more viable.

2. Guns are too easy to get and maintain.
- ammo. The need to conserve and produce ammo gives a cost to weapons. There should be a simple way to repair guns (a bit of steel and 1-2 components to repair a gun) to compensate.

[A Friend]

Without screwing over other mechanics, the best way of making melee more attractive is increasing the dodge chance.

Proficiency in melee = higher chance to dodge.
I know it's already like that ingame. But I believe it needs to be higher. Skill 20 for example should have like 98% chance to dodge attacks. While 10+ should at least be 50%
Dodging an attack should also prevent pawns from being slowed down. Making it possible for them to disengage from melee.

Higher dodge chance, lower risk of injury thus making it more viable.

[TrashMan]

That would make it too OP.
You could send one melee master and he could tie up 20 enemies by himself. Dodge chance should be affected by number of enemies attacking.

[A Friend]

You can dodge melee attacks, not bullets. Besides getting melee skill 20 is very hard thing to achieve anyways.

That would make it too OP.
You could send one melee master and he could tie up 20 enemies by himself. Dodge chance should be affected by number of enemies attacking.

But that's a decent idea too.

[TrashMan]

Also, as I said - shields. Physical shields. That would go a long way to help in melee. Chance to block depending on melee skill, that takes HP from shield. So you have to repair it occasionally.

Of course, two-handed weapons would need a buff - something like a first strike ability or ability to hit from 1 tile distance, chance to break trough block, etc..

[RemingtonRyder]

Give everything a Wolverine healing factor, then only decapitation will actually kill things.

[Razzoriel]

I'll say this again:

The change to fists broke melee. 5 damage was too much; 7 is bonkers. If pawns did 3 damage in melee, it would make sense to engage, and your own pawns engaging pirates with sniper rifles mean they face less of a resistance. It's not a solution, but goes a long way into making melee more viable.

[TrashMan]

An unarmed man that knows how to fight can be very dangerous.
Given that melee weapons do 10-20 damage, I don't see fists as overpowered.

Give weapons a reach value - weapons with greater reach have an advantage over weapons with shorter reach. The greater the reach difference, the greater the effect.
What exactly would that advantage be - could be reduced chance to doge  or hit for the enemy, slowing enemy attacks (because closing in to strike is more difficult), or a chance to interrupt/stop an enemy attack, etc..

If I have a spear and you have a knife, you're going to have a damn hard time getting close.

[Lowkey1987]

Jeahhh make a new topic because arguments getting old!
2 weeks old
https://ludeon.com/forums/index.php?topic=34118.0

[SpaceDorf]

Give everything a Wolverine healing factor, then only decapitation will actually kill things.

or the luciferium is used up ..


I would also argument for making Pawns two handed in general.
Giving them two hands to equip Items, Weapons, Tools or Shields,
Two Handed Weapons like Longswords and Rifles become a thing.
Bolters and Chainsword .. Pistols and Knifes
The one handed blind pawn is suddenly no longer able to use a Sniper Rifle.

And Melee Pawns get a Block Chance and a second Weapon that does Blunt Damage ..

[O Negative]

It would be interesting to see melee skill play as a factor in melee damage or cooldown time.

One could argue:

• Skilled fighters hit harder
• Skilled fighters have more stamina

So, for example:

• A healthy lvl 3 fighter does 2 dmg/hit, while a healthy lvl 10 fighter does 4 dmg/hit
• A healthy lvl 3 fighter attacks 7 times/minute, while a healthy lvl 10 fighter attacks 10 times/minute

I would personally opt for either one or the other, and not both, because balancing both with accordance to melee skill would be more trouble than it's worth and potentially confusing.

RimWorld melee combat boils down to who can essentially get the upper hand by getting the first few hits in. This is what often leads to frustrating situations of highly skilled fighters losing to your average lvl 3 fighter. RNG more than likely resulted in the lower skilled pawn getting a hit on your pawn's arm/hand/etc and it reduced his/her manipulation enough to tilt the advantage.

The ability for higher skilled pawns to dodge attacks was a great addition. But, certainly more can be done.

[cultist]

When you're outnumbered  (and you almost always are), a melee engagement is a bad tactical decision. Guerilla tactics or hunker down is pretty much the only choice you have for most of the game. You HAVE to thin the enemy numbers (especially with tribals) before even thinking about a head-on or even flanking melee assault.
That means that in most cases, melee can only be used for distractions, ambushes or clean-up duty.
It's not so much a problem with the melee system (though it has lots of issues) as a problem with the game always stacking the odds against you.

Mind you, I don't want this to change, but it does mean that melee never really becomes viable as a core part of your defense unless it's overpowered compared to ranged combat.

[TrashMan]

I still say reach should be in, simply because it is VERY important in real melee combat. Calculations can be very simple.

Fists - 0
Knives - 1
Shortswords/Maces/Hammers - 2
Swords - 3
Longswords - 4
Two-handed swords/spears - 5
Long Polearms (pikes/halberds) - 6

So you simply take the reach difference and apply a penalty to hit (let's say 10% per point of difference) to the one with the shorter weapon.

So two-handed sword vs. shortsword = 5-2=3, which means 30% penalty to the shortsword guy.
OR you can make a roll based on skill and speed to determine if the guy with the shorter weapons gets close enough to strike

[dkmoo]

When you're outnumbered  (and you almost always are), a melee engagement is a bad tactical decision. Guerilla tactics or hunker down is pretty much the only choice you have for most of the game. You HAVE to thin the enemy numbers (especially with tribals) before even thinking about a head-on or even flanking melee assault.
That means that in most cases, melee can only be used for distractions, ambushes or clean-up duty.
It's not so much a problem with the melee system (though it has lots of issues) as a problem with the game always stacking the odds against you.

Mind you, I don't want this to change, but it does mean that melee never really becomes viable as a core part of your defense unless it's overpowered compared to ranged combat.

This ^

melee is not broken, what's broken is people's insistence on playing melee like this game is Diablo or God of war. This game is a simulation and one "hero" is not supposed to be able to take on mobs upon mobs and come out on top. This just doesn't happen in real life. Even the mighty Spartans didn't Really take on 100,000 persians with 300, and they all died.

In this game you will always be out numbered and the only way to defend against that is with guns, better tactical approach, and superior defensive structure/set up, not 1 v 20 in melee. 

[SpaceDorf]

melee is not broken, what's broken is people's insistence on playing melee like this game is Diablo or God of war. This game is a simulation and one "hero" is not supposed to be able to take on mobs upon mobs and come out on top. This just doesn't happen in real life. Even the mighty Spartans didn't Really take on 100,000 persians with 300, and they all died.

In this game you will always be out numbered and the only way to defend against that is with guns, better tactical approach, and superior defensive structure/set up, not 1 v 20 in melee.

This is absolutely true.
A melee engagement on open field against any number of ranged forces is an absolutely stupid idea. If you outnumber them 10:1 .. you could win ..
But if I fight a retreating battle through my base, or infiltrate an enemy base, a decent Melee Fighter ambushing a gunwielder
should make short work of him.
And even a Melee Fighter holding a door should make a bigger difference, if the door is surrounded by enemies.
Sure .. if 20 gunmen shoot the door from max range .. no more melee,
But if 3 enemies stand next to the door .. melee guy has a lot of cover and the other 17 should stop shooting ..

Because those are exactly the tactics I need when being outnumbered.
Even one of the biggest killboxes in history, our precious Atlantikwall did not hold, when Allied Troops threw massive numbers at it.