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[Soulliard]

Oh so there will be no delay leaving block?

Not normally (at least for now). But after blocking a hit, it will still cause some knockback and stunning (though it will not cause the target to stop guarding). I guess I should have explained that better.

I guess that makes the concept of having a + on block move, a move which, upon impact renders the opponent immobile for more frames than it takes to finish the move, impossible.

Under this proposed system, there will be moves like that. It will be partially determined by the target's health, though, with more attacks becoming safe as the target becomes more badly damaged.

I didn't have any moves specifically in mind, just some of the better moves could be weakened a bit.

Blocking will have a huge effect on game balance, and should tone down the power of some characters. But you're right; this change will require some significant rebalancing afterward.

[-Frikman-]

even tough there'll be some unblock-able moves we still need guard broke (after a fixed amount of damage of course). this should work similar to how SSB guard broke works, what i mean: a bunch of seconds stunned. we'll need sprites for this so other posibility is to loose the ability to guard and a considerable reduce on the movement speed after a guard broke 

[Soulliard]

Why would we need guards to break? There's already chip damage to prevent guard-spamming.

[Soulliard]

Here's some specifics. All subject to change after playtesting, of course.

% of chip damage taken by character
15 (actually has a shield)
Dwarf
Blue Knight

20 (weapon well-suited to guarding, actually known for blocking attacks in source)
Golden Knight
Turner
Barkley

25 (weapon poorly-suited to guarding, energy shield)
Naija
Nikujin
Iji
Xoda
Trilby
Spelunker
Reimu

30 (weapon can't be used for guarding, unarmed)
Liero
Lyle
Gish
Madotsuki


List of unblockable attacks currently in game:
Naija:
vS

GK:
All attacks in bonesaw mode (except S)

Liero:
S

Nikujin:
vS

Iji:
>S
^S

Lyle:
>S
vS

Turner:
>S
^S

Trilby:
>S

Xoda:
>S

Dwarf:
A
>A
S

All Attacks with Nanoblast

Death Worm
Death Worm Bombs

Red Cube
Goo Ball
Akuji
Rope Burner
Cabadath
Sexy Hiker


Other Notes:
Golden Knight's bonesaw charges at the full rate even if his attacks are blocked.
Trilby's >A steals an item even if it is blocked

[Sir Raptor]

Just out of curiosity, will we also have dodging, or is that biting off more than we can chew?

[-Frikman-]

hmmmmmm i can't imagine this game with dodging system, no matter how many times i try it :/

[Soulliard]

Just out of curiosity, will we also have dodging, or is that biting off more than we can chew?

Potentially. But for now, I want to take things one step at a time.

Also, dodging would require a significant number of additional sprites. And I want to avoid making the game too defensive.

[Contrary]

Why's that?

[Soulliard]

I want the outcome of a fight to be based as much on knowing how to attack as well as how to defend. Basically, I don't want the victor to be determined entirely by who knows how to avoid attacks the best.

I'm not saying that introducing dodging would necessarily cross that threshold. It's just something I want to balance.

[Contrary]

Wouldn't more defensive options make knowing how to attack more important? The less defensive options you have to deal with, the less you have to know about attacking, as more things work more of the time.

Whenever I play games against people in fighting games who only know how to attack and not how to defend, I find that all I need to do is defend their stuff adequately, and then I don't even need to think about attacking as everything works pretty well. The opposite has proved true as well, in my experience.

IMO right now in IB attacking is really easy, everyone can attack at pretty much maximum efficiency, it's defensive capability which separates players. I know I kind of give the impression that I'm some sort of elitist who is all like "GRABS ARE CHEAP PROJECTILES ARE CHEAP BLOCKING AND TURTLING IS SKILLFUL", and while I am an elitist I am not biased towards defense, and actually often favour offensive and risky options in games. Of course I am not even beginning to imply that I think my judgment is better than yours or that I think that you or anyone thinks I am biased, I am just trying to say that I don't think I am as biased as the stereotype which I have so far been adhering.

[Soulliard]

You have a point. I guess the real question, then, is whether or not the addition of dodging would add depth to the combat or not. It's something I'll be thinking about.

