combat and death

[IamLags]

The death mechanic just makes the game frustrating and results in more scum saving / replaying combats. I get some people love the whole extreme difficulty thing but it there is a reason almost all rpg's don't kill off characters unless the entire party goes down. The way colony ship does as its just not fun for most people. The combat overall is more frustrating than fun in its present form, but that is another topic. But the theme and RPG aspects are really cool.

[Vince]

Which difficulty mode are you playing on? Asking for feedback purposes.

Also, we added a death timer mechanic (gives you 3 turns to finish the fight and save the fallen comrades), It's currently on the public beta branch so you can switch now.

Here's the full changelog:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/648410/discussions/0/3464983493945544642/

[Stan]

Yeah the difficulty is trademark and what makes this game a masterpiece.

[IamLags]

Hey Vince, playing on the normal difficulty (not hero mode) - i'm one of those annoying people who can't stand on playing on 'easy' mode :)

I think the timer mechanic is a great step. Its kinda frustrating when the smart AI gangs up on one character and kills them off before you can get control of the battle.

Feedback on the combat btw is that cover seems kinda pointless given how far melee can move and attack.

Melee seems a bit powerful overall which is strange in a game with lots of guns types :)

But I'm rolling a non-combat focus'd PC so maybe a different build dominates. Stills seems kinda strange to have to avoid most fights even with a full party to avoid replaying the combat dozens of times until i can somehow eek out a win.

[Vince]

Originally posted by IamLags:

Feedback on the combat btw is that cover seems kinda pointless given how far melee can move and attack.

If it were otherwise, a melee fighter would be unplayable. As for the cover, it provides a temporary advantage (like many other things: energy shield, gadgets, etc).

But I'm rolling a non-combat focus'd PC so maybe a different build dominates. Stills seems kinda strange to have to avoid most fights even with a full party to avoid replaying the combat dozens of times until i can somehow eek out a win.

A full party shouldn't really avoid fights. Are you using gadgets, grenades, and stims?

[IamLags]

Yeah using gadgets, grenades and healing stims, things might be different once I get the beta patch as someone going down won't ruin the fight anymore.

Thanks for being so responsive!

[SlvrPldnAlex4]

So, I wanna open by saying that I absolutely love this game. Good atmosphere, good mechanics, and the option to talk/trick/McGyver my way through things is good. That being said, I still don't feel like combat is off-kilter. Gadgets, stims, grenades, etc are cool, but I feel like cover and armor don't do anything to help keep me from getting damaged, and having to dumpb everything pre-battle into a single round of buff, or waste a turn or two buffing, doesn't help when badguys get to their turn and seem to rain down 40/50 points of damage in one barrage of attacks.
Is there something I'm missing? My skills are good, I've got toys, but again it seems like my armor does absolutely nothing to stop damage, and no matter how I position/hide behind things, my enemy always hits.

[Wrath of Dagon]

Armor isn't usually enough, you need decent evasion as well. Distortion field is a great help here, smoke grenades if that's not enough. Also it's best to kill the enemies quickly enough that they don't get to do a lot of damage.