Combat speed and APs

[syborg]

Hello, all! Does increasing a character’s Combat Speed (Speed stat) increase the number of Action Points available? Or does it simply increase the distance you can travel per Action Point? Just occurred to me this morning…

[Poor huwhyte Carl]

Distance. It's pretty much only useful for melee/unarmed builds.

[Radiac]

Your movement rate in combat can be looked up in the Stats section and is, if I recall correctly, expressed as a number like "1.3" which means that you get, statistically, 1.3 squares of movement per AP spent when you move. The way the game calculates that, during combat, is that it asks you to select a square to move to, calculates how many AP it should cost you to get there based on that "1.3" number, then rounds off any fraction of a square you might have left over. As a result, you COULD move 13 squares for 10 AP, but moving only 1 square will cost you 1 AP, and moving 2 will cost you 2 AP, and moving 3 squares will still cost you 3 AP, because for 3 AP, you get to move, officially, 3.9 squares, not 4.0, and the extra 0.9 get's rounded DOWN by the movement algorithm as such.

If, instead, you had a Movement Rate of 1.5, you'd get to move up to 3 squares for 2 AP, but moving just 1 square still costs 1 full AP, and moving 2 squares will still cost you 2 AP as well.

Lastly, I would point out that there are other, in my opinion better, ways to increase Movement Rate than putting points into Speed. If you have a spare Attribute point to play with and it get's you from 1.9 to 2.0, then I'd do it, assuming there were no other options available, lie getting better leg armor, etc. Even if it just get's you from 1.4 to 1.5 I'd probably do it then too. I think having a whole number or half-number Movement Rate is most efficient given how the system technically works. But you can get Movement Rate enhancement as a bonus from, from light Leg Armors such as Commando and Spectrum, and you can put mods in your Leg Armor that enhance Movement Rater as well, e.g. the The Exoknee and Personnel Drive.

It's also not a terrible idea to take one Rank in First Aid and get the Emergency Response Perk. Also, Big Guns has that Move Up! Perk.

[Douchebag Extraordinaire]

Base AP is tied to coordination rather than speed, where combat speed bonus dictates more on how efficient traversal is in terms of AP.

[Heau]

As others have said, AP is tied to coordination. Speed however also affects evasion% which helps smooth out damage intake, particularly from automated weapon with high firing rate.

The travel distance is in tile length, but since almost no movement in the game is ever in a straight line (line in the sense of the square grid), distance for angled movement (say 5 in one direction and 2 in the other), would be computed based on pythagore theorem if there are no objects further forcing skewed movement between origin and destination. So don't overly concern yourself with abstract "speed breakpoints". The only speed breakpoint I usually care for is however much I need to reliably get a free shot from the automated weapon perk with my excess AP (AP in excess of a multiple of 4). Which will vary as you change gear or gain coordination.

Oh I guess if you are like Radiac and never play melee, you might be tempted to look for speed>SQRT(2). It's what would be necessary to move (1,1) with 1 AP, i.e. pivoting around a cover block if you risk a flank or something. It tends to matters for high AP cost units with which you usually delay coordination (like snipers and HMG).

[syborg]

Thanks for the great responses - I appreciate it. Looked into the numbers a bit more while playing, tonight. And yes, @Heau, for this particular character it is brawling, as an experiment. High APs (11 at 3rd level). You can get around the grid readily and start punching!

[Radiac]

I didn't know the game actually used diagonals and true distance calculations when it computed movement, are you sure it actually does that, or are you just assuming? Just curious. My Snipers generally don't move a whole lot anyway.

[Heau]

@radiac I can't assure you about the exact implementation math-wise. That would be a tad bit too much math&stat theorycrafting for how difficult this game is.

But I play melee enough that I can tell you different angle diagonals to get next to an enemy can cost different AP even though all options are not one logical full square further than the other so-to-speak.

And from an implementation standpoint, pythagore is trivial to implement in a square-grid based game.

[Radiac]

So theoretically, if you have a movement rate of 1.0 (which is not actually possible in W3, but please hear me out), you should be able to move like a chess rook for 1 AP per square, but moving exactly 1 square diagonally would cost you 2 AP. On the other hand, if you have a Movement Rate of 1.5, you should be able to move one square in any direction for 1 AP, like a chess king.

Is that how it actually works, as far as anyone can tell? I uninstalled the game to make room for Pathfinder Kingmaker, so I can't check.

[Heau]

likely possible to force 1.0 or less speed with Bop Bag's -0.4 quirk and failed requirements legs iirc that also penalize mobility / rocket launchers' -0.5

I'll try to remember to check it a bit more thoroughly next time I fire the game up but it may be sometime. I can't make my mind on what odd comp setup to go with next run.

[syborg]

The PC that brought this up is a brawler with some extra APs. I had thought I noticed “the same number of hexes” is not always the same number of APs. Maybe I’m actually not crazy. Will check tonight.

[Radiac]

Wait, does this game use hexes, because that's a whole different ballgame. I played through the game like 4 times on different difficulty levels and can't remember or never noticed.

[Heau]

no, it's a square grid. Hexes are a lot more tedious to workout for TBS shooter mechanics like cover.