[-Frikman-]

As i sayed before i can't imagine this game with dodging system. just think of this: you're playing as Nikujin and you want to do your super ultra rapist spinning staff attack, wich is a really good attack (more than good i would say unbalanced, but that's just me), but when you start to do it your enemy dodges behind you and kill you, making this attack useless. the same would happen with any attack that gives you an advice or a warning (like GK spinning attack or even Iji's laser). why? because IB is a slow game compared to SSB, of course. you guys will maybe consider me an asshold for saying something like that (i feel somehow a bit heretic for that ) but that's what i believe, and i don't think i'm the only one who does ¬_¬. that being said i'm gonna take a shower and take a nap 

P.D.: i know that it's impossible that every slow attacks gets useless but just think that NOW, without the dodging system, i dodge all those attack just walking or jumping a bit, so you can imagine how the things will turn when the dodging system gets implemented 

[Soulliard]

I think that really is the potential problem. If all dodging does is make it even easier to move out of the way of attacks, it hasn't really added much depth to the game, but it did make it a whole lot more defensive.

[Contrary]

That is actually a really good point. Yeah what are jabs in this game, like 20 frames? And the animations are really readable, so yeah.

On the other hand, just because you dodge a move doesn't mean you are at an advantage. Depending on how long the dodge animation is, dodging like a A or something could actually put you at a disadvantage. For example Naija sits and waits for an attack so she can dodge and low kick Xoda in the back. Naija sees Xoda's body shifting, but dodges. But Xoda was just doing a jab! Xoda turns around and grabs Naija for epic combo. You could also make dodges have a sneaky but slow start animation

But it's all theory. I'm sure IB will already change quite a bit with blocking.

[gimymblert]

The real question is how to keep an interesting tension in the game while playing. Mind game and the kind. I mean what are the clear "push your risk" mechanics in iBrawl?

It would be easy to balance the game if we plot situations and generalize actions into a strategy chart. What are the safe strategy and what are the risky one? How strategy weight shift as the game progress (knock back vs energy vs position vs object)

BY experience we know, player adapt their strategy according to 4 general case.

Failure would be determined by how close the char are from death (hp close to 0)
Success would be measured by how close his enemies are from death (total Hp close to 0)

1st case: Low failure and low success scale
Obviously no real risk, offense is the dominant obvious strategy (increase success scale).

2nd case: High failure low success
High risk, healing is the obvious choice, it's about survival (decrease failure)

3rd case: Low failure high success
Risky offense, it's a clear domination, trade off can be made to kill enemy as quick as possible.

4th case: High Failure High success
TENSION! you either lose or win, it's all about the mind game.

Pay attention that moving from one cadrant to another can be interesting.
For exemple moving from 2nd to 3rd case is call a DRAMATIC COME BACK, it's usually achieve by adding a rubber band mechanics (super bar in fighting games, items in mario kart

)

How much the game support that in his actual mechanics?

It's better to think within a framework than with random addition.

[shig]

I think I'd prefer a separate key for guarding.

[Soulliard]

I agree, but it's easy enough to change, and I just wanted to get something working first.

So it's sounding like guarding is not usually a great idea in-game, and may be too situational. I'm comfortable with changing it, since this first implementation of guarding was really just to get a taste for it. Having shield HP instead of chip damage could work nicely.

One possibility that may be viable would be too remove chip damage entirely, and provide only a tiny amount of hitstun on a blocked hit. This could potentially allow for guard-spamming, but if each character has some way of dealing with guarding, it shouldn't be a problem. Giving each character a grab would be difficult, but their current moves may actually work just fine.

Iji, Lyle, Dwarf and Xoda all have grabs, which easilyt bypass guards. Trilby's Taser, Nikujin's Head Stab and Turner's recovery are a bit slower, but are still probably fast enough to act as a good counter for guarding.

The Golden Knight doesn't normally have any unblockable moves, but he still charges his Bonesaw even if his attack is blocked (and all of his Bonesaw moves are unblockable). I'm not sure whether this puts him at an advantage or disadvantage compared to other characters, but it's still an adequate counter for guarding.

I'm not so sure about Naija and Liero, though. Their only unblockable moves are slow item-summons. If an opponent is guarding, I guess you could retreat, summon the item, and then return to punish them, but I'm not sure if that would be a good enough counter or not.

Characters not yet implemented would also need to be designed with some way of countering guards in mind.

[-Frikman-]

mmm what about this: the shield has a life time of 5 seconds. to recover your block time you'll need to wait the time your shield has (of course, it won't fill inmedietely if you stop pressing the button and then you press it again, and if you start to smack the button ultra quickly you'll shield life goes down faster). this way we won't need chip damage and the shield won't be spamm-able.

