Here is an alternative to the seated position, the seiza, extensively used in japanese martial arts and culture in general. There are plenty of methods and techniques made from the seiza position where they disengage, dodge or even attack. Seiza is basically sitting on the knees btw.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GlWq2Vpj_fI (some explenation of seiza and meditation from it)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcddN7OjJBk (an Iaido technique from seiza, slowed down of course)
//Voices of Terminus' Youmu Svartie
Ashvaild said:When i hear meditation i think sitting. in combat this shouldnt happen, however in combat you will be tired from casting. so taking a knee to rest makes sense. in combat regen should NOT be as fast as out of combat meditation. i can see sitting in between pulls/fights, but kneeling during fights.
What if you are in an xp group with constant or near constant pulls, a chanter stacking up 2 or 3 mobs in a row as next in line to kill? You would effectively never be out of combat.
MINX said:Ashvaild said:When i hear meditation i think sitting. in combat this shouldnt happen, however in combat you will be tired from casting. so taking a knee to rest makes sense. in combat regen should NOT be as fast as out of combat meditation. i can see sitting in between pulls/fights, but kneeling during fights.
What if you are in an xp group with constant or near constant pulls, a chanter stacking up 2 or 3 mobs in a row as next in line to kill? You would effectively never be out of combat.
Youmu said:
Put the pauses of combat BETWEEN fight instead of WHILE fighting. And if they are chain pulling and not letting their healers regen up that mana between the fight they are basically dooming themselves.
//Voices of Terminus' Youmu Svartie
I get it, it's just that, as a chanter main, I can think of nothing worse than not being able to regen mana during a fight.....having to pause between every pull for med time would be terrible. People watching the video who aren't familiar with eq mechanics are already complaining about the pace of combat.
Edit: The forums just did some odd formatting there!
My suggestion would be like I said previously
Personally I would like to see in combat meditation not be a thing at all, instead have much bigger mana bars that woul deplete slower, but not having a way to regen in combat would still force healers and caster to cast responsibly and intelligently to conserve mana, making the mana bar a bit of a ticking time bomb to some degree. Ofc there would still be mana conserving spells, but instead of something just increasing mana regeneration I would like to see shorter duration spells that help with conservation that can be used tactically.
Maybe one mana bar can last 2 or 3 fights, it would give healers and casters more uptime on actually casting in fights and the time it takes to recouperate while out of combat can easily be adjusted by increasing or decreasing out of combat regeneration. So instead of casting-sitting-casting-sitting-casting you would be mostly casting and maybe some attacking through other means if there is no need to cast spells or you are trying to conserve your mana.
(Your post seems to have borked up a little)
//Voices of Terminus' Youmu Svartie
LOL yes my post was borked! Think I fixed it now.
I see what you are saying. What comes to mind immediately are longer fights such as a raid target.....we've all seen them take up to an hour, especially if a near wipe situation results in a drawn out recovery etc.
Any changes made to med will have far reaching implications to the game. Perhaps a simple animation change is the best route when all is said and done. Hit med and your character lowers it's head, maybe places both hands on its staff and plants it in front of himself if wielding a staff, etc.
whatever happens, Im going to miss my coercer myth clickie from EQ2 I can assure you of that hehe.
Fairchild said: I dont know if I am correct in this bit in EQ there was 4 different rates of mana regen, 1) sitting non-aggro 2) standing non-aggro 3) sitting aggro 4)standing aggro
Nope. You were either sitting or you weren't. Combat/aggro didn't matter. Just don't run out of drink!
I do not want the mechanic to change; just the animation/pose.
Do whatever you want just don't make mana/hp regenerate differently on/out of combat (I'm not talking about casting/doing action; I'm talking about being on/off combat) mana/hp regeneration should be the same. I really don't like how Mana/HP regenerates ridiculuosly fast in some games the moment you're out of combat. I don't even want to remember how much mana/hp I regenerate in-combat and out-of-combat. Just make my Mana/HP regeneration the same for every situation, it feels artificial how I magically heal better when suddently nothing is agroing me.
It pains me to say it, but WoW did regen right. They had Spirit, which was a stat that increased your regen after a significant break from spellcasting/combat and then mana per five second ticks (mp/5) which impacted your regen regardless of your combat status. Casters were given the chance to melee or use their wands to contribute to fights when trying to recoup mana in combat, which made it feel more appropriate (since most people wouldn't be sitting ass to grass in a real combat scenario).