[gimymblert]

Some quick suggestion, I tried to add some strategic element.:

Add facing as a strategic element, like hit from the back give 1,5 more damage.

Guarding should only protect in the direction you are facing (prevent damage and knock back). Maybe block stun when hit connect and also guarding take some time to wear off (you stay in that state for a very small amount of time).

Top of the character is not covered by guard (but forward-top is) leaving a small spot to be abuse (nikujin) and create a choice between moving or guarding. Also add a element of skills that add predictability (gameplay chokepoint) toward mind game.

Unblockable should be a designated move that is chargeable, maybe with 3 step (normal, guard shattering + hi knockback but no damage, hi damage little knockback but huge cool down).

THe use of character outline color as state feedback.


Just from the top of my mind and open to discussion. 

EDIT:
the idea is that when someone rush toward you you may have the reflex to guard to protect you from a direct attack. If attacks will have longer cool down like you had suggest, this mean that guarding is a great counter to retaliate. But if guarding trade off time, some one could use this to fake a rush only to jump over to hit into the blind spot. It create a small yomi situation: you need to second guess what your opponent will do. Charge unblockable add a new layer to this: if you guard and the opponent is preparing an unblockable you may have only a small window to escape, but if you did not you can retaliate. It makes every choices risky or safe depending on how well you read your opponent.

IB is highly positional, so i wanted to introduce gameplay that emphasize that.

Edit 2:
In case of overlapping attack, for exemple naija summon, if the attacks hit both "damage zone" and "guard zone", guard should have priority. IT makes more skill to pull out the attack and aiming without hitting the guard zone. Some attack may not be unblockable but gain advantage by their nature on guarding, GK "boomrang" come into mind (hit in blind spot).

EDIT 3:
What if the player get a small invincible (but cannot attack either) time while he double tap down and go through the ground. It would make for a situational dodge and may lead to some sort of gameplay chokepoint.

[Soulliard]

One possibility that may be viable would be too remove chip damage entirely, and provide only a tiny amount of hitstun on a blocked hit. This could potentially allow for guard-spamming, but if each character has some way of dealing with guarding, it shouldn't be a problem. Giving each character a grab would be difficult, but their current moves may actually work just fine.

Iji, Lyle, Dwarf and Xoda all have grabs, which easilyt bypass guards. Trilby's Taser, Nikujin's Head Stab and Turner's recovery are a bit slower, but are still probably fast enough to act as a good counter for guarding.

The Golden Knight doesn't normally have any unblockable moves, but he still charges his Bonesaw even if his attack is blocked (and all of his Bonesaw moves are unblockable). I'm not sure whether this puts him at an advantage or disadvantage compared to other characters, but it's still an adequate counter for guarding.

I'm not so sure about Naija and Liero, though. Their only unblockable moves are slow item-summons. If an opponent is guarding, I guess you could retreat, summon the item, and then return to punish them, but I'm not sure if that would be a good enough counter or not.

Characters not yet implemented would also need to be designed with some way of countering guards in mind.

Any thoughts on this? Would it be viable?

Add facing as a strategic element, like hit from the back give 1,5 more damage. Guarding should only protect in the direction you are facing (prevent damage and knock back).

I like the idea, since IB is very position-based. It's been added to the backlog.

Top of the character is not covered by guard (but forward-top is) leaving a small spot to be abuse (nikujin) and create a choice between moving or guarding.

Hm. An interesting idea, but I don't know if it's really viable. Besides determining whether an attack hit from the left or right, it's hard to determine the direction it came from.

Unblockable should be a designated move that is chargeable, maybe with 3 step (normal, guard shattering + hi knockback but no damage, hi damage little knockback but huge cool down).

So if you charge it a little, it does a lot of knockback, but if you charge it a lot, it does little knockback? That doesn't seem too intuitive... especially considering that many unblockable attacks are grabs.

The use of character outline color as state feedback.

This is a fantastic idea! It could be used to show when a character is blocking or using an unblockable attack, and I'm sure there are other uses, too. I'm surprised no one thought of it before.

What if the player get a small invincible (but cannot attack either) time while he double tap down and go through the ground. It would make for a situational dodge and may lead to some sort of gameplay chokepoint.

I don't really like the idea of making the ability to dodge dependent on standing on a platform.