I would suggest an innate mana regen solution similar to WoW's system... It would allow casters to AA or at least move around to better participate in combat while still regenerating mana. This would reduce the need for custom animations while still giving the game a more appropriate solution to the sitting dilemma.
~Talv
I'm pretty keen to see us do something other than sitting as well. I've already struck up the conversation internally - let's see what we can come up with. Thanks for all of the suggestions so far!
Chris "Joppa" Perkins | Creative Director
Joppa said:I'm pretty keen to see us do something other than sitting as well. I've already struck up the conversation internally - let's see what we can come up with. Thanks for all of the suggestions so far!
Chris "Joppa" Perkins | Creative Director
Good to hear, Joppa. I'm very interested to see where this leads. There are already a ton of good ideas on this post, so hopefully we're off to a good start.
I think meddding should only be possible AFTER and BEFORE a fight. Force clerics to beat on stuff with their mace, sitting around during a fight is lame and completely unrealistic. A way to solve the problem of sitting during fights is to not allow mana regen during combat, and offer in combat mana regen through actions such as melee combat (for example)
I think having mana regen be the same standing or sitting is fine.
Giving Enchanters a line of mana regen buffs starting at 1 (for reference, Enchanter mana regen started at 14 in EQ with Breeze) would do wonders in promoting interdependability as early as possible. Mana regen should be slow to encourage resource management but it doesn't necessarily have to be as EQ was.
That said, many classes like Necros, Shamans, etc. got personal forms of mana regen (Lich, Cannibalize) that didn't come into play until later in the game. Starting out early with these kinds of spells could mitigate the need for meditate as well.
My personal philosophy is that active gameplay is better than passive gameplay, to an extent. Having cool mechanisms like sacrificing health for mana seem far and away more fun and interesting than just sitting.
I think there definitely should be abilities that refill your mana bar for some percentage or fixed value, but they should be on a sufficiently long timer so they cannot be used too often in the same fight. Or they could use consumables, or the casters health..
Perhaps we could also think of meditation as "regenerating after great mental excercise". Think of Gandalf in Moria, where they notice the Balrog approaching and Gandalf says "And I'm already exhausted". Using up your mana could have other effects, like weaking you...so you actually have to sit down. I think that's something that could actually be done more...I always found it a bit strange that in MMOs you can basically run forever, take so many hits that you're barely alive, yet still fight like a champ. Maybe exhaustion (both mental and physical), and getting wounded should have much more effect on your combat effectiveness.
Liav said:I think having mana regen be the same standing or sitting is fine.
Giving Enchanters a line of mana regen buffs starting at 1 (for reference, Enchanter mana regen started at 14 in EQ with Breeze) would do wonders in promoting interdependability as early as possible. Mana regen should be slow to encourage resource management but it doesn't necessarily have to be as EQ was.
That said, many classes like Necros, Shamans, etc. got personal forms of mana regen (Lich, Cannibalize) that didn't come into play until later in the game. Starting out early with these kinds of spells could mitigate the need for meditate as well.
My personal philosophy is that active gameplay is better than passive gameplay, to an extent. Having cool mechanisms like sacrificing health for mana seem far and away more fun and interesting than just sitting.
totally agree
The idea of not having regen during combat does not sit well with me. In good groups where you're chain pulling your group may never leave combat.
An idea that does not directly relate to regen, but it ties into mana management, would be something that some MTG cards I've seen employ. Once your mana pool runs dry, you could add an option to allow the caster use their health as a less efficient power source. So, when it hits the fan, and your healer is full health, but out of mana, they will still have the option to cast at a high cost to themselves. I'm not sure that this would fit all classes, unless there was some kind of lore put behind it.
I still like the idea of having a few levels of meditation options, but the higher the regen the greater the cost to the caster. It gives the caster decisions so they are not just sitting/kneeling while watching the fight. Although, if I'm being honest, I have never had a problem with that system.
Laura said:
Do whatever you want just don't make mana/hp regenerate differently on/out of combat (I'm not talking about casting/doing action; I'm talking about being on/off combat) mana/hp regeneration should be the same. I really don't like how Mana/HP regenerates ridiculuosly fast in some games the moment you're out of combat. I don't even want to remember how much mana/hp I regenerate in-combat and out-of-combat. Just make my Mana/HP regeneration the same for every situation, it feels artificial how I magically heal better when suddently nothing is agroing me.
Katalyzt said:The idea of not having regen during combat does not sit well with me. In good groups where you're chain pulling your group may never leave combat.
An idea that does not directly relate to regen, but it ties into mana management, would be something that some MTG cards I've seen employ. Once your mana pool runs dry, you could add an option to allow the caster use their health as a less efficient power source. So, when it hits the fan, and your healer is full health, but out of mana, they will still have the option to cast at a high cost to themselves. I'm not sure that this would fit all classes, unless there was some kind of lore put behind it.
I still like the idea of having a few levels of meditation options, but the higher the regen the greater the cost to the caster. If gives the caster decisions to make so they are not just sitting/kneeling and watching the fight while their mana regens. Although, if I'm being honest, I have never had a problem with that system.
Maybe not every class needs to be treated equally as far as mana regen. Enchanters could have self buffs etc to help them with mana regen, while clerics use combat. Wizards could have tomes or shards they fill up beforehand and they expend during a fight to get mana back, etc... things like that, just to keep people off their butts. Playing a wizard is sit/cast/sit/cast/sit/cast/sit/cast.
I agree sitting in combat is crazy and should be left in the past. I think someone mentioned this already, but I actually like the idea of a mana recovery ability that you use once you're lom. This could have the character taking a stance where his arms are out, palms up and he's gathering mana from his surroundings. You would see blue particle fx channeling into his being and slowly refilling his mana. While he is in this state, he could be generating aggro and also take more damage if attacked. He can break the state at any point, so obviously he wants to channel as much mana as he can before drawing aggro and getting hit, but there is a risk trying to get to full mana. I also think this ability should have a cooldown so that it cannot be spammed.
jimmay said:I agree sitting in combat is crazy and should be left in the past. I think someone mentioned this already, but I actually like the idea of a mana recovery ability that you use once you're lom. This could have the character taking a stance where his arms are out, palms up and he's gathering mana from his surroundings. You would see blue particle fx channeling into his being and slowly refilling his mana. While he is in this state, he could be generating aggro and also take more damage if attacked. He can break the state at any point, so obviously he wants to channel as much mana as he can before drawing aggro and getting hit, but there is a risk trying to get to full mana. I also think this ability should have a cooldown so that it cannot be spammed.
It could be that the higher your mana gets while in that state the more hate you generate and the more damage you take per hit. Ultimatly, you need something to make casters avoid using the higher mana regen state as their default, but also allow them to make a risk/reward decision on how long they should push it in an effort to get mana back.
jimmay said:I agree sitting in combat is crazy and should be left in the past. I think someone mentioned this already, but I actually like the idea of a mana recovery ability that you use once you're lom. This could have the character taking a stance where his arms are out, palms up and he's gathering mana from his surroundings. You would see blue particle fx channeling into his being and slowly refilling his mana. While he is in this state, he could be generating aggro and also take more damage if attacked. He can break the state at any point, so obviously he wants to channel as much mana as he can before drawing aggro and getting hit, but there is a risk trying to get to full mana. I also think this ability should have a cooldown so that it cannot be spammed.
In my previous post I tried to identify all the variables that could be used to add something new to the meditation mechanic, but you brought one up that I hadn't thought of! The time since the previous meditation attempt can definitely be used to add some complexity to meditation. If, when meditation ends, you cannot start again for a set amount of time, then that will definitely make you plan around when to meditate and how long to meditate for. This definitely something that should be considered if they're looking to mechanically adjust meditation, instead of just changing the animations. I wasn't quite clear on what type of changes they're considering based on Joppa's post, but I guess we'll see!
We talked about this in another thread not long ago, but I think a sort of mana mini game with mana regen abilities that have high risk versus reward mechanics could make combat considerably more interesting. For instance, a cleric has a mana channeling skill. The ability starts off slow, but increases mana faster the longer you use it. The challenge will come with extended use. The longer you use the ability, the more threat you draw, the more susceptible to damage you become and the longer it takes to deactivate the ability. Using it will require players to know their threat levels and sort of ride on the edge of a razor. If they try to push the ability too far, they draw aggro which causes a mob to attack them. If they're unable to stop the ability in time, any attack lands for critical damage as well as a loss of mana gained.